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Going to university does not broaden the mind

economist.com

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Re: Going to university does not broaden the mind

#131

Post by WalterBright »

analog31 wrote: post #60
WalterBright wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some universities teach "follow the rules", others teach "here's where the rules come from." I was fortunate enough to have attended one of the latter. This was brought home to me when I had to calculate the moment of inertia of some gears in a gearbox. I started with the concept of MoI, and worked it out with a bit of calculus. Another engineer was looking over my work, and asked "what book did you get the formula f…

It would actually surprise me if any university had the ability to impose an overall bias in one of those directions over the other. There would seem to be too much variation among the individual professors, teachers, students, etc. Anecdotally, I live in the shadow of a Big Ten university, so I know a lot of academics, and I don't think any of them have expressed a "follow the rules" approach that I was able to disc…

I don't know about any university, but at Caltech it was consistent that everything used was derived from first principles. There wasn't any "trust me, use this rule".

Re: Going to university does not broaden the mind

#132

Post by Aloha »

jedberg wrote: post #98
TearsInTheRain wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why are social programs necessary?

Because not everyone is born into the privilege necessary to “pull up their own bootstraps”. In fact it was on college that I learned a lot about libertarianism, and was a strong believer in pure capitolisim. As I’ve aged I’ve realized that it just doesn’t work.

It's not privilege, privilege makes it easier, but it's certainly not impossible without it - unless you count things like intelligence and personality to be privilege.

That said, a certain subset of the population doesn't have the wherewithal, drive or ability to do it - and for an even smaller, the best in life they can hope for is to perform some sort of manual labor.

We mustn't forget about the self selection bias of being smart - we tend to only socialize and know other smart people - meaning, don't fall into the fallacy of assuming you're the median.

Re: Going to university does not broaden the mind

#133

Post by WalterBright »

dsfyu404ed wrote: post #129
WalterBright wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I just drew a box around half of the teeth. But the rest of the gear cross-section, being an airplane part, was sculpted to put material only where it was needed. Ideally, the strain at any point should be the same as any other point. So the MoI was not simply a stackup of some stock shapes. It's not that the calculation was particularly difficult, it's just that calculus was needed, and one couldn't just copy the fo…

>being an airplane part, That explains it.

Airplane parts are a whole 'nother world. I imagine that rocket parts take that to the nth level, which is one reason that working on rockets is the ultimate for an engineer. A real engineer would pay to work on an F1 engine design .

Re: Going to university does not broaden the mind

#134

Post by tylerhou »

Zafira wrote: post #126
jedberg wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Very different foods. The north is a lot more spicy stuff. The south is more about sauces and freshness.

> Very different foods. This I agree with, just like the US has varied cuisine depending on locale. > The north is a lot more spicy stuff. The south is more about sauces and freshness. Citation needed, please.

>> The north is a lot more spicy stuff. The south is more about sauces and freshness.

> Citation needed, please.

Not really true; here is an anti-citation: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sichuan_cuisine

Re: Going to university does not broaden the mind

#135

Post by nixpulvis »

scarface74 wrote: post #120

Only the privileged can afford to go to college to “broaden their mind”. Most people go to college to compete in the market and get a job. It’s amazing how much push back I get about computer science degrees should teach marketable skills and people say they weren’t meant to be ”vocational degrees” and you shouldn’t go to college for “job training”. Just the idea that people are suggesting in some of the comments tha…

I feel there's a bit of a strange tension in this argument. Why can't you have both?

While I was in classes it wasn't job focused, or at least not directly. I often hear people complain, for example about how they never use anything they learned in college for their programming jobs. I find this impossible to believe. The process of building a binary search tree or proving the pumping lemma are all exercises. Just like anything else being good at things takes practice, college is (or should be) as good of an environment for this as we can create.

If you're looking for a solution to the feeling that college doesn't do a good enough job preparing you for the working world, I'd like to at least mention how much of a fan of coop programs I am, and how they can be integrated into the higher education process.

People telling you directly that college shouldn't be about job training are feeling a bit nostalgic and idealistic, while holding on to a hint of truth.

So I say again, what's stopping the underprivileged student, paying for college with loans and scholarships, from broadening their mind, while getting the skills to pay the bills?

Re: Going to university does not broaden the mind

#136

Post by Aloha »

TearsInTheRain wrote: post #96
jedberg wrote: post #92

University definitely broadened my mind. I grew up in an area that was 99+% white and 50+% Jewish. We literally had “the black family” with twins who were our top track stars. And a few Asian families who hid their Asianness. It was at University that I learned about Asian culture. It was the first time I used chopsticks. It was the first time I drank tea without sugar. It was the first time I ate Chinese food that w…

Why are social programs necessary?

Because everyone isn't as smart as you are, and with the elimination of many jobs at the bottom of the economy we no longer have a good way to ensure the pie of wealth us equitably divided.

Re: Going to university does not broaden the mind

#137

Post by WalterBright »

someguydave wrote: post #76
WalterBright wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But they're still thinking of it as evil. Slavery is completely anti-ethical to libertarianism.

Is it? What if it is entered into voluntarily?

Your rights are inalienable. This means that you cannot transfer them, even voluntarily. They remain your rights. Slave contracts are worthless for this reason.

Re: Going to university does not broaden the mind

#138

Post by nixpulvis »

sethammons wrote: post #119
jedberg wrote: post #92

University definitely broadened my mind. I grew up in an area that was 99+% white and 50+% Jewish. We literally had “the black family” with twins who were our top track stars. And a few Asian families who hid their Asianness. It was at University that I learned about Asian culture. It was the first time I used chopsticks. It was the first time I drank tea without sugar. It was the first time I ate Chinese food that w…

True story. At work, folks going out for lunch. Ask if I want dim sum. I had never heard of it. All I could think of, in redneck fashion, was "that boy ain't bright, he's dim some." I declined going. Still not sure what it is. I think it is a soup.

You're truly missing out of one of life's greatest pleasures. Carts and carts of delight, oh what a sight!

Re: Going to university does not broaden the mind

#139

Post by forkLding »

shanghaiaway wrote: post #102
jedberg wrote: post #92

University definitely broadened my mind. I grew up in an area that was 99+% white and 50+% Jewish. We literally had “the black family” with twins who were our top track stars. And a few Asian families who hid their Asianness. It was at University that I learned about Asian culture. It was the first time I used chopsticks. It was the first time I drank tea without sugar. It was the first time I ate Chinese food that w…

What's the difference between north and south China?

North is generally colder in climate to the more tropical and warmer South, Northern Chinese traditionally eat grains and wheat-based foods like baozi and jiaozi (dumplings) while Southern Chinese will eat rice and rice-flour based foods like rice noodles. Northern China was occasionally under the influence of nomadic powers which shaped its culture. Southern culture is shaped by the gradual immigration of Han Chinese peoples from the North and assimilation of the native peoples into Han Chinese. Roughly before 1000 AD, Northern China was more economically powerful and the South was generally a hinterland while roughly after 1000 AD Southern China was more economically powerful (for example, see Guangdong/Canton region). Non-Han tribal minorities in the North tend to be descended off nomadic horse tribes while in the South they are usually descended off river and mountain-based tribes.

As of Modern China, the North tends to be politically powerful as it is dominated by Beijing while the South tends to be economically powerful, dominated by Shanghai, Guangdong/Canton, Shenzhen, etc.

For more info, click here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northern_and_southern_China

To some degree, similar to the North-South Indian cultural divide if you want to look that up too.

Re: Going to university does not broaden the mind

#140

Post by diogenescynic »

beaner wrote: post #3

Outside of specific academic focus, nearly everyone I know who has graduated a US university thinks basically the same way.

It’s narrow minded to generalize that massive groups of people think “basically” the same way... I can honestly say that when I went to college, there were definitely people who had a multitude of ideas and opinions—there was no groupthink or even a super majority consensus of opinion. Maybe you went to the wrong school and have a narrow social circle if all the people you know think the same way.
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