PhD Chatter

 Back in the 1990s, I worked in a vault area with a number of Air Force contractors.  One had a small stack of business cards on the side of the desk.....which I picked up to review one day.

The card had the name, and then under it.....'PhD, Scientist, and Engineer'.  

I quizzed one of the other contractors that I worked with, and he quickly noted that this person was the last person on Earth that you wanted to ask a question to.  

Naturally, I asked why.

He noted that any question to the person....meant a 12-minute explanation, and the end wouldn't really resolve the question you asked. 

The next day, I asked the PhD gal a question.  Yeah, the response was roughly 10 to 12 minutes, and the answer really didn't fit the question posed.

I went back to the original guy who'd warned me, and asked....why did they have this PhD person hired?  Well....the contract said something to the effect that you needed to have one PhD person out of the dozen folks hired for this support function.  It's not that they really filled some critical requirement....just that you might need their expertise in a critical decision process.  

Part of me wonders if the whole PhD thing is over-sold, or just wasted lectures by colleges in selling more 'degrees'.  

Beam of 'Light' Upon Debates

 For a number of years, I've sat and been amused over what journalists called debates.  It mostly fell into the category.....a dozen soft-easy questions upon one guy, and a dozen hard curve questions upon the next guy.  

Then one day....along came podcast folks.  Originally, they couldn't get the big guys to appear much....so they went to the second-level, and asked blunt questions to drag out 'truths' and explain the details.  

Then the big guys stepped up and said 'no,  no'.  So podcast guys said fine....why don't you come on our shows to do a Q-and-A, and things started fall apart for the big guys....because they CAN'T debate with any skill (they got used to the soft questions from journalists).  

It's so bad....that even if you have a PhD.....you probably can't go into a debate over your field.  

Podcast guys affecting our view of the PhD guys?  Yeah, and it begs the question....if they can't really handle questions, then should we go and re-brand PhD level to something less?

I had to sit yesterday and review over one PhD guy suggesting that mere mortals (without a PhD) can't read medical reviews or science reports.  

Where all of this will lead to?  A lack of respect for anyone who spent $200,000 for a PhD level degree.