On the Real Housewives of Atlanta, Sheree (I think that's her name) is confronted with a situation. Her boyfriend, Tiy-E Muhammad, had been pretending that he had a PhD, prompting Sheree to call him "Dr. Tiy-E."
I was confused on two levels: firstly, what was it about being a PhD that made Dr. Tiy-E want to have one? Secondly, what about being a PhD made him attractive to someone who drives an Aston Martin?
People with Doctor of Philosophy degrees are afforded a level of respect in society, presumably in recognition of their wide range of knowledge about a specific topic. Phd holders go through several years of reading, doing research, sniffing out free food, and attending industry conferences.
[Note: Although many PhD candidates are given some sort of stipends to defray certain costs, they are not, as many people assume, "paid to go to school." I sometimes think that doctoral funding is one giant research study that attempts to find out how long a student will attempt to live within the amount given before caving in and getting a job (tutor, library, online poker player) to make ends meet.]
After completing your program and earning your celebrated PhD, you land a prestigious job at a top University and earn roughly what the average MBA applicant makes when he is applying for Business School (now for PhD students who have MBAs, this begs several questions, all of which will remain unanswered in this post). While you may never drive an Aston Martin, once you have tenure your income is guaranteed (for as long as you have the energy to speak for 45 minutes straight twice a week and can find enough funding for TAs and RAs to do the rest of your work) not many professions offer this sort of perk.
Now when I consider the "Real Housewives" cast members, I can't help but wonder whether they somehow equate PhDs to MDs - after all, they are all doctors, right? Was Sheree dating a Doctor because she thought he made a lot of money? When she heard he was staying at the Holiday Inn and laughed along with miss "Tardy to the Pardy" was she thinking "I don't care if he's rich, he's fine and he's a doctor"? Who knows.
Now back to my first question, about "Dr. Tiy-E" - I understand that being known as a Doctor could have helped his credibility as far as his radio show was concerned and I'm sure he fancied himself a Black Dr. Drew. Once he got found out the first time, though, why would he insist on still going around claiming a PhD? Perhaps it was because he knew that the chances of getting jumped by "real" members of the PhD fraternity if discovered and found those chances more favorable than for claiming to be a volunteer firefighter. Perhaps he, too, knowing nothing about what a PhD does/earns/eats for a living, thought that he could pull off the "Rich Phd" oxymoron (note: I am exaggerating a bit here - I hear that there are a lot of rich Math PhDs working for Goldman Sachs).
In any case, I would like to advocate that people think twice about pretending that you have a PhD, especially if you have no idea what having one means. Not only do you run the real risk of meeting someone who is as clueless as you and having an absurd relationship based on your joint ignorance, but you also risk being laughed at (and possibly jumped) by those who have spilled their blood, sweat, and tears earning their degree. You don't just wake up one day and decide to become a cynical academic - the process takes years! The inverse relationship between capital letters behind your name and ability to lay the smackdown doesn't matter - PhDs travel in packs.
Wednesday, November 24, 2010
Sunday, November 21, 2010
The Philosophy of Research - Writing about Bulls**t
"On Bullshit," written by Princeton University scholar Harry Frankfurt (download here) is one of the more popular modern pieces of modern philosophy. In this essay the reader is taken through a thorough analysis of a word that is apparently misused on a regular basis - according to the writer, "we have no clear understanding of what bullshit is, why there is so much of it, or what function it serves."
"On Bullshit" is actually a rather interesting read and I suggest that everyone who has a spare moment to spend a few minutes to check it out.
My introduction to the essay occurred, believe it or not, in my Philosophy in Research class, in we are being taught the variety of things that we no nothing about anything. We are asking heavy questions such as following (courtesy of Professor John Artz):
Your friend lends you a laptop and during the year that you borrowed it, the wireless card fails, the hard drive needs replacing, and eventually everything needs to be replaced. For reasons unknown to anybody, you save all of the parts that you replaced and can assemble a second laptop.
Your friend returns and you tell her the story about the failed parts and subsequent repairs. You then ask her which laptop she wants. "I want the one I lent you," she says.
"Well, then take this laptop that I made you out of all of the failed components of the laptop that you lent me" you offer.
But it isn't the same laptop" your friend replies. "That laptop was working:
"OK," you capitulate, "take the other laptop"
"But that's not the laptop that I lent you" she asserts. "It is a collection of new parts."
What do you?
This, and other connundrums are discussed in our Philosophy of research class. We are learning how to analyze concepts "such as Bullshit," construct logical arguments, and identify research topics that make sense. Class is fun, but the homework can be mind-boggling (I say this as I read the 200 pages of assigned reading for the third time, after which I need to do a presentation on the contents). We are supposed to leave this class with a better ability to do research and the jury is still out regarding whether it will achieve its goal.
If nothing else, we can leave the class with a firmer understanding of what Bullshit means.
"On Bullshit" is actually a rather interesting read and I suggest that everyone who has a spare moment to spend a few minutes to check it out.
My introduction to the essay occurred, believe it or not, in my Philosophy in Research class, in we are being taught the variety of things that we no nothing about anything. We are asking heavy questions such as following (courtesy of Professor John Artz):
Your friend lends you a laptop and during the year that you borrowed it, the wireless card fails, the hard drive needs replacing, and eventually everything needs to be replaced. For reasons unknown to anybody, you save all of the parts that you replaced and can assemble a second laptop.
Your friend returns and you tell her the story about the failed parts and subsequent repairs. You then ask her which laptop she wants. "I want the one I lent you," she says.
"Well, then take this laptop that I made you out of all of the failed components of the laptop that you lent me" you offer.
But it isn't the same laptop" your friend replies. "That laptop was working:
"OK," you capitulate, "take the other laptop"
"But that's not the laptop that I lent you" she asserts. "It is a collection of new parts."
What do you?
This, and other connundrums are discussed in our Philosophy of research class. We are learning how to analyze concepts "such as Bullshit," construct logical arguments, and identify research topics that make sense. Class is fun, but the homework can be mind-boggling (I say this as I read the 200 pages of assigned reading for the third time, after which I need to do a presentation on the contents). We are supposed to leave this class with a better ability to do research and the jury is still out regarding whether it will achieve its goal.
If nothing else, we can leave the class with a firmer understanding of what Bullshit means.
Friday, November 19, 2010
Are you an expert?
In Malcolm Gladwell's book Outliers he mentions in order to become a professional musician, athlete, or an expert at anything one needs about 10,000 hours of practice. Assuming, for example, that someone decided today that they wanted to be a professional skateboarder, they would need to be on a skateboard for eight hours a day, five days a week, and 50 weeks a year - for the next FIVE YEARS. Doing that calculation made me realize that I could have been pretty close to being an expert at almost anything if I had decided 5 or 10 years ago that I wanted to.
Beyond that, however, that piece of information drove home the fact that being in a PhD program gives a person an opportunity to reinvent himself or herself, emerging 4 or 5 years later as Dr. (insert name here), expert at (insert area of knowledge here).
The big question for the first year doctoral student is how to make take advantage of this opportunity without letting other things get in the way. Being a full time student shouldn't take much more time than having a full time job but it takes discipline to spend the required amount of time without a boss around the corner who can make sure that your work is being done. What makes being a student wonderful and dangerous at the same time is the freedom to determine almost every aspect of how will fulfill your academic requirements. You're required to go to class and go to the final exam - other than that, you have the entire day to either work on becoming an expert or do something else.
Beyond the first year things get even more wonderfully (and dangerously) free - no exams (except for comps at the end of the year) and problem sets. If you don't work on developing your craft, you could find yourself in a situation when you have to start thinking about a dissertation and look for a job.
I think that everyone should ask themselves whether they are an expert at/at/of something - if not, there's still time! All you need is 10,000 hours - that could be 8 hours a day for 5 years or four hours for 10 years. If you really want to take it slow you could spend 2 hours a day for 20 years and still become a professional. It may be worth a shot!
Beyond that, however, that piece of information drove home the fact that being in a PhD program gives a person an opportunity to reinvent himself or herself, emerging 4 or 5 years later as Dr. (insert name here), expert at (insert area of knowledge here).
The big question for the first year doctoral student is how to make take advantage of this opportunity without letting other things get in the way. Being a full time student shouldn't take much more time than having a full time job but it takes discipline to spend the required amount of time without a boss around the corner who can make sure that your work is being done. What makes being a student wonderful and dangerous at the same time is the freedom to determine almost every aspect of how will fulfill your academic requirements. You're required to go to class and go to the final exam - other than that, you have the entire day to either work on becoming an expert or do something else.
Beyond the first year things get even more wonderfully (and dangerously) free - no exams (except for comps at the end of the year) and problem sets. If you don't work on developing your craft, you could find yourself in a situation when you have to start thinking about a dissertation and look for a job.
I think that everyone should ask themselves whether they are an expert at/at/of something - if not, there's still time! All you need is 10,000 hours - that could be 8 hours a day for 5 years or four hours for 10 years. If you really want to take it slow you could spend 2 hours a day for 20 years and still become a professional. It may be worth a shot!
Monday, November 15, 2010
How to successfully feel old at 31
There are probably a bunch of different ways to make oneself feel like he or she is "too old." 30 year-olds are considered old in a number of sports (gymnastics and tennis are a couple of examples) and would probably look very much out of place in the average high school.
But if you are looking to feel old but NOT also feel creepy (high school) or over the hill (sports) you can simply enroll in a PhD program. I have personally always been either the youngest or one of the youngest in my grade, all the way up to my MBA. The tables have turned and I am somehow the papa bear in the class.
Being an "older" doctoral students certainly has its perks. If you spent your early years pursuing a Master's degree, for example, you may have the advantage of having covered a lot of your early doctoral coursework in that Master's program. Not only are you given respite from the long hours your classmates have to spend learning F-tests and plotting demand curves, but you also get a head start on learning Academia's favorite pastime ("Research!"). Or you could spend some more time sleeping, of course (clearly, I chose the former).
You also have a lot of perspective to bring into Phd school, having worked in the so-called "Real World." There is nothing more irksome (to me) than research that has no bearing on said Real World. I don't know exactly how my having worked before will prevent me from doing research cares about (which apparently happens all the time, according to one of my more cynical professors), but I am confident that I will at least be aware of its irrelevance before standing in front of a room full of people and speaking about it for 15 minutes.
The list goes on - you can dispense fatherly advice about life, you can avoid doing "grunt" work (e.g., putting together the e-vite for the departmental happy hour!) even though you are a lowly first-year student, and tell lots of interesting stories in class about the "Real World."
Bottom line, although it isn't the best thing in the world to know that you are considered the old guy in the program, it has its perks. Yes, I will be almost at my scheduled Mid-life crisis when I graduate but I'll probably develop the tools that I need to address this crisis during the program (did I mention that we can take as many credits as we want.... for FREE!!). By the time I graduate I plan to be a one man production house who speaks six languages and sows baskets underwater - and, of course, an expert PdD in International Business!
But if you are looking to feel old but NOT also feel creepy (high school) or over the hill (sports) you can simply enroll in a PhD program. I have personally always been either the youngest or one of the youngest in my grade, all the way up to my MBA. The tables have turned and I am somehow the papa bear in the class.
Being an "older" doctoral students certainly has its perks. If you spent your early years pursuing a Master's degree, for example, you may have the advantage of having covered a lot of your early doctoral coursework in that Master's program. Not only are you given respite from the long hours your classmates have to spend learning F-tests and plotting demand curves, but you also get a head start on learning Academia's favorite pastime ("Research!"). Or you could spend some more time sleeping, of course (clearly, I chose the former).
You also have a lot of perspective to bring into Phd school, having worked in the so-called "Real World." There is nothing more irksome (to me) than research that has no bearing on said Real World. I don't know exactly how my having worked before will prevent me from doing research cares about (which apparently happens all the time, according to one of my more cynical professors), but I am confident that I will at least be aware of its irrelevance before standing in front of a room full of people and speaking about it for 15 minutes.
The list goes on - you can dispense fatherly advice about life, you can avoid doing "grunt" work (e.g., putting together the e-vite for the departmental happy hour!) even though you are a lowly first-year student, and tell lots of interesting stories in class about the "Real World."
Bottom line, although it isn't the best thing in the world to know that you are considered the old guy in the program, it has its perks. Yes, I will be almost at my scheduled Mid-life crisis when I graduate but I'll probably develop the tools that I need to address this crisis during the program (did I mention that we can take as many credits as we want.... for FREE!!). By the time I graduate I plan to be a one man production house who speaks six languages and sows baskets underwater - and, of course, an expert PdD in International Business!
Saturday, November 6, 2010
"International Edition" Textbooks
I finally purchased what I thought was a legitimate version of my Microeconomics textbooks - I had seen some of my peers carrying soft-copy versions of our book and was told that they were international editions. They looked exactly like the domestic version, only in paperback. Essentially, publishers give the rights to their books out in different places for different prices (which, as we learn in Microeconomics, is called price discrimination) so these students either purchased theirs back in their countries or got someone to send them over from wherever they bought them from.
When I started looking online for my book (somewhat late in the semester, given midterms had already happened) I found someone selling a new international edition book for around $40 (the brand new book sells for over $130) and, of course, I jumped at the opportunity to save $90! I placed the order and the book was sent DHL.
When the book arrived from India, I eagerly tore open the covering and was shocked to see a red book with Black words and gray lines (versus a white original with black and orange markings). This book looked nothing like the original and nothing like the other "International Edition" books I have seen!
When I turned over the book to find the opening of the book's cellophane wrapping I was greeted with a note that explained exactly why it was that I was seeing what I was seeing and why it was not violating copyright laws. Apparently, in India, they also have the rights to print this book but in their case, it seems, they also have the right to change the look of the cover.
I generally think that if you have to include a note with your product stating that it does not violate copyright laws, it probably does. That said, I'm not sending my book back - I can't prove that the printing of the book in which I am currently reading about Oligopoly violates copyright laws but even if printing the book does, I am pretty sure buying it unawares certainly doesn't.
At the end of the day, it would probably be best for local textbook printers to simply reduce their prices to a point where there are no profits to be made from importing international editions, whether they are legitimate or not. It's a clear arbitrage opportunity and one that really shouldn't exist.
When I started looking online for my book (somewhat late in the semester, given midterms had already happened) I found someone selling a new international edition book for around $40 (the brand new book sells for over $130) and, of course, I jumped at the opportunity to save $90! I placed the order and the book was sent DHL.
When the book arrived from India, I eagerly tore open the covering and was shocked to see a red book with Black words and gray lines (versus a white original with black and orange markings). This book looked nothing like the original and nothing like the other "International Edition" books I have seen!
When I turned over the book to find the opening of the book's cellophane wrapping I was greeted with a note that explained exactly why it was that I was seeing what I was seeing and why it was not violating copyright laws. Apparently, in India, they also have the rights to print this book but in their case, it seems, they also have the right to change the look of the cover.
I generally think that if you have to include a note with your product stating that it does not violate copyright laws, it probably does. That said, I'm not sending my book back - I can't prove that the printing of the book in which I am currently reading about Oligopoly violates copyright laws but even if printing the book does, I am pretty sure buying it unawares certainly doesn't.
At the end of the day, it would probably be best for local textbook printers to simply reduce their prices to a point where there are no profits to be made from importing international editions, whether they are legitimate or not. It's a clear arbitrage opportunity and one that really shouldn't exist.
Tuesday, November 2, 2010
"Grades just don't matter"
In class last week our Statistics professor made a statement that, for us doctoral candidates, "grades just don't matter." This was on the heels of a midterm examination the week before that literally traumatized a number of us. It wasn't clear to us at the time whether he was warning us that we were about to see grades that would depress us if we thought that they did matter.
Now that those grades are out, it looks like we didn't do as badly as we thought we would. Knowing that, we have to wonder how to interpret those comments by our professor. It is probably true that there will be few instances (if any at all) in which we will be asked for a copy of our doctoral program transcript - it is pretty widely acknowledged that the only thing that really matters is how many papers you publish and conferences you attend before you graduate. If that is the case, why was I so elated with my midterm grade? Similarly, why is the grade I just received for the homework I just turned in (I didn't do so well this last time) stinging me so badly?
Listening to my colleagues discussing and comparing grades shows that, even in a situation where grades are essentially irrelevant, we are competitive beings. There is no objective reason why I should care how my colleagues in Decision Sciences or Finance fared in the Economics midterm, right?
One last thought on this - if grades really don't matter, why aren't us doctoral students getting graded on a pass/fail basis (like it was in business school)?? It seems counter-intuitive to assign them to us if nobody is ever going to want to see them. The beauty of a pass/fail system is that you still have to do enough work to not fail, meaning that you remove the competition without allowing people to slack off. Just a thought...
Now that those grades are out, it looks like we didn't do as badly as we thought we would. Knowing that, we have to wonder how to interpret those comments by our professor. It is probably true that there will be few instances (if any at all) in which we will be asked for a copy of our doctoral program transcript - it is pretty widely acknowledged that the only thing that really matters is how many papers you publish and conferences you attend before you graduate. If that is the case, why was I so elated with my midterm grade? Similarly, why is the grade I just received for the homework I just turned in (I didn't do so well this last time) stinging me so badly?
Listening to my colleagues discussing and comparing grades shows that, even in a situation where grades are essentially irrelevant, we are competitive beings. There is no objective reason why I should care how my colleagues in Decision Sciences or Finance fared in the Economics midterm, right?
One last thought on this - if grades really don't matter, why aren't us doctoral students getting graded on a pass/fail basis (like it was in business school)?? It seems counter-intuitive to assign them to us if nobody is ever going to want to see them. The beauty of a pass/fail system is that you still have to do enough work to not fail, meaning that you remove the competition without allowing people to slack off. Just a thought...
Sunday, October 17, 2010
Midterm Madness
Halfway through the first semester of PhD school, it is now starting to hit me that I am really back into the grind of being a student. The biggest injustice of the period so far has been having to study 16 chapters of Microeconomics in 6 weeks, only to encounter a midterm that spanned less than a third of that material.
Apart from the Microeconomics exam, midterms have not been as hellish as I anticipated - the Philosophy exam (which essentially consisted of the question "is studying bad moods a good idea") was deceptive in its simplicity.
Statistics...well, suffice to say that it has never been my favorite subject and that our instructor is making it easy to keep things that way. His lectures are interesting for sure - his exam was absolutely brutal!
Apart from the Microeconomics exam, midterms have not been as hellish as I anticipated - the Philosophy exam (which essentially consisted of the question "is studying bad moods a good idea") was deceptive in its simplicity.
Statistics...well, suffice to say that it has never been my favorite subject and that our instructor is making it easy to keep things that way. His lectures are interesting for sure - his exam was absolutely brutal!
Wednesday, September 15, 2010
Can't Get to Bed!
One of the hardest parts of adjusting to PhD school right now has been getting my sleep schedule back to normal. For some reason I have been falling asleep between 4am and 6am every morning and nothing seems to be able to change that. I have tried Unisom, Nyquil, warm milk - the only thing that I haven't tried is prescription sleep aids (and I'm not so keen on going that route until I sign up and pay for health insurance!).
For now I'll have to be content with asleep at dawn and waking up close to lunch time - eventually (I hope) things will get back to normal soon! Thank goodness for the internet, audiobooks and 24-hour TV - they're keeping me from pulling my hair out when I'm done with homework and can't fall asleep!
For now I'll have to be content with asleep at dawn and waking up close to lunch time - eventually (I hope) things will get back to normal soon! Thank goodness for the internet, audiobooks and 24-hour TV - they're keeping me from pulling my hair out when I'm done with homework and can't fall asleep!
Monday, September 13, 2010
This is PhD School? Part 1
Ok, so now I'm officially in PhD School. It doesn't feel like being a student has felt in the past. In undergrad I was part of a class of 1400 people (almost 90 of them black - the relevance will be obvious soon) and in Business School there were around 800 of us (at least 50 black people). There were a lot of us and we were separated into residential colleges (undergrad) or cohorts (MBA) that became platforms for socializing, forming new relationships, etc. By the third week of class I was a little stressed out in both situations but I was also exhilarated by the whole thing - it was a new school, new people, new concepts, new future opportunities - it was awesome!
This is nothing like that. We have an incoming class of 13 or so and I'm the only person of African descent (funnily enough that is about right if you consider that 6% of my undergraduate class was black - we'll ignore that for now). In my department there are three of us coming into the class - me, an American who went to Ohio State and a woman from some part of Latin America (I think). It is a SMALL class.
Most of the class is from outside of the US and I would say about half are Chinese - this in itself isn't really a problem but after each classes we seem to naturally separate into three groups: the native-English speakers, the Chinese speakers, and a group of two made up of a Croatian and a Persian (from Iran), who sometimes hangs out with the native English speakers. Then there is the Latin American who basically disappears after class but is becoming a bit more social (she was sick last week so that may have something to do with it).
I have three class sessions a week - a total of around 6 hours. Classes are interesting (not in the "wow, this is interesting" way) - apart from the class titled "Philosophical foundations of Research" it is mostly a review of stuff that I learned twice over. The other two classes, Statistics and Microeconomics, are not so much giving me new knowledge as they are presenting that information in a different way and showing me how to use those concepts in different settings. We are basically learning how to think about Economics and Statistics as a researcher would. It is all very practical (and hence not all that "interesting").
The Philosophy class is basically teaching us that "A PhD, or Doctor of Philosophy, Is a Person Trained in Research, Able to Advance the Knowledge in Their Field of Interest" (quote taken from a slide from the first class). Now this class is completely new information and so far has been truly interesting. I like it.
The best part of PhD school has been my Mentor/Adviser - she is great. Extremely sharp, very well respected in the field and very much capable of helping me avoid true disillusionment (<---- never used that word before and quite surprised that the spell checker didn't give me a red squiggly line just now). I'll write more about her later but the work that she is assigning to me is quite interesting and she already has some really cool stuff for me to dig into as the Semester continues. She is working on a lot of stuff and really needs assistance getting it all done - an excellent opportunity for me to learn about becoming a "great researcher."
To be continued (or, as they say in Ghana, "watch this space")...
Doc2.0
This is nothing like that. We have an incoming class of 13 or so and I'm the only person of African descent (funnily enough that is about right if you consider that 6% of my undergraduate class was black - we'll ignore that for now). In my department there are three of us coming into the class - me, an American who went to Ohio State and a woman from some part of Latin America (I think). It is a SMALL class.
Most of the class is from outside of the US and I would say about half are Chinese - this in itself isn't really a problem but after each classes we seem to naturally separate into three groups: the native-English speakers, the Chinese speakers, and a group of two made up of a Croatian and a Persian (from Iran), who sometimes hangs out with the native English speakers. Then there is the Latin American who basically disappears after class but is becoming a bit more social (she was sick last week so that may have something to do with it).
I have three class sessions a week - a total of around 6 hours. Classes are interesting (not in the "wow, this is interesting" way) - apart from the class titled "Philosophical foundations of Research" it is mostly a review of stuff that I learned twice over. The other two classes, Statistics and Microeconomics, are not so much giving me new knowledge as they are presenting that information in a different way and showing me how to use those concepts in different settings. We are basically learning how to think about Economics and Statistics as a researcher would. It is all very practical (and hence not all that "interesting").
The Philosophy class is basically teaching us that "A PhD, or Doctor of Philosophy, Is a Person Trained in Research, Able to Advance the Knowledge in Their Field of Interest" (quote taken from a slide from the first class). Now this class is completely new information and so far has been truly interesting. I like it.
The best part of PhD school has been my Mentor/Adviser - she is great. Extremely sharp, very well respected in the field and very much capable of helping me avoid true disillusionment (<---- never used that word before and quite surprised that the spell checker didn't give me a red squiggly line just now). I'll write more about her later but the work that she is assigning to me is quite interesting and she already has some really cool stuff for me to dig into as the Semester continues. She is working on a lot of stuff and really needs assistance getting it all done - an excellent opportunity for me to learn about becoming a "great researcher."
To be continued (or, as they say in Ghana, "watch this space")...
Doc2.0
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