[bumby]

I suspect every technical field experiences this. For example, a surprising number of mechanical engineers I’ve worked with don’t know the difference between longitudinal stress and hoop stress derivations and the resulting impacts on design, yet they regularly design pressure vessels.

I think the reason has multiple dimensions:

1) most jobs, outside of fundamental R&D don’t require deep levels of understanding because they are more in the vein of “get ‘er done” type of work. Truth is, PhDs are over qualified for many (most?) jobs

2) some people simply want a credential and do a brain dump immediately after university

3) as you alluded to in a different comment, hiring managers often don’t have the technical chops to separate the wheat from the chaff