Why did the social prestige of science and engineering decline in the US?

Post by hga » Sun, Apr 03, 2011, 9:21 PM UTC

obvioustroll wrote: post #95

jseliger wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the US, vast majority of the kids want to become firefighters or cops. . . . It's probably hard to tell the cause from the effect. I think it's easy: jobs as scientists in the U.S. suck relative to other jobs. See here: http://www.miller-mccune.com/science/the-real-science-gap-16... ? for more. Basically, if you have the chops to get a job in science, you're probably better off doing something else (like med schoo…

> I think it's easy: jobs as scientists in the U.S. suck relative to other jobs. Hmmm... I'm making 6 figures as an engineer. I really doubt my brother the heavy equipment operator can say the same.

Scientist != engineer; the parent to whom your replying is just talking about scientists as is the mostly good essay he links to (the author is quite wrong about this state of affairs "just happening", but maybe he wasn't looking at the situation in the '80s when the NSF (most particularly) started the big campaign for cheap scientific labor).

Post by Deadman » Sat, Apr 09, 2011, 4:53 AM UTC

tom_swift wrote: post #91

jerf wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Part of the problem is that the American distrust of intellectualism is itself not the irrational thing that those sympathetic to intellectuals would like to think. Intellectuals killed by the millions in the 20th century, and it actually takes the sophisticated training of "education" to work yourself up into a state where you refuse to count that in the books. Intellectuals routinely declared things that aren't tru…

But what exactly is the definition of an "intellectual"? It's certainly not a synonym for "scientist". The best definition I've encountered is that an intellectual tries to find solutions to the world's problems through cogitation alone, without reference to experiment or other experience. (Think, say, Karl Marx.) In other words, an Aristotelian. But certainly not a scientist. (Of course, some people working today as…

Interestingly, Galileo disproved the incorrect doctrine that, ceteris paribus, heavy objects fall faster than light ones not just with “reference to experiment or other experience” but by logically refuting Aristotle’s reasoning:-

SALVIATI: If then we take two bodies whose natural speeds are different, it is clear that, [according to Aristotle], on uniting the two, the more rapid one will be partly held back by the slower, and the slower will be somewhat hastened by the swifter. Do you not agree with me in this opinion?

SIMPLICIO: You are unquestionably right.

SALVIATI: But if this be true, and if a large stone move with a speed of, say, eight [units] while a smaller move with a speed of four, then when they are united, the system will move with a speed less than eight; but the two stones when tied together make a stone larger than that which before moved with a speed of eight. Hence the heavier body moves with less speed than the lighter; an effect which is contrary to your supposition. Thus you see how, from your assumption that the heavier body moves more rapidly than the lighter one, I infer that the heavier body moves more slowly.

Re: Why did the social prestige of science and engineering decline in the US?

Re: Why did the social prestige of science and engineering decline in the US?