Скачать или смотреть On Humility During a PhD: Why It Protects Your Work

00:00 – This one’s about authority: intellectual / academic authority, and how it shifts through the PhD
00:00:14 – Early PhD identity crisis: “I need to look like a psychologist / linguist / academic”
00:00:34 – The real question: how much authority do you actually have?
00:00:47 – Answer: way less than you think

00:00:55 – Getting accepted matters (funded vs self-funded are different battles)
00:01:47 – The trap: “people should listen to me now” — try and avoid that
00:02:03 – Best advice I ever got: play dumb
00:02:13 – Don’t throw your status around; people are already intimidated by “PhD student”
00:02:56 – Modesty + humility are basically cheat codes as a PhD student
00:03:11 – Knowing your limits: “I’m not an expert on that” / “that’s beyond my boundary”

00:03:22 – Story: working at a charity in Manchester, head office, sitting next to another PhD student
00:04:15 – Neither of us knew the other was doing a PhD
00:04:31 – On placement: convo with a clinical psychologist about challenging behaviour
00:04:39 – I go abstract (culture of discipline, “kids being kids”, Eddie Izzard reference)
00:05:08 – His reaction: “What the f*** are you talking about, mate?”
00:05:21 – My response: “Do you want the linguistic route or the psychological route?”
00:05:24 – He pulls rank: “I’ve got a fing PhD in linguistics…”
00:05:44 – Plot twist: I’m also doing a PhD (psycholinguistics) — he goes white
00:05:59 – I call out the wording: “what are you talking about” vs “what the f are you talking about”
00:06:37 – He bails; later I clock he’s stressed and under pressure
00:07:09 – Afterward: I follow his work — interesting guy, different path, prolific

00:07:42 – What that taught me: humility matters, and some people use “PhD” like a weapon
00:08:03 – Underneath that is PhD frustration: you’re becoming an expert and nobody cares
00:08:43 – The loneliness: you’re deep in a niche that three people might care about in 10 years
00:09:04 – That resentment can leak out as status-flexing

00:09:37 – Another warning: don’t say “I have a PhD” before you’ve actually finished
00:09:51 – I fell into that trap after submission; supervisors: “steady on, viva first”
00:10:14 – When you’re seven years in, you just want the door closed

00:10:36 – Supervision arc: early stage = protect you from f***ing up
00:10:50 – Example: me reading loads of Timothy Crow — supervisor: “cool, but not your lane”
00:11:57 – Supervisors teach integrity/ethics and stop you publishing something retractable
00:12:39 – Example: me asking about interviewing acutely unwell inpatients — “ethics committee will crucify you”
00:15:13 – Peer review logic: the job is to stop authors making themselves look stupid in print

00:15:59 – Mid/late PhD shift: supervisors loosen the grip, let you go and try things
00:16:44 – Parenting analogy: baby → toddler on the climbing frame; secure attachment
00:17:20 – End-stage: supervisors start saying “teach us” — you’re the specialist now
00:17:40 – PhD supervision is an art: human stuff, not just procedures

00:18:10 – The balance: stay humble, but also accept you’ve earned real expertise
00:20:05 – Example in practice: back in NHS work post-PhD — I don’t announce it
00:20:40 – I only weigh in when it’s useful (e.g., naming a symptom like “circumstantiality”)
00:21:14 – The early-PhD urge to scream your knowledge from the rooftops — doesn’t help

00:21:32 – Why I make podcasts: people opt in to the knowledge; I’m not forcing it on them
00:22:02 – Social weirdness: people hear “PhD” and suddenly treat you differently
00:22:52 – It does carry capital — but don’t weaponise it or repeat it every 5 seconds

00:23:24 – A nicer way to do it: stay curious, ask questions, drip-feed knowledge without status moves
00:24:20 – Wrap: stay humble, don’t do the “I have a PhD, don’t talk to me” thing
00:24:39 – Don’t lose curiosity about what other people think, even when you’ve gone deep on the problem