Nobody Cares: PRS

[Dakota Tebaldi]

Honestly....the existence of the "Master's degree" has always puzzled me a little. Like why would you get a Master's rather than a PhD, in a field where both are available? Yes, I know the Master's is only one year as opposed to the PhD's two....but is there really a tangible benefit to taking it over one more year of school? What kind of employer, who is specifically looking for a post-grad with a specialization, is going to hire a Master's over a PhD?

I have the same conceptual problem with B.A.s in hard sciences like like physics or geology, where the B.S. is more valuable in every single way. What kind of a job that's actually within the sphere of geology, for instance, wants someone who's essentially saying "I liked geology enough to take a couple of classes about it but not enough to become a fully trained geologist"?

 

[Bartholomew Gallacher]

Unforeseen consequence of the chip crisis: Intel wants to buy Globalfoundries for around 30 billion US$. Globalfoundries is an per order chip maker like also TSMC or Samsung.

This is quite ironic given the history of Globalfoundries: back in the early 2000s when AMD was running short on money, AMD outsourced all of their chip fabs into that company and sold it. Back then nobody considered GF to be a competitor to Intel or TSMC. So when Intel now wants to buy this company, they are mostly buying the old chip fab branch of AMD.

Intel in talks to buy GlobalFoundries for about $30 billion - WSJ

Intel Corp (INTC.O) is in talks to buy semiconductor manufacturer GlobalFoundries Inc for about $30 billion, the Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday, citing people familiar with the matter.

www.reuters.com

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Honestly....the existence of the "Master's degree" has always puzzled me a little. Like why would you get a Master's rather than a PhD, in a field where both are available? Yes, I know the Master's is only one year as opposed to the PhD's two....but is there really a tangible benefit to taking it over one more year of school? What kind of employer, who is specifically looking for a post-grad with a specialization, is going to hire a Master's over a PhD?

I have the same conceptual problem with B.A.s in hard sciences like like physics or geology, where the B.S. is more valuable in every single way. What kind of a job that's actually within the sphere of geology, for instance, wants someone who's essentially saying "I liked geology enough to take a couple of classes about it but not enough to become a fully trained geologist"?

It's a bit different in the UK, where a PhD is a pure research degree, but I think the idea is that a lot of people want to study a particular area of a discipline in more detail than is possible at the undergraduate level but don't want to undertake a major research project over several years.

That's particularly the case in the US, I think, where undergraduate degrees are, by design, far more generalist than they are in the UK (and, I think, elsewhere in Europe, too, but I'm not at all sure), and there's a real need for something to bridge the gap between (e.g.) a US Batchelor's degree with a major in English or Engineering and a British university's BA or BSc honours degree, where you typically spend three years studying one particular discipline and little outside it.

Masters' degrees are, it seems to me, a far more preferable qualification to the alterative of being a Ph D candidate ABD (all but dissertation).

 

[Veritable Quandry]

The type of Masters the tweet is talking about seem to be the kind that you get when a job requires "any Masters degree." Many of those programs really are exchanging money for a diploma that confers vague career advantages.

However there are some Masters programs that are more specifically career focused. As Inulla pointed out, most US undergrad degrees are intentionally broad (although some are not, I would say Engineering and Computer Science are closer to European equilants). So a Masters in a discipline puts the professional knowledge on top of the broader academic degrees.

For example, I have a Masters in Museum Science, which focused on the care of collections and museum theory, as well as a Masters in Public Administration which is in many ways similar to a Masters in Business Administration except it replaces courses in Economics with Political Science. Mrs Quandry has a Masters in Literature, which allowed her to teach college level courses, and a Masters in Libraries and Information Systems, which is required for most mid to senior library positions.

I actually have a third Masters, but it is an "in progress" degree that some PhD programs award to students who have completed their coursework and comprehensive exams so that they have an alternative to the ABD designation.

 

[Beebo Brink]

I have a less well recognized degree called an EdS -- specialist in education -- which is basically a Masters plus doctoral work, but without the dissertation. I was mostly just killing time by studying so I could put off making Life Decisions. This was back in the day when you could do grad work without going into debt.

This degree landed me a job in school administration, as staff of an audio-visual education dept. (my specialty). After a year I went in another direction, so I never really used it. But I can't say I regretted it either. These days, however, the cost would not have been worth the return, but I probably wouldn't have gotten a BA under current conditions either.

 

[Argent Stonecutter]

How the fuck can they call something a masters that doesn't build on a four year bachelor's? How is that even legal?

Honestly....the existence of the "Master's degree" has always puzzled me a little. Like why would you get a Master's rather than a PhD, in a field where both are available? Yes, I know the Master's is only one year as opposed to the PhD's two....but is there really a tangible benefit to taking it over one more year of school?

Actual Masters degrees can be two years or more, and Doctorates can take a good deal more than that. Doctorates are supposed to represent original research in a field of study, not just a certain amount of advanced study in a subject like a Masters.

Source: No degree because I basically ignored the breadth requirements for a Bachelor's because I was probably not ready for college and my faculty advisor literally hated dealing with undergrads and signed off on anything including the interesting graduate courses I selected and didn't bother to tell me I actually had to take that humanities bullshit.

 

[danielravennest]

Honestly....the existence of the "Master's degree" has always puzzled me a little. Like why would you get a Master's rather than a PhD, in a field where both are available? Yes, I know the Master's is only one year as opposed to the PhD's two....but is there really a tangible benefit to taking it over one more year of school? What kind of employer, who is specifically looking for a post-grad with a specialization, is going to hire a Master's over a PhD?

I have the same conceptual problem with B.A.s in hard sciences like like physics or geology, where the B.S. is more valuable in every single way. What kind of a job that's actually within the sphere of geology, for instance, wants someone who's essentially saying "I liked geology enough to take a couple of classes about it but not enough to become a fully trained geologist"?

I had a friend who was a mission controller for the Voyager spacecraft. He had a B.S. in poetry from MIT, while I have a B.A. in physics from Columbia. We used to joke about swapping diplomas. A bachelor's is a bachelor's. Some colleges only award one kind. Others award different kinds depending on the major field of study.

A Ph.D. can take 3-5 years, and some people are not suited to doing original research, which is supposed to be a requirement for a doctorate. I stopped with a bachelor's because I did the math. Starting salaries for a Masters in the aerospace field I wanted to work in were higher. But working for a year both brings in income, and likely a raise, so the pay differential was small. Going to school for an extra year would not only lose a year of income, but add a year of college costs. I wouldn't have caught up for a long time.

As far as employers and hiring, at least in my field, if you had an advanced degree in a relevant subject, you could get a higher starting offer, but if you had some years of experience you could also get a higher starting offer. Who they then hired depended on what they needed at the time - warm bodies or particular skills.

 

[Essence Lumin]

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Evernote link because why not

 

[Cindy Claveau]

Honestly....the existence of the "Master's degree" has always puzzled me a little. Like why would you get a Master's rather than a PhD, in a field where both are available? Yes, I know the Master's is only one year as opposed to the PhD's two....but is there really a tangible benefit to taking it over one more year of school? What kind of employer, who is specifically looking for a post-grad with a specialization, is going to hire a Master's over a PhD?

My Master's is in English, which was pretty much a requirement to get into education administration at the time. (Turned out to be the most worthless degree ever invented if you never teach, but I'm ok now). Considering the salaries of teachers and educational administrators, why would I want to invest another 4 or more years (not 1) to get my PhD? I weighed the overall time investment, realistic benefits and also wanting to start a family. "Doctor Cindy" sounds so cool, but it would have been a diploma too far for me.

 

[Cindy Claveau]

Trump Said He Thinks He Could Have Beaten George Washington In An Election

Former President Donald Trump told the authors of a new book that he believes he would have had a good chance of winning a presidential election against George Washington, even with Abraham Lincoln as Washington’s running mate.

Trump made the outlandish observation as he indicated that his re-election in 2020 was inevitable had it not been for the COVID-19 pandemic — which appears to contradict his comments about a “rigged” election.



“I think it would be hard if George Washington came back from the dead and he chose Abraham Lincoln as his vice-president, I think it would have been very hard for them to beat me,” Trump told Washington Post reporters Philip Rucker and Carol Leonnig, they recount in their new book “I Alone Can Fix It.”


The twice-impeached former president was recently ranked nearly at the bottom of the pack of America’s presidents — 41st — in a survey of historians across the nation. Abraham Lincoln ranked first, and Washington came in second.

Trump’s favorability polls while he was in office were lackluster at best. His full four-year average of approval in Gallup polls was 41% — four points lower than any other president since polling began, NPR noted.


A Guardian review of the book on Saturday, which included the excerpt about Trump imagining a race against Washington, noted that Trump’s “hubris shines through,” and described his claims about besting Washington “surreal.”

 

[Dakota Tebaldi]

That's completely unsurprising on Trump's part; but....LOL, "what if you were running against George Washington and Abraham Lincoln was his running mate".....like, who came up with that question? It's weirdly....I want to say "nerdy"? Like it reminds me of people having debates over who would win a fight between Michael Knight and Captain Kirk, only it's history nerds so it's like "Scipio Africanus could totally beat up Baron von Steuben".

 

[Essence Lumin]

Trump fake quoting Lincoln, "In the end, it’s not the years in your life that count, it's the life in your years. ".

 

[Kamilah Hauptmann]

A remote first nation in northern British Columbia is celebrating having clean drinking for the first time in decades. Lhoosk’uz Dené Nation cut the ribbon on their new water treatment facility after years of relying on bottles.

https://www.aptnnews.ca/national-news/remote-dene-community-in-b-c-celebrates-clean-water-for-1st-time-in-decades/

 

[Innula Zenovka]

In a shocking turn of events, another family values-oriented, anti-LGBTQ GOP politician is facing outrage and disciplinary action for sexual improprieties.

This time, it's Republican West Virginia politicians Joe Jeffries, a member of the state's House of Delegates, who has been stripped of his committee positions after he gave graphic and explicit oral sex advice on TikTok.

The TikToks have since been deleted. But a screen capture of one of the videos has been circulating on Twitter, which you can see below.

Having seen they can't be unseen, of course, but if you want a West Virginia Republican's advice on oral sex...

 

[Essence Lumin]

Joe, that's no pledge of love.

 

[Dakota Tebaldi]

In a shocking turn of events

*giggle*

 

[Dakota Tebaldi]

Trump fake quoting Lincoln, "In the end, it’s not the years in your life that count, it's the life in your years. ".

About what you'd expect from a guy who completely made up a Civil War battle just so he could put a commemorative plaque for it on his golf course and pretend it was an important historic site.

 

[Dakota Tebaldi]

WATCH: Car Catapults Off Highway 99 In Yuba City, Crashes Into Road Below

A shocking car crash in Yuba City was caught on a truck's dashcam video which shows a vehicle flying through the air before slamming into the road below.

sacramento.cbslocal.com

 

[bubblesort]

Having seen they can't be unseen, of course, but if you want a West Virginia Republican's advice on oral sex...

I don't think republicans would give good sex advice, but to be fair... if you wanted to know the average price hookers charge for a BJ in washington DC, a congressman isn't the worst person to ask, LOL.