151–160 of 293 posts
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A cynical view is that US universities teaches you the opinions and manners you need to assume your role in the ruling class.
I prefer that US universities teach you have to learn. What you learn doesn't really matter.
Outside of specific academic focus, nearly everyone I know who has graduated a US university thinks basically the same way.
Jeff Schmidt's book "Disciplined Minds" is a great read about this kind of thing -- http://disciplinedminds.tripod.com/ Here's some discussion from a review of Disciplined Minds by Brian Martin: > Jeff Schmidt provides an answer in his book Disciplined Minds: professionals, including teachers, are selected and molded to have politically and intellectually subordinate attitudes, thereby making their creative energies…
Of course they did. It wasn’t them or their kids getting drafted....
76% of the men sent to Vietnam were from lower middle/working class backgrounds.
In short, the study suggests university does not change personality or attitudes; however while vocational training increases conscientiousness, it decreases investigative or enterprising traits. Would it be wrong to say it sounds like a lot of people doing vocational training end up just wanting to do a good job and get on with enjoying their lives? Is that a title more in-line with the article, and not even surpris…
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I was in Engineering, then Applied Math, now in computer science. I don't do well in university style math classes. It takes me a long time working through something to understand what is happening (and why - the why of a thing is one of the first questions I ask when I'm learning something new). It takes me about twice as long to learn a math concept as my peers (or so it seems). But I'm typically the first to speak…
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…
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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 li…
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. Your examples are at least related to software. What good is Art History? The 6 courses of calculus, differential equations, and three or four other classes math classes I took over 20 ye…
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?
I've met far more smart people on the internet than I could ever meet in real life. In fact most people I meet in real life are stupid.
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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.
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> 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
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A cynical view is that US universities teaches you the opinions and manners you need to assume your role in the ruling class.
Haha, as if the average US university graduate is joining the ruling class