Ask HN: Will getting a PhD lead to a more interesting life?

If you had an opportunity to study AI for your PhD then it might be worth it. However, since your field is rather niche, I don't see how it would be that valuable to industry. My advice is that you need to get out of there, and get a job as soon as possible. You will realize that what you've learned at university and real world software development are really quite different.

Well, here are some thoughts:

1. What is "interesting work" to you? Everything depends on that. Would you be going into industry as a researcher? If not, a PhD may not be useful, and interactive theorem proving in particular doesn't seem relevant to industry.

2. Many people get their PhD at a different institution than their previous degree(s), so I don't understand the choice you think you're facing.

3. It's perfectly possible to step away from university study and come back. I had a ~2 year gap before starting my PhD.

4. Some PhD research is very collaborative. Depends on what you're doing, where, and with who. Look up authors of papers you think are great, especially those with quite a few authors.

5. Research success is often as much about persistence as intelligence. Yes, sometimes you need to read papers all day, but it's with the goal of creating new things.

6. If you think you'd be miserable while doing a PhD, you'd be crazy to do it.

As a 5th grade dropout who is a fully self-taught developer, I did Interview, mentor, and supervised a multiple of developers with masters and PhDs to help them understand and get comfortable in the real world of the IT industry, sure they are probably "smarter", faster researchers, more organized than me but I have the experience to put together the big picture, cover the edge cases, account for common mistakes in the domain, understand the market and the clients mentality etc... most of that won't be covered by a PhD.

Noone started his career with a bunch of experience, you'll get boring jobs, you'll encounter annoying bosses or clients, you'll have stress and deadlines pressure, you'll be forced to develop things that don't match "your idea" of quality, you'll probably have some imposter syndrome... these are just common parts of the industry especially for newcomers.

The best advice would be if you're not looking to go into academia then don't go for PhD, it's a waste of time you can use that time to grind through the industry and get that experience. Another important thing IMHO is that no matter how cool your field is, no matter how much you like it, if it fells under the deadlines, pressure, and stress wheel you'll not enjoy it, you'll find something else that seems more fun and you'll wish if you can do that instead!

I would say if you want maximum fun and then have fun on side-projects, open-source, or freelance on the side

Entry to a PhD program is not something that is dangled like a golden carrot as the promise of an interesting life. Anyone offering such a lure is more likely looking for cheap graduate student labour and you should run a mile away.

In reality, if you are self-funded or have a scholarship, and suitable grades, most academics will gladly take you on as a PhD candidate. There is no shortage of junior academics looking for people to maintain their labs, fix their equipment, and add their names to the end of some papers as a professional courtesy for fixing a few spelling mistakes. Sure, you might not get a position under a world-famous academic, but - especially if you have no interest staying in academia afterwards anyway - this has absolutely no impact on your future life whatsoever. If you're just interested in the letters P, H, and D after your name then you can study for that anywhere, anytime, on your terms.

From the limited context you've provided, I would recommend you do not continue on to this PhD. Do one later in life if you still feel it's warranted.

All you said about yourself doesn't quite sound like you should get a PhD.

Also having a PhD doesn't automatically make your life more interesting.

Having a PhD will make you an expert in a narrow topic. So it most likely will lead to job opportunities inside this topic. If you love this topic, then it might help having a more fulfilling work life.

The problem is, it's not quite possible to really know if you're still interested that much in a topic after studying it for several years. You might be even sick of the topic after your PhD.

What you will take away from a PhD are some research skills that you could apply on different topics. But if you don't like and enjoy researching, then I don't quite see what you will really take away from a PhD.