Originally Posted by RChung

I have a PhD and I'm pretty damn unsure about most of the stuff I've done. I don't pay much attention to doctorates as a qualifying attribute.

Decades ago when I was still a grad student, I asked the then-chair of our department, a pretty well-known guy and a member of the NAS, about a long-running academic dispute he had with another professor on campus, of equal reknown and also a member of the NAS. He thought for a moment, then lowered his voice and leaned in. "Robert," said he, "you can lead a horse's ass to water but you can't make him think."