That reminds me of the possibly apocryphal story that in Germany, a man with the family name “Schmidt,” who is a professor and holds two different doctoral degrees, would indeed be formally addressed as “Herr Professor Doktor Doktor Schmidt.”
In the U.S. if you’re a Doctor of Fine Arts, it’s an honorary degree. If you’re a Doctor of Arts, you earned it for research and teaching, not performing. In the U.K. YMMV
Not apocryphal in the least, and two doctorates is nothing: plenty of “Prof. Dr. Dr. Dr.” around, though at some point you might want to stack some of those into a “doctor multiplex”.
ETA what may or may not be apocryphal are the stories about the old school (pre-war, maybe pre-both wars?) in Germany, in which let’s say an undergraduate formally wouldn’t get to address a Professor Ordinarius at all. If he or she had questions, that’s what the assistants were for.
I was visiting a hospital and a patient called a Dr. by her first name. She said “Please call me Dr. X” in the hospital.
A Dr. I know worked with a Dr. Superdoc (real last name). He said they should pronounce it as Sooperdoc.
I presume the doctor and patient were not friends or colleagues, but strangers? I can see that. This is not the cocktail party setting of the OP (in which no MD or PhD I ever met introduced themselves other than by their first name)
If my name were, e.g., Dr Death or Dr Strange, I might nudge people onto the correct pronunciation.
Part of it is, he’s got quite a bit of money, and gives pretty generously to the theater, so they like to keep him happy. And he seems to be a good chemist. He puts together a lot of the special effects for various shows. The most recent show we did was Jekyll and Hyde. He provided all of the equipment to make Jekyll’s lab look suitably cool and steampunky, and also came up with a “formula” that vividly changed color when mixed together. And was also safe for the actor playing Jekyll to drink, which he said was the really challenging part.
Apologies for the hijack.
I was once called for jury duty and got as far as the questioning session. Both the prosecutor and the defending attorney were asking potential jurors their marital status. If a woman was married, they asked if she preferred to be called Mrs. or Ms. One older woman looked over her glasses and, in a cool voice said “It’s Dr.” I could see the judge trying not to laugh. I still wonder what kind of Dr. she was.
Oh, and this is irrelevant, but if a potential juror said they were married, they would be asked for how long. One guy’s response was “This time or cumulative?”
There’s this Russian Linguistics major who seems to think Honorary Degrees should qualify him to present to the American Physical Society, using his honorary titles. Strangely enough, they seem to agree.
It kind of brings up the difference between Schooling and Education. Schooling is what is done to you. Learning to sit still, stand in a line, raise your hand, all the things imposed on you. Education is what you take from a situation. Understanding, comprehension, critical thinking. Newton and the apple, Archimedes and displacement, Einstein and his deep thoughts in the patent clerks office. You can get an education in both school settings AND in real world settings. But you can only get a degree if you’re willing to put up with schooling.
Honorary degrees, like the one awarded to Augusto Odone, simply confer the academic achievement on people who got their education in a different way. The fact that some institutions bestow these on candidates of dubious worth is a different issue.
Enjoy,
Steven
Honorary degrees turn into “Dr. h. c.” on the CV, so, sure, there is a “Doctor” in there. (Also, just having one is no indication the person in question is not also Ph.D., Sc.D., etc.)
When someone asks if you prefer Mrs. or Ms., I wish someone would answer “effendi”.
This.
Heck, even I can do that. Any indicator (cabbage juice works), combined with any acid (plenty of those that are safe to drink).
:rolleyes:
And Doctor Doom got kicked out of college without a degree for dangerous and forbidden experiments. He is not in fact entitled to call himself a doctor, and Dr. Octopus has been known to refer to him as “That dropout”. Although never in Dooms hearing range.
Its been my impression that the usage of the word “doctor” as a specific term for MDs originated in the US, where it was for many years the only doctorate colleges could bestow. And that the colloquial use as spread from the US. Although technically, an MD still needs a phD to be allowed to call themselves doctor in many nations, in practice its a part of general parlance now.
A physicist colleague (who was married to an MD) described the difference as: “In med school, they run you through with a sword. In a Ph.D program, it’s a knife, but you have to stick it in yourself”.
Ask Doctor Science! He knows more than you do!
http://drscience.com/wordpress/
Disclaimer: “Doctor Science is not a real doctor.”
Doctor Science: “I have a master’s degree. In science!”
I’d totally forgotten this until just now, but we had a retired Multiple Ph.D as our paperboy. He was in his 70s, and had been ordered by his cardiologist (only one Doctorate) to get out and walk briskly every morning. Well, the only way he could motivate himself was to pick up a part-time job where he HAD to walk briskly or people would complain.
I still remember seeing him walk down the street, tossing the morning paper onto the front stoops. When he saw us, he’d chuckle and pretend to forget our house… and we’d run out on the lawn and try to catch him, yelling “Doctor Doctor, gimme the news!”
I concur, except that right after getting their PhD, it is expected you will call them “Doctor” for a while. It acknowledges their new degree.
In the USA, physicians generally have a Medical Doctor Degree.
I imagine the world would be a lot better off if we stopped humoring assholes.
No one needs to be called doctor in a social setting.
I considered a MD to be a terminal degree. They are both Doctorates, you just come at them different ways.
https://study.com/articles/Doctor_of_Medicine_Steps_to_Become_a_Medical_Doctor.html
Degree Level Doctorate
In order to become a doctor, you will need to obtain a doctorate degree in medicine.