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David Cordell
Bob D.,
First, I chuckled at Lady Macbeth.
Most PhDs consider the EdD to be a lower level degree. It isn't snobbery. It's just that admission standards and dissertation expectations are typically different.
I consider the MD to be a professional degree, and the PhD to be an academic research degree. As far as I know, MD candidates are not required to do research, in contrast to PhD candidates. I don't have any statistics on this, but I am pretty sure that a lot more PhD candidates than MD candidates don't complete their degrees. Part of that might be that some PhD candidates get discouraged and determine that their job prospects are grim, especially in the humanities and social sciences. MDs don't have that issue.
I left UT and took a job at LSU while I was ABD -- all but dissertation. It took me 18 months to finish, and that occurred only after LSU told me that I would no longer be employed if I didn't finish before the next semester.
There are lots of ABDs floating around.You may know that PhD students typically have to take "prliminary" exam before they start the program to determine what their coursework should be. You probably know that , after completing their coursework, PhD students have to pass comprehensive written exams covering the coursework in their major and, in my case, two minor courses (Economics and Statistics). Then there is the scary oral exam in which five or more professors on your committee pick at your comprehensive written exam answers and ask other questions that they can't answer themselves. Then there is coming up with a dissertation topic and doing enough preliminary research to present it to your committee. They grill you. If approved you then trudge through the dissertation, knowing that when you "finish" you will have a dissertation defense at which your committee holds the word of Damocles over your head.
I never expect "civilians" to call me "doctor", possibly because that was my PhD father's approach. But I know that some people would call my father doctor. He was a research geologist, beginning as a professor and ending up in industry. I was just on the phone with TIAA-CREF, which caters to professors, and the representative, who had access to my information, called me doctor.
PhDs can be professors and professors can be PhDs and almost always are PhDs, except maybe in colleges of education. There are exceptions. I mentioned Elspeth Rostow, who did not have a PhD.
Back to the "doctor" thing --
When we lived in Clear Lake, a man was walking past my house while I was in the front yard, and I introduced myself as David Cordell. He introduced himself as "Dr. Greytok". He lived several doors from us on the other side of the street. At a neighborhood party shortly thereafter. Dr. Greytok was there, along with several astronauts who lived in the neighborhood. One man I met there was a very unassuming fellow named Sonny Carter. Turned out that Sonny, who lived three doors from us, had been a professional soccer player, was a Naval officer, MD (flight surgeon), test pilot, and astronaut.
It was interesting to see how one's status drops when someone like Sonny Carter enters the room. Sonny had been on shuttle flight STS-33, along with Kathryn Cordell Thornton, whom I have mentioned before and who also lived in our neighborhood.
Sonny Carter was killed on the same flight on which Senator John Tower was killed in 1991.
The night of Sonny's death, I took some food to their house - a neighborly thing to do. There were lots of cars parked in front of the house and down the block. I was greeted at the door by someone who could have been a bouncer at a bar and who barely opened the door, asking who I was before allowing me in. There were lots of astronauts and astronaut spouses inside, offering support to Sonny's widow Dana (who was absolutely beautiful). They allowed me in, but they were very careful not to allow members of the press even to get past the sidewalk. It was very interesting to see how they closed ranks to protect their own.
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