I've found that PhD level academics are usually wrong about practical matters. It's almost as if having a PhD is itself proof that they are not good at identify

I've found that PhD level academics are usually wrong about practical matters. It's almost as if having a PhD is itself proof that they are not good at identifying optimal solutions to reach practical goals. Also, it may show that they are overly concerned with superficial status markers instead of results. I think it's also the secret to why they can go so deep on certain abstract topics. Their minds are lacking a garbage collector and they can go in literally any direction and accumulate any amount of knowledge and they'll be able to memorize it all easily even if it has 0 utility value.