this post was submitted on 18 Mar 2024
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Because they're arrogant bastards, no more intelligent than your average person, but convinced of their inherent superiority by education and surroundings.
I find that medical doctors and engineers both commonly suffer from huge superiority complexes and/or narcissistic tendencies (and I say that as someone with an engineering degree). I think a huge part of it is that everyone is constantly fawning over them and telling them how smart they must be to have made it through the schooling that they begin to believe it (combined with the fact that many people conflate academic success with intelligence).
As a chemistry major, I went to undergrad with tons of pre-meds that went on to become medical doctors and then I went to grad school in an engineering department. Believe me, plenty of idiots hold a degree (even an advanced degree) in these areas. Most medical doctors are just mechanics that specialize in troubleshooting one particularly poorly designed device, and many engineers are convinced that because they know how to fix or optimize one problem, they can spend a few days/weeks to learn more than experts in unrelated fields.
As an engineer (had to, very sorry) I noticed there is a 50/50 split between the “I am always right” and a massive imposter complex.
Doctors, never see the imposter complex. It’s kind of ridiculous. We also have to remember that science and engineering lead the advances in medicine, and most doctors fight us tooth and nail for the last several decades. They didn’t want to even wash their hands. Surgeons refuse to follow checklists thinking they are infallible, but when they do there is a measurable drop in patient mortality and infection.
Doctors and surgeons are glorified tech workers that need to be taken down several notches.
I definitely agree that the issue seems much more pervasive in doctors. Even my brother-in-law, who is about the least confident, most "imposter syndrome prone" person I've ever met has changed significantly since he graduated from med school, becoming first confident, then overconfident, so I definitely think it's a culture issue.
And while my experience with engineers was much more than 50% in the "I'm always right" camp, I am not a practicing engineer and most of my experience is from my time in a ChemE PhD program, so I was definitely seeing a skewed population.
I see a similarity to lawyers here.
TBF, yes, but doctors who also study engineering disciplines are a bit better.
Still, I've met a few very arrogant over, say, things I do for years vs them having had a few seminars, but I think this concerns people who study well in general. They can't psychologically accept that a person with ADHD who just won't have the patience for their studies can know some narrow subject much better due to hobbies and simply job experience.
As an IT admin that has worked in hospitals, nearly all of the docs I had to deal with couldn't comprehend simple things like capslock making their password not work and the fact that turning off the monitor doesn't shut down the PC.
And I'm reminded of the joke: "What do you call a doctor that graduated at the bottom of their class?"
Doctor...
This is my experience with IBD and drs. I have to explain the disease to them for them to understand so they can make decisions. I don't know why my consultant doesn't just make the decisions instead when he's the expert.
It reminds me of this video. The biotech girl with a PhD in cancer biology was so sure she was the smartest person in the room until she took an IQ test and ranked behind the military guy everyone picked for last.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=RAlI0pbMQiM
The video is making a decent point, but doing it in a very, very flawed way. IQ tests are far from unbiased and don't really test intelligence; they test how well you can take an IQ test. And since the structure and questions on IQ tests are very biased against every demographic that's not "white, upper/middle class, male" all this video really shows is that a dude in the military knows how to take an IQ test.
I only linked it to support OP's point that doctors are just normal people but tend to be very overconfident. Your point is correct but I don't think it detracts from what I'm using the video to illustrate.
The whole video is a fun watch to see how people behave in tense social situations with strangers.
Apparently you really want to think that an unscientific "intelligence test" designed by a Nazi (look it up) better summarizes a person than a PhD in cancer biology.
Being smart is different from being fit for IQ tests, or for human computer job, I think these people would score well in IQ tests, but nobody would consider them smarter than engineers and scientists for whom they'd make calculations.
I haven't yet finished watching the video, but judging by the quality of recommendation, she might really have been
.
OK, at this point I've finished watching it and that girl ranked people based on what she called "social intelligence", saying that explicitly, in contradiction with what she said in the beginning of the video. She seems to worry about that a lot, and that appears to be her weaker side, so - oops.
"The military guy", I think, just wasn't distracted by the situation, makes sense.
In his ranking, 6 - really cares about his appearance, wastes emotional resources unnecessarily, 5 - a bit of the same, and also arrogance, 4 - not too much arrogance, but a lot of nervous attempts to be social, 3 - similar to 4, but less nervous, 2 - still a bit strained, 1 - himself.
EDIT: and it makes sense that 6 noticed the same emotional problem in 4, LOL.
Anyway, I've scored ~120 one time, ~170 another time, I can't take them (EDIT: these tests) seriously.