This right here is a perfect example of why this position is gatekeeped so much. Having a PhD doesn’t automatically mean you think like a scientist of a mathematician, and having a bachelor’s degree and 15 years of experience writing code and then putting in the effort to read Elements of Statistical Learning, compeleting several online courses in machine learning and data science, studying probability, combinatorics, graph theory, does not mean you don’t have a scientific mindset. A scientific mindset can be learned. You are not special because you have a PhD and I don’t. The only difference between you and me is that I had the ability to learn for free what you paid for. But when you go “oh hah, he’s just a coder and only has a bachelors degree” and you won’t even call me to talk to me that means you are missing out, and you are gatekeeping. You are not special and you are not smarter than me. You’ve just read a book I haven’t and wrote a white paper. I can read that book too. I can write a paper too.
I can do everything you can do.