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America's obsession with STEM education is dangerous

washingtonpost.com

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Re: America's obsession with STEM education is dangerous

#31

Post by _gotmilk »

eutectic wrote: post #13

This article is conflating two different ideas; that we should have more students studying STEM subjects, and that students should have a narrower (and more STEM-focused) education. You can disagree with either of these proposals (and I disagree with both), but it is wrong to set up one as a straw-man to argue against the other. The real reasons to think that STEM-mania is silly are much better described elsewhere (e…

I have seen this argument a lot, and it doesn't hold water.

Those STEM majors leaving the field often get salaries higher than people who majored in that field going into it. It seems that these employers value the STEM education moreso than people who major in the same field.

Second, it is entirely possible that these STEM majors voluntarily left the STEM field. More people are doing STEM but that doesn't mean more people are passionate about STEM. Engineering isn't for everyone, and I myself have thought about leaving the field and going elsewhere not because I can't find a job but because I want to.

Re: America's obsession with STEM education is dangerous

#32

Post by Smoofer »

IgorPartola wrote: post #23
reasonish wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can see the worry with vaccination, as it directly affects everyone, but does everyone necessarily have to agree on the other two issues? Is it a real issue if someone is doing really good things for society, being an excellent person, but happens to disagree with you about evolution or climate change? Science is getting to be its own fundamental religion for many IMHO, who prescribe 'science' as the answer to ever…

Yes. People who do not believe in evolution are holding back progress. They are making everyone's quality of life worse through their sheer ignorance. People who do not believe in global warming are even worse. I will literally suffocate in my lifetime because of these imbicils. I suppose in some philosophical sense, no we don't all need to agree, but in a practical sense if we want to survive and thrive as a species…

Your comments come off as ridiculously condescending

Re: America's obsession with STEM education is dangerous

#33

Post by kazinator »

subsection1h wrote: post #30
pconner wrote: post #10

I resent the seemingly common belief that STEM and creativity are so disjoint. Every breakthrough in STEM required incredible amounts of creativity. Even average STEM workers (say, for example, a software developer) usually need to exercise creativity pretty regularly.

Similarly, I'm also bothered by the common argument that participation in sports is vital for learning to work as part of a team, as if STEM projects don't facilitate gaining such experience.

The argument is wrong in a different way too: there are non-team-sports in which you can participate by yourself just fine, while reaping all the fitness and health benefits.

Re: America's obsession with STEM education is dangerous

#34

Post by reasonish »

IgorPartola wrote: post #23
reasonish wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can see the worry with vaccination, as it directly affects everyone, but does everyone necessarily have to agree on the other two issues? Is it a real issue if someone is doing really good things for society, being an excellent person, but happens to disagree with you about evolution or climate change? Science is getting to be its own fundamental religion for many IMHO, who prescribe 'science' as the answer to ever…

Yes. People who do not believe in evolution are holding back progress. They are making everyone's quality of life worse through their sheer ignorance. People who do not believe in global warming are even worse. I will literally suffocate in my lifetime because of these imbicils. I suppose in some philosophical sense, no we don't all need to agree, but in a practical sense if we want to survive and thrive as a species…

You're probably going to die from cancer or heart disease.

Even if you just look at environmental factors, we're more likely to die either from the bee population dying due to pesticides, or because of the massive increase in routine use of antibiotics in meat production. Neither of which really get much media attention, maybe because they're both issues caused by science, and people like cheap food.

But at the end of the day we're going to die from overcrowding . The population has doubled in the last 30 years. (Hence why science has to make horrible dangerous food to feed them all).

Whether your fellow man believes in global warming is pretty irrelevant, and whether he believes in evolution is even less relevant to anything that matters. You're certainly not going to die from global warming!

Your comment is the sort of "scientific fundamentalism" I was talking about.

Re: America's obsession with STEM education is dangerous

#35

Post by Smoofer »

subsection1h wrote: post #30
pconner wrote: post #10

I resent the seemingly common belief that STEM and creativity are so disjoint. Every breakthrough in STEM required incredible amounts of creativity. Even average STEM workers (say, for example, a software developer) usually need to exercise creativity pretty regularly.

Similarly, I'm also bothered by the common argument that participation in sports is vital for learning to work as part of a team, as if STEM projects don't facilitate gaining such experience.

Eh, in a high school setting, there's no better way to learn teamwork than being on a sports team, imo.

Re: America's obsession with STEM education is dangerous

#36

Post by kazinator »

pconner wrote: post #19
kazinator wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes; it's just not the liberal arts kind of creativity where there is no objective criterion for being wrong. You can't teach that creativity. The people with some of the most notable kinds of creativity didn't get it from sitting through some humanities courses.

There isn't always an objective criterion for being wrong in STEM either. Obviously, in some cases, like mathematical proofs, you're either correct or not (and your correctness is formally verifiable), but design of scientific experiments or design of software systems can allow as much creativity as composing a song or writing a poem. The results of these designs can sometimes be evaluated in an objective fashion, bu…

There are actually objective measures in evaluating a song or poem. Such concepts are rejected in the modern humanities and fine arts. The only thing wrong is to be "non-creative" (e.g. compose something in the baroque style, or paint realism: any form which has rules.) That is the real sin: to adhere to some obvious form which inherently demands the taboo of an objective evaluation of your work.

Re: America's obsession with STEM education is dangerous

#37

Post by protomyth »

Smoofer wrote: post #35
subsection1h wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Similarly, I'm also bothered by the common argument that participation in sports is vital for learning to work as part of a team, as if STEM projects don't facilitate gaining such experience.

Eh, in a high school setting, there's no better way to learn teamwork than being on a sports team, imo.

Mainly learning about winning and losing and trying again.

Re: America's obsession with STEM education is dangerous

#38

Post by eutectic »

_gotmilk wrote: post #31
eutectic wrote: post #13

This article is conflating two different ideas; that we should have more students studying STEM subjects, and that students should have a narrower (and more STEM-focused) education. You can disagree with either of these proposals (and I disagree with both), but it is wrong to set up one as a straw-man to argue against the other. The real reasons to think that STEM-mania is silly are much better described elsewhere (e…

I have seen this argument a lot, and it doesn't hold water. Those STEM majors leaving the field often get salaries higher than people who majored in that field going into it. It seems that these employers value the STEM education moreso than people who major in the same field. Second, it is entirely possible that these STEM majors voluntarily left the STEM field. More people are doing STEM but that doesn't mean more…

The burden of proof is on the pro-STEMmers to show that we really do need a bunch more STEM majors, not on the rest of us to prove we don't.

Edit: and are you sure that your higher-wages claim (source?) is not just evidence that STEM majors act as an effective filter for the smart and driven.

Re: America's obsession with STEM education is dangerous

#39

Post by psychometry »

pconner wrote: post #10

I resent the seemingly common belief that STEM and creativity are so disjoint. Every breakthrough in STEM required incredible amounts of creativity. Even average STEM workers (say, for example, a software developer) usually need to exercise creativity pretty regularly.

You clearly didn't read the article. The success the U.S. has had in being innovating in STEM fields is due to our cultural tradition of comprehensive education rooted in the liberal arts. A focus only on STEM is what gets you modern-day China, Korea, and Japan, where there are many technically skilled workers but a lower inclination to be innovative.

Re: America's obsession with STEM education is dangerous

#40

Post by acadien »

tedunangst wrote: post #29
IgorPartola wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. People who do not believe in evolution are holding back progress. They are making everyone's quality of life worse through their sheer ignorance. People who do not believe in global warming are even worse. I will literally suffocate in my lifetime because of these imbicils. I suppose in some philosophical sense, no we don't all need to agree, but in a practical sense if we want to survive and thrive as a species…

It's extremely hard for me to imagine how my quality of life would improve if my neighbor started believing in evolution. Perhaps you can provide an example?

Its about an educated and critical thinking public. A public that approaches everything with a critical eye is less susceptible to political pandering and more accepting of good science and evidence/data based laws. The average person doesn't know how to interpret a bar graph and has no clue what a good source of data looks like. Agreeing on a specific point, such as evolution, is just a symptom of the larger problem.
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