Is it good policy to give financial aid to liberal arts majors?

[GePap]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker

http://www.usnews.com/usnews/edu/grad/rankings/law/brief/lawrank_brief.php

UVA's eigth.

Anyway, Actuarial science is, since you obviously don't know much about it, a subject deeply concerned with the law (especially pension actuaries). However, lawyers are a bad example of liberal-artsy people; law is a far more technical field than, say, philosophy, and requires actual logical reasoning.

I love it when the kid gets ideas above his station.

As for your statement about lawyers, I work with several, and NONE have been science majors.

As for the second part of your statement, either you are incredibly sheltered (we knew that already) or you have not met many liberal arts majors. The "logical reasoning" for law is closer to the kind of thinking taught in the liberal arts that say mathematical thinking more common in engineering, and the reason is because the law is an ongoing arguement. It may have a shap now, that but shape is open to change, and re-interpretration. Law is not static, and while you can be wrong (as in, that does not fit the part of the statue, this does), a huge part of law involves fitting an interpretation into the gritty every day details of real life.

[Whaleboy]

My experience with classics is limited to understanding what it is, and understanding its purpose in permitting excessive snobbery in people who decide to study it.

It's one of those fields that is rather useless in the modern world.

Its the study of the works of the formative years of human civilisation; one of the most important areas in historical studies. Would you claim that learning history is "rather useless in the modern world"?

[Asher]

Originally posted by Whaleboy
Its the study of the works of the formative years of human civilisation; one of the most important areas in historical studies. Would you claim that learning history is "rather useless in the modern world"?

I don't think Classics are History.

I think they are different things, which is why they are different things.

Can you stop lobbing me softies? Yet another incredible argument by a Liberal Arts major.

And why did you stop responding to the computer thread where you demonstrated reading comprehension problems and fundamentally stupid reasoning?

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by GePap


I love it when the kid gets ideas above his station.

wtf?

As for your statement about lawyers, I work with several, and NONE have been science majors.

Technical != science major.

As for the second part of your statement, either you are incredibly sheltered (we knew that already) or you have not met many liberal arts majors. The "logical reasoning" for law is closer to the kind of thinking taught in the liberal arts that say mathematical thinking more common in engineering, and the reason is because the law is an ongoing arguement. It may have a shap now, that but shape is open to change, and re-interpretration. Law is not static, and while you can be wrong (as in, that does not fit the part of the statue, this does), a huge part of law involves fitting an interpretation into the gritty every day details of real life.

My dad is a lawyer (he just didn't used to be). So are both grandfathers, my mom, and about a third of my uncles. Law involves intricate logical reasoning and what is essentially technical knowledge, even if it doesn't involve machines.

[Agathon]

Originally posted by TCO
Actually Aggy, I think you are right that there is a certain skill in pulling themes out of a literary work and it is not easy for the young or untrained. I'm not sure how much is a type of brains or how much some learning. I remember in 10th grade, I had to compare and contrast various themes of Huck Finn and The Art of Motorcycle Maintenance and the physical journey was not allowed to be one. It kicked my ass. Wrote a really crappy essay. Afterwards talked to teacher and we both understood then, that such an assignment was beyond me since I could not extract sufficient themes. She told me a bunch and I was like aha. And she also said that when I was that stumped to come talk to her vice soldiering on when I couldn't even do stop one properly.

Later at USNA, I had a very challenging class which required compare and contrast of 2-3 chapters of history (same period but written with different schools of thought--revisionist, Wilsonian, etc.) I was bad at that at first, but then learned the trick and was good at it.

I'm sure that there are some differences in aptitude for that sort of inference. I also think though, that a lot of liberal arts try to mystefy what they have out of compensation.

I do think there is something called issue analysis which is important for real world problems (management consulting) and has elements of both. But in general physicists kick ass at it, since they're so damned generally smart.

And I dated (a little) a St. Johnie. That school and USNA are both wierdly anachronistic but in different ways. And USNA closer to the norm. But we still had to go to the board at USNA. Basically USNA was the college of years ago. Basically more like high school in methodology, but covering college material. St. Johns...well they study Euclid in Greek!

P.s. My friend dropped out and went to a local commuter college.

Oddly enough, engineers happen to be really good at Greek. I imagine it is the formal style in which the language is taught.

The liberal arts have been going through a bad patch since the 1960s. Hippie ideals tended to infect them to a large degree. While some of this was good, a lot of it is bad. It means that a lot of useless people can do the subject and waste everyone's time, but that doesn't mean that it has no value for those people who should be there – it just means that there should be some reform.

Funny thing is: this conversation would seem absurd if it were conducted in 1925 because the arts used to be taught in a much more rigorous way.

[Agathon]

Originally posted by TCO
I wish I had learned Latin formally and English grammar formally. It helps with other languages, with logic, with things that you see sometimes...

I was one of those people whose education occurred when the teaching of formal grammar had fallen out of favour.

I know Classical Greek grammar better than I know English grammar.

[Whaleboy]

I don't think Classics are History.

Then what, literature? Lingual studies? Same question applies.

I think they are different things, which is why they are different things.

This makes no sense.

Can you stop lobbing me softies? Yet another incredible argument by a Liberal Arts major.

Mine was not a proposition but a question. Since you've made no serious attempt at an argument in this thread, nor have you made any attempt to refute my argument, I'm hardly inclined to go to the effort of repeating myself for your benefit am I?

And why did you stop responding to the computer thread where you demonstrated reading comprehension problems and fundamentally stupid reasoning?

Which one was that... that one graphics card that was 20% faster than another on an already obsolete platform was better value, even though it was twice the price than the slower model?

[Agathon]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker

Anyway, Actuarial science is, since you obviously don't know much about it, a subject deeply concerned with the law (especially pension actuaries). However, lawyers are a bad example of liberal-artsy people; law is a far more technical field than, say, philosophy, and requires actual logical reasoning.

Law is actually less technical in some aspects than philosophy, especially the part of philosophy concerned with formal and practical logic. Many law students will take philosophy as a support for this reason – I know this: I've taught them.

[GePap]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker

Technical != science major.

Jesus. Fine, all have been humanities or social science majors.

My dad is a lawyer (he just didn't used to be). So are both grandfathers, my mom, and about a third of my uncles. Law involves intricate logical reasoning and what is essentially technical knowledge, even if it doesn't involve machines.

Technical knowledge is just that, knowledge. Anyone can gain technical knowlegde by reading a book. You honestly think some english major could not learn car repair by reading, that lib art majors are incapable of learning? My friend studies anthropology. That seems a pretty "liberal arts" sort of thing. He now practices law, and was able to gleam enough knowledge to pass the bar in three states. So what?

Hell, music is all about technical knowledge, or one kind of it. Same for paiting, or ceramics. Technical knowledge. So what?

The issue is the ability to USE that knowledge, to make something out of the information. That in fact is the biggest part of an education. You don;t need a professor to gain the knowledge. For that all you need is a library, or the internet. You need a professor to know how to use it.

[Agathon]

I think they are different things, which is why they are different things.

There's a thorny metaphysical problem here if this is true.

[Whaleboy]

Funny thing is: this conversation would seem absurd if it were conducted in 1925 because the arts used to be taught in a much more rigorous way.

Unfortunately there seems to be this directionless and assumed anti-intellectualism in society and discussions - I think a lot of people have grown up in a world where they feel there's the world of the academic that, perhaps through poor teaching, they're made to feel they can't reach, and the world of business and work which they're made to believe is mutually exclusive to the exercise of the intellect.

It's a bit sad really, people taking pride in their ignorance and lack of wisdom.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Whaleboy
Which one was that... that one graphics card that was 20% faster than another on an already obsolete platform was better value, even though it was twice the price than the slower model?

It's over twice the performance in modern games and less than half the price. It would also buy him time of about 2 years before he upgrades, vs 1 on the 6800GS.

You also quoted an article which said nothing about 6800GS -> 7800GS upgrades, twice, and claimed it did. Even then, it's irrelevant because he's upgrading from a significantly slower card to a 6800GS or 7800GS. Upgrading to a card that already makes modern games like Oblivion hard to play on is a really weird suggestion.

Then what, literature? Lingual studies? Same question applies.

Why do you have such a problem with this?

Classics is not literature, linguistics (do they seriously call it lingual studies over there or are you just ignorant?), nor history. It's a very specific set of studies for a very specific time that's pretty damn pointless today.

[Kuciwalker]

Technical knowledge is just that, knowledge. Anyone can gain technical knowlegde by reading a book. You honestly think some english major could not learn car repair by reading, that lib art majors are incapable of learning? My friend studies anthropology. That seems a pretty "liberal arts" sort of thing. He now practices law, and was able to gleam enough knowledge to pass the bar in three states. So what?

Anthropology is science. Social sciences are, for the most part, sciences. English is not a science.

Hell, music is all about technical knowledge, or one kind of it. Same for paiting, or ceramics. Technical knowledge. So what?

The issue is the ability to USE that knowledge, to make something out of the information. That in fact is the biggest part of an education. You don;t need a professor to gain the knowledge. For that all you need is a library, or the internet. You need a professor to know how to use it.

The knowledge you gain (or are supposed to gain) in law school is how to apply the basic facts; that's knowledge in itself. The point is that legal reasoning is, in our system, more akin to math than to English.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Agathon


There's a thorny metaphysical problem here if this is true.

Classics != History

Do you want to argue that Classics is the same as History, or would you rather dwell on semantics rather than deal with anything of substance? This is a rhetorical question, don't answer it -- we already know the answer...

[Agathon]

Originally posted by Whaleboy


Unfortunately there seems to be this directionless and assumed anti-intellectualism in society and discussions - I think a lot of people have grown up in a world where they feel there's the world of the academic that, perhaps through poor teaching, they're made to feel they can't reach, and the world of business and work which they're made to believe is mutually exclusive to the exercise of the intellect.

It's a bit sad really, people taking pride in their ignorance and lack of wisdom.

It's a disease of the English speaking world. We ought to be worried about that.