Comment by snowwrestler
7 hours ago
Much respect to this man as a fundraiser. He convinced people to pay him to play Viking and go sailing as his job. Could be grants or private fundraising or both.
It illustrates how one monetizes a PhD in a subject overtly noncommercial like archaeology. Plenty of people have sailed in these waters, maybe even played at being Vikings. But with a doctorate in the field, one is able to make the case that doing so will be Real Science because you have developed expertise in that knowledge domain, and research skills to fit whatever you find into the broader scientific context.
I’m not being dismissive, by the way, it’s a fantastic idea to explore for new archaeological finds. And it is absolutely true that academics need to have as much hustle as entrepreneurs to find funding.
I find your use of "play Viking" dismissive, despite your disclaimer.
The article mentions how some archeologists learn flintknapping, which helps them understand their finds better.
Do you think they are playing Stone Age people?
For what it's worth, https://www.ht.lu.se/en/the-faculties/staff-training/interna... says funding came from Erasmus+ traineeship, several other grants, "and my own earnings", and he started while a grad student. (That page is from 2023.)
So no, he did not "monetize" his PhD as he didn't have one while doing this fieldwork, and he paid for part of it himself.
Also, my high school grades got me a college scholarship. I don't interpret that as me monetizing my high school degree, but then, I don't view everything through a hustle lens.
His has "a general interest in ancient seafaring and experimental archaeology" with a focus on "reconstructing the sailing routes used by sailors from the Viking Age in Western Scandinavia". He "spent 11 months learning about traditional sailing and boatbuilding techniques at Fosen Folkehøgskole", "conducted a series of sailing trials and trial voyages onboard traditional clinker-built, square-rigged boats", and "spent about 500 hours sailing or rowing, often for several days at a time, enduring every kind of weather imaginable, in an attempt to test the performance of these boats under the widest possible range of conditions."
How do you get from that hard work to "playing Viking", without being dismissive?
Historical reenactor here.
"Playing" is only dismissive if you view the incredible, fast learning children achieve (compared to adults) as "mere child's play".
By "playing" at reenactment, we test out theories on how things worked, how people did things, and why they did them.
My favorite example is a Dutch hat. Every instance two friends found in artwork had a spoon slipped into two cuts in the raised brim. They thought that looked stupid, and made one without the spoon (they merely pinned the brim up). The hat wouldn't stay in place, so they decided it needed a weight to stabilize the raised side of the brim... like a spoon.
Where do you see me dismissing play?
What does "play Viking" mean to you, in the context of what this researcher is doing?
Don't overlook that snowwrestler coupled playing Viking to monetizing one's PhD.
Do you do historical reenactment in order to monetize your play?
If I learn to operate a 1907 Avery steam tractor, would you say I am playing farmer?
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Back when I was "playing" (in the dismissive sense) at being physicist and physics teacher, what I found was that the secret to actually understanding something was being free to fiddle with the parameters of the thing to try to dive a preferred outcome. That's more or less the mission statement of Bell Labs in its heyday.
I don't understand how you can exist in this space (that is, Hackernews and the larger startup culture) while being dismissive of folks out there exploring their particular parameter spaces, outside of practical constraints.
I think it is generally fine to consider the things we do playing with stuff—I consider myself very lucky to enjoy playing with computers as they’ll let you have careers in that.
But, for example, if I say that this site is a bunch of people playing at being engineers, in most contexts (maybe other than this thread) I’d expect to get some pretty annoyed responses.
Firstly, because there’s a difference between saying we’re playing with a problem, and saying we’re playing at being something.
Secondly, because it is great to be self-effacing, but less so to be others-effacing.
Researcher here: yes it's playing. And playing isn't a bad thing. If we hadn't fun, a lot of us would have quit already.
Sure. In my 20s I remember telling my boss that I had so much fun programming that I would do it even if I wasn't paid. (That was probably a mistake, but at least it was a state job with salary guidelines.)
But having fun and playing as part of work is doesn't mean I was "playing programmer." Even had I been an unpaid trust-fund baby.
What does "play Viking" mean to you, and how do we know that's what this researcher is doing?
Would you also say that he "plays sailor", given that he's an actual sailor?
Should we say the people building the 13th- century style castle at Guédelon are playing serfdom?
Those trying to rediscover ancient building techniques are playing Egyptians, Romans, Eastern Islanders, Incans, etc.?
Was Thor Heyerdahl was "playing a 'Tiki person'" in his famous raft voyage, when that culture doesn't exist, or was he trying to demonstrate that the raft hypothesis for human migration could not simply be rejected as impossible?
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Well he is playing Viking. Sailing in that way was not only their living but it was also life or death for them.
They struck out into the ocean without a map of the world, let alone GPS and satellite phones. They didn't even have life jackets.
Without downplaying this researcher's earnest efforts, nothing we do today could come close to truly recreating what it was like back then for people to live and breathe the sea like your life depends on it and to reacquire whatever deep nuanced tacit wisdom they accumulated about how their ships handled in the waves.
Whenever I've watched interviews or studied people at the top of a craft, any craft, you'll be surprised at the amount of detail they are sensitive to. A recent thing that comes to mind is how much Chopin studied and analysed the anatomy of the hand to deepen his understanding of piano technique
I read "playing viking" affectionately. How many people manage to turn a childhood dream into a sustainable career?
The article doesn't mention when he started this goal. How do you know it was in childhood and not, for example, as an undergraduate student?
Is it a sustainable career? He only recently got his PhD.
As a kid I dreamed about being a programmer (among many other things), and I am one.
If I bought an old PDP 11/70 to get hands-on experience on using early Unix systems work, would that mean I'm playing a Bell Labs researcher?
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"Play" has a specific meeting for reenactors. When I was in the SCA, I "played" an 11th century Welsh longbowman. It's certainly not a derogatory term when used in this context, and the amount of effort put into it isn't relevant. I just wore the clothes and learned to hit a target with the bow more than half the time, but I played alongside people who spent a lot of time and money learning the languages and skills of the roles they played.
I think its just implying he had fun doing it. I mean I sincerely hope he did, would you really rather believe this was a super serious endeavor, no fun allowed research?