Science, like music or art, is one of those things that you do because you decide that you like the rewards it brings more than the struggle that is required to achieve success. If you are rich, the risks of doing it are lower, but being poor hardly stops you.

If you do any of those in order to produce finacial gain, it is pretty dumb, as there are easier ways to make way more money if you have the potential to be successful in those feilds.

The professor saw that the guy didn't have any real passion for science, and thus told him to do something else.

The real quote i disagree with is "This is the basic theory behind the practice of tenure of professors in American universities. First, a recent PhD graduate must first steel oneself and complete 5 years of hard work. Afterwards, if you are picked by the group of tenured professors and one day pass their requirements, then for the rest of your life you will never have to worry about making a living again. At that point you can wholeheartedly devote your time to research and study. Naturally the school also knows that the overwhelming majority of these tenured professors have no research potential left in them. Equally impotent are the lowly menial workers of the research laboratory. However, out of the vast numbers of tenured professors a few stand out from the crowd that actually have talent and contribute positively to the economy."

Science today needs a lot more menial laborers than professors directing research, because it works on grants and doesn't generate its own income, professors are perfectly happy to take people who are not really interested in the work, but will be methodical and will work for very low pay (like asian PhD students) because they need a lot of hands to run these tedious experiments. That doesn't mean that once a professor becomes a professor they are useless or lack talent. It seems as though he confuses positive economic contributions with positive intellectual ones (which might only be capatalized on decades later).

The choice quote is:

"To be honest, I wasn’t familiar with the professor’s research methods whatsoever. Instead, I said I was interested because if I didn’t do this low-paying job the professor wouldn’t give me the position of assistant research fellow and then I wouldn’t have the money for school tuition."

The guy wasn't interested in research, just in money, and his professor (rightly) called him out. The PhD process is one of passion: if you don't have the passion for the subject you are studying, you are wasting everyone's time and money, not just your own.

Ok, that's a big of an exaggeration, but only a bit.

Personally, I think it might be wise for the US to consider providing a very fast and easy path to citizenship for people who earn PHDs here. In my current graduate studies I know many very bright students that could contribute tremendously to society in the US if they were actively encouraged to stay here after finishing their PHDs, and most of them would want that opportunity if they had it.

Obviously, the F1 forces students to leave once they graduate.

The system is set up to actively discourage students to stay. I don't know which organization came up with the idea of using public money (because most will be funded this way) to educate people and then make them leave. It's somewhat bizarre, and doesn't seem to benefit the US at all.

That said, I do agree with you about the making it easier for bright, hard working, educated people. I just think that PhD programs need to clean up their act if they're going to lure us citizens out of law, med, mba (or no grad degree), and if they can essentially award citizenship (but these other programs can't), they won't experience the reckoning they so richly deserve.

Anecdotally, many post-secondary students view diplomas and degrees as simply documents certifying that they've put in their time, and paid their dues. In a sense, the whole academic infrastructure has been somewhat perverted from pursuit of knowledge to pursuit of dollars/fame/status.

You are seriously out of touch with reality. Well, if you want to be a programmer, you can be a programmer right after high school, and there's no need to spend $30K per year to learn Java and Turing machines. Maybe you, too, have fallen under the spell of PG almighty and believe that "making something that people want" is sufficient to be a sucessful entrepreneur. After 10 years of trying and failing, you may come to the realization that playing the "all or nothing" game usually results in... nothing. Now you're on your late 20s, your high school friends who had more common sense are getting married and having kids, and you have nothing to show. Since you believe you're better than the ones who chose the easy path, you go "all in", hoping for that ever-elusive IPO that will make you rich enough to stick it to the system. In the process, you will have wasted your life chasing a dream.

Programmers tend to think that having coding skills is all that matters to make it big. Problem is, the barrier of entry is very low in programming these days, and if a high school kid can outcompete you, you're probably playing the wrong game.

People who live in the real world understand that universities sell credentials, not knowledge. Such people understand also that an undergraduate degree is little more than indoctrination, a process through which obedient employees are created. Most organizations need obedient employees, they don't need "creative" coders. Sorry, you're not a special & unique snowflake, and the world does not owe you a thing. It may suck, but being in denial won't help.

An undergraduate degree serves many purposes. For one, it indoctrinates you, which sounds evil, but is a necessary evil. Second, it allows you to find out what you like and what you don't. Third, by doing what you like and meeting like-minded people, you end up realizing who you are, not by introspection (fuck that new age BS), but through action. Fourth, it allows you to network with people from all walks of life and the most various fields. Fifth, it provides the skills necessary to accomplish something. You can stay 4 years at home studying by yourself, but you'll go crazy before you accomplish anything. Being in a structured environment for 4 years is a much gentler way of building a skill set that actually matters... just as long as you stay away from sociology, psychology, "womyn" studies and other such distasteful insanity.

A good number of universities (especially if you study math, science, or engineering) sell much more than credentials. They sell you a lot of knowledge. I don't understand how you can seriously make that statement. I learned an unbelievable amount of stuff in my four years in college, and I'm sure many other studious students did also.

Many of my former EE classmates ended up going into business, consulting, banking... and I am sure it wasn't their expertise on analog VLSI or DSP that landed them the positions, it was a piece of paper with a lot of good grades that, essentially, said: "I can be an obedient worker, I will put in the long hours without questioning the status quo, and I react to carrots & sticks".

If you actually care about knowledge, you can learn a tremendous lot in 4 years, but don't assume that most people are like you, because they aren't. Except if you go to Caltech or MIT, of course, but the girls are ugly and the parties suck at such schools...

While some students may be more interested in getting the diploma, that doesn't reflect on the motivation of the institution.

You are right to say that;

>>>An undergraduate degree serves many purposes. For one, it indoctrinates you, which sounds evil, but is a necessary evil. Second, it allows you to find out what you like and what you don't. Third, by doing what you like and meeting like-minded people, you end up realizing who you are, not by introspection (fuck that new age BS), but through ?action. Fourth, it allows you to network with people from all walks of life and the most various fields. Fifth, it provides the skills necessary to accomplish something. You can stay 4 years at home studying by yourself, but you'll go crazy before you accomplish anything. Being in a structured environment for 4 years is a much gentler way of building a skill set that actually matters...<<<

Yet, in the longer run why are you doing that? It is corny to say that there is more to life than the pursuit of social prestige/money/luxury, but it's quite true.

I think of it this way; when I die I want to die knowing that I have lived life to its fullest potential, and for me that involves creating beautiful things. I might not be a special and unique snowflake, but my integrity is precious to me. If I rush down that path I have no doubt that I will lose myself, and what worth is a life like that?

For some people that path matches their core identity, but for me it simply doesn't. I don't know why, but I am just nuts about stuff like that.

You see, for me the beauty I see around me and the overwhelming beauty of the things I create is reality. It might starve me to death. Maybe not. I accept the risk as the price I shall pay for my freedom to create.

Oh and Sociology, Psychology, and women studies do matter, but the way they are currently taught is nothing but intellectual fraud.

I am sorry if it came out as if I was making a categorical statement. It is quite true that I might not have read up on those subjects as much as you have, from an academic point of view anyway.

What I was trying to imply was that even though earlier a few years ago I used to snort at such things, but now I have some rather unique life experience that has changed my view point. I've come to realize that people aren't really rational beings at the end and it is quite important to study what composes their identity in order to make sure that you don't burn up bridges.

Think about it this way. We live in an interconnected world where our ideas are not judged my majority of the population on the basis of pure intellectual merit. The idea that all human beings are born equal is met with acclaim around the world as long as it supports people's bottom lines. The very next second they tear it apart and turn into oppressors. Thomas Jefferson put it quite beautifully;

What a stupendous, what an incomprehensible machine is man! Who can endure toil, famine, stripes, imprisonment and death itself in vindication of his own liberty, and the next moment . . . inflict on his fellow men a bondage, one hour of which is fraught with more misery than ages of that which he rose in rebellion to oppose.

I have experienced that first hand in my life, and now I understand the value of understanding how people behave and why they behave the way they do so. The entire way that field now works in some places is quite like intellectual fraud. I know this through a few interesting experiences with a few psychologists.

So sorry about that.

edit: Those experiences were supplemented by stuff I downloaded from iTunes U.

I'm speaking from experience. I quit college during my sophomore year, got multiple job offers, and took a high-paying job writing compilers. How'd I do it? Entirely because I had a portfolio of substantial projects under my belt.

The dangerous thought is assuming that what works for programmers can work for other people. If you want to be a lawyer or a medical doctor, what projects can you have under your belt that demonstrate "can-do"? None?! Promoting the idea that an undergraduate degree is not valuable is an extremely irresponsible thing to do. I know that HN is a hacker community full of can-do over-achievers, but the rest of the world isn't like that... and perhaps it shouldn't be like that.

More than that, there are a great many non-research career tracks that are only open to someone with a degree, and a great many others that don't technically require a degree but go much more smoothly.

It only makes sense to pursue a PHD if you have both a passion for that field and at least enough money to handle the necessities. For most people, it makes sense to get a bachelors if you are able.

2. Come to USA for PhD, get Paid Double the amount + save around 4k$ per year atleast. Get Prestigious degree after 5 years and then get a job that pays at least 70k$ or Join Academia which pays 40k$ +

3. Go to USA for Masters, Pay fees out of pocket or via loan, so total cost will be ~50k$b- 80k$ Get a job which pays 60k$ P.A. post graduation. And repay the loan in next 3-4 years, after which one can go for an MBA

Now Choice 1 is pointless, Choice 3 requires your parents to be waelthy enough to afford the loan. Hence an overwhelming number of them choose 2. Also there is nothing wrong with it, plus the whole make money instead argument is bullshit.

Unless you have god gifted green card, no one will give you a job in USA, and regarding working in China/India the Minimum Wage here 10404*12 ~ 19k is more than best starting salary in their country

If you are good enough, it doesn't matter how much money you have, someone else will throw money at you to ensure that you keep doing what your doing.

She attended one of the best private schools in Australia - also paid 100% through scholarship.

The money is out there, some people are just more tenacious at looking for it.

Edit: I should add, the music establishment doesn't acknowledge the music of the poor as "real music". Prodigies on, for example, turntables, are not considered "real musicians" even if they are as much of a genius as the 10 year old violist.

The "real musicians" have a longer history, and thus there is more to learn, which is why school is more necessary to be qualified.

I.e. the best violinists come out of conservatories, whereas the best d.j.s can easily be self taught.

What makes you think there's more to learn? Yes, the classical library spans more years, but the library of recorded music is growing at an exponential rate. I'm quite certain that there is more recorded hip hop music available today than there is recorded/transcribed classical music. Are you aware of the volume of LPs and tapes that are circulated amongst the DJ community? It's enormous, and spans all genres, including classical music. There's an insane amount of music to learn, and the great DJs do learn it.

And if that's true, then your reasoning that Conservatories exist because there is so much classical music to learn has no foundation.

Conservatories are just the white way of teaching kids how to make music. Hip hop has its own methods.

I can tell your intentions are in the right place, but have you ever considered the possibility that there might be something racist about the notion that classical music is somehow special?