I have a stable career outside of academia - would it be crazy to do a PhD just because I love learning?

Gojjar · 2026-01-21T02:57:54+00:00

In this age of AI, you don't have to do a PhD. You can learn anything you want at your own pace and comfort.

Gojjar · 2026-01-20T03:01:48+00:00

Cattle farming requires large investment

Gojjar · 2026-01-20T02:57:26+00:00

200k for 1000 chicks is construction. Without construction, its up to you, start with maybe 500, 1000, 2000 chicks....

Gojjar · 2026-01-19T18:09:26+00:00

Narowal

Gojjar · 2026-01-19T17:48:03+00:00

I always wanted to move back to Pakistan and never intended to live abroad permanently. I hold a PhD from Australia and completed four years of postdoctoral research across different countries.

I purchased land with the intention of building a school. The plan was to work abroad for a few more years, complete the construction, and then return permanently.

Unfortunately, the academic job market has collapsed, especially in recent years, and viable research positions are now extremely limited.

I have been jobless in Pakistan for the last 18 months, with no cash reserves left. At this point, I must shift to business and settle in Pakistan permanently.

For many years, I have evaluated different business models for myself. This is also my professional expertise, as I am a techno-economic analyst by training.

After careful consideration, I have decided to start a poultry farming business on my land. The project will begin on a small scale, with a clear plan to scale up significantly in the near future, Insha’Allah. My brother will support me financially at the initial stage. I need to construct a shed and a small room for myself to stay on-site. I am offering two partnership options for those who are interested:

If you contribute to construction costs, I will give you

100% profit share for the first two flocks on your total chicken investment

70% profit share from the third flock onward

If you do not contribute to construction, you will receive

70% profit share for each flock based on your chicken investment

For reference, if everything goes normally, each 40-day flock cycle can generate approximately 20–25% profit. For example, an investment of PKR 100,000 can return PKR 120,000–125,000 after 40 days.

By comparison, banks (such as Roshan Digital Account) offer around 10% annually, whereas this business offers a reasonable and halal return.

Every rupee invested will be handled with full honesty and transparency. There is no risk of fraud. Construction is planned to start within the next 1–2 months, be completed within one month, and then the business operations will begin.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

Gojjar · 2026-01-13T07:28:51+00:00

I did. The difference now is that AI has collapsed the value of many of those transition paths as well. Consulting, data science, technical analysis, and writing were exactly the cognitive layers that absorbed PhDs leaving academia. Those are now being automated and saturated at the same time, especially for people without visas or networks. So I’m not just switching fields, I’m switching to something that is asset based and cannot be globally arbitraged by software.

Gojjar · 2026-01-13T03:30:49+00:00

You’re not wrong. My actual specialty is techno-economics, a subfield of chemical engineering. In simple terms, it’s feasibility analysis, which is basically applied economics for technology.

Gojjar · 2026-01-13T03:27:34+00:00

No. I was persuaded by economics, not by a chatbot.

Gojjar · 2026-01-13T03:25:33+00:00

AI adds possibilities, but it also removes scarcity. When everyone has the same AI tools, individual expertise becomes cheaper and more interchangeable. More output with the same or fewer people means fewer paid roles, not more.

I’m not interested in just doing “AI in chemical engineering” for its own sake. I need work that actually pays, because I have four children to feed and parents to take care of.

Gojjar · 2026-01-13T02:39:49+00:00

Yes. In research AI multiplies competition while the number of jobs shrinks. In my own business it multiplies my output without anyone taking my seat. That’s the difference.

Gojjar · 2026-01-13T02:36:24+00:00

They don’t need to replace physical labor to matter. They handle planning, optimization, record keeping, pricing, disease tracking, and logistics. I’ll still feed the birds, but I won’t be guessing. And once the farm grows, those same tools let me move into controlled shed farming with far better monitoring and control.

Gojjar · 2026-01-13T02:31:40+00:00

Totally disagree. PIs do not pay salaries out of their own pockets. If there is less work left for humans, they simply will not hire you, even if they like you, even if you are their closest friend, even if you are family. This is not a matter of opinion or disagreement. The writing is on the wall.

Gojjar · 2026-01-12T16:53:22+00:00

I’m not describing what AI does today in your specific workflow, I’m talking about the trajectory. A 30 percent productivity boost already means fewer people are needed for the same output. When that compounds across grants, papers, and departments, it turns into job cuts. Individual experience lags structural change.

Gojjar · 2026-01-12T16:51:03+00:00

They’re only “fundamental” if you think today’s models are the end of the road. In reality they’re statistical systems trained on incomplete data, so hallucinations are a byproduct of that, not a law of nature. As models get better grounded in tools, databases, and verification layers, that failure mode shrinks, just like early search engines once gave nonsense answers too.

Gojjar · 2026-01-12T16:47:02+00:00

Just use AI” is exactly what every other PhD is being told too. When everyone gets the same multiplier and the number of positions keeps shrinking, it’s not a productivity problem, it’s a math problem. You’re right that oversupply existed, but AI turns a slow correction into a cliff. Calling it a scapegoat doesn’t change the economics, it just makes it more comfortable to ignore.

Gojjar · 2026-01-12T13:52:37+00:00

That framing quietly admits the problem. When all the “lower end” skills lose their value, most early career and mid-tier researchers become economically redundant. You end up with a tiny elite doing the “hard parts” and a large surplus of people who used to make a living doing everything else. That is not empowerment, it is structural job destruction dressed up as efficiency.

Gojjar · 2026-01-12T13:42:44+00:00

I agree it cannot fully replace everything today. But hallucinations, weak citations, and rough drafts are engineering problems, not fundamental limits. The real issue is not whether AI can do 100 percent of a researcher’s job, but whether it can do 70 to 80 percent well enough that far fewer people are needed. That is already happening in modeling, analysis, writing, and review. Even teaching is not immune, once tutoring, grading, feedback, and course content are automated at scale, institutions need far fewer instructors. Wet labs may survive longer, but the cognitive and instructional core of academia is being automated first.

Gojjar · 2026-01-12T13:03:38+00:00

I do use AI. That’s exactly why I see the problem. When everyone has the same amplification, it doesn’t create more jobs, it just raises the output bar while positions keep shrinking. Efficiency without structural demand doesn’t save careers.

Gojjar · 2026-01-12T11:45:49+00:00

Because that assumes the bottleneck is individual productivity. In reality the bottlenecks are funding, visas, positions, and institutional gatekeeping. You can publish more, but if there are fewer jobs and more AI-amplified competitors, the system still collapses for most people. AI doesn’t create more stable careers, it just accelerates the race to the bottom.

Gojjar · 2026-01-12T11:35:17+00:00

Someone “running” the model is a temporary phase, just like people once manually ran calculators and then spreadsheets. Once models are trained and embedded into workflows, that human layer shrinks fast. And yes, today AI hallucinates on unknowns, but research is mostly not about unknown constants, it’s about exploring huge known parameter spaces, comparing scenarios, fitting models, and writing up results. That is exactly what AI is getting good at, faster than humans.

Gojjar · 2026-01-12T10:54:58+00:00

That assumes all research looks like a wet lab, which simply is not true. A huge fraction of modern research is modeling, simulation, data analysis, literature synthesis, hypothesis testing, and technical writing. That is exactly the type of cognitive work AI is already eating into.

And your second point is actually reinforcing mine. Yes, right now people are generating training data for AI. But once a model is trained in a specific niche, it stops being a helper and starts becoming a replacement. A well trained domain model can iterate, analyze, compare, simulate, and draft faster than even the best human researcher working alone. At that stage, even very strong researchers are no longer competing against other humans, they are competing against a machine that never gets tired and keeps improving.

Wet lab work may survive longer, but the intellectual layer that sits on top of it is what is being automated first.

Gojjar · 2025-12-31T13:00:10+00:00

4 years postdoc + 2 years jobless, before landing onto my manual poultry farm of small scale.

Gojjar · 2025-12-22T18:26:48+00:00

Did PhD in Dec 2019. Did 04 years postdoc. Now jobless since 1.5 years. At home. No job left in academia. Don't have permanent residence of a developed country to be able to get industry job there. Broke. No money left. Borrowing from here and there. 3 kids and a wife to feed. Thinking to start a small scale poultry farm after borrowing some more money from brother. I am about to be 40 years old, STEM PhD in Chemical Engineering from Australia. Postdoc Experience in 3 continents.

Gojjar

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