Wow, having worked as a database guy in a number of academic institutions I find it hard to believe that he is suggesting academia over a high paid stable career in MS.
Maybe CS PhDs are different, but biology ones who I have worked with are low paid, stressful, and highly competitive to get past a couple of postdoc positions.
It might be more interesting work, but is your work the only real interest you have in life? There is so much more to explore than sitting in front of a screen trying to make code work.
CS PhDs are different than biology PhDs. They are still low-paid relative to industry, stressful, and competitive. However, multiple postdocs in CS are pretty uncommon, and it is not uncommon for a PhD candidate to get faculty offers with no postdoc (though many do a year of postdocing anyway, since it's less pressure than being junior faculty but at least twice the pay of being a grad student).
I think a reasonable rule of thumb is that the quality of life for grad school in area X is directly proportional to the employability of a BA/BS or MS in area X. In CS most anybody doing a PhD at a decent school could leave for a CS job paying at least twice as much. In biology this is less true, and in the humanities it's even less true. IMO this explains mych of the difference in grad student experiences across these areas.
The older I get, and as my family grows, I find it harder and harder to invest time in projects outside of work. If I can rig or find a job that fulfills my need for mastery, it ticks one of my most important needs. I can go home and focus on my family instead of having my attention wander to another task.
Here's the catch in that, my master's experience convinced me that even academia, isn't as free as it is hyped up to be. There's a strong marketing drive to hype up the freedom in academia, but there's a strong guide/suggestive coercion from the guides, to do your work along the lines and plans they have. Eventually i decided not to do a ph.d.
Note: This is the case of an average coursework. Perhaps cal newport was always extraordinary and so had extraordinary options, but the advice has it's limitations for applicability to everyone.
Maybe CS PhDs are different, but biology ones who I have worked with are low paid, stressful, and highly competitive to get past a couple of postdoc positions.
It might be more interesting work, but is your work the only real interest you have in life? There is so much more to explore than sitting in front of a screen trying to make code work.