I have an upcoming meeting with my advisor about a new project idea. I've been working on this idea for the last couple of weeks, but now I've heard from the other students in the lab that he thinks the idea is crap. I'm all out of ideas. The only thing I can think of is re-trying one of my old projects, but it was difficult and failed for technical reasons. So, I'm not for sure what to do currently. I don't want to look like an idiot when I talk to my advisor.

well, if he really does think it's rubbish and you think it's great (or mediocre!!!) then go to him with the solutions. why does he think it's rubbish? if it's technical, show him how you will solve the technical problem. show him the gap in the literature etc. only once you try and work out these issues will you know if it's actually rubbish...

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supervisors don't know everything! so if you believe in it, go for it.

my first two projects that were given to me, were rubbish, both technically and otherwise.

but when i came up with my own idea with help of a visiting professer, my supervisor didn't really care. until i started to get good data. and now it's all forgotten how it all came about, and i wrote a paper and it got published on it.

so they don't always know
and the other project that he thought was great, it's been 5-6 years and it's still not working to the level they want.. i stopped working on it, and now it's a poor RA's headache and not mine!