3 ms·

I think the person is more wildly confused than anything else. I don't know of any PhD students having trouble getting jobs. Somehow this person has gotten the

I think the person is more wildly confused than anything else. I don't know of any PhD students having trouble getting jobs. Somehow this person has gotten the impression that what you do with a PhD is go out and get an entry level job prorgramming RoR or something. That is not the case.

cousin_it 18y ago
I agree that people can enter and follow the programming career path easily without a PhD. Completing a PhD equips you to follow your dream of science, of being a patent clerk by day and brilliant theorist by night, but it doesn't exactly help you make money. Like studying classical music for ten years and then complaining you can't get a job: dude, I hate to upset you, but a "job" wasn't the point at all.
- whacked_new 18y ago
  One thing I realized was that the PhD isn't what makes you the patent clerk by day and brilliant theorist by night. It is the brilliant theorist that makes you the PhD and the patent clerk by day. This is true, at least in Einstein's case. Or, s/patent clerk/surfer/g, s/Einstein/Garrett Lisi/g But the romanticism has gone out of proportion.
  - dinkumthinkum 18y ago
    Actually, I don't understand this either. The PhD is what makes you a patent clerk by day? Does anyone actually know Einstein's real history and not the vague stuff written on the backs cereal cartons? This sounds like the same stuff people say when they erroneously talk about Einstein as having not been good at mathematics. As for all this stuff about how PhDs don't make any money and how no one cares about their work boo hoo wah wah .. There are thousands of working PhDs that would disagree with you all and think you all out of your minds!
- dinkumthinkum 18y ago
  I don't really understand this. Einstein was a patent clerk before getting a PhD. Honestly, if you think PhDs don't make any money, frankly I don't think you know what you're talking about. Perhaps this is the case in the arts and humanities but in science, particularly computer science, this isn't the case at all. I always here people say this and usually they recommend people go get stuck in some 60,000 a year job, because supposedly that's more than any PhD will make ... lol. It's a naive view that CS PhDs don't or unlikely to make much money. Sure, most PhDs aren't millionairies several times over but neither are code monkeys. I'm just trying to be honest about it.
  - cousin_it 18y ago
    if you think PhDs don't make any money I don't. PhD correlates with smartness, and smartness correlates with wages. Please take care not to assume causation. But should you get a PhD just to make money without a love for research? Each year of industry experience at a young age will be more valuable to you than a year of study. Yes, you can get stuck. You can also get unstuck and learn ten different languages under ten different employers, as I did.
    - dinkumthinkum 18y ago
      I'm not assuming any such thing about "causation." This is an empirical issue for which you seem to have been very much misinformed.

cousin_it 18y ago

I agree that people can enter and follow the programming career path easily without a PhD. Completing a PhD equips you to follow your dream of science, of being a patent clerk by day and brilliant theorist by night, but it doesn't exactly help you make money. Like studying classical music for ten years and then complaining you can't get a job: dude, I hate to upset you, but a "job" wasn't the point at all.

whacked_new 18y ago
One thing I realized was that the PhD isn't what makes you the patent clerk by day and brilliant theorist by night. It is the brilliant theorist that makes you the PhD and the patent clerk by day. This is true, at least in Einstein's case. Or, s/patent clerk/surfer/g, s/Einstein/Garrett Lisi/g But the romanticism has gone out of proportion.
- dinkumthinkum 18y ago
  Actually, I don't understand this either. The PhD is what makes you a patent clerk by day? Does anyone actually know Einstein's real history and not the vague stuff written on the backs cereal cartons? This sounds like the same stuff people say when they erroneously talk about Einstein as having not been good at mathematics. As for all this stuff about how PhDs don't make any money and how no one cares about their work boo hoo wah wah .. There are thousands of working PhDs that would disagree with you all and think you all out of your minds!
dinkumthinkum 18y ago
I don't really understand this. Einstein was a patent clerk before getting a PhD. Honestly, if you think PhDs don't make any money, frankly I don't think you know what you're talking about. Perhaps this is the case in the arts and humanities but in science, particularly computer science, this isn't the case at all. I always here people say this and usually they recommend people go get stuck in some 60,000 a year job, because supposedly that's more than any PhD will make ... lol. It's a naive view that CS PhDs don't or unlikely to make much money. Sure, most PhDs aren't millionairies several times over but neither are code monkeys. I'm just trying to be honest about it.
- cousin_it 18y ago
  if you think PhDs don't make any money I don't. PhD correlates with smartness, and smartness correlates with wages. Please take care not to assume causation. But should you get a PhD just to make money without a love for research? Each year of industry experience at a young age will be more valuable to you than a year of study. Yes, you can get stuck. You can also get unstuck and learn ten different languages under ten different employers, as I did.
  - dinkumthinkum 18y ago
    I'm not assuming any such thing about "causation." This is an empirical issue for which you seem to have been very much misinformed.