Advice for future scholars

Hucmenzu
Sun, 06 May 2012 03:50:59 +0000

ginnyvere,

I admit the labeling is problematic. I am sorry if my use of the word “academic” was offensive. Let’s call the first group A and the second group B from now on. I was targeting those who want to pursue their PhD’s in a traditional sense of pure academics (i.e. pure math vs applied math, physics vs engineering, economics vs business). And as you have mentioned, the divisions are not straightforward and clear. That’s why I used the words “spectrum” and “extreme” in the first post if you know what I mean.

I do not mean to call the 7-11 years of medical school “unacademic” either. Yes, any student is academic at least temporarily when they are in school. But I still think there is a difference between those two kinds of schools (type A and B). Furthermore, I was talking about the undergraduate level of studying and the primary “goal” that is to be obtained by attending a school, not the entire 7-11 years of studying itself.

And isn’t there a different between doctors who mainly practice their skills with their patients everyday and doctors or biologists who mainly publish papers and teach at universities? Isn’t there a difference between a businessman who lead companies and a business academic or an economist who study human behaviors and the money flow? I am not saying one is better than the other. If all the medical students are motivated merely by the study of biology, I would label them “A” (again not to be offensive). But many medical students are also motivated by other things such as helping those who are in need of medical treatment, saving people’s lives, etc which would be labeled as “B”. And if there truly are the “A” type of students in medical schools trying to practice medicine in the future, I don’t understand why the A type of students would not just become biologists then. Maybe you can explain it better since you are a medical student yourself? I am asking this because I am really curious, and I admire medical students and how devoted they are to saving human lives…as opposed to pure academics who live in their own world of books and labs.