Hi, senior faculty person here who has occasionally said something approximating this. Dr. Liu is mostly correct, but the key is context (1/5)...
https://twitter.com/DrSarahLiu/status/1397486279412129794
If someone asks me about pursuing a Ph.D., I behave like a rabbi responding to someone who wants to convert to Judaism: I explain why it’s a bad, bad idea for so many reasons (2/5)
If someone is in a Ph.D. program, I will tell them to follow their passion when writing their dissertation. That’s not because everything works out if they do, but the odds of it working out if they don’t are way lower (3/5)
Writing a dissertation is hard. If you don’t love the subject matter, it makes it much harder. So yeah, following your passion is a necessary but not sufficient condition for success (4/5).
A good adviser should advise on the other keys to success. An honest adviser also needs to point out that academia is a high-risk career and there are no guarantees (5/5).
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