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YouTube Stars Being Paid to Sell Academic Cheating

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Re: YouTube Stars Being Paid to Sell Academic Cheating

#111

Post by creep »

misterbowfinger wrote: post #43
baldfat wrote: post #2

As a former University Librarian and Residents Director A) Cheating happens more then it doesn't. In a Philosophy Class which had a dozen seniors all cheated in Spring Semester. Professor flunked them all by giving them an F and told them they were lucky they weren't expelled. President Graduated the students and fired the professor. Then on appeal the President was fired and the Professor rehired with a raise. B) Sh…

> Morally this is wrong since cheating hurts everyone in education. Going to slap a big "NOPE" to this bit. It's the school's responsibility to educate and assess students, and therefore it's their job to reduce cheating. IMHO, if it's really easy to cheat on a test (mostly rote memorization), then students SHOULD cheat. It's a bad test and and insanely huge waste of everyone's time and money.

I agree with you. Why not take advantage of the loopholes given? I think that's clever.

I'm a math major, and something I've noticed is that my exams aren't helpful for actually learning math. I don't cheat on the exams because I want to learn as best I can, and I want to say that my good grades really are mine, but in all honesty my degree isn't useful in the future because I have the ability to get the right answer by hand on a carefully constructed math problem-- it's useful because of mathematical thinking, and because I now have the awareness of the mathematical tools at my disposal and their known use cases.

But really, cheating isn't more "wrong" than any other category of thing some people wish didn't exist but does. If there's a loophole and that loophole gets you where you want to be all things considered, then take the loophole.

I agree that, for some people, cheating is ultimately harmful. For example, if you're a comp sci major and know nothing about computers going in, you're gonna want to do it the way the university wants you to do it, or you should drop out and learn a different way if that suits you better. But otherwise, just consider the costs/benefits and cheat with awareness. Our most innovative and important achievements as a species were obtained by finding loopholes.

Re: YouTube Stars Being Paid to Sell Academic Cheating

#112

Post by matz1 »

eponeponepon wrote: post #98
matz1 wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Its not a shitty job for some of the right people. I can easily think few possible advantage of this job: - flexible time - potential to earn lot of money - sheer enjoyment of writing - improve one writing skills

All of those points are also true of making a living by (e-)mail fraud, and the first two are true of almost any criminal enterprise.

The difference is essay writing service is not criminal.

Re: YouTube Stars Being Paid to Sell Academic Cheating

#113

Post by creep »

ocdtrekkie wrote: post #18
sithadmin wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone that used to write papers for cheaters: it doesn't bother me much, because higher education is already eating itself alive in the US. The impact of a few students paying others to author papers on their behalf is nothing compared to the massive grade inflation one sees at top universities in the US.

It's always intriguing to see how people justify grossly unethical behavior to themselves. I don't think the issue is your disservice to higher education in general or grade systems as a whole, but to your customers, who never receive the education they were meant to, and that they paid for.

Ethics are in the eye of the beholder.

Re: YouTube Stars Being Paid to Sell Academic Cheating

#114

Post by matz1 »

eecsninja wrote: post #102
s17n wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's like saying "stealing isn't morally wrong - inventory control is retailers' responsibility and therefore it's their job to reduce loss".

Academic cheating is NOT morally wrong in a general sense. We only think it is because it's drilled into us from a young age by the educational system. But there's really no equivalent of "cheating" in real world industries where it's the results that matter. e.g. nobody cares if you took wrote the software yourself or got it from someone else's library, as long as the software product works. If cheating happens, it…

Morality is relative anyway.

Re: YouTube Stars Being Paid to Sell Academic Cheating

#115

Post by sithadmin »

openasocket wrote: post #72
sithadmin wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I worked with less than 100 clients over the course of two years. My impact was statistically insignificant.

Statistics don't enter into it. Whether something is morally wrong or right is intrinsic to the act itself, not based on what other people are doing. If everyone in the world starts stealing from stores, that doesn't mean it is OK for you to start stealing as well.

Okay, so you're into the deontological line of thinking. I'm not. The fact that you think your approach to morality is the default just suggests that you haven't actually had a meaningful engagement with current literature on moral reasoning.

Re: YouTube Stars Being Paid to Sell Academic Cheating

#116

Post by sithadmin »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #82
sithadmin wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sorry, but that's a dumb response. There's value in producing a work that passes muster as an acceptable paper to turn in for an assignment. But there isn't a pre-existing reference good that has a defined market value to counterfeit.

> there isn't a pre-existing reference good that has a defined market value to counterfeit By your rationalization, it's impossible to counterfeit a painting.

Can you explain to me how you would come to that conclusion?

Re: YouTube Stars Being Paid to Sell Academic Cheating

#117

Post by JumpCrisscross »

sithadmin wrote: post #83
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The outcomes are both unknowable and in most cases impossible to tie to my act directly You breached academic code and, if money was exchanged, potentially the law. Given you wrote the paper and received the money, the act is quite simple to tie to you.

I'm sorry, what academic code? What which binds students at schools that I didn't attend and have no contractual relationship with? Lol, okay. >potentially the law Yeah, show me the law that tells me it's illegal to write something for someone else. Thanks.

> show me the law that tells me it's illegal to write something for someone else

Writing papers for someone else is not illegal. (The student presenting the paper as their own violates your copyright, and potentially other laws.) But if you market and sell your papers for the purpose of cheating, particularly with respect to students pursuing degrees they intend to use for licensing/certification (e.g. law or civil engineering), you're aiding and abetting fraud.

Re: YouTube Stars Being Paid to Sell Academic Cheating

#118

Post by sithadmin »

e40 wrote: post #97
sithadmin wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone that used to write papers for cheaters: it doesn't bother me much, because higher education is already eating itself alive in the US. The impact of a few students paying others to author papers on their behalf is nothing compared to the massive grade inflation one sees at top universities in the US.

You are a terrible person.

There were far worse ways that I could have kept myself afloat, income-wise. I'm pretty okay with this one, thanks.

Re: YouTube Stars Being Paid to Sell Academic Cheating

#119

Post by JumpCrisscross »

majormajor wrote: post #39

A bit of chatter here about "it eventually catches up to people anyway" that I think misses the point. You want people to learn when the stakes are low. This is better for them, and it's better for all of us. School should gradually go from low stakes to higher stakes, not be a low-stakes zone the whole time that then tosses people into the real world. Otherwise you're presented with terrible choices like expelling a…

One community particularly harmed by academic cheating is foreign students, particularly those from China and India.

Cheating amongst foreign students, particularly those from India and China, occurs at elevated frequencies [1]. But there is money to be made. Universities earn fat tuitions. And parades of scumbags take exams, write papers and falsify figures for a fee. The result is limited enforcement in the specific, i.e. against offenders and facilitators, in favor of a presumption of guilt in the general, i.e. against all foreign students from China and India.

I personally know honest individuals who had to overcome a presumption of cheating at school, at interviews and in the workplace. And it isn't just the cheaters who are complicit.

[1] https://www.wsj.com/articles/foreign-students-seen-cheating-...

Re: YouTube Stars Being Paid to Sell Academic Cheating

#120

Post by 2close4comfort »

Too bad they do not possess the moral standing to do better with the audience they have. But hey, Capitalism is great right as long as you have zero character and are vapid enough to believe that any of this fake crap matters. I say it is fine because they are the crabs at the bottom of the bucket...
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