Can you still do a postdoc if you definitely don't want to become a professor? Will your advisor think less of you for doing so? I'm a senior grad student struggling with existential angst. I'm fed up with my advisor, to the point of fantasizing about quitting my PhD. I likely don't want to become a professor. But at the same time, I still love my field of study (in the biosciences), I like research, and I have a postdoc lined up starting next year at a great institution working on a project that I am really excited about. Also, due to conflicts with my advisor, I am really worried I won't be able to graduate in time to take this postdoc job. My questions are:


Is it still worth doing a postdoc? Another way of asking is: have other people set out to do postdocs with the clear intention of not becoming a professor?  I don't mind the low pay and I'm excited about the topic, so my guess is yes... but I'm worried it might hurt my chances of getting a job in industry or elsewhere afterwards (not sure what I do want to do instead though).
Would it be a terrible idea to TELL my current advisor that I don't want a career in academia in the long run, but still want to do a postdoc? I feel that it might help with the current impossible standards he/she is holding me to, and hence speed up graduation. But, I'm worried that both my current and postdoc advisor will assume it means I won't take science as seriously, and hence won't do a good job as a postdoc.
1) If you are truly interested in the work, then yes, it can be worth doing. A post doc could also be a path to a long term non-professor role in academia, though those positions are quite rare and are definitely undercompensated. You should probably be aware, though, that your time as a post doc isn't likely to count much as "experience" in the non-academic fields unless the work is very closely related to an industry.

2) I have certainly heard stories of students that were pushed through by their advisors/departments at their request after not expressing interest in academia, so maybe this could help you - personally I think that's silly and isn't how PhDs should work at all, but reality doesn't always match the ideal. Have you done enough to earn a PhD in your department? It isn't clear what exactly your conflicts are with your advisor, and whether you are being held back when you should be allowed to graduate or if you have not been productive enough to have earned the degree.

It's also hard to give you advice on this because your current situation with your advisor suggests there isn't a lot of confidence that your advisor has your best interests at heart. That said, at least in the US where I have experience, the reality is that most PhDs in the biological sciences will not get professor jobs, regardless of their desires: the math simply isn't in favor of it when each professor graduates multiple students and yet universities aren't growing exponentially. A good advisor should understand that reality and take some interest in preparing students for whatever they want their post-PhD career to be like. In that context, I wouldn't really be interested in having a PhD or postdoc advisor who could not accept that reality, and from the advisor's standpoint I would expect the same level of productivity out of graduate students and post docs regardless of their career goals, except for being honest with them about the caliber of work that is required for those goals.