Ask HN: Is a Doctorate Worth it?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1818482

by Rhapso • 16 years ago

12 13 16 years ago

news.ycombinator.com

I am a Jr in college at the moment, set up to double up my senior year with the 1st year of my graduate school. If I play my cards right I am looking at a doctorate 5 years from now.

First, why do I want a doctorate? At this point in my life I am nearing the end of My computer science bachelor's and I have learned enough to know I have so much left to learn. I love learning, I feel like I can learn so much in the process of getting this degree.

My goal in life right now is to be as educated as I can and have a stable income large enough to support a family. My worry is that the two might be mutually exclusive.

I see myself teaching while in graduate school, but I do not want to make it my long term profession. I want to work in software engineering and I have a big interest in Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning and right now university seems the place to work on such things right now.

This all boils down to, what is the job market for a 25 year old with a PhD in Computer Science and no work experience?

colinsidoti• 16 years ago

No, at least not immediately. You can always go back to school, try and take a stab at work experience. My first real job was at a startup between my junior and senior year of high school. I loved it, and now I'm asking myself if my Bachelors is worth it.

Unless your pursuing something that you absolutely need the PhD for, don't worry about it for now. You might enjoy yourself more in industry.

grails4life• 16 years ago

25 is young. Many 25 year olds dont have much work experience. Just make sure when you do go for the PhD, you finish it and dont end up spending 4 years and no degree. 25 + PhD in CS = very employable.

cperciva2• 16 years ago

If you get a PhD doing research in machine learning, I'd be absolutely shocked if Google doesn't offer you a Research Scientist position.

DrJosiah4• 16 years ago

I knew a half-dozen people with doctorates in machine learning at Google. None of them were research scientists.

cperciva2• 16 years ago

I know lots of PhDs at Google who aren't doing research, but it's because they don't want to be doing research.

equark• 16 years ago

If you're interested in machine learning, it's hard to imagine how you will get beyond tinkering without an advanced degree. A PhD brings a depth and maturity when thinking about how to frame machine learning (statistics) problems, which I rarely have seen in people who haven't studied to literature at the PhD level.

If you do decide, look for the right advisor (http://www.cs.berkeley.edu/~jordan/) and try to go to a top program.

arn• 16 years ago

Do what you love. Everything else will follow.

edit: realize this reads as "not very helpful". But you seem to know what you want to do. Job opportunities will be what they are in 5 years. Who knows. But if you try to change your natural trajectory, I think you'll be less happy, and ultimately less successful as a result.

dpavlenkov• 16 years ago

Learn, machine, learn!

DrJosiah4• 16 years ago

I don't know how long it takes to finish a doctorate in machine learning, but if you claim to be able to finish in 5 years, I'll just wish you luck. Took me 5 1/2 to finish a doctorate in Algorithms and Data Structures (Theory), and I was very lucky with my problems and papers.

If you go to grad school, you are going to need to TA or teach, this will be good for you. You'll probably also need to grade homework, tests, etc. This will also be good for you.

If you pay attention, work hard, and have fun, grad school can be even better than undergrad. Depending on your workload, you may even have time to do contracting work to help pay for school, and/or earn some experience along the way. Be careful though, I knew a lot of people who dropped out to join companies, and who will never finish.

Most of the advice I've been giving out over the years I've written out here: http://www.ics.uci.edu/~jcarlson/gradschool.html

Good luck, whatever you decide.

Rhapso• 16 years ago

Thanks! The 5 years estimate is on the hopeful side. I have been told my current course-load is insane by a few of my professors but it does not seem that bad yet (I am doing my bachelors in 3 years (currently on year 2), and hopefully overlapping with grad school on the last year (A honor student option here at Georgia State!)) I might be changing schools for my masters/PhD so there is a potential wrench to be thrown in gears there, a PhD might actually be harder work then I arrogantly expect it to be and take more then 4 more years. Either way, it looks like fun. On the flip-side it does have a cost, one I asked this question to help evaluate.

DrJosiah4• 16 years ago

If you've not taken the GRE subject test for CS, then unless your program doesn't require it for entrance, it's going to be difficult or impossible to get into any of the top-tier schools (I don't know if that's your intent or not).

Unless your expectation of grad school is 16 hour days work every day for 4 years, then it will be harder than you expect it to be :P In all seriousness, work will ebb and flow. Some weeks/months you will be inspired and working whenever you're not sleeping or eating. Some weeks/months/years, you'll be uninspired, spending a few hours checking email, news sites, then sit down and play video games or watch TV.

Really though, those days intermix, and the sum total of the work that I did for my degree (aside from coursework for the masters degree) could have been completed in 6-9 months. The rest of that time was spent (in order of most to least time) relaxing, trying to figure out what to work on, campus politics, working on things that didn't make it into any paper (but which expanded my knowledge in other directions), and waiting on other people.

Edit: forgot the requisite infographic http://matt.might.net/articles/phd-school-in-pictures/

ganley• 16 years ago

The usual caveats: This is just one man's experience.

I have a PhD in Comp Sci. It took me 4.5 years after my BS to get it. (2 for MS, 2.5 more for PhD.)

I rather suspect that I don't make any more than I would have if I'd just started work 4.5 years earlier, but I do believe that the work I've done is much more interesting than what I would've found with just a BS.

OTOH, times were different then (mid-90's) than they are now. Arguably you could learn more about AI/ML if you went to work for Google or a startup right now than you would in school.

I guess my advice would be: Apply to grad school, but look for an interesting job at the same time. If you find one, take it.

Ask HN: Is a Doctorate Worth it?

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