TeMPOraL comments on Post ridiculous munchkin ideas! - LessWrong

55 Post author: D_Malik 15 May 2013 10:27PM

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Comment author: TeMPOraL 13 May 2013 11:34:32AM 7 points [-]

FWIK, some universities allow you to get PhD in computer science by submitting PhD thesis for review and paying some amount of money (~$1200 on my university). This way, one can follow your advice and still get PhD.

Comment author: Barry_Cotter 13 May 2013 02:09:41PM 28 points [-]

Tell us more. Much more, in excruciating detail. I am reasonably sure I remember reading Eliezer write about the impossiblity of what you just described, i.e. getting a Ph.D. without necessarily having an advisor, funding or a Bachelor's degree.

Comment author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 13 May 2013 10:50:05PM 10 points [-]

Seconded.

Comment author: dvasya 13 May 2013 05:49:34PM 5 points [-]

A PhD is only as good as the reputation of your advisor. If everybody knows your advisor then you won't have a problem finding a job in academia. If your PhD is not backed by a prominent professor with a name, you're going to have a very difficult time finding a good position. It may be a bit easier in CS, where universities have to compete with industry, compared to my field (physics/chemistry/materials science), but generally this is how academia works.

An easily obtainable PhD is generally not the right kind of signal.

Comment author: EHeller 13 May 2013 06:10:21PM *  12 points [-]

A PhD is only as good as the reputation of your advisor. If everybody knows your advisor then you won't have a problem finding a job in academia.

I would amend this to be "if everybody knows your advisor you'll have FEWER problems finding a job in academia." Some fields are very, very crowded (theoretical physics, for instance). For a very brief time, I was in a small team at a consulting company where 3 out of the 4 of us had done a science phd under a Nobel winner, and still ended up making major career transitions after half a decade of postdocs. Science is crowded, the more basic the research the more crowded the field. To first order, no one gets a job. If you are under a famous advisor you might move your odds up to 1/10 or 1/5 or something like that.

Comment author: MichaelVassar 16 May 2013 11:00:37PM 2 points [-]

email me with info about that company, OK?
Sounds like maybe MetaMed should inquire into working with them.

Comment author: tondwalkar 26 May 2013 05:36:59AM 1 point [-]

Extraordinary claims....