what a phd means...

I thought it might be interesting to make a (semi-funny) bulleted list about what a Ph.D. is.

  • doctor of grading As a teaching assistant, I know a lot about grading.  Despite knowing a lot, some assignments are still genuinely hard to grade.  Or at least, it’s difficult to decide partial credit.
  • (sometimes) smooth talker Have you expended a huge amount of effort with only small progress?  Are you worried about how it’ll look?  I’m your guy!  I’ve been trained to be able to talk about theoretically interesting concepts and alternate representations of progress that can showcase the hard-earned fruits of your labor, despite any potential issues in the results.
  • still a little kid I still think Legos are awesome.  Also, I’ve avoided “real life” for ages, whatever “real life” is.  I don’t know, but it sounds scary.
  • a skeptic of news It’s okay to be different.  But it might not be okay for newspapers to misquote and misinterpret scientific results, then have friends and family try and sell the misinterpretation to me.
  • doctor of realism If your results seem too good, there’s probably a bug in the code.  Also, when you fix a bug, don’t expect the results to improve.  Also, if you want to do anything meaningful, be prepared to spend at least half of your time on (unpublishable) systems issues.
  • my self-worth is external My thesis is like a projection of myself.  If you say bad things I might cry.  I think of it as my child.
  • doctor of dreaming A part of me still believes that I’ll find a job involving fun and interesting research with mostly my own guidance.  The part of my brain that lives on the Earth still hasn’t stopped laughing at this part of me…
  • an unreliable friend If I just had a paper or draft rejected or if bad results just came in, I probably want to be alone for a while.  If I have a deadline, I probably won’t be seen outside my office for a few days.  The rest of the time, the contrast with academic life leads me to appreciate friends and family more than I can say.
  • a cheapskate Graduate contracts are done yearly or by semester.  During grad school, I don’t always know if I’ll have a job next semester or year.  So I can’t afford to waste much.  I’m especially bad because I grew up without much money.  At the same time, I value talking to a friend much higher than the $5/hr rate of movies.  This also leads me to monetize everything.  Do I get $45 of value per month from TV?  Nope.  Do I get $45 of value per month from DSL?  Maybe.  Do I get $20 of value from Pride and Prejudice (A&E) over the course of my lifetime?  Yeah.  In college my buddy and I valued everything in terms of the number of burritos we could get from Taco Bell instead.
    • deal hunter Back when we worked closer to main street and I had friends that liked to go to lunch, I knew the lunch specials at every place in town.
  • completely different than impressions of me I don’t know where people get these ideas.  They think I can fix computers without any extra information.  Or that because I work with text, I can become an instant millionaire like (case example). Or that I travel the world when going to conferences.  I’ve come to the understanding that it’s like the explanation of magic in Blood of the Fold - because I’m who I am, I understand, but other people can’t understand cause they’re a different type of person.
    • This one is actually funny because even people who work with me have a funny idea of me.  I don’t tend to show emotions much, so they think I’m calm and relaxed all the time.  I can’t even really remember what it’s like to feel relaxed all the time.