And whither the PhD - are they any good?

Did you have a nice PhD? I never did one myself, so I would not know. There was a discussion in the Guardian today by an Alex someone, I am sure he will forgive me because I gave him the address of this blog. I am not wishing to insult him. I am here on a frolic of my very own. Whither the PhD, what use was it and what flavour was your one?

What is the use of a PhD. It is designed to show that you can research a subject in depth and come up with something original at the end of it. Thats wonderful if you are going to produce a new Beecham's poweder, or something but even then you would probably just produce that. All that a PhD seems to me to be is the result of sitting around musty old referemce libraries and study centres for about three years, writing 50,000 words of what, at the end of the day, might be utter drivel.

Worthy though a lot of academic enterprise is, in this way, it hardly matters because mostly nobody is going to read your stuff about "How many Angels can dance on the top on a pin". It does not move the human predicament on one iota. There are so many things that Universities can do and so many things that researchers can do but sanctioning drivel and turgid writings about lacklustre subjects should not really number among them.

It has been said to me in the Guardian blogging that really what the PhD is about should be teaching. Question is to my mind, is it really even about that? Just because universities (and now even colleges of further education) put a PhD in the person specification does not mean that they mean anything.

If anything, I would prefer that the Doctorate was reformed so that anyone with two degrees could have one. That does not count me in of course because I boast only a Diploma in English Law (Open University) and an Honours Degree in Accounting, so only 480 CATs points there, I am afraid. Then we must look at my 240 CATs points towards my Open Degree! So ever so nearly there! Anyway, look at your average GP. He has two degrees, such as: Bachelor of Medicine, Bachelor of Surgery. He has earned his flying colours but has done something useful with it. Yet we dont say that he has to have a PhD to earn the epithet "Doctor".

Or maybe we could confer the "Doctorate" title on someone who has got one BA amd one MA? I only throw this out as a spur to the Universities maybe reforming this lacklustre form of learning! Lets take this out of the dark ages; I have to admit that most people who are doing a range of subjects at University or have one or two degrees are at least as worthy as those doing the PhD. Research is one thing; gibberish is another. We need to separate research out from the PhD. Keep the former and do away with the latter. Cheers.