Yes, Jill Biden is a "doctor."

 The WSJ Opinion piece, written by Joseph Epstein, commenting on who's a "real" doctor - a physician vs someone who holds an Ed.D (Doctor of Education) has caused some stir. This has centered around Jill Biden, wife of politician Joe Biden (D - Delaware). Conservative pundit Ben Shapiro also broadcasted his thoughts on the matter on his Youtube channel. Both conclude that Jill Biden has no right to use Dr. in front of her name let alone be called "doctor" in the public square.

They're both wrong. 

In the States the term "doctor" is often referred to a physician, or a medical doctor. The history of how this came to be is somewhat interesting. To make a long story short physicians in Scotland asked PhD holders, the original "doctors," if they can use the honorific title in their everyday language to refer to practitioners in their own field to bolster their prestige in the public eye. An agreement was met and that honorific title became synonymous with a physician alongside the prestige that was wanted. This carried over to the New World. 

The etymology of the word also does not lend itself to Epstein and Shapiro's daft and elitist rantings. The word "doctor" means to teach. It also means a "learned person." In the medieval times subjects that were open to study were immensely limited. Theology was the main subject matter and the advanced degrees conferred are today's ancestors of what is now known as the PhD, or Doctor of Philosophy. For those that are religious or are religious literate the phrase Doctor of the Church will ring a bell. This phrase refers to theologians, mainly Catholic, who have contributed immensely to the body of knowledge that have advanced theology and philosophy. 

A PhD is mainly used as a research to degree and many who are able to finish their doctorate are employed by the university/college system as professors or lecturers. They are expected to contribute to their chosen speciality in form of publications (enter the "publish or die" mentality in order become tenured). All PhDs require a dissertation that require an oral defense. This differs from professional doctorate degrees in the States (e.g. JD, MD/DO) where no dissertation is required leaving no oral defense to be had. Professional doctorates are, truly, vocational tracks, especially the older professional doctorates (MD, JD). An Ed.D is a fairly new kind of professional doctorate, sort of like the DSW (Doctor of Social Work) or PsyD (Doctor of Psychology). You may have seen a subtle difference between the PhD and these professional degrees in the name itself. There is no "Doctor of Philosophy." An MD is Doctor of Medicine, not Doctor of Philosophy in Medicine. 

On a more grounded and modern level, technically anyone with a doctorate degree can be referred as a doctor in public. Unless a physician is needed such people are doing no wrong in asking to be called doctor. The term doctor was not given to the profession by the layman or some governing body because they came to the realization that physicians were immensely smart and that their services were critical to the human race. None of that happened; no such thinking was entertained. It was simply asked for by physicians themselves to bolster their reputation, and given there were more physicians than academics interacting with the public, the public started to associate the word with the profession. A smart marketing move by Scottish physicians one might say. It has paid dividends. 

And remember: not until the turn of the 20th century did medical research, procedures and equipment start to advance rapidly into what would be today's world of medicine. Institutions for formal medical training were sparse and knowledge was infantile. Surgeons were seen as inferior to that of what is now considered the family physician (primary care); surgeons were sometimes not seen as physicians but as a vocational track, like brick layering or that of a blacksmith. Quack doctors were abound prescribing moonshine to ailments and cures for deadly viruses. 

So is Jill Biden a "real" doctor? Yes. The layman must educate himself, or even re-educate himself on the matter. Unless a non-medical doctor tries to pose as a physician, wishing to have all the positive stigmas that being a physician entails in modern times, then there should be zero issue. For those that do - don't do that. Stop it. Be secure in your degree and speciality, add to the body of knowledge, be a pioneer, be a competent practitioner and scholar. 

Dr. Jill Biden, I hope that you do not mind  the fact that your honorific title was used as an example to spread proper knowledge and to shed ignorance of whom can be called a doctor and whom cannot. 

The Big Ten Conference and Expansion: Rutgers and Maryland should be rejected for two others.

A change of subject for now. Football. American football.

Originally the Big Ten conference had, well, ten universities. Then it expanded to 11 and then most recently to 14. The new additions from the 11 were Nebraska, Rutgers and Maryland. 

I said it before that Maryland and Rutgers were mainly added to for financial reasons - to expand a majority Midwest market to the East Coast, delving into the Boston-DC corridor. So far the fruition of more money has sorta kinds paid off but not to the effect that the powers that be would hope so. This expansion to 14 universities was done around the 2010-2011 seasons. 

People will point out that the state of Pennsylvania as a non-Midwest. Okay, they have a point. But there's Penn St. and Penn St. has the "feel" of a Big Ten university that Maryland and Rutgers do not who are too far east to have any meaning sports wise to those in the Midwest. Nebraska, from its first day as a conference member, felt like it truly belonged (more so than Northwestern).

Realignments of sports conferences happen though not frequently. If I were the Big Ten Commissioner I'd send a hard push to get University of Pittsburgh and the University of Missouri. University of Kansas could be a back up. Geographically Pitt and Missouri makes sense. If we let go of the "not enough marketing money" talking point I believe these two universities make the most sense. They're also strong academically. 

I'll be the first one to say it in public: Rutgers and Maryland are just cash cows for the Big Ten. There really hasn't been any meaningful rivalries that have grown from the Rutgers and Maryland basketball-football additions. Nebraska brings volleyball and football; sure their basketball team isn't strong but so what. Penn St. is equally as horrific. The same goes for Northwestern sports save for football. Nebraska football is plain awesome and to have that be part of the Big Ten makes the conference even more amazing. 

Missouri would be a safe pick and that's okay. I can see the rivalry between Missouri and Illinois basketball become even more heated and tense. Missouri's football team is rock solid and would also add to the Midwest Big Ten football vibe. 

Pitt's football, like Missouri, has also been solid. Volleyball they're okay and basketball I can see them getting better at recruiting. The rivalry between Pitt football and Penn St. football would be great to broadcast on the Big Ten. Out of the two, Pitt is the most well-rounded school to add to the conference.

Academically Pitt is stronger than Missouri, but Missouri is currently ranked at #124 on the national university list by US News (if we use them as the standard). It's fine by me. What's the real difference between the undergraduates at Michigan St. (ranked around the 80ish mark) and Penn St. (ranked around the 60ish mark)? Not much. Missouri's undergraduate academics are not of a concern (they have a Phi Beta Kappa society) since they still bring in solid medical and law schools at the graduate school level. When people bring up the talking point that Missouri isn't "strong enough" academically, I'll point to Nebraska who's currently ranked at #133 as far as public universities goes.

Let's say the Big Ten stays at 14, with no newly added universities leaving, I'd still want Pitt and Missouri to be considered heavily given talks to expanding to 16 members was on the table when 14 was on the table. 

I'd also like to see the Big Ten divisions to be scrapped. It's not entirely needed. 

Big Ten Conference Members Wish List

Dismiss: Rutgers and Maryland

Invite: Missouri and Pitt

Illinois

Northwestern

Wisconsin

Minnesota 

Iowa

Indiana

Purdue

Michigan

Michigan St.

Ohio St.

Penn St.

Nebraska

Pittsburgh

Missouri 

Keep it at 14 members. There's no true need to be bloated like Big East or, even, the ACC. The Big Ten creates better rivalries and keeps a strong academic profile as a whole (thank you Northwestern being ranked in the top ten).

Of course there's Notre Dame to consider, but they're too in love with themselves and their Independent status for football. It would be great though. 

A Quick Comment on Obergefell v Hodges (2015)

It is said that people could not marry of the same sex and that this was unfair. This was marriage inequality. 

Originally the landmark case was because a person of the same sex could not have visitation rights, inherit money or have tax benefits etc. as compared to couple of the opposite sex who were married. On the national stage the narrative morphed into "bigots don't want gays to have equality via marriage." Now this is an interesting case on both the state and federal level. For now I'll just focus on the national narrative.

The national narrative is more or less false. The concern was that marriage was between one man and one woman. Pretty simple. But then The Left threw in the concept of love. This further muddled any sort of actual fair reasoning and logic. Here's the raw truth that defeats those in favor of Obergefell v Hodges: As previously noted, homosexuals (and bisexuals) had the right to get married all along - to the opposite sex. The standard was the same for every single person in the States. And it's been done before.

Numerous people with same-sex attraction have married people of the opposite sex. Probably a good amount of spouses had no idea that the person they married was either a homosexual or bisexual. The latter party had to "come out" to their partner. Maybe some had an idea that something wasn't "straight."A number of couples even had children. Some "came out" decades into their marriage. To parrot and drum on that people with same-sex attraction weren't allowed to enter marriage is a complete and utter lie. It's a false belief. 

Exceptions to the rule make for bad law. Obergefell v Hodges is a case that led to bad law.

Sex Education Doesn't Really Matter (Sort of)

 The push for "comprehensive sex education" has always made me tilt my head to the side in interest and concern. As a product of parochial schools from K-12, the concern to learn how to put a condom on properly or to know the "options" of how to delay pregnancy when a female is in her early teenage years has truck as immensely odd and disturbing. People will say it's a health concern. I say it's a campaign disguised as concern to infiltrate the homes of parents without being the student's parents. It's an insidious plan. It's the invisible social worker influencing the very intimate actions of a child. It's government saying they're just merely concerned.

One reason I think sex education, at least how public schools handle it in general, is one big joke is that the act of sex isn't rocket science. Boys are naturally curious. Girls are naturally curious. Growing up, for whatever reason, no one that I knew of in either my grade, the grade below me or the grade above me, got pregnant before the age of 20. I suppose we either had decent parenting or just had good self-control. I think both. I don't think we were anymore mature than our public school counterparts, just that we had been taught that sex is intimidate and "special." I mean, I'd bet that we instinctually knew this and we respected more so than others, especially in comparison to any teenage John Hughes characters. 

The approach to public school sex education is also warped. It's mostly done out of a public health concern. It indirectly says that sex outside marriage is okay and that to avoid pregnancy and STDs you can use many options of artificial birth control (ABC). Physicians in the forms of OB-GYNS support this push for ABCs on young teenage girls. Why? Simply put: it reduces STDs and pregnancies. Fair enough. But they are oddly not concerned about the effects of ABCs on what is biologically natural in the form of ovulation and eggs and so forth. Public studies triumph over the decline of teenage pregnancies due to the advent and use of ABCs. No concern is followed up by how ABCs effect the view of sex, children and marriage. No OB-GYN that I know of has raised an eyebrow. It's an odd mix. an OB-GYN deals with something that is natural yet they don't care much about the effects of what they push onto their patients.

Another reason I think public sex education is a crock is that it's rather immature. Sex is seen as something you sorta snicker at and if you've listened to the OB-GYN, Masters in Public Health expert, and you're "taking control of your sexuality" you might get an IUD implanted in your uterus. You want to the O but not the child. People mock abstinence in that it doesn't work, citing the failure rate. Stupidly enough they don't cite the failure of alcoholics getting a sip of wine instead of abstaining from it. Proof that abstinence is 100% effective are those who dedicate themselves to religious life or those who choose not have sex in general, either out of religious or health concerns. No sex. No kids. No STDs. If people are going to tout the brilliance of ABCs in its effectiveness while laughing at abstinence then they should also laugh at the failure rate of not using ABCs and having sex. Hello pregnancy. 

Self-education, in this case, is better than having some government program waltz into your classroom or gymnasium or library extolling the wonders of ABCs. Heck, anecdotally, most of my friends who never had a "comprehensive sex education" never had any real issues regarding sex. They dated, got married and had kids. Unless you're some weird pasty loser, religious or otherwise, with underdeveloped social skills a Chesil Beach isn't likely gonna happen. 

Better yet, I think my own sex education which was regulated to an annual visit to an outside secular agency dedicated to relatively neutral sex education starting in six grade (though I'm not sure how much the agency has changed since then), was more dignified and respectful to sex in general. Aided with my school's religious themes, we walked away with a somewhat balanced view of sex minus the touting of ABCs. At the end of the day we realized that if you don't want to get pregnant the best way is to not have sex. We were reminded of common sense that isn't all too common today.

Public "comprehensive sex education" is an exercise pushed by your agenda driven Masters in Public Health Overlord of Wokedom. This Overlord doesn't trust that kids can indeed figure it out without the government's help. 

Even medical doctors can have a lack of perspective.

From SDN written by an attending physician:

There are a dozen other ways to help people in the medical profession, but only one of these ways requires grit and determination and years and years of tough self-sacrifice to do. If you don't want to eat, sleep, breathe, LIVE BEING A DOCTOR, think it over. Because that passion and drive is the only thing that will get you to the finish line.

I will agree that the road to becoming a physician is a long and hard one when compared to other health professionals, but to say that becoming a physician is the only one that requires grit and determination is immensely myopic. Certainly determination is needed, but grit? Here are some sheer facts about medical school:

• Medical school is hard just by the volume and diversity of information one needs to process and understand in the first two years which are considered pre-clinical years.
• Medical schools try their very best to not let anyone flunk out because administering a medical education isn't cheap; it costs thousands and thousands of dollars to educate just one medical student. It's harder to get into medical school than it is to be let go due to poor grades. Medical schools do not want to admit people who they feel, or know, cannot hack the curriculum, hence, those given admission have demonstrated the ability to persevere a hardcore science curriculum.
• Medical school is self-selecting. This simply means those that want to become physicians have wanted to become physicians for years so they craft their resume to show their dedication to the sciences and to the field. 
• Medical school is pretty straight forward. In general, you have classes for the two years and then rotations for your last two.  There aren't any surprises in the curriculum.
• It is greatly emphasized to have support systems in place during medical school to help with the mental toll of studying. This is why many say choose a school near family and friends or, if not, that you have a significant other to make up for that.
• Residency is a pain due to the hours and consecutive days being scheduled, but then again it mirrors attending life. You may have a 24 hr work day, but how many hours are you "on" and treating a patient? Unless you're in the ER, you're sitting on your butt during the night for the most part.

Let's not make medical school and residency equal to The Crucible where Marine candidates must successful complete in order to be officially called a Marine. And compared to medical school and residency, which can take anywhere between seven to ten years if we don't include a fellowship, The Crucible is "only" 54 hours long.