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Comment by locknitpicker | Hacker News Reader

> In an ideal world, sure. In reality, a PhD[1] is about publishing papers in the hope that you learn something along the way.

You're being needlessly dismissive of what "publishing papers" mean. Writing down what you learn is what papers are for, and the only papers that count for a PhD are those which are accepted by reference journals, which impose a relatively high bar on what content they accept.

So you still need to explore uncharted areas, and your main output is still writing down what you found for others to build upon. Those are the deliverables. For the person doing the PhD, the primary benefit is developing research skills, such as independente and self-reliance.

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> which impose a relatively high bar on what content they accept.

Nope. In fact they accept utter garbage most of the time. I can't count the numbers of times I've caught pure errors (literal logic errors, code errors, mathematical errors) even in highly respected journals. Journals have a high bar of entry because they've gated their communities, only allowing insiders to publish (ie tenured professors, people associated/employed with university labs or their colleagues). If you don't have an industry connection the odds of you self publishing in these journals is zero. And if you _do_ find a connection, say a professor whose willing to help you out, they'll demand to place their name on your paper (without actually contributing anything). This is how you get papers with 50 authors, because every politicker wanted a piece of the pie.

This is also why you see frontier AI labs self-publishing on their websites rather than in journals.

> Nope. In fact they accept utter garbage most of the time.

Unless you enrolled in a fraudulent, make-believe University of Phoenix style program, no. Any real PhD program only counts publications in a closed allowlist of reputable journals. Those journals are peer reviewed and enforce quality and relevance standards.

> I can't count the numbers of times I've caught pure errors (literal logic errors, code errors, mathematical errors) even in highly respected journals.

That's fine and all, specially if what you actually want to do is take a shot at humble bragging, but back in the subject papers are supposed to be snapshots of your understanding of a topic that can be used by others to inspire or advance their exploration. This means they are not infallible or free from criticism. In fact, it is rather ok brand to publish papers improving upon prior publications by correcting errors, improving methodologies, and even presenting contradictory evidence. That is what it means to be at the bleeding edge.

The commenter is stating that respectable journals accept a lot of bad papers. This is actually very true.

> This is also why you see frontier AI labs self-publishing on their websites rather than in journals.

What they self-publish on their own websites should be regarded as marketing.

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