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My education was hardly one-sided. Just because YOU think that everyone should be math and science experts doesn't mean that the rest of the world does. Not everyone can be a nurse or accountant.
Of course its one sided, as you just stated you haven't studied math or science. You "don't want to, don't need to". How possibly can an education be well rounded if it ignores two large branches of academia?
Being knowledgeable about science and mathematics is dramatically different than being an expert, I don't expect any undergrad degree to make anybody an expert.
Nursing and accounting are careers, mathematics and science are academic disciplines. I'm talking about education, not careers.
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Originally Posted by NYChistorygal
What is being systematically studied? Life. People. Humanity.
There's the fools that completely dismiss math and science... and then there's the fools who hold math and science as the greater academic areas to study. An individual with a liberal arts degree from a good program is pretty damn well rounded. Sure, they might only have to take 2 or 3 lab sciences and maybe just 2 college level (calc or equiv) classes... but they take a lot of classes in other areas that help them be, well, well rounded.
I think a lot of "useless" degree majors have too much of a denial mentality. They know in the back of their mind that it's going to be very tough for them to land a job when they graduate, but they ignore that feeling. They tell themselves I'm going to learn what I enjoy and worry about the consequences later. They remind themselves of the advertising pitch their guidance counselor told them of the glamourous jobs they could potentially land. That's fine and all but it's still a mistake to ignore your future. Living with no job and no money is not fun. Many will regret it later on.
Actually, a lot of people majoring in the liberal arts plan on continuing their studies in graduate or professional school. Many I knew planned on entering law.
Actually, a lot of people majoring in the liberal arts plan on continuing their studies in graduate or professional school. Many I knew planned on entering law.
Rightfully so. Liberal arts degrees are not terminating degrees. The folks complaining about college are often folks that dropped out of their educational career half-way though.
I once worked for a guy who got his degree in Geology from a City College--"C" student. He seemed to do just fine. Some of you know him as Gen Colin Powell.
Is that the guy that lied in front of the United Nations and said that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction. I think he said that they had a large amount of them, but "just a pinch" would be enough to kill thousands of people. He seemed very convincing. I guess Cheney and Bush had to find the dumbest guy they had to head over to the UN, since they made him believe it, and he was then able to seem more convincing. Geology. . . .
I'll have to check into that.
Sure, they might only have to take 2 or 3 lab sciences and maybe just 2 college level (calc or equiv) classes... but they take a lot of classes in other areas that help them be, well, well rounded.
Yes, a lot of other areas, like "media studies", "American culture", etc.
Liberal arts programs almost entirely isolate students to liberal arts courses, its very far from being well rounded. Which is of course ironic, since traditionally the liberal arts was the general study of all major disciplines...today its the study of non of them.... Go figure.
Yes, a lot of other areas, like "media studies", "American culture", etc.
Liberal arts programs almost entirely isolate students to liberal arts courses, its very far from being well rounded. Which is of course ironic, since traditionally the liberal arts was the general study of all major disciplines...today its the study of non of them.... Go figure.
At my university, liberal arts students have to take lab science and math courses. They certainly don't have to take engineering classes. What are you expecting them to take in order to be well rounded?
Believe when I say there are plenty of qualified and unemployed nurses out there. Many hospitals are on a hiring freeze or they refuse to hire more nurses because they don't want to spend more money on nurses. Nurses are an added expense that many hospitals do not want to bother spending on. So they hire a few good nurses and force them to take on dangerously high patient loads, networking and burning their staff out.
This is so true! My sister was just saying how they could never get RNs to work at the Nursing Homes where she worked a few years ago because the RNs had so many options. Now they have their pick of RNs because the hospitals/insurance companies are trying to lower costs by getting by with the fewest Nurses possible.
And yet its not, psychologists use the same sort of quantitative methods that are used in the "hard sciences". But psychology, unlike the hard sciences, is rather new so there is still a lot of things that can't be researched quantitatively. But this doesn't make psychology methodologically distinct from the hard-sciences, you can find the same sorts of things in the theoretical parts of the hard-sciences.
I don't know if it's due to being new, or just the nature of the beast. It's probably a combination of both. I agree with the last statement, but that emphatic broad brush of yours is simply wrong. And your statements here remind me of that prof I worked under. She said similar things and got pretty cranky over the subject. I still fail to see the merit of it. The challenges I faced in her project were not challenges I contended with in the biochem lab. My role in the work, the potential for extreme bias due to the nature of the work, is an important distinction.
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Also, you mentioned evolutionary psychology, that's probably less legitimate science than the half-baked project you're talking about....
On this we agree. But, this is exactly what happens under the umbrella of psych. Perhaps a term like semi-soft will surface in the future.
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So then you'd consider me a scientist if I purchased a $100 microscope made some hypothesis about such and such and tested it?
Important is relative, but it would no more make you a scientist than make a person an artist who swings by Walgreen's to pick up crayons and construction paper on the way home from work. As stated, both require dedicated time an effort. What you're offering here as an example doesn't cut the mustard.
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You are suggesting that anybody that does something that can roughly be described as "art" is an artist, yet are making rigorous demands for someone to be a "scientist". Your definition of artist is vacuous, it applies to everyone. You are putting science on a pedestal....
But the "real world" doesn't share this vacuous notion of an "artist" that you are trying to employ, art oriented businesses aren't going to consider someone that draws for fun as a serious candidate for a job. Just as a science oriented company isn't going to take my home lab work as serious scientific experience.... Furthermore, since your definition of art is so loose, the claim that there are science geeks that do art really doesn't assert much at all. After all, if you pick up a pencil and draw you are magically an "artist".....
But whatever, you're an artist, I'm an artist, my cat is an artist.
I don't consider the employment requirement as putting science on a pedestal, rather scientific work normally requires capital. Your microscope is a good example. You really can't do much with it. Folk with access to the tools commonly used in science tend to be scientists. I guess this just follows your "same" mantra. It doesn't fit in this comparison and it doesn't fit with your methodology argument.
What are you expecting them to take in order to be well rounded?
I asked the same question, didn't receive a definitive answer though.
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