“I’m reminded of the stipulation we have in the UK when someone wants to study for a PhD, that they have to have the research question. And I’m familiar from having done two PhDs that there was no research question at all, and that it took me many, many years after I finished doing my PhDs to discover what they were about. I knew particularly the one in cybernetics was extraordinary. And as I look at it it gets more extraordinary. But what it was about – I had no idea. I know where it came from officially, I know where it came from actually, but I always get concerned when I find myself asking students: ‘What’s your research question?’ It is sort of part of the accountancy world we live in. But I think there is a legitimacy in asking that sort of question in that it helps you to start going. What is absolutely essential is that you’re never trapped by that question.”
Reference: Ranulph Glanville (2009), Conversation during the 2009 ASC Conference in Olympia, WA. (private recording)
