1345 Days
That’s how long my PhD was, from the day I started to the day I had my viva. 1345 days is just over three and a half years. That’s a long time! I didn’t work every day. I took holidays,...
the phd
A Local Maximum
A term from maths: sometimes a peak in a graph is not the topmost point, but just the highest one for now. A downward slope afterwards might not run down forever. The curve may rise again, higher, further and faster....
Long, Short
The PhD is long. The viva is short. The many years you spend researching and writing prepare you for the few hours of thinking and talking.
Six Thousand Hours…
…is my ballpark, back-of-the-napkin calculation for how much time someone might spend working on a PhD. Compare that to two to three hours in the viva. Three orders of magnitude difference and then some. If you’re nervous about the viva:...
Countdown
You could spend your final year of your PhD counting down the days: Another day gone until I have to submit, another day gone until my viva… I knew PhD candidates who stressed and obsessed that time was running out....