Yes it makes full sense. Novel results are essential for a doctorate. That is what the doctorate is for. Without significant, new results, the candidate is known as "All But the Degree". Sadly, the candidate cannot even put ABD after his/her name when the 5 years are up!

Novel and new ideas, concepts, observations, results, conclusions, future prospects, research directions is what PhD is all about! Sometimes you get these ideas in the very beginning and sometimes you fail to get anything. Here your guide is very important. Period is not very significant, being able to deliver something new is! If you don't get any ideas, just wait till you get them, no choice there ! You have asked if this makes sense? But then, research is basically a search for innovative ideas !

@Alfarra, I can understand your feelings, one gets frustrated if nothing is working out. This is the time when the research guide, under whose supervision you are working has to play an important role of boosting the morale of the student ! If your guide is not helping you out and just watching you struggle , then there is something horribly wrong somewhere ! I suppose, in such cases, if the student requests a change of supervisor or guide, university should grant it! But then, I suppose students do not dare to take this step! Working on new, novel results or ideas is the basic aim of any research, which if not fulfilled, I am not sure if a degree like PhD be granted ?

The suggestion that one should receive a degree merely because her or she has paid fees, sat through classes, etc., is disturbing. It seems to be yet another example of how education has become commodified. In any legitimate program, a student will have completed sufficient research in advance of the dissertation to know whether he or she has viable hypotheses.

In my experience, what prevents doctoral candidates from completing the degree is seldom related to the inability to produce new knowledge. Instead, it is related to the fact that most dissertations require independent research--for which few are well prepared. These students find many ways to spend time doing everything except working on the dissertation. I recall visiting one such candidate who, when I arrived, was busily organizing alphabetically the food in his pantry.

Some universities have a bad reputation as degree mills. About a month ago a news report mentioned how a dog received a PhD with letters of recommendations just from having the owner paying the fees. That particular news article did not bestow much faith in DeVry. I happened to chose the university I am earning my PhD with based upon the particular degree program I am completing. Some universities have a reputation for their graduates having a 4.0 upon graduation. Western Governors University is such a school. I found out while working on my BA in Secondary Ed they have the students rewrite their papers till they are grammatically correct with disregard if the reasoning in the papers was sound. There was virtually 0 student-instructor interaction. At one time I was attending University of Illinois - Springfield and the same problem occurred with a lack of interaction. I suspected my instructor in Linear Algebra was only teaching the class having lost a bet with a co-worker. The university I discovered was also known for having the students to purchase 750 dollars worth of books, only have to multiple books for a class never used or even references. In one particular class I had to purchase 5 books on Philosophy and we never used 3 of those texts and we barely used the other 2.I estimate approximately 40% of colleges and universities offer online classes with the hope of increasing profitability while having little or no interest if the students actually learn the material they are studying.