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MIT moves all classes online for the rest of the semester

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Re: MIT moves all classes online for the rest of the semester

#521

Post by marcinzm »

akhilcacharya wrote: post #412
marcinzm wrote: post #339

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Top private US schools provide very good financial aid packages and are a very good choice for underprivileged students if they can get in. Schools in turn want such students for diversity and metrics.

> if they can get in. These questions are framed in the wrong way. The filter isn't cost, it's getting in, and people from middle class and poor families are at a disadvantage in terms of accomplishments.

>These questions are framed in the wrong way. The filter isn't cost, it's getting in, and people from middle class and poor families are at a disadvantage in terms of accomplishments.

Yes and no. In that there is correlation but probably not direct causality. For example, Asian middle and poor families seem to do fairly well in getting their kids to have the right achievements.

Re: MIT moves all classes online for the rest of the semester

#522

Post by bluGill »

xur17 wrote: post #367
pfranz wrote: post #361

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are shortages in the supply chain; hand sanitizer, masks, and tests for coronavirus in addition to overwhelming hospitals by sick people. If there aren't open beds or staff (ideally who aren't overworked), people who otherwise would get medical attention will die. If a vaccine wasn't even in the picture flattening the curve would help with these things.

That's a good point. Also, my understanding is that antiviral medications might be an option in a "few" months.

There are a lot of things in the future. Antivirals show promise of working in a few months - but we don't actually know they will work (or for that matter that the virus won't evolve a new unique resistance to them). It will take time to figure out what works best for treatment.

Re: MIT moves all classes online for the rest of the semester

#523

Post by bluGill »

rellui wrote: post #180
smallgovt wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually, I think it's likely going to be seen as an overreaction in hindsight by the general public (even though it may not be). If these actions are successful in curbing the virus' spread, most people won't appreciate how bad things could have really gotten.

In this case though we've examples of how bad it can get. Iran comes to mind. As this progresses we'll see what happens to countries who didn't attempt any quarantine or drastic measures at all.

That won't be the US though which is already quietly quarantining things. Conferences are being postponed. Companies are stopping all non-emergency travel. Nursing homes are not allowing visitors.

Re: MIT moves all classes online for the rest of the semester

#524

Post by samscully »

laputan_machine wrote: post #499
Ntrails wrote: post #491

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I certainly doubt you to be lying, but you are wrong afaik. There are certainly shared rooms in a university in the UK (at least were ~10 years ago and doubt has changed). However it was a handful of students in shared halls rooms (in big old houses etc) compared to a population that must have been a few thousand. It was cheaper, and some people thought sharing a room would help make friends. I remain dubious.

Can you show me any UK university that has shared sleeping rooms? I have never heard of this. Shared living areas, i.e. sharing a house, does exist, and is what my original post said.

My halls at Imperial College had double and triple shared rooms [1]. Looks like they don't use those buildings as halls any more though.

[1] https://www.imperial.ac.uk/centenary/memories/JoaoCabral.sht...

Re: MIT moves all classes online for the rest of the semester

#525

Post by hak8or »

WalterBright wrote: post #196
samatman wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most of the value of an elite education is signaling: it proves the student had what it takes both to get into MIT, and to graduate. If MIT switched to an online-only format, that would erode the value of the latter (which, remember, is social proof, not something which is notoriously rational), while open enrollment would obliterate the former. A semester of remote teaching won't damage the brand.

> Most of the value of an elite education is signaling Not in my case (Caltech). It was clear when I got an industry job that a BS from Caltech was at about the same level as an MS from other institutions. But if the institution is large enough, one can get an elite education by careful selection of the classes and professors, and doing the maximum in those classes rather than just getting by. For example, take honor…

> If you don't find yourself studying 6 hours a day, you're not getting an elite education.

This is absolute nonsense and a garbage mentality, akin to gate keeping.

Re: MIT moves all classes online for the rest of the semester

#526

Post by cultofmetatron »

Larrikin wrote: post #403
aatharuv wrote: post #340

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What dorms don't have kitchens? Certainly when I went to MIT, most (if not all) dorms at least had kitchenette's, 20 years back. Shared, of course, which is the main problem.

I've never seen a true dorm with a kitchen, the transition apartments owned by the university for juniors and seniors had them but freshman and sophomore dorms I've been in tend to have microwaves and thats it. Its the right decision in my opinion since the largest number of fire alarm evacuations I've had to do were in those dorms because 18 and 19 year olds living away from their parents can't even figure out how t…

how does an 18-year-old who cant even make popcorn even get into college???

Re: MIT moves all classes online for the rest of the semester

#527

Post by ghaff »

bilbo0s wrote: post #426
peter_l_downs wrote: post #341

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I went to MIT too and with the exception of about three classes, every single in-person class was a waste. The value the school offers is, in order: - the people you meet - the brand name on your resume - the psets and structured guide to learning hard things Notice that the last two still work over Zoom. If I were in the hard sciences this might be different but as a professional Software Engineer, the classes were…

I disagree. Maybe your specialty is a different case, but there's no way on Earth that I would have gotten access to the equipment I used without the lab. Doesn't have to be MIT's lab, but someone has to have the ridiculous amounts of money necessary to construct and outfit advanced research labs if a student is to replicate that experience. And that hypothetical, "someone", would have been unlikely to allow me to us…

That seems like the most difficult situation. I also assume that there are a lot of people who are/were on track to graduate who need to finish an undergraduate thesis. (I assume those are still required for some majors.) There are only two real choices at this point I would think: Pretend everyone completed the current semester's coursework/projects satisfactorily or require a summer session or some other form of make up time.

Re: MIT moves all classes online for the rest of the semester

#528

Post by admax88q »

easytiger wrote: post #514
fudged71 wrote: post #389

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>a successful response would be seen by the uninformed as an overreaction This is what worries me the most. Is there a name for this bias? Seems similar to survivorship bias, I'm sure it's seen across all kinds of contexts.

Have you thought about inverting your thinking? Every pandemic this century ended up being a damp squib despite WHO et al promising doomsday.

Was it the WHO promising doomsday? Or the media reporting on it?

Re: MIT moves all classes online for the rest of the semester

#529

Post by bluGill »

perl4ever wrote: post #225
smacktoward wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They may be "legally habitable" under the normal building codes, but those codes don't take into account the circumstances of a pandemic disease. MIT has contracted with these students to provide them with housing. Part of their normal obligation under those contracts would be to provide them with housing that offers a reasonably healthy environment. MIT will have by now heard from a lot of Highly Credentialed Expert…

"Yes, it'll suck for the kids, but not as much as drowning in their own fluids would." I keep reading that the casualty rate for young people is miniscule. It's the nursing homes that are being decimated, no?

The kids going to visit their grand parents on weekends is a risk as well

Re: MIT moves all classes online for the rest of the semester

#530

Post by CydeWeys »

saagarjha wrote: post #509
Gibbon1 wrote: post #296

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah people make the mistake of thinking your can figure out the law based on deduction and first principals. You can't you need to be familiar with applicable case law. Thing to remember law predates science by about 3000 years.

> Thing to remember law predates science by about 3000 years. Does it really?

Yes it does. Science as we know it really only dates back to the enlightenment, whereas law dates back to at least 1754 BC (and likely earlier).

More specifically, computer science only dates back a few decades (being generous, call it a century), and most of the people applying incorrect frameworks to law on this site are coming in with preconceived notions from that.

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