The ad lib ad hoc punk rock post doc

on skipping the phd

Love learning?

Do you never feel happier then when you are deeply immersed in a learning challenge?

Thinking of doing a PhD?

Skip the doctorate.

That just costs money. There’s a better way.

Let me explain.

We’ll begin with the ending - the post doc part - and work our way back to you.

Post Doc

A post doc is a training focused position available to those who already have a doctorate. Postdoc’s exist to bridge the gap between a student experience and a professional one. You are already a professional. You don’t need a bridge.

There could be some theories and an intellectual framework that inform how you live. You might want some time to extract what you know. It could be helpful to learn about what you’ve had to learn in order to get this far. Any fool knows that you can write a PhD about pretty much anything.

If everything is figureoutable, if Steve Jobs can drop out of school and end up changing the world as he did, figuring out what to do a PhD about and how to do it isn’t asking all that m…