What Price a Degree?

OK, hopefully a quick cut and paste job will satisfy you then maybe I can be left in peace?

We are first introduced to the joys of Clopin here where he attacks another member and their decision to study:

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You know the government didn't 'earn' that money right? That's money other people provided to pay for services which are supposed to be useful to them, which probably doesn't include your two useless, indulgent degrees. The cushy government job you mention just adds to your guilt amigo.

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From which some 'logic' suggests he doesn't particular care for degrees. Note the words 'useless' and 'indulgent.' Now what does that suggest? Also note the tone in which his views are expressed...some might say not particularly pleasant, but unfortunately that seems to be the way Litnet is going these days. Main thing to note however is that degrees are 'useless' and people taking them are 'indulgent.'

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Besides I see no problem with people getting trades or learning real professions and actually having to earn a living. Anybody can self educate, get a library card they are free. You can even download the curriculum from top schools directly from their websites and watch many lectures online. Education is the cheapest it's been in the history of mankind, but that useless piece of paper that qualifies you to do absolutely nothing? Yes that's an expansive scam.

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Note 'real' professions suggesting that jobs in the humanities, what exactly I'm not sure, are not proper jobs. 'Useless piece of paper' and 'scam' also suggest degrees are not of any value.

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Also the quality of a university education seems to be complete crap nowadays. My girlfriends room mate is a business student and she hasn't read a book outside of the classroom (so she reads maybe ten books a year) in her entire life aside from trite **** like Harry Potter and Janet Evanovich. The courses she's enrolled in include; public speaking, a history of the Beatles, astronomy and greek mythology and a few retarded business classes where she learns how to shake hands and print business cards.

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Anecdote which seems to form a basis for critical insight of the degree process, note the use of 'retarded business classes' which to me suggestions he doesn't give much value to it. Or am I pushing that argument?

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Yes that's realy terrible... being expected to pay back money you borrowed. My heart weeps for people who expected to be able to spend four to six years critiquing Herzog films, talking about Andy Warhol and reading Russian poetry on the federal dime without having to be responsible for their own spending and then 'discovering' that the hackneyed education they picked up is totally worthless regarding absolutely everything.

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'Hackneyed education' fits in with a theme against degrees which I am noticing...

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Canada (where I live) has such a shortage of skilled tradespeople and frankly unskilled workers that the country is going so far as to import labour for decently paid and available positions, and yet all the 'smart' people are employed at Starbucks with their liberal arts degrees. The stigma against trades and actually working for a living is perpetuated by such idiotic buffoons that it pains me to even think about all the degrees handed out to these imbeciles annually.

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The myth of the shortage of skill workers was addressed. Again the attack on degrees and the people with them. It is not difficult to also suggest that the poster is jealous of these 'idiotic buffoons' these 'imbeciles.' Again though it doesn't take a genius to see the hatred of the educational system and those who study in it.

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When did I suggest getting rid of 'the arts'? This is a totally fallacious, probably intentional, misunderstanding on your part; the idea that without people going and getting pointless degrees nobody would read or contribute to art. I don't have a degree and I read ten books last month, it's really easy to do... I went to the library, took them out and then read them, it was free as well.

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Which as I say suggests the poster equally values self-study to university.

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That was one of the stupidest posts I've ever read. Congrats.

I was going to just leave it at that, but here I'll just go and point out why your post was totally retarded and betrayed a stunning lack of logical cohesion in your thought process.

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It is a shame that Litnet has descended to the level of YouTube, but there you go.

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You start by countering my suggestion that reading classic works of literature/non fiction is a valid educative process and an autodidactic education can yield as many benefits as taking a degree by suggesting that this is the equivalent to watching youtube videos on medicine. What makes you say that? First of all, medicine is largely a trade which requires sophisticated tools, machinery and use of fine motor skills and the failure to perform adequately can result in loss of life or debilitating injury for patients. I also don't believe you can learn to be a carpenter by reading books on carpentry; you have to actually go out and build things to master the technique. Similarly you can not learn to paint like Rembrandt solely from reading books on painting, and in all of these fields dedicated hands on training will be more valuable than book learning (youtube videos might often actually be of use though).


Now it was my assumption that this thread was largely considering degrees in liberal arts and humanities (a degree in medicine is obviously very valuable) in which case reading the actual classic works and criticism which are the curriculum of said university degrees can't really be dismissed as "watching videos on youtube" because that's simply... not a fair comparison.


You next move on to Wikipedia and mcdonalds (which I never mentioned) and bring up closing down universities and replacing them with supermarkets and fast food restaurants as some sort of horrible anti education dystopia which I suppose my ideas on self educating would naturally bring about.

I have plenty of friends with "complete degrees" and they haven't opened a book in years and they know absolutely nothing because getting a BA with almost purely elective courses of dubious educational merit is totally possible and in fact easy to do.

Now for some people who are serious scholars and researchers universities are invaluable, but for most people you can educate yourself just fine without spending the hundred grand.

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Already addressed most of this, though another anecdote about those with 'dubious' degrees. I agreed with the fact that you can educated your fine and that degrees are over-priced. I also provided a link, Future Learn, where one can do this for free, though these courses are in the early stages of development they at least give yourself some form of structure often lacking when you try to self-study. (And also the problem with self-study is that there are no 'must dos' it is doubtful you are going to turn in essays/presentations which force you to do the work, find the sources etc week in week out.)
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No... I never said that. I said that the education is expensive and possible to obtain without that expense. I never said that a university education is bad, just that it's not necessarily better than self education and not always (or even often when it comes to humanities) worth the price of admission.

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Hold on a minute. There are a few words in bold quoted above which suggest otherwise I think.

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I pointed out that quite often university graduates don't know very much to show that things like a degree/university courses in themselves are quite meaningless. The point is that if someone really wants to learn they will do so, in a classroom or on their own, and if they just want the degree they can obtain that without learning much at all.

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Unbelievable generalisation. 'University graduates don't know very much..." I did agree that there are people who don't make the most of the university experience and just get the degree with minimal work, however so what? This is life.

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A lot of these degrees are easy to do. Every idiot straight out of high school nowadays gets a degree in some sort of bologna and they end up paying for it while working retail for minimum wage.

Also your post was not perfectly accurate and I addressed why in my post. You chose to ignore that of course and focused on one small sentence to draw your inane conclusion of my meaning and point, which you got wrong.

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For sure some are easier than others, but all require at least three years work and endless essays/exams/presentations and again so what? Are you suggesting that they have to run their futures by you? Let people study what they want to.
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Nelly in my own studies I am only interested in humanities fields. It would be flagrantly against my own self interest and convictions to suggest that studying literature, history, art and philosophy is lesser than science, medicine, technology or mathematics. Kindly stick to responding to things which I have said when you are arguing with me. Yes you point out above that you're also considering other peoples views and generalizing, but that wasn't exactly clear until your most recent post.

This is debatable. I think if you cared to try you could find cases of very inexpert, stupid and destructive professors teaching at universities throughout the world at any given time.

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Yes and you can also find fantastic professors full of passionate and knowledge, but why not focus on the negatives eh?

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"Furthermore, you have potential access to some of the best reading material and resources not readily available to the general public."

Some examples please.

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OK, I didn't give you an example before but if you match my city's central library vs the three university libraries it contains about 1/10 the number of books available that are any good. My own bedroom has about three/four times more books on literature(and that's not that many) than my two local library branches put together. The local libraries are targeted more for older people who want books from writers like Catherine Cookson. Good luck with your self-education there. I suspect it is very much the same for most places in the UK, baring perhaps the London libraries or central library in places like Glasgow or Edinburgh.

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Why? That potential is limitless. Unless you are telling me you've gone through the entire contents of all of the libraries in your area. Also am I supposed to be in complete isolation? I post on forums online to get other peoples opinions on what they've read and I have my own friends and acquaintances offline to speak to about what I've read.

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See above regarding libraries. I am surprised that you get anything from discussing with us imbeciles with degrees on Litnet.

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What do you mean you 'suppose' it's possible? It's a demonstrated reality and it doesn't take much searching to find a list of people who published significant works, furthered their fields of research/thought or achieved a real depth of knowledge despite never setting foot inside a university. Goethe, Hemingway, Borges, da Vinci, Gorky, and Melville to name just a few.

I think it's pretty much anyone. If you can graduate high school you can graduate with a BA in something.

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More anecdotes and flawed logic (logic that some seem to admire). These writers don't have degrees - therefore university is pointless. Same as: Richard Branson left school without any qualifications and is now a multi-millionaire - therefore if you want to be a multi-millionaire leave school without any qualifications. A dog has four legs and is an animal - therefore all animals have four legs, same sort of so called 'logic.'

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I honestly never made half the claims you're ascribing to me in this post. I've also never (nope not once) suggested that a self education is "better" than a university education. You could really stand to take some reading comprehension courses bucko.

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I hope the irony is not lost here. You have spent all of your posts making comments against courses and degrees and then suggest I go on one to improve my reading comprehension!! You never suggested self education is better? What those pointless 'retarded' courses...

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Watch out... Neely might not want to talk to you anymore if you keep it up. I mean Melville wrote Moby Dick after consulting wikipedia and youtube right? Do you really think learning outside a university is possible? *scoff*

You never actually responded to anything that I said and when I questioned a few of your points of reasoning you abruptly decided that "some people just like arguing and you wouldn't waste your time with me". You never explained why self learning was necessarily inferior, you never addressed cases like Hemingway and Melville (among many many others) who were entirely self taught and vastly more educated than yourself or the average -and above average- degree holder. This is your second iteration of the sentiment that you are "not wasting time on me" so am I to assume that 'wasting time' only refers to 'addressing my point of view' and doesn't extend to say, spending time writing snarky posts utterly devoid of substance?

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Never explained why self learning was necessarily inferior? Do you skip over my post I will copy for you below? On the last note about snarky posts devoid of substance I'll just leave to you, seeing as you are pretty good at it with your anecdotes, flawed 'logic' and your way with addressing other posters and their 'retarded' posts.

Post where I stated why self learning is inferior:

University courses offer a structured approach to learning, guided by absolute experts in the field. Furthermore, you have potential access to some of the best reading material and resources not readily available to the general public. You study in an environment of other learners in which you can bounce ideas around, share notes or catch up on things you might have missed. Pit this against a library card and a sole learner and it is very difficult to match the potential for learning. Yes I suppose it is possible, but not likely. And yes there are lazy people on degrees who don't do the reading vs people not on the courses who do, but so what? The potential learning with university support vs without it is clearly better and anybody who thinks not is deluded.

My only question is this: You keep attacking Clopin's argument that a degree in something "soft" isn't worth the time, money, or effort. But he's given examples, anecdotes, evidence, logical reasons, and all you're doing is nitpicking and reinterpreting what he says to make him look bad. What job do you get with a degree in history? Or art? Or - God forbid - Art history?

If you're interested in doing what you love, and drawing or writing or studying history is what you love, then maybe it would be worth it, but only because it gives you credibility. If you're interested in actually getting better at the subject, usually being self-taught is better. I have several friends who are amazing artists and they've never taken a class in their life. Getting a degree wouldn't make them much better, it would just lend them credibility.

Besides, people are different. You can't definitely say that a degree is better than being self taught, because sometimes it is and sometimes it's not. Some computer scientists state that a mix between university taught and self taught programmers is best because the university taught ones know how to get things done and the self taught ones tend to be more creative and find unique solutions.

Also, your arguments seem to be rapidly fluctuating between logic and attacking your opponents character, then stating in a rather pretentious way that you're done with this argument.

Edit: And yes, I understand the irony in making a joke about you being pretentious and then accusing you of attacking other poster's character, but the difference is that I had grounds for that, and if you call me out on it, it makes you a hypocrite.

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Originally Posted by Hwo Thumb

My only question is this: You keep attacking Clopin's argument that a degree in something "soft" isn't worth the time, money, or effort. But he's given examples, anecdotes, evidence, logical reasons, and all you're doing is nitpicking and reinterpreting what he says to make him look bad. What job do you get with a degree in history? Or art? Or - God forbid - Art history?

If you're interested in doing what you love, and drawing or writing or studying history is what you love, then maybe it would be worth it, but only because it gives you credibility. If you're interested in actually getting better at the subject, usually being self-taught is better. I have several friends who are amazing artists and they've never taken a class in their life. Getting a degree wouldn't make them much better, it would just lend them credibility.

Besides, people are different. You can't definitely say that a degree is better than being self taught, because sometimes it is and sometimes it's not. Some computer scientists state that a mix between university taught and self taught programmers is best because the university taught ones know how to get things done and the self taught ones tend to be more creative and find unique solutions.

Also, your arguments seem to be rapidly fluctuating between logic and attacking your opponents character, then stating in a rather pretentious way that you're done with this argument.

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He has given some anecdotes...I am not reinterpreting what he says, it is there in black and white. I have even highlighted relevant points for you and his character speaks for itself. I have simply copied and pasted his posts. He is the one calling people with degrees 'imbeciles' and calling people's posts 'retarded' is that not so?

I mean you make a statement here: If you're interested in actually getting better at the subject, usually being self-taught is better.

I mean this is opinion with no evidence...it is worth nothing. What are you saying, if you want to get better at something struggle on your own and seek no help or opinion from those better than you, or with those with more knowledge on the subject, for this is inferior?

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If you're interested in actually getting better at the subject, usually being self-taught is better

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What I mean by this is that often the best way to become a better artist is to draw. The best way to become a better coder is to code. The best way to become a better writer is to read and write. You can attend all the lectures you want, and ace all the classes but it doesn't change the fact that if you never do any hands on work, all the research in the world is worth nothing. Universities provide opportunities for hands on experience, but it's seldom opportunities that wouldn't be available to you outside the school.

Although I will admit, you're right. That statement is an opinion. It just happens to be one that holds true for me. I learn better on my own, and I can understand why others might not. The best way is likely a compromise between the two.

Finally. Now lets get crackin.

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From which some 'logic' suggests he doesn't particular care for degrees. Note the words 'useless' and 'indulgent.' Now what does that suggest? Also note the tone in which his views are expressed...some might say not particularly pleasant, but unfortunately that seems to be the way Litnet is going these days. Main thing to note however is that degrees are 'useless' and people taking them are 'indulgent.'

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I was responding to a few users here who were lamenting that there wasn't a system put in place in Canada whereby low income earners would be ineligible for repayment on student loans. This tickles my ire particularly because the assumption is that other people should be fitting their bills while they live and study for four years. In this context (where you are not in a position to repay loans you've taken out, and expect not to be forced to pay them back) any degree would be indulgent because you are quite honestly indulging your own fancy at the expense of other people. If you aren't earning any money your degree is useless as far as an investment in you is concerned. Now I'm going to offer an anecdote on the condition that you do not take that as your cue to ignore the argument I've put forth already, okay?; here goes. At my place of work (in Canada), there's an Australian security guard who is about forty five years old, makes minimum wage and went to school for "free" in Australia. This means the government - see taxpayers - spent elaborate sums on his needless education only to see him working a chump job in Canada and paying no taxes of his own. Now obviously you can't force people to stay in their home countries after they receive a subsidised education but I suspect that the investment doesn't often result in a decent return in the case of state subsidised education. But wait! I can see it's already on the tip of your tongue (or finger); "education isn't about employment opportunities or returns on an investment it's an enrichment of the life and no price can be put on something like that". Indeed, but in that case if all the education is going to do is enrich your life then maybe you should pay for it, or in the case of having taken out a loan, repay that loan.

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Note 'real' professions suggesting that jobs in the humanities, what exactly I'm not sure, are not proper jobs. 'Useless piece of paper' and 'scam' also suggest degrees are not of any value.

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Jobs in humanities can be professions, writing is a profession. Here I applied clumsy wording and don't mean to condemn the humanities so completely, but in context I simply meant a profession which will always be sort of... self actualizing? A carpenter can always carpent, a plumber can always plumb, but there's no guarantee a university graduate can necessarily do anything. And yes, my suggestion was that in many cases degrees are valueless, an assertion I have had proven to me time and time again in my own personal life. Also please note the word degree is used, and not education.

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Hold on a minute. There are a few words in bold quoted above which suggest otherwise I think.

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re - never having said a university education is bad.

Perhaps I should have phrased this to say that a university education is not necessarily bad. That said the level of education I have observed among my peers who are university students is very very low and I stand by that.

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Unbelievable generalisation. 'University graduates don't know very much..." I did agree that there are people who don't make the most of the university experience and just get the degree with minimal work, however so what? This is life.

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"Quite often"
"Quite often university graduates don't know very much"

Try to read more thoroughly next time. I also note a trend here where you bold a very small section of my posts and ignore the comparative bulk of my point.

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More anecdotes and flawed logic (logic that some seem to admire). These writers don't have degrees - therefore university is pointless.

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The misinterpretation of my statement here is absolutely staggering. I never said that university is pointless because you can educate yourself without it. I was using those examples to prove to you that self education to a very sophisticated level is possible as you seemed to doubt that to be the case. I figured that examples of famous writers who were uncontestably well read, learned, educated and became such without entering a university would prove my point. It did, but of course you ignored that and pretended I was saying something completely different.

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Same as: Richard Branson left school without any qualifications and is now a multi-millionaire - therefore if you want to be a multi-millionaire leave school without any qualifications. A dog has four legs and is an animal - therefore all animals have four legs, same sort of so called 'logic.'

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This is nothing near to what I suggested.

Take what I actually said below

"What do you mean you 'suppose' it's possible? It's a demonstrated reality and it doesn't take much searching to find a list of people who published significant works, furthered their fields of research/thought or achieved a real depth of knowledge despite never setting foot inside a university. Goethe, Hemingway, Borges, da Vinci, Gorky, and Melville to name just a few."

And kindly tell me where you see the logical discrepancy? I am responding directly to your statement that "you suppose" (indicating doubt) that it's possible to become very well educated on your own. These individuals are very well educated and they did so by themselves, this proves that it is indeed possible and your supposition can happily morph to certainty. In no way did I ever state that the existence of self educated individuals made the process of obtaining a degree useless.

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I hope the irony is not lost here. You have spent all of your posts making comments against courses and degrees and then suggest I go on one to improve my reading comprehension!! You never suggested self education is better? What those pointless 'retarded' courses...

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Some courses are pointless and retarded, not all of them. Thank you for demonstrating further your lack of reading comprehension. Honestly the lack of logical consistency and intellectual honesty (you must be aware here that you are misquoting me on purpose) displayed by yourself in this argument just further reinforces my "university graduates/students are dullards", stance.

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He has given some anecdotes...I am not reinterpreting what he says

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hahahahahahahahahahaha

Looking at that nice post I took time and care to write and just imagining how neely will completely ignore all of the actual points I wanted to make and focus on my using examples from my life to explain my position (the horror) is a little frustrating. Neely, please respond reasonably to my post (I hear there's this new thing people are trying where you actually take into account everything the other person says during an argument and respond to that, instead of just picking at little bits out of context) or I will have to stop replying.

I'm going to back out of this argument on the grounds that Clopin is taking Neely's place as the obnoxious one and Neely is making good points and I'm no longer sure I want to be on anybody's side here. I think we can all stand to learn a lesson about arguing with strangers on the internet here: Nobody is right.

Also, Clopin, using the word "retarded" to mean "stupid" is incredibly offensive. They're not the same thing. Being retarded is an actual mental condition. It's tough for people to live with it, it's tough on the people around them to live with it, and using it as an insult is awful. You can use all the big words you want, but including that one in that context just dropped my opinion of you more than enough to compensate for your extensive vocabulary.

And that second post is almost as condescending and pretentious as Neely's "I have to go play chess" line.

Being stupid is an actual mental condition and it's tough for people to live with. Seriously though no offense was meant and I don't think I've ever seen anyone take particular issue with my using that word. I'm sorry if you did though as it wasn't my intention to debase people who have real mental illness and I had thought that given the context of my post the word wouldn't bring up a very literal interpretation.

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Originally Posted by Clopin

Being stupid is an actual mental condition and it's tough for people to live with. Seriously though no offense was meant and I don't think I've ever seen anyone take particular issue with my using that word. I'm sorry if you did though as it wasn't my intention to debase people who have real mental illness and I had thought that given the context of my post the word wouldn't bring up a very literal interpretation.

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Remember when you were in middle school and high school and your friends would use "Gay" to mean stupid?

"I got an F on the chem test, Mr. S is so gay!"
"I know, right? Chemistry is gay!"

It's basically taking an actual word and turning it into an insult, which destroys the original meaning of the word. I understand you didn't mean any harm, but be sure to watch out for that in the future.

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Originally Posted by Hwo Thumb

I'm going to back out of this argument on the grounds that Clopin is taking Neely's place as the obnoxious one and Neely is making good points and I'm no longer sure I want to be on anybody's side here. I think we can all stand to learn a lesson about arguing with strangers on the internet here: Nobody is right.

Also, Clopin, using the word "retarded" to mean "stupid" is incredibly offensive. They're not the same thing. Being retarded is an actual mental condition. It's tough for people to live with it, it's tough on the people around them to live with it, and using it as an insult is awful. You can use all the big words you want, but including that one in that context just dropped my opinion of you more than enough to compensate for your extensive vocabulary.

And that second post is almost as condescending and pretentious as Neely's "I have to go play chess" line.

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Methinks you should have realized this from the start my friend :(

I second your point about the use of the world 'retarded'

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Originally Posted by Volya

Methinks you should have realized this from the start my friend :(

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Well, less of a lesson and more of a reminder.

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Originally Posted by Hwo Thumb

I think we can all stand to learn a lesson about arguing with strangers on the internet here: Nobody is right.

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This is smug and idiotic. What exactly do you think nobody is right about? Proper conduct of debate is not the issue here. Clearly there is an argument being made about whether or not self education to a high level is possibly and clearly there are both correct and incorrect statements which can be made. The fact that the argument is taking place online is irrelevant and the fact that certain people contributing to the argument have spoken rudely to each other is also irrelevant. This rudeness changes literally nothing about the argument and you are making a gross ad hominem when you suggest that someone is more/less correct or even less logical because they are being rude.

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Originally Posted by Clopin

This is smug and idiotic. What exactly do you think nobody is right about? Proper conduct of debate is not the issue here. Clearly there is an argument being made about whether or not self education to a high level is possibly and clearly there are both correct and incorrect statements which can be made. The fact that the argument is taking place online is irrelevant and the fact that certain people contributing to the argument have spoken rudely to each other is also irrelevant. This rudeness changes literally nothing about the argument and you are making a gross ad hominem when you suggest that someone is more/less correct or even less logical because they are being rude.

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So to summarize, "You can be as much of an a-hole as you want on the internet, and if you're technically right, it's okay."

I would disagree with your statement that "Proper conduct of debate is not the issue here." If you can't hold an debate and respect each other at the same time, you should not be debating anything, because you're a jerk and nobody cares about your opinion. (I'm using a general plural "you" here, I'm not directly targeting you.)
I think you're interpreting my statement too literally. (Needless to say, that is a personal "you.") I don't actually mean it is impossible to make a correct statement when discussing something on the internet, I mean that said correct statement will be crushed under a pile of... well, internet... to the point where it doesn't matter that you're right.
Also, "idiotic" is better than "retarded," but we still need to work on the namecalling. Just because you disagree with it doesn't make it stupid.

But maybe you're just unhappy that you no longer have my support?

Reminder
Please do not personalize your comments
And don't argue
Please keep this a debate. All sides are making points that are worth consideration.

Could you guys stop arguing like children? Seriously, this thread will be locked. Clopin, you would make your posts much better if you stopped presenting them as if you were right and the whole world is filled with idiots. You merely provoke ridicule that way. And Neely, you and I both know a degree is certification for unemployment. There are root issues in the university education system, and though not all degrees are useless, many of the students who take such courses are useless to the field of study. In that sense, they perhaps could be better trained to pursue other things; it would generally help with allocating different skilled labor for the betterment of a country.

In a sense we cannot discuss degrees without their function. If a university degree does not function to properly set up a student for their life (which is one of its goals, especially by the marketing now) or does not actually work to provide a service, or could provide things better, then we legitimately should criticize.

In my opinion, arts classes should be more strict, and less fun, so that they only encourage the truly devoted to pursue studies. A class should not be so big, and people who do not have anything to contribute should not pay tens of thousands of dollars to do so.