Job Prospects for Graduate Students

 

This week's issue of Nature has two short articles on the future of science in the USA. The first one refers to Indentured Labour. It talks about the fact that the number of life science researchers in the universities (tenure and tenure-track) has leveled off at about 30,000 while the number of students earning degrees in the life sciences has doubled. The pejorative reference to graduate students as indentured labour is quite unnecessary. It declares a bias and prevents rational discussion.

The second article makes a similar point [More biologists but tenure stays static] about the job prospects of Ph.D. students.

Both Nature articles are based on statistics compiled by the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology (FASED). The original study can be found at [Education and Employment of Biological and Medical Scientists: Data from National Surveys]. The Nature articles have stimulated considerable debate on the blogosphere, See PZ's posting and the comments [The most daunting numbers I've seen yet].

Most of the postings have failed to ask the really hard questions so that's what I'm going to do. But first, let's look at the data from the powerpoint presentation on the FASEB site.

The first graph shows the number of Ph.D. graduates in life sciences over the past 40 years. The rate was about 4,000 per year throughout most of the 1980's then jumped up to about 6,000 per year in the late 1990's. Lately there has been a further increase to about 7,000 per year. Much of the increase is due to foreign students.


The second graph shows the increase in positions for researchers with a Ph.D. in life sciences. The number of jobs has almost tripled from 1973 to 2003. Most of the increase has been in industry as a result of the expansion of biotech firms. Most of the fuss is because the number of academic jobs seems to have flattened out at about 60,000. Of these, only 30,000 are tenure or tenure-stream positions. At our university the number of positions in hospital research institutes (non-tenured) has vastly outpaced the number on the campus (tenured) so this isn't a surprise to me.


One of the questions being debated is whether we should continue to graduate far more Ph.D's than the number of academic positions that need to be filled. The answer is yes and here's why.

Assuming (incorrectly) that our primary purpose in graduate education is to train our replacements and assuming (incorrectly) that all graduates want an academic position, we should still graduate more candidates than there are positions because we will want to choose the best candidates for a position and this means that there has to be a larger supply than the demand. How large should this supply be if we were to treat graduate students as a commodity? I don't know, maybe five or ten times the number of jobs?

Now, don't get me wrong. I'm not advocating that we behave this way. I'm simply pointing out to those who do want us to adopt this point of view that there should be many more Ph.D.'s than jobs. That's something that most people don't seem to understand. They seem to think that the number of Ph.D. graduate should approximate the number of jobs available. What this would mean in practice is that the selection for tenure-stream Professors would take place mostly on admission to graduate school and whatever happens afterwards is hardly relevant (i.e., no weeding out). (Some people even think that the candidates for tenure-stream positions are chosen from graduates of their own institutions. Those people are really out of touch.)

Is the "crisis" as serious as most people think? I don't believe it is for several reasons. First, many of the foreign students will return to their native countries. This means that the graduate students who are getting Ph.D.'s in America won't all be looking for jobs in America. Second, many students want to take jobs in industry because they pay better. They won't be competing for academic positions. Third, there's a considerable lag between the expansion of student numbers and the expansions of faculty. Many universities have plans for faculty expansion in the near future. Fourth, the steady-state level of faculty positions disguises the fact that faculty hired in the 1970's expansions are now retiring. Thus, for the short term there will be more new hiring than the graphs indicate.

But behind all this debate and discussion is a more serious issue. Why do students go to graduate school? Is it only because they want to be trained for a future job? Should Professors look upon every graduate student as a job trainee and behave accordingly? I'd like to think that there are still students out there who go to graduate school for the love of science. I did.

The graduate school experience is an end all by itself and not always a means to an end. Sure, it would be nice if things work out and the student gets a nice post-doc and an academic position—if that's what they want—but there's other things to do after graduate school. I've known lots of students who went into teaching, medicine, or law for example. I've known students who choose to be full-time parents even though they did well in graduate school and enjoyed the experience.

I'm very reluctant to fall into the mindset where I view every graduate student as a trainee for a job in industry and academia and not as a young inquisitive scientist. If Professors adopt the former mindset, and some do, then the goal of graduate research is not to answer important scientific questions but to churn out enough papers in respectable journals to ensure you get a good post-doc. The fact that this goal is sometimes compatible with the ambitions of the P.I. (more papers) makes for a deadly combination.

University of Toronto Professor in Space

 
That's astronaut Dave Williams on the right. He's a University of Toronto adjunct professor of surgery. According the the University of Toronto press release,Williams was a Professor here in emergency medicine until he was selected for the astronaut training program in 1992 [U of T professor to walk in space].

Virtual Toronto

 
Here's a site that combines an interactive map of Toronto with images from selected streets [Toronto Virtual City]. The photograph (left) shows the entrance to my building on the University of Toronto campus. The view is looking north from College St.

The satellite view is about two years old. It was taken when the new building was still under construction so the street level image doesn't match the satellite view.

Hmmm ... that reminds me. How come we don't see any more postings where we have to identify a university campus? I forgot which blog that was on.

[Hat Tip: Monado]

Circular University of Toronto

 
The main front campus of the University of Toronto is a popular place these days as parades of graduating students walk across it on their way to Convocation Hall.

This photograph was taken by Sam Javanrouh at daily dose of imagery [King's College Circle]. My building (Medical Sciences Building) is at 1 o'clock. The science library is at 10 o'clock and Convocation Hall is at 3 o'clock.

Hypothesis: A Journal for the Discussion of Science

 
Hypothesis is a journal for the the discussion of science [Hypothesis].

The journal is supported by the Department of Biochemistry, Department of Immunology, Department of Medical Biophysics, and Department of Medical Genetics & Microbiology at the University of Toronto. Most of the editors and contributers are graduate students in one of those departments. You may have heard about Hypothesis before if you read Eva Amsen's blog [easternblot]. She is one of the editors-in-chief.

The May 2007 issue contains several interesting articles and a provocative editorial on Food Science Gone Bad. Let me quote the last paragraph of the editorial in order to tempt you into reading the whole thing.

The fact that science is complicit in a food philosophy detrimental to public health presents an ethical dilemma for researchers. Whereas health products based on pseudoscience are reflexively disparaged among scientists, the use of nutrients to build healthy foods is seemingly founded in peer-reviewed research published in reputable journals. Scientists must address this problem by being vocal outside the scientific community, where journalists and product developers stretch the conclusions of nutritional studies well beyond their intended context. While it would be naïve to suggest that scientists ought to downplay the significance of their research, the ease with which research findings are misused implies a responsibility to demand balanced reporting. A more practical reason to speak out is that exaggeration in science journalism slowly erodes the credibility of the scientific enterprise in the public eye. Unfortunately, the promise of diet fads and myriad weight loss products makes it even harder to digest the sober truth about the scientific study of nutrition: progress is slow, true breakthroughs are rare, and you still have to eat your vegetables. [my emphasis, LAM]

Other articles are ...

North Carolina Science Blogging Conference. Eva Amsen

Environmental Factors can Modify Genotype Risks by Slight Changes in Protein Conformation: The Role of Water. Shahram Shahabi, Zuhair Muhammad Hassan, Nima Hosseini Jazani, and Massoumeh Ebtekar

Fun with Microarrays Part II: Data Analysis. Paul C. Boutros

Normalizing Endophenotypes of Schizophrenia: The Dip and Draw Hypothesis. Béchara J. Saab and John C. Roder

How to Get Into Medical School

 
Here's some advice on how to get into medical school here in Ontario. It includes tips on how to get into medicine at the University of Toronto [Medical School Applications].

How to Get Into Graduate School

 
Shelley Batts has all the right answers [Guide to Getting Into Graduate School for the Sciences]. You need to read her entire posting but here's the short version to tempt you ...

1. Spend your spare time doing research.
2. Cultivate awesome letters of recommendation.
3. Take the relevant classes, but have a few other interests too.
4. Have a reason why you want to do research.
5. Read the literature, know the basics, and a few tough surprising facts.
6. Know your interviewers, and their research.
7. Shell out the money for a GRE tutor if you are a nervous test-taker.
8. Apply to schools based on labs, not the US News and World Report Rankings.
9. Email professors you are interested in working with.
10. Follow the funding.
11. Good scientists don't always make good mentors.
12. Don't be afraid to get out if it isn't working.
13. Stand up for yourself, and keep at it.
14. Share most of your ideas, but keep a few to yourself.
15. Apply for NRSAs.
16. Be curious.
17. Know some science lineage.
18. Know who won the Nobels that year, in your field.
19. Email the students in the program, and in the lab.
20. Find out where/what students from that program are doing now.
21. No second-choices. Nothing but science will do.
22. Be professional, talk shop, ask what projects their students are doing.

Some of these only apply to Americans but on the whole it's excellent advice for everyone. Be sure to pay close attention to #21. Ignoring that advice is problably the second most common mistake that applicants ever make. The most common mistake is ignoring #2 or thinking that there's no relationship between #2 and #21.

Undegraduate Research Experience

 
The following press release appeared on EurekAlert [Students benefit from undergraduate research opportunities].

Students benefit from undergraduate research opportunities

Many pursue advanced degrees in science, technology, engineering and mathematics

Undergraduate students who participate in hands-on research are more likely to pursue advanced degrees and careers in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) fields, according to a new study.

The study's authors state that National Science Foundation (NSF) and other entities' efforts to encourage representation of underrepresented groups in STEM fields appear to be effective.

For example, students who entered 2-year colleges were as likely as those who entered 4-year colleges or universities to participate in research. And undergraduate researchers were more likely than non-researchers to pursue a doctorate.

"This study indicates that carefully designed undergraduate research experiences motivate students," said Myles Boylan, program director for NSF's Course, Curriculum and Laboratory Improvement Program in the Divisions of Undergraduate Education and Graduate Education. "Students consider their research experiences to be effective previews of doing STEM graduate work as well as good learning experiences."

Many of the talks and discussions at the recent Experimental Biology meeting in Washington focused on the value of the undergraduate research experience. There were a lot of talks noting the correlation between students who went on to graduate school and students who did an undergraduate research project. Most assumed that it was the undergraduate research experience that motivated students to apply to graduate school.

I'm a little disappointed in these claims. As a scientist, I'm well aware of the fact that a correlation does not prove a cause. In my school, the undergraduates know that you have to do an undergraduate research project in order to enhance your chances of getting into graduate school. Thus, students who are motivated to go to graduate school will choose to do an undergraduate reseach project. I'm not sure that the undergraduate research experience is what motivates students to apply to graduate school or whether it is the motivation to go to graduate school that causes students to choose an undergraduate research project.

In my experience, the undergraduate research project is a fourth (senior) year phenomenon. Usually the application to graduate school has to be sent in before Christmas and the GRE's have to be written long before that. To me this suggests that the motivation precedes the research experience but then I'm just a scientist. What do I know about these things?

Don't get me wrong, I think research experience is a wonderful thing. My concern is that its value is being hyped at the expense of other ways of acquiring knowledge and motivating students to pursue a career in science.

At the meeting, I attended ten different talks on undergraduate research. There wasn't a single talk about how to improve the teaching of basic concepts and principles in biochemistry and molecular biology. Is this a problem? You bet. Several of the speakers revealed some misunderstanding of those very concepts and principles. This leads me to suspect that they are concentrating too much on the "doing" of science and not enough on the understanding.

University Classes Doubled in Size when Grade 13 Was Abolished in Ontario

Friday's Urban Legend: FALSE

Back in the 20th century Ontario had a unique education system where students spent an extra year in high school. They didn't graduate until they had completed Grade 13.

This system was abolished in order to bring Ontario into line with the rest of the civilized world. There didn't seem to be any logical reason to force Ontario students to stay in high school for an extra year. When they entered university they ended up being a year older than students from every other country and every other province in Canada.

The new system began with an overhaul of the high school curriculum so that five years worth of material could be taught into four years. Some voluntary breadth courses were abandoned. On implementation day all students entering grade nine were going to graduate at the end of grade 12.

This created a double cohort of graduating students since those completing the new four year program were graduating at the same time as the class ahead of them who were the last to finish grade 13. Naturally, the universities in Ontario were expected to accommodate the double cohort so that students in the first year of the new system would not be penalized. It was widely believed that the "double cohort" really meant there would be twice as many students entering university at some point.

Newspapers published articles about the double cohort as though the class sizes would double. Parents believed that classes would double in size and so did students. Even today, after we have seen the result, it is still widely believed that there were twice as many students in the double cohort year.

It never happened. The universities knew that their enrolment would not double and they published lots of data to explain why. As it turned out they were right and they publicized that too. Still the myth persists. An article in this week's Toronto Star show how little we've learned (see below the fold).

Let's start with a little quiz. Here's some data on the size of first year science classes at the University of Toronto. The red bars represent students enrolled in our first year biology class. Green is for chemistry, blue is calculus, and yellow is physics. I haven't told you when the so-called "double" cohort entered university. See if you can guess by looking at the data.


The double cohort class entered university in the Fall of 2003. The universities predicted that class sizes in that year would increase by about 20-25% over those of the previous years. They also predicted that class sizes would remain at that level for several years. The double cohort hit universities at the same time that applications were expanding because of the echo boom and because of increases in participation rates. The chart below shows the increase in university students throughout Canada over the past decade. You can see that the numbers grew from 2000 to 2005 and this has nothing to do with the double cohort in Ontario. Even without a double cohort there was a predicted increase in enrolment during this time frame.

Why was the "double cohort" increase only 25% and not 100%? There are many reasons but the most obvious one is that universities attract students from all over Canada and from many foreign countries as well. The double cohort only affected graduates from Ontario high schools. If only half the students at the University of Toronto are from Ontario, for example, then the expected increase would only be 50% assuming that the double cohort really was twice the size and assuming that all qualified applicants were accepted.

The reason it was less than that had to do with other, predicted, events. First, a significant number of students in the last year of the five year program were allowed to "fast-track" in order to finish in four years and get ahead of the double cohort. A significant number of students in the first year of the new four year program took an extra year in order to fall behind the double cohort. Many more students than normal in the double cohort went to universities in other provinces.

Let's look closely at the actual numbers by normalizing the class size to that of 1997-98.


Now we see that the largest increase was in 2002-03, the year before the double cohort entered university. This increase is entirely due to expanded enrolment in anticipation of further increases that are due to increased participation. It had the added benefit of accommodating the fast-trackers. The actual enrolment increase in the double cohort year was only 10-15% higher than that in the previous year and it was less than the numbers in the following year. This is an important point. The real increase in that particular year (2003-04) was no more than 20% and in most cases was considerably less. Part of the increase (about 20%) in this period was due to demographic factors unrelated to the double cohort as demonstrated in the chart for Canada as a whole.

This brings me to the Toronto Star article [Double cohort graduating again].

There was much concern when the last Grade 13s and the first graduating-year Grade 12s combined to create the largest group to finish high school en masse in the province's history.

The decision was designed to cut public education costs and bring Ontario in line with the rest of the continent, where 12 grades were already the norm, but it left educators facing serious challenges.

Would universities and colleges have enough staff and classroom space? What about residences? Would crowded schools affect the quality of education? Would thousands of students fall through the cracks just because they happened to be born in the wrong year?

Four years later, the Ontario government is again straining to accommodate the double cohort. Apart from concern about a flood of entries to the labour force, the province has to provide an extra $240 million a year to create 14,000 graduate school spaces by 2009.

The Star interviewed three students. I'd like to quote the remarks on one of them in order to illustrate the double cohort mythology.

As part of the double cohort's older half, Allard regrets not having fast-tracked her way through high school.

"In high school, I thought it was no big deal. Now I've come to realize that for the rest of my life, this group is going to follow me wherever I go. Whether it's grad school, medical school or work, there will be twice as many people trying to do everything I'm trying to do. If I'd fast-tracked, I could have gone to university a year earlier."

As a double cohort student, I presume Allard was interested in the numbers. She probably read the predictions and she probably read about the actual increase in class size. I can't imagine that she didn't. At some point she must have been exposed to the fact that her class was less than 20% larger than the one ahead of her and smaller than the one behind her.

She has just spent four years in university were one hopes she learned how to think critically. She must have noticed that her classes weren't twice as large as other classes. So why does she say that she will always be competing with twice as many people? I can't help but feel that we've failed to do a good job of educating if there are so many out there who believe in things that are easily refuted by facts and observations.

Young will graduate with a degree in political science from the University of Western Ontario next month. A good student in high school, he had no trouble getting into his university of choice. In fact, he liked being in the double cohort.

"It was fun," he says. "I was in the younger year of the cohort, so I got to spend my year with twice as many students, and half of them were older than me."

Hmmm ... one wonders just how much attention he was paying in class. A good many of his classmates were not from Ontario so they were the same age. The class was only 20% bigger than the previous class so where did he get the idea that there were twice as many students?

Young's plans were also affected by the double cohort. Had it not been for the increased competition for graduate school positions, he says he likely would have continued his education.

"In a different year, I probably would have worked a bit, then considered getting my master's, which would have helped me land the kind of job I want."

The data is clear. His "competition" is no greater than most other years. This is because the actual increase in the graduating class this year will be less than 20% and the number of graduate positions has increased significantly. We must not have done a good job of teaching critical thinking in this case either. Maybe it's not a requirement in political science?

Thanks to Brenda Bradshaw in our office for gettng some of the data on very short notice.

Ann Coulter Finally Gets Something Right

 
A Gentleman's C (love that title!) quotes Ann Coulter from her book Godless,

...Professors are the most cosseted, pussified, subsidized group of people in the U.S. workforce. They have concocted a system to preemptively protect themselves for not doing their jobs, known as "tenure." They make a lot of money, have health plans that would make New York City municipal workers' jaws drop, and work -- at most -- fifteen hours a week.

At last she gets something right ... or almost right. Well ... maybe a little bit right.

Tenure doesn't protect us from not doing our jobs, it protects us when we're doing our jobs. If you don't do your job you're going to lose it and tenure won't, and shouldn't, protect you. Tenure means that if Ann Coulter were a Professor she couldn't be fired for being such an ass, as long as she works hard at it. But that's a minor difference. For Ann Coulter, being 180° wrong is close enough.

Some Professors make a lot of money, but only when they get old. Most Professors make far less than they could if they were in the private sector. Some make less than a high school teacher. But that's a minor discrepancy. Ann Coulter is probably not familiar with how the real world lives.

Canadian Professors have a good health plan. But that's not very special since all Canadians have a good health plan. It's one of the benefits of living in a civilized society. Ann Coulter ought to try it sometime. Maybe she should move to Great Britain or Australia. They are pro-war staunch American allies. She'd like it there.

As for workload, I checked with my colleagues and they all agree that 15 hours a day is too much. The average seems to be closer to 10-11 hours a day during the week and another 10 or so hours on the weekend. The total comes out to about 60 hours. In this case Ann was being too generous. Professors put in a lot of hours but 15 hours per day is not sustainable over the long haul.

[Hat Tip: John Lynch]

Centre for Inquiry

 
Visit the Centre for Inquiry, Ontario. The new facility is just two blocks south of the main University of Toronto campus, and just a short walk from my office.

The grand opening is this Saturday night. I know you've got nothing better to do on Saturday night (the Brier semi-finals are in the afternoon) so come on out and help them get the ball rolling.

Don't forget to keep Thursday, March 22nd free for "God and Evolution."

The Evolution of the HSP70 Gene Family

Here's a picture of my three second year project students in front of their poster. Blerta Kolaj, Milu Jauregui, and Zarna Shah collaborated on this project to study the evolution of various members of the HSP70 gene family.

Eukaryotes contain at at least five or six versions of HSP70 genes. Two of them are present in single copies (mostly) and they were present in the common ancestor of all eukaryotes. One of these is the mitochondrial version, which is derived from the proteobacterium ancestor of mitochondria. The other is a version found in the endoplasmic reticulum (ER). The ER member of the HSP70 gene family (=BiP) arose very early in eukaryotic evolution.

A phylogenetic tree of either the mitochondrial gene or the ER gene should reveal the evolution of all eukaryotic species. The two trees should be identical provided the genes evolve independently and there has been no horizontal gene transfer. Furthermore, the two trees will root each other since they join at a common ancestral node representing the split between eukaryotes and prokaryotes. The purpose of the experiment is to test this hypothesis and see if we have enough examples of ER and mitochondrial genes to make duplicate trees. The problem is that we need an example of each gene in every species we test. The fact that we now have quite a few genome sequences means that this has become more feasible than in the past.

Blerta, Milu, and Zarna were able to add in one more set of sequences; the chloroplast members of the HSP70 gene family. These genes are derived from the cyanobacteria ancestor of chloroplasts so they provide independent confirmation of the eukaryotic tree for plants and algae. Unfortunately, there aren't very many examples of species that have sequenced versions of the chloroplast gene, the mitochondrial gene, and the ER gene.

Here's the tree.

As you can see, the relationship of most species (actually genes) in the mitochondrial and ER branches is very similar. This confirms that the two family members are evolving independently. Differences occur with the protists such as trypanosomes, Leishmania, plasmodia, and cryptosporidium. This is unfortunate since analysis of HSP70 genes could have helped resolve the relationship of protists, which is very controversial. At least we're sure of the roots of each major branch—that's a big step forward.

The chloroplast and mitochondrial clades are closer together than either is to the eukaryotic ER versions of the HSP70 family. This is not unexpected since both organelle genes are prokaryotic in origin. It suggests that the universal root is along the branch leading to the ER clade.

Now my students have to turn their attention to their individual projects. They have about six weeks to finish up. I'll post summaries of their work in May. I'm pretty excited about all three projects, we could end up answering some pretty important questions using the HSP70 database.

Peter McKnight on the Marcus Ross Issue

 
One week ago I commented on an opinion piece in the Vancouver Sun. Peter McKnight wrote in support of giving Marcus Ross a Ph.D. in geosciences. I disagreed (Peter McKnight of the Vancouver Sun Weighs in on the Marcus Ross Incident).

I sent Peter a link to my blog and he replied. We've exchanged emails. I then asked permission to post his original message to see what kind of feedback it gets here. Peter has just given permission so here is his letter.

Hi Larry,

Thanks for notifying me of this. It is a worthwhile discussion you're having, but I still don't agree with you.

You say there's plenty of evidence there is something wrong with Ross's science, but you fail to say what that evidence is. Indeed, what you're really saying is that there's something wrong with him - that is, with his belief.

This might be, but it doesn't mean there's anything wrong with his science or his understanding of science. You say doctoral students must understand basic concepts and ideas and think on their feet and defend their ideas etc. Where is the evidence that Ross failed to do so? I assume he did exactly that in his oral exam.

It seems that you want nothing less than Ross's assent to an old Earth theory, which is, of course, a matter of belief, not understanding. And rather than launching into a discussion of epistemic conditions for belief, let me just say that I, for example, understand intelligent design theory quite well I think, and yet I don't believe a word of it.

And one need not be a postmodern relativist or a fundamentalist Christian (which, I've argued for a long time, amount to the same thing) to refuse to accept that that scientific theories are literally true - if by true we mean correspondent with reality. There are, after all, pragmatist philosophies of science that suggest scientific theories are "true" in so far as they work, but that they aren't true in the sense most people give to that term. I assume you reject these philosophies of science, but surely you wouldn't deny a student a doctorate because he doesn't subscribe to the correspondence theory of truth.

Look, I think Ross is dishonest, but I don't know that for a fact. For all I know, maybe he really is a radical relativist, who believes science and religion present two incommensurable paradigms. But either way, he's doing enormous damage to his religion, and it was the point of my column to make that case.

Best,

Peter

An American Rhodes Scholar in Biochemistry

 
Nick Anthis at The Scientific Activist writes about the Rhodes Scholar experience in Oxford [It's OK to Nibble, but Don't Bite Off the Hand that Feeds You]. He discusses an important point, namely the push to finish a Ph.D. in only three years. Is this in the best interests of biochemistry graduate students in general and Rhodes Scholars in particular? I think not, and so does Nick Anthis.

President of University of Toronto Receives Order of Canada

 
David Naylor is the President of the University of Toronto. He's one of the best Presidents we've had for several decades. A few weeks ago he received the Order of Canada in recognition of his work in Medicine and the University.

That's our Governor General Michaelle Jean beside him in the picture. As the Queen's representative in Canada she is our Head of State. The awards ceremony was at her house, Rideau Hall, in Ottawa.

It's comforting to know that Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper can't do a lot of damage to the country as long as Michaelle Jean is Governor General and the Rt. Hon. Chief Justice of Canada is Beverley McLachlin.

More on the Marcus Ross Case

 
Read what Janet Stemwedel has to say in Scientific and unscientific conclusions: now with pictures!.

It's going to take me a while to figure out how to respond but I think she's make a big step toward clarifying the issue. What it boils down to is this. Is it possible to be a scientist and hold "beliefs" that flatly contradict scientific evidence? Janet suggests that it is possible because your "beliefs" can be entirely separated from doing good science.

But, it seems to me that the aim of the scientific enterprise is to find ways to draw inferences that move beyond the beliefs of any individual scientist. Leaving the "belief" boxes out of the flowchart doesn't seem to remove any of the steps required for building sound scientific conclusions. Scientific conclusions may well affect the belief structures of individual scientists, but that's a matter of their own personal growth, not required step in the construction of the shared body scientific knowledge.

I wonder if this point of view can be extended to philosophy? Janet talks about Popper in her posting. She doesn't mention Kuhn. Lets imagine a philosophy student who is preparing a thesis in epistemology. Assume that the student writes all the right things about Popper and Kuhn in her thesis. Assume that this students then gives public lectures where she claims that Popper advocated scientific revolutions and Kuhn was really a proponent of falsifiability. In other words, points of view that are contrary to fact.

Is it fair to ask this student about her "beliefs" during her Ph.D. oral? Is it fair to say that she is a good philosopher as long as she keeps her strange contrary-to-fact beliefs separate from the work she does on campus?

Peter McKnight of the Vancouver Sun Weighs in on the Marcus Ross Incident

 
Peter McKnight wrote a column in the Vancouver Sun ['Young Earth' creationist stirs a scholarly storm]. He makes a number of points but I'll confine my comments to those that have a direct bearing on the awarding of a geology Ph.D. to someone who believes the Earth is only 10,000 years old. Read more about my position on this issues at [What Is Science].

Ross's advisers described his work as "impeccable" and they therefore had no reason to deny him his doctorate. But many other scientists, including physical anthropologist and U.S. National Center for Science Education executive director Eugenie Scott, have expressed concern that Ross would use his doctorate from a secular school "to miseducate the public."

I don’t know what motivates Eugenie Scott but I want to make it clear that this is not something I’m the least bit concerned about. Once a student is awarded a Ph.D. they are perfectly free to do and say whatever they want. I will not deny a student a Ph.D. simply because of what I think they might say once they graduate. What I'm concerned about is awarding the degree in the first place.

Furthermore, the fact that his former advisers saw nothing wrong with what they did is part of the problem. You can't use the fact that they gave him the degree as proof that there was nothing wrong with the process. That's a circular argument.

Scott claims that refusing to admit a doctoral candidate like Ross, whose views "are so at variance with what we consider standard science," would be acceptable because it would amount to discrimination "on the basis of science" rather than because of his personal beliefs.

While Scott's concerns are understandable given that Ross has already appeared in a video promoting the anti-evolution theory of intelligent design, there's no evidence that there is anything wrong with his science.

It's apparent, then, that Ross's personal beliefs really are the issue here.

I disagree with Peter McKnight. There is plenty of evidence that something is seriously wrong with the science of someone who believes that the Earth is only 10,000 years old. McKnight, like many others, seems to think that the only thing that counts in a Ph.D. program is what’s written down in a thesis. Not true. Students are also questioned about their understanding of basic concepts and ideas in their chosen field of study. We don’t award Ph.D.’s to students who can’t think on their feet and defend their ideas in an intellectual environment.

We know that Marcus Ross has a flawed understanding of the science of geology and for this reason he does not deserve a Ph.D. in geosciences. We also know that Ross’s flawed understanding is derived from his Christian fundamentalist beliefs. It may seem silly to deny that Ross is not being discriminated against because of his religion but that’s the truth. He should have been discriminated against because of his stupidity and not directly because of his religion.

Does this mean that Ross’s “personal beliefs” are really the issue as Peter McKnight suggests. Well, yes, if by personal beliefs you mean what someone is thinking. When I flunk an undergraduate for not understanding the material in my biochemistry course then I’m definitely making their “personal belief” the issue. What else could it be? Let’s not confuse the examination of a student’s personal understanding of the material with the “personal belief” canard that raises the specter of religious discrimination.

That said, Ross's views present an even greater challenge to religion than to academic institutions. After all, there are only two ways to explain how Ross can simultaneously subscribe to two incompatible belief systems, and neither way is particularly palatable: Either Ross is dishonest, with little interest in witnessing what he believes to be the truth, or he is a relativist, with no belief in truth at all.

As for being dishonest: If, as he claims, Ross really believes in the Biblical account of creation, then he must also believe that many of the statements in his dissertation are patently false. If the world really is less than 10,000 years old, then mosasaurs couldn't have disappeared 65 million years ago, which means Ross doesn't believe what he wrote.

Ross is cagey on this issue, as he essentially dodged the issue by telling the Times, "I did not imply or deny any endorsement of the dates." This suggests a kind of agnosticism, and leads to the second way of explaining his incompatible beliefs.

I disagree. To me the evidence is strongly in favor of outright deception and not “no belief in the truth at all.” Ross fully intended to misrepresent his beliefs in his thesis, and perhaps during the oral exam as well. I’m pretty certain that Ross has created a rationalization in his own mind that justifies this form of cognitive dissonance. In other words, Ross probably doesn’t think that he’s being deceitful—but that’s only because he has taken the time to deceive himself first.

And now it seems that young Earth creationists want a piece of the action. Ross's insistence that there is no conflict between his paleontological and Scriptural beliefs, because he is capable of "separating the different paradigms," reveals that he is a true believer in the Kuhnian revolution.

But he must then necessarily cease to be a true believer in another very important sense. In accepting that Scripture merely presents one paradigm among many, and that the claims in the Bible are therefore no more or less true than the claims made in any other paradigm, Ross must abandon the belief that the Bible speaks the Truth -- not just the truth relative to a specific conceptual framework, but the truth that exists always and everywhere.

I realize that the logic here seems impeccable, but only if you make the assumption that Ross is speaking the truth when he talks of different paradigms. We all know that the assumption is overly gratuitous. In Ross’s mind there’s only one truth and everything else is false.

[Hat Tip: John Pieret]

Some People Defend Lying for Jesus

 
Judging by the number of different opinions on the Marcus Ross case, there appear to be a variety of standards for the Ph.D. degree at different universities. Several bloggers think that it's okay to lie in your thesis about which scientific facts you accept and which ones you reject.

The University of Toronto has a Code of Behaviour on Academic Matters that specifies how students and teachers are supposed to behave in an academic environment. Here's part of the preamble,

What distinguishes the University from other centres of research is the central place which the relationship between teaching and learning holds. It is by virtue of this relationship that the University fulfils an essential part of its traditional mandate from society, and, indeed, from history: to be an expression of, and by so doing to encourage, a habit of mind which is discriminating at the same time as it remains curious, which is at once equitable and audacious, valuing openness, honesty and courtesy before any private interest.

This mandate is more than a mere pious hope. It represents a condition necessary for free enquiry, which is the University's life blood. Its fulfilment depends upon the well being of that relationship whose parties define one another's roles as teacher and student, based upon differences in expertise, knowledge and experience, though bonded by respect, by a common passion for truth and by mutual responsibility to those principles and ideals that continue to characterize the University.

This Code is concerned, then, with the responsibilities of faculty members and students, not as they belong to administrative or professional or social groups, but as they cooperate in all phases of the teaching and learning relationship.

Such cooperation is threatened when teacher or student forsakes respect for the other—and for others involved in learning—in favour of self-interest, when truth becomes a hostage of expediency. On behalf of teacher and student and in fulfilment of its own principles and ideals, the University has a responsibility to ensure that academic achievement is not obscured or undermined by cheating or misrepresentation, that the evaluative process meets the highest standards of fairness and honesty, and that malevolent or even mischievous disruption is not allowed to threaten the educational process.

Call me old-fashioned, but I believe in those values. I believe that truth and honesty are essential requirements in a university environment. I believe that freedom of enquiry is threatened when a student misrepresents the truth and makes it hostage to expediency. I believe that students who violate the fundamentals of a university should not graduate, especially with the highest degree that the university can offer (Ph.D.).

Jason Rosenhouse put up a message on EVOLUION BLOG [Why is This in the New York Times?]. Jason says,

This is a complete non-story. By all accounts Ross produced competent scientific work. That he was effectively an actor playing a character reflects very badly on him, but does not reflect badly on URI. If he chooses to use his degree to lend credibility to asinine religious ideas that's his business. The rest of us will have to settle for bashing him for the things he now does. It's not the job of URI, or any other university, to pass judgment on the religious views of others.

It's not the job of a university to discriminate on the basis of religious beliefs. However, it is the job of a university to uphold minimal standards of honesty and accuracy. Ross misrepresents his position when he writes about 65 million year old fossils in his thesis. He doesn't believe that any of those fossils are more than a few thousand years old. He can't honestly discuss explanations for the extinction of marine reptiles at the end of the Cretaceous without revealing that he rejects any explanation that dates this event to the ancient past.

But apparently that's exactly what he didn't do. He misrepresented his true scientific opinion in his thesis. He did this deliberately because he knew that telling the truth in his thesis would probably mean it would be rejected.

John Pieret says,

Some people have questioned whether such a person is engaging either in a mammoth mental disconnect or deliberate deception and, in turn, whether he should be awarded the Ph.D. I think that that is a dangerously slippery slope to climb onto, given the relative risk posed.

The difference between "mammoth mental disconnect" and "deliberate deception" isn't as great as you might imagine. It only requires that before deceiving others you take the time to deceive yourself. In either case the candidate is guilty of stupidity for not accepting the scientific evidence and deception for hiding it. Universities should not award Ph.D.'s to students who are either stupid or intellectually dishonest; and they should definitely not award advanced degrees to students who are both.

This is a slippery slope. It's only asking for trouble when we excuse stupidity and dishonesty because it's part of a religious belief. You don't deserve a free pass through a university just because you get your ignorance from the Bible. Religious students should be subjected to the same rigorous standards as all other students.

No atheist student would get a Ph.D. in paleontology if he rejected all the evidence for an ancient Earth and claimed that our planet was built by aliens 10,000 years ago, and all species were created in just a few days. Such a student would be laughed out of the Ph.D. oral exam—if he ever got to it.

Lying for Jesus

 
Today's New York Times has an article about Marcus R. Ross [Believing Scripture but Playing by Science’s Rules]. Ross teaches earth science at Liberty University. He is a Young Earth Creationist who believes that the Earth is less than ten thousand years old.

Marcus Ross recently obtained his Ph.D. in paleontology from the University of Rhode Island and there's the rub. According to his supervisors, his thesis was very good—it analyzed the extinction of marine reptiles 65 million years ago.

How can Ross reconcile the thesis work with his belief that the Earth is less that 10,000 years old? Here's how,

For him, Dr. Ross said, the methods and theories of paleontology are one “paradigm” for studying the past, and Scripture is another. In the paleontological paradigm, he said, the dates in his dissertation are entirely appropriate. The fact that as a young earth creationist he has a different view just means, he said, “that I am separating the different paradigms.”

He likened his situation to that of a socialist studying economics in a department with a supply-side bent. “People hold all sorts of opinions different from the department in which they graduate,” he said. “What’s that to anybody else?”

Whoa! Let's unpack that statement and see where it takes us.

First, the analogy to differing points of view in an economics department is entirely specious. Capitalism and socialism are both valid positions on a controversial topic. The issue about which view is correct hasn't been settled—pehaps neither one is correct. If a socialist graduate student were to defend a thesis in front of a group of capitalist Professors, you'd expect some tough questions. The student would be expected to defend her point of view in a rational manner with evidence and facts to back up the argument.

The same thing would happen if the student was a supply-sider and the Professors were Marxists. In neither case would the student be in danger of failing just because she disagreed with her Professors. As a matter of fact, the Marxist Professors would be just as hard on a Marxist student. That's what Ph.D. orals are all about. If you can't think straight then you don't get a Ph.D., but there are many perfectly valid ways of thinking in economics.

Now, what would happen if a known Marxist student tried to deceive the Ph.D. oral committee by pretending to be a capitalist? The goal is to appease the Professors by telling them what they (presumably) want to hear, in order to get the Ph.D. That student would fail, I hope. Universities are no place for lies and deceit. You must stand up for what you believe and learn to defend it in an academic context. Otherwise, you don't deserve a Ph.D.

Marcus Ross thinks it's okay to write a thesis about 65 million year old reptiles when, in fact, he doesn't believe a word of it. He justifies this by referring to "different paradigms." Apparently, there's one kind of "paradigm" when you are trying to get your Professors to give you a Ph.D. and another kind of "paradigm" at all other times. This is just a euphemism for "lying." In this case, it's lying for Jesus.

If I had been on the Ph.D. oral exam, I would have honed in on the discrepancy between the dates in the thesis and the known beliefs of Marcus Ross. It is not intellectually honest to write something in a thesis that you "know" to be incorrect. I would want to know what Ross means when he writes that his marine reptiles went extinct 65 million years ago and I would expect an answer that's not intended to deceive me. If I'm not convinced, he doesn't get a "yes" vote from me no matter what the thesis says.

[Hat Tip: RichardDawkins.net]

Tuition

 
Hundreds of students turned out yesterday for a rally at Queen's Park (Ontario Parliament Buildings). Many of the students marched from the University of Toronto campus and they waited in the freezing cold for more than an hour before the contingent from Ryerson marched along College St. and up University Ave. to join them.

Like most Professors, I want tuition to be as low as possible because education is a right. The government of Ontario should at the very least hold the current tuition at its present level for the foreseeable future. It should increase direct funding to the universities to maintain quality and allow for expansion.

The long-term goal should be to provide free education to all qualified students.