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Ask HN: How did you start higher education after 40?

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Re: Ask HN: How did you start higher education after 40?

#91

Post by Der_Einzige »

capitalsigma wrote: post #85
qorrect wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hear a lot of non-engineers say this. Talking about formal logic, and how philosophy and math were once the same discipline, how math proofs are akin to philosophical arguments etc. I don't think this crowd would get much out of it.

I agree. Philosophy gives you a level of abstract reasoning of the form: "if we agree (with Kant) that we should only take those actions which could be universal law, does it follow that the death penalty is morally justifiable?" There is some degree of reasoning from premises here, but all of the objects you deal with are things that you come into with a bunch of intuition that you never really leave behind. On the…

If you get spooked by deontology in most philosophy classes, than maybe it's better to not take those philosophy classes in the first place.

This world needs more utilitarianism and less categorical imperatives...

Re: Ask HN: How did you start higher education after 40?

#92

Post by Isamu »

qorrect wrote: post #65
simonebrunozzi wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> (I chose philosophy, much more relevant and practical than I think many realize). As others have already asked, could you expand on this? Very interested.

I hear a lot of non-engineers say this. Talking about formal logic, and how philosophy and math were once the same discipline, how math proofs are akin to philosophical arguments etc. I don't think this crowd would get much out of it.

As an engineer I got into logic through the philosophy department. It was very eye opening for me.

Engineers are not models of logical thinking that they assume they are. Illogic is everywhere and it takes constant vigilance to avoid always going with your gut feelings.

Re: Ask HN: How did you start higher education after 40?

#93

Post by jeffbee »

dominotw wrote: post #66
coldcode wrote: post #20

I wanted to get a PhD in CS at 40 but was convinced by a local professor of CS that it was a waste of everyone's time and there were no jobs to be had in the academic world anyway. Shortly thereafter Google started hiring them by the truckload. I wish I had ignored him. I did have a 4 decade career as a programmer, but who knows what might have happened if I had taken the time mid-career to do the doctorate.

> Shortly thereafter Google started hiring them by the truckload. I wish I had ignored him. Google hires people without PHD by truckloads too, if anything they hire more ppl without phds.

And the people with PhDs are just as likely as the rest of them to be writing code that moves protobufs from one place to another.

Re: Ask HN: How did you start higher education after 40?

#94

Post by capitalsigma »

Der_Einzige wrote: post #91
capitalsigma wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree. Philosophy gives you a level of abstract reasoning of the form: "if we agree (with Kant) that we should only take those actions which could be universal law, does it follow that the death penalty is morally justifiable?" There is some degree of reasoning from premises here, but all of the objects you deal with are things that you come into with a bunch of intuition that you never really leave behind. On the…

If you get spooked by deontology in most philosophy classes, than maybe it's better to not take those philosophy classes in the first place. This world needs more utilitarianism and less categorical imperatives...

Kant is actually towards the top of my list of "stuff I thought was dumb before I read the actual source material but which I now have a lot of respect for." The categorical imperative stuff is a reflection of a really profound value that Kant assigns to human life.

Utilitarianism benefits a lot from having a Cliff notes version that sounds less dumb than the Cliff notes versions of other ethical frameworks, but I don't think that is the right way to evaluate ethics. Besides, philosophy class ethics is really more of an exercise in "let's construct a formal framework that matches our intuitions" rather than "let's make normative judgements about stuff in the real world."

Re: Ask HN: How did you start higher education after 40?

#95

Post by sour-taste »

Not me, but my mom went to med school at 60. She didn't get into any US med schools her first time around so she went to a school in the Caribbean. She then transfered to a US med school and from there followed the normal path through med school and residency. She's practicing now.

She said that she did see ageism, mostly in the form of people just assuming that she'd be incompetent (she's not she was in the top 5% or something when she took her board exams). She said she struggled with the memorization aspect: some things are just easier when you're young but if you work hard you can do it. This may or may not apply to you but late nights doing work (in her case being OnCall at a hospital) became very hard for her. Her young classmates had a much easier time. The truth is that school does kind of assume you're young. It's possible to overcome it but it isn't easy.

Fwiw my mom is the happiest she's ever been and said she would do it all again.

Re: Ask HN: How did you start higher education after 40?

#96

Post by FarhadG »

simonebrunozzi wrote: post #44
cdicelico wrote: post #7

I went straight to work and didn't get to college until 41/42. I'm working on my undergrad and plan to continue to my masters. I've found it incredibly rewarding for two main reasons. First, since I have a career already, I'm free of the pressure to go to school for career purposes and can focus on something I enjoy, which also provides immense value to what I'm doing every day (I chose philosophy, much more relevant…

> (I chose philosophy, much more relevant and practical than I think many realize). As others have already asked, could you expand on this? Very interested.

Not exclusive to philosophy but a strong emphasis within philosophy is the focus on developing the ability to:

- Intelligently entertain various perspectives

- Effectively imagine "possible worlds" where positions may be held or refuted

- Formalize language and all of its "fuzzy" characteristics into clear positions

- Hypothesize generalizations and abstractions to map across domains

- Think from first principles and explore their logical conclusions in conceptual and foreign territories

These were my big takeaways from philosophy undergrad and I find them increasingly important in my various technical careers.

Re: Ask HN: How did you start higher education after 40?

#97

Post by gergov »

AussieWog93 wrote: post #51
letsgo39 wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you expand on how you found philosophy practical?

Just to offer a counter-point to the others here, I've personally noticed that quite a few people who study philosophy (either formally or via self-study) tend to become "disembodied". Formal reason becomes king, even when informal methods are more appropriate for solving the task at hand, and the intangible becomes irrelevant, even when it matters deeply. Perhaps things would be different for someone in their 40s, w…

I guess philosophy education tends to vary from region to region, but "young people into phil" tend to be insufferable in one way or another, while older people with an understanding of philosophy (...and a great many real world problems) tend to be pretty okay people.

But that seems to be a broader issue with specialization anyway. Focus on one lane for too long and your brain starts to disfunction in odd ways.

Re: Ask HN: How did you start higher education after 40?

#98

Post by dangus »

I don't know if this the right advice for everyone, but for me these are things I thought of when choosing a school:

- Pick a school based on what learning management system they use. All your coursework is going to be done on these systems, so you should think about which one your prospective school uses. Canvas and Moodle seem to be well-liked, Blackboard is in the middle, D2L Brightspace sucks. At least, that seems to be the general consensus. [1] Other questions might revolve around whether your school actually keeps their solution up to date. I think that this is possibly important enough to be a deal breaker if your school's LMS solution sucks.

- If you are at all good with computers, do asynchronous classes online. Don't mess with in-person learning or virtual time scheduled lectures unless you're trying to do a prestigious program or something involving laboratory work. Online is going to be cheaper and the whole "fall asleep during lectures" model of learning sucks. You're probably still working so you want flexibility on your time.

- Closely inspect your prospective programs' curriculum. How many options do they have for electives and specializations? What are the course schedules like?

- Consider whether you actually want/need school for anything. My employer won't notice or care that I am getting my master's degree, and I'm going to guess yours won't, either. It's for my own knowledge and personal enjoyment.

- Obviously don't mess with unaccredited/poorly accredited programs and for-profit schools. For online schools I mostly considered long-established state schools that had a good history of running online programs. Other than that, I didn't really consider ranking or prestige.

- School is very easy for adults. It's all about showing up and putting in effort. I got terrible grades in undergraduate with all the distractions of young adulthood, the masters has been comparatively easy.

- !!! Very Important !!!: Along with the above, do you actually need or want school in the form of a full degree program? It's a commitment once you get into it and it's usually expensive. Lots of ways to learn these days.

[1] https://www.reddit.com/r/Professors/comments/ik76kq/whats_yo...

Re: Ask HN: How did you start higher education after 40?

#99

Post by melvinmelih »

AussieWog93 wrote: post #51
letsgo39 wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you expand on how you found philosophy practical?

Just to offer a counter-point to the others here, I've personally noticed that quite a few people who study philosophy (either formally or via self-study) tend to become "disembodied". Formal reason becomes king, even when informal methods are more appropriate for solving the task at hand, and the intangible becomes irrelevant, even when it matters deeply. Perhaps things would be different for someone in their 40s, w…

> Perhaps things would be different for someone in their 40s, who has a wealth of real world experience to draw on, philosophy would be valuable. But for the average 18 year old kid, studying it seems to create a set of terrible habits that take years to undo before the student can become a properly integrated adult.

In the time of Plato and Aristotle it was frowned upon to teach philosophy to students below the age of 35 because they wouldn't know what to do with that knowledge.

Re: Ask HN: How did you start higher education after 40?

#100

Post by cluelessmaker »

barry-cotter wrote: post #37
cluelessmaker wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you don't mind, could you share the university you went? I dropped out my bachelors in final year, and kinda old now. Spending 1 or 2 year for masters is okay for me now, but don't want to spent 4 years for bachelors again. Trying to figure out options.

University of London. There’s more than one Master’s degree that allows you to take individual modules as stand alone qualification and once you hit the limit you transfer to being a Master’s student proper. I did Finance. Last I looked the London School of Tropical Medicine also did this. If they offer a Postgraduate Certificate they’ll probably take your money for an individual module if you have any evidence you c…

If I do edx micromasters, will they consider for Msc computer science or related courses?
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