9 ms·

It has hard problems and doesn't need PhD's. You don't need a PhD to solve hard problems, even hard theoretical ones.

by wissler 13y ago

seanmcdirmid 13y ago
PhDs are adept at solving hard problems, which is why google hires so many of them. You can develop these research skills without getting a PhD, but experience at many companies only really trains up code monkeys.
elteto 13y ago
This, if true at all, is a very unique characteristic of the software industry. In pretty much any other place, you need advanced degrees if you are doing new and genuine research
- yetanotherphd 13y ago
  It's more the fuzziness of terms like "hard problem" that is causing confusion. The way I would put it, the things that CS PhD's typically end up working on in industry, are usually things that would require a CS PhD. E.g. almost all the cool computer vision stuff you see on HN is developed by people with PhD's or PhD students.
graycat 13y ago
Anyone who can solve hard theoretical problems can pick up a Ph.D. quickly. Why? Because the main requirement for a Ph.D. is just the research. Commonly there is no coursework requirement. For the research, the main requirement is that it be publishable, and there the main criteria are "new, correct, and significant". It's a grim, nearly bloody, literally life threatening fact of life, that doing such research is really tough and the main challenge of a Ph.D. The Ph.D. training is supposed to help people do such research, and it does. Still the research is tough. Without the Ph.D. training, such research is much more difficult. Net, the idea that a Ph.D. is not needed for good research can be true only for really rare exceptions. Again, getting a Ph.D. is tough, yes, life threatening, and the main challenge is just the research. Broadly there's another option: Now the richest area of the US is likely within 100 miles of the Washington Monument in DC. Why? Because the US Federal Government has a license to print money - literally! Simple. My career started there, and that area just loves technical Ph.D. holders. I failed to understand just how much that area loves such Ph.D. holders and should not have left. You can apply to US Civil Service and/or individual parts of the Federal Government or to the huge number of private companies that do work for the Federal Government. The Washington Post used to be a fast way to get job ads, send a few resume copies, go on seven interviews, and get five offers (I did that once). Some routine Google searching should get you a lot of names and addresses, and sending 100 resumes should get you some good offers.
- Iftheshoefits 13y ago
  Your first paragraph is a bit too simplistic. There are still political issues (institutional political issues) that impede otherwise good researchers (and some, many even, dropout--there's a reason that "ABD" exists as an abbreviation, and it isn't because PhDs needed a quick and handy shorthand to cast aspersions) from getting the degree itself. Doing the research necessary to write a dissertation really isn't that tough for somebody who is bright enough to tackle the problem. Its navigating the waters of academic politics and knowing the right people to be able to get into a research program that fits one's skills that is the toughest part. If this seems like it's familiar, it should be: academia has as much political and networking based "merit" as any place else. It just manifests differently there.
  - graycat 13y ago
    Sure, your point that a Ph.D. program can be a political mud hole is correct. For your > get into a research program that fits one's skills that is the toughest part. I didn't bother with that and, instead, picked my own problem, did my own research, and submitted my results. My professors had very little idea what I was doing until I was done and submitted my work. Net, my "research program" was mine. Maybe in some fields, e.g., cell biology, can't do what I did and your description is correct. But if pick a good school, then what I said is simple but correct. E.g., Johns Hopkins, where I got my Ph.D., then, and maybe still, has no official coursework requirement for a Ph.D. The official requirement for a dissertation was, and maybe still is, "an original contribution to knowledge worthy of publication". If there is any doubt, then the student can just submit the work for publication. In my case, I took a problem I noticed in a course, did a pass by the library to confirm that there was no solution in the literature, worked up a rough solution, asked for a 'reading course' to attack the problem, got the course approved, and right away showed my rough solution. Two weeks later I had a nice, clean, solid solution. I walked my original work around campus to some world famous guys, and they saw my work as new. So my work was clearly publishable. So, in two weeks I'd met the official requirement for a dissertation. My work was not trivial: I found a new result comparable with the classic Whitney extension theorem and applied my result to solve the problem I'd started with but noticed that my work also solved a problem stated but not solved in a famous paper by Arrow, Hurwicz, and Uzawa. Poor Uzawa may still have not gotten his Nobel prize! I didn't try to use that work as my dissertation, but the reading course credit filled out what I needed for a Master's. Also my research in that reading course put a halo on my head so that a Ph.D. was much more likely. Let me emphasize again, the key is in one word, research. For my dissertation, I took a problem I'd brought to graduate school, done the research on it independently in my first summer, got the work approved as my dissertation, wrote and ran some illustrative software, wrote up my work, stood for an oral exam, and got my Ph.D. For the work of the reading course, I published that later in a good journal. In most good research universities, a student who passes the qualifying exams and has some good, publishable work will have to do something really strange not to get a Ph.D. Some good research can make the political mud wrestling disappear quickly. The main reason for ABD is the challenge of doing some research that is publishable, "new, correct, and significant". If there is any doubt about the quality of the work, then just publish it. The definition of a good algorithm is from J. Edmonds. He was a graduate student at U. Maryland, told the faculty to stuff it, went to NBS, did some research on graph theory, published it, and got a visit from U. Maryland saying that if he would take copies of his papers, put them in a stack, put a staple in a corner, and submit that as his dissertation, then he'd get his Ph.D. Again, the point is the research. The mud wrestling is nonsense easily wiped away by some good research.
eriksank 13y ago
Every successful, real-life application required solving at least one really hard problem. This hard problem may only look like 1% of the application, but if it does not get solved, the application would have failed. That 1% requires you to build something of a similar level of difficulty as rolling your own relational database system. At least one guy has to be able to recognize the problem and to solve it. Otherwise, the other ones won't be able to build, support and maintain the remaining 99% and won't have a job at all.

It has hard problems and doesn't need PhD's. You don't need a PhD to solve hard problems, even hard theoretical ones.

by wissler 13y ago

It has hard problems and doesn't need PhD's. You don't need a PhD to solve hard problems, even hard theoretical ones.

PhDs are adept at solving hard problems, which is why google hires so many of them. You can develop these research skills without getting a PhD, but experience at many companies only really trains up code monkeys.

elteto 13y ago

This, if true at all, is a very unique characteristic of the software industry. In pretty much any other place, you need advanced degrees if you are doing new and genuine research

yetanotherphd 13y ago
It's more the fuzziness of terms like "hard problem" that is causing confusion. The way I would put it, the things that CS PhD's typically end up working on in industry, are usually things that would require a CS PhD. E.g. almost all the cool computer vision stuff you see on HN is developed by people with PhD's or PhD students.

graycat 13y ago

Anyone who can solve hard theoretical problems can pick up a Ph.D. quickly. Why? Because the main requirement for a Ph.D. is just the research. Commonly there is no coursework requirement. For the research, the main requirement is that it be publishable, and there the main criteria are "new, correct, and significant". It's a grim, nearly bloody, literally life threatening fact of life, that doing such research is really tough and the main challenge of a Ph.D. The Ph.D. training is supposed to help people do such research, and it does. Still the research is tough. Without the Ph.D. training, such research is much more difficult. Net, the idea that a Ph.D. is not needed for good research can be true only for really rare exceptions. Again, getting a Ph.D. is tough, yes, life threatening, and the main challenge is just the research. Broadly there's another option: Now the richest area of the US is likely within 100 miles of the Washington Monument in DC. Why? Because the US Federal Government has a license to print money - literally! Simple. My career started there, and that area just loves technical Ph.D. holders. I failed to understand just how much that area loves such Ph.D. holders and should not have left. You can apply to US Civil Service and/or individual parts of the Federal Government or to the huge number of private companies that do work for the Federal Government. The Washington Post used to be a fast way to get job ads, send a few resume copies, go on seven interviews, and get five offers (I did that once). Some routine Google searching should get you a lot of names and addresses, and sending 100 resumes should get you some good offers.

Iftheshoefits 13y ago
Your first paragraph is a bit too simplistic. There are still political issues (institutional political issues) that impede otherwise good researchers (and some, many even, dropout--there's a reason that "ABD" exists as an abbreviation, and it isn't because PhDs needed a quick and handy shorthand to cast aspersions) from getting the degree itself. Doing the research necessary to write a dissertation really isn't that tough for somebody who is bright enough to tackle the problem. Its navigating the waters of academic politics and knowing the right people to be able to get into a research program that fits one's skills that is the toughest part. If this seems like it's familiar, it should be: academia has as much political and networking based "merit" as any place else. It just manifests differently there.
- graycat 13y ago
  Sure, your point that a Ph.D. program can be a political mud hole is correct. For your > get into a research program that fits one's skills that is the toughest part. I didn't bother with that and, instead, picked my own problem, did my own research, and submitted my results. My professors had very little idea what I was doing until I was done and submitted my work. Net, my "research program" was mine. Maybe in some fields, e.g., cell biology, can't do what I did and your description is correct. But if pick a good school, then what I said is simple but correct. E.g., Johns Hopkins, where I got my Ph.D., then, and maybe still, has no official coursework requirement for a Ph.D. The official requirement for a dissertation was, and maybe still is, "an original contribution to knowledge worthy of publication". If there is any doubt, then the student can just submit the work for publication. In my case, I took a problem I noticed in a course, did a pass by the library to confirm that there was no solution in the literature, worked up a rough solution, asked for a 'reading course' to attack the problem, got the course approved, and right away showed my rough solution. Two weeks later I had a nice, clean, solid solution. I walked my original work around campus to some world famous guys, and they saw my work as new. So my work was clearly publishable. So, in two weeks I'd met the official requirement for a dissertation. My work was not trivial: I found a new result comparable with the classic Whitney extension theorem and applied my result to solve the problem I'd started with but noticed that my work also solved a problem stated but not solved in a famous paper by Arrow, Hurwicz, and Uzawa. Poor Uzawa may still have not gotten his Nobel prize! I didn't try to use that work as my dissertation, but the reading course credit filled out what I needed for a Master's. Also my research in that reading course put a halo on my head so that a Ph.D. was much more likely. Let me emphasize again, the key is in one word, research. For my dissertation, I took a problem I'd brought to graduate school, done the research on it independently in my first summer, got the work approved as my dissertation, wrote and ran some illustrative software, wrote up my work, stood for an oral exam, and got my Ph.D. For the work of the reading course, I published that later in a good journal. In most good research universities, a student who passes the qualifying exams and has some good, publishable work will have to do something really strange not to get a Ph.D. Some good research can make the political mud wrestling disappear quickly. The main reason for ABD is the challenge of doing some research that is publishable, "new, correct, and significant". If there is any doubt about the quality of the work, then just publish it. The definition of a good algorithm is from J. Edmonds. He was a graduate student at U. Maryland, told the faculty to stuff it, went to NBS, did some research on graph theory, published it, and got a visit from U. Maryland saying that if he would take copies of his papers, put them in a stack, put a staple in a corner, and submit that as his dissertation, then he'd get his Ph.D. Again, the point is the research. The mud wrestling is nonsense easily wiped away by some good research.

eriksank 13y ago

Every successful, real-life application required solving at least one really hard problem. This hard problem may only look like 1% of the application, but if it does not get solved, the application would have failed. That 1% requires you to build something of a similar level of difficulty as rolling your own relational database system. At least one guy has to be able to recognize the problem and to solve it. Otherwise, the other ones won't be able to build, support and maintain the remaining 99% and won't have a job at all.