Put the “Ph” Back in PhD

http://magazine.jhsph.edu/2015/summer/forum/rethinking-put-the-ph-back-in-phd

by Amorymeltzer • 11 years ago

86 76 11 years ago

magazine.jhsph.edu

Sure, let's "put back" something that was never there in the first place. Philosophiae Doctor is just the name of the degree. Where did it come from? Let's ask wikipedia ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doctor_of_Philosophy ):

In most of Europe, all fields other than theology, law, and medicine were traditionally known as philosophy, and in Germany and elsewhere in Europe the basic faculty of (liberal) arts was known as the faculty of philosophy.

dagw2• 11 years ago

It's also interesting to note that Germany (and elsewhere in Europe) also have the degrees of Doctor of Engineering or Doctor of Technology. If one believes that PhD's should be more philosophical/theoretical (and I'm certainly cool with that), you should also add a new, comparable, degree for people who really want to spend few years digging into the hardcore technical side of their chosen field.

vacri3• 11 years ago

Philosophy is also responsible for the scientific method and things like the null hypothesis. There's a strong tendency for 'hard science' folks to look down their noses at philosophy, but the truth is that the fundamentals of their research is squarely due to the philosophy. Philosophy is responsible for scientists developing the methods of rigorous observation.

Source: I once looked down my nose at philosophy, then I started doing first-priciples on the methodology I was taught. Turns out that 'philosophy of science' is a field unto itself.

mattmanser6• 11 years ago

You've got it backwards. It's not like a bunch of philosophers sat round and came up with the scientific method and until they did that there was no science. Scientists experimented and tried to justify their conclusions (sometimes badly or incorrectly), which lead to the philosophy of science. Karl Popper was a recent philosopher, not a forming giant of science, he rationalized the scientific method with falsifiability after the fact, after Einstein's Theory of Relativity, for example.

It's also easy to get the two mixed up as Philosophy basically used to be the nascent 'science'.

It's also worth reading this before you get too attached to philosophy:

http://www.paulgraham.com/philosophy.html

Ultimately present day philosophy, last I looked and certainly since Wittgenstein, is all about playing with word meaning and almost upfront about it, but pg argues in reality it always was like that.

maus42• 11 years ago

And 'science' as we know it today used to be called 'natural philosophy'.

Keyframe2• 11 years ago

OP asked wikipedia in the wrong place. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_science#History

As one can remember from high school, natural science fields spawned from natural philosophy from 17th through 19th century. Culminating maybe with psychology in the early 20th century (end of 19th). No mystery there.

teekert2• 11 years ago

I had a friend/college from Russia, he told this is the case there. During the thesis defense there is a section reserved for Philosophy (of life, meaning etc). Any Russians care to elaborate?

nobodyshere2• 11 years ago

Can't elaborate on the thesis, but prior to enrolling for a PhD program you indeed have to pass a philosophy exam. This is usually considered the most difficult. Passed it in summer.

Grue3• 11 years ago

I remember taking this. I had to answer something about socialism or marxism or whatever (I remember having to name the prominent socialist thinkers). This was in the 2000s, by the way. I got 3 points out of 5. I passed the other exams, math and English, perfectly, and that was not enough. I only got accepted due to personal recommendation of my scientific advisor. Since then I'm of the opinion that "Ph" is complete bullshit.

kartikkumar• 11 years ago

At my university (TU Delft), we have to include a set of premises/statements that are open for questioning during the thesis defense. You're supposed to list ten statements and the usual breakdown is that a few will be on the specific topic that you're graduating on, a few will be about the field of research at a whole and the rest are "philosophical musings". I've started thinking about mine and I actually think it's a valuable exercise to have this as part of the culmination of a long and arduous journey. I think it's in our graduation process now as a matter of tradition, rather than an impetus to spawn true philosophical debate, which is a shame. Friends who have graduated have put down some pretty deep thoughts, which I think reflects upon the fact that a PhD done right provokes you to think about the nature of research and the world around you.

teekert2• 11 years ago

I love that tradition but the University where I did my PhD (Leiden, 25 km from Delft) very (very) strongly discouraged this, a shame in my opinion.

kushti• 11 years ago

I did study General Philosophy / Philosophy of Science / Philosophy of Informatics during PhD fellowship. Last two courses were awesome, each course lasted for half an year. No special section in thesis though.

jmmcd5• 11 years ago

We need big thinkers

We need some, but there aren't anywhere near enough big-thinking jobs for all these PhDs.

The success of science and technology will always lead to new ethical dilemmas. How do you spot them and try to work with society before they become problems? A better appreciation of ethics is likely to address what has become an epidemic of retractions in the scientific literature.

All the recent retractions have nothing to do with scientists being unaware of ethical dilemmas raised by their work. They're to do with perverse incentives, p-hacking, and occasionally deliberate dishonesty.

Fede_V3• 11 years ago

Yeah, pretty much exactly this. In the abstract, I fully support teaching science PhDs more about Quine, Russell, Popper, Carnap - they are all great thinkers who had very intelligent ideas. In practice, PhDs at top tier institutions are far too concerned with the day to day rat race that the history of ideas is not likely to be a serious priority.

As long as the competition for stable positions will remain so fierce, and the criteria for which candidates are judged will remain so narrow, the problems are likely to be far more prosaic than those raised by analytical philosophers.

jamesrcole9• 11 years ago

In practice, ...

You're arguing that what happens to be the case now is how it should be.

Do you think this is the best way for it to be, and if so, why?

cryoshon2• 11 years ago

The last academic shop I was at had an Eritrean biostatistician around who was the only actual philosopher of science in the entire troupe. He understood the different perspectives of epistemology as well as statistical analysis, and was a tremendous asset in planning new studies for the most high impact data... unfortunately, to many of the postdocs and PIs, he was just an annoyance, because they refused to accept that their studies were poorly constructed and their data was less than rigorous.

emanuelev2• 11 years ago

I quite agree that the post PhD job market is kind of challenging as there are few companies tackling big questions.

However, if you forget the job market, the argument the guy is making is absolutely spot on. There's a solid trend in academia that is "publish early, publish fast". Although one might argue that it actually makes sense (career-wise or whatever), it is intrinsic in such a system to penalise pursuing big, risky ideas. Considering that the PhD (and the few years after) are the most productive in a researcher's life, it is a shame that students are not actively encouraged to think bigger.

rhaps0dy• 11 years ago

the PhD (and the few years after) are the most productive in a researcher's life

Source? I'm curious.

lmm4• 11 years ago

There's a solid trend in academia that is "publish early, publish fast".

With an increasing number of researchers isn't that a great thing? If you publish your little incremental innovations then everyone can build on them. If you try to build your giant all-encompassing framework before you publish any of it, you'll have to do it all yourself (if it even amounts to anything).

jamesrcole9• 11 years ago

> We need big thinkers
We need some, but there aren't anywhere near enough big-thinking jobs

Ok. Perhaps we also need jobs for them?

[EDIT: what I mean is, perhaps it is in society's interest to divert some resources to creating more jobs for such people?]

And perhaps the research itself, that these big thinkers do for their PhDs, has important value for society?

jmmcd5• 11 years ago

Diverting resources sounds good, but obviously should come first.

The research itself could and should have value. But a PhD must go all the way to the bottom, in terms of detail. It's not a pop science book or a funding programme, which can delegate the details to someone else. Therefore, asking the PhD student to be a big thinker as well as taking care of the experimental details is just raising the bar -- it's not changing the focus, it's raising the bar. Fewer people will be able to start PhDs and fewer will be able to complete them. The article doesn't suggest that this has been recognised.

Instead, I suggest that a PhD is not a great vehicle for "big thinking", and instead serves as a training-ground for planning, executing and describing ordinary research. Maybe the big thinking should be done -- as it is currently -- by people who have already demonstrated that they can do all that very well.

rquantz• 11 years ago

We need big thinkers We need some, but there aren't anywhere near enough big-thinking jobs for all these PhDs.

Yeah, man, jobs! It's all about jobs! Jobs jobs jobs! Steve Jobs! Jobs jobs!

How about this? The world needs big thinkers in ways other than their capacity as economic actors. Einstein worked at a patent office. The work he did there (for the patent office) was not his primary contribution to the world at that time.

jmmcd5• 11 years ago

Great! Meanwhile his PhD was not particularly "big thinking". So in Einstein's case I think we're both happy?

As for jobs jobs, I think you missed the point. If we lie to PhD candidates about career prospects and train them in things that have a negative effect on their careers, then the best people won't undertake research.

cryoshon2• 11 years ago

Yeah, I think the author forgot that:

1. Being smart isn't a product, and most people won't consider it a skill

2. Thinking big isn't a product, and most people won't consider it a skill

3. Thinking big is usually reserved for top level people, of which there are less than five

You know what they call the big thinker who is looking for a job with his shiny new PhD? Unemployed.

Retra• 11 years ago

Without being employed to do this kind of work, your opportunities for networking and partnership are vastly diminished, which translates to less success. And that's ignoring the fact that competition demands ever-increasing capability. There's a huge difference in capability between amateurs and professionals in almost every field, and there are relevant reasons for that difference.

theyblinked• 11 years ago

Thinking isn't about jobs. It is about life.

Perverse incentives is a great point.

thefastlane• 11 years ago

The Senior Executive Provost of Whatever sees your department as nothing but a cost center. Literally. I agree completely with the author, but I'll add one more thing: we need big ideas to overcome the market-fundamentalist ideology that drives university administrations today.

bthallplz• 11 years ago

I find it odd that one's exposure to and encouraging of bigger-thinking is somewhat reserved until the PhD level and that, after a long while of not exposing or encouraging such, our systems had ever expected people to suddenly think big once at the PhD level.

It may be more productive to have the expectation of bigger-thinking introduced earlier and let that expectation be realized more fully at the PhD level.

rubidium• 11 years ago

This 100x.

By the time you're getting your PhD, the college graduate should have read the classics, done at least 1st year level calculus, biology, physics, ethics, philosophy, and 2-4 years of a foreign language.

High school and undergraduate is the time to be broad-minded. PhD is for very focused work (with the big picture in mind).

Personally, I read the classics and learned Greek and Latin (high school), then in college took 8 courses of philosophy, 2 of Spanish, 2 in economics, 4 in business/entrepreneurship, and a smattering of other interesting things (art, music, etc...) while getting a Physics major.

Then I went and spent 6 years learning more about one thing than anyone in the world.

d_theorist• 11 years ago

I think this article mixes together and perhaps confuses a few different things.

Stated problems:

- scientists are not equipped by their training to be able to tackle "big" challenges such as meteorites and pandemics.

- "hyper-competitiveness" for grants

- extreme specialisation means that people can't communicate.

And the solution is to learn about:

1. epistemology 2. quantitative skills 3. ethics

I certainly don't disagree with the value of learning about these things. But while epistemology and quantitative skills might help make the scientific process more rigorous, I don't see that it will change competitiveness or the inability to tackle big challenges or deter specialisation.

And while ethics is always a valuable thing to think about, I don't think it helps scientific rigor or any of the author's stated problems.

Overall I found the piece a bit muddled.

gkop• 11 years ago

Quite muddled.

Put the “Ph” Back in PhD

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