7 ms·

Holy Shit! Imagine being the CEO of a RadioShack, then saying "I want to become a Doctor" and actually doing it. That's amazing! Love this story.

danans 7y ago
> That's amazing! Agreed. Now imagine being a similarly aged retail service worker, or agricultural laborer, and doing the same. Even more amazing, if rare. The point is: both the drive and capital are needed. This person clearly had both at their disposal.
- stronglikedan 7y ago
  Sufficient drive begets the requisite capital, but that's even more rare, and arguably more amazing.
  - d3ad1ysp0rk 7y ago
    "Sufficient" meaning "Extraordinary"? The data doesn't really show that being hard working correlates with creation of wealth. In addition, it seems wealth plays a larger role in medical school acceptance than one might expect/hope for. "The AAMC explains that the percentage of medical students from families in the highest quintile of household income has not dropped below 48 percent since 1987—half of students come from the richest 20 percent of the population—while the percentage of students from the lowest quintile has never risen above 5.5 percent [9]" https://journalofethics.ama-assn.org/sites/journalofethics.ama-assn.org/files/2018-05/oped1-1502.pdf https://journalofethics.ama-assn.org/sites/journalofethics.a...
    - owl57 7y ago
      Correlation or causation?
      - quickthrowman 7y ago
        It’s classism, and it’s reality. Correlation and causation are irrelevant.
        cung 7y ago
        Doctors kids become doctors and doctors are well paid. This is anecdotal, but my elementary school class was full of doctors kids and I can tell you that the doctor parents would almost disown their kid if they didn't get into medical school. Doctors seem to have a very strong opinion on the medical field being the only right option. So in that sense it's more of a correlation with money, and a causation through inheritance.
        digikazi 7y ago
        That is true, up to a certain extent. I'd say that at university, about half of the medical students I met had one or sometimes two parents who were doctors. The rest seemed to come from comfortable middle-class backgrounds. In my case.... my dad is a doctor and it was sort of expected I become one myself. Its not my thing though, or it wasn't at the time so now (like a lot of people on this forum) I work in engineering. In a way I do regret it now, because I wish I did something "useful" to society. My younger sister however, did go to med school and is about to finish. She was very driven from a young age - I don't remember her saying she wants to become anything else but a doc. When her and my dad talk, I feel a little left out and only occasionally I have the feeling they look at me and shake their heads.
        owl57 7y ago
        Exactly. In my country it works the same way, and doctors aren't well paid here. Some of them then go to places where doctors are paid better. Thus, they don't inherit money indirectly through going to schools for well-paid professionals, they inherit profession.
  - xenocyon 7y ago
    That's a bit of a tautology, isn't it? Of course sufficient drive begets the requisite capital, since any amount of drive which fails to beget the requisite capital is, by definition, insufficient :)
    - wutbrodo 7y ago
      Just to go down the pedantry-hole with you (it's fun every once in a while!): I think a reasonable interpretation of the claim is that there's no initial condition such that some amount of drive won't get you to the level of capital under discussion. This isn't tautological, as the negation would be "there are certain situations where drive alone isn't sufficient to get you to that level of capital". That's a claim a lot of people make (I think I'd probably agree with it), and the parent comment is disagreeing.
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
- K0SM0S 7y ago
  I reckon that in France, you can become a doctor without capital— although studies are long and absolutely not designed to help the student work a job part time, so there's an underlying social factor at play; gov help doesn't target 18-25s for some reason (most benefits start at 25). It's not perfect, but it's certainly better than having to spend mid-five figures. That the student learns law, medicine, math, physics, biology or any other university discipline doesn't cost more or less to the family. The benefit for the country however is massive. The "cost" of training a doctor is repaid infinitely by the benefits of medicine itself (and great tax contributions!) during their whole career (30+ years). I wish it were like that everywhere...
  - Judgmentality 7y ago
    > It's not perfect, but it's certainly better than having to spend mid-five figures. It costs a lot more than that to become a doctor in the US. Typical student loan debt for doctors is well into 6 digits. https://www.bestmedicaldegrees.com/is-medical-school-worth-it-financially/ https://www.bestmedicaldegrees.com/is-medical-school-worth-i...
    - filoleg 7y ago
      Correct, but I don't know a single doctor in the US who actually paid it upfront instead of taking out all those loans and then easily paying them back with their newfound doctor salary later.
      - sndean 7y ago
        Yeah, the only people that I know who don't have >400000 in loans with a >5% interest rate coming out of residency have wealthy parents who paid for everything, did the military's HPSP program [1], or did a free 7-year MD/PhD program. It's an interesting process. [1] https://www.medicineandthemilitary.com/joining-and-eligibility/medical-school-scholarships https://www.medicineandthemilitary.com/joining-and-eligibili...
        7y ago
seccess 7y ago
A bit tangential, but this reminded me of Dexter Holland [0] the lead singer and songwriter of the band The Offspring. He went on to get a PhD in molecular biology (not an honorary one) and publish various papers about HIV. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dexter_Holland https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dexter_Holland
- PetitPrince 7y ago
  Note that he was already a PhD candidate went he met success with the Offspring. The same could be said of Brian May with astrophysics and Queen.
- jmccaf 7y ago
  This info adds interest to song "The Kids Aren't Alright" , if he is doubly-accomplished but his childhood friends all burned out. Apparently Dexter did inspire/write the song: http://www.mtv.com/news/504023/offspring-rock-back-to-basics/ http://www.mtv.com/news/504023/offspring-rock-back-to-basics...
- jkestner 7y ago
  Greg Graffin of Bad Religion has a PhD in zoology, certainly after he began the band in high school. Something about SoCal punks. His dissertation is of course "Evolution and Religion: Questioning the Beliefs of the World's Eminent Evolutionists"
- jordanthoms 7y ago
  James Williamson (one of the guitarists of Iggy Pop & The Stooges) retrained as an Electrical Engineer, and ended up as Vice President of Technical Standards at Sony working on Blu-ray. If you've read anything about what they were like as a band that's quite a career path!
- arcticbull 7y ago
  Action movie star Dolph Lundgren is also super educated, with a degree in chemical engineering from the Royal Institute of Technology and a master's in chemical engineering from the University of Sydney [1]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dolph_Lundgren https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dolph_Lundgren
amachefe 7y ago
I think Ed Roberts who built the first PC Altair 8800 and gave Bill Gates his first job also did same
DrScump 7y ago
Guitarist Jeff "Skunk" Baxter (most famous for his work with Steely Dan and the Doobie Brothers) became interested in data compression algorithms and missile defense applications and came to chair the Civilian Advisory Board for Ballistic Missile Defense. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeff_Baxter#Defense_consulting_career https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeff_Baxter#Defense_consulting...
omega3 7y ago
I think the deciding factor is having the safety net of FU money.

danans 7y ago

> That's amazing! Agreed. Now imagine being a similarly aged retail service worker, or agricultural laborer, and doing the same. Even more amazing, if rare. The point is: both the drive and capital are needed. This person clearly had both at their disposal.

stronglikedan 7y ago
Sufficient drive begets the requisite capital, but that's even more rare, and arguably more amazing.
- d3ad1ysp0rk 7y ago
  "Sufficient" meaning "Extraordinary"? The data doesn't really show that being hard working correlates with creation of wealth. In addition, it seems wealth plays a larger role in medical school acceptance than one might expect/hope for. "The AAMC explains that the percentage of medical students from families in the highest quintile of household income has not dropped below 48 percent since 1987—half of students come from the richest 20 percent of the population—while the percentage of students from the lowest quintile has never risen above 5.5 percent [9]" https://journalofethics.ama-assn.org/sites/journalofethics.ama-assn.org/files/2018-05/oped1-1502.pdf https://journalofethics.ama-assn.org/sites/journalofethics.a...
  - owl57 7y ago
    Correlation or causation?
    - quickthrowman 7y ago
      It’s classism, and it’s reality. Correlation and causation are irrelevant.
      - cung 7y ago
        Doctors kids become doctors and doctors are well paid. This is anecdotal, but my elementary school class was full of doctors kids and I can tell you that the doctor parents would almost disown their kid if they didn't get into medical school. Doctors seem to have a very strong opinion on the medical field being the only right option. So in that sense it's more of a correlation with money, and a causation through inheritance.
        digikazi 7y ago
        That is true, up to a certain extent. I'd say that at university, about half of the medical students I met had one or sometimes two parents who were doctors. The rest seemed to come from comfortable middle-class backgrounds. In my case.... my dad is a doctor and it was sort of expected I become one myself. Its not my thing though, or it wasn't at the time so now (like a lot of people on this forum) I work in engineering. In a way I do regret it now, because I wish I did something "useful" to society. My younger sister however, did go to med school and is about to finish. She was very driven from a young age - I don't remember her saying she wants to become anything else but a doc. When her and my dad talk, I feel a little left out and only occasionally I have the feeling they look at me and shake their heads.
        owl57 7y ago
        Exactly. In my country it works the same way, and doctors aren't well paid here. Some of them then go to places where doctors are paid better. Thus, they don't inherit money indirectly through going to schools for well-paid professionals, they inherit profession.
- xenocyon 7y ago
  That's a bit of a tautology, isn't it? Of course sufficient drive begets the requisite capital, since any amount of drive which fails to beget the requisite capital is, by definition, insufficient :)
  - wutbrodo 7y ago
    Just to go down the pedantry-hole with you (it's fun every once in a while!): I think a reasonable interpretation of the claim is that there's no initial condition such that some amount of drive won't get you to the level of capital under discussion. This isn't tautological, as the negation would be "there are certain situations where drive alone isn't sufficient to get you to that level of capital". That's a claim a lot of people make (I think I'd probably agree with it), and the parent comment is disagreeing.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
K0SM0S 7y ago
I reckon that in France, you can become a doctor without capital— although studies are long and absolutely not designed to help the student work a job part time, so there's an underlying social factor at play; gov help doesn't target 18-25s for some reason (most benefits start at 25). It's not perfect, but it's certainly better than having to spend mid-five figures. That the student learns law, medicine, math, physics, biology or any other university discipline doesn't cost more or less to the family. The benefit for the country however is massive. The "cost" of training a doctor is repaid infinitely by the benefits of medicine itself (and great tax contributions!) during their whole career (30+ years). I wish it were like that everywhere...
- Judgmentality 7y ago
  > It's not perfect, but it's certainly better than having to spend mid-five figures. It costs a lot more than that to become a doctor in the US. Typical student loan debt for doctors is well into 6 digits. https://www.bestmedicaldegrees.com/is-medical-school-worth-it-financially/ https://www.bestmedicaldegrees.com/is-medical-school-worth-i...
  - filoleg 7y ago
    Correct, but I don't know a single doctor in the US who actually paid it upfront instead of taking out all those loans and then easily paying them back with their newfound doctor salary later.
    - sndean 7y ago
      Yeah, the only people that I know who don't have >400000 in loans with a >5% interest rate coming out of residency have wealthy parents who paid for everything, did the military's HPSP program [1], or did a free 7-year MD/PhD program. It's an interesting process. [1] https://www.medicineandthemilitary.com/joining-and-eligibility/medical-school-scholarships https://www.medicineandthemilitary.com/joining-and-eligibili...
      - 7y ago

seccess 7y ago

A bit tangential, but this reminded me of Dexter Holland [0] the lead singer and songwriter of the band The Offspring. He went on to get a PhD in molecular biology (not an honorary one) and publish various papers about HIV. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dexter_Holland https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dexter_Holland

PetitPrince 7y ago
Note that he was already a PhD candidate went he met success with the Offspring. The same could be said of Brian May with astrophysics and Queen.
jmccaf 7y ago
This info adds interest to song "The Kids Aren't Alright" , if he is doubly-accomplished but his childhood friends all burned out. Apparently Dexter did inspire/write the song: http://www.mtv.com/news/504023/offspring-rock-back-to-basics/ http://www.mtv.com/news/504023/offspring-rock-back-to-basics...
jkestner 7y ago
Greg Graffin of Bad Religion has a PhD in zoology, certainly after he began the band in high school. Something about SoCal punks. His dissertation is of course "Evolution and Religion: Questioning the Beliefs of the World's Eminent Evolutionists"
jordanthoms 7y ago
James Williamson (one of the guitarists of Iggy Pop & The Stooges) retrained as an Electrical Engineer, and ended up as Vice President of Technical Standards at Sony working on Blu-ray. If you've read anything about what they were like as a band that's quite a career path!
arcticbull 7y ago
Action movie star Dolph Lundgren is also super educated, with a degree in chemical engineering from the Royal Institute of Technology and a master's in chemical engineering from the University of Sydney [1]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dolph_Lundgren https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dolph_Lundgren

amachefe 7y ago

I think Ed Roberts who built the first PC Altair 8800 and gave Bill Gates his first job also did same

DrScump 7y ago

Guitarist Jeff "Skunk" Baxter (most famous for his work with Steely Dan and the Doobie Brothers) became interested in data compression algorithms and missile defense applications and came to chair the Civilian Advisory Board for Ballistic Missile Defense. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeff_Baxter#Defense_consulting_career https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeff_Baxter#Defense_consulting...

omega3 7y ago

I think the deciding factor is having the safety net of FU money.