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I have copied these from the catalog of the University of Texas, a large well regarded public university that offers pretty much any degree that is commonly offered. Does anyone really disagree with my categorization? I would note that UT puts mathematics, physics, chemistry in the "College of Natural Sciences", not the "College of Liberal Arts".
Well, it's not a matter of opinion... but I'd say that your opinion differs from what has always been well regarded in academia.
Most schools don't split out the natural sciences from the liberal arts schools. They often have one school referred to as "College of Liberal Arts and Sciences" because it also includes professional programs like engineering and health.
No one is redefining anything but you in your post here. That's exactly why I asked the question to the OP in the second post of the thread. Liberal arts includes natural sciences and maths. Looks like other posters were pointing this out to clarify for others who may think that liberal arts and STEM are exclusive. They are not.
I think someone else pointed out that BA is common for the natural sciences.
Professional programs like engineering sit outside of liberal arts.
And yet the question in the OP is about cognition, while the liberal arts vs. applied arts/professions dichotomy is about the stance of the program regarding employment.
Are you implying that pursuing education for the sake of learning rather than for the sake of employment, which is ostensibly what the liberal-applied dichotomy is about, changes the nature of the education received or the abilities of the people who enroll in the program?
There is usually only one program in a discipline or sub-discipline offered by a school. If you want to study chemistry, it does not matter what bureaucratic penumbra the department is organized under. The curriculum will be pretty similar to what is offered by other schools, no matter what the philosophy of the school is towards learning or knowledge, which is mostly just marketing for incoming undergrads. For good reasons the disciplines have settled on a menu of things to teach and this doesn't change with regard to the department's claimed stance toward the applicability of what it teaches or the employability of its graduates.
For example many elite universities do not offer undergraduate business schools because they see them as applied, and frankly declasse. Yet the economics departments of those universities function as undergraduate business schools.
There are definitely gradations of quality between institutions, but those hinge more on the perceived prestige of the institution more so than they hinge on the content taught, or how it is taught.
When I was in school the computer science department at my school moved out of the college of arts and sciences and merged with the electrical and computer engineering department within the engineering school. The curriculum or enrollment did not change. Some distribution requirements and prerequisites changed, but it was mostly a relabeling of the program.
And let us be honest. The vast majority of undergraduates have an applied stance toward their educations. They want to be gainfully employed because of their education. All the talk about "learning for the sake of knowledge" is BS for most students. So even if a department is operating according to that spirit, the students are probably not.
Graduate students are more likely to possess a liberal stance regarding education, but one need only look at the scads of CS, mathematics, and economics grad students who bail on their programs in favor of Silicon Valley and Wall Street to put paid to the idea that they are in it for the life of the mind. Many graduate students don't stick with their programs because they are scholars pursuing the life of the mind. They stick with them because they have no other perceived options.
The liberal-applied dichotomy has very little to do with critical thinking skills, math skills, or verbal skills.
The subject matters of the various disciplines, and the skills required to master those subject matters, have FAR more to do with the type of person attracted to those disciplines, and what that person is capable of. Not some bureaucratic musical chairs or pedagogical marketing tactic.
I'm guessing for some it stems (sorry) from the usual dichotomy of 'good in math' vs. 'good in english'. Guess a pupil frequently has at least one subject they don't excel in. Me, I liked the main 4 except for math (Geometry was ok). But unfortunately that teacher was such a blue stocking I recoiled strenuously. (Only 1 math teacher; came from a very small school.)
<<SNIP>>
It's not every day that I learn something new on CD, but I have (to the best of my recollection) never seen that term before. Thank you!
Ok, saw an article today that used the current Corona crisis to argue that we need more liberal arts/humanities majors because STEM didn't provide critical thinkers.
Putting aside the use of a crisis to justify a position, I'm more interested in the implication that STEM majors don't learn critical thinking skills. We've even seen that argument posed here in CD. What is the basis for this belief? Just looked up the STEM program where my daughter graduated. 29 of the credits were from various humanities requirements. In contrast, History only requires 8 science and math credits.
Where did that belief come from?
I'm re-posting the OP here so that we can get back to the topic. Here's a snippet to remind everyone of the Terms of Service for this site, "Be civil, no personal attacks, flaming, or insults. We may attack ideas (politely) but we do not attack the speaker of the idea. Be careful with your words, there is a point where being direct crosses a line into blunt, in-your-face hostility. Please, report bad posts instead of engaging in flame wars on the boards. Insulting another member or a moderator will not be tolerated anywhere on this website. This includes Direct Messages and Reputation Comments.
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Folks, for the purposes of this discussion and to avoid getting bogged down into where various universities slot various courses, let's define our terms exclusively.
STEM = science, technology, engineering, mathematics.
Liberal Arts/Humanities = not STEM
Business, agriculture, textiles, and other specialties = other
Yes, I know there is some overlap between STEM and the classic academic definition of liberal arts but this distinction between Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics or Liberal Arts is the basis of the original article that "STEM degrees don't provide critical thinkers and liberal arts degrees do."
Let us assume that as per the OP, STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) is considered as a group of fields of study that have a lot in common. More in common, really, than divides them.
There's another set of fields that would include things like Literature, Music, History, Philosophy, Psychology, Sociology, Political Science, and so on. Most people would agree that these courses have more in common with each other than they do with STEM.
Business and Education I'm not really sure where they fall, whether they could be considered part of the second group, or yet a third group.
I still remain astonished by the claim that STEM subjects somehow "don't teach critical thinking" and that you need to take courses in "group 2" to be able to do that. Really? As far as I'm concerned, science in the ideal is about nothing other than critical thinking. If the data don't bear out the hypothesis, then the hypothesis is wrong.
As to "logic" vs. "critical thinking", logic without critical thinking can lead you to the medieval controversies about exactly how many angels could dance on the point of a pin; critical thinking without logic can lead you to questioning everything that's known, even to the point of believing the moon landings were faked and every single person involved in the space program was in on the secret and not a single one has spilled the beans in 50+ years.
As I said, earlier, to be a fully functioning adult in any field needs the use of critical thinking, but it also requires a certain degree of subject knowledge. You can't expect an engineer to think critically about propositions in the history of development of the Gothic novel unless he knows something about the subject. By the same token, you can't ask a professor of poetry to make sensible statements about a particular change in the design of a machine is likely to solve a particular problem cost-effectively, without the subject matter knowledge.
I think that there's a very strong strain of hatred for engineers and scientists in this country, as we can see by the way they're portrayed in the media and arts, and so I consider statements like "STEM people can't think critically" to be just another round of engineer-bashing.
Folks, for the purposes of this discussion and to avoid getting bogged down into where various universities slot various courses, let's define our terms exclusively.
STEM = science, technology, engineering, mathematics.
Liberal Arts/Humanities = not STEM
Business, agriculture, textiles, and other specialties = other
Yes, I know there is some overlap between STEM and the classic academic definition of liberal arts but this distinction between Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics or Liberal Arts is the basis of the original article that "STEM degrees don't provide critical thinkers and liberal arts degrees do."
So to keep it simple:
STEM and Humanities & Liberal Arts sans STEM? We could just use that terminology to mitigate confusion rather than redefining Liberal Arts.
I think whether you study STEM or another Liberal Arts program, you will generally be positioned well in terms of critical thinking. The vast majority of foundational classes should be the same. The out-of-classroom experiences (primarily research) involves learning how to apply critical thinking at a much more rigor than lectures/classroom time.
STEM and Humanities & Liberal Arts sans STEM? We could just use that terminology to mitigate confusion rather than redefining Liberal Arts.
I think whether you study STEM or another Liberal Arts program, you will generally be positioned well in terms of critical thinking. The vast majority of foundational classes should be the same. The out-of-classroom experiences (primarily research) involves learning how to apply critical thinking at a much more rigor than lectures/classroom time.
This is a valid point. PhD students build their career on being able to think critically and assess research from an alternative angle. Anyone who has a college education, no matter what area of study, has spent more time in research labs with PhD students and professors directly contributing to unique research than they do with their actual credit-based classes. That's where the most value of college comes from and is fairly constant whether you are a "STEM" student or a student of another discipline.
STEM and Humanities & Liberal Arts sans STEM? We could just use that terminology to mitigate confusion rather than redefining Liberal Arts.
This makes sense and is a good way to specify it. The OP, as written, is confusing and was the reason I asked my question in the second post. Thanks for taking the time to identify.
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