Is There a New Geek Anti-Intellectualism?

Larry Sanger writes "Geeks are supposed to be, if anything, intellectual. But it recently occurred to me that a lot of Internet geeks and digerati have sounded many puzzlingly anti-intellectual notes over the past decade, and especially lately. The Peter Thiel-inspired claim that college is a waste of time is just the latest example. I have encountered (and argued against) five common opinions, widely held by geeks, that seem headed down a slippery slope. J'accuse: 'At the bottom of the slippery slope, you seem to be opposed to knowledge wherever it occurs, in books, in experts, in institutions, even in your own mind.' So, am I right? Is there a new geek anti-intellectualism?"

Comments

False Premmise

[AvitarX]

Geeks are supposed to be, if anything, intellectual

I disagree, geeks should be doers. They should make things, be it overly detailed costumes, or new pieces of electronics. I don't think the hacker ethic is about intellectualism, it's about doing. The intellectual part is a side-effect, and a helper, but it is not a requirement. Maybe I'm wrong to refer to hot-rodders as car geeks though.

Re:False Premmise

[Mordok-DestroyerOfWo]

Agree completely. My graduate education was almost completely liberal arts, I only had a token EE class as an undergrad (CS major) and I still spend a ton of time with my soldering iron. I consider myself a geek, although I play city-league basketball and don't live in my parent's basement so maybe I'm a hybrid. I guess the point of my rambling is that the need to create is what defines me as a geek, not any pseudo-intellectual ivory tower nonsense.

Re:False Premmise

[Anonymous Coward]

You are confusing geeks with hackers. Hackers yes, are doers.

Re:False Premmise

[0racle]

Exactly, what makes you a geek is a single-minded passion, not any level of intelligence or intellectual capacity or drive. An Otaku for instance, doesn't have to be the brightest bulb in the bunch, but damn if they don't know that in episode X Bob did Y at time 3:24 and why it's important to the story.

Re:False Premmise

[poetmatt]

geek as a term just shows a lack of understanding. The US education system in general is mostly a joke and ridiculously overpriced with standards beyond low. No child left behind etc just made it substantially worse.

Re:False Premmise

[Anonymous Coward]

Jeri Ellsworth: highschool dropout, race car builder, race car driver, FPGA designer, builder of transistors from scratch.

School does not promote intellectualism, school is rote training. Anyone who loves learning does it in spite of school.

Re:False Premmise

[obarel]

It didn't take long to start discussing the definition of a geek.

Any what is the definition? Are you saying that someone who spends all his time sitting in a library and reading every book about insects is not a geek? On the other hand, if you spend all your money and free time trying to build your own wind turbine then you're also a geek.

What is the conclusion? Either there is no definition, or any definition is broad enough to be useless.
One thing is clear: Chuck Norris is not a geek.

Re:False Premmise

[Zerth]

"I have never let my schooling interfere with my education."
-- Mark Twain

Re:False Premmise

[second_coming]

Chuck Norris is/was a karate geek.

Re:False Premmise

[Vegeta99]

I'm cool with car geek. And that geeks are doers. However, the intellectual part is just plain inseparable. Nobody spoon-feeds you how to replace the radiator in your car or write a shell script. It requires an above average ability to reason and self-teach, which to me is intellect.

Re:False Premmise

[TheCRAIGGERS]

In the programming world, I always got the impression that, collectively, we respected the self-taught coder more than one who spent four years in school being spoon fed how to code.

And while you can certainly get some understanding from reading a "how to code for dummies" book, you won't get far until you fire up an editor and start tinkering. So I can certainly agree with the GP here that we are more doers and a lust for knowledge may be more of an effect than a cause.

Re:False Premmise

[Hognoxious]

Isaac Newton, Cambridge graduate, member of the Royal Society (and later Prpresident thereof), mathematician, physicist, astronomer, philosopher, theologist.

OK, he was also an alchemist. But he was probably a better statistician than you. I know I am.

Re:False Premmise

[AlienIntelligence]

Chuck Norris is/was a karate geek.

Seconded...

Chuck Norris doesn't read books. He stares them down until he gets the information he wants.

-AI

Re:False Premmise

[grcumb]

It didn't take long to start discussing the definition of a geek.

And that is a pretty good place to start defining geek nature.

Rather than being anti-intellectual, geek nature is unconventional, in the sense that a typical geek:

• Prefers empirical evidence to hypothesis;
• Questions whether the dictionary is right;
• If necessary, writes his own damn encyclopedia;
• Prefers reasoning to received wisdom;
• Is not nearly as susceptible to appeals to authority as others;
• And - the sometimes fatal flaw - prefers others to partake of his wisdom than to partake of theirs.

Re:False Premmise

[Hognoxious]

Momma always said, "geek is as geek does."

Re:False Premmise

[StarvingSE]

not any pseudo-intellectual ivory tower nonsense. I think this is the kind of anti-intellectual thinking the article is referring to...

Re:False Premmise

[AvitarX]

Perhaps self-drive and not the doing would be a better defining characteristic.

I concede that when I get lost in a net of wikipaedia links on a subject, I would describe it as geeking, and it certainly isn't doing.

Definitely the self-driven, and though that doesn't preclude schooling as a pursuit of knowledge, it doesn't require it either.

Re:False Premmise

[StarvingSE]

In the programming world, I always got the impression that, collectively, we respected the self-taught coder more than one who spent four years in school being spoon fed how to code.

I feel like comments such as this are what programmers who didn't go to college say to feel better about their decision.

Why assume that just because someone spent four years in college, that they had to be spoon fed coding knowledge? Many of my classmates were tinkerers well before college.

Higher education provides many advantages, many of which are intangibles, that help one rise above a simple "tinkerer" to someone who wants a career in a field.

Re:False Premmise

[Comboman]

"Wear your learning, like your watch, in a private pocket: and do not pull it out and strike it; merely to show that you have one."
- Lord Chesterfield

Re:False Premmise

[hedwards]

Which is why places like Korea are working to make their educational systems more like ours? And why people from all over the world pay big bucks to go to college here as well?

Re:False Premmise

[Comboman]

Intellect doesn't make you an intellectual anymore than being an adult makes you an adulterer.

Re:False Premmise

[muindaur]

I have to agree, and that's the reason some consider it smart not to attend college unless it's an in state school. There are a few around here that can get you a BS for $5K a year in tuition. If you are in your last year or two, even less if you take only the one or two needed classes (~$300-$400 per class.)

So it shouldn't be a call not to go to college, but rather not to do it out of state. Most middle class kids, or lower, can qualify for subsidized Stafford loans. Loans that are far more forgiving on interest, and have more forbearance options.

Since going back to school on a full grant at a community college for a different degree, something odd is going on. I've had several teachers that were better than than private four year school, and cared more.

The head of business and info tech at mine is a retiree that does some classes part time for the extra cash. So it's not the case of those that can't do teach with all. That adage my be true at times, but not always.

So the quality of the school depends on it's location. To be honest the good state four year school is not the main university, but the one that looks a bit run down (that also lacks tenure so they can hire good professors with the savings by not spending millions on a pretty entry way that has zero purpose.)

Re:False Premmise

[hedwards]

Perhaps if you go to a bad school, that's the case. But when I was in college there was a ton of discussion of not just what the facts were, but how we knew them to be true and to what extent they could be trusted. People promoting the view that you are are typically either trolling or went to a bad college. It's very hard to get through college just by rote memorization. I'm sure that a few do, but that's just not how the brain works, you learn facts in a constructivist light and they build connections with other things you've learned. Learning by rote is pretty much the slowest least efficient way of learning and pretty much only happens when you're doing the bare minimum of work and purposefully avoiding any other exposures. Which is hardly the school's fault if you're can't be arsed to expose yourself to other sources of information.

Re:False Premmise

[hobo sapiens]

this.

beside, equating chasing after the university degree with intellectualism isn't just plain wrong. Being intellectual is to enjoy learning, and one could argue that many universities are less about learning and more about learning enough to pass a class.

Re:False Premmise

[Joe Snipe]

It's premise.

Re:False Premmise

[asliarun]

Chuck Norris once punched a drunk in Rensselaer so hard, he spun around and became a knurd.

Re:False Premmise

[hobo sapiens]

LOL, ironically my post about intellectualism seems to make the point that the article was trying to make ...

Forgot the s on "beside". The "isn't" should have been "is". Also "being intellectual" should have been "to be intellectual".

Re:False Premmise

[thePowerOfGrayskull]

A hybrid geek? What's the mileage on those like? And how long does it take to repay the cost of initial investment?

Re:False Premmise

[thePowerOfGrayskull]

In the programming world, I always got the impression that, collectively, we respected the self-taught coder more than one who spent four years in school being spoon fed how to code.

In the programming world, I find that that education levels almost never come up in day to day discussions. You can either design, code, debug, think -- or you can't. I've encountered people capable of all of the above -- and don't find out for weeks, months, years (or ever) whether they have a degree or not.

Re:False Premmise

[Sinthet]

I think he meant public education, which can be highly variable, but tends to be lackluster, especially when compared to public education in places like Germany or China. However, College here is a different story, as evidenced by your valid rhetorical remark. At the very least, an American college on your resume looks prestigious almost anywhere in the world.

Re:False Premmise

[Sinthet]

I think shes just an example of a very driven individual, someone who finds a strong passion and pursues it. Everybody doesn't necessarily have that passion. I'd agree that school doesn't promote intellectualism (at least not through University, where you have more freedom in choosing what you study), but it can help develop interests.

Re:False Premmise

[green1]

I think the larger point is that spending 4 years in college doesn't make someone a geek, there is no degree that transforms a non-geek in to a geek. Likewise, not going to college doesn't disqualify one from being a geek. Being a geek is who you are, not how you were educated.
Likely the geeks you knew in college were geeks long before they got to college, and the non-geeks likely didn't magically become geeks by going through the process.

Re:False Premmise

[phlinn]

That's not anti-intellectual, it's anti academia. Intellectual != college educated.

Re:False Premmise

[jimbolauski]

In the programming world, I always got the impression that, collectively, we respected the self-taught coder more than one who spent four years in school being spoon fed how to code.

With that statement I can tell you did not go to college, I have a CS degree but did not go to college to learn how to code, it would take a year tops to teach some one how to code and what typically happens is that the freshman year is a syntax year, the complex logic is taught later so the students don't have to struggle with learning the syntax and logic at the same time. I would say the opposite that more formal education you had in a technical filed the more respect you are given, most program managers have a Masters or higher in their field if not then a bachelors and many years of experience there are a few outliers on both sides but unless you plan an starting your own company formal education will get you further.

Re:False Premmise

[marnues]

Intellectual and college educated are so closely coupled that saying they are non-equivalent is an issue of semantics rather than practicality. College may not make someone a geek, but it absolutely can make them an intellectual.

Re:False Premmise

[MBGMorden]

I have to agree, and that's the reason some consider it smart not to attend college unless it's an in state school. There are a few around here that can get you a BS for $5K a year in tuition. If you are in your last year or two, even less if you take only the one or two needed classes (~$300-$400 per class.)

That's where I think the discrepancy lies. It's hard to broadly paint college as a "waste of money" when the costs vary so much for attending. In-state public universities are typically 1/5th or less the cost of a private college. In-state public technically colleges (where you can often do the first 2 years of a degree if you want) tend to be even less.

Like everything, you should bargain shop. When I graduated college I barely broke $20k in student loan debt (which is now 14 months from being paid off). That's about the cost of a mediocre car. Considering that my living and houses expenses for that time were included in that (ie, those were expenses I'd have had to pay anyways that I got to delay), it's not a bad bargain at all. Whether or not I'm any "better" at what I do because of the degree - I'll leave that up to debate. I'll say that it helped develop a lot of non-specific skills tremendously though (such as public speaking and general social skills), and at the end of the day it opens up a lot of job opportunities that simply require a degree.

Re:False Premmise

[Lilith's Heart-shape]

There are people who will pay hundreds of dollars for a pair of Nikes when they can get a perfectly good pair of sneakers for a fraction of the price. They're paying for the brand.

Re:False Premmise

[marnues]

GP might be refering to ITT Tech as college...

Re:False Premmise

[Surt]

A real geek should be, if anything, a circus performer performing sensationally morbid or disgusting acts.

Re:False Premmise

[marnues]

Nope. You are defining what I believe as a nerd (I also self identify). I say that as I cannot find common ground with my geek friends. Geeks are weirdos who are passionate about culturally unacceptable pursuits. I have played DnD with many people who couldn't even read a dictionary let alone understand why one should be questioned.

Re:False Premmise

[c0d3g33k]

Bullshit. "A degree" won't transform a non-geek to a geek, but a transforming life experience (which could include earning a degree) might. I don't place much stock in the "you have to be born with it" nonsense. Granted, change becomes harder over time, so geek transformation is less likely to happen later in life, but it's possible. Besides, using the definition very loosely, there are plenty of geeks who are probably not recognized as such because their geekery is more mainstream. Fashion, music, finance, needlepoint, gardening ... the list could go on. "Traditional" geeks don't like to acknowledge this because it detracts from their particularly acute need for specialness. That's why a lot of geeks self-identify, I would guess. But it's really not that special, sorry to say. I'd go so far as to say that geekery is part of our DNA - geekery about things that enables oneself and family/tribe to stay alive seems like a good survival skill to have.

Re:False Premmise

[marnues]

Passing a class and chasing a degree should be one-and-the-same as being intellectual. That was my college experience. We had to think outside the box in every engineering class I took to achieve an A. Those who struggled with intellectualism also struggled with grades. I hope you will help kids find these pursuits rather than spoil them with horror stories.

Re:False Premmise

[AK Marc]

I think the larger point is that spending 4 years in college doesn't make someone a geek,

Given that college is considered an intellectual pursuit, and geeks look down on people with college as having been "spoon fed" and it can't make one more geeky (I'm a geek with an MBA, so fuck you anti-intellectual geeks), it seems you are not disagreeing with the premise that geeks are anti-intellectual. The only exception to the "geeks look down on those with degrees" I've seen here is that engineering degrees are tolerated because they are required to be engineers, which is inherently geeky.

But then, I've found that the collection of "nerds" here (it is news for nerds after all) is not well representative of the nerds/geeks I've encountered in real life. And I'd say that geeks are anti-intellectual because so many geeks are inherently bad at school (a geek is a free-form learner and doer, and schooling is the opposite of free-form learning) and there is some jealousy between those who just can't do schooling and those who have completed a higher level. I know more than one geek millionaire that dropped out of college (and not in the "had an idea so I quit" sense, but the "failed all my classes so they didn't let me back in" sense) and went to work in tech. It wasn't that they weren't capable of learning all that college had to teach, but that they weren't capable of completing the classes in the structured environment required. Since a "real geek" would fail out of college (according to the geeks that fail or don't even try) then those that go on to get degrees must not be "real geeks."

And thus, anti-intellectualism is linked to geek-ness.

Re:False Premmise

[tnk1]

Okay, you proved that it is possible to get an intellectual out of a college with your example. You didn't prove that it takes college to make one.

And Newton did much of his best work at home in Woolsthorpe, while Cambridge was closed due to plague.

And yes, he was an alchemist, and by all accounts an incredible asshole. But he may well have been a better historian than you. I know I am.

Re:False Premmise

[AK Marc]

In the programming world, I always got the impression that, collectively, we respected the self-taught coder more than one who spent four years in school being spoon fed how to code.

Given that they don't do a good job of teaching "coding" in college at all, and the manner in which you refer to instructor-led learning as "spoon feeding" I would presume that you haven't completed a college program and are, in fact, an anti-intellectual geek. Every programmer I've met that made it through college was a *better* programmer than the self taught. Why? Because there are "tricks" (like how to design before you start coding) they cover greatly in college. Those who are self-taught might run across something like that, but they are much more likely, from my experience, to start pounding out code and worrying about the design and layout later.

How does that change the code that's put out? The person that went through college, with multiple challenges to reduce CPU cycles to accomplish the same thing, to make a single program coded in multiple languages in order to reduce CPU, will have more forethought into which loop style (or alternate way other than loops) will get the job done best. Perhaps you have lots of memory and a memory wasteful recursive loop would be fastest, or memory is a premium and a more normal loop is required, or perhaps the loop could be handled by a long if-then statement more efficiently.

But the self-made coder is much more likely to stick with what he knows and code "more efficient" code based on lines of code, not length of compiled code or resources required to run that code. And that leaves the self-made coder at a disadvantage to the "spoon-fed" coder who has spent time with peers analyzing code and the efficiency of it in order to make the best code possible, regardless of their personal preferences for loop style or sort algorithms.

Re:False Premmise

[cheekyjohnson]

The fact that a few other places are attempting to imitate us does not make what we are doing good. It could mean that they are making a mistake (however unlikely such a huge mistake is), or even that it is simply better than their current educational system (which doesn't necessarily make ours good).

Re:False Premmise

[jhoegl]

Your logic is sound, but the conclusion would not be "anti-intellectualism", it would be "anti-structure" or "anti-conformist", or both.

I have seen both, none, and each. No one can be put into a nicely wrapped box of explanation, which is why we find ourselves in our own conundrum of definition.
I view it as a waste of time, and would rather look into tougher issues plaguing society than societies definition of who people are.

Re:False Premmise

[causality]

You can either design, code, debug, think -- or you can't.

I think that's what really sets a geek apart from what you could call mainstream culture.

It's a willingness to educate yourself and find your own answers. It's when you encounter a situation you don't know how to handle, and you take the time to research it and understand what you're dealing with and when you make your own decision. It's a willingness to try new things even if that means picking up the pieces when something doesn't work the way you had hoped. Above all, it's a valuation of self-sufficiency and an eschewing of helplessness.

Contrast that with most non-geeks who run into problems with i.e. a computer. They resent the very idea of even a quick Google search. They want someone to do it for them, to provide hand-holding. Even intelligent people who are quite capable of locating, reading, understanding, and executing concise, well-written instructions will do this. It's not anti-intellectualism vs. intellectualism; it's a third option encompassing both, a type of intellectual laziness that does not delight in learning new things and making personal discoveries. It's as though many people become mentally incapacitated and deny themselves the use of their skills the moment they leave their comfort zone, rather than having something like a sense of adventure and exploration.

I've encountered people capable of all of the above -- and don't find out for weeks, months, years (or ever) whether they have a degree or not.

That one depends on the person. Some people do not easily take initiative. Many people need some kind of external pressure. For some, the structure and the deadlines of formal education provides the pressure they need to find motivation. Rather than view learning as an open-ended exploration they do at their own pace, they need a clearly defined goal (i.e. a degree) and an easy way to measure how much progress towards that goal they have made.

While I believe it is better and if you like, a sign of a stronger person to not need these things, the bottom line is that such people do have the virtue of knowing themselves and knowing what it takes to acquire the skills they want. They do what is necessary to make it happen and that much is commendable. It is their own path to the same destination, and so long as it works for them and they are happy with it, it is ultimately a good thing. Since the destination is the same or quite similar, it is not surprising that how they attained their skills rarely comes up in your experience. What matters is that they have them and value them.

Re:False Premmise

[mbkennel]

University study is very useful to teach you lots of things that human civilization, which has included a boat load of people every bit as smart as you, and quite a number of people a hell of a lot bleeping smarter, has happened to have figured out already.

Anti-intellectualism means that is all BS. It's a radically arrogant---and yet the numbskulls continually complain about those "arrogant elites".

And the 18 year old self-taught know-it-all who really doesn't is prime recidivist offender.

Re:False Premmise

[causality]

That's not anti-intellectual, it's anti academia. Intellectual != college educated.

It's somewhat anti-intellectual to view it in terms of "ivory tower", summoning images of something inaccessible to all but a privileged few. Especially when it comes to computing, the information is out there, it is freely available, and anyone who really wants to work for it can master it. That's the truth of it, even if some in academia do view themselves as some kind of elite. To assume the "ivory tower" is strictly valid is to buy into their elitism, something that would properly be recognized and rejected as unworthy of attention.

Re:False Premmise

[igreaterthanu]

Which is why places like Korea are working to make their educational systems more like ours? And why people from all over the world pay big bucks to go to college here as well?

I'm not familiar with what Korea is doing. As for people paying big bucks to go to American colleges, America has a very small number of colleges that are exceptionally good and a very large number that are mostly a joke (See GP). Just because the best are really good doesn't mean they all are.

Re:False Premmise

[n5vb]

I disagree. Neither formal education nor the acquisition of degrees correlate exactly with either intellectualism or geek-nature. (Some, including myself, might argue that the correlation isn't even all that close.)

I might dare to suggest that the academic environment can in some cases do more to kill geek-nature than it does to nurture it. There are exceptions, but a lot of institutions actively discourage geekery in favor of rote "learning" models that work great for turning out corporate-ladder fodder than they do for instilling any sense of creativity. And geekery is a creative enterprise from the foundations on up.

I don't know how true this is for anyone else, but for me, the feeling is definitely anti-academia and not anti-intellectual. The fact that I'm self-educated does not negate the fact that I'm very much an intellectual.

(p.s. by the way, it's "premise"..)

Re:False Premmise

[AK Marc]

I view it as a waste of time, and would rather look into tougher issues plaguing society than societies definition of who people are.

One of the things made clear in college, is that most of the tougher issues plaguing society are caused by societies definitions of who people are.

Your logic is sound, but the conclusion would not be "anti-intellectualism",

Being anti-education because formal education has excessive structure or conformity (which I would assert is an invalid argument because conformity is not required - I certainly didn't go out of my way to conform and instead sought out others who were similarly minded rather than attempt to conform to what some perceive the majority to be, and I certainly wasn't alone in that) is still anti-intellectualism. That may only be a side-effect, but it is a direct effect none the less.

Re:False Premmise

[TeknoHog]

Died a virgin, a true geek.

Re:False Premmise

[joebok]

If you consider sitting behind a computer screen "doing" then maybe you have a point. In my experience, geeks are incredibly knowledgeable about the things that they are geeked out about - that is practically the definition of what being a geek means. I don't think "doing" has anything to do with it.

Re:False Premmise

[sortius_nod]

I don't think that saying university/college is a "waste of time these days" is anti-intellectual. In fact, it's the complete opposite.

As someone who has been to university and left due to a complete contempt from most lecturers/tutors for thinking outside the box, I can assure you that University isn't about being intellectual at all. These days it's about getting a piece of paper and getting a high paying job. I have met very few people who actually respect intellectualism that have gone through university. The ONLY people I have met that are actually pro-intellectualism and have been through university are people with their PHDs working in science. The mentality drastically changes between degree and masters/PHD study, going from rote learning to actual thought.

I think one of the big problems is that university lecturers (and consequently their tutors) have spent so long locked up in academia that anything that challenges their knowledge is disregarded. This has a flow on effect of forcing students to stop thinking and just start parroting. Spend 5 minutes in a university bar and you'll see all the arts students parroting their lecture notes, or engineers acting like their still high school jocks, and so forth. Getting an intellectual conversation that doesn't rely on course notes going is quite difficult.

This is not ALWAYS the case, I had a great philosophy lecturer that did encourage thinking, advised not to write notes and refused to give any reading material. Instead of telling the students what to think, he taught the students how to think. Then again, I had a linguistics lecturer who refused to accept or (even discuss) new research or any challenge to the theories presented in the course book.

I don't look down on people who've been to university, but I do approach anyone who has with caution. I have been disappointed many a time by people with degrees. Even my partner will admit her degree didn't teach her to think, nor did it teach her anything relevant to current technology (she did a Info Sci degree).

While she is "using" her degree at the moment, it took a lot of learning to get up to speed with current tech. How can anyone agree that university is an intellectual pursuit when you aren't even equipped with the tools required to do the jobs the degree is designed for when you graduate?

Re:False Premmise

[eepok]

Wow... severely overrated post! School definitely promotes the growth and treasuring of intellect and if you've experienced otherwise recently, then you've had a very bad school experience. (Note: "School" is the institution and educators, not the kids.)

Anyone who loves learning does it EVERYWHERE HUMANLY POSSIBLE. That means in school and out.

Re:False Premmise

[Darinbob]

But didn't college used to be the place where you did stuff? You certainly do more interesting things there than at a grunt entry level job. For most people college was probably more interesting than even high level jobs. To me the "skip college" crowd seems to be composed of two types of people. The first being those who just want a job quick and the second being those who think they can make at as an "entrepreneur". I see only the second group as "doers", but they're extremely naive doers.

Another facet of a lot of geeks is just learning new things. That just doesn't gibe with being non-intellectual. A geek wants to learn stuff that the mainstream considers useless or boring or too hard or not cool enough.

I think a problem here is that we're applying the term "geek" to the wrong people. Just being techie or technophile doesn't make one a geek.

Re:False Premmise

[michael_cain]

In the programming world, I always got the impression that, collectively, we respected the self-taught coder more than one who spent four years in school being spoon fed how to code.

Depends.

Much of my career was real-time programming, both hard and soft. In many cases, one of the critical questions the programmer needed to be able to answer was "What's the worst-case run time for this code?" The person who spent four years in college almost certainly has been exposed to computational complexity and analysis of algorithms; the self-taught coder, probably not so much. Or the (typically) opposite side of the coin that may crop up in embedded systems: speed is not critical, but we're damned tight on main memory, how can you pack the needed functionality into less space? Again, the degreed person seems more likely to have been exposed to concepts like special-purpose languages and virtual machines that may provide the answer.

Programming is often more than just coding.

Re:False Premmise

[chebucto]

There's been a tenancy to make the term 'hacker' as well as 'geek' so broad as to be useless. These days, anyone with more than a passing interest in any given hobby can call themselves a geek without being outside the common usage of the word. Listen to some of the talks at HOPE conferences and you'll hear people use word 'hacking' to describe involvement in politics, FFS.

Personally, I'm happy to keep the standard definition of Hacker (someone who's very good at and very active in computer technology or electrical engineering, to the exclusion of most or all other activities. Little social life, probably little bathing, mild to strong loner-ism, and mild to moderate social awkwardness), and the standard definition of Geek (someone who has extensive, arcane knowledge of a sub-field of technology with little to no practical benefit, coupled with at least mild social awkwardness) and shunt everyone else into the 'Maker' category or whatever.

In other words: soldering a few blinkenlights on the weekend does not make you a hacker, just as becoming proficient at your hobby doesn't make you a geek.

One category not yet defined, but very germane to this discussion, is the Nerd. The nerd is a special category, reserved for people with the traits of a geek, combined with a strong IQ (typically, with strong math skills as well), and a knowledge of the sub-field that extends beyond the arcane and into the novel: the nerd knows enough about the subject to advance the state of the art.

Re:False Premmise

[Ira Sponsible]

Chuck also dug up the Oak Island treasure with a runcible spoon. If that ain't geek, I don't know what is.

Re:False Premmise

[trevelyon]

I agree that what makes a geek is the DIY mentality. Knowledge and training can help in this but there is also usually a certain practical application portion to any successful geek. It's this portion that may be weighing in on the returns of higher education.

My personal experience included 3 years of math/physics, 2 years in electronics tech school, formal training courses on server and networking. That said almost everything I do for my job (IT) was self taught. Each school taught me valuable skills and knowledge but in today's world with ready access to information and the ability to get involved and learn real world applications of that knowledge as you go it's hard to justify the inflated and still escalating prices higher education is demanding for most subjects. Computer science, electrical engineering and theoretical subjects in particular are hard pressed. There's still justification in subjects like experimental physics and other areas that require access to expensive and rare equipment for practical experience but for most subjects the internet is as or almost as effective as the large lectures and bulk memorization that constitutes the first 2 years of many technical university studies. I've learned orders of magnitude more from internet sources than I did in school with the exception of the life lessons learned from moving away from home that coincided with going to university. To me it seems logical a practical, get it done, more engineering-focused group would come to the conclusion there is a better return from alternate approaches than University education. I don't find it anti-intellectual in the least. After all they are not deriding learning or science just the currently suggested method of learning.

Re:False Premmise

[avandesande]

He is if he wants to be!

Re:False Premmise

[hey!]

I think you need to develop an ontology of geekdom. The root class (the union of all kinds of geeks) are people whose interests are incomprehensible to most people. Beneath that overarching class that you have

(a) geeks that do unusual things
(b) geeks that know unusual things
(c) geeks that create unusual things

Membership in just one of these subclasses qualifies you as a geek, although naturally the subclasses overlap. To illustrate, let's take the Society for Creative Anachronism. Participating in SCA events qualifies you a geek that does. Knowing the history of Medieval fashion qualifies you as a geek who knows. And if you make medieval clothing that qualifies you as a geek who creates. If you sew your own costume based on your own research, then wear it to an SCA event, you're a hat trick geek.

Re:False Premmise

[cpu6502]

>>>we respected the self-taught coder more than one who spent four years in school being spoon fed how to code.

BAH! If you didn't learn to code before becoming a teenager, then you're already behind. Oh..... and get off my lawn! j/k ;-)

Re:False Premmise

[Eponymous Coward]

In the programming world, I always got the impression that, collectively, we respected the self-taught coder more than one who spent four years in school being spoon fed how to code.

I think in the programming world, degrees from respected schools open doors. After that, what is respected is the ability to create. Nobody gives a crap what school Notch went to. What matters is that he created Minecraft. That said, I really would recommend that if you have the means to go to university away from home, do it. In my experience, academics are no more than about 25% of why you go to school. The rest is about a social life and immersing yourself with other (mostly) young people and getting access to just about anything a young hacker could ask for. My special tip: most schools have a machine shop that motivated people can get access to. Take advantage of this. Be respectful of the old guy who maintains it and this may be the place you learn the most.

In geeky fields (and especially open source) it really is a meritocracy.

Re:False Premmise

[idontgno]

Much of my career was real-time programming, both hard and soft. In many cases, one of the critical questions the programmer needed to be able to answer was "What's the worst-case run time for this code?" The person who spent four years in college almost certainly has been exposed to computational complexity and analysis of algorithms; the self-taught coder, probably not so much

My first professional job (10 years) was real-time systems. O(n) analyses were imprecise to the point of useless. You code the damn thing and hand-step through the assembler instructions. Your system's architecture manuals will tell you execution times for the instructions. You compute your execution loop's min/max/most likely execution time and trim the code if it'll be too long (like, falling outside the operating system's 10ms time limit for interrupt-priority execution time, after which your code is relegated to batch priority. Not good if you're writing interrupt service code for a small-buffer high-speed communication device.)

But again, nowadays... you'd do exactly the same thing, but perhaps in a simulator.

Re:False Premmise

[aristotle-dude]

In the programming world, I always got the impression that, collectively, we respected the self-taught coder more than one who spent four years in school being spoon fed how to code.

With that statement I can tell you did not go to college, I have a CS degree but did not go to college to learn how to code, it would take a year tops to teach some one how to code and what typically happens is that the freshman year is a syntax year, the complex logic is taught later so the students don't have to struggle with learning the syntax and logic at the same time.

I am almost at a loss for words. Do you really believe that software development as a discipline has anything to do with syntax? Are you confusing syntax with design patterns? Syntax is an attribute of a particular language and not writing code so learning the syntax of one language is not going to help you in a language with a dissimilar syntax style. Are you certain that you went to university? Logic is something that can be taught however application of logic in innovative ways is something which requires a specific temperament which cannot be taught easily in a class room. Some people call this natural talent.

People interested in writing software should be screened to see if they have a logical mind. I would recommend a test be given with a series of logical problems to be solved. I would also recommend that students be taught how to map out specific problems in logical "pseudo" code before they learn a specific syntax of a language. It is vital to be able to write out or story board user stories before you exert the effort to actually "code" something because the team can discuss what the roadblocks or dependencies are and give some rough estimates on efforts/complexity.

  I would say the opposite that more formal education you had in a technical filed the more respect you are given, most program managers have a Masters or higher in their field if not then a bachelors and many years of experience there are a few outliers on both sides but unless you plan an starting your own company formal education will get you further.

This is most certainly true however I would argue that much of the automatic respect is undeserved. It should be earned through accomplishments and overall throughput on the job. University degrees miss out a lot of soft skills that are essential these days for becoming a productive developer. Anyone can be taught to write Java code but not everyone can write good code.

Re:False Premmise

[idontgno]

Wow... severely overrated post! School definitely promotes the growth and treasuring of intellect and if you've experienced otherwise recently, then you've had a very bad school experience. (Note: "School" is the institution and educators, not the kids.)

That's pretty much a "no true Scotsman" argument.

Yeah, a good educational environment will foster and nourish intellectual development. A bad one will smother it.

Care to speculate which is more likely?

This must be why this article is "News for nerds."

Re:False Premmise

[tnk1]

Sure, college can teach you about the accumulated corpus of human learning. That is a far cry from presuming that it is the only way to learn a significant portion of that.

I'm not one of the people who will call college "useless", I went to college myself. A very good one, by all accounts. I definitely did learn things there, but there were also a lot of things that I did not pick up as well in the classroom as I did on my own, in my own time.

I would not advise someone to drop out of college, but that advice has more to do with their future success than it does their ability to learn. On average, you need a degree to get a decent job. There are some huge successes out there, but much of that is opportunity as much as their own ability. Bill Gates and Microsoft could easily failed to get the IBM deal that made them into what they are today. Getting a degree grants you more opportunity and that is what a college degree's major use is to most people who get one these days. It is not Anti-Intellectual to point out that simple fact.

My advice would be slightly different if they just wanted to go there to learn some subject, however. In general, you should go to college to learn because it has experts and equipment and an environment conducive to education. This goes without saying. But if you needed to bankrupt yourself to go and submit yourself to grinding debt that would make your life worse if you couldn't pay it off, I might tell you to either skip it, or at least wait until you are more secure financially to go for it. You *can* learn just about anything you learn in at least undergrad outside of a college. You would need to work much, much harder at it, and it would take longer, but it is possible.

The point is this: college is not the only way to go if you want to simply learn things. If being an intellectual means being part of a group that loves learning and knowledge and has picked that up, then you don't need college to do that. Look at the most closed minded leaders today. Even some of the anti-intellectual ones. They all went to college. Some went to very good colleges. Their distrust is born not of jealousy or a lack of erudition, but of experiencing how detached some people in academia can be from what happens outside. They shouldn't punish colleges for that, but there are certain aspects of academia that do make for a groupthink situation to occur. That means that there is a place for people of sufficient ability and motivation to make real contributions outside of that system.

Re:False Premmise

[Forty Two Tenfold]

"I have never let my schooling interfere with my education." -- Mark Twain

Also, "It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education." -- Einstein

Re:False Premmise

[ShakaUVM]

>>Spend 5 minutes in a university bar and you'll see all the arts students parroting their lecture notes, or engineers acting like their still high school jocks, and so forth.

I agree with you, except the bit about engineers acting like jocks. (What?)

However, I think the university experience does have a large YMMV component to it. I found my college experience to be very valuable, and everything I'd hoped it to be (except for the whole collegiate sports thing - UC San Diego has no real tradition supporting sports teams). I met lots of smart people, got to interact with interesting professors that, outside of intro classes, were genuinely interested in developing your ability to think and solve problems, and learned the kinds of things about coding you can't pick up from a book. Was well worth the time and effort to get my Master's degree in CS, too.

>>I don't look down on people who've been to university, but I do approach anyone who has with caution.

I'm... somewhat the other way around. While the smartest coder I've ever worked with was a college dropout, a lot of people that don't go to college have bad coding habits that cause problems down the line in terms of bugs, readability, and maintainability. These sorts of things traditionally get beaten out of you in your intro classes in college.

>>I had a great philosophy lecturer that did encourage thinking, advised not to write notes and refused to give any reading material.

By contrast, I had the Churchlands for some philosophy classes, and they were dismissive and condescending to anyone that didn't agree with their point of view. Their goal was to create clones of themselves, I think, since they're so outnumbered in the philosophy field.

Re:False Premmise

[Rophuine]

Agree, but I have an insight into the 'appearance' of anti-intellectualism. We have no respect for the traditional signs of an intellectual: research papers, degrees, citations, accreditations are meaningless: we just care about how GOOD you are. No degree can tell us that: all it tells us is that you satisfied some panel or series of lecturers who were interested, not in your ability, but in whether you satisfied some set of criteria that probably aren't really all that relevant.

It can easily LOOK like anti-intellectualism, but it's just that we'd prefer to judge for ourselves, thank you very much, and not defer to the opinions of a bunch of people we don't know.

Re:False Premmise

[Requiem18th]

I'd have to concede the point to the parent poster, "anti academia" *it's* intellectualism.

Academia is the formal practice of generating and passing on knowledge, to be against formal education is to be against the scientific method that develop it and informs it.

A point could be made that the institutions are filled with corrupted and/or clueless bureaucrats but you are arguing from the point of view that it is "pseudo-intellectual ivory tower nonsense".

Your need to create makes you an artist or just creative person in general, but it's the will and capability to analyze it formally what makes you an intellectual.

Re:False Premmise

[IICV]

Any what is the definition? Are you saying that someone who spends all his time sitting in a library and reading every book about insects is not a geek? On the other hand, if you spend all your money and free time trying to build your own wind turbine then you're also a geek.

What is the conclusion? Either there is no definition, or any definition is broad enough to be useless.
One thing is clear: Chuck Norris is not a geek.

Sounds like you've stumbled on a definition: geeks are people who get deeply obsessed about at least one topic.

That's the one I use, at least. It does mean that most people are geeks about something, but hey - we've all got a little jock in us too :)

Re:False Premmise

[Rophuine]

In the programming world, I always got the impression that, collectively, we respected the self-taught coder more than one who spent four years in school being spoon fed how to code.

You've created a false dichotomy. Spending four years doing a degree, for most of the people I hung out with, was nothing about being spoon-fed how to code - most of the people who needed that failed out and went elsewhere. Some of them struggled through. Lots of us were good coders long before we went to uni, and we breezed through and spent most of our time messing about with stuff that interested us: we often got worse grades than the ones struggling through, because they were focusing on meeting the criteria while we were off messing with something fun.

Most of the (good) coders I've ever worked with have been a mix of the two. They taught themselves to code, then went to uni and learned all sorts of new and interesting stuff about coding, as often from their fellow students as from the courses. I've met good coders without training, but I often (not always!) find that a lack of 'four years in school being spoon fed how to code' leads to all sorts of bad habits, poor practices, and general amateurishness. NOT, by any stretch, always! There are great coders who are entirely self-taught - but I'm gun-shy of them, because I've seen some of the bird-nests these people put together.

Re:False Premmise

[Requiem18th]

Oh yes, Newton the theologist, Christians always bring that up, sad thing that they can't name any advances in theology or useful models or theories of Christianity he left behind.

Re:False Premmise

[Vasheron]

Okay, you proved that it is possible to get an intellectual out of a college with your example. You didn't prove that it takes college to make one.

You've got the wrong idea. Here's the right one: College/university is to intellectual endeavors as a dojo is to martial arts. Sure you can do martial arts all alone and maybe you'll get somewhere... You might be able to figure out how to kick, punch, and perform some kata. You might even become quite good at these things, but you'll never learn how to block quite as effectively as you could if you had other people to practice with. You'll never learn more complex techniques like throwing, or locking, and you'll certainly never get to practice them. You also won't have the advice of mentors who have been practicing for way longer than you have (and learned from others as well); and therefore, you probably won't learn much of the theory behind the movements, their history, their proper application, common pitfalls, etc... You also won't be able to experience the wonderful social atmosphere a good dojo provides (which helps a lot with motivation). So yes, you could go off and be a martial artist all by yourself... but, it gets a lot better when you do it with others.

Re:False Premmise

[Idarubicin]

The plural of "ancedote" is not "data".

Successful dropouts are noteworthy because they are the exception.

No one reacts with surprise and astonishment when they hear about how someone with an advanced degree achieves financial, technical, or creative success. Why do you suppose that is?

Re:False Premmise

[superwiz]

You forgot to mention banker. While the statical evidence presented by gp is not strong, as an example of a larger trend it is nothing to laugh at.

Re:False Premmise

[similar_name]

Education and intellect are hardly synonymous.

"In large states public education will always be mediocre, for the same reason that in large kitchens the cooking is usually bad." -Friedrich Nietzsche

"Nothing that is worth knowing can be taught"-Oscar Wilde

"It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education." - Albert Einstein

Re:False Premmise

[Torodung]

Inventor of the aether. Staunch believer that God was a mathematician, and that he could decode His divine works. Best work in math simultaneously arrived at by Leibniz.

You're talking about a time when the university was the only game in town for an intellectual. Your example is relevant only to the modern scientific movement of the 19th century, which chose him as an authority to establish secular education (as opposed to Church sponsored), not the 21st century where folks can learn it on their own at the Kahn Academy. You might as well be bringing up the medicinal uses of tree bark in this context.

--
Toro

Re:False Premmise

[similar_name]

When people talk about thinking outside of the box, the box they are referring to is education. College may provide knowledge for someone, but it doesn't provide intellect.

Re:False Premmise

[TapeCutter]

there is no degree that transforms a non-geek in to a geek

Agreed and let's hope they don't find one! However, for pre-existing geeks there are plenty of degrees that can turn their geeky hobby into a career.

Re:False Premmise

[geminidomino]

Geeks have the passion.
Nerds have the deep wizardry.
Hackers combine the two

Re:False Premmise

[abigor]

The United States has far and away the finest universities in the world. And I'm not American.

Re:False Premmise

[mjwx]

Isaac Newton, Cambridge graduate, member of the Royal Society (and later Prpresident thereof), mathematician, physicist, astronomer, philosopher, theologist.

OK, he was also an alchemist. But he was probably a better statistician than you. I know I am.

Perhaps the GGP should have said,

"Anyone who wants to learn will do so, anyone who does not will not in spite of school".

If we judge education by it's failures it will always look bad. We have to look at the success and the failures to get an overall idea of effectiveness (I'm not that great of a statistician either).

Re:False Premmise

[lennier]

Academia is the formal practice of generating and passing on knowledge, to be against formal education is to be against the scientific method that develop it and informs it.

I think your definition begs the question somewhat: you are claiming that formal instutitions are both necessary and sufficient for the generation of knowledge.

Granted I don't have a formal university education, so by the very terms of your question any analysis I could make that rebuts this statement would be disallowed - but my impression from an informal study of history is that institutional formality is not at all the same thing as the generation and transmission of knowledge: for one thing, institutions don't actually embody formal processes 100% correctly, nor do formal processes 100% correctly embody knowledge - and that assuming that knowledge and institutions which claim to embody that knowledge are identical is pretty close to the foundational error of all civilisations which have fallen in the history of the world.

I mean, a moment's reflection should advise you that if your claim is correct, no knowledge-generating social institution should ever have made errors - their formal processes for accumulating knowledge should have prevented them from doing so. But they have and they do, time and time again. Rejecting an institution is not the same thing as rejecting the ideals of an institution, nor is rejecting any particular institutional knowledge claim the same as rejecting knowledge itself.

Re:False Premmise

[Garridan]

That's because we're currently on top. We're on top largely because of how our grandparents acted during WW2, and the vast natural resources available to us. So, the cultures that equate respect, money, and power (like Korea) want to be like us. The best thing in their minds is to go to an American school and bring back some of the brilliance we're supposed to be full of. So, they model their education systems after ours because that's what American schools require to accept foreign applicants. Staying on top is going to be increasingly difficult, unless we bamboozle all other first-world nations into adopting our education practices.

Re:False Premmise

[lennier]

A real geek should be, if anything, a circus performer performing sensationally morbid or disgusting acts.

So coding HTML/Javascript/PHP counts?

Re:False Premmise

[StarvingSE]

Yup, these quotes always rear their heads when an education debate sparks on slashdot. I fully concede to the fact that not everyone learns the same way. Nietzsche, Wilde, and Einstein are very unique individuals who required a different path to satisfy their curiosity and learning. Other people excel in structured formal education.

There are people who fail out of college, but are then successful anyway, and then they come complain that the formal education system is a failure because it didn't work for them.

There are others who graduated with honors from college, and lambaste those who failed out because they "didn't try hard enough" or "they just couldn't cut it."

Both parties are wrong. Formal education doesn't work for everyone, that doesn't make it inherently evil. Not all universities are extremely formal. I, for one, went to a university that catered to different kinds of students.

Re:False Premmise

[euroq]

And why people from all over the world pay big bucks to go to college here as well?

To be fair, the university system and in general, colleges in the U.S., are wholly separate from what the OP was referring to, i.e. public schools K-12.

Re:False Premmise

[vegiVamp]

I tend to define a geek as someone who is obsessive about knowledge in one or more domains. The manner in which that knowledge is obtained (reading, doing, whatever) is less relevant. I haven't much thought about this bit, but I suspect it is mostly to do with "hard" knowledge - although I could perfectly picture a psychology geek, too.

The very fact that geekdom is about knowledge, makes it intellectual, though, as it requires a fully working brain. Geeks may have problems with the way specific institutions like schools transfer knowledge, but a geek that is opposed to actual knowledge cannot exist.

Re:False Premmise

[metacell]

That's like saying anyone who criticises the political system is against elected representatives.

You can be critical of academia *as it exists today* without being against formal practices of generating and passing on knowledge in themselves. Furthermore, you can be against formal education without being against university research. Furthermore, you can be critical of the quality and usefulness of today's formal education without being against formal education in itself.

Furthermore, colleges and universities are not the only providers of formal education. For example, there are certifications and online courses which may be more useful for some people and parts of the economy.

Re:False Premmise

[silanea]

I don't think the hacker ethic is about intellectualism, it's about doing. The intellectual part is a side-effect, and a helper, but it is not a requirement.

I partly disagree. As I see it the truth lays somewhere in the middle. The Hacker Manifesto sums it up nicely: "My crime is that of curiosity." Geeks should be makers, yes, but primarily they should be curious about their world. They should tinker with objects, institutions, people. They should push the boundaries of what is possible - by making things deemed impossible.

The problem that TFA sees lies not so much with geeks not being curious but with academia growing more and more useless and extraneous. Many colleges indeed are a waste of time for anyone with a functional brain. Many university courses are so narrowly focused that they really are apprenticeships/vocational trainings with the practical parts stripped away. There is nothing remotely intellectual about those courses. More than half the literature classes I had last semester were a variant of "X in Harry Potter". Smashing. And this semester I see people fail to grasp even the most basic concepts in Robinson Crusoe or Peter Pan.

Re:False Premmise

[freudigst]

Condemning academic institutions at-large epitomizes pseudo-intellectualism, and further explains why the world has to tolerate so much mediocre technology.

Re:False Premmise

[Kashgarinn]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bcC2l8zioIw

School can be free-form and cater to individual learning. It's based on trust, and in America, there is no trust nowhere.

Geeks are people who enjoy learning and tinkering and exploring, they just do it on their own terms.

Re:False Premmise

[Jarik_Tentsu]

I think a lot of people simply call people who are antisocial geeks/nerds.

Obviously, that doesn't make them intellectual. Many of them will sit there raging at people in video games, or troll 4chan all day long.

Re:False Premmise

[AK Marc]

OK, then we can say that the geeks in the US are anti-intellectual, and those in Finland may be less so. And this being a US site with US content by US editors for a US audience, we can simplify that slightly to be "Geeks are anti-intellectual."

Re:False Premmise

[mcvos]

Does that fact that he wasn't a successful theologist change the fact that he was one? I don't think anyone denies that his talents and obsessions lay elsewhere.

Re:False Premmise

[Targon]

College is something that most consider is required to get a good job, and that has been the case since the 1980s, perhaps even late 1970s. The problem is that a high school education alone is not enough to get the education needed for many jobs, so college is NEEDED. Most geeks DO hold to the philosophy that you do what you have to do to get the knowledge you need, and being surrounded by others who are in the science and technical professions is also important to that desire for knowledge, so college fits that too.

Now, there is one vital part that you CAN get from a college education when it comes to programming, and that is the idea that programming is half about getting the program working, and the other half is to have elegant code. This is something that is lost on many programmers today, but it is true that efficient code is something that not enough programmers strive to produce. Get the job done, brute force is fine, even when a more elegant solution would get the job done faster seems to be the way many applications are written, and from my own background, that is the WRONG approach. Getting the job done is just half of the job.

The other thing to remember is that many successful PEOPLE have dropped out of college to start their business. They did get at least SOME of the college education, but the academic life does not fit those who in general are looking for the BEST ways to do things when school administrators generally are more interested in how things appear to be, and those who don't look and act the part just are not seen as acceptable.

Re:False Premmise

[bluemeany]

The dictionary defines an intellectual as: "someone possessing or showing intellect".

Re:False Premmise

[tehcyder]

As someone who has been to university and left due to a complete contempt from most lecturers/tutors for thinking outside the box, I can assure you that University isn't about being intellectual at all.

Yes, that's what school/college drop-outs have always used as their excuse. They're just too fucking clever to bother with all that "getting a degree" nonsense, when they could be out robbing little old ladies of their pension money/coding the new Facebook.

Re:False Premmise

[Phoghat]

Attended university where I studied for a professional degree. Everything else that I know is self taught. My personal opinion is that a university degree in an un-classified subject (eg Liberal Arts) is a complete waste of everyone's time. My $0.02

Re:False Premmise

[tehcyder]

That's not anti-intellectual, it's anti academia. Intellectual != college educated.

No, but most people who are incapable of getting a college degree are too stupid to be intellectuals.
Everyone knows this, which is why the reason for not getting a degree is almost always some version "I had severe (self-diagnosed) psychological problems when I was eighteen, and so although I find the classes laughably simple, my vast intelligence was unable to remain confined within the straitjacket of the so-called education system".
Very few people will ever admit they're just too thick.

Re:False Premmise

[tehcyder]

The problem is using a single word like "geek" to generalise about a hugely disparate number of people. It's meaningless. Someone who is a Harvard-educated, rich, handsome symbolology geek (for instance) has very little in common with a basement-dwelling tentacle-rape-obsessed Otaku.

Re:False Premmise

[tehcyder]

Which is why places like Korea are working to make their educational systems more like ours? And why people from all over the world pay big bucks to go to college here as well?

The fact that the top 1% of US universities are excellent says nothing about the quality of the other 99%.

Re:False Premmise

[tehcyder]

Chuck Norris is/was a karate geek.

Cue the Chuick Norris jokes...

Re:False Premmise

[tehcyder]

Intellect doesn't make you an intellectual anymore than being an adult makes you an adulterer.

I hope that was a failed joke. It's better to be unamusing than fucking stupid.

Re:False Premmise

[TheCRAIGGERS]

OK, I concede that fact that saying "spoon fed" may have been too strong a phrase. It was a poor choice of words that many people here took as a challenge, or that I was biased against higher education. Both are incorrect.

However, unlike many of the rebuttals I received after my post, I have some evidence to cite- namely the Hacker's Jargon file section on Education-

The self-taught hacker is often considered (at least by other hackers) to be better-motivated, and may be more respected, than his school-shaped counterpart.

This is located at http://www.catb.org/jargon/html/education.html and was created with the help of a survey that went out to Usenet way back in the day. Yes the data is old. Yes, the data and/or editor may be biased. But this jargon file was put together by many hackers and read by countless hackers in its many years of existence. And I said nothing about college not having any benefit; we can all certainly agree it is easier to have a career with a degree than without.

Re:False Premmise

[Requiem18th]

Please, let me emphasize that I'm talking about "formal practice" as in "research as methodical, disciplined and absent of emotion or bias as humanly possible"; not "formal institutions" as in "accredited institutions" or "reputable institutions", though it is often the case that institutions that try to practice science formally become reputable.

While you are right that universities don't follow formal process with 100% correctness all the time is correct, it is just childish bickering, as is the claim that any mistake (of very undefined natures) ever committed by any institution that (claims to) follow formal practices of research invalidates the practice of formal research and analysis itself. The choggobbles of wrong ideas mankind accumulated and continues to accumulate based on informal, and down right mystical experience suffices as counter example.

But that is besides the point, that is not important. My claim is that you are being anti-intellectual, your commentary that "nor do formal processes 100% correctly embody knowledge" boils it down neatly. Yeah sure you claim to not reject knowledge itself, but you reject formal and disciplined research in favor of what? Scarce anecdotal evidence and gut feelings? How is that not Anti-intellectual?

Also your commentary of "the foundational error of all civilisations which have fallen in the history of the world" seems nothing short of delusional. To give you the benefit of the doubt, what civilizations have ever fallen because of too much formalized education?

Re:False Premmise

[TheCRAIGGERS]

OK, I concede the fact that saying "spoon fed" may have been too strong a phrase. It was a poor choice of words that many people here took as a challenge, or proof that I was biased against higher education. Both are incorrect.

However, unlike many of the rebuttals I received after my post, I have some evidence to cite; namely the Hacker's Jargon file section on Education-

The self-taught hacker is often considered (at least by other hackers) to be better-motivated, and may be more respected, than his school-shaped counterpart.

This is located at http://www.catb.org/jargon/html/education.html and was created with the help of a survey that went out to Usenet way back in the day. Yes the data is old. Yes, the data and/or editor may be biased. But this jargon file was put together by many hackers and read by countless hackers in its many years of existence. And I said nothing about college not having any benefit; nor do I agree with you incorrectly attaching the "anti-intellectual geek" label to me. I love knowledge in nearly all its forms, and I only say 'nearly' because I don't really want to what my own feces tastes like.

Re:False Premmise

[eepok]

This is very far from a "no true Scotsman" fallacy. People often throw out that accusation when they have no experience in a given topic.

"That's not a classic muscle car unless it has 4 wheels."
"OMG! No True Scotsman!"

The fact is that people who have bad experiences are very likely to suggest that school is overrated or, worse, suggest that it is detrimental to the growth of intellect. They base their opinion of a system on their one experience and generalize it completely.

I think my opinion has significantly more weight behind it because I've not only gone through school, but public schools and public university... and then worked in public school. And am now working at a public university. And interact with students daily (undergrad and grad). And faculty. And administration.

Which is why I make sure to qualify my statement with "(Note: "School" is the institution and educators, not the kids.)" because kids are assholes to other kids.

Re:False Premmise

[Requiem18th]

You are asking me to get into details which the parent poster did not get into.

He criticized "academia" without singling out specific institutions or specific practices within those institutions or academia as a whole so I could only respond in kind.

Also notice I did allow for the claim that current institutions are not following formal practices with enough rigor, but he wasn't making that claim, his claim was that it was "ivory tower nonsense" which seems a cry against formal education itself (specially of the purely theoretical not immediately practical kind.)

And while colleges and universities are not the only providers of formal education, any other equivalent institution is just academia by another name.

Re:False Premmise

[Requiem18th]

Does that fact that he wasn't a successful theologist change the fact that he was one?

Did I say so? No I didn't.

What I found amusing is how he singled out "alchemist" while including "theologist" up there with the other legitimate sciences he is known for. He could have as well said:

OK, he was also an theologist. But he was probably a better statistician than you.

Re:False Premmise

[ginbot462]

Prefers empirical evidence to hypothesis;
        Questions whether the dictionary is right;
        If necessary, writes his own damn encyclopedia;
        Prefers reasoning to received wisdom;
        Is not nearly as susceptible to appeals to authority as others;
        And - the sometimes fatal flaw - prefers others to partake of his wisdom than to partake of theirs.

Spot on [+].

Re:False Premmise

[Gilmoure]

Hey y'all, watch this!

Re:False Premmise

[similar_name]

I agree with you. Formal education is great for some and terrible for others. I don't agree that being against formal education is any more anti-intellectual than being for it is intellectual. To each his own. My sister excelled at formal education and has a PHD, I'm terrible at it and always struggled through school. I received a D in Algebra II in high school. When I graduated my teacher actually apologized saying I knew the material better than she did. I told her not to apologize since I hardly ever did any of my homework. Most people who know us consider both my sister and I intellectuals.

Re:False Premmise

[Coren22]

Alchemy became Chemistry. Alchemy was the attempt to break everything down to its component parts, which is the basic level of chemistry.

Re:False Premmise

[metacell]

So when someone criticises academia, you take that criticism to include, for example, certifications and online computer science courses?

Re:False Premmise

[poetmatt]

hahahahahahaha no. You might want to look around the entire globe before you jump to such a presumption. We have some great universities and a whole lot of filler, but that doesn't do anything about the fact that the school prices are ridiculous for middle class and below, and that our entire country is quickly heading downhill overall.

Re:False Premmise

[Requiem18th]

So long as they take a formal approach to education yes.

Offtopic, damn it, Slashdot javascript is completely broken.

Re:False Premmise

[phlinn]

As I understand it, academia is the set of colleges and universities, which engage in academic pursuits.

To be clear, I think academics as a method is great. I would argue that our current set of academic institutions provide numerous pseudo-intellectual areas of study which lack any actual understanding of the real world, and in some cases deny reality in favor of nonsense, or deny that there is such a thing as reality. Marxist professors. People who think that if they could just compel everyone to be like themselves, life would be hunky dory, and that their preferences are actually some sort of objective good. Elitist nonsense like that found in "What's the matter with Kansas?". Most forms of macroeconomics which suffer from a pretense of knowledge about an inherently chaotic system. That sort of thing is what I would call pseudo intellectual ivory tower nonsense.

There are intellectuals who never went to college, and there are non-intellectual people in the college system. Their may be a correlation, but they aren't the same thing.

Re:False Premmise

[Requiem18th]

The point of the question, whether there is an anti-intellectual current or not depends on whether you blame the failures of intellectuals in their individual incompetence or rather in the very concept of education and rational analysis.

The way you respond makes it hard to accuse you of anti-intellectualism, and honestly I don't think there is an anti-intellectualism current among the geeks either. In fact I don't even think there is a movement against the current set Academic institutions among geeks, even though they are the first to know what is wrong in these institutions and how make them better.

I would argue however that there IS an anti-intellectual current going on among the working class of the bible belt region.

college != intellectual

[Anonymous Coward]

I went to big state school, and it didn't make me more intellectual. Most of my classmates were just ordinary people trying to get degrees so they could get good jobs. If any of them were intellectuals, they were that way before they went to school.

Re:college != intellectual

[Wyatt Earp]

I went to a medium sized state school to finish undergrad and do grad school.

While some were just there for a job degree, we had our share of real intellectuals, especially in History, Stats and Geology.

Re:college != intellectual

[uniquename72]

I went to big state school, and it didn't make me more intellectual.

Nothing will make an intellectually non-curious person into an intellectual. In a perfect world, intellectuals would go to college, and everyone else would just go to trade school, or learn on their own (or just be garbage men, which is fine).

Instead, college is a business, and to maximize profits they need to attract everyone they can. Unfortunately, this means a lot of people who have no business going to college -- who will neither gain anything from their time there, nor contribute to the intellectual pool of the community (or the world in general) -- wind up drinking their way through an extra 4 years of high school.

Rather than pushing everyone to go to college -- which leads us to the broken system we have -- I'd rather we encourage more people NOT to go to college. Leave that for the thinkers and those who want to better themselves. As someone who's worked at a public university for 10 years, I estimate that these people make up less than 20% of the student body.

Re:college != intellectual

[jedidiah]

If anything, the anti-college sentiment that has arisen is a manifestation of ICONOCLASM. The idea that being anti-college is anti-intellectual is just the sort of idea that an iconoclast might be inclined to object to. Kill the sacred cow!

Re:college != intellectual

[Have Brain Will Rent]

Unfortunately, this means a lot of people who have no business going to college -- who will neither gain anything from their time there, nor contribute to the intellectual pool of the community (or the world in general) -- wind up drinking their way through an extra 4 years of high school.

While I agree there are a lot of people who do not benefit from college it is often not possible to identify them until they have gone to college for a while. It is also the case that many people who drop out do so not because they aren't bright enough, not "intellectual" enough, but because they were unprepared. Where I am university and college are two different things.

A common occurrence is for a bright kid to go to university and fail out the 1st year. Why? Because nobody at U cares whether you do your homework, or are sick, or have problems at home, or are a procrastinator... they go from an environment where people care about them and actively supervise them to one where nobody gives a crap and they just aren't prepared for that. By the time they realize what is going on it is too late.

OTOH kids who go to college first and then transfer to university do much better as a whole - it is much gentler transition and they learn to cope. Then they do quite well at university.

And don't disparage time spent in the bar - I met some of the very brightest people I've ever met while hanging out in the bar... bad for my liver, good for my intellect and paradoxically bad for my brain cells.

Part of the problem with "people who shouldn't be there" being there is that their parents want them to go, or they can't think of anything else to do, or they want to do things that require a university education and they did well in high school but just aren't up to university... or they are away from home for the 1st time and not being supervised at all can't handle limitless sex, drugs and booze being on the shelf right beside the learning shelf.

Re:college != intellectual

[blahplusplus]

"I went to big state school, and it didn't make me more intellectual."

Let's also not forget being an intellectual doesn't mean you have to have a college degree or even like school. i.e. not all people who have intellectual talent use it towards what are considered traditional intellectual pursuits. Many intellectual understand that the rat race is a life of constant stress and find rewards in less traveled paths of life.

Re:college != intellectual

[eepok]

Nothing? I remember not being intellectually non-curious. Then I met some really great teachers.

As someone who has and is still working at a public university, I'll directly contradict your suggestion and am frankly appalled that you say that we should encourage people not to go to college. Anyone who would suggest limiting another's education is intellectually stunted him/herself. Sure, you can't polish a turd, but with appropriate education, everyone can better themselves, their understanding of the world around them, and then the lives of those over which they have influence.

If you want a better world than you know, you have to start and finish with education. People need to know logic (and fallacies), history, law, and philosophy (and know them well) if we're going to expect a more civil future.

Seriously... wtf?

Re:college != intellectual

[nomadic]

OTOH kids who go to college first and then transfer to university do much better as a whole - it is much gentler transition and they learn to cope. Then they do quite well at university

You're Canadian, aren't you...

Re:college != intellectual

[briansct]

Okay I understand where you are coming from but I also work in Higher Ed and the student body at my college is representative of adult learners (yes we're non-profit). These are working adults that have realized that to get ahead in their field they need a degree.

Broken system or not to get ahead you need a degree. The problem here is that too many geeks think that they are too good for the traditional system (Cnn article inspired by Thiel). Reals geeks have Phd's or are working toward one.

There is a real reason why the Master's degree is the new Bachelor's degree and the Bachelor's degree is now equivalent to the HS degrees of the past.

Re:college != intellectual

[Have Brain Will Rent]

I can't resist asking why you think that might be the case?

Re:college != intellectual

[nomadic]

The problem is for a lot of people college seems to have no effect; they perform intellectually at about the same level after college as they do before. A lot of people also don't enjoy college, hate going, and don't learn anything there; they would be much happier getting vocational training, and our society would also be pretty much better off. Honestly, I consider a trained electrician, carpenter, or plumber "better educated" than someone with a C-average communications degree from a fourth-rank college. Everyone should be allowed to try college if they want, but not everyone is entitled to graduate.

Re:college != intellectual

[nomadic]

There is no distinction between college and university in the United States in terms of level of education for undergraduates; they both provide bachelor's degrees.

Re:college != intellectual

[scamper_22]

I think the author of the article should examine if colleges and universities are anti-intellectual.

Universities SHOULD be intellectual places.
The idea that university is what you make it... is well the reason people say just skip college.

If university is what you make it, why not skip the tuition and make life what you make it. I have always read a lot and tried things out. I consider myself an intellectual.

These days with the internet, information is so easily available and collaboration infinitely easier. You will only get into any kind of decent intellectualism in your doctorate... and even there I am increasingly seeing problem as university become areas of grant quotas, ideology, and paper outputs... About the only hope you have of really pursuing intellectualism is in a doctorate in a technical field.

And well I'm not averse to definitions. I am definitely anti-intellectual-institutions... because well.. they're not very intellectual.

Re:college != intellectual

[Have Brain Will Rent]

Ahhh I see... is there a reason why some say College and others say University- is it a regional sort of thing? I had thought that some institutions also gave "Associates Degrees" or is that just technical schools?

IIRC it isn't just Canada that distinguishes between College (2yr diploma) and University (4/5 yr degree + advanced degrees) although College has other meanings as well so it can be confusing.

Re:college != intellectual

[MaxEmerika]

Nothing will make an intellectually non-curious person into an intellectual.

I didn't consider myself intellectually curious before I went to college. Exposure to the humanities as part of my lib ed requirements did, in fact, make me that way.

Re:college != intellectual

[nomadic]

There are community colleges/junior colleges that give 2-year associates degrees, though some 4-year colleges also have separate associates degree programs (and some community colleges give bachelor's in limited subjects). Generally a university is a larger organization than a college (and many universities are made up of multiple colleges) , typically offer graduate degrees while many colleges do not, and subsequently also tend to do more original research than colleges.

Re:college != intellectual

[Paul1969]

I, OTOH, went to a respected Ivy League institution, and did more drugs (in both quantity and variety) than ever before or since in my life.
Had some wild intellectual discussions while high, though.

Re:college != intellectual

[Jarik_Tentsu]

True.

I guess it's the difference between two people doing the same degree, and one of them loves reading up more on wikipedia and whatnot, while the other just concentrates on studying. The person who loves to be there to learn, and the person who is learning to get a good job.

The interesting thing is, the marks don't always reflect who is the more 'intellectual' person.

Re:college != intellectual

[tehcyder]

In a perfect world, intellectuals would go to college, and everyone else would just go to trade school, or learn on their own (or just be garbage men, which is fine)

You don't need to be a career academic/intellectual to gain a lot from a college education.
Besides, would you count lawyers, doctors, computer scientists or engineers as just "trades" and therefore not deserving of a college education?
In fact, now I've had time to think about it, you're a fucking twat.

Re:college != intellectual

[uniquename72]

You don't need to be a career academic/intellectual to gain a lot from a college education.

Please point out where I said this was the case. In fact, I'm NOT a career academic; I'm in IT doing UX design and systems training. None of this came directly from my undergraduate music history degree, just as my lawyer friend's JD didn't come as a result of his marketing degree.

Reread my original posting and then realize how a little college might have helped you with reading comprehension and critical thought. And if you've already been to college, consider grad school to continue your clearly lacking education.

Not anti-intellectualism

[GameboyRMH]

The "college is a waste of time" thing is purely economic advice, nothing anti-intellectual about it.

Tagging article "troll."

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

Arguably, treating college as 'purely economic' is the anti-intellectual part(or a sign that you experienced a shitty school...)

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[JeffSh]

In order for the statement "college is a waste of time" to be anti-intellectual, one has to presume there is intellectual knowledge to be obtained exclusively from college and nowhere else.

I find a vast majority of students (these days or perhaps any other) treat college more as an extension of high school and a social/networking opportunity more than raw pursuit of exposure to academics.

I do not like the way the question is posed. It seems to make assumptions that are not necessarily true in order to posit that "geeks are becoming anti-intellectual".

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[GameboyRMH]

Oh jeez not the "go to college to become a better rounded person" argument. College costs as much as a mid-range to high-end sports car. Lower and middle-class people don't have the luxury of going to college for the pleasure of learning. There must be a return on such a significant investment. It's that simple, it has nothing to do with anti-intellectualism.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[vlm]

Arguably, treating college as 'purely economic' is the anti-intellectual part(or a sign that you experienced a shitty school...)

Probably in his lower 20s, due to the educational bubble... Youngsters now a days need to take a lifetime vow of poverty if they go to college, very much like the only way to get an education in the middle ages was to take a vow of poverty and enter the monastery. Not much has changed in CS since then, not the money or the dating life. I think back on how much I learned post-college, which in part required me to spend money the youngsters will never have, due to $200K student loans...

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[hedwards]

The intellectual value of college is hardly the classes, it's spending time with similarly interested people outside of class time debating and discussing various things. Outside of the academic world it's nigh impossible to find that kind of density of intellectually astute individuals.

Personally, I learned far more from my classmates than I ever did from the lectures. And that's not surprising, the banking model of education was never particularly well suited to learning. People generally don't retain facts in isolation, there's a lot more information that needs to be learned in order for the knowledge to be integrated, and that's where the classmates come into things.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Marillion]

"College as a waste of time" is also an indicator of what's wrong with modern university education. They're turning into glorified trade schools. I've had recently graduates tell me, "We studied .NET at school." I'm sorry, .NET is a trade not Computer Science. In my book, you're not a real computer graduate unless you believe that Computer Science is language agnostic.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[stanjo74]

Education is virtually free (the library, the web, used books). A diploma costs money.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[DanTheStone]

I do not like the way the question is posed. It seems to make assumptions that are not necessarily true in order to posit that "geeks are becoming anti-intellectual".

That's called "Begging the question".

I agree with you in general. My college experience was very little intellectual experience, mostly practical work training and well-rounding busywork. I feel like I came out of it far smarter, but not more "intellectual" (depending on how you define such a thing). I think I've learned more intellectual thinking from books than college.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Larry Sanger]

Well, there's more to the post than the "college is a waste of time" thing. Scan down for the points (numbered 1-5) that I'm calling anti-intellectual. "College is a waste of time" is one only of them. And besides, if you'll look at Dale Stephens' CNN article, you'll see plenty of anti-intellectual notes.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[dotagamer69]

Well I went to college and graduated in 2008. First year out of university I was making over $100,000 [BS Chemical Engineering]. Seems like a good deal to me.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[hsjserver]

It's more like you have a guarantee to be impoverished if you don't go, and are less likely to be impoverished if you do go. Speaking as someone who doesn't quite have their degree yet, and can't even get an interview for a job, I shudder to think what life would be like for those that are content to deal with the job market with a High School diploma. Not that you can't be successful, just it's incredibly unlikely. At least that stupid bachelors degree gives me a leg up over them, or ought to when it's done.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Anonymous Coward]

The pleasure of learning is the return on investment. Knowledge is its own reward, not just a tool for prosperity.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[econolog]

Well you are also wrong again (your groupon sig) Whether people like it or not it matters what you get your degree in and where you go. So say you plan on going to that community college for a degree in literature... that might not benefit you financially. http://www.payscale.com/best-colleges/degrees.asp There is also a website that calculates the annual difference in average salary depending on the university, major, and grades. I don't have time to find it right now but you can probably find it on Google. **All** show that it's significantly beneficial to go to university and that which school you go to matters.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

Oh, I'd be the first to agree that colleges are damned expensive, sufficiently so that most people's access to them is largely an economic question. That much is indisputable.

However, the fact that "many people can afford to pay little or nothing for those aspects of college that don't make purely financial sense", which is unquestionably true, does not imply that those aspects don't exist, just that people can't afford them.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[PRMan]

As colleges keep raising the prices high above the inflation rate, it becomes a worse and worse deal for those involved. It's really that simple. Also, advanced degrees are often detrimental to software development jobs, since degree-holders like to waste time arguing about technologies and methods rather than getting around to using something and getting a job done.

Also, for most of us, our CS degree wasted our time with endless amounts of calculus and physics that we haven't used once since, but neglected to teach us tons of things that would have actually helped.

So you'll forgive us if we are distrustful of college, since it was only about halfway helpful for our job.

And yes, I also don't agree that everyone needs to be running around over-educated. College should absolutely be a trade school for intellectual careers. It's positioned that way to employers anyway.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[justinlee37]

Lower and middle-class people can typically get grants to go to school by filing a FAFSA, or scholarships based on either their low income or their high merit.

I've just finished college, and I had grants and scholarships, so if I was a little more frugal I could have made it through without my very modest student loan debt.

The ability to apply for a wider range of jobs was well worth the investment, and my family was certainly middle-class.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[thisnamestoolong]

I would argue that this is only the case because of the rampant anti-intellectual sentiment in 'Merca these days. In Europe, learning for the sake of learning is still valued and is something that is feasible to the average person. By contrast, in America, where nobody gives a fuck about anything that does not have a dollar sign attached to it, this is not the case. Tuition goes up year after year and nobody does anything about it, because it is viewed as an investment rather than a tool to be used for personal growth. In fact, just the idea of self-awareness and personal growth seem to be looked down upon, as there is no immediate cash value to them. This inability to see past the next ledger sheet is, in my opinion, the biggest problem that America is currently facing today. This will be the reason that our nation of fat retards will fall.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[zolltron]

The "college is a waste of time" thing is purely economic advice, nothing anti-intellectual about it.

College might be a waste of time if you view the only benefit of college as increasing your earning potential. But, this view of college is anti-intellectual. There are other benefits to college other than monetary, and some people are willing to pay for them.

Most of what you do for money is bad for your bottom line. Buying that TV? That won't make you money. Going to the movies? Waste of money. But I'll bet you do some of those things. Why? Because the item or service you receive in return is valuable to you -- more valuable than the money you exchange for it. The same could be said in college. While the money you invest will not increase your earning potential proportionally, it still might be worth it if you value the intellectual rewards you get while there.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[tuffy]

It's more like you have a guarantee to be impoverished if you don't go, and are less likely to be impoverished if you do go.

That's the crux of the college bubble. A lot of people believe that the massive investment in college education (both in time and money) is almost certain to pay off in the long run with higher paying jobs. Just like they believed that an investment in housing or tech stocks was a "sure thing".

But if that belief falters, the students will find themselves "upside-down" on their education expenses and colleges will pay a heavy price as alternatives for high school grads become more mainstream.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Seumas]

I am put off by people who clearly do have an anti-intellectual attitude and refer to people who are smart or desire to be smart or are working at being smart as "elitist". However, I can sometimes partially identify with that sentiment, when some asshole is going around saying things like "well, if you feel that you don't get enough out of college to justify the time and expense, then you are being anti-intellectual". I call that being disingenuous.

As someone who did not go to college (in fact, I did not even finish high school, but was fortunate enough to build myself a successful career which was well under way before I turned twenty), I admit that I have a bit of that "fuck institutional academia" in me as well as a little bit of what George Carlin (who dropped out in the 9th grade, just like I did) commented on as "when you drop out in the ninth grade, you spend the rest of your life proving yourself".

I don't personally have anything against people who go to college, but I don't see it as an absolute necessity. At best, I see it as a road-block. Something you must endure, to get where you need to go. Even if you know more going in than the instructors do. Even if you learn at a faster pace than they're willing to teach. You need to pay six figures and four years to get that little piece of paper, so businesses will give you a look. You need to prove that you are willing to be part of the machine, so that you can be part of the machine.

Some exceptions are made, of course. College is absolutely necessary if you're a lawyer or doctor. But is it really necessary, if you're going to be a history expert or journalist or historian or programmer?

I see college as generally a path made available for those who kind of want to do something, but don't know how to do it or don't have the passion to do it themselves. They need someone to lead the way and guide them along every step of it. Many of them are ultimately just looking for something to pay the bills. They're told that accounting is a well paying field, so they go into accounting. Maybe a decision they make in the last few months, before attending.

But then there are others. Those of us who know what we want to do. Have always known it. Have spent years learning about it on our own. Practicing it. Seeking out knowledge and experience and mentors. Those who have a deep passion for what they want to do and for whom college is almost entirely a grin-and-bear it situation, just to get an official stamp on a degree, so they can move on.

I sincerely feel for the people who went to college and came out in massive debt. Often they're doing the same thing I'm doing. Often along side me. The only difference between them and myself is that one of us went to college and one didn't. Oh, and one of us is still paying off a student loan in our 30s and the other has been earning clear and free of any debt their entire adult life.

I'm fortunate and not the most common example around, I admit. But it's possible and there are plenty of examples who have done the same and still can. It's just a matter of what the individual wants. I'm all bout your passion, experience, and capability (or at least, capacity to learn). How you arrived there -- through institutional education or on your own isn't terribly important, to me.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Seumas]

Others, much smarter than myself, have often repeated that "College is where boys go to drink, girls go to find husbands, and everyone goes to prolong their childhood another four years".

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[tibit]

Different people learn in different ways. To me classmates were, at best, a distraction.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[iceaxe]

Oh jeez not the "go to college to become a better rounded person" argument. College costs as much as a mid-range to high-end sports car. Lower and middle-class people don't have the luxury of going to college for the pleasure of learning. There must be a return on such a significant investment. It's that simple, it has nothing to do with anti-intellectualism.

Because we're ignorant, and we want to stay that way, only with money.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[AlienIntelligence]

At least that stupid bachelors degree gives me a leg up over them, or ought to when it's done.

Let us know how that works out for you...

-AI

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[tibit]

It is language agnostic to a point. Ultimately you need to do examples in some language. I hope I won't rain on anyone's parade by mentioning, just in passing, that the CLR and the languages that run on it often provide reasonably state-of-the-art functionality when it comes both to back-end compiler features and front-end language design. And I'm not a MS fanboy, just somewhat worried by stagnated state of C++ and ObjC.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[u38cg]

And it's bad advice. Even in the US, one of the most expensive educations on the planet, the present value of the enhanced earnings a degree brings you are still significantly greater than the (present value of the) cost.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[maxwell demon]

If it was "purely economic advice" wouldn't it say "college is a waste of money"?

Time is money.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Xaedalus]

Mr. Sanger,

did you consider that perhaps what you call an "anti-intellectual" bias is actually a hallmark of American culture? America has always had a love/hate relationship with its intellectuals, because here the intellectuals are the elites, and most settlers came here to get away from "elites". It wasn't the elites who first settled America, it was the common men and women who wanted to get a little piece of paradise for themselves, without any of the elaborate social constrictions/prohibitions of the Old World.

I liked your blog post, and I don't believe you've posted anything new in it. America has always short-changed its teachers and it's elite class because we've always been suspicious of education, educated people, and the elite in general. It's in our cultural make-up to be - chances were good that in the 1700s and prior, any intellectual you met was an aristocrat and/or wealthy. To me, this anti-college anti-intellectual geek movement is nothing new. From extensive personal experience, I can tell you that I've had plenty of geek friends revolt against "knowledge" because knowledge stood in the way of their particular obsession. If it wasn't directly related to what they found interesting, then there was no use for it (a mindset too many comp sci/engineers have regarding the liberal arts). I also believe that there will always be intellectuals in our society. There's simply too many geeks and trivia purists out there to ever allow intellectuals to fade away as a species of man.

thank you again for that blog post, I quite enjoyed it

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Hognoxious]

Yes, your chances of getting a better paying job afterwards are better---but 150k is still quite a bit.

True, but you don't have to earn it back in one year.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[icebraining]

It's hard to feel such pleasure when you don't have enough money to eat.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[bigsexyjoe]

Well, you can be an intellectual who believes that one can develop their intellect without school and that college doesn't do a lot to help you. I happen to belong to this school of thought. I know plenty of college graduates who have not mastered formal logic, abstract thinking, written expression, nor have they come out of college knowing much about anything really.

Just as I've met many liberal arts grads who possess less liberal arts knowledge than myself. I know many people with technical degrees that don't know how to apply their knowledge outside narrow limits and also know little about the world. Likewise, I've met plenty of people who did not go to college (generally due to lack of opportunity) who are quite intellectual and knowledgeable and, in some cases, excellent writers.

In my opinion, the most important factor in whether you develop your intellect is having a desire to do so. We've had libraries for a long time, and with the Wikipedia, a sufficiently motivated and talented person could become a self-taught mathematician if they have a high school diploma and enough free time.

Great intellectuals who did not have much formal schooling include Joseph Campbell, Michael Faraday, and Srinivasa Ramanujan. And, of course, all great intellectual accomplishments come from self-learners of great intellectual curiosity.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[uniquename72]

Like so much in life, you'll get out of college what you put into it. If you expect your professors to push intellectual rigor upon you, you'll be disappointed.

But if you demand intellectual rigor from yourself, you'll experience the fruits of it.

Yes, that means that you can do the same thing outside of school. But it's easier to surround yourself with like-minded people and expert thinkers in a university setting.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Rakishi]

But is it really necessary, if you're going to be a history expert or journalist or historian or programmer?

I'd very much prefer a history expert to have a broad knowledge of history and all it's sides rather than just what interests them.

The view that humans are somehow rational ubermensch is deeply flawed. We're all irrational emotional creatures that often don't even realize it. It's why advertising and conman and salespeople and charismatic assholes work so well. And that inherent irrationality seeps into every single aspect of our lives.

Learning on your own is likely to lead to a limited view of things because your mind isn't a perfectly rational creation hooked up to an oracle. You study what you want at that point in time. College forces you to study broadly and aspects that you may not have chosen otherwise. In the end that leaves you better and more knowledgeable.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Antisyzygy]

Except that statistically, a bachelors degree will earn you more money in your lifetime. You earn even more with a graduate or professional degree. Its changing recently due to the recession, and now tons of college graduates my age are basically screwed. We are the worst affected by this recession right now as far as unemployment goes (ages 22-28). I looked for a job for 9 months already and I have a MS in Applied Math with a 3.7 GPA and two years programming experience using clusters in a research role. I have since lowered the bar and I have some sales and tech support jobs looking at me. Go figure. Now I either accept a job to survive and then get looked at funny next time I try to get a research or engineering job or I hold out for one and remain poor. I would think with my education I could at least get put on a research or engineering team and get paid somewhere around 15 an hour. I made 14 as a research assistant before my term was up. The US politicians and wealthy class really piss me off for screwing our economy over so badly so I can't even apply my knowledge to anything worthwhile.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[MimeticLie]

Colleges are generally the ones in the "sports car" range. Four years of in-state tuition at the top university in my state is $28,000, before any tuition assistance or scholarships.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[DrgnDancer]

And on average people who go to college earn way more than a mid-range sports car worth of extra money in their lives. Note "on average". Sure you, personally, have a great job and a million dollars despite having never earned a high school diploma (I'm exaggerating the typical story that goes along with this sort of post), but the vast majority of people who don't go to college don't get that job. Almost universally people who tell you not to bother with college cite anecdotes, while people who say the opposite cite statistics. Certainly, if I randomly reach into the population of non-college graduates, then randomly reach into the population of college graduates, I could pull out an anomalous situation where the former makes more than the later. It's not likely though.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Rakishi]

Those top schools all give you a full scholarship if your parents make under $100k or some such number. Middle and bottom tier private schools are where the real problem lies. Better to just go to a public school instead.

So congratulations on failing to do your research.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[rmstar]

Oh jeez not the "go to college to become a better rounded person" argument. College costs as much as a mid-range to high-end sports car. Lower and middle-class people don't have the luxury of going to college for the pleasure of learning. There must be a return on such a significant investment. It's that simple, it has nothing to do with anti-intellectualism.

Your position is deeply anti-intellectual, apart of being factually wrong. The "become a better rounded argument" wasn't being made. An intellectual derives from his knowledge and thoughts, from his creations and his intellectual environment much more pleasure and fullfillment than most people get out of owning a sports car.

That was the anti-intellectualism in your post. The factually wrong part comes from many lower and middle-class people going to college for the pleasure of learning. They really do. It's called having a life. It might not be the best in terms of money, but it is not that bad either.

You see, not doing the things you want to do in life for purely economic reasons is also irrational behaviour.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[sjames]

However, is it absolutely necessary to intellectualism and unique to college?

If not, it is not anti-intellectual to suggest that there may be other things that provide a better value.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Hognoxious]

"College: the best[1] entertainment you can buy!"

Actually, I agree with you 100%, well said.

[1] per hour according to industry standard test, yemv, void where prohibited[2].

[2] Does that need stating? Isn't anything ipso facto[3] void where prohibited.

[3] I'm one of them there inty-lechulls. See, I can speek Greak!

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Antisyzygy]

With a bachelors degree you make about 1.9 times as much as someone with a high school diploma. The average salary is about 64,000 vs. 37,000. So if you figure you have 150k in debt after getting a BA or BS, you can live off the 37,000 and pay 27,000 a year to your loan. You pay it off between 7-10 years. Then over the rest of your life you will make between 837,000 - 918,000 more than a person with a high school diploma. Now, most people aren't stupid enough to spend 150k on only a Bachelors. It cost me about 40k to get my BS in Applied Math but I spent two years at a community college. You still have to factor in the recession and unemployment rate being the highest among the younger generation, but it still seems like it pays off to me.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[hsjserver]

It's not a belief, it's a reaction to market forces, which demand college education. The baby boomers are going to be retiring en-mass in the next few years and that's going to open up a lot of work for people primarily with college education. It isn't that they necessarily think that an education will lead to higher paying jobs so much as will lead to any job at this point. This isn't a "bubble" because tuition increases as a direct result of government funding less and less for higher education and not 'speculation' that drives up the cost. Where I agree with you is that the classic liberal arts education is pretty antiquated and we would be much better served by an increase in trade schools.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[tmosley]

Then why is it that 99.9% of people don't go to school after entering the workforce, unless it is in the pursuit of a higher paying job?

You can get all the learning you want at your local library for FREE, or now online with Khan Academy. Don't feed people a line of bullshit about college not being a matter of economics.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[mcmonkey]

Oh jeez not the "go to college to become a better rounded person" argument. College costs as much as a mid-range to high-end sports car. Lower and middle-class people don't have the luxury of going to college for the pleasure of learning. There must be a return on such a significant investment. It's that simple, it has nothing to do with anti-intellectualism.

Why can't the pleasure of learning be the significant return?

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[tmosley]

Yeah, you have to earn it back by the end of your lifetime, which with interest and penalties means you pay a half a million dollars or more.

And with the current jobs situation, that rate of appreciation will only get worse.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[intelaside]

No, not really.. The premise for the "anti-college" argument generally acknowledges that a few of the professors at each school are great while all of the schools are shitty. Just because the colleges portray themselves as intellectual entities doesn't make folks who are anti-college into anti-intellectual. There's a fallacy here, but I can't be bothered to look up the proper name.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Baloo Uriza]

So...which schools aren't shitty at this point? The cost/benefit ratio of going into debt for college is about the same as buying a house on a high interest credit card these days.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Have Brain Will Rent]

As someone else pointed out the economic advice response itself could be seen as anti-intellectual itself since it assumes the primary point of University is to increase earning power.

I went to several schools, I got a few degrees and none of that time and effort was in order to increase my income (which was already quite healthy the entire time I was a student). On balance I think it was time well spent.

That aside, I think the "college is a waste of time" argument is frequently made using some combination/variation of arguments that have nothing to do with return on investment. Such as these:

1. I taught myself and I'm as good as anybody with a degree.
2. I taught myself and that practical experience is much more important than the useless stuff they teach in CS schools.
3. Certifications are a waste of time.
4. Getting a degree isn't even an accomplishment.
5. Why do employers keep emphasizing degrees when they are so pointless?
6. Employers don't care about degrees they want people with practical experience/knowledge.

And yes, I know some of those are mutually contradictory. Perhaps not surprisingly they're often made by people without the education they so disparage.

In any case I think the general question being asked is an interesting one - in fact I wouldn't limit it to geeks but would ask: is our culture becoming more anti-intellectual?

I can tell you that for as long as I've been around there has always been a certain type of person who automatically distrusts anyone they perceive as being smarter than are they. My impression is that a larger and larger portion of the population is composed of people with that attitude. Perhaps because they are so routinely lied to by the very people they are supposed to be able to trust... but I think there is more to it than that and the end result is a flourishing anti-intellectualism.

Back in the 60's and 70's John Brunner http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Brunner_(novelist) predicted all sorts of things which seem to have come to pass... unfortunately that includes "Reality TV".

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[tnk1]

You actually debated things in college? I remember sitting in gigantic lectures and being told what I needed to know by a professor writing on an overhead projector. Then a bunch of overworked TAs spent time attempting to interpret the lecture for everyone else and reviewing problem sets. The only debating that I did was trying to get partial credit for an answer from a TA.

Sure, I get that you're not going to be exposed to new things in isolation, but we really could come up with a significantly less expensive way of doing it than a cut-throat, four year equivalent to band camp.

I went to school with some of the world's smartest, and most boring, people.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Antisyzygy]

That is why they need to separate Software Engineering from Computer Science and place them into different colleges. I.e. CS is in with Math and Physics, and SE is in with all the engineering disciplines. Computer Science is supposed to be about theories of computation, computer architecture, and mathematics. Engineering should be a minor part of it, with electives for those interested. The same thing happens in Mathematics. We can take engineering math courses or even full fledged engineering courses if it suites us. It changes when you go to get a MS or PhD, then you are expected to focus on a branch of mathematics, however most branches in applied mathematics overlap significantly with practical applications if you get involved.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[thePowerOfGrayskull]

In fact, just the idea of self-awareness and personal growth seem to be looked down upon, as there is no immediate cash value to them

I'd say to re-evaluate the circles you travel in if you're an American and this is the only attitude you find. I don't encounter it much at all (except for people complaining about it in forums ;) - even growing up in the middle of West Nowhere and working on a farm during the summers. I"m not saying it doesn't exist - clearly in places it does - only that it's not as pervasive as you might think.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Comrade Ogilvy]

Your reasoning has merit, but it only applies if one blindly assumes "college education (both in time and money) is almost certain to pay off in the long run".

The payoff has never actually been automatic. It was very close to being automatic decades ago. It was usually, but not always, a correct sentiment in the recent past.

The answer lies in recognizing that one should leave college able to build a resume that includes some bullet items attractive to prospective employers, and not assume that the wonderfulness of your degrees will be good enough. The crappy "I have a degree" plan worked well enough for me, in fact, but I would not recommend such for the 21st century. (I had the benefit of hard science degrees from top universities.)

There is still much time in college to begin the journey towards becoming a well-rounded person. Alas, college is far too expensive now for the luxury of believing that that alone is sufficient, and assumning stuff like having a plausible career plan can wait until after graduation.

BTW, I do think it is plausible that people who are great self-starters can manage by skipping college. But such people were probably already obviously that personality type at age 15. Going to college is the sub-optimal route for some people. Not going to college is the sub-optimal route for some others.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[StuartHankins]

Try smaller businesses first, who don't have an HR department, assuming you know the basics and have the interest to do a lot of OJT. Build experience and make friends. At some point your experience will be enough to offset the lack of a degree.

I was one of the tinkerers who was lucky enough to start programming very very young, had few friends etc, and was genuinely curious and interested in computers, and I get to work with them all day every day. I have no degree, but I was willing to work part-time in a "regular" job and spend a lot of hours doing consulting work. I charged very little but my condition was that the clients told friends about me. I had more work than I could ever have imagined, which was exactly what I wanted. I switched to full-time consulting, and eventually accepted a position as an employee. Through the years I've been able to play with much larger, more expensive equipment that I would have ever owned, and as my skills have grown I've secured better and better positions.

May not work for everyone, but stay hungry and do everything you can. I am not a college graduate but I made up for it with dedication to my work and clients. Good luck on your endeavors!

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[HeckRuler]

Maybe if you weren't so anti-intellectual you'd have learned something useful in college along with that worthless philosophy degree. Of course, you have to be a little knowledgeable about the world to realize that when signing up for classes. They kinda expected you to pick this stuff up in the two decades prior.

Honestly though, a lot of college-kids would do well to take a remedial class along the lines of HOW TO FEED YOURSELF POST SCHOOL 101.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[metlin]

In order for the statement "college is a waste of time" to be anti-intellectual, one has to presume there is intellectual knowledge to be obtained exclusively from college and nowhere else.

Yes, there is intellectual knowledge to be obtained exclusively from college and nowhere else.

I cannot speak for others, but I can certainly speak for myself. I almost did a PhD in Quantum Computing and opted out. I did not realize it then (but I realize now) that the reason I decided not to pursue the program is because I was less interested in the physics aspect of it and more interested in the math aspect of it.

So, I quit to do my startup, ended up in consulting, and now I'm trying my hand at another startup, thinking that I could find a substitute for my obsession. But I could not. And somewhere amidst all this, after much soul searching, I decided that what I really wanted to do was pursue math (and not really PhD).

I figured, I'd study something different and and use my free time to do math, because, hey, you can always learn and do stuff on your own. Even in a field like math, where the community is pretty small and you can pretty much email anyone (except, of course, Grisha Perelman) and expect a response, it is impossible to do anything worthwhile outside of a university environment.

Part of what school offers is a support system, and one where when you have questions, you've peers and experts to answer them. Where you don't have long periods of waiting between periods when encountering obstacles. In grad school, if I had a question, I'd ask my advisor and he'd put me in touch with the right people, and they'd respond quickly. Outside of it, you're pretty much on your own. Nobody will be willing to explain a paper (and trust me, math papers, especially the good ones, are pretty fucking obscure).

The other part is the contacts and networking aspect, which you readily dismiss without a second thought. The ones who've done good work outside of academia have only been able to do so because they've had the necessary background, training, and *contacts* within the academia to help them out.

By supporting the premise that college is a waste of time because *some* students are not taking advantage of it is speaking for all students. Even so, the things that I learned in completely unrelated classes are useful outside of it.

I learned Fourier Analysis in high-school, which had no meaning outside or applicability (ironically, it was considered "pure math" back in the day). Come college, and I started using Fourier Analysis in DSP. And having studied Fourier Analysis in high-school made it easy for me to do very well because I had the basics licked, even when I thought it was quite pointless. My latest startup uses yield management, and I am fortunate that I paid attention to my economics classes to speak halfway intelligently to investors. That's the value of education, even when you don't realize it.

So, yes. If you're planning on doing something worthwhile and making genuine contributions to the human society and civilization, it's mighty fucking hard to do it outside a college environment/lacking a college background. And a handful of examples and exceptions don't make the rule. This is especially important when you consider the fact that the vast majority in fact need school, and the minority would have done well independent of a collegiate education.

And for the record, I believe the OP is referring to exactly the kind of anti-intellectual sentiment that you're spewing forth.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[thePowerOfGrayskull]

That's the crux of the college bubble. A lot of people believe that the massive investment in college education (both in time and money) is almost certain to pay off in the long run with higher paying jobs. Just like they believed that an investment in housing or tech stocks was a "sure thing".

I think you're missing GP's point. It's more like it pays off by providing a foot in the door, and convincing potential employers that they should look at your resume. Often these employers won't (especially now) if your education stops at high school. I was fortunate in that I entered the market in the early-mid 90s, with a decade of hacking behind me and a "programming" degree from a 1 yr tech school. That's really no longer enough except for the one-off jobs you find on Craigslist. Those Craigslist jobs don't add up either - a string of two-week "contract" jobs is no more appealing to employers than a high school diploma.

The choice is becoming one of "working at a job that lets you make minimum payments and eventually get ahead" and "unemployed with no college loans to pay off".

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[HeckRuler]

Shrug. I'm 27 and I paid off my college loan a long time ago. I'm also a little past half-way paying off the house loan. So I'm not sure what you're talking about.

Of course, I had scholarships, didn't go Ivy, got a CompE degree, married an engineer, and we haven't had kids yet. Which is a pretty smart way to go, moneywise.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[phlinn]

Ok, lets put that knowledge on the plus side. If you had to take out 100k in loans to get that knowledge, and the knowledge won't get you a job that will let you repay the loans, then there was a negative return on investment unless you value the knowledge more than not being in debt for the rest of your life. If you don't need to take loans, feel free to study what you want.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[oakgrove]

University is no place to push a solution that is owned and controlled by a single vendor. There are many more languages that are more suited to teaching concepts than .net. Not to mention that there are already serious questions as to the future of .net seeing as MS seems to lost its enthusiasm for it for the next iteration of their desktop OS and the mono boys just got put out on the street. How practical is .net anyway? How many great programs are written in it as compared to C++ or Java? Not that many, actually. I can't think of too many reasons to teach it and I can think of many reasons not to.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Americano]

Two hundred thousand dollars in student loans? Please, explain to me how you arrived at that sum.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Comrade Ogilvy]

Well, the famous counterexamples were generally ferociously driven persons at all ages.

I agree that college is not a magic wand that turns frogs into princes. It gives frogs tools that can help them turn themselves into princes.

Some frogs can build the tools on their own.

Joseph Campbell has two degrees from top universities BTW.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Americano]

Actually, it's more appropriately termed "Didn't read the fucking article."

The mention of "anti-college" sentiment is only one example out of numerous that are given, yet it's the only thing people are focusing on here, as if the author just walked into your church and shouted "There is no god!"

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[metlin]

Where on earth are you getting the $200k in loans number from? I've met many people who've had to pay through college, and the maximum I know of is $40k, and only because she went to Georgetown and partied (and she got a graduate degree out of the bargain). And she graduated in 2005, which was not that long ago.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[xannik]

I wish I had mod points. College is one of the biggest things an individual will ever pay for in his/her lifetime. For most people(i.e. anyone who will earn $150,000 or less) deciding between a $10,000 a year state university versus a $45,000 a year private institution has everything to do with economics. Any who suggests otherwise is being disingenuous.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Curlsman]

Shouldn't college also be OS agnostic? If just teaching Unix/Linux or Windows is the only exposure, aren't the students being cheated out of what is done with programing languages? ZOS, OpenVMS, NONSTOP, SCOPE (on a CDC CYBER I think...), OSX, and some others I've touched that I don't remember, where all different results to some common problems: how programers and users utilizes resources to get work done.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Surt]

Your math works only if you elect not to pay taxes, but hey, maybe you elected the non-college path. ;-)

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Surt]

Don't wait too long to have the kids. Your odds of getting a kid with a really expensive problem go way up as you and your wife age.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Surt]

It's just unfortunately a closer call than most people think, and the risk is substantial. You can't ever escape your student loan debt if the increased earnings don't pan out.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Antisyzygy]

You are right. However, even adjusted for taxes you still come out ahead.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[HeckRuler]

Yeah yeah, not past 30. Well aware. According to "the big plan" kids are supposed to be about now. We've got a big trip planned abroad and then.. I guess... it's baby time.

Honestly, I'm scared shitless. I fear change, and this is about as big as they come.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[marnues]

Because then GP would have to understand how anti-intellectual he is.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[theunixman]

Q.E.D.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Altus]

I am not sure how far back the Anti-Intellectualism streak goes in the US, but you are right that it has been around for a while, in some form for at least as long as I have been alive and it seems like quite a bit longer. But I don't think that geeks and geek culture got caught up in this very much.

Perhaps it is not the traditional geeks who are becoming Anti-Intellectual. These are the people who read Gravity's Rainbow over and over again and know their way through all of Tolkein and Asimov. Perhaps it is just that more and more people are joining Geek culture and bringing this sentiment with them. Perhaps it is not the traditional geek that is changing but the culture is changing due to the growing size of the Geek tent.

What I wonder is, is this happening out side of the US. I suspect it is, but I don't have any kind of reliable metric for measuring this.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Ensign Nemo]

"There must be a return on such a significant investment."
    That return isn't necessarily monetary. If you major in literature because you really do appreciate the classics, you could still feel it's worthwhile, even though you will get zero monetary return.

    My issue is the for-profit colleges and universities are turning a higher education into very expensive job training. Churn out the cogs for companies and charge the student (directly or indirectly) throw the nose for it.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[marnues]

You sound just like so many anti-intellectual Randians that I find it difficult to take you seriously.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[hitmark]

The â attachment issue is spreading in Europe as well.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[marnues]

If that was their college experience, how can you qualify them as smarter? By that quote I'd have to say they exemplify the anti-intellectuals in college. Or they think it's cute to hate. Neither option makes one smart.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[hitmark]

interesting, Slashdot do not like the Euro sign...

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Surt]

Fortunately, the lack of sleep turns everything into a hazy blur so you won't even be able to think about how radically things have changed.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[marnues]

This. This is exactly what I wanted to see (I couldn't get the words out myself). College is an opportunity to become a better person in so many ways (not all intellectual). It's many middle-class people's first experience of freedom, it's their first experience of being surrounded by learning, it's their first experience not being tethered to the safety of home. I didn't hear it at first myself, but it was also the first time that people actually wanted me to excel beyond the image they had for me. It was the first time that I was able to actually find myself. These are not pursuits that most Americans are able to engage growing up in middle America.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Surt]

True, I didn't mean to say otherwise. It just takes longer to break even / get ahead.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[tnk1]

Well for one thing, if you are going to get into debt, you should probably have a means of paying it back to the person who lent it to you.

You weren't loaned that money to provide you the pleasure of learning. You were lent the money for the strategic purpose of creating and maintaining a middle class and skilled workers.

Sure, take pleasure in it, but remember, you're not in college because its your birthright. People worked to put you there, and giving you pleasure was the least of their concerns.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[GameboyRMH]

I don't understand how my view is anti-intellectual. I understand that a person may enjoy going to college, but if doing so is a bad economic decision (I wouldn't make any sweeping statements that going to college in general is a good or bad decision, it depends on the circumstances) then it's just a bad investment, regardless of whether it's enjoyable. Doesn't matter if it's college, a house, a car, or a hookers-and-crack party. Nothing's wrong with spending some money on things you enjoy, I've basically wasted lots of money on things I enjoy myself, but I don't pretend they're good investments, and the money I waste on entertaining myself is an amount I can easily afford. Unless you're very wealthy, a college tuition is an insane amount of money to spend unless you have a plan to make a return on that investment.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[AK Marc]

There must be a return on such a significant investment. It's that simple, it has nothing to do with anti-intellectualism.

Being anti-learning because learning is expensive is still anti-intellectualism.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[marnues]

I generally agree with your sentiment, but don't go romanticizing America's first settlers. They were outcasts, miscreants, and religious nuts. The common men and women never reached the boat.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[nomadic]

I was shocked to learn recently that a bachelors degree at a high end university (such as NYU or Columbia) can cost around 150k these days

NYU's a good school, but not really a high-end university. It's actually kind of middling. Unless you mean pricewise.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[nomadic]

Your odds of getting a kid with a really expensive problem go way up as you and your wife age.

Nah, just as your wife ages.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[forkazoo]

The intellectual value of college is hardly the classes, it's spending time with similarly interested people outside of class time debating and discussing various things. Outside of the academic world it's nigh impossible to find that kind of density of intellectually astute individuals.

I have to respectfully disagree with you. First, finding high density groups of people who share your geeky interest is easy these days. There's probably a meetup group of them. Or a hackerspace full of them. Or a gathering for a lecture at a museum or a film screening.

More importantly, physical density isn't that significant. You and I are currently debating intellectualism among geeks. Which is about as geeky a conversation as a person can have. It would be improbable that the two of us are in the same time zone, and unreasonable to imagine that everybody who has posted to this slashdot discussion is in the same city.

In five minutes, I can jump on discussion forums talking about marine electrical systems, economics in developing nations, and nitpicking my favorite anime. I certainly think the Universities are a good thing, but ultimately there are people who will seek out content, and people who don't care. These days, pervasive communication technologies have made it so nobody doesn't have access to a group of people to talk to about any subject. With a phone, I can even sail to a third world economy on a boat, and download the latest episode of anime without missing a beat.

Some time in the next few years I do plan on going back to take some more classes because I like that sort of thing. But, it's hardly a requirement in the late 20th century. (Let alone the present...)

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[cheekyjohnson]

With a bachelors degree you make about 1.9 times as much as someone with a high school diploma.

That depends on the employer.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Xaedalus]

Outcasts, miscreants, and religious nuts constitute the vast bulk of the ranks of the "Common Man" in any age. We are uniform only in our deviancy.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[brainzach]

If you are just studying Computer Science, you are treating college like a trade school.

There is a big world outside of computer science that is just as intellectually stimulating.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Stradivarius]

Why can't the pleasure of learning be the significant return?

Of course it can. But there are many ways to learn, some more costly than others, so if your objective is to maximize your learning, you may well decide college is not the right forum for learning certain things, while it is for others. For example:

1. A lot of learning is both pleasurable and economically rewarding. For example, much of engineering, mathematics, and the sciences offer economic returns as well as intellectual ones.

2. For pleasurable learning that is not economically rewarding, there are often less expensive ways than college to obtain it. For example, you don't need to pay thousands of dollars just to read the classics. They're readily available at the bookstore for far less. So you have to ask yourself, how much is the classroom experience worth to you, for a specific type of learning? Is it worth tens of thousands of dollars a year more? Maybe - if you want to teach literature at university someday, or have a huge passion for the subject. Maybe not, if you're just learning for pleasure's sake.

3. What different learning could that same amount of money buy you? Is it worth thousands of dollars to take a class about a foreign country, when for the same sum you could actually visit that country? Maybe, maybe not, depending on your goals and opportunity costs.

The real issue with the "become better rounded" argument for college is not with being rounded, per se. A liberal education is great. It's that the argument is often made by folks who do not know where they are trying to go in life, make an enormous life decision without putting serious thought into it, and then graduate and complain how unfair life is that they have six-figure debts and no career prospects. These people are known as "fools", but pretend to be "intellectuals" because admitting foolishness is a blow to one's ego.

On the other hand, if you make a college decision with your eyes wide open, and are willing to trade off your future material well-being for the intellectual rewards of, say, an art history degree, I salute you. That's not foolish, that's having values and living up to them.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Antisyzygy]

Yes, it does, but I am speaking of averages nation-wide.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[im_thatoneguy]

Why can't the pleasure of learning be the significant return?

Because you can usually do it cheaper with specialized courses on your own off campus. Want to learn history? Read a great book.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Anonymous Coward]

You go and whine about .NET being a single vendor then give an example of something supposedly better "Java" which is ALSO SINGLE VENDOR.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[eepok]

"Lower and middle-class people don't have the luxury of going to college for the pleasure of learning."

Who said anything about "luxury"? You're the one that brought in the comparison to the luxury item. Education isn't about anything but better understanding the world around you (through the lens of one of many specializations in higher education).

If you can't see the value of understanding, then you shouldn't be talking about education.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[tnk1]

Everyone learns alone, just like they die alone. College doesn't turn you into some sort of superhuman learning machine or even make you open minded. Just about every minister or priest goes to college. And by college, I don't mean just the seminary. There are those who would consider them closed minded.

College provides resources and a group learning environment. That may have advantages, but they are probably based on the person and the circumstances.

At the moment, the larger proportion of people are in college to get a piece of paper. They are there because they are expected to be and they expect to be. Many people have found a way of enjoying college in various non-academic ways, but they are there academically because there is the idea that you need to be. That may sound like a criticism, but that is only the case if you expect college to be something more than training. If you don't, then it's just fine (except perhaps the cost).

And even if you go to college, you will learn more on your own, outside of college, than you learned inside of college. What you learn in college can have a shelf life. More to the point, you don't cease learning because you leave school and you spend a lot more time out of college than in college.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Darinbob]

And there is significant return on investment. You get better jobs, more pay, more career opportunities, etc. A state university is generally affordable by the middle class and there are plenty of scholarship programs for lower income students. If the person is bright the scholarship opportunities will go up. An 18 year old thrown out into the world is going to find lousy jobs. Who cares if they've got some techie skills, they'll just found lousy techie jobs. Then a few years later they'll find their skill set is weak and that the college grads are being hired instead of them and being promoted before them.

Not having a degree in a profession dominated by people with degrees is going to be an immense disadvantage. I've seen very bright people hit very hard glass ceilings due to lack of a degree.

It's true that not everyone can afford college. But that is a poor argument for actively avoiding college if it is available.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[GameboyRMH]

Learning isn't always expensive, and I don't see how advising people to think carefully before spending tens or even hundreds of thousands of dollars on learning is anti-learning. I'd advise people to think carefully before spending similar amounts on a car or house but I'm not against car or home ownership.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Have Brain Will Rent]

I think your first statement is incorrect. Suppose the knowledge is at the college and at the public library - i.e. satisfying your non-exclusivity requirement. Now I can make the statement "College and the library are wastes of time." Which obviously can be anti-intellectual. You might quibble that I'm not allowed to reference the other source in my "College is..." statement but even then you can't say it is not anti-intellectual because you do not know the intent of the speaker and whether they are generally anti-intellectual.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Darinbob]

And not everything is this expensive or involves no additional income. Ie, factor in less expensive universities or colleges, colleges you can commute to while living with the parents, doing the first part at a junior college, etc. Then there are grants, scholarships, student loans, part time work, summer jobs, etc. Most financial aid packages are a combination of all that.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Asmodae]

+1 mod parent up

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Antisyzygy]

Yeah, like I said. I did 2 years at a community college then 3 at a university. The university was a public in-state university and about 5 hours drive from my parents house. I sort of screwed around for a two years dabbling in computer engineering and computer science at the university as a dual major but ended up dropping it. Even with that my total student loans are under 40k. It actually got much worse when I went to grad school for a MS. I upped to total to about 120k. Now, Im shooting for a PhD so Im sure it will be even more. Im hoping I can get paid about 80-90k a year, which is about standard, when I finish so I can afford to pay off the loans in a timely fashion. Unfortunately, I would have not gone for a PhD if there were jobs available in industry that could give me equivalent experience, but sadly for a person my age (27) there are not many. I wanted a PhD eventually anyway, but the economy sort of forced my hand early. Now Im working as a Tech Support guy for a forex trading firm while in school, which is almost entirely unrelated to my major and my career choice.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[xevioso]

Oddly enough, this is what I did. I'm 40K in debt, with a History MA. I do web development for a living and I love it. I am very happy I got my degree, and while I am still in debt, it was, in my opinion, worth it.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[lostmongoose]

No, you don't, but I guess if soul crushing debt and the equivalent of a 30yr mortgage on your education is your thing, go for it.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[lostmongoose]

Except you don't need college to have those things either. We have this marvelous thing called the internet where people of like mind and curiosity can come together and debate, discuss, swap information, help with problems, etc. Perhaps you should look into it.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[demonlapin]

The statistics have a lot of noise in them - the average college graduate is different from the average HS grad in ways that go well beyond four more years of formal education. However, accepting the premise that the education and the degree are responsible for the additional earnings, there are a lot of schools whose costs are fast approaching the entire net present value of the additional earnings over a lifetime.

Furthermore, many students attend college but depart without any degree at all. Clearly, some are so ill-prepared that sending them off to acquire student loan debt for a year or two does them a tragic disservice - all the more so because they are likely to come from the lower end of the economic spectrum and so be less able to handle that debt.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[cartman]

Yes, there is intellectual knowledge to be obtained exclusively from college and nowhere else.

I went to college, and I got several different undergraduate degrees (comp sci, philosophy, psychology). I didn't learn anything during college that I couldn't have learned elsewhere. To be more specific, I could've learned everything I learned in college, by visiting college bookstores, buying textbooks, reading them, and doing all the exercises. That and a few hours of tutoring would have conveyed as much knowledge to me, at far lesser cost, than going to college did.

Outside of it, you're pretty much on your own. Nobody will be willing to explain a paper (and trust me, math papers, especially the good ones, are pretty fucking obscure)... The other part is the contacts and networking aspect, which you readily dismiss without a second thought. The ones who've done good work outside of academia have only been able to do so because they've had the necessary background, training, and *contacts* within the academia to help them out

I grant that there is a social network within the university setting, which will place you in contact with experts in various fields. However that becomes important only when you've reached a very high level already. Most undergraduates (in fact almost all of them) are not on the "bleeding edge" of some complex discipline. They would never need to contact some important mathematician directly. That kind of social contact isn't necessary if you're taking a calculus 2 course. (If we ever reached the point that undergraduates were contacting important mathematicians directly then the whole system would break down).

However, it's still probably helpful to go to college, for several reasons. You can discuss things with other intellectual people. You can talk to people knowledgeable in a field even if you don't have bleeding-edge questions. You can participate in various kinds of debates, if only by listening.

That said, these benefits of college are not in any way commensurate with the amount of money you spend. All that's necessary for such social interaction is for smart people with different intellectual backgrounds to have an environment in which they can study and interact, and in which professors can make enough money to support themselves. I believe that that could be provided for about 1/4th the amount of money that colleges typically charge now. Nobody should go to the outrageously expensive colleges out there.

The cost of many colleges today is outrageous and unjustified. Undergraduates are indenturing themselves for the rest of their lives, by taking out horrendously large loans. Most of those undergraduates are un-intellectual and are going to college only to improve their career prospects. They're being badly misled if they believe that spending a lot of money on college will mean they'll make a lot of money in the future. And they won't get the kind of education you spoke of. That can't just be bought.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Charcharodon]

Yes and you in Europe with your 50-75% tax rates are doing oh so much better. I lived in England and worked throughout Europe for the last three years. Everything costs twice as much and is half the size, and let's here it for those high double digit unemployment rates!

The women are not typically not nearly as fat(sigh)and the beer is much better(double sigh), but other than that you guys are swiming in as many problems as we are.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[binary paladin]

Fuck you people. Seriously. The only anti-intellectualism going on around here are the assholes that think college is knowledge or learning or anything. It's college. That's all it is. Some people need it. Some people don't. Some people can't afford it. Some people ARE better off without it, regardless of what the degree-bearing pompous fucks think.

Look, just because half you assholes are still trying to justify the gigantic amount of money you probably flushed down the toilet doesn't mean you have to push your religion on the rest of us.

(And I say this as someone who DOES NOT think college is necessarily something to avoid, but I also don't think it's the be all, end all.)

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Stradivarius]

I suspect what you're seeing is not a disdain for knowledge itself (anti-intellectualism), but instead three things:

1. A disdain for the arrogance with which certain "experts" conduct themselves, specifically an over-reliance on appeals to authority. Experts should be able to make appears to logic, by providing the relevant facts they gained from their expertise. Routine reliance on "I have degree X, therefore you must do Y" is a sign of intellectual decay. It's the sort of thing you expect to hear from religious zealots, not scientific experts. Don't get me wrong - I place a lot of weight in the authority, of, say, my physician. But if he simply told me "take this drug" without explaining himself, I'd find a new doctor. Ditto for experts in other fields.

2. A disdain for experts whose expertise in their narrow field is not matched by an awareness of, and good judgment in, the broader world. These are the folks always coming up with some new Grand Scheme, based on some narrow concern, and blissfully ignorant of all the hell that will break loose if you actually inflict that scheme on the world. This usually boils down to a lack of understanding of economics or systems thinking in general. There are no free lunches and every solution will involve tradeoffs.

3. Many tradeoffs of public concern involve multiple disciplines, while expertise is increasingly focused on small niches. As humanity's knowledge base expands, this becomes somewhat inevitable. But it makes expertise in one field insufficient for the expert to have much of a leg up on generalists, when it comes to deciding What To Do. That's not disrespect for expertise, it's acknowledging that there's a lot more expertise required than one practitioner will have.

For example, a climate scientist can model the likely effects of CO2 emissions on the temperature. Concerned, he proposes some strict cap on CO2 emissions. But can he tell me how that proposal will play out? Probably not better than other generally educated people. He's not an expert on economics. He's not an expert on the various energy industries or the technologies behind the alternatives. He's not an expert on the legislative process. So his guess is as good as anyone's, when it comes to what the effect of his policy idea would be. Will it hurt economic growth, and if so, by how much? Is that a short-term effect or long-term problem? What alternative technologies are likely to be required for a lower-carbon energy future? Do they cause environmental problems themselves? If we screw things up, how long will it take us to fix it? Just look at the ethanol-as-fuel boondoggle. "Experts" thought that was a great idea. The government mandated it, in part on those recommendations. Eventually everyone realized that it's actually worse for the environment, economically inefficent, and drives up food prices too. But the US government still subsidizes it, years later. When folks get invested in a potential "solution", sometimes they confuse others' frustration with their inability to assess tradeoffs as anti-intellectualism. It's not. It's just a recognition that some things are hard problems.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[metlin]

It's hard to feel such pleasure when you don't have enough money to eat.

Nice straw man. That is not an argument against college, that is an argument for better economic conditions.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[DrgnDancer]

A lot depends on where and how you go to college. A state school, attended while living at home, is not likely to leave you with crushing debt. A poor or lower-middle class student could probably cover most of it with grants, and very minimal loans. A wealthier student's family can probably pay for a reasonable percentage outright. Some state schools are quite good, few of them are less than middle of the road. Conversely, going to U of Phoenix is likely to leave you crushing debt under almost any circumstances and the degree is all but worthless; both in the amount it's going to add to your long term earning potential, and in its "raw" educational value. I wouldn't necessarily recommend someone who has a good job drop it to go get a degree, but I wouldn't necessarily recommend against it either if the job is a dead end or whatever. I'd never recommend a place like U of P unless your job is paying for it.

Personally I went to small liberal arts university and lived in the dorm. Thanks to a scholarship, grants, and a very small infusion from my parents, I graduated debt free and have found that my degree opened a lot of doors. YMMV, but college doesn't have to involve soul sucking debt, and is quite useful in the job market. Not to mention I enjoyed the Hell out it. It was intellectually stimulating, socially advantageous, and yes I enjoyed my share of parties (not so many that I didn't graduate with a good GPA though).

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[IICV]

Why can't the pleasure of learning be the significant return?

Can't eat pleasure.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[martin-boundary]

Unless you're very wealthy, a college tuition is an insane amount of money to spend unless you have a plan to make a return on that investment.

This. The reason you're missing his point is right there. You're thinking college tuition = education, which is wrong.

Education is a build-up of knowledge, which can be obtained for cheap or expensive. The end result in a person's head is the same. College tuition prices have nothing to do with it.

Say you care about archaeology. You can learn the subject from any number of places from real cheap to real expensive. To succeed, you only need to choose a place and spend a few years learning. After that you can specialize or do whatever you like.

There is a reason why so many people want to go to a few top, expensive, places, but education isn't it. The reason is networking, making friends and contacts that could prove useful in life. But guess what? That's got nothing to do with the education in a person's head.

Networking is an anti-intellectual reason for going to college. And you're right, it's a gamble and a fairly bad investment in America, given the prices.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Surt]

Bad news ... you too. Sperm quality drops pretty steadily with age.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Requiem18th]

Because not everybody enjoys learning. There is a difference between claiming education is useless and claiming that some people don't derive enough good from it.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[metlin]

That said, these benefits of college are not in any way commensurate with the amount of money you spend. All that's necessary for such social interaction is for smart people with different intellectual backgrounds to have an environment in which they can study and interact, and in which professors can make enough money to support themselves. I believe that that could be provided for about 1/4th the amount of money that colleges typically charge now. Nobody should go to the outrageously expensive colleges out there.

The cost of many colleges today is outrageous and unjustified. Undergraduates are indenturing themselves for the rest of their lives, by taking out horrendously large loans. Most of those undergraduates are un-intellectual and are going to college only to improve their career prospects. They're being badly misled if they believe that spending a lot of money on college will mean they'll make a lot of money in the future. And they won't get the kind of education you spoke of. That can't just be bought.

I agree with the rest of your post, but pretty much all the arguments above are statements against the rising costs of college, not college itself.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[darkfeline]

Computer science may be "language agnostic", but it's advantageous to teach computer science by focusing in depth on a single or a handful of languages. From personal experience (high school and low level college courses), studying computer science means studying Java or C, but in the process you are learning a lot of skills that transfer over to any new language you need to use.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[nomadic]

Hmmmmm....interesting. Though the degradation can't be nearly as bad as with women.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Vasheron]

You've got it all wrong...

College/university is to intellectual endeavors as a dojo is to martial arts. Sure you can do martial arts all alone and maybe you'll get somewhere... You might be able to figure out how to kick, punch, and perform some kata. You might even become quite good at these things, but you'll never learn how to block quite as effectively as you could if you had other people to practice with. You'll never learn more complex techniques like throwing, or locking, and you'll certainly never get to practice them. You also won't have the advice of mentors who have been practicing for way longer than you have (and learned from others as well); and therefore, you probably won't learn much of the theory behind the movements, their history, their proper application, common pitfalls, etc...

You also won't be able to experience the wonderful social atmosphere that accompanies a good dojo (which helps a lot with motivation). So yes, you could go off and be a martial artist all by yourself... but, it gets a whole lot better when you do it with others (assuming you go to a good dojo).

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[AK Marc]

Advising people to "think about it" is a polite way of saying "that's stupid." Perhaps not to you, but I know plenty of people who would take it that way and not even consider there to be another possibility. "You are going out in that? You should really think about that."

But that's irrelevant to the question. Are geeks who say "I succeeded and I didn't need to stinking formal education" anti-intellectual? I vote yes. And when they say that to people planning on going to college as a means of dissuading them, I say "hell yes."

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Attila Dimedici]

A couple of years ago, someone did the math. At today's tuition rates, if you get out of high school, get a job that pays average for a person with a high school degree (and continue to hold a job that pays average for a person with a high school degree and your amount of experience), immediately start putting the maximum into a 401K plan, you will have more money at retirement age than someone who gets an undergraduate degree that holds down a job that pays the average for an undergraduate degree and pays off their student loan and saves for retirement.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[CosmeticLobotamy]

It's hard to feel such pleasure when you don't have enough money to eat.

How much money do you usually eat?

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[GameboyRMH]

I didn't mean to say "that's stupid." I really only meant to consider the economic pros and cons rather than to assume that college = great success. Depending on what line of work you're going into and what costs you're looking at, it could be a good decision or a bad decision.

I don't think stating that you can become successful without a formal education is anti-intellectual, but those who did should realize that they are outliers and shouldn't advise others to do so just because they did. Even if you have taught yourself the knowledge that would gained in college, the lack of certification can be a severe impediment to advancing your career.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[GameboyRMH]

I only picked the sports car example to illustrate the extravagant costs facing someone fresh out of high school.

However the blissfully ignorant are a lot happier than me. What's all this knowledge and intelligence good for? It makes other people fabulously rich, makes me good at nerdy stuff that nobody cares about, gives me the ability to fully appreciate what an increasingly shitty world I live in and how helpless I am to change it, and makes me totally alien and boring to most people. The blissfully ignorant work shitty jobs, are routinely exploited by abusive corporations, watch trashy TV for entertainment and can have engaging conversations about the latest episodes or some other boring pointless shit, and they're happy with all that. Who's better off?

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[superwiz]

Not necessarily. Life-long intellectual development requires a certain amount of leisure time. And pursuing economically destructive paths early in life will significantly diminish the overall amount of leisure (and by extension of intellectual development) over the course of the lifetime.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Tacvek]

C++0x is a substantial improvement in many areas. It deliberately has minimal actual innovation, but does have improvements. For what it aims to be, which is multi-paradigm language suitable for low level and/or high-perfromance work.

It does not provide memory management by default[1], but does provide the reference counting shared_ptr type. It gained closures, type inference, strongly typed enumerations, and full threading support, including an updated memory model.

Sure if you want some advanced things like reflection, light-weight code generation, or features like LINQ, then core C++ is not enough. But then perhaps if you want those sort of features, a CLR-based language may be a better fit anyway.

Of course, it is a shame C# is still viewed as a non-portable Microsoft technology by many (despite the existance of mono), since it fills a niche applicable to any platform. (A sweat spot between dynamic languages, and a language like C++.) The only other popular language that comes close is Java, but Java has a distinctly behind-the-times feel to it, being very resistant to growing new convenience features, at the expense of requiring substantial amounts of boilerplate code for many purposes. (Not to mention the old slow-and-bloated stigma that has never completely left the language despite it actually being very competitive when used well.)

[1] Although C++0x deliberately makes it possible to have a garbage collector, by making certain pointer-obfuscation techniques result in undefined behavior, and explcitly making it implementation defined if unreachable objects are automatically collected.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[drsquare]

The reduction of higher education to vocational training is itself a sign of societal anti-intellectualism.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[icebraining]

I am learning useful stuff in my college CS course, thank you. But I also know people who can't afford to pay both college and food.

And I'm everything but anti-intellectual, by the way.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[AK Marc]

I don't disagree. My statements aren't necessarily about what you mean, but how it can be taken or what others saying similar things mean (and they mean them in distinctly anti-intellectual ways).

The self-taught geek will resent someone with less experience (and more education) being hired/promoted above them (assume 4 year education and 4 year experience vs no college and 6 years experience). The geek will point out that they've been learning for 6 years, not just 4, and have more actual working experience, while the other guy just sat in classes that may or may not have been educational and then had less experience since. Whether anti-college is or isn't anti-intellectual, it at least appears to be on the surface. Add in a few more times something like that happens to him, and you'll find that the geek will become more anti-college (anti-intellectual) without even noticing.

Regardless of whether he's right, he now has a bias against those with degrees because he's been "robbed" of promotions and jobs by those educated people. And that leads to anti-intellectualism. And focusing on the few that made it big that dropped out or such is a red herring because so few of the millionaires next door got there that way. The vast majority got there with a degree, hard work, and frugal spending. But the American trait of focusing on the outliers as the ideal leads to people of all types to focus on the wrong things.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[icebraining]

It's an argument against going to college in the present conditions. You can't disassociate the two.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[metlin]

Of course you can. You cannot make a blanket statement like that just because *you* believe the two cannot be separated. Especially when you've evidence to the contrary.

There are several solutions -- go to a community college, work through college, get a scholarship, join the military for the GI Bill benefits etc. Given the income differential that has been shown between those with and without college degrees, the poor -- and especially the poor -- must make education a higher priority.

And none of this takes away from the fact that a college education is of utmost importance.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[White Flame]

Because many people do not have a pleasure of learning?

You do know that the types of people who read Slashdot are generally those who want to stay informed about certain areas, and are not representative of society at large. You cannot expect everybody to take the same pleasure in learning as you do. Why should people who do not have learning as a significant driver in their life be expected to trudge through academia just to get an average career going?

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[sjames]

If it's not the ONLY way, then eschewing it is not an example of anti-intellectualism.

The question of how optimal the solution is is orthogonal to the question at hand.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Gr8Apes]

It is language agnostic to a point. Ultimately you need to do examples in some language. I hope I won't rain on anyone's parade by mentioning, just in passing, that the CLR and the languages that run on it often provide reasonably state-of-the-art functionality when it comes both to back-end compiler features and front-end language design. And I'm not a MS fanboy, just somewhat worried by stagnated state of C++ and ObjC.

C++ took a left turn back around the namespace and STL issues. (If you don't know what I'm talking about, you missed out on some serious fun).

I would use the CLR to point out how LCD limits the way the multi-language supported VM functions. How this differs from the GNU approach on C/C++ and even FORTRAN support. (Yes, the CLR has serious issues that no one really wants to talk about. Namely, it's inherently type unsafe, since it has to support pointers)

But, all of those merely build on top of assembly, and machine language. You really do need to understand the basics before you can make good use of the higher level languages and understand why somethings happen the way they do.

There should be no class focusing on a single language, unless it's a lower level language. At least not for CS concepts.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[mjwx]

Oh jeez not the "go to college to become a better rounded person" argument. College costs as much as a mid-range to high-end sports car. Lower and middle-class people don't have the luxury of going to college for the pleasure of learning. There must be a return on such a significant investment. It's that simple, it has nothing to do with anti-intellectualism.

Why can't the pleasure of learning be the significant return?

Well the US education system is screwed up, much like the US health system.

In Australia, TAFE (collage which focuses on teaching technical, workplace applicable skills) costs about A$2-700 a semester with $2-500 being the norm. Diploma's can be earned in 3-6 semesters depending on which disciple is learned. So much like the health care system in Australia, it's quite affordable.

The system may be broken, that does not invalidate it's purpose.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Unkyjar]

I guess the question is more "What do you want do with your life?"

If your answer is live comfortably then that is good, and I hope you have a wonderful life. This does not mean you aren't smart or maybe even a genius, nor that you don't enjoy learning.

If your answer is to learn, then congrats, you're an intellectual.

Academia (Which is usually characterized as University) is really a place where many intellectuals tend to gather, and there you are most likely be to be able to both learn and make a living at learning. And more importantly this is true even if what your learning isn't of any immediate or practical use to others.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[vegiVamp]

Thing is that it only pays off if you a) manage to actually *get* the bachelor, and b) manage to get and keep a job at that level without being kicked out for incompetence.

The former should only be true for those who are smart enough, but there's political pressure on the American school system to pass a large percentage of students. Politicians only care that it looks like the population is getting better educated, but (consciously) ignore that lowering the bar has the inverse effect and actually devalues the obtained degrees.

As for the latter, well... I'm sure that there's statistics about how many bachelors and masters flip burgers at the Mc. It's not going to be a pretty figure.

The push towards better accessibility of higher education was a good plan, but it should not have been at the cost of influx in trade schools. I can assure you, an independent tradesman - say, a plumber - makes at least as much as a bachelor, if he manages his business properly.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[metacell]

Assuming college provides adequate intellectual stimulus... in my experience, formal education focuses very much on rote learning, and if you want to really understand something, it's better to study it on your own.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[giuseppemag]

In my book you need some studying to do if you think .Net (one of the major managed runtimes of today) is a language.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[tehcyder]

Oh jeez not the "go to college to become a better rounded person" argument. College costs as much as a mid-range to high-end sports car. Lower and middle-class people don't have the luxury of going to college for the pleasure of learning. There must be a return on such a significant investment. It's that simple, it has nothing to do with anti-intellectualism.

If you value money over intellectual development, you are in fact anti-intellectual, in the same way that if you prefer to believe literally in the Bible rather than accepting proper scientific research, you are anti-science.
This is really just a matter of word definitions.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[GameboyRMH]

So if I not only advise moderation and careful planning in spending money on education, but also don't literally spend every non-survival-supporting penny I have on education myself (since a penny not spent on survival or education is one I value more than intellectual development), then I'm anti-intellectual? Guess it can't be helped then, I'm anti-intellectual :-(

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[tehcyder]

The pleasure of learning is the return on investment. Knowledge is its own reward, not just a tool for prosperity.

It's hard to feel such pleasure when you don't have enough money to eat.

Well, yes, you might want to look up Maslow's hierarchy of needs. It's hard to find pleasure in anything much if you're actually starving. But it's hard to see why an adult in a civilised country would actually be that badly off nowadays.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[zildgulf]

Well, college CAN make you a more well-rounded person, but I can't see spending a king ransom on getting a degree from an ivy league school to accomplish that goal. Since most colleges are horribly expensive now the reason for the "don't go to college" argument is economic not educational.

I think that a freshman year, and possibly a sophomore year, at a community college is a good thing to help you find out what you want to study or to generate new ideas to push to the market if you don't have one already.

If you want to be a more well-rounded person I think that by your sophomore year that goal is mostly achieved.

Once you hit your junior year (or post associate degree work) you should have a goal and you should determine if college is the right path. Also if you generate an idea that you want to run with that would be the time to drop out and try it.

If your goal requires a Bachelor's or Master's degree then college will be worth it.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[tehcyder]

Then why is it that 99.9% of people don't go to school after entering the workforce, unless it is in the pursuit of a higher paying job? You can get all the learning you want at your local library for FREE, or now online with Khan Academy. Don't feed people a line of bullshit about college not being a matter of economics.

Going to college forces you to become intellectually disciplined. In the same way that if you don't do any sports until you're twenty, you're overwhelmingly likely going to grow up physically underdeveloped and unhealthy, so if you don't have your brain channelled in some way you;ll never be able to think prop0erly.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[tehcyder]

All these arguments just show the stupidity of the US education system rather than saying anything about the value of education.
In the UK we used to have free university/college education, so anyone who wanted to could go to college, now the Tory geniuses in government (following on from the "New Labour" conservatives) want to move towards the US model of saddling graduates with many tens of thousands of pounds of debt.
Hopefully in a couple of years time, young people will have had enough and will start stringing the fuckers up from lampposts.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[zildgulf]

But if people want to learn for the sake of learning why push them to get a Bachelor's degree and saddle students with hundreds of thousands of debt?

In many American communities you can take a few classes here and there to learn for the sake of learning without the massive debt. You can even do that online now without breaking the the bank.

Colleges and community schools are for learning but a college degree is mostly a tool for employment in America.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[tehcyder]

The prevailing slashdot attitude, though, is "if something applies to me, then i must also apply to everybody else". ,br> Therefore, if I have mad a billion dollars without being able to write my own name, so can everyone else; and the whole reading/writing thing is just a liberal sham to oppress hard-working non-tax-paying natural geniuses like me.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[zildgulf]

Not when it costs you hundreds of thousands of dollars to get "the perfect degree from the perfect university", and for what?

Community colleges and state schools are usually the better bet for getting a degree with less debt and/or for the sake of learning. Many communities have community sponsored continuing education programs that give you a better educational experience for less cost.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[tehcyder]

Two hundred thousand dollars in student loans? Please, explain to me how you arrived at that sum.

Blackjack and hookers. In fact, forget the blackjack.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[tehcyder]

the only way to get an education in the middle ages was to take a vow of poverty and enter the monastery. Not much has changed in CS since then

If you think Computer Science existed in the middle ages, I suggest your education is lacking somewhat.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[zildgulf]

It really depends on what you want to do. In your case being in a university is the only way. For others it is not.

I think we are at a crossroads in education in America. The "high school-college-job" track is applying less to a growing number of students, especially the student that need to pursue something outside of college.

Colleges need to be more open to student of all ages since some of us will not and cannot follow the "BS-MS-PHD" track for a myriad of reasons, economics being one. I feel the need to learn for the sake of learning is something more young adults do not appreciate until they are older.

Why do we have to force a decision on a post-teenager about education when they don't have the life experience to understand their decisions? Why not get the college education when you need it?

You realized that you had no alternatives than to go to a university to get the education you want. There is no good reason for any university to keep you from doing that. Since you realize that you will have an appreciation of the education process than some of the younger students. You will appreciate your education more.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[tehcyder]

Great intellectuals who did not have much formal schooling include Joseph Campbell, Michael Faraday, and Srinivasa Ramanujan

Don't know which Joseph Campbell you mean, but the monomyth-guy had a BA and MA according to Wikipedia.
In any case, for every one intellectual who doesn't have formal schooling, there must be hundreds or more likely thousands who do

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[tibit]

Modern CS concepts (read: only recently come mainstream) need a language and a platform to try things out. I do know that you can teach everything using LISP, but it is somewhat useful, IMHO, to show that those concepts also apply in widely deployed platforms like F# on top of CLR, C#, etc.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[tehcyder]

Different people learn in different ways. To me classmates were, at best, a distraction.

I bet you were just a bundle of fun at parties.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[tehcyder]

Others, much smarter than myself, have often repeated that "College is where boys go to drink, girls go to find husbands, and everyone goes to prolong their childhood another four years".

Drinking and finding husbands are not childhood activities, smartarse.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[tehcyder]

"College as a waste of time" is also an indicator of what's wrong with modern university education. They're turning into glorified trade schools. I've had recently graduates tell me, "We studied .NET at school." I'm sorry, .NET is a trade not Computer Science. In my book, you're not a real computer graduate unless you believe that Computer Science is language agnostic.

If you really were language agnostic, you wouldn't get your knickes in a twist just because someone uses a Microsoft language.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[HeckRuler]

. . .and why would that be?

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[rolando2424]

It's hard to feel such pleasure when you don't have enough money to eat.

Well, sur-

I'm so alone, I don't have any friends... I keep eating them...

That's a solution I guess.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Antisyzygy]

Yeah. I read that there are about 600,000-800,000 jobs available in skilled labor, transportation, and manufacturing that can't be filled because people are going to college for fluff degrees instead of to a trade school where they belong. Its a lot of fun to go for four years and party while you pursue a business degree (marketing, communications, management), but most business degrees are the most watered down. I have a friend that got his MBA and never went to class. You still get pretty good STEM degrees usually, though math is getting more lenient due to people bitching about not being able to pass calculus. Now they grade on a curve at most schools, which is the most ridiculous idea I have ever heard of for a math class that is that easy. People turn their brains off when math problems appear, but I know from experience they can do them if they would just try and stop being lazy.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Marillion]

Let me address several comments. My choice of .NET is just one example of the "trade school" problem. The same is true of any language/environment/database "Platform": J2EE, Ruby on Rails, .NET just to name few.

I also respect that students need to "Hit The Ground Running" upon graduation. Hiring managers look for platform skills, not whether an applicant understands Quick Sort, Directed Graphs, Linked Lists and Combinatorics. But all that knowledge is vital.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[ginbot462]

>> And I'm not a MS fanboy, just somewhat worried by stagnated state of C++ and ObjC.

dude, where are you looking? Those 2 languages are here for our lifetimes (and C/C++ for the unseeable future). I still see fortran shit. ... And I am not trying to bring out the greybeards. I would say I would take the C/C++ programmer over the Java/C# programmer (completely over-generalization and hyperbole to follow), because the C (and some of the C++) guys have already had their senses burned out and won't try to reinvent the whole fucking system. Java people we'll say how they could have done this, that, blah, blah, Yea, I know that. I've learned a lot of languages too, but you are getting a Fortran model(s) with Visual Basic extensions in a C/C++ architecture (pick your network com, lets say CORBA Tao for now. Though I like WCF myself) with a little C# gui controller. Deal with it; cause you only got 2 weeks. And you know what, most Java people do deal, just like the C/C++, and that weird Haskell guy (but he/she is smart .. almost too smart; don't overthink the problem ok?) ... because like doing a security exam by asking "How are you? Where are you going?" you don't give a shit about the answers but HOW they answer it.

I am sorry that it also WHO you know too though. And that is where the language you know on the paper matters. Just put them all down, even if you just played around with it a week (but you had to enough to fake it); at least somebody, if they are smart, we weed out the resume inflaters over experimenters who crave new things.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[Coren22]

What I found when looking for my first job was that everyone wanted 2 years experience for a "entry level" job, so the biggest leg up you can get while in college is to do internships, that gets you the experience you need to get started.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[tibit]

I think that if you start factoring in productivity, safety (think code running an elevator) and employee morale, we seriously need a statically compiled successor to C++. I do plenty of embedded system development and frankly said C sucks big donkey balls, and C++ is not much better. Good luck getting C++0x support for lower-end CPUs. If the vendor doesn't base the toolkit on LLVM, they'll have jolly good time porting their gcc held together by string and chewing gum unless they use a mainstream architecture that's supported by gcc out-of-the-box and is being maintained.

I'm really longing for a language that will enable producing good quality compiled code while still enabling compile-type computation a-la lisp. This would let us, among other things, have domain specific languages (DSLs) and custom introspection in our projects.

C/C++ compilers treat a bunch of functions in a special way, but won't extend the courtesy to others. Think of a line such as y = sin(1.3). Modern compilers know that the sin function is a special function, and they hard-code how to obtain the constant result during compile-time. It's a big fucking shame that this is not possible for arbitrary pure functions.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[bigsexyjoe]

I was thinking about the fact that he never got a PhD and insisted on being called Mr. Campbell. And most of his learning was on his own.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[ginbot462]

Sort of reaffirms my belief, I would hire you based what you'd said more than specific language experience (which can be taught). However, domain experience is still important (unfortunately, sometimes treated as the only important aspect). It can get down right silly .. sort of like this real ad posting, with the game - e.g. search term - cut out:

Requirements: [...snip...] Candidate should be proficient with C++ programming, DLL development and have direct [Obscure Game] programming skills. Candidate should be a knowledgeable scripter in [Obscure Game] and other COTS game engines. Experience with the implementation of simulation algorithms is also required and experience with [Even more Obscure and New API to Obscure Game] is preferred.

I found it when searching for info on that API in the posting. Along with other requirements, that's probably only a handful of people that even KNOW of the API. [Hell, it was even in my home town. Which could be why google served it up to me.] I've noticed it's already be revised somewhat. It just shows the disconnect between HR and the technical minded people that would work with this new recruit.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[nomadic]

Because men can have children into their 80s, so the slope has to be much shallower, and the fact that I and presumably a lot of people didn't know the fact likely means the impact is not nearly as noticeable as with women.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[icebraining]

The number of people helped by Caritas soared by 30 per cent to more than 60,000 this year - and the organization says it does not have enough resources to attend to all those in need.

About 600,000 Portuguese aged over 65 years are undernourished or even suffer from outright hunger, according to a recent study by the organization NutriAction.

The social organization Banco Alimentar, which feeds about 240,000 people daily, says 27 per cent of the 10-million-strong population goes without eating at least one day per month.

http://www.monstersandcritics.com/news/business/features/article_1601310.php/Poverty-fuels-anger-during-general-strike-in-Portugal-News-Feature

This is where I live, and it's getting worse, not better.

Re:Not anti-intellectualism

[tibit]

So, to you it's impossible to have life outside of school, because obviously I can only go to parties with classmates. I went to school to learn shit. I had life and family outside of school. Grad school classmates were a distraction. I would not want any of them at any party I went to, thankyouverymuch. Undergrad classmates were some of the coolest people I've ever met, though, some of them became friends for life.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

It's libertarianism

[sseaman]

Libertarianism seems to be married to a distrust of authority, including academic or otherwise intellectual authority whose power isn't based on some sort of commercially-viable aesthetic appeal (for example, libertarians will acknowledge the authority of bestsellers widely read in their circles, or directors, video game designers, programmers, or musicians).

Re:It's libertarianism

[medcalf]

Yes, Victor Davis Hanson is a noted anti-intellectual.

Sarcasm, for those who can't tell.

Re:It's libertarianism

[geoffrobinson]

To be fair, there are numerous failures of central planners and "smart people" who try to control our lives and make decisions for us. 5-year plans, Vietnam, etc.

You can take this distrust to the extreme. Or you can follow the American Constitutional model. Keep decisions like this as local as problem and limit the scope of the failure if something really stupid is done.

Re:It's libertarianism

[Jaborandy]

Please don't malign libertarianism with a connection to anti-intellectualism. Libertarianism is a distrust of ABUSE OF POWER, not of AUTHORITY. When authority is earned on its merits, as it is with the value of classic literature in a free market of ideas,then any power it has is legitimate. But if a college accreditation board decides that all students must learn that classic book to graduate with a meaningful degree, and there is no alternative choice available, then they are abusing their power no matter how honorable their intentions

Re:It's libertarianism

[Hognoxious]

To be fair, there are numerous failures of central planners and "smart people" who try to control our lives and make decisions for us. 5-year plans, Vietnam, etc.

Yeah, that must be why China is so deeply indebted to the US. them dumb commies! They could have had a property boom, pissed the nonexistent proceeds up the wall and then ended up on food stamps for the rest of their lives as the result of a subprime crash like us if they'd been smarter!

Re:It's libertarianism

[Americano]

If you want to talk about libertarian economics, yes, their belief is that a free & unregulated market will direct the most money to "the best" people at doing whatever they are trying to get paid for. In an ideal libertarian economy:

-- the best musicians will make the most money, because they produce the most widely-loved music;
-- the best writers will make the most money, because they produce the most widely-enjoyed literature;
-- the best doctors will make the most money, because they provide the best possible care and can command high prices for their time;
-- the best lawyers will make the most money, because they provide the best legal advice and courtroom performance;
-- the best programmers will make the most money, because they produce the most robust, high-performance, and feature-rich software with the fewest bugs;

I'm not sure why you'd think this turns into a mistrust of intellectual authority.

To be the "best" doctor, you must provide the best care; to provide the best care, you must have the deepest and broadest understanding of your patients and their conditions, as well as all of the current research & thinking about the best treatments for each condition your patients present with.

To be the "best" programmer, you must understand computer languages and software; you must understand and be able to design high quality algorithms, and then implement them in well-written, well-planned, robust systems of software; you must have a broad and deep understanding of the tools and techniques available to you, as well as all of the current research and thinking about the best techniques for each problem domain.

In what way is that anti-intellectual, or exemplary of a mistrust of intellectual authority?

What libertarians mostly distrust is the fact that some political appointee is going to insert himself into the decision making process and tell you, "You must go to Dr. Jones, even though Dr. Smith is an internationally recognized expert in treating your condition. Why? Because fuck you, I have the authority to tell you what to do, that's why." Or that the same appointee who is probably in his position simply by virtue of knowing somebody who got elected will (after taking away your ability to choose which doctor you wish to go see), tell Dr. Smith, the internationally-recognized expert in treating the condition you have to have that, "Sorry, Dr. Smith, we're simply not paying for that treatment because we don't feel the benefits justify its costs." They mistrust arbitrarily granted authority, wielded by non-experts with political power - with numerous and good reasons.

I could argue that libertarianism actually encourages intellectualism in every citizen, because it leaves it up to the individual to assess the facts of the situation, and make the best decision possible, based on those facts. Someone who lacks logic, intellectual rigor, and the ability to synthesize disparate facts into a rational whole would largely be unable to function in a "libertarian" model.

Re:It's libertarianism

[marnues]

I caulk it up to Ayn Rand. Now there was an anti-intellectual.

Re:It's libertarianism

[marnues]

Or we can note that sometimes we get it right and sometimes we get it wrong and that reactionary anti-anything is a bad idea. Bad central planners are not always worse than not letting good central planners do their thing.

Re:It's libertarianism

[AK Marc]

Libertarians love to play the "no true Scotsman" card. In being anti-abuse of power, they are often anti-authority because authority leads to abuse of power. And others may not agree with your "earned authority is ok, but not authority gained by sources other than what I personally approve of" opinion.

And no, having minimum educational standards isn't abuse of authority, no matter how much you'd like it to be.

Re:It's libertarianism

[tnk1]

Actually, the Chinese have moved away from both Central Planning and definitely away from Five-Year Plans. What they are using at the moment is "Socialism with Chinese Characteristics", better known as state mediated capitalism.

Of course, there isn't anything wrong with the *idea* of a centralized plan, the problem is that they usually end up being made by politicized ideologues rather than practically minded experts.

Don't get too positive about China yet. Their success depends as much on the continued prosperity of the US as it does anything they have done. They have cheap labor and artificially controlled currency exchange rates. This has helped them, but there are some serious pitfalls in the future for them if they can't convert that into something more stable and long-term. There is plenty of time for them to develop other bad habits as well. Indeed, one might point out that their current success is merely a respite from the previous decades, or some would even say centuries, of unmitigated failure.

Re:It's libertarianism

[geoffrobinson]

Plus, Chinese demographics will start getting worse (i.e. older) due to the one-child policy that comes from (drum roll please) central planning.

Re:It's libertarianism

[lennier]

Or you can follow the American Constitutional model. Keep decisions like this as local as problem and limit the scope of the failure if something really stupid is done.

That would actually be a good idea if applied to multinational corporations. They seem to be an end-run around the whole concept of states' rights and local decisionmaking.

Re:It's libertarianism

[lennier]

-- the best musicians will make the most money, because they produce the most widely-loved music; ...
Someone who lacks logic, intellectual rigor, and the ability to synthesize disparate facts into a rational whole would largely be unable to function in a "libertarian" model.

Meanwhile, in our universe, the rigorous free-market process has currently selected Lady Gaga as the "best" musician of our era. Are we to derive from this that Lady Gaga's music is, in fact, the product of strict intellectual rigor and rationalism, and encourages intellectualism in every citizen?

I mean, I'm sure she's a smart lady and all, having worked out the perfect pop formula, and it's obviously working for her. But does it say the same for her fans?

Re:It's libertarianism

[lennier]

I caulk it up to Ayn Rand.

But her arguments are already watertight!

Re:It's libertarianism

[Americano]

I see you omitted a key part of my statement:

In an ideal libertarian economy:

Do we live in a world with an "ideal libertarian economy"? Of course not. Much like we will never live in a world with an ideal socialist economy, or any other economic form. Idealism in any form tends to get bruised and dented when it meets reality. So pointing at Lady Gaga's success in the "real world" and saying that it disproves my comment about some "ideal" libertarian economic model is kind of foolish, even if we were to grant your assumption that there is some "objective" truth about intensely personal matters of taste like what music we like.

But, to respond specifically to your comments about Lady Gaga:
1) I never suggested we live under an ideal libertarian economy; I also never said that libertarianism would require rational thought and intellectual rigor in every choice made by every person at all times. I said it would "encourage" intellectualism because it is up the individual to assess & choose based on their own rational capacity. Latching on to a single aspect of my argument, twisting it so that it suggests something I, in fact, never said, and then refuting that single made-up point as if it disproves everything I've said is known as a straw man fallacy.

2) Do you really mean to suggest that through intellectual rigor and rational thought alone, we can arrive at some single objective (rather than 6 billion intensely subjective) definition of what constitutes "the best music"? Note I said "best musicians" - a group, not a single superlative. Music, being a very personal preference, will always be highly subjective, and thus difficult to pin down simply with rational thinking. But please, explain to me how a musician who succeeds in connecting to a broad base of fans, who writes & performs music that people want to dance/fuck/party/chill to, and who puts on shows that many people are happy to spend their hard-earned money buying a ticket to see is an example of someone being a bad or unsuccessful popular musician?

But does it say the same for her fans?

This comment says far more about your desperate need to feel superior to someone over something as trivial as a personal musical preference than it says about Lady Gaga's fans, or libertarian economic models. Thanks for playing, and thanks for the straw man. If you'd care to try again, by all means, go for it

Question

[MobileTatsu-NJG]

Is an intellectual somebody who has memorized a lot of information, or is it somebody who is adept at learning?

I ask because I don't see a case of 'cool to be stupid', instead I see an evolution of how we function in a society where we've stored our knowledge in a manner that is dirt-simple to get at.

Re:Question

[Larry Sanger]

I don't see a case of "cool to be stupid," either. Geek anti-intellectualism is not like jock anti-intellectualism. As TFA says...well, I'll just let you read it.

Re:Question

[LoudMusic]

I think an intellectual is a person who asks questions and attempts to answer them. A knowledge seeker. They don't ask the same questions over and over - and they share their results openly.

Re:Question

[maxwell demon]

Is an intellectual somebody who has memorized a lot of information, or is it somebody who is adept at learning?

I ask because I don't see a case of 'cool to be stupid', instead I see an evolution of how we function in a society where we've stored our knowledge in a manner that is dirt-simple to get at.

Well, the point is that if it is not stored in your head, it's not knowledge. It's information which you can look up, and as such it is very useful, and if valuable enough, you can turn that information into knowledge. But it is a mistake to take that information as knowledge. Knowledge is available to you even if you don't explicitly search for it. If you know something, and then see something related, you may see a connection which you would not have seen otherwise, because you never would have gotten the idea to look up that information. And it's exactly those moments where you see relations between things which seemed to be unrelated which provide true insight.

Knowledge is live information. Your brain constantly compares new information against it and looks for connections, even if you don't notice it. Indeed, even when you're sleeping, your brain is actually working on that knowledge. On the other hand, information you have to look up is dead. It does exactly nothing until you look it up. It comes to life only as you read it.

Note that I'm not saying that this information is not useful, or that it isn't a huge advantage if you can look it up quickly. But it's much less useful than information which resides in your head. Of course, the information you can have in your head is limited, and therefore it is an advantage to easily be able to look up things. Also, there are things you might need sometimes, but which are clearly not generally relevant to you; not needing to learn those is definitively an advantage. But the idea that you could generally replace knowledge with looking up information is misguided.

Re:Question

[dogmatixpsych]

Or, is an intellectual someone who is removed from the real world by dwelling in the pillared halls of academia? Is an intellectual someone who condescendingly looks down on the unwashed masses? There are a lot of uses of intellectualism - some are positive and some are not. It depends on the person. We have to define intellectual (like you were implying) before we can have a more meaningful discussion about whether or not post-modern-neo-lib-con-uber geeks are pro- or anti-intellectualism.

Re:Question

[geekmux]

Is an intellectual somebody who has memorized a lot of information, or is it somebody who is adept at learning?

I ask because I don't see a case of 'cool to be stupid', instead I see an evolution of how we function in a society where we've stored our knowledge in a manner that is dirt-simple to get at.

Exactly. I think you hit the nail on the head here. I get onto my kids all the time because their excuse for not knowing even the simplest of things is "oh, I can just Google it". I know I sound old-fashioned here when I say "the internet may not always available for you to get your answer", and in many cases today, it is still actually possible for people to be "offline" and without an internet feed.

That being said, I think the writing is on the wall, and soon enough we will have internet capability just about anytime and anywhere, and therefore the true intellectual is a dying breed. There is no need to memorize tons of semi-useless information other than maybe to impress others (Mensa or a spot on Jeopardy! game show) who still hold value towards that particular ability/trait.

Re:Question

[necro81]

I ask because I don't see a case of 'cool to be stupid'

Actually, I see an awful lot of that. Look at some of the drivel that comes from, say, Michelle Bachmann, and it's pretty easy to discern the following attitude: "I'm going to assert something I believe is true, and you should believe it's true, too. I don't have any persuasive evidence for this assertion. I don't know all the facts, I don't care about the facts, and you shouldn't care whether I know them, either." And for this, they are somehow idolized for sticking it to those eggheaded Commies from the Ivy League that always lord it over the common man. As though there is no difference between being an intelligent, well informed person and an elitist jackass! I've met plenty of smartasses from top-tier colleges, and plenty of self-taught geniuses, and there's plenty of space for everyone in between.

Re:Question

[radtea]

Is an intellectual somebody who has memorized a lot of information, or is it somebody who is adept at learning?

Although both are necessary to be an intellectual, neither is sufficient.

An intellectual is someone who values and pursues the life of the mind in all its diverse forms. Such people necessarily end up knowing a lot, and the only way to learn some important things is through memorization, so they will necessarily be adept at various ways of learning, including memorization, which is of course an important tool in any learning toolkit.

On the other hand, the work of intellectuals needs to be distinguished from sterile mental gymnastics like philosophy, whose practitioners seem to believe they can think without having actual detailed, scientific, empirical knowledge to think about.

Learning--including learning by memorization--is necessary to know things, and intellectuals value knowledge because it gives them stuff to think about (as opposed to the sterile contents of their own reflective self-impressions, which is all that philosophers think about.)

Re:Question

[colnago]

I suppose an intellectual is neither of these. Perhaps as dogmatixpsych states, an intellectual may be segregated from the real world behind the walls of academia. I'd like to think that an intellectual neither memorizes nor learns but synthesizes and develops alternatives based on what is already known. If an intellectual happens to be grounded in the real world then those alternatives may also be relevant and productive.

Re:Question

[locallyunscene]

While I think the author is being a bit alarmist, I agree with his definition of an intellectual more than yours.

As an example, memorizing dates of all the battles leading up to the battle of Hastings is not intellectual. However, knowing how those earlier battles affected the battle of Hastings itself is intellectual and is hard to do if you don't know the chronological order well.

Or if you prefer the sound bite version, you have to know the rules before you can bend them effectively.

Re:Question

[Krau Ming]

an intellectual: someone who does not whip out their phone in order to answer questions beyond the scope of "hi how are you?" or "how 'bout that weather?"

Re:Question

[ArsonSmith]

By "looking something up" is not, at least in geek culture, meant to be complete ignorance of a subject prior to the research. It is more along the lines, I have read, possibly in detail, about that subject and know specifically where to go to find the details once again. Although I can't regurgitate them on demand. There are many subjects that I have become an expert in, in a short amount of time and then mostly forget what I had learned other than the basics and where to get the information if needed in the future.

Re:Question

[Have Brain Will Rent]

That is an excellent point and the so often heard "you don't have to know stuff you just have to know where to look it up" deserves to be on the list of blossoming anti-intellectual attitudes.

One of the most illuminating and probably most educational experiences I had was studying for comps during my doctorate. At that school it basically went like this: "OK, here is a list of 50 books covering several areas of computing (mostly at a Masters level). One year from now we are going to test you. Anything in the books is fair game." The areas were things like computational theory, linguistics, hardware, AI etc.

Now I kind of procrastinated about this reading... so as the year was coming to a close I was cramming 50 books worth of material into my brain. Now some people would say this was useless memorization but in fact there was an epiphany along the way in which it became clear just how all these seemingly unrelated disciplines were actually all facets of the same thing or at least related to each other in interesting ways, analogous to the way one NP complete problem can be transformed into another NP complete problem that looks completely unrelated to the first problem.

It would not have been possible to form those connections without having all that information simultaneously available to me, what you term "Live" information.

Re:Question

[recharged95]

"Is an intellectual somebody who has memorized a lot of information?"


Yes. (at least in the western world). Is the person useful is questionable.


somebody who is adept at learning... is a smart person that uses his intellect. There's a difference. And a smart person is always useful.

Re:Question

[hey!]

Is an intellectual somebody who has memorized a lot of information, or is it somebody who is adept at learning?

Neither condition is sufficient or even strictly necessary. Somebody can be adept at learning and as a consequence have a great deal of knowledge at his fingertips, but that doesn't make him an intellectual. If he is just a passive recipient of information (a follower of an ideology say), he's not an intellectual. If he pursues knowledge purely for its practical utility (e.g. it will make him a lot of money), he's not an intellectual, although he may be quite bright and knowledgeable.

I would say that an intellectual is an active, critical participant in some culture of ideas. What I am calling a "culture of ideas" is a community of people who collectively develop and refine ideas in some field. The ideas can (and usually do) have utility, but they are valued by the community for their own sake, provided that they are consistent with the overall framework of ideas in that community. As an active, critical participant in a culture of ideas, an intellectual transforms, rejects, refines and adds to its body of ideas. Although he doesn't necessarily contribute his work back, if given a chance to he will at least debate the merits.

Suppose you are in a group that's into the design of programming languages. Chances are some of you are intellectuals by virtue of *how* you participate in the group, others are not. If you are exclusively interested in collecting knowledge so that you will know that language X supports some feature in case you ever have to use X, you're just a geek but not an intellectual. If you fancy yourself something of a philosopher of programming languages then you're a geek *and* an intellectual, although not necessarily more knowledgeable than your simple geek colleagues. The topic of programming languages is a utilitarian one, but your interest and participation transcends utility. Consider this test: imagine somebody created a programming language, not for actual use, but to prove a point. Would you consider learning that language?

An intellectual is necessarily a geek, since he has consuming interests that are incomprehensible to most people. But not all geeks are necessarily intellectuals. Mere collectors or conduits of information are not intellectuals, no matter how impressive the collection or compelling the presentation.

Re:Question

[i_b_don]

The only problem is the base level of knowledge is very important. To say "I don't need to memorize that equation because I can just look it up" is all well and good until your base knowledge becomes disconnected from the true facts. Psuedo science, politics, health information are all areas where people have let the reality and facts slip away until a lie is repeated enough and people believe it and repeat it.

I don't have a problem saying that someone is very smart even though they don't have a ton of facts memorized, but there are plenty of people out there who fail critical thinking even though they can go look up a lot of facts quickly and easily.

(And if you want "cool to be stupid", then just look at the above topics.... oh, and throw in religion there too. I mean saying "I believe it on faith despite any evidence" and being proud of it is the definition of "cool to be stupid". but this is not a problem that was invented with the internet.....)

d

Re:Question

[eepok]

An intellectual is someone who constantly seeks knowledge and then analyzing the results of the search for whatever reason.

Re:Question

[Deus.1.01]

But intellectualism isn't about memorizing stuff, its how you analyse the things you know then apply logic against the unknown.

Re:Question

[Deus.1.01]

Some words from a philosopher friend of mine.

"If we didint teach you how to apply logic you would be using all that empirical data to club dinosaurs with"

Im not a philosopher myself, attleast im not book learned about the subject, just bits and pieces of abridged knowledge.

But don't take for granted the last 300 years of philosophy....you want to have to deal with Platon and his metaphysics?

Its also smacks of hubris, to think "yeah, they gave us the scientific methodology now their useless".....I can't predict the future...but...100 years..200...years...a thousand....who knows....maybe there still is flaws in the way we apply empiricy.

That said...IANAP

Re:Question

[Requiem18th]

My understanding of intellectual is one who uses his intellect to work.

Being intellectual doesn't mean you "look down on the unwashed masses", but doing so doesn't mean you aren't. Being an intellectual doesn't men you are "removed from the real world by dwelling in the pillared halls of academia". That is unbelievably silly and childish nonsense!

Academia is not an alternate dimension where your every need is tended and you are sheltered from the world, people there are no more sheltered than their wealth allow them, which varies form person to person. Some of them struggle to make it to the next month.

And while it's true that some field within academia do not seem to have immediate practical benefits, neither does Twilight, or Big Brother, or the Thor movie. If it is legitimate to spend one's own time considering the best recons to Batmans' timeline, why can't some one spend their time trying to find out predictive experiments out of string theory?

Re:Question

[geekmux]

But intellectualism isn't about memorizing stuff, its how you analyse the things you know then apply logic against the unknown.

Well, that all depends on your definition. To me, what you've described is more a "scientific mind", ripe with logical thought process.

That's not necessarily the same guy who is on the Jeopardy! game show, which is what I've personally found as being branded as an "intellectual".

All a matter of interpretation, we're both likely right here. Cheers.

Re:Question

[lennier]

If it is legitimate to spend one's own time considering the best recons to Batmans' timeline, why can't some one spend their time trying to find out predictive experiments out of string theory?

Because most fanfic writers don't consider what they are doing to be "work" and ask for grant money for it, while most string theorists and cultural theorists do? That's the big difference. Once you start asking for money from the public purse, people get justified wondering why what you're doing is worth their money.

You could make an interesting comparison between, say, the Star Wars/Batman/X-Men fanfic community and hackers on the one hand, and George Lucas, DC, Marvel and university faculty on the other hand.

The first team is unorganised, unpaid, amateurl, and produces a mixture of brilliant original work and crud.

The second team is organised, paid, professional - and seem from a distance, also seems to produce a mixture of both brilliant work and crud.

In some cases, the professionals seem to do a lot worse work than the amateurs. George Lucas, for instance.

Are the Star Wars amateurs 'anti-science-fictionalist' by pointing out that the professionals aren't always better just by being professional?
Are the science amateurs 'antiintellectualist' by pointing out that their professionals aren't always better either?

Re:Question

[lennier]

Consider this test: imagine somebody created a programming language, not for actual use, but to prove a point. Would you consider learning that language?

Possibly, depending on what the point was. Joy for example, isn't entirely a 'real' language but has very interesting ideas behind it and is worth studying for that reason. If the ideas are interesting enough, eventually someone will translate them into a real language for doing actual work.

Both idea and implementation are important, and both need rigor and testability. The ideas have to come first, and necessarily won't be fully formed initially, but if the ideas can't ever actually be implemented, then they're probably incorrect - implementation is to philosophy as experiment is to science.

I think the 'bad' side of intellectualism, which people rightly dislike, is a tendency to merely promote ideas without ever considering if they are implementable in practice, or even to look down on implementation as a distraction from 'pure' ideology. Which would be like theorists in science looking down on experimentalists as misguided fools - 'we don't need to check against reality, we already know our ideas are correct. Just do it already, dammit!'

This stereotype of the ' ivory tower academic' promoting socially destructive ideas without checking if they are in fact correct (such as the right-wing bete noire, Marxism-Leninism - or the left-wing equivalent, 'Washington Consensus laissez-faire') is what think of when they say 'intellectual' with a sneer. A person who thinks, and teaches, but doesn't check their thinking and teaching against reality by consulting the lower, implementing, classes.

I'd like to think this stereotype is completely false - but, well, have you ever read a Lisp forum? In some cases, this attitude is alive and well even in computer science. Why are there so few working Lisp implementations? There's lots of discussion over the pure ideas, very little over the hard nuts-and-bolts of implementation, and often a sense that producing a working implementation fo a possibly-good-idea is somehow 'beneath' a 'real' computer scientist, because it's mere details which someone else lower down the pecking order should do.

Heck, I've seen that attitude right here in the phrase 'computer science has as much to do with computers as astronomy has with telescopes'.

Re:Question

[Requiem18th]

Once you start asking for money from the public purse, people get justified wondering why what you're doing is worth their money.

So in the end it's always about money uh?

Well drawing something positive from your post it seems that at least you implicated, by omission, that it academical interests ARE fine as long as you don't pay for it. The money problem solves itself in that while purely theoretical work takes a while to find practical applications when they are achieved they are plain awesome, (graphene any?) but you at least are no enemy at the *concept* of academic work.

Your comparison isn't adequate because arts are subjective and there really isn't a "right" way of doing it.

It would be better to compare homeopathic medicine against actual medicine. This is not about getting paid or not, it's about fixing things with brains versus guts, and I sure rather be diagnosed by Dr. Hibbert than Nick Riviera.

slashdoted all ready

[scharkalvin]

That was quick!

Re:slashdoted all ready

[blair1q]

Slashdot. Providing camouflaged DDoS attacks for over a decade.

Re:slashdoted all ready

[greg1104]

I think the author could use a bit more intellect in the area of making sure their blog will survive before submitting a self-promotional link.

None of them are geeks

[vlm]

None of the people in that article are geeks. All liberal-arts majors, book authors, marketing personnel, PR, spokemodels, management, etc. If I remember my HHGttG correctly, they're all from the "B Ark". As a group, they've always been anti-intellectual, its just they've recently had a thin veneer of geekiness smoothed over them.

It may be that I'm out of touch and being a geek now means you're a "tech journalist / blogger".

Re:None of them are geeks

[mjwalshe]

yep need a proper geek test like

which end of the soldering iron gets hot
what is the eighth layer of OSI and the 5th layer of TCP/IP
what layer Does MIDI fit into in the OSI stack (and no its not what CISCO tells you)
which Computer game has "two chease burgers and a big mac to go" as an easter egg
bonus point what hardware did it run on
extra bonus point did you succeed in the game

:-)

Re:None of them are geeks

[ildon]

I don't think it's fair to require that geeks be 50+ years old.

Re:None of them are geeks

[vlm]

So, you're saying you disagree with them. Right? Just checking.

The opinion of a non-geek portrayed as a geek is simply irrelevant. Right or wrong is a function of statistical randomness, not enlightened analysis. Its rather like asking Tom Cruise to answer detailed questions about F-15 flight instruction, after all, he portrayed a pilot in a famous movie, but it turns out he's just an actor.

As for right or wrong, the problem is the original article writer seeing thru very narrow 1930s-ish eyes that "intellectualism" is sitting in college, wearing tweed jackets, while puffing a (tobacco) pipe, speaking in a psuedo-british accent, and writing essays in for-profit journals. If you slightly modernize the definition to adjust to technology, nothing much has really changed amongst the geeks except they share a lot more ideas, a lot faster, and the folks "left behind" seem to be getting more than one year behind every year, very technological singularity-like.

Re:None of them are geeks

[t2t10]

I would say that none of them are intellectuals either. In particular, the "liberal arts" (classics, literature, philosophy, history, social sciences) lost touch with intellectual life long ago and have turned into political parties and social clubs.

Re:None of them are geeks

[vlm]

I don't think it's fair to require that geeks be 50+ years old.

Just to help with categorization, if it takes someone 50+ years to figure out

which end of the soldering iron gets hot

then they fit in the moron category, not geek, unless they have a truely incredible excuse.

what layer Does MIDI fit into in the OSI stack (and no its not what CISCO tells you)

For those who don't know, thats supposed to be a (kind of) funny joke. MIDI is like ISDN in that it covers a whole bunch of layers under one umbrella, from a physical port and voltage standard all the way up to management by controlling sound mixers... The funny part is Cisco puts it under "Presentation" because its used for music performances and stuff, and those are "presentations", aren't they? I think they're trying to make the point about ".midi" extension data files being transferred by many different types of layer 7 systems, I guess.

Re:None of them are geeks

[mjwalshe]

only the Moon Lander ones are that old skool

Re:None of them are geeks

[mjwalshe]

hey us ex OSI specialists have to take our jokes where we can (well theres always TCP/IP and Google's attempts and standard writing ) And I liked the quote that "real network professionals when presented with MIDI either giggle slightly hysterically or feel sick".

Though for its intended job it actually works rather well - current loop interfaces being much better in the electrically noisy area that is a stage/pc set up.

Re:None of them are geeks

[HeckRuler]

If only we had a way to distinguish between TRUE geeks and these false imposters!

-----BEGIN GEEK CODE BLOCK-----
Version: 3.12
GCS/GE@ d>d- s:+ a- C++$ L++ W+ K w$ PS+(+++) PE(-) Y+ PGP(GPG) t(+) 5+ X- R+ tv-- b(+) DI(+) D+ G e++ h--- r+++ y+++
------END GEEK CODE BLOCK------

Re:None of them are geeks

[chebucto]

And you base that assertion on what? The liberal arts have a strong association with intellectualism, if by intellectual you mean knowledge for the sake of knowledge, or considering problems with no direct practical application, or novel understanding of social systems.

There are party colleges out there where people are like you describe, but anyone who's serious about liberal arts doesn't have to look hard to find intellectual stimulation, and the attitude you describe is a ticket to mediocrity (at best) at any decent college.

Re:None of them are geeks

[t2t10]

What I'm getting at is the following.

Historically, the "liberal arts" included state-of-the-art science and mathematics education.

Many science majors at good colleges and universities will, in fact, get a good grounding in non-scientific fields: they will have to learn foreign languages, read Shakespeare and other original writers, read original historical documents and interpret them, and take philosophy classes. That's a liberal arts education in the traditional sense.

What passes for "liberal arts" these days in colleges and universities is people taking a lot of courses requiring reading and writing, but their exposure to the sciences and mathematics is superficial. It's as if science majors would watch the Reduced Shakespeare Company for their literature requirement and read Asterix for European history.

And if you talk to these people, they don't even feel guilty about it; instead, they assume that anybody who actually bothers learning about math and science must be a soulless geek, and that they are the true scholars.

The only liberal arts majors in colleges and universities are the science and mathematics majors. Everybody else is missing an large chunk of their liberal arts education.

Re:None of them are geeks

[chebucto]

I agree with most of what you said - modern north american liberal arts programs do have token science / math content. The only caveat I would give is that, in my experience, the reverse is true in science and engineering: such programs require a writing credit and a language credit, but don't expose BSc's and BEng's to a rigorous arts/social science curriculum.

Of course, there's only so much you can do in eight terms, but more balance could probably be achieved without too much difficulty, especially in the first two years.

Re:None of them are geeks

[t2t10]

True, there are lots of science and engineering programs that only require a token writing and language credit. But there still are many universities (at least in the US) that do actually have meaningful liberal arts requirements for their science degrees. When you get a science degree at one of those, you do get a traditional "liberal arts" degree.

I think we also just have a "scholar inflation". Few people in the 19th century actually achieved a good understanding of "liberal arts", but these days, we expect universities to produce scholars predictably and by the thousands.

Re:None of them are geeks

[SoupIsGoodFood_42]

Don't mistake non-intellectual for anti-intellectual. A wise person knows the difference.

Re:None of them are geeks

[theNAM666]

You do not remember your HHGttG "right." The second arc was for hairdressers, telephone booth cleaners, and marketers (etc). You may wish to consider that Douglas Adams was a liberal arts major.

Your anti-intellectualism is noted, however :P

Re:None of them are geeks

[vlm]

current loop interfaces being much better in the electrically noisy area that is a stage/pc set up.

Not just the signalling scheme, but isn't it part of the actual spec that the receive ckt has to use an optoisolator? Bye bye ground loops and ground loop hum and popping GFCI outlets ... Also not sure about "recent" blue LEDs and friends, but Ye Olden Days LEDs as used in optoisolators used to be virtually bulletproof to ESD. As in nothing short of a near lightning strike will take them out.

Bringing back to the original article topic, Faux-Geeks or Psuedo-Geeks write tech journalist blogs about new products and pontificate about tech company corporate strategy, all apparently in an anti-intellectual manner, but real geeks daydream about an alternate history world where the crappy RS-232 standard never existed and everyone and everything used a standard that was physically and electrically very much like MIDI. I would have liked that world. RS-232 kinda works, but pretty much sucks.

Re:None of them are geeks

[mjwalshe]

That reminds me of when I was working on campus at CIT for BHRA we had some very long rs232 runs which ran underneath a metal roof. Several times we had nearby lightning strikes take out our vt100's - eventually we brought the full DEC VT100 manual and one of our electronic shops changed the blown components.

Re:None of them are geeks

[lennier]

which end of the soldering iron gets hot

Whichever end your thumb is nearest to.

what is the eighth layer of OSI and the 5th layer of TCP/IP

The PEBKAC/LART protocol buffer

what layer Does MIDI fit into in the OSI stack

MIDI? Real hackers use CB2 sound!

Re:None of them are geeks

[mjwalshe]

actually the 8th OSI layer and 5th TCP/IP is of course politics (try being third line support for OSI based systems for the uk and you will understand why I say this)

and real geeks use OSC open sound control - of course really old school ones prefer pipe organs.

Bull...

[shadowfaxcrx]

Seems to me that "college is a waste of time" is an economic, not an anti-learning argument. Economically college can be a waste of time. How many English majors are out there making huge bucks vs how many of them are working at Home Depot? How many people got a degree in "web design" or some such fluffery in the 90's only to discover that, gee, there's not a huge market out there for such services.

If I'm going to end up working at McDonalds after I get my 4-year degree, then I might as well skip the degree and work at McDonalds 4 years early.

As for learning, dunno about the rest of you guys but my college education was largely an exercise in bullshit. Repeat what the professor said if you want an A. Disagree with his premises if you want an F. That's not learning. It's regurgitation. Parrots can do that too, and they don't attend college to do it.

And of course there's the student attitude side of "education" as well. A good number of my "getting educated" classmates liked to say stupid crap like "well I paid for the class and so the professor owes me an A." Those guys aren't there to learn. They're there to get a piece of paper that says they went to college. That piece of paper is worthless in and of itself. The value comes from either having learned something (and these guys pretty much limited their learning to the fluid dynamics of beer bongs) or from getting a job that you could not otherwise have gotten.

Well, you probably can't get that job in this economy anyway, and meanwhile manufacturing jobs are starting to open up, and remain open because companies can't find qualified welders etc. Economically speaking, currently anyway, it makes more sense for a lot of people to go to a trade school and learn how to weld than it does to go to a college and learn how to do something that they won't be able to do once they graduate.

That's not anti-intellectualism. It's anti-impracticality.

 

Re:Bull...

[gregarican]

Pretty valid points. College is essentially intellectual exercise and not necessarily a practical (i.e. - monetary investment) exercise. I was an English major and wound up being an IT Manager the past 15+ years. A degree shows you can learn, regurgitate facts, and comform to professors' requirements. All of those years and experiences could've been replaced with a bottom rung IT A+ type of job and taking some technical certification classes...

Re:Bull...

[blair1q]

Skipping the degree to get a McDonald's job is not the same as skipping the degree to get a job as a welder.

Re:Bull...

[Bengie]

My college education taught me how to learn better. I learned a lot of critical thinking, organization, and problem solving.

Nearly all of my teachers emphasized thinking outside the box by presenting a problem, showing you some tools and theory, having you solve it, then showing you how to "correctly" do it. Then we compare and contrast how some people solved the problem and what was good and bad and why.

Most of my classes were project based and graded on originality and teamwork. I had a lot of tests that were open book and open internet, just not open neighbor.

In the end, I was taught how to teach myself.

Re:Bull...

[blind biker]

As for learning, dunno about the rest of you guys but my college education was largely an exercise in bullshit. Repeat what the professor said if you want an A. Disagree with his premises if you want an F. That's not learning. It's regurgitation. Parrots can do that too, and they don't attend college to do it.

Wow - seriously? I want to know the institution of higher education that you have attended, because my college experience was completely different. It was the most fun I have ever had up to that point. I was stimulated to think, to learn new and exciting things all the time. And the same seems to be true for all the other colleges/universities I have had the chance to attend or visit, or get to know pupils of. I have never heard of a college or university of the kind you speak of, and would appreciate it very much if you could tell us where is it that you studied, because it seems like a place out of this world.

Wait - was that math/science/engineering curriculum at all? I can see liberal arts being taught that way...

Re:Bull...

[Jaborandy]

In the end, I was taught how to teach myself.

What college and what major/degree program?
What did it cost (approx)?

Sounds like a great place.

Re:Bull...

[shadowfaxcrx]

I'm not sure what you're driving at. Are you saying it's OK for liberal arts to be taught that way?

Re:Bull...

[jstoner]

It would be interesting to compare openings for welders against openings for, say, product design. Which is growing more? I know which one is more of a 'trade.'

If the welding is growing faster, that could be evidence the economy is climbing back down the abstraction ladder, which (I think) would be a bad thing. Welders may make the world, but they don't run it. Product designers direct a lot of what your world looks like. And product designers need some insight into how human beings work and what they need. An understanding of the deep narratives of the culture will help you make things for it.

Maybe that doesn't entail a whole degree, but it certainly entails some degree of liberalism in education, and more than most high schools give you.

tl;dr: trade school vs. liberal education is not a binary, it's a scale. Maybe things need to move closer to the trade end, but not necessarily all the way.

Re:Bull...

[Batmunk2000]

Education is up to the students. Some people want to show up and somehow be blessed with magical powers that will allow them to earn more and be better people without having to get outside of their comfort zone. College is what people make it. Some people grow themselves in school, some do it while working and some never grow.

Re:Bull...

[geekmux]

...And of course there's the student attitude side of "education" as well. A good number of my "getting educated" classmates liked to say stupid crap like "well I paid for the class and so the professor owes me an A." Those guys aren't there to learn. They're there to get a piece of paper that says they went to college.

Who's to blame for that mentality, the ignorant student, or society as a whole who have literally reduced that $100,000 "piece of paper" to a single checkbox on most job applications? Some "management" positions don't even care what the piece of paper says on it, so long as you have one. Not to mention how quickly technical degrees can become obsolete even while still obtaining the degree. Go figure when you find students putting forth minimalist effort.

While I tend to agree with you here in the true value of a college education, I still do find it rather disgusting what society has reduced a 4-year degree to, especially considering the cost involved in that "investment", only to be facing an even larger one (masters degree) to at least start to differentiate yourself from the rest of the herd.

Re:Bull...

[supercrisp]

Please don't think I'm a jerk. But I want to offer a rebuttal. I teach at a university. I am frequently nominated by students for teaching awards, and I get very high marks on student evaluations. Students generally like me, and I generally like my students. That's to offer evidence for my "not a jerk" claim. Because I'm about to be very like a jerk. So, I sometimes get students who say to me some variant of "my college education [is] largely an exercise in bullshit." The vast majority of the time, those students are both ignorant and conceited--and, to be topical, anti-intellectual. When the majority of the class is prepared to discuss the material, this person will be unprepared. When others show enthusiasm, he (and it's almost always a man) looks pissed-off and disgusted with the way those "suckers" are buying into the "bullshit." He's not completely arrogant, he's willing to admit that there are some things he doesn't know. But he'll quickly let you know that those things aren't worth his time. Sometimes, and sadly, bravado seems an attempt to mask his incapacity; he can't write well, or isn't articulate, or is well-informed but only narrowly, or is simply a bit of an isolato. SO. I never approach the student as bluntly as I say all this. Instead I engage in Socratic dialog, ask him to consider others' values, other systems of value, the possibility of his own (and my) limited knowledge. Et cetera. It's refreshing for once just to say that such people are not as well-informed as they think, not as wise about their own futures as they think. AND none of this is to say that the university isn't full of bullshit. After all the first one was started in Bologna, and maybe that's the origin of "full of baloney." But generally the person saying "education is for suckers" isn't capable of spotting the real bullshit, because he's too busy polishing his own particular sacred turd. (Not that we aren't all turd-polishers. You just have to take a break from it now and then to look at the other guy's turd. It might be a nice one.)

Re:Bull...

[Antisyzygy]

The average wage of a person with a BS will still let them make around 800,000 more than a person with a high school diploma in their lifetime. The problem is, you need to be able to get a job and most people in my age group (22-28) cannot get jobs. We're the hardest hit in this economy. Its pretty much a "How can I get experience if no one will hire me without experience" situation right now since the people taking our jobs are older individuals with experience and similar qualifications.

Re:Bull...

[shadowfaxcrx]

What I'm really getting at is that we need to stop looking down our nose at the guys in trade schools. For decades now the welders and pipefitters and anyone else that might be featured on Dirty Jobs have been considered to be beneath the white-collar fields. We need to realize as a society that there's nothing wrong with being a welder, nothing wrong with hard work, and nothing wrong with not having a 9-5 desk job.

As far as liberal education, I'm certainly not against it. I'm against colleges pitching English or Foreign Language or Theater as money-making degrees. For a long time now we've heard "go to college! You'll make more money! Oh, you wanna be a theater major? Cool, sign here!" when really we should be hearing "Go to college and major in something practical and you'll probably make more money! Oh, you wanna be a theater major? OK, but be aware that you're probably going to end up being a waiter."

The other end of that problem is that everyone has a college degree now, including intellectually incurious drones who have no business ever being near a college, and so the value of a degree is cheapened. Used to be that if you got a college degree you were pretty much guaranteed a good job driving a desk somewhere because the degree said something about you and your abilities. Now that everyone and his dog has one, that guarantee no longer exists.

And the offshoot problem is that employers are requiring college degrees for jobs that should never need a college degree. In my town there are a bunch of biotech jobs which require college degrees. These jobs consist of what is essentially factory work. Take chemical from beaker A and squirt it on test card B. Repeat. That kind of work requires about an hour's worth of training. A 4 year degree for such work is stupid.

And the flip side of that offshoot problem is that colleges are starting to require PhD's in order to teach an applied field. My alma mater requires all instructors to hold a doctorate. This means that Tom Brokaw cannot teach TV journalism, Steven Spielberg cannot teach film, and Bill Gates cannot teach business. That is monumentally stupid, especially when you realize that they don't particularly care what your doctorate is in. The chair of their journalism department holds a PhD in philosophy.

In short education, societal impressions of education, and the economy have all come together to collectively cheapen the economic value of higher education, and the degree-factory mentality of many schools has resulted in cheapening the intellectual value as well.

That's not to say that you can't get anything out of college anymore, but it is to say that not everyone can, and yet those who can't are expected to go there anyway.

Re:Bull...

[jedidiah]

I actually encountered the most effective "college skills" instructors in High School, not college.

If you need to be "brought around" by the time you get to college then it's probably too late already.

Re:Bull...

[blind biker]

I'm not sure what you're driving at Are you saying it's OK for liberal arts to be taught that way?

I have no opinion on that issue.
Now please answer my original question, or I'll just assume you invented this shit altogether, and the kind of "teaching" you described exists in only one university: the one in your head.

Re:Bull...

[iceaxe]

Seems to me that "college is a waste of time" is an economic, not an anti-learning argument. Economically college can be a waste of time.

It seems to me that the important part of that statement is "can be". There are plenty of economically well off folks who went to college, and use what they learned to make money. The fact that a few high profile dropouts became billionaires does not make ignorance a statistically likely path to riches. It's demonstrably true that a college degree is not required for financial success, nor for most other forms of success, but I'd posit that the path to riches is paved with being smart, working your butt off, and being lucky, in various combinations. Having or not having a college degree is almost orthogonal. It is but one way of learning what you want or need to learn - but it can be a very good way, provided you apply those other factors (smart, work).

How many English majors are out there making huge bucks vs how many of them are working at Home Depot? How many people got a degree in "web design" or some such fluffery in the 90's only to discover that, gee, there's not a huge market out there for such services.

If I'm going to end up working at McDonalds after I get my 4-year degree, then I might as well skip the degree and work at McDonalds 4 years early.

*raises hand*

B.A. Cum Laude, English Literature. Currently enjoying a reasonably successful career as a software developer/architect. Huge bucks? No. But I'm comfortable, I've raised a family, and gotten one child successfully through college and another in the process. And no, I didn't learn software development in college. I learned how to work hard, be persistent, and figure things out on my own, all of which I use every single day. Could I have learned those things elsewhere? Sure. But college was a crash course in them, where spending 40+ hours a week at a fast food joint or other unskilled career would have atrophied my mental agility worse than public schools did.

As for learning, dunno about the rest of you guys but my college education was largely an exercise in bullshit. Repeat what the professor said if you want an A. Disagree with his premises if you want an F. That's not learning. It's regurgitation. Parrots can do that too, and they don't attend college to do it.

My friend, you did it wrong.

"Making an A" and "Learning" are two very different things. I learned that in college. Trying to make As is what you do while you are in the process of learning. It's also good preparation for Real Life (tm) where stupid BS is de rigeur.

My college education was awesome. I learned a million things, a few of them even in classrooms. But in any other environment I'd have missed out on most of those things, classroom or otherwise.

And of course there's the student attitude side of "education" as well. A good number of my "getting educated" classmates liked to say stupid crap like "well I paid for the class and so the professor owes me an A." Those guys aren't there to learn. They're there to get a piece of paper that says they went to college. That piece of paper is worthless in and of itself. The value comes from either having learned something (and these guys pretty much limited their learning to the fluid dynamics of beer bongs) or from getting a job that you could not otherwise have gotten.

See above. College is an opportunity which can easily be squandered even while earning a meaningless piece of paper. Or it can be seized and squeezed for every last drop of good it can do you. The choice is yours.

Well, you probably can't get that job in this economy anyway, and meanwhile manufacturing jobs are starting to open up, and remain open because companies can't find qualified welders etc. Economically speaking, currently anyway, it makes more sense for a lot of people to go to a trade school and learn how to weld than it does

Re:Bull...

[Have Brain Will Rent]

Seems to me that "college is a waste of time" is an economic, not an anti-learning argument. Economically college can be a waste of time. How many English majors are out there making huge bucks

There is a significant difference between "college is a waste of time" and "college can be a waste of time."

In my own experience I disagreed with my profs - not infrequently and often vocally - and in only three cases did a prof make the mistake of trying to lower my grade for it. One I just laughed at because I couldn't have cared less and he just seemed sad and pathetic. The other two were ordered to change the grade (from below C to A) - it hurt their careers more than mine. And then there were profs at the other end of the spectrum who enjoyed an intelligent challenge/questioning of their position. I think either something else was going on or you are exaggerating that aspect of university.

As for "English majors" a friend of mine was in upper management at IBM and he told me that they often hired "arts" majors and then taught them what IBM wanted them to know about computers. The idea was that it was better to hire someone trained to communicate well and able to interact well with others and teach them technical info than it was to hire someone with technical knowledge and try to turn them into proficient communicators who could work well with others. Perhaps it's different these days.

Re:Bull...

[eepok]

It seems to me that "college is a waste of time" is a tunnel-visioning economic statement... not good life advice. For those who don't give a damn about learning and improving themselves, resisting the imposition at every turn, college can indeed be a waste of time.

I don't know about you guys, but my college education was largely an exercise in question and assertion. I would be asked a question and, based on my learnings thus far, would make an assertion. The quality of logic and ability to recall material would be graded. I disagreed with my lecturers/professors on multiple occasions, but I only spoke up when I was 100% sure about something so I was correct in the matter. In two cases, the person in the front of the classroom disagreed, but wanted me to speak nonetheless. That led to discussion. Everyone who participates enjoys and learns from discussion.

I met some people in school who had obvious grade inflation and went to college increase their earning potential. The certificate of completion they received at the end will help them get interviews (only more so than those without such certificates), but that's about it. If they wasted their time in school, it will show.

Economically speaking, it may be better for some to skip college and go into trades-training. But I would always suggest those who have curiosity (or are willing to have it) to seek professional higher education. There is so much you can learn in a class room setting that cannot be duplicated by books or wikipedia.

But then I'm a fan of a better future... not just a better bottom line.

Re:Bull...

[shadowfaxcrx]

have you considered that you might have been wrong in disagreeing with his/her premises?

It would be intellectually dishonest of me to fail to consider that. However, when one is speaking of an interpretive rather than factual question, such as in a (heh) philosophy course, and one notices a pattern that every time an answer differs with the professor's opinion the grade goes down, one is forced to draw certain conclusions. We're not talking about physics (although I did have a physics prof who's information was out of date and who docked me on a test and refused to reconsider even though I brought him a recent peer-reviewed article that proved me right) or disagreeing on what 2+2 is here, we're talking about a system that gives (I promise you I'm not the only one to have experienced this) lip service to thinking for yourself, yet penalizes you if your self-thought does not mirror that of the instructor's. I'm delighted to see that you are not one of those professors, and in the interest of full disclosure, I had a good number of that kind of professor as well, however I doubt that you will deny that there are bad profs out there.

As for sour grapes, btw, my GPA in college was quite good, and I'm actually working in the career field for which I went to school. There are no sour grapes here regarding how my life turned out as a result of my college education. But there is some annoyance that the work I did to earn that diploma has been cheapened not only by flooding the market with literally millions of people with the same level of educational achievement as I have whether they needed it or not, but also by the overall lack of quality in education.

BTW go on a bit of a tangent here to discuss why I think the argument that "college taught me how to think and so it was good" is somewhat spurious. If so many people have college degrees, and college is so good at teaching us how to think, then why are we as a nation so short-sighted when it comes to interpreting communications? Ads trick us into thinking that a vibrating rod will melt the fat off, that a magnet will double our gas mileage, and that a magic pill that doctors won't tell us about will give us an enormous penis. Politicians say, with a straight face, that if we only give rich people a lot more money, they'll open up businesses selling products for which there is no demand and thusly strengthen the economy. We are told that global warming does not exist because it snowed in April. I could go on until I hit the post length buffer, but I think you get my point - Americans are not, as a rule, very good at critical thinking, and yet nearly a third of us have college degrees. How do you explain this disparity?

Re:Bull...

[shadowfaxcrx]

Far too many treat the University as a trade school.

That's my point. Well, one of them. Why wouldn't they treat the University as a trade school? The University pitches itself as a trade school. "Come here and you'll earn more money!" is the ad pitch, not "Come here and better yourself."

My friend, you did it wrong.

"Making an A" and "Learning" are two very different things.

No I didn't. I learned. I too "squeezed every drop" of learning I could get out of college. But that said, if I allowed my grades to suffer in order to "do it right," I'd have spent many thousands of dollars for an education that might better my understanding of various things, but would not further my career chances. See above; College as Trade School.

Re:Bull...

[shadowfaxcrx]

A state university system in the upper-midwest. Yes, it's accredited. Yes, I have a liberal arts degree.

Better?

Re:Bull...

[physicsdot]

...Repeat what the professor said if you want an A. Disagree with his premises if you want an F.

Could this is an example of the anti-intellectualism Sanger was talking about? Although it *may* have been true in your instance, it sums up many of his themes: that you believe that knowledge is just a social construct, and that a professors assessment of your premises has no more weight than your own, that he is not an expert with a deeper understanding of the subject than yours - that such a thing may not even be possible.

Later you comment that as you'll end up in MacDonalds anyway, you might as well skip college. Once again, this reduces college to something that is only worthy (in your eyes) if it gets you a job. This too is part of Sanger's point. Intellectual investigation is a worthy exercise, even if it doesn't get you a job.

Re:Bull...

[theNAM666]

>Seems to me that "college is a waste of time" is an economic, not an anti-learning argument.

What's the difference?

>Economically college can be a waste of time. How many English majors are out there making huge bucks vs how many of them are working at Home Depot?

I love this tired myth.

The average salary for English majors from Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Stanford and the top tier of Liberal Arts Colleges is well over $150K at age fifty. Compare to the average salary of tech graduates from the ITT level... the difference is the quality of the person and institution, not the major.

>How many people got a degree in "web design" or some such fluffery in the 90's only to discover that, gee, there's not a huge market out there for such services.

WTF does this have to do with the topic?

Re:Bull...

[shadowfaxcrx]

You missed my point entirely.

Re:Bull...

[blind biker]

Was the situation you described standard MO among professors, or just a few bad apples?

Re:Bull...

[swb]

100 percent accurate. All of it.

What's worse is many trades require training and experience and testing AND certification beyond most any white collar jobs. I've known electricians doing work more complicated than anything I've done in IT in 20 years.

Re:Bull...

[metacell]

Well, since the OP argued against his professors, I'll assume he doesn't think knowledge is just a social construct. There'd be little reason for his professors to be upset if he merely argued his own viewpoint was equally valid.

Btw, technically speaking, knowledge IS a social construct. The question is if it's MERELY a social construct.

Re:Bull...

[metacell]

Seems to me that "college is a waste of time" is an economic, not an anti-learning argument.

What's the difference?

The difference is that you're not against learning or academia in themselves. For example, you can believe computer science research is useful and worthwhile, but that the best way to apply computer science is to pick the knowledge up as you go along solving real-world problems, not studying courses for a number of years before you begin your career.

With today's rapid changes in the economy, and in the IT field in particular, which forces you to keep updating your knowledge your whole life, it makes more sense than before to pick it up as you go along

Economically college can be a waste of time. How many English majors are out there making huge bucks vs how many of them are working at Home Depot?

I love this tired myth.

The average salary for English majors from Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Stanford and the top tier of Liberal Arts Colleges is well over $150K at age fifty. Compare to the average salary of tech graduates from the ITT level... the difference is the quality of the person and institution, not the major.

The people who go to Harvard, Yale, Princeton and so on are not a representative sample of the people who attend college. They usually start out with a better socio-economic status and better contacts than other college attendees. Contacts (and knowing how to use them) are extremely important in getting a job.

Re:Bull...

[shadowfaxcrx]

It was a spectrum. I had some really good profs. I had some really awful profs. Most fell somewhere in between, as would be expected.

Re:Bull...

[theNAM666]

>With today's rapid changes in the economy, and in the IT field in particular,
>The people who go to Harvard, Yale, Princeton and so on are not a representative sample of the people who attend college.
>They usually start out with a better socio-economic status and better contacts than other college attendees.
>Contacts (and knowing how to use them) are extremely important in getting a job.

Yeah, yeah, and whatever. There's always a specious counterargument, and the specious counterarguments to your specious counterargument, begin by pointing out that nearly a third of matriculants at these institutions are first-generation college students...

Your argument was that English majors are not worthwhile (etc). The counter-argument is that worthless degress from third and forth tier institutions, are useless degrees from third and forth tier institutions, whether they're in CS or English or Engineering.

On the other side of that, a solid English degree from a first or second tier institution provides communications skills, which are key in any endeavor.

Re:Bull...

[metacell]

Your argument was that English majors are not worthwhile (etc).

No, that was shadowfaxcrx. I jumped into the discussion half-way. And I don't think shadowfaxcrx meant to disrespect English majors specifically - he also mentions web design as an example of a less than useful education.

I do, however, doubt that the college you go to makes much difference. I think most of the differences between the students exist before they get into a college, in the form of social background and motivation. It's natural that the students who get into the most prestigious universities are the most ambitious ones with the highest grades, so it's no wonder they also succeed better later in life.

On the other side of that, a solid English degree from a first or second tier institution provides communications skills, which are key in any endeavor.

Hm... well, I don't have that kind of education. I just make sure to read carefully.

Re:Bull...

[blind biker]

In my two MSc and one PhD curriculas, I met good, bad and excellent professors and TAs - but even the worst of them, implicitly or explicitly, presented a course that required creative thinking. There wasn't one subject that was boring.

I'm listing the worst of the worst of the profs I had, and no... I just don't recall being actually bored during class or while doing the coursework.

Re:Bull...

[theNAM666]

Okay-- I'll accept that you jumped into the 'argument' halfway, then, without knowing what it was about. What if anything does your series of points then have to do with the argument? Nothing as far as I can tell.

That "English" etc are "examples of ..." remains a tired myth. At comparable levels, English is a more useful major than Engineering. The most useful levels to examine, are the big leagues (HYPS/ major LACs). That's the point. And "reading carefully" is not equivalent to understanding.

Re:Bull...

[metacell]

OP is about how some college educations may be pointless from an economic point of view (for those who view education as a way to get a better job, and want the education to pay itself back in dollars and cents).

That's why the OP brings up web design degrees - it's an education which is irrelevant, because there's not much of a market for it in real life. He also brings up English degrees with unambitious students who just sit through classes, which the OP believes don't lead to improved job chances.

English degrees on a higher level may have a much better turn-out, although I believe it has more to do with the background and motivation of the students who go there than with the education itself. I believe the same is true for most educations, not just English.

College isn't Intellectual Enough

[smug_lisp_weenie]

The reason geeks look down on college is because the vast majority of colleges/universities set their bar too low. College professors and students are insulated from market forces and over time this has eroded the system.

BTW, I worked 40 hours a week as a video game developer in college, and still pulled out an A- average at my crappy school (USF) for a Biology degree, even though I skipped most of the classes to go to work.

I think I learned about 10x from my job, where we had to deliver a marketable product on a tight deadline, than I ever learned at my college. Wish I would have skipped that colossal waste of time.

Re:College isn't Intellectual Enough

[toppavak]

College professors and students are insulated from market forces and over time this has eroded the system.

On the contrary, I think the exact opposite is the problem. Colleges are increasingly under pressure to teach skills that will get students jobs, recruit more students to get more funding and twist every metric possible in order to move up in rankings. Take admissions and graduation statistics, for example, the more students that get rejected from a university the more "prestigious and exclusive" it becomes, on the flip side the more students that fail out of the university, the more inept it appears. It is thus in every university's best interest to encourage the widespread ideas that everybody can and should go to college and then relax graduation standards for accepted students.

Even academic research is slowly but surely moving away from high-risk, publicly funded fundamental work to applied technology development (itself not necessarily a bad thing) which has gone hand-in-hand with the rise of the university Technology Transfer Office and a drive to squeeze every drop of money out of that academic research rather than focusing on the core university mission to produce and disseminate knowledge as widely as possible. While the dissemination of many technologies may benefit from patenting and exclusive licensing (particularly tech that requires significant private investment to develop and bring to market), the promise of commercial success has motivated patenting in many fields which do not fit this model.

Re:College isn't Intellectual Enough

[smug_lisp_weenie]

I think my mistake was the school I went to, not the major.

Re:College isn't Intellectual Enough

[smug_lisp_weenie]

I disagree. I think colleges are under pressure to give the _appearance_ of "teaching skills that will get students jobs".

Re:College isn't Intellectual Enough

[jcr]

I think I learned about 10x from my job, where we had to deliver a marketable product on a tight deadline, than I ever learned at my college.

I would expect that to be the case for any job worth doing.

-jcr

Re:College isn't Intellectual Enough

[Larry Sanger]

So, you went to an undemanding college that grants degrees easily. And that logically implies that college, in general, is a waste of time?

Re:College isn't Intellectual Enough

[smug_lisp_weenie]

Fair enough- I meant that colleges are insulated from the kind of market forces that lead to high achievement.

Instead, they are affected by market forces filled with perverse incentives that have little to do with achievement.

Re:College isn't Intellectual Enough

[smug_lisp_weenie]

No, I think going to an elite school, assuming it is affordable to you, may be worth it. I don't know, because I didn't have that opportunity.

Re:College isn't Intellectual Enough

[PraiseBob]

I believe the phrase is: You are what you eat.

You skipped classes to spend time at work, and then say that work taught you more? That seems pretty obvious. You seem to be missing that the opposite would also be true. IF you had spent 40 hours a week on your courses, you would've learned a lot more in them.

Depends on your definition of geek

[dingo_kinznerhook]

Is a person a geek because he/she is antisocial, is an expert in something obscure, or for some other reason?

Re:Depends on your definition of geek

[vlm]

Is a person a geek because he/she is antisocial, is an expert in something obscure, or for some other reason?

According to the article, it's because they're a journalist / marketing dude / manager who tries to influence public opinion by writing about tech. Not really my definition of geek, but if it works for him...

College worked out great for me....

[kaizendojo]

.. I didn't go and I didn't get a degree. Now I make a very comfortable living working three days a week instructing those that DID go to college, how exactly they should be doing their jobs. Ironically enough, one of the markets I specialize in is - wait for it - education.

Re:College worked out great for me....

[wiedzmin]

How many yeas did it take you to get to where you are right now, without college education? Not questioning, or attacking you personally - just curious if you think a degree could have expedited this, by letting you get your foot in the door earlier and at a higher-level, etc.

Re:College worked out great for me....

[rickb928]

Ditto here. I've worked in the IT field for 21+ years, was almost exclusively self-taught, and make good money. I'm a generalist, which disqualifies me for the sort of short-lived, high-pressure, technically focused jobs that appeal to H1Bs and graduates.

But I'm learning Java, 'cause it's here to stay, widely used, and I don;t have to be proficient in it to be employable. Just knowledgable. Sometimes, there is value in being able to deal with the coders and get them back on track. Sometimes, it's just about being able to spot the problem and describe it to the coders in language they can understand. Telling them that the input box keeps defaulting to the previous value get the response 'um, yeah, that's how to works'. The user, on the other hand, gets frustrated telling the support weasels that the behavior requires them to back out of the screen and come back in again, cause the value can't be edited once it's been entered, and that by itself sucks when they have to enter a few hundred data points on the same screen each week.

Is that intellectual? I don't think so. Wrong question.

Re:Intentional?

[cyberchondriac]

Neo-nerd

Lol

[moogied]

College is a waste of time for anyone looking to go into the IT field. Programming? Its iffy honestly. Most places would hire someone with 5 years XP over some college kid with 1 year. So my choices are I could either just work in IT.. spend maybe 100k over my entire life on certs and renewals and make the same as a college kid... or I could go to college, leave with 200k in debt, still need the 100k for certs and renewals, and start 4-7 years after my competition... so.. uh... ya. College? Waste of money sometimes.

Re:Lol

[mjwalshe]

try and get a job at Google with out a degree then

Re:Lol

[blair1q]

Most places would hire someone with 5 years XP over some college kid with 1 year.

Most places should do that, but in reality most will divide the pile of resume's into degreed and non-degreed piles, and look at the non-degreed pile only if the degreed pile has nobody with anything resembling the skill-set in it.

Re:Lol

[vlm]

College is a waste of time for anyone looking to go into the IT field. Programming? Its iffy honestly. Most places would hire someone with 5 years XP over some college kid with 1 year. So my choices are I could either just work in IT.. spend maybe 100k over my entire life on certs and renewals and make the same as a college kid... or I could go to college, leave with 200k in debt, still need the 100k for certs and renewals, and start 4-7 years after my competition...

Before the educational / tuition bubble really took off, my strategy was to use the then omni-present tuition reimbursement scheme at my employer(s) to pay for college.. Worked out well, except for being so far ahead of my class that I was bored silly. Graduated with basically no debt, in fact brokerage acct fulla money, new car, new house, etc. I don't think that's possible with current hyper-inflated tuition. And this was just a decade ago, not in the 50s or whatever.

And that's with a real job ... to get my real job I went to the local CC and got an associates, and kids now a days do not believe that it was financially possible to work a minimum wage job, live in an apartment, own a car, and pay near full time tuition... But it was... Of course corrected for inflation, minimum wage in the early 90s is probably equivalent to $20/hr now....

Re:Lol

[smug_lisp_weenie]

The reason companies like Google give priority to people with degrees is because a degree is a signal that you're the kind of person that can complete a hard task (finishing college, in this case.)

They care less about the knowledge you attained at school.

Re:Lol

[Anonymous Coward]

And this is why employers are more and more looking at software developers the same way they look at framers... just like this jackass here, they think it's just about hammering nails, not realizing a good developer is also part architect, part engineer as well.

Or, at least, the good ones are... the rest are uneducated twats who don't actually know what they're doing. For example, they probably think "certs" have any relevance in the software development world.

PS. IT != "programming", dumbass. Why the fuck the slashbots around here continue to conflate the two, I don't know. But believe it or not, programming and administering my build server are light-years apart as far as careers go.

Re:Lol

[Black Parrot]

The reason companies like Google give priority to people with degrees is because a degree is a signal that you're the kind of person that can complete a hard task (finishing college, in this case.)

Or maybe that you're the kind of person who is willing to put up with endless amounts of arbitrary bureaucratic bullshit...

Re:Lol

[smug_lisp_weenie]

The bureaucratic bullshit _is_ the hard task :-)

Re:Lol

[Anonymous Coward]

Most places would hire someone with 5 years XP over some college kid with 1 year.

How are you going to get that 5 years of experience, eh? They'll definitely hire the college kid with 1 year of experience over the high school grad with 0 years experience.

Re:Lol

[DoomHamster]

try and get a job at Google...........

FTFY

Re:Lol

[rickb928]

You could try a cheaper college. High-end colleges appeal to those who intend to go into research or the high-paying stratum, but for the rest, perhaps your local state college (assuming it's not OSU for instance, maybe) is an option. Good training in fudamentals is not the exclusive province of $50k+/yr schools. And you might get a job in youir intended field even before you graduate... It happens. I seen it....

Ditto for certs. Learn how to learn and avoid the boot camps.

Re:Lol

[Rakishi]

Go to a cheaper college, middle and bottom tier private schools are a rip-off. Cost the same as top schools but provide no financial aid. Basically, either find a cheaper public school or go to a top 10 private school (where financial aid is godly). Everything in between is a rip-off imho unless your parents are loaded (then who cares).

If you really care then get a masters afterward on your employer's dime at a better school.

Re:Lol

[geekmux]

The reason companies like Google give priority to people with degrees is because a degree is a signal that you're the kind of person that can complete a hard task (finishing college, in this case.)

They care less about the knowledge you attained at school.

Perhaps Google in their infinite wisdom could try and prove that this ancient mentality actually results in a more effective workforce, because I have found far more focused and goal oriented individuals born out of our Military than I ever have found coming from any campus.

A piece of paper certifying that you managed to barely pass final exams using nothing more than wrote memorization skills while hung over for a period of four straight years shouldn't be used as an indicator of potential success for your organization. Fifteen minutes interviewing someone face to face should tell you FAR more, regardless of education or experience.

Google is guilty of the same crime as the rest of the corporate world. They've reduced a $100,000 degree to a checkbox to get in the door, nothing more.

Re:Lol

[Comboman]

Almost. One pile is resumes with 5 years experience AND a degree. The other pile is the trash can. And when everyone in the first pile turns down their lowball offer, they complain to the government about there being no qualified workers and demand more visas for foreign workers.

Re:Lol

[Antisyzygy]

It cost me 40k for a BS in Applied Math with a programming focus. Im pretty sure no-one spends 200k on school unless they are at Ivy League, and then they should be working harder because they are guaranteed a very lucrative job if they keep their grades up.

Re:Lol

[Anonymous Coward]

Hate to disillusion you but ... I actually *do* hire technical and IT people, and I most assuredly will hire someone with a college background over someone who just has a bunch of certificates. Why? Because in my experience, the people without the formal schooling background, the ones with a bunch of certs and nothing else, cannot figure their way out of wet paper bag. I have to constantly hold their hands, explain things in great detail and watch their work very carefully in order to ensure that they create and deploy well thought out and robust solutions to problems. The certs are little more than trained monkeys, honestly and I find them to suck down my time without end. I will always hire someone who has the schooling in the fundamentals and the curiosity to understand how things work rather than training on which buttons to push.

Prime example - was hiring someone who had "certs" for a network admin position. Asked them if they had brought up a corporate network before, to which they answered "yes". I then asked them what a "network mask" and "default route" where, to which they had no answer. I asked how they could have brought up a corporate network if they didn't know what these items were? Their reply was "oh, I just plugged in the numbers that the other network guy gave me". I promptly showed them, and all their certs, the door.

Re:Lol

[ruebarb]

good lord, what certifications are you spending 100K for - I have maybe blown 1k over 10 years on my Cisco certifications?

Re:Lol

[iceaxe]

If writing computer programs and acquiring money are the only meaning your life will ever have, you might as well step in front of a bus. Waste of a life.

I left college with no debt at all. I worked to earn the money to pay for it, going part time some times, and got a few grants as well. I didn't finish in four years, and I lived dirt cheap, but I made it, and I will never regret it.

200k is insane. Go to a cheaper school. And get your employer to pay for certs. If your employer won't pay for them, you probably don't need them. For that matter, get an employer to help pay for college. Lots of them have tuition reimbursement programs.

I think this whole 'don't need college' business is a bunch of lazy asses looking for an excuse to quit.

Re:Lol

[Have Brain Will Rent]

Of course corrected for inflation, minimum wage in the early 90s is probably equivalent to $20/hr now....

Unless, where you were, minimum wage was >$10/hr in the early 90's you might want to ask for a refund on your math courses.

Re:Lol

[Have Brain Will Rent]

Most places would hire someone with 5 years XP over some college kid with 1 year.

Really? Done a survey have you? How exactly do you know this?

Seems as if you're just pulling stuff out of your ass in order to justify denigrating college... which in turn seems like a pretty good example of the anti-intellectual attitude being discussed.

Re:Lol

[geoffaus]

that 100K for certs will be a lot less if you work for a good company that pays for training/certs

Re:Lol

[Kjella]

Its iffy honestly. Most places would hire someone with 5 years XP over some college kid with 1 year.

Probably... when you have 10 years XP and the college kid 6 years, that tends to change a bit though, assuming you somehow make it out there. If you're great enough I guess you'll find away around that glass ceiling, but many places you only get so far without a degree. Normally I'd say the education system is a good way to avoid a short recession, but I think now the education system is packed all the way back to the financial crisis in 2008 and the demand still isn't there and pretty soon there'll be a huge oversupply of people who've finished their degree already.

Re:Lol

[IICV]

Programming? Its iffy honestly. Most places would hire someone with 5 years XP over some college kid with 1 year.

Why do people think that college and work are mutually exclusive? Most campuses have some sort of computer infrastructure, and obviously they will hire students - and the best part is that in those jobs, since you're just a student, there's a lot of latitude for side projects and whatnot since nobody expects you to actually be competent, on-time or even sober. Then, when you apply for summer internships at real companies, you can list impressive sounding projects on your resume under the heading of "Campus IT, Student Assistant" - and those summer internships will lead to a full-time job wherever you move after college.

Believe me, companies will hire a college kid with five years of part-time work experience who can handle both graph theory and practical application development over someone with five years work experience who doesn't know what the difference is between a vertex and a node in a graph*.

*I've been asked that before in an interview (as a trick question).

Re:Lol

[swillden]

try and get a job at Google with out a degree then

I work at Google. My team of about 20 engineers contains three people with PhDs, probably ten with MS degrees, several with BS degrees (some, like me, with multiple BS degrees) and two with no degrees at all, though they did spend some time in a university CS program.

Google doesn't particularly care about degrees. Google's interview process does care a LOT that you have a solid background in algorithms and data structures, and definitely requires that you understand algorithmic complexity. It's unusual -- though hardly impossible -- for someone to acquire that knowledge without formal CS training. You also need to be able to write code, but that skill is easy to obtain without schooling.

Re:Lol

[RockoTDF]

I'd like to see anyone get a job at google or some other top company who "managed to barely pass final exams using nothing more than wrote memorization skills while hung over for a period of four straight years"

Re:Lol

[westlake]

College is a waste of time for anyone looking to go into the IT field. Programming? Its iffy honestly. Most places would hire someone with 5 years XP over some college kid with 1 year.

I think its fair to say that the geek is little uncertain - "at sea" - when he looks at the iOS, at Unity, at Windows 8. Even "The Ribbon" can throw him off-balance.

The liberal arts major doesn't have to be told why a name like The Gimp becomes a liability when porting to other operating systems and environments.

The business major will look at Skpe and see the UI. The feature set. The ubiquity of the client. The networking effects and other factors that drive adoption.

Understanding the tech is easy, if the tech is all you know.

Understanding the user is hard.

Re:Lol

[theNAM666]

>College is a waste of time for anyone looking to go into the IT field.

Seriously?

Why don't you walk over to Harvard, Stanford or MIT CS, and try that?

If you're a dunce who will never rise above working for the Geek Squad, then College may be a bad idea because the college opportunities open to you are small-- and you'd do better working on your communications skills. But the reason you're stuck, is probably that you're a dunce, and think that the Geek Squad is "IT."

The age of programmers who can't bathe or brush their teeth, is largely over. And even most of them, went to College and learned real programming in a structured curriculum.

PHP hacking is an entirely different thing.

Re:Lol

[geekmux]

I'd like to see anyone get a job at google or some other top company who "managed to barely pass final exams using nothing more than wrote memorization skills while hung over for a period of four straight years"

For most degrees, the difference between a 2.0GPA and a 4.0GPA is about 10% more effort and dedication. There is no more magic in taking a college class than there was taking a high school class. Same rules apply. College is not hard by any means, which is why my example has some semblance of accuracy here, because I knew people like that who pretty much treated college like one big-ass party. And in the end, they still ended up with a degree and damn good jobs.

And plenty of top executives went to non-Ivy league schools. It all depends on the individual. Those who put blind faith in hiring only those "pedigree" graduates of Ivy-league schools should know by now it's a crap-shoot when it comes to ROI.

C'mon, do you actually think that Google would(or should) care at all about your magna cum laude status when applying for their "think tank" division? Hell no. They want to see how well you can think and analyze out of the box. Creative thinking is what gets results, not some piece of paper hanging on the wall that says you mastered data regurgitation with information that is now obsolete. That was yesterday. What have you done for me today. What can you do for me tomorrow.

Re:Lol

[Billly Gates]

If you dont have that magical piece of paper that says computer science then your not even qualified to answer phones in a call center for 80% of jobs I see, according to hr. Hell, good luck being even a secretary without one in this economy. Many employers are buckling down on filtering applicants out and are used to requiring experience, education, and 3 letters of recommendation before they eill even talk to you. If you lost your job tomorrow I highly doubt you would find another one as easily simply because hr is convinced a computer science degree teaches I.T. Support and web design. Dont under estimate it.

Re:Lol

[vlm]

Of course corrected for inflation, minimum wage in the early 90s is probably equivalent to $20/hr now....

Unless, where you were, minimum wage was >$10/hr in the early 90's you might want to ask for a refund on your math courses.

Not getting your point... My $5/hr job bought me $1/gallon (or LESS) gasoline, my parents house was worth about $75K, and tuition at the local private engineering college was something like $5000/yr full time.

Now its $4/gallon gas, ye olde parental home topped out at the peak of the bubble at $300K, tuition at the local private engineering college is $30K/yr.

Minimum wage is slightly more than $5/hr, but which of those expenses has less than quadrupled?

Re:Lol

[lwriemen]

IT also != administering servers. IT encompasses everything to do with information technology, so it's okay to consider programming within the context of IT.

The rest of your post is spot on; a good developer had better know about requirements analysis, design, test, and technical writing. Of course to get back on topic, colleges don't necessarily teach good software engineering, and the best developers are those who continue learning how to be more productive.

Re:Lol

[immakiku]

Actually the IT you see at Joe Papercompany is different from the IT you need to successfully run a large company whose business is tied to the IT (such as Google or certain types of finance companies). So "most IT" that most people here think they know about is dramatically different from the top 10% of IT.

Re:Lol

[Have Brain Will Rent]

Not sure what the point of the value of your parents' house 3 years ago is, or the price of the other two things. Your claim was general and was that the minimum wage in the 90's is equivalent to $20 and hour now.

You've now supplied that minimum wage was $5/hour. Your claim is that $5 then is $20 now or in the parlance of these things that $5 in 1990 is equal to 20 inflation adjusted 2011 dollars or equivalently that with inflation adjustment $20 now is the same as 5 1990 dollars.

That is a 400% change in about 20 years. That didn't' happen. Based on the US Consumer Price Index the change from 1991 to 2011 was 65% so you are off by a factor of about 7... thus my suggestion about your math courses... of course your math could be correct and simply founded on faulty premises.

BTW it's not really relevant since your claim was more general, but FWIW according to the US EIA the average price of regular gas in the US on Dec 3 1990 was $1.34 and on December 13 2010 it was $2.93 for an inflation of 218% not the >400% you are stating. Of course the price varied wildly during that period and from region to region so choosing gas price at any two points in space-time is probably not the best choice for a measure. There are similar problems with choosing tuition for a measure. But again you were making a generalization so specific measures are not relevant.

Maybe? But not because Larry Sanger says so.

[Shortgeek]

TFA is a load of strawmanning - he discusses an interesting point, which I won't go into because I haven't thought/read enough about it, but his discussion is oh-so-exaggerated. To quote:

"The classics, being books, are also outmoded. They are outmoded because they are often long and hard to read, so those of us raised around the distractions of technology can’t be bothered to follow them; and besides, they concern foreign worlds, dominated by dead white guys with totally antiquated ideas and attitudes. In short, they are boring and irrelevant."

It would be rather hard to find any person, geek or no, who would say something like that. I think that definitely, there are some geeks who are decidedly anti-intellectual. (Just like there are some geeks who are decidedly intellectual.) And if Larry Sanger wants to copy a couple of their statements and distill them down to a J'accuse - well, congratulations. He's done what every political pundit does every day.

Re:Maybe? But not because Larry Sanger says so.

[Intron]

But like any caricature, there is a grain of truth in what he says. Let's take a quick poll. How many people have read a work by a "Great Author" in the last year, like Shakespeare or Faulkner? And no, I don't count Neal Stephenson as a Great Author -- the only sci-fi that might make the cut is Bradbury. My personal favorite, Elmore Leonard, is not on the list, either, so I fail.

Everyone would condemn someone who said the above quote as anti-intellectual, but maybe we should glance at the mirror first.

Re:Maybe? But not because Larry Sanger says so.

[mjwalshe]

Ah the great Author fallacy (tell me which is the latest contender for the GAN?) - as some one commented its eng lit grads with thirds bashing the Lord of the Rings - because Tolkien pointed out the error in there argument in a tutorial before the war

It is not so long ago when you referred to the "modern writers" in a literary sense you meant Shakespeare. Real authors where Thucydides, Plato and so on - and those ghastly modern "novelists" simply beyond the pale my dear - total penny dreadful trash.

Fad, Will Pass.

[Medevilae]

Similar to the current hipster movement, it's not cool enough, almost too "mainstream" to be an intellectual right now. Some geeks try to hide their intellectual side- not necessarily abandoning it, for the sake of being different and special. This is amplified by the sheep who follow those other geeks, thinking that the underlying motivations for their kinds' exodus was something other than self definition/separation/what have you. Reddit is a good example. They're obviously still geeks, but they try to hide it by putting stress on life and (usually) lies about their social life, something unheard of and in fact rather unnecessary on the internet when you're not in a setting with people you know in real life usually, however the behavior persists for the aforementioned reason. Whenever the balances of the great hipster scales are tipped, you'll see the converse of this. Also I can't have linebreaks? I am not happy.

Only among the loud.

[TheSpoom]

The rest of us are still expanding our skills, finding jobs, studying in school, and generally doing our thing. It's just really easy for it to look like the loudest represent us all. (This applies to more than just geekdom.)

What?

[oic0]

Seems a bit trollish. If anything geeks are more likely to flame you for not knowing some obscure bit of information. Perhaps the "hipness" of being a geek has drawn in a few mindless idiots though. In my opinion geeks fall in to one of two categories. The "hip" crowd that is also usually very liberal, also because it is hip. These people are usually borderline retarded. At the other end of the spectrum are the real geeks who can't help but be a geek. These people typically don't buy in to any political propaganda and lean towards general distrust and dislike of the government regardless of party,

Re:What?

[rickb928]

You make geek sound political... Wow, that sucks.

Re:What?

[oic0]

Reading comprehension failure? I didn't say liberals are retarded. I said people who are liberal because it is hip are retarded. If you don't think that failure to think for yourself is retarded I am not sure what can be done for you. Also, yes I think you could find correlational data to link geeks to a particular political view and I said that I think that view is typically that both sides are worthless.

Re:First post

[maxwell demon]

Cause I didn't go to college and so got here 4 years before everyone else.

Well, maybe if you had been to college you would have learned how to really get first post. :-)

Poor Example

[geoffrobinson]

It is a very poor example to use college. For many people, it is a waste of time. For many others, even if you do receive a good education, you get a ton of debt.

What the parent post seems to be saying is that if you disagree with a position that you hold or that a majority of educated folk hold, that is anti-intellectual. That isn't anti-intellectual. That is a minority viewpoint. There is a difference.

Id have to disagree

[umask077]

I see some of what you are saying. Yes it was stated that college is a waste of time. This can be true. Depends on the field. Undergrad level of school is more about if you can do homework and take a test then actual knowledge gaining it seems. I disagree that geeks abandon knowledge because they abandon traditional concepts. Geeks are the forefront of change. The geek is the one who is smart and is likely to be successful or so we were taught in high school. When I worked in IT i skipped college and part of high school. Knowledge and my ability to research beyond traditional means moved me well into the 6 figure salary range. Do to numerous circumstances I find myself reexamining my life and needing a change from the stress of IT work. I've reentered college but I don't feel its a waste as my knowledge of my new field, psychology is limited from a professional standpoint. I have no doubt I could have another job in IT without those degrees but in person growth I am forced this time to get a degree. Is it a waste? No, its about if you learn from it. Sitting through a class in say "Unix shell scripting" would be pointless for me but If I wanted that IT degree odds are I would need it. It doesn't mean I can't do the job. College is about training people so they can do a job. If you can do a job without it then there is no reason why you need that degree, but if you can't its time for training. Its pretty simple. As to rejecting paper media if its on the screen are you going to learn any less from it? Geeks want innovation and paper books are an antiquated relic of times past. Technology is an enabler and it should be used as such. As to opposing knowledge that seems absurd. If someone truly opposes knowledge its probably time to remove them from the gene pool.

Re:Id have to disagree

[DorkRawk]

"College is about training people so they can do a job."

This is why people start arguing that college is a waste of time. Because, this is WRONG.

Vocational schools are about job training. Working on practical projects (often part of college courses) is about job training. Internships are about job training.

College is about learning how to learn. Yes, a lot of what you need to know to be a good programmer can be learned without ever setting foot inside a classroom. A good college degree in computer science IS NOT about learning to be a programmer. This is like studying mechanical engineering because you want to be a mechanic.

People who are hard workers tend to be good at their specific job whether or not they went to college, but college forces you to study things you might not study on your own (why would I study Eastern Religions if all I want to do is write software!?) and THIS IS A GOOD THING! It makes you more adaptable. It's why you're degree holding boss is your boss, even though you can code circles around him.

Yes, many people throw themselves into too much debt because they feel obligated to go to college, when what they really want is vocational training and that's where I agree that college isn't for everyone (no matter how smart you are). But most of the time the people who say that "College is a waste of time" either lucked out and got into a position that they want to stay in forever on their own or wasted their time in college.

Re:Id have to disagree

[Mephistophocles]

College is about training people so they can do a job.

No, that's trade school. Only in recent memory has college become a worker-factory, all about providing base-level skills (and most recently, only the facade of those) required to get a job and make money. College that does what you suggest is just an institution to manufacture wage-slaves.

The irony of course is that, as many true geeks will tell you, college is hardly required to get a good job and make lots of money; the richest often have no degree and while I haven't seen actual numbers, I wouldn't be surprised if a majority of top wage-earners have limited college, at most. Those who do attend and complete college (probably the vast majority of them) end up with (at best) mediocre jobs (which, in the U.S, they may have just lost given the current unemployment rate).

Call me an idealist, but college shouldn't be primarily about getting a good job. That may be a happy side benefit, but college should be about higher education - that is, building upon basic skills learned in pre-college education (critical thinking, intermediate mathematics, hard sciences, and fine arts) to refine the person as a human being. College should be an institution where those people with the required talents may learn the skills to transcend the worker-class and obtain the tools needed to accomplish something truly great (be it art or science, or perhaps both). Sadly, a scant few current high-school graduates have even basic math and hard science skills, and no critical thinking or fine arts skills at all, and they graduate college with nothing added. I suggest that the wage-slave mentality you've outlined in your statement is largely to blame.

Overly Skeptical

[hsjserver]

I'm not sure that's exactly the phrasing I would use for it. I think I'd call it unhealthy skepticism, where we've become so cynical to what we've been told that we automatically discount it and fall back on how we tend to see things. I suppose they're pretty similar but I don't think that's really how those types of people see themselves, and they probably deserve the benefit of the doubt. I notice it most when anything political or economic comes up and we hear about how we're going to turn into Zimbabwe because PRINTING MONEY, but I think it has more to do with the difficulty to find and digest real information when 90% of claims made are on their face bullshit, and another 7% seem legit but are actually bullshit.

So I guess, sure, some are anti-intellectual, but I think most of us just have a hard time sifting through the noise.

Geek Reactionism

[oldrepublic]

There is a new level of geek culture that seems to be less like the island of calm spirit that I used to love in my childhood and more a loudmouth beer swilling defensive stance that will argue and ram opinions down any and everybodies throat that disagrees. You see much of this online winging on about how youd be 'fun at parties' and other comments that quite frankly aren't what made the culture strong. bb

Re:Um... college is a waste of time.

[gearsmithy]

I think the more appropriate statement is that college is a waste of time, for some people.

Happiness through the lack of thought?

[Max Romantschuk]

Ignorance is bliss, they say...

I don't think it's (only) Anti-Intellectualism.

[deathcloset]

Among the ignorant, of course there is anti-intellectualism: this is by nature. I think among the intelligent, however, there is a sentiment of antiestablishmentarianism.

The two sentiments maybe coincide and so have a combined effect to erode the public faith in institutional education, but amoung geeks, the intelligent and the educated it's not anti-intellectualism.

I am not unintelligent. Throughout school, however, I did terribly. This is not a new story.

There is perhaps a growing feeling or perception that current education is mostly about memorization at the great expense of imagination. Imagination is creation. Memorization is indoctrination.

Re:I don't think it's (only) Anti-Intellectualism.

[Mephistophocles]

There is perhaps a growing feeling or perception that current education is mostly about memorization at the great expense of imagination. Imagination is creation. Memorization is indoctrination.

True, and imagination is a trait of artists and free men. Indoctrination is how one creates slaves.

Re:I don't think it's (only) Anti-Intellectualism.

[Fallingcow]

Did poorly, too, from junior high through college. Usually knew the material as well as the top two or three in the class though, at all levels. For some reason I have a huge amount of trouble motivating myself to do school work. No problem with work ethic in any other area. Very strange.

My best guess is that I subconsciously categorize it as play, and since it's really boring and crappy play (not even any good for learning, as it's so slow), I don't want to do it. Can't figure out any other explanation. Easily learn new things and finish projects at work, easily dedicate hours to learning things I just want to know. Only formal education gives me that kind of trouble. I spent years fighting myself over it, and never did get much better.

So yeah, personally I kind of hate higher education. Couldn't pay me to go back. It's not you, though, higher ed.--it's me.

No

[oldhack]

No, you're wrong.

STFU and go away.

Paradigm shift

[peacefinder]

Don't confuse anti-academicism with anti-intellectualism. People are just as interested in learning as they ever were, but the monopoly on higher education held by the university system for the last couple centuries is crumbling in the face of the freer exchange of ideas offered by the internet.

Universities are in the content delivery and certification business. They're suffering the same internet-related issues as other content delivery systems as other options become viable. (Khan Academy, anyone?) But worse for them, they've allowed their certification standards to steadily be weakened, while at the same time raising their prices far faster than inflation. Faced with paying ridiculous prices for weak degrees when free options abound, it's hardy surprising that many choose to opt out.

Re:Paradigm shift

[AtlantaSteve]

On the other hand, I just noticed that he titled his post "Paradigm shift". Actually, you can mod *down* for that.

Re:Paradigm shift

[peacefinder]

Hee-hee. That was just to build credibility with the academic crowd. :-p

Re:Paradigm shift

[peacefinder]

"That sounds like a reasoned response. Got any research to back it up? Of course, for suitable research to actually be meaningful, it would probably require recognised experts in commerce and education. Might want a quick trip down to your local university to see if you can find some.

Oh, wait. You don't believe in them. Well, you just go ahead spouting unsupported statements."

Most amusing.

To treat your post seriously for a moment, you're overlooking a very substantial truth: Good science is arrived at by an open process, not by a university's stamp of certification. Recognized experts are entirely optional to good science.

I'll freely admit that I've done no studies; although salted with fact, what I wrote above is opinion not science. But there's nothing stopping someone from doing science on these questions, inside academia or out.

Where is the anti-intellectualism?

[Toonol]

The Peter Thiel-inspired claim that college is a waste of time is just the latest example.

I think you should be concerning yourself about whether college may be showing signs of anti-intellectualism. I think you could make some strong arguments that it is, and that its importance and utility has diminished.

Re:Where is the anti-intellectualism?

[hsjserver]

I'm not sure, though your point it certainly valid. I think it has more to do with the input college gets these days, because public school are essentially day-cares now. That's too bad because I think most people who teach are very capable, but they don't have the type of funding and a poor home life for kids does major damage to their education prospects. As for the importance of college, yeah, I think for a lot of areas we'd be much better served with trade schools, but with the economy as it is, you need a degree just to differentiate yourself from the hordes of unemployed looking for the same work. McDonald's might take you, but who wants that?

Anti-Institutionalism

[SageinaRage]

There's a difference between anti-intellectualism and anti-institutionalism.

College HAS become a waste of time

[unity100]

colleges, universities come from scholastic roots from their roots in 13th century church universities. even the word scholar, scholastic has church roots. over the centuries, universities have served good use by liberating themselves from their religious aspect and adopting positive sciences, but, they have more or less maintained the general hierarchical and monolithic structure of the scholastic roots. curriculums et al remain almost same for centuries in system and mechanics. this worked well for centuries. but ....

times have changed. we have the information revolution now, the internet, intellectual and processing power of the crowds, new methods, new approaches, new techniques. it moves fast now. colleges and universities cant keep up with internet. you can see it at the minimum in the difficulty of i.t. related departments of colleges for keeping up with the fast tech.

we need something new in our times. and i guess it will be something having to do with internet.

Re:College HAS become a waste of time

[unity100]

i ate it

Quotes

[Synn]

A few quotes by a few people doesn't make for a culture of Anti-Intellectualism. The change in how knowledge is acquired over the last 20 years has been beyond drastic. 20 years ago when I wanted to do a paper on super novas and pulsars I spent days in the library sorting through books. Today all that information, and more, is available to me in seconds.

It's completely valid that this sort of change will shake up how humans deal with education and the transfer of knowledge. It's also good to be questioning the impact such systems have on us as a whole(such as how the super organic impacts knowledge when it's completely free flowing and popular opinions percolate to the top). Questioning old guard institutions and methods isn't Anti-Intellectualism, it's quite the opposite.

Re:Quotes

[binary paladin]

Unless, of course, you're trying to justify the six figures you spent on the university and have little to show for it—or hell, you have something to show for it and need to stuff your opinion down all our fucking throats.

Most people who drone on and on about "anti-intellectualism" are just trying to label their opponents and put themselves on some kind of fucking pedestal. Information and education will evolve tremendously in the next decades and hopefully for the better. The cost of college is going to hit its own bubble soon because, right now, it's out of control.

How is it we managed to have universities 50 years ago without people going 5 - 10 years worth of salary into debt just for the privilege of going?

Yes.

[LWATCDR]

A coder is not a computer scientist or even really a programer. They have the same relationship to a programer as draftsperson has to an engineer or architect. Some coders can become programmers but they are the ones that read Knuth and take classes and so on. It is going down hill fast folks, I deal with support techs that don't understand what an ascii file is. They have no idea what Unicode is. And they really don't even know what binary is. Most don't even know that it takes 1024 bytes to make a kilobyte and 1024 kilobytes to make a megabyte much less why.
Sure they can tell me which GPU is the fastest but they will also things like AMD video cards suck because their drivers are crap. Or better yet that Macs suck! They have never used one or a Linux box but they know that it sucks....
Sigh...
I gave them a link to some free computer science texts I have found including one my Wirth. Not one of them bothered to read them.
I fear that as more people adopt the label "geeks" the more the rift raft creeps in. Hell they are showing wrestling on the Science Fiction channel!
That is how bad we have fallen!

Re:Yes.

[Jaborandy]

The wild poularity of ThinkGeek proves that the self-applied Geek label is meaningless now. Everyone and their brother claims it now.

Re:Yes.

[ADRA]

"1024 bytes to make a kilobyte and 1024 kilobytes to make a megabyte much less why."

Well, technically we're talking kibibyte's and and mebibyte's if we're going by standards here... but your sentiments aren't far from a lot of people's reality.

It all comes down to scale. If you have millions of programmers of varying scale of 0 - 1, you're going to deal with a lot of 0.1's in your job. The closer to systems development and hopefully academic programming the closer to 1 you get.

Re:Yes.

[LWATCDR]

Good heaven is any programer didn't know that I would scream. These are the support techs I am talking about.

Re:Yes.

[LWATCDR]

Oh and the another sign that geeks aren't anymore. Grammar and spelling trolls on Slashdot.

Not anti-intellectualism...

[dyingtolive]

...but more like a focus away from what I can only call "traditional intellectualism". It's the "I'm smart enough to drop out of school at 16 and get my GED so that I can start on real life rather than high school bullshit" mentality. I know a guy who did that. Started working at a mom & pop ISP back in the 90s, and then went on to be a successful network engineer. Also, college IS overrated. Sure, the piece of paper looks nice, might get you another $AMOUNT of money on your paycheck, but at the end of the day, it's still sophistry to the highest degree, and you spend that additional $AMOUNT of money paying it back for years to come. For anyone actually genuinely interested in learning, and not just looking for a job, we have Internet resources like Khan academy, tutorial sites, and Wikipedia (love it or hate it, it is informative enough to be a starting point). Honestly, I trust Wikipedia more than I trust most of the "professors" I had in college, but perhaps I'm just bitter, and/or perhaps I just picked a shit school.

On the other side of the coin, I could also see Mr. Sanger having a legitimate point. I refuse to accept any research on 'controversial' issues with large amounts of political or corporate interest behind them. I refuse to believe in or against global warming, for example. For some reason, people are too polarized on the topic, and I can't find any information I trust on the subject, so I willfully ignore anything I encounter concerning the topic, and do not take a stand as I do not feel well informed enough to feel justified. Most 'studies' I read that aren't paywalled in a journal somewhere always have that 'corporate slime' feel to them, and so I hear about the new medical breakthrough or recent scientific finding, and I can't help but think to myself, "Is that real? How are they going to market that?"

Is it right, wrong, good, bad, or otherwise? I wish I knew. I'm not informed enough to be able to make a decision.

The whole premise is wrong

[thomp]

Not knowing that the Battle of Hastings was in 1066 is not anti-intellectual. Knowing trivial facts about that event does not necessarily mean you understand the significance of that event.

Re:The whole premise is wrong

[Mindcontrolled]

True - but the reverse is also true. Knowing that the Battle of Hastings happened 1066 is not intellectual. Intellectualism is integrating lots of facts, which, each for itself, are apparently trivial, to a bigger picture. Intellectualism is pattern recognition in a sea of seemingly unrelated and trivial facts. That should be a geek thing. At least for me, it is.

Re:The whole premise is wrong

[Americano]

-- I went home.
-- I lit a fire in the fireplace.
-- I filled up a tank of gasoline.
-- I left the house..
-- I bought matches and charcoal.

Without knowing what time (or at least, the relative chronological ordering) of each of the events above occurred in, was it arson or an accident that burned my house down?

If you know those "trivial" facts about when something occurred, you might see additional significance in the events which occur before and after. You're going to have trouble understanding the significance of the event without knowing some of those "trivial" facts about the event. Tell me, what intellectual conclusions can you draw about the causes and repercussions of the Battle of Hastings if you only know "it was a battle, that took place near, in, or involved somebody or something named Hastings?"

When somebody says you've won a Pyrrhic Victory, would you be inclined to pat yourself on the back for a job well done? You might, if you don't know the context of the battle being referred to there. But why would you need to know trivial facts about an old battle? It's stupid to waste time with that stuff, right?

Anti Real intellectualism? Or anti pretensions?

[Mike Van Pelt]

TFA has been melted into slag by slashdotting, so maybe the author covered this, but I wonder what, exactly, is meant by "intellectual"? A lot of what passes for it has less to do with rational works of the intellect than with currently trendy fashions among those who pat themselves on the back for being "intellectuals."

Geeks tend to not go along with that sort of crowd. (They have their own sorts of crowds.)

Re:College?

[hedwards]

Noam Chomsky? You mean the same one that said that somewhere in the brain is a Language Acquisition Device, but I won't propose where it is or what specifically it encompasses, that Chomsky?

College is what you make of it, if you don't take advantage of the environment to question authority and find the answers that are bugging you, then you're not going to be educated, ever. College just tends to speed the process up a great deal by requiring study in areas outside your major and providing the catalysts for further study. If you can't continue on your own after graduation then the college has failed miserably at it's job.

FTFY

[TimHunter]

'At the bottom of the slippery slope, you seem to be opposed to everything.'

/. commenters, lacking knowledge substitute cynicism, lacking experience substitute pessimism, lacking wit substitute sarcasm, and lacking passion substitute indignation.

Re:FTFY

[Anthony]

I heartily agree. Many Slashdot commenters are indistinguishable from Youtubers.

Re:FTFY

[Tarsir]

I was just thinking that. Wish I had mod points. Well said.

Re:FTFY

[StoneyMahoney]

The Internet is a great place for meeting people who think exactly like you do in order to ridicule those who don't. It also disguises short-term popularity as long-term success and the slightest flash of inspiration as life-long genius. The vastly overwhelming majority of people who come to /. will never actually achieve anything that hasn't been achieved before, including myself, but we can gather round to celebrate those dwindling number of successes and feel like we were there when the trail was blazed and the boundaries pushed back. But if we then pooh-pooh the very processes by which we learn to extend human capability (and I may be wrong but I always seem to detect a hint of jealousy whenever I hear people make those arguments) then we contribute to the threatened developmental stagnation of the human race as a whole. Lucky for us, the real people doing the work most likely don't read this crap, they just go on with their research and development blissfully unaware that a bunch of undermotivated morons and nay-sayers think they're doing it wrong.

Tell me, anti-intellectual fools, how do you fit the Large Hadron Collider into your college-is-a-waste-of-time ramblings?

More Specific

[xclr8r]

Anti-Intellectual? No

Anti-Institution? Probably Yes.

A large portion of geeks today are self taught and have confidence in their own ability to figure things out. The institution is worthless to them. I just watched Jaws recently and I relate the owner of the boat an old Sea Hand who kept making fun of the college researcher. Near the end of the movie he runs out of ideas and finally starts listening to the college kid. (Maybe I'm just buying into Hollywood stereotypes).

As they pass on do they want their knowledge to be lost so other geeks can re-invent the wheel and get to the same point they did .. or do they want to build upon the existing knowledge base - this is where the institution comes in. Unfortunately a lot of institutions have been slow on the uptake for IT.

I'll take my Karma hit now.

Blame

[bi$hop]

It's all Geek Squad's fault. The very definition of geek was tainted the moment they started bundling their services at Best Buy.

anti-intellectuals, not anti-intellectualism

[t2t10]

As an intellectual, I'm anti-intellectual, in the sense that I take nobody's word for granted, even if they are supposed to be a "recognized expert". Either explain your reasoning or go away.

Nullius in verba.

Re:anti-intellectuals, not anti-intellectualism

[Mindcontrolled]

Well, you cite the motto of the Royal Society. That's not exactly a new one - that's the classic intellectual stance. How that translate into "anti-intellectuals" is beyond be. I haven't met many intellectuals who would have demanded me to bow to any authority. Sure, it happens that in a specific field some opinion gets overwhelmingly strong so that you have indeed problems to speak against it, but I never encountered that as a systemic problem. There are intellectual fads, each field has them, but in the end, healthy skepticism carries the field through that.

Re:anti-intellectuals, not anti-intellectualism

[t2t10]

Well, read what Larry Sanger wrote:

1. Experts do not deserve any special role in declaring what is known. Knowledge is now democratically determined, as it should be.

In fact, experts do not and should not have any special role in declaring what is known. They can explain and advise, they can point at experiments and interpretations of those experiments.

But ultimately, truth is, in fact, democratically determined, both in the sciences and in democracies. That may fail sometimes, but the alternative is that truth is determined by popularity contests and official credentials, and that is far worse.

Re:anti-intellectuals, not anti-intellectualism

[lennier]

But ultimately, truth is, in fact, democratically determined, both in the sciences and in democracies.

No, it isn't. Truth simply is, and it's our job to find out what it is and adjust our beliefs accordingly. Our beliefs about truth may or may not be democratically determined, and beliefs may change from day to day and place to place as the whims of politics and fashion blow, but none of our beliefs can ever change the truth one bit.

Where did this weird idea that 'truth' is something that people create come from? It's just bizarre and nonsensical.

That may fail sometimes, but the alternative is that truth is determined by popularity contests and official credentials, and that is far worse.

Er, but "democratically determined" is a popularity contest. That's what democracy means!

Re:anti-intellectuals, not anti-intellectualism

[t2t10]

Where did this weird idea that 'truth' is something that people create come from? It's just bizarre and nonsensical.

Words in natural languages have multiple meanings. You picked the wrong one. Go try figure out what meaning I was referring to, then we can talk again.

College is what you make of it.

[jhantin]

For me, college coursework -- especially computer science coursework -- was mostly a breeze, an overview and introduction to the material. What made it worthwhile was the time spent digging deeper than the classes -- independent study in the truest sense of the word. College creates the environment where that kind of self-directed, self-motivated learning is possible. The Internet facilitates the flowering of a new Invisible College beyond the conventional campus.

Anti-intellectual sentiment is so prevalent in the zeitgeist of much of America, the Middle East and central Asia, it's no surprise some geeks are picking it up. Anti-college sentiment specifically, on the other hand, likely arises from the large number of graduates -- even those with master-level degrees -- that are unable to "hit the ground running" in a work environment, or even require refresher courses on basic algorithms and data structures such as breadth-first search with associated queues.

Re:College is what you make of it.

[jedidiah]

...so is a library.

Want to be "educated"? Then you can do it in the same manner as Jefferson and skip the student loans.

This is one of the greatest reasons we have public libraries.

Knowledge does not require a college of cardinals and bishops and other assorted gatekeepers and bridge trolls.

Re:College is what you make of it.

[jhantin]

I'll grant that -- the accreditation document is not the knowledge. Perhaps the problem is that the accreditation document is used by employers as a marker for the knowledge, and they are willing to accept a ton of false positives and false negatives in an early rough screening pass through the applications as long as that pass both reduces the number of applications and does not worsen the odds of each applicant actually having knowledge.

Re:College?

[Vlad_the_Inhaler]

I went to college, was there for 4 years (that was the way the course was set up).
After 3 years I almost dropped out. I felt I had learned all I was going to learn at that place. I was talked into remaining there another year.
That last year was totally finals-orientated. "Finals" turned out to be totally rote-knowledge based, something which rather surprised me.

Yes, the last year was pretty much a waste of time. Nothing I picked up during that time actually turned out to be of any use, apart maybe from the degree itself - something which I have never needed since. The preceding (third) year - *that* was loaded with useful information.

Tradition of geek independence

[penkwe]

Geeks have always had a tradition of valuing independent thinking and doing things, including thinking, for themselves. It's a bit like being religious without belonging to an organized religion. That's part of why geeks, even when going to college, may not graduate in a standard amount of time, or may not graduate at all. During my undergrad years many decades ago at MIT (and yes I graduated in a standard amount of time) it was not that uncommon to see perennial quasi-students who contributed to the life and culture of the institution without any semblance of traditional participation. Opting out of college altogether and going into business directly these days may not be all that different, depending how it occurs.

Outliers

[ZeroNullVoid]

This is the opinion using the extreme outliers but...

But in it's defense, I got an IT degree (actually I got 3 degrees, but that is a different story) and I can honestly say the only thing I learned that is real-world relevant is the jargon/naming conventions for stuff I already knew.

So basically I learned how to properly name and refer to things in a way that management would NOT understand.

I am all open to knowledge, however the academic systems are unable to keep up with their current models.

A 12 year old reading up on the internet and letting their natural curiosity set them on their journey for knowledge while having someone to chat with who is more progressed in their journey will learn more and actually understand it, instead of being a memorization or boxed in college student.

All a degree is a piece of paper that say you have some background in this field and you are capable of learning to meet the minimal expectations of your professors.

Please note, I was not a slacker in college, I got 3 degrees in 5 years time and had an overall GPA of 3.8.

DIY

[snooz_crash]

Geeks have never been "intellectual." They have been smart and focused on their own subject (read "obsessive'). The internet has now made it possible to for these DIYers to bypass the traditional form of education. Intellectualism equates to being well rounded - that only happens later in life, when the geek has saturated his knowledge on his own subject and decides to branch out.

for a lot of people college IS a waste of time...

[night_flyer]

... and money

higher ed has been pushed on a whole generation whether they were prepared for it or not. Some of the most successful business people did not go to college, and they were successful because they were able to do things their way and not "conform" to the proper way to do something because they were never exposed to it.

Just look at how many people are so far in debt because of student loans, colleges aren't just there to educate, they are there to make money.

Or...

[Kyd_A]

I think the meaning of "geek" is in flux.

You could argue that at one point "geek" was just a term for "non-academic intellectual." Now it seems that "geek" is a much looser term, requiring only a fondness for technology.

As an geek in the high old fashion, it's a bit sad to see the word lose its meaning, but "real" geeks are still out there.

Larry Sanger is anti-intellectual

[timster]

Personally, I think it's antil-intellectual to criticize the way others are learning to think and operate in a new, more complex world. I think it's anti-intellectual to proclaim that Wikipedia is useless. I think it's anti-intellectual to boldly assert that Google is making us stupid without solid research showing diminished capacity to solve real-world problems.

I think there's a real case to be made that some "democratization" of knowledge is a good thing. It's not that we can vote on the truth (and it's essentially dishonest for Sanger to continue to insist that Wikipedia operates democratically). I don't believe that it's very useful to absorb "knowledge" from the uninformed but I also don't believe that this is really what people are doing. Rather, I think the new information technologies make it possible to absorb knowledge from a wider, more diverse array of knowledgeable people.

I don't think anyone believes that you can understand a complex topic without careful study. However, I think it makes sense to expect the nature of this careful study to shift over time. There is some sense that "facts" are less important and understanding more so, and I think that in the past there has been in fact too much emphasis placed on memorized facts as a substitute for understanding.

We can debate the benefits of different methods of learning, but I fear that Larry Sanger in particular is not contributing to this discussion. Rather I feel he has a tendency to mis-state the arguments of those who disagree with him (Wikipedia as a democracy, etc). I wish he would spend more time understanding why Wikipedia is a better, more useful model than something like Citizendium.

Re:Larry Sanger is anti-intellectual

[Deus.1.01]

As one that belives diversity is important in any context, society or otherwise...I still belive there must be rigour.

How do you think the anti-vacine crowd got so popular?

(maybe a bit more ridiculus example)
What do you think happened in Europe when the bible was handed to laymen without the theologians.(as much as the Chatolic church was repulsive at the time the varius sects that popped up burning jews were way worse)

Those are examples on mass information backfirering.

Re:Larry Sanger is anti-intellectual

[timster]

I think you're ignoring the ways that projects like Wikipedia are developing to include rigor. Look, my whole point is that I don't think anyone is seriously arguing for a 100% naive interpretation of "wisdom of crowds".

The bible thing is a really good example actually. Although handing the bible to laymen resulted in a whole ton of bad theology which persists to this day, could history really have gone any other way? Even the modern Catholic Church is still repulsive and ridiculously stale despite attempts at reform. Keeping everything in the tower would not have worked.

Nerds vs Geeks

[moozh84]

I think there is a difference between geeks and nerds. They both like Star Wars and Dungeons and Dragons... but geeks hate school and nerds love it.

Where did these thoughts come from?

[Zelucifer]

After reading this article, I have to wonder, how did A + B = C? No one has seriously argued that classics no longer need to be read, no one is saying education is important and no one claims that knowing the exact date of the Hundred Year War is a necessary part of every single person's life! There is a huge difference between necessary information and tertiary information, aka trivia. This editorial fails not only to differentiate the two but also to clearly understand the points other articles, cited within this one, attempt to elucidate.

The often cited, rarely understood article referring to a programmer's need (or lack there of) for a formal education is a great example of ways this article fails to understand the very material it references. No one has ever argued that programmers require no education. No one truly believes that coder's are born with silver keyboards in there mouth. The article simply states that a formal education is not strictly necessary. This of course leads back to the overarching flaw in this article, the juxtaposing of formal and informal education into one swiftly discarded container. Obviously for the sake of this argument, informal education is anti-intellectualism. No matter how self-educated One is.

As any reasonable amount of observation will tell you, there is a constant public outcry to remove all difficult readings from public schools, or to cut up Romeo and Juliet into smaller, twitter-sized bites. Similar to Dan Brown's rather pathetic style of writing. While it is hard to argue that there has not been an attempt to dumb down, censor, rewrite and remove the flavor of classics, see for instance, the attempts to change Huckleberry Finn's "nigger" to "slave", completely ignoring the "free niggers" who would become "free slaves, and of course in some ways this does lead to an anti-intellectual slope, the vast majority of the population still strongly believes in education! Yes, many want the world to be black and white, and to eliminate all shades of grey, but thankfully for the geeks, for the nerds, for the erudite and the elitist, one can become as educated as one chooses to be as long as one has access to the internet. Look at Project Gutenberg, with the thousands of public domain books available, listen to Jon Stewart and pay close attention to the allusions he makes to literary figures, that require a great deal of knowledge! Read XKCD and discover that you barely understand the jokes! Check out a Physics forum and boggle at the complexity of the discussions currently going on in this anti-intellectual society!

So what should I teach my kids?

[Jaborandy]

This leaves me thinking about how I should talk to my kids. Do I want them to value college? And if so, for what purpose? I agree that the cost/benefit of college is terrible, and the truest lessons are learned almost despite college. Yet I still feel compelled to send them there. Why is that?

I want them to learn how to think for themselves, how to take information and turn it into knowledge no matter the subject, how to be introspective and apply critical thinking to their own processes and behaviors. I want them to be eloquent speakers and to be culturally fluent. I also want them to be happy. How do I get there from here?

--Jaborandy

Re:So what should I teach my kids?

[night_flyer]

kinda depends on what they want to do, if one shows an affinity to become a Dr. then of course college is the way to go, but if they would be happy running a lemonaide stand then maybe a community college and some business courses will fit the bill.

Pragmatics vs. Anti-Intellectuals

[Anonymous Coward]

The author seems to think that Pragmatic thought is Anti-Intellectual thought, and to be fair progressing too far into the utilitarian world does result in a degree of anti-intellectualness, but it seems to me that it's those imitating geek culture with out being geeks themselves that are the anti-intellectuals. Amongst all of my geek friends the amount of knowledge and analytical power available is incredible, even for things we have very little interest in, as it's faster to recall something than to google it, especially when you're doing specific analysis that relies on some random things.

Both theory and a trade

[tepples]

I'm sorry, .NET is a trade not Computer Science. In my book, you're not a real computer graduate unless you believe that Computer Science is language agnostic.

I agree that a university needs to teach theory. But it also needs to teach each student enough of a trade that the student can start paying for tuition.

Re:Both theory and a trade

[jawtheshark]

But it also needs to teach each student enough of a trade that the student can start paying for tuition.

Yes, I agree in a sense. However, in computer science they should teach one language per programming paradigm. Preferably not the popular ones. Then, in programming projects you give them the task to do in other programming languages. If the concepts are understood, one language is like the other and can easily be picked up.

It is uncanny how many time I get asked what "my programming language of choice is". I don't have any: know one programming language, know them all. Sure, they all have their pitfalls, but you should be able to pick the language up quickly.

Re:Both theory and a trade

[HeckRuler]

He's talking about computer science, as in scientists with goggles and lab coats in a lab. (The coats are a fashion statement). Unfortunately, he doesn't recognize that not all CS students go on to grad school, professorship, and/or R&D positions. Indeed those seem to be the extreme minority. We honestly DO NEED something like a trade school for programmers. People that can take current, known, stable technology and apply it to make a buck. And that trade school is known as India right now. They have a lot of good programmers, but their software engineering program could do more.

Over here, if you want to learn how to do things, you go into engineering.

Re:Both theory and a trade

[pxc]

Well, those things really belong under two different degree designations: Computer Science and Software Engineering. In either case, the electives should leave you some room to place additional emphasis on either the practical or the theoretical.

Re:Both theory and a trade

[JustSomeProgrammer]

If a student truly grasps the theory the trade comes naturally. It took me less than two weeks to start coding effectively in Java for my first job. Never even saw the language before that. Heard of it, but never saw. But my education was strong enough and I really learned that learning new computer languages is extremely easy. I would be severely disappointed in someone who just learned .NET or C++ in school. You're not there to learn the language. They might use a language to help you grasp concepts, but you should be learning the concepts.

Re:Both theory and a trade

[tepples]

It took me less than two weeks to start coding effectively in Java for my first job.

So how did you manage to get the job without already having a sizable portfolio of software written in Java at the time the position was first posted?

Re:Both theory and a trade

[oakgrove]

I'm working at a job as a java coder right now and I hadn't seen one line of it before walking in the door. I demonstrated a bunch of stuff I'd written in Python that the boss really liked and got hired on the spot. Learned enough Java to do what I needed to do in about 3 weeks and now we're shipping the final product in about a week. It's been a wild ride but, I'm now convinced real programmers don't need to know the language to effectively build a product. And crappy programmers will never be able to do anything great other than accidentally no matter how much they "know".

Re:Both theory and a trade

[marnues]

No no no. That is the student's job. As GP said, if they want a trade, go to trade school. Teaching trades at university is a waste of everyone's time.

Re:Both theory and a trade

[tepples]

But few students would have the money to go to a university without the "buy university, get trade school free" offer that the universities have fallen into.

Re:Both theory and a trade

[Deus.1.01]

"he doesn't recognize that not all CS students go on to grad school, professorship, and/or R&D positions."

*faceplam*

I think...he was referring to algorithms....you can find math outside of academic papers you know.

Re:Both theory and a trade

[Darinbob]

This is not necessarily true. If you learn computer science properly you can learn any language they throw at you. The snag is that more and more corporations are not thinking this way anymore and instead want replaceable cogs. They want to hire someone who can immediately be moderately useful, and then discard them later when the skill sets change.

So what does someone who learns .NET today do a couple decades later when no one uses it? They'll either need to learn to adapt or they'll be out of the industry (or maybe be a manager so they don't have to know anything anymore). And what the hell happens if .NET is your basis of your trade skills when you leave college and your first job doesn't use .NET?

When I was in college we were never formally taught a language except in the intro class (Pascal), and later only in brief segments of time. Everything after that was "oh yeah, we're using C++ in this class, the book is on your list, ask your TA if you have problems, first assignment due in two weeks."

When I interview someone I want to see a rounded individual who can learn all the new and weird stuff that gets thrown at them, and not someone who only knows trade skills. If you want trade skills then don't go to a college, go to a trade school get used to having a mundane career.

Re:A telling sign of geek anti-intellectualism

[Mephistophocles]

Well said, but doesn't modern society in general equate the two? Would that possibly be one of the strongest criticisms of modern culture, or what passes for culture?

Geek != Intelectual

[wisnoskij]

And also it is hard to judge who is a geek when all the geeky things of the past have been taken over by the mainstream market.
And "college is a waste of time" != "don't learn new things and test/improve your intelligence"

Re:Geek != Intelectual

[AK Marc]

And "college is a waste of time" != "don't learn new things and test/improve your intelligence"

Yes, it is. The minority of your education in college should be dedicated to the coursework. If you can't figure that out, you will fail at college, even if you earn an degree. College is a waste of time only for the anti-intellectual or those incapable of completing it.

Re:Geek != Intelectual

[wisnoskij]

First off, where do you come off with saying that not going to college means that you cannot learn another thing in your life. A monopoly on education was not given to colleges and universities.

And secondly what college did you go to? Other then the Arts (which I only know off second hand {for example a friend of mine passed a arts math course that he did not know he was in [and therefor did not attend a single lecture or attempt any assignment] until the day before the final exam}) the assignments alone in Math/CS can take 80 hours a week. just writing down the answers alone have taken me an hour plus to some very boring but big questions.
And in CS if you have to write some moderately challenging program in a language you only learned last week then it will take you some time.
And don't even try contradicting the teachers, I have never met one who would agree that they were wrong no matter how oblivious it is that they were (because there is always some convoluted logic that makes there explanation semi correct).

In summery The Arts are not Science, so don't try to compare your education to mine if that it the background you come from.

Re:Geek != Intelectual

[AK Marc]

First off, where do you come off with saying that not going to college means that you cannot learn another thing in your life. A monopoly on education was not given to colleges and universities.

The same place you come off indicating that going to a place of learning will prevent you from learning.

Re:Geek != Intelectual

[wisnoskij]

At no point did I say that you cannot or will not learn in any of these places. You almost certainty will if you are at all interested in learning and maybe even if you are not. I simply think, and I think that my statements thus far have indicated this, that they are far from perfect institutions and in many cases may not be the optimal place to learn skills that interest and help some particular individuals.

Re:Geek != Intelectual

[AK Marc]

At no point did I say that you cannot or will not learn in any of these places.

And I never said "not going to college means that you cannot learn another thing in your life." But you asserted I did. I figured if you were just going to make up shit and then argue against things that nobody said, I should do so as well.

I simply think, and I think that my statements thus far have indicated this, that they are far from perfect institutions and in many cases may not be the optimal place to learn skills that interest and help some particular individuals.

If they are not the optimal place to learn those skills, what is the optimal place to learn those skills? I would assume that "place" indicates somewhere other than "self-taught" or "on the job learning" but then it might (though I would have thought the language you used should be altered to indicate that as your intention).

There is no other place to learn such things for the vast majority of subjects, so anyone anti-college is also anti-education, and thus could be taken (rightly or wrongly) to be anti-intellectual. My stance isn't that a monopoly on education was given to colleges. My stance is that, despite your hint that there may be other institutions which cover similar material better, there aren't. Feel free and prove me wrong with a list of institutions or types of institutions which cover material covered in college without being a college. I can think of only a few, and then only if you are talking about very specific skills that many would consider "skill" in the sense that it is mutually exclusive from "education." Much like going to a soccer camp for a summer and learning soccer specific skills wouldn't be considered by most to be an "education" and certainly not one on par with college. The same with, say, a carpentry apprenticeship.

Re:Geek != Intelectual

[wisnoskij]

Well self-taught is a good way to go for many people. And universities and other educational places are more and more opening up learning for free from the internet (for example you can view many MIT lectures online for free I believe).

And if you want to learn anything useful in the real world, like CS, then you can find tons of learning material online and people willing to help you with it.

Re:Geek != Intelectual

[AK Marc]

Everything you mentioned is self directed. So there is no other institution that competes with colleges. You said they don't have the monopoly on learning, but I pointed out they have the de facto monopoly on learning institutions. You apparently agree with that. The two choices given are college or figure out how to learn it on your own. So if you aren't a good self-directed learner, then you have no other choice other than college.

Re:Geek != Intelectual

[wisnoskij]

But if you are not a good self directed learner how could you be classified as a intellectual anyways? if you completely stop learning after college then I cannot see you really being qualified for any career or to be considered that smart of a person.

Even colleges do not go so far as to say what they have to teach is the only thing you will ever have to know or learn.

Re:Geek != Intelectual

[AK Marc]

But if you are not a good self directed learner how could you be classified as a intellectual anyways?

Whether one is or is not intellectual is not in question here. Perhaps you are implying that someone who is intellectual would not be anti-intellectual, and thus proof that all geeks are intellectual would make them, by definition, non-anti-intellectual. However that begs the question (I like when I get to actually use that right). You are assuming that geeks are intellectual (via virtue of being self-directed learners) and that intellectuals can't be anti-intellectual. So you do have a really good proof. However, I do not agree with the premises needed to make that a relevant argument.

Even colleges do not go so far as to say what they have to teach is the only thing you will ever have to know or learn.

Why do you keep saying that? I never said it, nor did anyone else say that here as far as I saw. When you keep making up strawmen, it seems more desperate than anything else. Perhaps you could use more quotes in your replies so we know who said you can't learn outside college, because it wasn't me and it wasn't anyone else I saw.

Intellectual != agreeing with status quo

[Servo]

The biggest problem is that the definition of "geek" has been widely expanded. What people consider as a geek is not what it used to be. There are many internet/it/technology pundits calling themselves geeks out there that might otherwise be written off as kooks with a soapbox if it weren't for the internet or TV.

As for the anti-college kick, I think some people are missing the point. Its not so much that college is useless, its that the ROI for some folks isn't worth while to attend. On one end of the spectrum, you might be better off going to a technical/trade school instead of spending a ton of money on a degree that may not land you a job paying all that much better. On the other end of the spectrum, you might be better off skipping an expensive education because you've already gained skills enough to learn and grow on your own. The folks in the middle are still probably better off going to college because of lack of skills or because specific jobs require large amounts of training (ie, a doctor).

People who end up in the innovation industry (computer or otherwise) usually learned what they did by dyi trial and error or early on the job experience. Just taking a look around my own office, the people I look up to and respect are also the ones that either didn't go to college, or didn't go to college for what they are doing now. The people who don't can't be left alone and expected to get stuff done without a script are usually the ones who went to school for the specialty they work in now.

Re:Frist Psot

[Jeremiah Cornelius]

Intellectual?

It's rare that the garden-variety "Geek" ever had much time for what could be called "intellectual" pursuits.

There's not a high degree of literacy in geekdom, outside of their specialised technologies.

Plato? Proust? Swift? Wittgenstein? Wilde? Eco? Baudrillard? Pound? Spinoza? Aquinas? Borges?

Nope. Not common. Never was.

Two problems with Invisible College

[tepples]

One practical problem with going to Invisible College is that without an accredited school affiliation, one doesn't qualify for student discounts on learning materials such as industry-standard software. Another is that Invisible College doesn't grant the sort of brand-name degree that an employer is looking for. But I'll grant that those could be rephrased as statements against industry, namely that industry has standardized on proprietary software and that employers don't understand Invisible College.

Details, please?

[alispguru]

There's got to be an entertaining story behind your business. Or am I being awesomely dense today by not being able to name it?

Re:What if you're the one that's wrong?

[aitikin]

What were the five common opinions, widely held by geeks? Without that information, it could actually be YOU that was wrong in the argument, and not the other geek. :)

According to TFA:

1. Experts do not deserve any special role in declaring what is known. Knowledge is now democratically determined, as it should be.

2. Books are an outmoded medium because they involve a single person speaking from authority. In the future, information will be developed and propagated collaboratively, something like what we already do with the combination of Twitter, Facebook, blogs, Wikipedia, and various other websites.

3. The classics, being books, are also outmoded. They are outmoded because they are often long and hard to read, so those of us raised around the distractions of technology can’t be bothered to follow them; and besides, they concern foreign worlds, dominated by dead white guys with totally antiquated ideas and attitudes. In short, they are boring and irrelevant.

4. The digitization of information means that we don’t have to memorize nearly as much. We can upload our memories to our devices and to Internet communities. We can answer most general questions with a quick search.

5. The paragon of success is a popular website or well-used software, and for that, you just have to be a bright, creative geek. You don’t have to go to college, which is overpriced and so reserved to the elite anyway.

Credentialed is not educated

[SuperKendall]

College may be a waste of time, because for lots of people all it gets them is a diploma saying they were at that college. Forget the amount of money spent, is the paper important or how much you learned? Yet there are so many avenues for learning now.

There is not a rise against intellectuals, but instead those people who wave credentials as proof they know better than the rest of us. That is in response to waves of credentialed people screwing lots of people over by pretended they knew better than everyone what do do, and then failing spectacularily.

geek arrogance

[joeaguy]

I think this is just a facet of the also typical arrogance of geeks. Look at Steve Jobs and Apple, making really wonderful devices that work well, but force you to play by their rules. He knows better. Bill Gates and his foundation, where he feels he can take his success in business, which was rather amazing but ruthless, and apply it to social causes, by jumping in with lots of money. The Gates foundation does lots of good, but its hardly a democratic exercise. Gates knows better about how to save the world than its citizens. Mike Bloomberg is a technocrat who gets to run a whole city.

So its not so much anti-intellectualism but it is the arrogance of personal intellectual experience and achievements over any collective or institutional approach to the same. For example, "I succeeded without college, so no one needs college to be meet my criteria for success". If what has caused me wild success works for me, then it can work for anyone. Simply forge ahead with the courage of your convictions and all else be damned.

Colleges are by their very nature collegiate, a collaborative and community experience in learning, that involves not just getting information, but integrating it into yourself. The phrase "fake it till you make" it is the ultimate rejection of that approach. There is something missed when you only focus is getting ahead at the task at hand, by any means you can.

This Technorati individualist approach has produced great things, and good things. It is certainly appropriate for certain individuals who have the wherewithal to handle it and come through. Many more people fail taking the same approach. There is also the issue that success is not defined the same way for everyone. It is certainly I think it is no way to run government, or certainly every business or every career. Our successes are build on the successes of others, on the history of their work, their contributions, and their knowledge. To say you know better so you won't pay attention is a dangerous thing.

The goal of education and intellectual pursuits are to make you a better and more whole person. The goal is not to be just be a good worker, to make the most money, to have the most power. It is to improve thought and understanding. The specific nature of knowledge and learning is changing due to technology, that is inevitable, but those are just details. The purpose remains the same, and our intellectual institutions that are truly the best (not just in name) strive to advance that purpose. By abandoning that history and being arrogant towards it, we loose its benefits.

So I am sure some people will yell at me over one part or an other of this post without considering the whole thing. That always happens online. My point is, no persona can say they know better, that they can ignore some existing knowledge, experience, or opinion, because they have such certainty, even if that certainty is backed up by success or accomplishing what may be considered good. There is a bigger world than yourself, and it needs to be let in in order to obtain true and lasting success and meaning as a person on this Earth. Humble geeks can do amazing things.

College isn't necessarily a waste of time.

[cheekyjohnson]

If it helps someone learn what they need, then that is good. However, far too many employers seem to instantly decide not to hire someone merely because they didn't go to a college (apparently, anyway). Having gone to a college does not necessarily mean that you know what you're doing, and as such, I think it is a good idea to make applicants demonstrate their knowledge anyway. Especially for smaller businesses that don't have hundreds of job applications at once. It may still be possible even then, but I'm not sure how.

Re:College isn't necessarily a waste of time.

[sandytaru]

Indeed, for many higher paying jobs you either need a 4 year degree or 4-5 years of experience in order to even get in the interview. When a HR manager has 100 resumes on his desk for a position, and 50 have a college degree (or 4 years of experience with relevant certifications), and 50 don't, guess which 50 are going to be tossed in the trash can first?

Re:First post

[Hartree]

"Cause I didn't go to college and so got here 4 years before everyone else."

And you'll still be here four years after everyone else has left.

TL;DR

[Altus]

What is Anti-Intellectualism and who does Larry Sanger think he is that he paint all geeks everywhere with this brush of his. I bet he has never even been outside the walls of his Ivory Tower!

College was a waste of time

[shellster_dude]

I got a BS in CS.
It was a lot of work, and I learned a lot of arcane stuff. I also did a lot of busy work.
The only real programming related skills I picked up were almost exclusively from the work I did to support myself in college. Now I'm a professional programmer for a major defense contract.
I've got a ton of school debt that I'm paying off, and I "wasted" four years at a university. Now it's certainly true, that my piece of paper potentially helped me get jobs though I could have made the degree up for all my employers actually checked. It's also possible that the four years I spent in college, I could have spent working for minimum wage gaining programming skills and experience, and I would have gotten just as far as I am now. What's a piece of paper when I can show that I am a proficient programmer and I have references and experience? I at least wouldn't have come out the door with 40 grand in debt.
Claiming that college is a "must" anymore is just silly. It depends on what you want to do, and if you have the chops to start working for less, and demonstrate proficiency in an interview.
I don't particularly regret getting a degree, and it certainly was satisfying to say that I got a degree and graduated magna cum laude, but I am not so arrogant as to believe that my degree somehow makes me superior to someone who didn't go to college.

Re:Silent Majority

[Altus]

exactly... its not new, its just finally becoming an embarrassment to the rest of us geeks.

You want big money?

[Gonoff]

Then you need to get well up in a big organisation.
Do you know what you need to get past an HR department and managers that do not have a clue about what you do?
That's right - you need a degree...

Now I know that many people think that the only way to work is either self employed, a small company where everyone knows everyone else or a startup.
This is just statistically unlikely. Because big companies hire more people, they have a bigger part of the workforce - that is just arithmetic.
If you end up working for anything that has hundreds of employees without that bit of paper, you will probably carry on doing your job. You will not be in charge and you will not get paid as much as the idiot with a BA in greek literature who is your boss.

If you are working, that is what evening classes are for. You might need to move after you get that qualification, but you will have better options.

Re:College?

[Altus]

Chomsky? Way to bust out the Appeal to Authority fallacy.

Wait, which side am I on again?

It was uphill. Both ways.:

[Hartree]

"I don't think it's fair to require that geeks be 50+ years old."

Who said life was fair, young'un?

what is a geek

[theCat]

I know a few geeks, not many of which could hold up their end of an intellectual conversation. I tire of them fairly quickly.

I also know a lot of engineers. There are a few nerds among them, but not many geeks. The engineers I know can talk all four legs off an Arcturian Megadonkey and then convince it to go for a walk afterwards.

Yes, I've wrapped a lot of subtle distinctions in all that. But that's really the point of the exercise. We all could stand to examine our definitions of a lot of things. I would start by examining one's definition of success.

School is where you learn how to learn.

[PeanutButterBreath]

As for learning, dunno about the rest of you guys but my college education was largely an exercise in bullshit. Repeat what the professor said if you want an A. Disagree with his premises if you want an F. That's not learning. It's regurgitation. Parrots can do that too, and they don't attend college to do it.

That is a sad commentary. Certainly not similar to my experience. Of course, I was in a non-"geek" field, taught by non-"geeks". Maybe that's the difference. I graduated with a BA in a foreign language and within 2 years embarked on a 10+ year career in programming based on skills that I taught myself.

School is where you learn how to learn. Or it should be. Increasingly, it seems to be seen as a place where they tell you what employers want you to know.

It takes a special breed of geek

[northernfrights]

to manage to /. your own blog.

Smart Phones = Dumb People

[Anonymous Coward]

We're rapidly becoming a world of children who ask our parent/guardian/device a question and trusting its answers (usually from Google).
The smarter our devices get, the dumber we get, and the less we try to actually learn and remember.

College Value

[Myopic]

College is absolutely a complete waste of time, unless you are one of the 99.995% of programmers who don't become the next Bill Gates or Larry Page.

Sadly, I'm one of those, and I graduated from an Ivy League school (by which I imply top-tier of cost) with a CRUSHING $20,000 in student loan debt, which for several years had a lower interest rate than my simple savings account, and in any case amounted to an UNTENABLE six months or so of marginal wages. Alas! Pity me, the fool who went to college!

It has always been true that if you are the one-in-a-million super-genius ridiculously motivated overachiever, that you don't need anybody's help to get where you are going. Saving, planning, and getting an education are merely for all the rest of us.

Re:College Value

[vlm]

Sadly, I'm one of those, and I graduated from an Ivy League school (by which I imply top-tier of cost) with a CRUSHING $20,000 in student loan debt, which for several years had a lower interest rate than my simple savings account, and in any case amounted to an UNTENABLE six months or so of marginal wages. Alas! Pity me, the fool who went to college!

Given your ID number, I'm thinking you went before the educational bubble really started accelerating. You have to add at least one zero to the end of that "crushing debt load". Also, now, the odds of your "marginal wages" approaching zero are much higher. Your sarcasm about the past, is unfortunately the modern day truth.

Liberal arts kids now graduate with more debt that doctors did when I was a kid. Unfortunately, the average wage paid to liberal arts kids has dropped since then, especially if you average in the unemployment checks.

Re:College Value

[Myopic]

I graduated in 2002. The cost of an Ivy League education has increased by about $10,000 per year since then, from about 40 to about 50. I still think education remains a great deal. If you will allow the appeal to authority, the guys at Freakonomics agree with me, cf 3:10 - 3:25, and the rest of the show is also very good.

Anyway, it's an untenable claim. The claim would be that the cost of an education, plus interest, is less than the marginal increase in salary over the expected career length. That's not credible. Sure, some dumb people somehow get through college and then can't make a career out of it, but those are the rare exceptions to the rule that the more you learn, the more you earn.

For what it's worth, this article says that I owed a bit more than average when I graduated, and now the average is up to about $23,000. That's low, easily within a few years' marginal salary increase for modest middle incomes.

Geek quality was better when it wasn't cool

[sl4shd0rk]

I remember when there were like 5 kids in the whole school who played computer games and everyone thought they were, well, geeky. Arguments happened all the time over designing electrical circuits, if Microsoft Macro Assembler was better than Turbo Assemlber, if Stacker was worth the price, or whether it made sense to upgrade to a 14400 modem (the phone company would not guarantee speeds over 9600 baud).

I think we are just inundated with people ("geeks") who have gleaned a lot of 1/4" deep knowledge from google. They know enough to argue about what they read, but haven't enough understanding to hypothesize.

Re:Geek quality was better when it wasn't cool

[DCheesi]

Now that geeks are hip, hipsters are pretending to be geeky...

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Looking at it differently

[CapnStank]

Quite personally I find myself expressing some of the view points from the article but see it from a different angle.

I'll fully admit my university was under-par. I came out near the top of my class and was one of the 25% of the graduating class that landed a job immediately (I actually had multiple offers). What I felt coming out was that all the work that *I* put into university was what caused my "successful" outcome. I try to stay humble and credit those who were there along the way (profs/peers) but I still often feel that it was a direct result of my efforts as to why I ended up where I am.

Having said that if you take that view point and twist it, it can sound as if I think I am here solely as a result of my own actions which is not true. I see many people in my field who share this view and as a result make the leap forward and say that their university had nothing to do with their success and their own drive would have landed them in the same position they are in now. Keep extending the argument and you come full circle to the idea that "college was a waste of time" which is more often then not very untrue.

Now the only real argument that I have against this view when people take it that far is to ask them what they've accomplished since graduation besides a job. Can they tell me they've continued to learn multiple programming languages or other related items at the same rate? What about practical applications of knowledge? What have they to show for their months/years post-degree? The obvious factor that I see people missing is the motivation that peers and others around you provide in the university or education environment...

/rant

who measures intellectualism?

[scamper_22]

At the crux of it all is what is intellect?

I went through the system and I got my degree. My own view is that the college/university system has little to do with intellect.

It is a mass education system that has more to do with job creation and ideology than any serious attempt at academic study.

Not to pick on the current president. But has anyone read for example Michelle Obama's Master's thesis? http://www.politico.com/pdf/080222_MOPrincetonThesis_1-251.pdf

There is no intellectual merit to it at all. It reads like an opinion piece.

About the last refuge for real academic work is in the hard sciences. Yet even there you see the problems. Professors have to constantly make up studies and work to show value to administrators and grants...

And so are geeks anti-intellectual?
I'd prefer to ask:

Have Colleges and university become anti-intellectual.

I have this underlying theory that all institutions are inherently corrupted over time. As Locke would say, power corrupts and absolutely power corrupts absolutely.

Just as the church was one associated with God...
universities used to be associated with intellect.

We can all see in plain sight how ridiculous it was to associate belief with the church.

In time, we will see that associated intellect with educational institutions was also ridiculous.

And no... peer review does not solve anything. When the institutions in question get to pick their peers... when there is a lot of self interest and ideology involved...

Well.

[drolli]

I had the feeling that geek anti-intellectualism usually reflects the personal experiences of people who did not fit in towards certain parts of the academic world.

I am a geek and still hold a phd, but i recommend that anybody who cant stand to sit in lectures and listen to the one to many textbook reading of the professor due to any reason to leave the room and take a book (for example i have a problem focusing on oral presentations). And i recommend to people for whom university does not work to leave it. We need different kinds of talent doing different things, everybody what and how he does best.

Re:First post

[tmosley]

Left for what? There are no jobs that require college degrees. We've got PhDs flipping burgers and pushing mops, FFS.

The point of the "don't go to college" meme is that by not going to college, you avoid the soul crushing debt that most students now graduate with. I've been out of school for almost six years, and I STILL don't make enough to pay all my loans, even though I have what most would consider to be a "good" job, in my field, ie I manage a multimillion dollar materials research lab.

If I had it to do all over again, I would have taken my college fund that was only enough for about a year of school and started a business. College is now a suckers game, and has been for a decade.

Frrr rr rr r rr rr p

[Hognoxious]

[BS Chemical Engineering]

You were designing bio-methane plants?

Re:dumbing down languages

[Intron]

The typical "cargo cult" programming process:

1) Read the problem statement
2) Find the library call with the longest sequence of letters in common
3) Write the call using as parameters the variables that you have
4) Hope that it does what you want

geek?

[Charliemopps]

Since when is the founder of paypal a geek? Just because it involves computers no longer makes it geeky. In the 80s and 90s yes... but now computers are a profit vehicle and attract more non-geeks than geeks. Geeks want to do things because they haven't been done before. They want to know how stuff works, and will work very hard to figure it out even if the result is useless. Would Peter Theil have founded paypal if it wasn't going to be profitable? No... not a geek.

That being said... Formal education has nothing to do with being a geek either. It can be a tool to be used to further their goals though... and often you'll find the people getting the worthless degrees that never make you any money are the geeks.

When I was a kid...

[Bryan3000000]

I wasn't a geek. Geeks were the kids who were not intellectual, and were generally considered good for nothing by their peers, including the intellectual ones (nerds). Geeks were what might now be considered mindless fanboys of something or other (not something requiring an intellect to understand, although sci-fi would count). They were the ones who lacked grooming and social skills, and also did not apply themselves in school, not because of lack of interest but because of lack of capacity. It was a true insult to call someone a geek.

So if this trend is true, then it looks like one of the old usages is coming back into trend. It's simply not possible for a term that supposedly describes highly intellectual and motivated people to come to encompass so many people as the word 'geek' has consumed. It can't be a catch-all for anti-mainstream becoming mainstream and cool, because such a thing cannot exist in humans, at least not in the bulk of humanity as I know it. Particularly since the bulk of humanity can't simultaneously be anti-mainstream, and cool, representing a pinnacle, can't also be a near-universal trait. The 'geek' as it has been recently symbolized was always a myth, and impossible by definition.

I did exactly that

[Anonymous Coward]

I worked there for four years as a software engineer. I have no degree. I left university 3 months early to take a job out of state. My major was geology and not computer science or engineering, in any case.

-B

Wow.

[DG]

1. Knowledge is most decidedly NOT democratic, in that the truth is not determined by whichever idea is most popular at the time. The Truth is the Truth, dammit.

I keep seeing this sneaking into science and engineering all the time. Yes, your mother told you that your were a rare and special guy, and that means it is hard for you to hear that your opinion is actually no-foolin' *wrong* - but the Earth goes around the Sun, and no amount of "democracy" will ever change that.

Granted, more applicable to hard sciences than to literary criticism.

2. Books represent a point in history, written by someone who took the time and effort to contribute his understanding to paper. As such, they may contain errors. But I also find that a person willing to take the time and effort to write a book usually knows a fair amount about the subject matter - it is rare that an idiot writes a treatise on Calculus.

3. He who does not read the Classics misses out on enormous amounts of cultural reference. So many works refer to or allude to classical literature, that to willfully NOT read them is to miss most of the information in more modern works. It'd be like trying to watch Family Guy without having watched any TV, seen any movies, or listened to any music made in the last 30 years - you's miss most of the real material.

4. Awesome idea - until circumstances remove that electronic crutch. What do you do in a power failure, or a natural disaster, or in Afghanistan?

5. What a narrow and short-sighted view of "success"! I'd say "success" is a real-realized life.

Granted, a university degree need not be part of that - I taught myself mechanical engineering (and was employed as an engineer) without taking any University engineering courses. Did it the hard way, through hard-won experience and a whoooooole lot of reading (thank Lob for books!)

DG

Re:Wow.

[AK Marc]

Knowledge is most decidedly NOT democratic,

It is today. "Consensus" matters more than what the studies actually find. Language (well, most of them except French) is determined democratically (most language is descriptive not proscriptive so that if enough people use a word to mean something, it will, "irregardless" of whether it is correct [dammit, even the spell checker says "irregardless" is a word now]). The person who shouts the loudest is rightest, even if the facts disagree. At least so I've learned from experience.

Not anti-intellectualism, but pseudo-intellectual.

[SteveW928]

It isn't really anti-intellectualism, but pseudo-intellectual elitism. What has gone out the window is critical thinking and really caring about getting to the truth. What remains is the belief that one is intellectual when one is really just following a pseudo-intellectual herd.

get er' done

[Twillerror]

A lot of IT and programming is not about something you learned in math class. Yes there are times when having a good understanding of math, etc can help, but I don't think there is much math in understanding the HTTP protocol, or TCP for that matter. Most languages are high enough level where you don't deal with the low level stuff all that often.

I've seen kids come out that are super smart, but couldn't get a project from start to finish to save their souls. Each team will need one or more of those super nerd types to help when we need a complex algorithm etc. Although I often want more and better open source libraries where you can just get this stuff..most of the time you do a google search and find some dudes work.

Does installing anything from a mysql server to an Exchange server really require anything that college would require.

For my money we need to start turning our world into more like a construction union. Certainly we still need engineers and other computer scientists, but we also need the project managers, carpenters, plumbers, etc.

I don't want unions and all their baggage, but it would feel cool to have various guilds like a HTML/JS/CSS guild, a DBA guild, a server admin guild, etc.

And why isn't high school enough anymore? Maybe we should stop teaching stupid history and English course and help kids understand computers earlier. Maybe the problem lies earlier than college.

Finally this sounds like some very arrogant crap. Like academia, scientists, economists, etc are never wrong about anything? College professors are always right right?
 

Not Anti-Intellectual. Skeptical.

[hobb0001]

Speaking for myself as a geek, I don't consider myself anti-intellectual. It's just that over the years I've come to discover that a lot of conventional "wisdom" is BS. Pert of being a geek is doing things a different way, experimenting, and seeing what happens. Well guess what? Some of those experiments actually pay off and you discover how ass-backward the rest of the world is doing things. Over time, these life experiences accumulate to form a general skepticism of all authority in general.

It's a recession, time for some blow-back

[scorp1us]

Our jobs are secure. We are useful in the down economy. If our company goes under, we have many options. Now the unlearned labor (skilled labor - tradesmen, and unskilled labor - secretaries) are finding their jobs depend to a higher degree, on the economy.

TL;DR

[scorp1us]

How's that for anti-intellectualism?

Re:for a lot of people college IS a waste of time.

[Huckabees]

Extraordinary people will be extraordinary regardless of college. For the rest of us there's a framed piece of paper to get our foot in the door and have a few beers while we're at it.

Re:money to ...

[TaoPhoenix]

Yep.

You go to college to eat and pay rent. It's a calculated gamble of which major has the best ROI.

You study the fun topics on your own time.

Also, I'm a bit disturbed by the comments all the way down to here. Cue the 10 exceptions to the rule, silent are the thousands who could have gotten midline jobs with midline degrees.

Not counting the games that colleges play, you go to college as a scheduled flow of the information, and hopefully to claw our way out of trouble if you start to slip. Let's assume good profs and office hours, etc.

Also, college is just about raw processing time to learn a couple of fields. Coming out of high school it's easy to fall into the Pink Floyd "we don't need no education" bit that seems to drive this article. Go to college even for a little and see all the weird fields you never even know existed. (Weather variance hedge securities!? Black Swan Silent Evidence Information Modeling!? Psychological History!? Forensic Anthropology? Long Tail and Freemium Economic Theory!?)

Elsewhere there was that article about the guy who thought he proved the hailstone theory, except he didn't take advantage of college resources to vet it, and he's now skunked on the net for a flawed paper. College is supposed to partially prevent you from turning into Timecube Guy.

Re:Halo effect?

[Hognoxious]

"Education is a system of imposed ignorance"
-- Noam Chomsky

"Noam Chomsky is well respected as an expert on linguistics. That doesn't mean I'd blindly trust his opinions on politics, economics, or the right way to make saag aloo. Or anything else, for that matter.

I certainly wouldn't trust the commie fucker to wire a plug"

-- Me

Re:Intentional?

[Hognoxious]

Geek classic.

Hey, it worked for Coca Cola.

Re:First post

[Americano]

And your business would likely have failed during the time you would have otherwise been in college, based on even the most generous statistics which seem to indicate a 50-60% small business failure rate in their first five years. Then you would have found yourself in soul crushing debt, AND with no college degree.

And this seems the better alternative to you?

For me, it was a waste

[DigiTechGuy]

For me college was a waste of time and money. I wasted 3 years going back to school attempting to finish a BS in IT. I already had a good job in IT when I started. Over 3 years tuition increased from $26k to $42k. As tough as that was I could swing that. It didn't help that for 3 quarters they cancelled classes I had registered for, putting me at part time enrollment, yet still billed me for full time. The final straw that made me drop out with only two quarters worth of classes left was that they charged me two quarters of tuition ($18k at the time) to go to work every day, as I did before and while going back to school and they did not allow me to take any classes during this time. They called this a "cooperative internship experience", though I had no contact with the school during this time. Unfortunately they automatically billed this against my loan and I had no recourse. I was told upon entry to the school (Drexel University in Philadelphia, PA), that the "cooperative internship experience" was mandatory, but you could either pay two quarters tuition during the internship and take classes like normal, or opt to not pay and not take classes, saving money to help pay the tuition bill. This was an outright lie.

Then they wanted to charge me a full years tuition ($42k) for the next two quarters for 7 classes to finish a degree. I was tapped out and didn't have any more money and couldn't take on any more loans as I already had around $100k in loans. I asked if I could take a year or two off to save the $42, or more realistically $50k+, that tuition would be. They said I could, but they would expire the credits I transferred when coming in. Those were credits from a 2 year college I took immediately after graduating high school a year early. So if I waited a year or two to finish, the cost would be over $100k for two years of tuition. I was already tapped out and taking another $100k of loans is not an option.

So here I am, working the same job. A good job, but a dead end from a pay or promotion standpoint without a degree. My boss dangles promotions over my head if I get a degree but the money simply isn't there to do it. So now I'm financially crippled as a result. I should have bought an investment property, or heck, even blowing all my money at the casinos would have been wiser than trying the college route. At least at the casinos I would have had some fun and couldn't lose more than I have.

The greater shame in all this was I didn't learn much, and the little that I did learn was mostly unrelated to IT or generally trivia type knowledge, not useful or practical knowledge. The classes were always brought down to the dumbest common denominator. I was on the dean's list with a 3.9 GPA, but not eligible for any scholarships or grants that I was able to find as I either made too much money, was not a minority, or not a woman. I quickly stopped caring about a good GPA and coasted along with a 3.4, as it gave more time to focus on work and bettering myself through learning on my own. Tests and projects were all a joke. Extremely basic level stuff for the little bit that was relevant. After seeing what goes on in a "reputable" university with "highly regarded" IT/IS/CompSci programs I would never hire anyone straight out of college with no experience.

I feel bad for many of my friends back at school graduating now who have a lot more debt than me, learned very little, and didn't work through school as I did. All through school I was working 40-50 hours a week at my job, and doing side work on the weekends. These kids had no motivation to learn a skill and get a job while in school. Now that they've graduated they all complain about scraping by with loan payments and such while working retail sales jobs. Meanwhile I get job offers of comparable or better jobs than where I'm at now with some regularity, but none are local so far and thanks to that student loan debt I can't afford to relocate. School has kept me trapped and stuck in a rut.

A college degree [in IT/IS/CS] truly is meaningless and is a waste of time and money. Those years can be spent working, and learning in your own time and growing in your career. All this can happen without racking up tens or hundreds of thousands in debt.

Re:No

[Hognoxious]

Anyone who is anti-intellectualism is not a geek.

Indeed. because anti-intellectualism is an abstract state of mind, not a concrete person.

In short; type mismatch, failing near line 18.

Being intellectual doesn't require college/uni

[thepacketmaster]

It's a false assumption that if you don't go to college or university that you cannot be intellectual. It's also a false assumption that college or university will make you an intellectual. I have met plenty of people in my time that have bachelors or masters degrees and yet they are unmotivated morons that are disconnected from any sort of reality we would call useful. As another poster mention, while being a geek is considered intellectual there is also another component: motivation. People who go to university are essentially saying, "I'm too lazy to educate myself and need someone to spoon feed me". Geeks on the other hand are always curious about the world around them and have a burning desire to learn more, doing this in any number of ways. Having attended university and find it to be a complete waste of time, the one thing I realized is that if you just read the same books and gain experience in what you've read, then you have the same knowledge as someone from university. The only difference is you don't have a certificate, you didn't waste tens of thousands of dollars, and you didn't have multiple hookups along the way. . . Okay, that last part may be a downside to not going to university.

College doesn't always help...

[nurbles]

In my 25+ years in the software biz (with barely an AS degree) I've needed to help out on projects designed and built by CS PhDs. The designers often had little comprehension of the "real world" -- at least how it would interact with and affect their software and/or how users would do the same. My boss brought me to design meetings to take notes and afterwards, he'd clean up my questions and send them to the PhDs, often resulting in significant redesign.

It wasn't that those folks weren't smart and didn't know how to make the computers jump through hoops. It was more like they had blinders on to some of the real world issues (even simple things like dealing with power failure and recovery) and those blinders seemed, in many ways, to be a result of their advanced training. In a sense, they'd gotten so far into the theoretical, that they'd forgotten (or lost contact with) the practical.

IMHO, it isn't that college is a waste of time and money, it is just that a well rounded team often needs someone not encumbered with too much knowledge but who can still ask pertinent questions to keep a design grounded. (smiling) Basically, every big project needs someone like me!

These comments proved the article

[brainzach]

Geeks live in their own world.

For me, taking a wide variety of classes in college definitely challenged my own perceptions of the world and made me a more well rounded person. College suppose to teach you how to analyze information better, not just memorize facts. Memorizing the date of a war is really useless, but analyzing the causes and consequences of a war is a skill that can be applied to other aspects in life.

Instead of just reading stuff that conforms to your worldview, college has taught me how to better analyze different points of view, the evidence behind it and draw my more accurate interpretations, while understanding the limits of my own knowledge.

Re:These comments proved the article

[ErikZ]

Instead of just reading stuff that conforms to your worldview, college has taught me how to better analyze different points of view, the evidence behind it and draw my more accurate interpretations, while understanding the limits of my own knowledge.

Debating on the Internet in good faith taught me that.

Wait, let me guess

[dubl-u]

Let me guess before I've read the article:

Larry Sanger, whose only claim to fame is a brief association with something that became impressive well after he left, is upset that people aren't deferring to him just because he has an official stamp of expertise in something other than the topic he is currently opining on.

Paradigm Shift

[Millennium]

The dominant epistemology -how we answer the question of what it means to know a thing- is indeed changing. I'm not sure that it's changing for the better, either. But to call it anti-intellectualism is more than a bit of a stretch.

The dominant epistemology isn't perfect (only zealots think the perfect epistemology has yet been devised). And so, like every epistemology that has ever held sway, this new one seeks to address the flaws of what has came before it. It has its own weaknesses too; like I said, I'm not sure this particular change is for the better. But this article doesn't make its points toward that change being a fundamentally anti-intellectual one very well.

I'm a geek

[alienzed]

and let me think about that...

Re:First post

[metlin]

We've got PhDs flipping burgers and pushing mops, FFS.

PhDs in what, and from where?

Someone doing comparative literary analysis of Westerns or someone with a PhD in Electrical Engineering? Someone with a "PhD" in Psychology of Education from a no-name school in North Dakota or someone with a PhD in Physics from MIT?

These things matter. I would argue that unless you're doing your PhD in a worthwhile subject under the auspices of a good school, you were probably going to flip burgers anyway.

Unless you're doing it for fun, and in which case, well you had fun, and now it's time to pay the piper.

Re:Frrr rr rr r rr rr p

[Hartree]

"You were designing bio-methane plants?"

A hundred grand for a lot of stinky hot gas?

Not a bad deal, though it sounds a little like politics which also concerns stinky hot gas.

Percy LeBaron Spencer

[darkwing_bmf]

School does not equal education.

From wikipedia:

Percy LeBaron Spencer (9 July, 1894 – 8 September, 1970) was an American engineer and inventor. He became known as the inventor of the microwave oven.

Spencer was born in Howland, Maine. His father died in 1897, and his mother left him a short time later. He lived with his aunt and uncle after that. He never graduated from grammar school, but went to work in a mill as an apprentice at age 12, before joining the U.S. Navy in 1912 to learn wireless telegraphy. He joined the Raytheon Company in the 1920s.

In 1941, magnetrons, which were used to generate the microwave radio signals that are the core mechanism of radar, were being made at the rate of 17 per day at Raytheon. While working there, Spencer developed a more efficient way to manufacture them, by punching out and soldering together magnetron parts, rather than using machined parts. His improvements were among those that increased magnetron production to 2,600 per day. For his work he was awarded the Distinguished Public Service Award by the US Navy.

In 1945, while standing in front of an operating magnetron, a chocolate bar in his pocket melted. He then tested popcorn in front of the magnetron (surely turning up the power and standing out of the beam), and it quickly popped all over the room. Development of the microwave oven grew out of these observations, and by 1947 a commercial oven was being sold by Raytheon. (Note: He received US patent 2,495,429 out of his invention of the microwave oven.)

He became Senior Vice President and a senior member of the Board of Directors at Raytheon. He received 300 patents during his career at Raytheon; a building there is named after him. Spencer was married and had three children, James, John, and George.

I think someone doesn't get it

[rickb928]

Remember the TV show 'Paper Chase'? The opening sequence with the crusty professor finishing with the line 'you'll leave thinking like lawyers'?

For many fields, college is more about teaching you how to think than it is teaching you what things are. Actually, it used to be that, but now it's very at least as much 'what to think' as it is 'how to think'. And those goals are somewhat exclusive of one another.

College should, I think, focus on the how to think, how to learn, and in the process also deposit significant fundamental knowledge. Especially in a field like IT, where new things come up more often than every four years, to expect a lifelong grounding in all that is on a particular topic is unrealistic, and short-lived. If you learned Fortan in college, you are not that far from learning Java. More importantly, did you learn how to program? That serves you no matter the particular language you use.

I'm going through a series of college lectures on Java programming, and in the second lecture, the presenter drops this toss-off line:

"...turns left, like a good Democrat..."

If you've taken the course, or heard the lectures, you know now... But the remark was just plain out of place. Political science is a few buildings away.

It's this sort of thing that makes me wonder if college is enough about 'how to think', or too much about 'what to think'. Aside from that remark, and one other, this lecturer is focused on the 'how to think' goal, spiced with basic Java stuff. This has value for me. I'll add Java to my resume when I can demonstrate some proficiency. That will mean some projects for friends and willing guinea pigs, and some things on my own web page. That is the geek version of a diploma. This I want and need.

Intellectual?

The real answer is...

[Caerdwyn]

...it's not anti-intellectualism. It's laziness. What's being rejected isn't "intellect"; it's the idea that you have to work for reward. "I'm smarter than everyone else, I shouldn't HAVE to work to get the best pay! My mere presence and occasional acerbic comments on the inadequacy of others should be enough to warrant a six-figure salary and accelerated vesting!"

Not all geeks, of course. I would even challenge that such a person isn't a geek, because they don't DO anything. Having good tools (in this case, raw intellect) doesn't make you a craftsman, but we all know people who think that ownership of specific bits of tech tools (Android this, iOS that, Linux the other-thing, scripts downloaded from rootkit.org) makes you a tech god. Tell me, when was the last time you saw an Apple-hater accomplish anything important? Or the last time you saw a Windows-hater have anything to contribute to a discussion other than vitriol? The loud aggression masks a lack of ability. It's a form of counterpunching, to deflect the "oh yeah, what have YOU done that has geek cred?" before it can be said.

In fact, let's just agree that people like that... the self-labeled "geeks" who exhibit what can be taken as anti-intellectualism... aren't geeks at all. They are the coat-tail riders coasting on the efforts of others.

Re:for a lot of people college IS a waste of time.

[Pino Grigio]

On the other hand when it comes to knowledge the foundations you gain from college/university are useful. I know a guy at work who didn't do an under-grad degree. We're both developers. He didn't understand the concept of transitive closure (something we studied in CS), or how you could create a tree structure in a relational database.

Re:Frist Psot

[Hylandr]

This sparks rage in me, and be prepared for a passionate, not flaming response.

 

Intellectual?

Plato? Proust? Swift? Wittgenstein? Wilde? Eco? Baudrillard? Pound? Spinoza? Aquinas? Borges?

What enrages me nearly beyond comprehension is the expectation that we must be versed in the F*Tards listed above in order to be considered "Intellectual". F* you and your tired demarcation of what constitutes mental prowess. The fact is that we have *moved on* and live in the now of our own immediacy. Knowledge of these people will rarely help you in any business or IT environment.

Granted, It's important to know how to *think* and having read of these people will *NOT* increase your ability in that capacity. If it did, we wouldn't be awash in college graduates that have to be taught to close the damn bathroom door to take a piss. ( Yes, there has been this talk. )

College may have been fine and dandy when the knowledge pool took generations to change. These days you will spend more time in college than most IT jobs last. College has outlived it's paradigm.

So please, get off your intellectual high horse and stop trying to justify the excessive tuition you may still be making payments on. The need and applicability have been analyzed and it's waste of time and money.

- Dan.

Re:There is

[somersault]

So whata? Are those "facts" meant to prove some kind of point? The history of a country is pretty irrelevant to the present day. Power and cultural focal points have shifted many times in the last few thousand years. If we're to go by your logic then we should all be saying how genetically superior the Chinese and Egyptians are for develping such advanced cultures early on.

The fairly obvious truth is that human culture has little to with genetics. Raise a white man in Japan, or a Japanese man in Africa, and they will both fit in fine with the local culture.

Re:Frist Psot

[jhoegl]

I like the cut of your jib sir.
+1 Intellectual

Many schools...

[blahplusplus]

... have stopped having worthy intellectuals. One can look at the rise of neoconservatism in the US and the right wing think tanks everywhere spewing their anti-global warming garbage and many people with degree's or PHD's after their name from corporately funded schools. Corporations have highjacked the educational systems in order to spin ideology and misinformation into the curriculum and it's spreading. There is tonnes of misinformation all over the net with think tanks and special websites funded by billionaires.

Begging the question

[starfishsystems]

Oh yes, the "Internet geek" community. Is there a "new anti-intellectualism" amongst them?

Considering that both of these terms are undefined and contentious, it should be no surprise to see a diverse, noisy spectrum of responses to the question. After all, who gets to say what sort of person qualifies as an "Internet geek"? At that rate, I suppose we might as well all have a crack at the definition. Is it anyone with a Facebook account? Or do you have to be a protocol designer? If the former, then we're really talking about a massive sampling of the whole human population, and there's no particular discussion to be had. If the latter, then I'd argue, as someone working in the profession, that it's the same highly-skilled elite as always, and that - of necessity - nothing has changed.

Something has changed. It's more crowded now. When I got started in this profession, computer science was a new term for the sorts of inquiries being made by mathematicians and electrical engineers. To be a computer scientist was much like being a rocket scientist. Everything was exotic. A lot of the work was, perforce, purely an exercise of intellect. Anyone who had free access to computer time lived in a rare state of privilege. Today networked computing is absolutely prosaic, and comparisons with the old profession are essentially meaningless under any but, as noted above, a fairly elite definition of "Internet geek".

That's what has changed. The once-exclusive hot tub has become infinitely more crowded. Well, but what does this tell us about a "new anti-intellectualism"? It tells us absolutely nothing that we didn't know before. In the limit, the average IQ of a population still converges, by definition, to 100. Such a population places no particular emphasis on intellect, since intellect is not its particular asset. That population of Internet practitioners is our reward for all the hard work of building the Internet. Most people don't appreciate what it means simply because they can't. It's not a question of hostility to intellectualism, it's just that it's no longer necessary for everyone to be an expert.

Does this threaten the intellectual elite which brought the Internet into being? I can't see how. Of course, it can be frustrating at times to deal with ignorance disguised as superiority, but that's nothing new. We can go back further, to Aristotle and beyond, and find the very same thing.

Information vs knowledge..

[modi123]

Sounds like this is more of a larger issue of information versus knowledge. The internet is pushing for information to be everywhere and open to be modified by other individuals. Right now I have a crazy amount of information at my fingertips - stuff I would never have access to if it was fifteen years ago. Sure - the databases can act like a "collective memory", but the problem comes to applying deep concepts. I might have a breadth of knowledge available but if my depth is only an inch deep how does that better you?

At once point there was a good balance of depth and breadth; an understanding that it is important for you, the individual, to still consume the information to formulate an opinion, thought, or just to *create* from it. Relying on copies of copies of quick cliff notes degraded this.

Accelerando, by Charles Stross, deals with this in part. The main character had his "external memory" pouch swiped and he complains of feeling lost and incomplete. Basically the sum of his being was book marks and meta tags... take away that and effectively cripple the person.

Re:Frist Psot

[nomadic]

What enrages me nearly beyond comprehension is the expectation that we must be versed in the F*Tards listed above in order to be considered "Intellectual". F* you and your tired demarcation of what constitutes mental prowess. The fact is that we have *moved on* and live in the now of our own immediacy. Knowledge of these people will rarely help you in any business or IT environment.

QED.

Re:Frist Psot

[fusiongyro]

I disagree, because I think there's more point to learning than increasing intelligence, and there's more to being human than being able to apply intelligence to business or technology. Education is also about producing well-rounded people. For example, people who know the difference between a social norm (closing the bathroom door), intelligence, and cultural knowledge (Plato, Proust, Swift, etc). We haven't "moved on" from the human condition. Reading Wilde makes you a better person, not a better programmer, trader, or businessman. Seeing college purely as exchanging money for employability in a particular field, of course it is a bad deal. But that's the difference between a degree and a trade certification. Or it was.

Are you right?

[drb226]

No. (Elaboration is left as an exercise for the reader)

Anti-intellectualism is broadly based in society:

[Hartree]

It was never just the right or the religious.

I'd include the left during the 60/ early 70s as a hotbed of the sort of thing you mention. The revolt against any sort of intellectual authority was taken up wholesale by the "turn on, tune in, drop out" generation.

Examples:

Mentioning a gifted program at that time was an anathema to educational theorists who held that nearly all ability was aquired and that all could be brought up to one level with enough effort.

Sadly, this often resulted in the "gifted" program at smaller schools at that time being the special ed room.

My father had to deal with that for much of that period, being a biology teacher. He got it from the religious fundamentalists on evolution, and the left on genetics when it was even obliquely applied to humans.

In literature and philosophy, there was a whole litany against the DWMs (dead white males) and the substitution of nearly anything else for well established classic texts. Some of this was good, as it introduced different viewpoints. But there was much baby that was tossed with bathwater.

Any intellectual pursuit that treaded on the wrong toes was suspect. To research genetic contributions to behavior (real research, not Shockley's nonsense) was suspect. It was a good question in the 70s whether fetters would be put on genetics research aimed at modifying organisms, and most of that didn't come from the right. The right's move against stem cells was a considerably later development.

This was taken to an extreme in the literary criticism movement that went almost to (and in some cases directly to) the belief that all ideas are equal, and no intellectual framework has any more sway than another. Presumably even if it's based on the psychic friends network.

My point is that unlike the view referenced in your article saying that anti-intellectualism was considered by many a hallmark of only conservative protestantism, it was and still is enthusiastically embraced by many different groups. The only criteria was that it be a form of study or knowledge that conflicted with the entrenched views of $(group).

Re:Frist Psot

[teslafreak]

Reading any book does not make you a better person any more than violent video games make people violent. The ability to read at all certainly makes you a more useful person. There are a number of very intellegent yet very horrible people in the world.

Anti-establishment Perhaps

[InsertCleverUsername]

I see a resurgence of anti-establishment sentiment, but not anti-intellectualism. We are at the dawn of an amazing new age where education is about to undergo seismic change due to technology. Establishments like the university no longer own recondite information that we can't learn ourselves for free (minus bandwidth and connectivity charges, of course). Another side effect of technology on education in the near future will be the end of the memorization of trivia that can be parsed and synthesized into answers to complex questions by Watson's progeny. Many jobs that hinged on encyclopedic knowledge of some area of law, for instance, will simply evaporate, as will degrees emphasizing filling one's head with facts. The human race can increasingly focus on broad understanding, developing better critical thinking, and asking more interesting questions.

Keyword-scanning HR departments

[tepples]

I agree with a lot of what you said. My experience is similar; I learned enough Python in a few weeks after starting my first real job. But it took me years after graduation to find this first job, and I'd bet that had a lot to do with keyword-scanning HR departments that wouldn't even give me an interview without the magic buzzwords on my resume. And some of those businesses where I did get an interview were probably put off by my medical condition, which appears to be common among geeks.

Re:Keyword-scanning HR departments

[JustSomeProgrammer]

I was unemployed for nearly a year out of college but that was mostly due to the area I lived in not having anything good for me and most companies hating to hire someone from another location straight out of college. The salary I asked for was significantly lower than anyone else at the company because I was getting desperate. But only a few years later I'm over 6 figures.

Re:Frist Psot

[Rei]

If we consider your average Slashdot poster as what a "Geek" is, I think it's fair to say that most would consider themselves intellectual -- just not focused on historic literature and philosophy. And I think the author was spot-on in their observations -- "geeks" are so interested in intellectual pursuits that they overstate their abilities in a given field to themselves (believng anything can be readily learned, even complex fields of study) and wanting to be on the side of those who tear-down paradigms. So whenever they hear anyone with credentials decry a majority position, they tend to side with said person, no matter how outspoken said person is in their field -- and said geeks generally are educated enough to understand said minority person's positions in detail but are not versed with the bountiful amount of contrary literature that shows why their stance is implausible.

Oh, and FYI: Global warming is a myth, hydrogen doesn't burn, Polywell or Focus Fusion is the future of fusion, the Big Bang didn't occur, and John Doe from Podunk, Illinois has just discovered something in his garage which overturns Dominant Paradigm X.

Anti-intelectualism? try anti-institutionalism

[zTDGz]

It's actually anti-institutionalism.

A lot of people agree that the institutionalization of knowledge is wrong, and that information, education and let's throw in intellectuality, should be freely accessible and decentralized.

Anti-expert, anti-university and anti-intelectualism are merely missinterpritations of the thoughts that information, and knowledge should be a free pursuit.

Re:Frist Psot

[cpscotti]

Your generalization is stupid.

I spent as much timing discussing nihilism or nietzsche with friends as I spent discussing the big Oh, Knuth's musical enterprises or xkcd comics.

Heck, just read xkcd .. there's a lot of "intellectual" in there.
(literacy != intelluctuality)

Re:Frist Psot

[cpscotti]

btw.. intellectuality sounds better..

Re:First post

[tmosley]

How did I get this soul crushing debt when I used the money I had saved?

If my business had failed, I would have gone and done something else. Hell, I could have driven a truck for 4 years and saved up $80,000 (by not having a home of my own, or any bills outside of a cell phone). That would be enough to do any number of things. Hell, a few more years of that, and you could retire.

Defining "Geek"

[eepok]

I grew up with the understanding that Geeks are people who simply love knowledge. That knowledge can come in the form of literature, arts, computers, tech, anime, movies, physics, math, biology, etc. A geek is someone who fully immerses him/herself in the information of a topic.

When you see someone on the internet suggesting that college is a waste of time, there should be no assumption that the person is a geek at all-- just a person with computer literacy sufficient to post a comment.

Re:First post

[tmosley]

I know Physics PhDs from state universities that are making only $30,000/year in a testing laboratory.

And the competition for THOSE crappy jobs was FIERCE!

Re:First post

[Hartree]

"Left for what? There are no jobs that require college degrees. We've got PhDs flipping burgers and pushing mops, FFS."

And what's new about PhD's flipping burgers? Early 80s? Check. In the early 70s we used to kid my brother that when he finished his doctorate in anthropology he'd wash buses for a living. It was only partly a joke.

And it's not just the liberal arts. I work fixing lab equipment, and I've got a physics degree. Before that I was a sysadmin.

No jobs that require college degrees? Really? Sounds like the one your doing requires it to be considered.

Whether it should is a different story.

BTW, I did start and run a business for 2 years. It crashed with the housing downturn. So did a lot of other HVAC/Refrigeration companies.

(You're reading more into my comment than was there. It was twitting an AC saying that he'd gotten to slashdot 4 years early and falsely claiming a first post. Getting to slashdot first, or getting first post may be a little like winning the special olympics. ;)

Re:First post

[Americano]

I see... so while your business is failing over the course of 4 years, you would have magically acquired income from... what, exactly? Or did you start your business with no seed capital, and spend your $20k or so of savings on living expenses? But you lived like a king for those 4 years.

There is no world in which a (failing business + living expenses) * 4 years = $20,000 dollars + no debt from living & business expenses.

You're either being willfully ignorant about the cost of living, or you literally have no clue how much money rent food and basic utilities actually cost.

Media hype

[Major Byte]

The claim of "a lot of Internet geeks and digerati have sounded many puzzlingly anti-intellectual" does not pass the litmus test. A great deal of learning (self and/or formal education) is needed, and not just intellectual skills but also diligent effort.

On the other hand, those that claim to be a computer expert because they can run a mail merge from Word, or copy an Excel macro from a website, or talk l33t, these people might abase intellectual effort because they make none. Posers, in a word.

This would not be the first time a few flashy shallow loudmouths are embraced by the news media as a trend. After all, no news sells no newspapers (or web site adverts).

Geeks and what being a geek means

[DarkOx]

Geeks are not and never were supposed to be intellectuals, they were supposed to be smart and capable. Often being an intellectual correlated with being smart and capable. Its less so today because being an "intellectual" no longer implies being a critical thinker, being open to the facts, questioning ones own assumptions and presumptions; rather it has come to mean in most parts of academia accepting a particular political view point.

It used to be that attending university was a the best route to learning a great deal about a topic you found interesting and wanted to work at applying while at the same time picking up all kinds of useful background information. In many many cases its not anymore. The business people at many schools figured out people don't like paying tens of thousands of dollars and possibly not getting a diploma to show for it. So they watered the curriculum down to the point the sort of person who is a true geek (smart) would have to almost apply themselves to failing in order to do so. Consequently university is depending on your financial resources and interests not the best place to obtain useful education or at least not the most efficient route; for many geeks it is therefore a waste of time.

Individualism, Intellectualism, and Truth

[catchblue22]

In a world where we are encouraged only to follow our own self-interest, where the state and anything associated with the Public Interest is under attack, it is no surprise that the Truth becomes a casualty. Our habit of looking inwards seems to be carried over to our intellectual lives. In this world where we are all individual islands, it often seems that everyone is right and no one is wrong. We seem to denigrate the idea of Truth, and with it we denigrate the institutions whose purpose is to explore for Truth. Academics, intellectuals, and people who rigorously use logic and reason to seek the Truth are put at the same level as charlatans and those who do not care about logic but have other agendas. Surely the idea that "nerds" are becoming "anti-intellectuals" can be tied to this broader trend.

Re:Frist Psot

[interkin3tic]

It's rare that the garden-variety "Geek" ever had much time for what could be called "intellectual" pursuits.There's not a high degree of literacy in geekdom, outside of their specialised technologies. Plato? Proust? Swift? Wittgenstein? Wilde? Eco? Baudrillard? Pound? Spinoza? Aquinas? Borges?

Wiki says an intellectual is "An intellectual is a person who uses intelligence (thought and reason) and critical or analytical reasoning in either a professional or a personal capacity."

You're right that they've never been the most literary or philosophical group, but there are multiple types of "intellectuals" A scientist definitely qualifies as "intellectual" in my book. At least 40% of scientists are geeks in my estimation, and most geeks seem to like science.

Maybe there are some geeks who are anti-academic, disliking the higher education system, and maybe they do have more of a voice than they used to. As an academic scientist, I dislike the notion that we spend too much time learning, but maybe we do pay too much for it. They have a point. But that's not "anti-intellectual" in my opinion.

Re:There is

[teloric]

I can't help myself here. The "caveman" as you call him is clearly a pre-christian era norseman! That hair, and the clothing are clear tongue in cheek indicators(don't believe me, go check out Hägar and read a few of them). Further I think you should note that by your own presumptions of the superiority of Caucasians there would be more Caucasians in the tech field then other breeds of human, so if the article is about the backword(pun intended) movement of Geeks and intellectualism, then clearly the image meant to illustrate this should be a "regressed" Caucasian. I would suggest that before you go storming around on what is clearly a pet issue for you, you actually check the context of the article and the consider that perhaps someone purposely chose something for it's applicability and not for a biased attempt at political correctness.

In the US, maybe

[fantomas]

College costs as much as a mid-range to high-end sports car

In the US, maybe. This is the model of society you have chosen as a people, that education should cost a lot of money and exclude those who aren't rich or aren't given credit to go into debt.

In some other countries, education is seen as something society should subsidise and doesn't cost as much, and is accessible to all and not just the rich. It depends on your preferred model of society.

A true geek....

[Dcnjoe60]

A true geek would have pointed out before you could truly have this discussion, one must define what the definition of a geek is. It seems in society and here on slashdot, we have many who exhibit "geeky" behavior, but that in and of itself does not make one a geek.

Re:Frist Psot

[Ex-MislTech]

I have heard different versions but here goes.

By the time the college figures out where rapid tech is heading, tech
has already moved onto the new latest thing and or changes
are happening in real time and college 'somewhat' has not
adapted to this rapid real time in how its done.

Ppl show up in the working world and what they were taught in school
has been changed majorly or retired.

For ppl in the real world to keep up they are self learning via books,
the net, and other tools before the professors teach it in their
classrooms or student have to parallel learn the classroom material
that is may be obsolete with what is really being used.

One intellectual inferred this would be part of the Technological Singularity,
in other words tech would speed up learning, publications, and the old ways
of doing things would have to adapt.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technological_singularity

The other aspect of the singularity are argued, but I'd say this one is
coming true in certain areas to certain extent, YMMV.

My use of this example is due to how fast we are advancing due to the net,
rapid on demand publishing, etc etc.

The whole tech sphere is accelerating itself in some areas, in others
it seems to be complicating things...but that is another story.

The best thing to learn IMHO is how to learn on your own via
the online resources, books, journals, and be adaptive to a fluid world
that is moving faster than it has in the past.

I think we can all agree that a lot of areas are accelerating.

Re:Frist Psot

[Jeremiah Cornelius]

Ah yes. Intellectuality is useless unless provides some form of sucking at a corporate-industrial cash-teat.

Thanks for validating my thesis.

Absolutely

[TheoMurpse]

I have befriended a number of people based on a common geek interest in my town. Within a year or so, I came to realize they're all fucking morons. They like this geeky thing, but have no logical reasoning capabilities, have almost no post-secondary education, and have menial jobs.

But I wouldn't really call it a rising trend so much as "geeky" things becoming mainstream: video games (Halo did this more than any other game, I think), sci-fi/fantasy (came about because of LotR), computers...

Everything that used to require you to be a nerd, too,* now only requires you be a geek.

* Full disclosure: I consider a nerd to be someone with depth and breadth of knowledge (which sort of implies a high degree of intelliigence), while I think a geek merely has depth. So you can "geek out" over one topic like video games, but unless you're actually an intelligent person, you aren't a nerd.

And yeah! this all sounds elitist, but I don't care. I used to befriend computer people and then happen to have conversations with them about number theory, geopolitics, whatever. Now there is no guarantee a "computer person" I befriend even knows what a kernel is.

Re:Absolutely

[TheoMurpse]

I'd like to preëmptively point out that I'm not equating doing a menial job with being a moron.

Slashdot discussing stuff politely?!

[Larry Sanger]

I've posted quite a few times here on Slashdot, and I have to say, this is the most civilized discussion I have seen, well, ever in this forum. I have to think that I've hit a nerve, and people are actually not just doing their usual posturing, but actually caring about the question and trying to come to grips with it. There may be hope for geeks yet.

Re:A telling sign of geek anti-intellectualism

[eepok]

Well said. I'd +1 ya if I didn't already comment in this thread.

Re:Frist Psot

[Ex-MislTech]

Right now a PC with a hypnosis program and the material that is needed to
learn combined in the right manner would make things go even faster.

Try self hypnosis and reading some time, its amazing, thou
if not used and reinforced it tends to fade faster than usual in most ppl.

Re:A telling sign of geek anti-intellectualism

[eepok]

Yes, modern society generally equates the two... in public. If you find any parent talking to his/her child about life goals, that parent, in the most genuine honesty, will say, "Be happy."

Re:You're getting it wrong

[devphaeton]

It actually goes deeper than this.

I've watched the level of literacy and general acknowledgement of grammar, spelling, correct use of apostrophes and such decline over the last 5 years on the web. I even see it here. I thought this would be the last place it would happen, but it's occurring more and more every time I come back.

What frightens me more than anything are the new crop of 20-somethings I see in college every day. So many of them can't spell, can't read, can't write, are completely incompetent, yet they are so narcissistic and full of themselves and feel they're the most brilliant kids to ever grace the halls of the institution. College-level kids turning in 4th-grade level work in college courses. In some classes, the gradebook shakes them out pretty quick, in others it doesn't, to my surprise.

These are the ones that put on the dark-rimmed glasses and go around claiming to be the "genius by birth, slacker by choice" geeks. It's not all of them, but enough of them to where I have lost a lot of hope.

These are your future doctors, engineers, politicians and teachers.

Geekdom is about applied intellect

[Qbertino]

Geekdom is about applied intellect, not intellectualism. In fact, I'd argue that it is precisely the opposite of intelectualism.
Intellectualism is basically a bourgeoise exercise in brain farting, with no real effect on the world in general and no direct practical value to personal life. Geekish applied intellect on the other hand is the - more or less - systematic acquisition of skill and/or insight into the workings of the world around you. For the sake of, in the end, improving the world for oneself and others. In essence, it's the modern pinnacle of Stoicism ... or its eastern variant, Zen Buddhism. Maybe with a tad more materialism, but basically that's it.

That in times like these, where knowledge is free and widely available and top-grade expertise is just a download away, I see no contradiction to geek intellect when the value of a college career is questioned every now and then.

And I see geek intellect only pro-actively up against intellectualism where the latter gets out of hand and places itself to far above the sort of intellect that actually 'gets the job done' contrary to just musing and bullshitting about things.

My 2 cents.

Buccaneer Scholars

[Wordplay]

I'm certainly not anti-intellectual, I learn all the time, probably more so than most college grads do. I'm not anti-academic, either; I respect people's choice to go to college, and I even went for a couple of years myself before deciding that just getting a job coding software was a better path for me.

What I am is against having college forced down someone's throat as the only option, especially when the universities (at least the private schools) are heavily profiting from this attitude. I'm against the idea that you have to be tens or even more than a hundred thousand dollars in personal debt at age 25 to succeed in life. And I'm against a self-perpetuating system of college graduates who think only college graduates could possibly be as skilled as they are and thus artificially inflate the value of the degree.

You absolutely can succeed without college, if you're smart and determined. And if you're an entrepreneur, then getting the hell out on the market is much more valuable than biding your time while learning things that have nothing to do with your dream. Never mind the tuition costs, the opportunity costs to an entrepreneur for waiting are crippling.

And then, if you really want to go to school, go. But only if you really want to do so.

Re:Frist Psot

[Icegryphon]

Oh, and FYI: Global warming is a myth, hydrogen doesn't burn, Polywell or Focus Fusion is the future of fusion, the Big Bang didn't occur, and John Doe from Podunk, Illinois has just discovered something in his garage which overturns Dominant Paradigm X.

Reminds me of a John Doe who went head to head with Stephen Hawking http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonard_Susskind http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Susskind-Hawking_battle

To all that say college is a waste of time...

[werepants]

I'm afraid maybe you went to college for the wrong thing. I'm a self-taught IT guy and computer programmer, and I never saw any point in going to college for those things because I could do them well enough already, and I'm confident I could teach myself anything else I care to know in those fields. However, after dropping out of a liberal arts program that I was doing just to get my degree, I worked some shit jobs and then decided that if I went back it was going to be for something worthwhile. I chose physics, and I can tell you that I've learned no end of useful, applicable stuff, and opened doors that never would've existed before. There are jobs paying 60k a year that I could have right out of college if I wanted them. I've gotten research experience and contacts that will make me a shoe-in at most grad schools I'm interested in. I've been able to work with fun stuff - particle detectors, liquid nitrogen, robotics, radioactive substances, aerospace projects - And, I've gotten my education certification, without which it is illegal to work as a teacher.

So, college has done a whole lot for me. There's not a class I've taken in physics that hasn't taught me something cool and useful. And, it is useful in both a "people would pay me for this shit" kind of way and in a "I've always wanted to be able to do this" kind of way. And, believe it or not, the education program has given me a lot of real-world experience and practical knowledge that will make my job as a teacher much easier.

If you go to college just for the earning potential, it is probably a waste of time. If you go to college to pursue a passion or, I don't know, learn something, you might find it a more valuable experience.


In terms of anti-intellectual geeks - Intellectualism doesn't mean that you can do something complicated or that you've built something, or that you can outprogram your peers in your chosen language. In my mind, intellectualism means a love for knowledge and truth and an endless curiosity. A lot of geeks have blinders to everything that isn't computers, gaming, or otherwise overtly nerdy.
Somehow the ideal of the Renaissance man has disappeared, but for quite some time I think that was the meaning taken by "Intellectual". To qualify, I think you need to value knowledge itself. As soon as you call some field of knowledge worthless, you've undermined the entire body of intellectualism. Sure Art History doesn't require calculus and doesn't have the same earning potential. So what? You've made it ok to say "knowledge is worthless" in one instance, so you undermine whatever piece of knowledge you claim to value.

Intellectuals do not require a degree

[OldHawk777]

I am a high school dropout with 160+ semester hours (Math, Art, Anthropology, Law, Business, Telecommunications...).

In 1969@17yo I was in the USMC. I make a decent living. I am respected by my peers and work colleagues. I am respected by scientist and engineers in labs and field. I am respected by lawyers for my understanding of technology application. IOW: I do very well without the academic crutch with (like myself) most professionals.

Regrettably, I seldom get any respect from business/career-management idiots, because I am degree-free. Senior, staff, and the wannabes of marketing and business management are frequently disappointing. They have no leadership skills, and excel at micro-management their next career move. I have never met any senior clerical leaders, staff/managers that I do not consider scoundrels and frequently just flat-out evil.

About 1 in three C*Os, project/program managers... and politicians are fair to exceptional and typically a mutual respect between the good/exceptional is probable.

Some folks; I work with say, I have a pragmatics science degree. I just know I am a good troubleshooter/guesser.

WHY DO I NEED/WANT A DEGREE? George Bush has one, I suspect Sara Palin, Don Trump, the Vatican Pope all have degrees. I bet most of politicians, C*Os, and economist have degrees. I knew there were no WMDs in Iraq, I knew the tech (got out six month early) and housing (I sold two thirds of my position) bubble would burst....

Anyway, degree or no degree does not make you an intellectual or moron, but an official degree does allow many folks to be elitist, walk on bullshit, and make money, then grin at the poor trusting folks that lose their homes, money, retirement, medical insurance ... and say "I want my life back."

"Intellectual" I know more about fine arts and applied or theoretical science/math than any Biz-buzzard I have ever met. I earn respect; So, let the dude-degree folks earn respect. I suspect, most cannot earn respect except from another Biz-buzzard.

Autodidacts with a degree in pragmatics, that always are learning, are the wave of the apt, agile, and flexible wave to the future. Stanford, MIT, Harvard ... are already moving to a new academic business model.

  What it will finally be, I am not sure, but I suspect the Bush/Palin... of the future world are in for less money, housing, food, medical care, education....

!HAVEFUN!

Re:Frist Psot

[presidenteloco]

The reason to read the works of (or paraphrases of the works of) ancient or historical thinkers is because they introduced new concepts and new patterns of thought. You can study these concepts and their relationships, and rehearse these patterns of thought, and increase your intellectual ammunition and versatility.

To think you don't need to get deep into some of these areas, and don't need to take time to wander around in each area of knowledge with expert guides, because "there is a wikipedia page for that", is the height of pseudo-intellectual arrogance. You will know the stuff in the same way a parrot knows it. And it will be as much use to you as it is to the parrot.

Re:Frist Psot

[metacell]

Hm, each one of those majority positions has a chance of being wrong. I wouldn't be too sure not one of them turns out to be.

Re:There is

[metacell]

Don't feed the troll...

Re:for a lot of people college IS a waste of time.

[binary paladin]

None of which has anything to do with college. Understanding computer science generically requires... studying computer science. Holy shit. What a fucking concept.

If you treat your profession as a trade, you'll learn trade skills. If you treat it as an art or a science you'll learn more. If you are intellectually curious you'll study outside of your bubble.

College can certainly help with those things, but it's not the one and only true path.

Re:Frist Psot

[Hylandr]

The reason to read the works of (or paraphrases of the works of) ancient or historical thinkers is because they introduced new concepts and new patterns of thought. You can study these concepts and their relationships, and rehearse these patterns of thought, and increase your intellectual ammunition and versatility.

So I can parrot these guys? Become an unoriginal automaton?

To think you don't need to get deep into some of these areas, and don't need to take time to wander around in each area of knowledge with expert guides, because "there is a wikipedia page for that", is the height of pseudo-intellectual arrogance. You will know the stuff in the same way a parrot knows it. And it will be as much use to you as it is to the parrot.

Damn right there is a wikipedia page for that, information isn't hard to come by these days. It's the ability to work with that information that's not being taught in hardly many schools

And to quote someone above:

Seeing college purely as exchanging money for employability in a particular field, of course it is a bad deal.

Welcome to the HR mandated curriculum. I wonder how many companies would soar to profitability by just laying off the whole damn HR money sink?

- Dan.

Re:Smarts, Not degrees

[presidenteloco]

If you have real world tools you are a real world tool.

University is supposed to let you run up a pyramid of previous intellectual giants stacked together, so you can leap off the top and transcend what has gone before.

Yes it's good to learn things for yourself, but so much has already been learned by others that you need to get a briefing, a map, and tips about the shortcuts, along with a brain bootcamp workout (labs and exams).

Kudos!

[jsprenkle]

Journalism 101 template: "Is dead?"
Journalism 201 template: retitle Journalism 101 material: "Is there a new trend against ?"

Congratulations on graduating to your second semester of Journalism school.

Re:Smarts, Not degrees

[presidenteloco]

See. If I'd paid attention in university I would've learned how to make un-mixed metaphors that don't have people leaping off the top of metaphorical pyramids and tumbling down the side of them into oblivion.

Re:Frist Psot

[Rei]

The Felix Bloch Professor of Theoretical Physics at Stanford University is a "John Doe from Podunk"? Were his colleages in that debate also the same? Is Hawking the sum of theoretical physics?

Mod parent up

[AtlantaSteve]

This sums it up. Everyone else can stop now.

On college and education in general...

[BlueTemplar]

"I have never let my schooling interfere with my education." Mark Twain

Going to school has one benefit

[ub3r n3u7r4l1st]

Find your love in school while you are still in it. If you wait until working outside to find your other half, all you get is gold diggers.

Of course there are people who still want to go this route because it saves you money during college, but then make sure you get a pre-nuptial to protect your assets.

Re:Frist Psot

[similar_name]

“Nothing that is worth knowing can be taught.” - Oscar Wilde

Re:Frist Psot

[similar_name]

What's somewhat amusing is that many of the great thinkers we study in education had few good things to say about education.

intellectual orthodoxy may be at fault

[superwiz]

Many forms of intellectual inquiry better yield themselves methods of discovery other than the Socratic method. This is simply the case because of the cheapness of presentation medium in the modern age. Few would argue that Sesame Street, for example, inhibits intellectual development of children. Well, with the cost of interactive medium coming to the low levels it has come to, many forms of inquiry (which were previously only available through the rigorous structure of the Socratic method) are now available to be purveyed through more individualized means. Those adroit at exploiting such venues of discovery are not anti-intellectual, but they often are geeks. They may appear to be anti-intellectual since they sidestep the orthodox methods of inquiry (which are traditionally associated with intellectual endeavor). But those who give too much credit to such appearances are guilty of elevating form over function.

persuit of knowledge

[currently_awake]

The core belief of a geek is seeking knowledge in all its forms. It doesn't matter if you do it in school or self taught, whether you build or study, the seeking is the thing itself.

Oblig. Asimov

[TapeCutter]

Hm, each one of those majority positions has a chance of being wrong. I wouldn't be too sure not one of them turns out to be.

Established theories are well tested models of how certain bits of the universe work and by definition models are imperfect. However, established theories (eg:Evolution, AGW, Heliocentricity, Germ Theory, Politically sensitive theory X) are very unlikely to be flat out wrong

Re:Oblig. Asimov

[metacell]

Man-made global warming and the position that focus fusion is not viable are not scientific theories, and they're not tested in the sense that scientific theories are.

It seems to be common nowadays to confuse scientific theories (e.g, the theory of evolution, heliocentricity, germ theory) with statements made on a scientific basis (e.g, the viability of focus fusion, meteorological predictions, recommendations for vaccination) or scientific hypotheses (e.g, anthropogenic global warming, the origin of life).

Re:Oblig. Asimov

[TapeCutter]

Yeah right, the vast majority of scientists are doing it wrong.

Re:Oblig. Asimov

[metacell]

Perhaps they just simplify when they're talking to the public?

Peter Thiel got lucky

[thisisauniqueid]

The times I have heard Peter Thiel speak in person, I have been decidedly unimpressed. He's one of the guys that got lucky, he's not where he is because of genius. So of course he's going to reject college education, he didn't need one to get where he is.

Re:Frist Psot

[OptimusPaul]

See this is where both you and the parent are right and wrong. Many of the geeks I know agree that college is a waste of time, but they also have read the classics and then some. Some of these "anti-intellectuals" are far more learned and social aware than many of these college educated nerds. Education doesn't need to come from schools, and from what I've seen a degree doesn't tell me more about a person than that they spent money on college.

Re:Frist Psot

[Jeremiah Cornelius]

True.

For that, you must start with silence.

On a sliding scale of intellectual...

[johncandale]

On a sliding scale of intellectual, a geek is well above the average in a given social group but below a true academic. A select group of them tend to become academics. Once and awhile one becomes a poisoned dragon and becomes Malcolm Gladwell, the anti-thiesit of a true intellectual

Is There a New Geek Anti-Intellectualism?

[vijaysharma1122]

@Larry Sanger. I agree and here are my opinions/comments. I expect geeks to be intellectual and have never tied formal or informal education with intellectualism. I have often felt disappointed at the spelling, grammar, mathematics and other minor errors shown by some of the geeks. But I have seen similar errors shown by other professionals also and was equally dismayed, not that I wanted to, but had no choice in accepting what was true. One word, Geek and Intellectualism are obviously not synonyms, and as all engineers, physicians and other professional are not at the same level in terms of expertise; so are various schools, Ivy league or other, this then will not be proper to expect and attach a significance to one working professional with all the intellectual capacities, because of the anticipated connotations involved with the word "Geek". My guess is, it would be more appropriate to judge or evaluate on a case by case basis rather than roll all under one carpet or put on a high pedestal.

Tangible benefits != economic benefit

[danhaas]

Going to college has intangible benefits, and that means you are less likely to do stupid stuff like crack cocaine, unplanned parenthood, etc. After going to college, you have a better clue of how the world works and that may, or may not, help you survive and succeed in it.
You can go to college and still do stupid stuff, so this argument of "self improvement" isn't always good.

The tangible benefit of going to college is that you are better in a certain trade. If you went to a good college, you are not simply trained, you have an actual deeper understanding of the trade.
To cite an example that I'm familiar with, anyone that works with compressed gases knows that when a compressed gas discharges to the atmosphere, it gets colder. If you studied fluid dynamics and thermodynamics, you know why that happens and you can even predict how much colder it will get. The guy that worked with compressed CO2 for 5 years will have just a "feeling" for it, and that kind of "feeling" won't get us to the stars.

Now, if that deeper understanding of the trade will translate to economic benefit, that depends on the society you are in. Sadly for my american friends, your society doesn't value that sort of knowledge as it used to. Maybe you need another USSR and terrorism isn't cutting to it, maybe the american dream succumbed to greed, idk. Here in Brazil, the trend for economic value of knowledge is certainly up.

PS.: there are 3 ways to explain why gases get colder when decompressed to an open environment: thermal energy is transformed into kinetic energy; or the gas suffers an adiabatic decompression, and it cools because it exerts work on the surrounding air; or if you consider temperature as random movement of the atoms, when you align that movement to a certain direction, the random movement of the particles must decrease to keep the energy of each particle constant. Number 3 is just a fancy way of saying number 1, though.

Intellectuals aren't what they used to be.

[Fractal Dice]

Every year I was an undergrad, my score in the Putnum math competition dropped (in my first year I got the highest score in my school, second year I tied for highest, third year I was middle of the pack and fourth year I was so stressed about other work that I overslept on the day and missed it entirely).

That's the only emperical evidence I have, but it suggests that higher education was worse than useless for me :)

Re:Frist Psot

[Nursie]

Really?

They actually introduced new ways of thinking?

I'm sorry but I find that somewhat hard to believe. They may well have performed thorough intellectual investigation of thought patterns, of what it means to be human, to be alive etc etc, but I think you credit them with being more influential on the rest of humanity than you can possibly support.

Technophillia doesn't stop anti-intellectualism

[dbIII]

Oh yes, the "Internet geek" community. Is there a "new anti-intellectualism" amongst them?

Yes.
A major characteristic of a self defined geek is a love of technology. Among a disturbing number of those is an inpatience, disgust or even absolute hatred of the underlying science or whatever field of study lies behind the technolgy they love.
It's cargo cult anti-intellectualism.
You can see many examples of this on the comments to articles here, many along the lines of "who cares, don't tell me about this advance until I can buy it at Walmart". Other examples lie with anything involving biology or climate where the scientists are derided and arguments by barely educated lay preachers and mathematically illiterate economists are put forward instead. Something like that cannot be mistaken as anything other than anti-intellectual by anyone other than partisans cheering mindlessly for their team.
Discussions on civilian nuclear technology here really draw out the mindless cargo cult behaviour. For example if I was to put something like "Synroc stablises high grade nuclear waste by incorportating ..." I would get a reply along the lines of "Nuclear waste does not exist, it's just an opportunity for future fuel - and what about coal?". Mindless fanboys cheering for their team and regurgitating the lines from PR campaigns. They are extremely hostile if there is any mention of the underlying science. That's anti-intellectualism.
It's not just the nuclear power cargo cult with their 1970s PR fuelled dreams, there was a frequent advocate of solar energy by photovoltaic cells here that described the simplest behaviour of materials under stress as "magical thinking" and was full of insults for anyone that dared to discuss simple high school physics. There's a beanstalk cargo cult that do not understand why there is the concept of a space elevator in the first place - they just know that it is GOOD and anyone who wants to bring very simple physics in to explain why things won't just rise off the ground on the beanstalk without putting in some energy gets hit with mindless rage and insults - how dare you sully the lovely dream of technology with talk of science! They do not begin to understand that the technolgy does not just magically drop from the sky.

Re:Technophillia doesn't stop anti-intellectualism

[starfishsystems]

Well, that's just sad.

Re:Technophillia doesn't stop anti-intellectualism

[dbIII]

I thought after your post I should steer things back on topic to intellectualism instead of intelligence which seems to be what you are going on about instead.
The article's question doesn't translate in doubleplusgood ebonics to "are geeks stupid now" it translates to "do geeks hate details outside of their obsession and put down anyone that works with those details".
It's not just sad, it's as incredibly fucking depressing as meeting a creationist oil company executive that thinks all geologists and geophysicists are liars doing the work of the devil.

You've misunderstood what anti-intellectualism is

[mjwx]

And thus, anti-intellectualism is linked to geek-ness.

You've misunderstood what anti-intellectualism is.

You have a point that intellectualism is not intrinsically intertwined with geekdom (although more often then not it is) but that does not make it anti-intellectual.

To clarify, Anti-Intellectualism is the rejection and ridicule of intellectual pursuits. Being a geek is contrary to this, even if you're a traditional hacker and never pursued structured study you are still driven by a desire to learn. People who are geeks tend to be good learners and rational and/or abstract thinkers. They put their brains to work a lot and demonstrate aptitude in problem solving. Geeks are often intellectual, even without appearing to be.

Anti-intellectuals on the other hand constantly deride learning and problem solving, They tend to be followers who discourage individual thinking, often irrational and erratic using loaded arguments and emotional language to instil hate, fear or loathing in those who they dispose. Luddites fit the mould of anti-intellectuals as do most fanboys. The "jock" is the classic example.

Re:Frist Psot

[Nursie]

And yet here I am with a six figure salary, programming in C, a language that's been around since the 70s.

A good foundation in computer science doesn't become irrelevant. The language of the moment may, which is why it's not always the best idea to heavily teach the current fad.

Re:Frist Psot

[gordo3000]

so what you are saying is in order to consider my logic and thought to be sufficient, I first have to read these books? that is like saying you must read On the Origin of Species to understand evolution. Both are equally idiotic and if you think so, your ability in both fields is probably lacking. Darwin, while having a great idea, did not understand the process or or the science as it is understood today and frankly, modern evolutionary theory can be taught without knowing anything about some random islands he went to. Being able to quote Darwin is for people who want to seem or act like they are educated.

For the rest of us trying to expand our boundaries, we'll happily forgo wasting time on methods and ideas that have either been completely replaced or expounded upon in ways that clarify the ideas. It'll save us time so we can try and push forward.

Re:You've misunderstood what anti-intellectualism

[AK Marc]

To clarify, Anti-Intellectualism is the rejection and ridicule of intellectual pursuits.

If you define "college" to be a subset of "intellectual pursuits" then geekdom is anti-intellectual (for at least some of the subset of intellectual pursuits).

Anti-intellectuals on the other hand constantly deride learning and problem solving,

Geekdom doesn't get a free pass because they deride learning at college and support learning if it's from self-study. They deride learning. Thus they are anti-intellectuals. That they then praise some "approved" subset of learning doesn't change the fact that they already earned the anti-intellectual label by deriding learning.

Note, the above is a little more "devil's advocate" than I like to be, but it's showing that when you look at specific traits and specific geekdom beliefs, they can be seen to be anti-intellectual.

Not Anti-Intellectual but Anti-Institutional

[ForgedArtificer]

I would argue that "geeks" are not anti-intellectual as you position, but are increasingly against traditional (and often sorely outdated) methods of gaining knowledge.

I myself am against traditional education, and yet I am a very intelligent, knowledgeable person. I have gained that knowledge by learning on my own, and through others. In today's society you just don't have to go to a special building and pay hundreds or thousands of dollars to learn a lot of things.

Anyway, I'm not going to stay on my soapbox... suffice to say that traditional education is, to me, mostly obsolete or in need of a serious overhaul.

re

[mjwx]

If you define "college" to be a subset of "intellectual pursuits" then geekdom is anti-intellectual (for at least some of the subset of intellectual pursuits).

You've defined it as that, I said

Being a geek is contrary to this, even if you're a traditional hacker and never pursued structured study you are still driven by a desire to learn.

You're trying to paint the issue into a black and white corner here. Being geeky does not preclude having an education from an institution or choosing other methods of learning.

Geekdom doesn't get a free pass because they deride learning at college

I know few geeks who'd actually do this.

Those geeks who did not get a formal education are normally smart enough not to deride it as they understand that learning can happen in may forms.

I'm uni educated, I do not deride anyone who is not for the simple reason that I understand that they can be just as smart as I am, perhaps more so. Trying to limit the definition of "education" to gained certifications is pointless as it's easy to change the definition. E.G.

I'll bet that you are not a certified boilermaker therefore you are uneducated.

This is a strawman because it ignores A) you may have the skill set but not the certification B) boilermaking is not the only skill in the world.

Uni/Collage is not the only way to learn, although in my experience it's a very good way (TAFE, the rough collage equivalent in Australia is focused on delivering practical skills and does quite a good job at it) but it is not the only way. Anti-intellectualism is rejection of learning, not disagreeing over the best method.

Re:re

[AK Marc]

You're trying to paint the issue into a black and white corner here. Being geeky does not preclude having an education from an institution or choosing other methods of learning.

You obviously don't understand what a generalization is. I'm not trying to preclude anything. Nor am I stating anything about what all geeks do. I'm defending the premise of the article that states that geeks, in general, have some traits. That you can identify exceptions doesn't disprove the generalization. That you identify with geekdom and are somehow offended by the "anti-intellectual" tag doesn't mean it doesn't apply, in general, to geeks.

Anti-intellectualism is rejection of learning, not disagreeing over the best method.

The definition apparently changes from post to post. And the definition of the word lays not with those who wish it to mean something, but in those who use it. Watching geeks here bash people with MBAs, watching geeks here bash people who get computer science degrees and go into programming, watching geeks who constantly assert some edge cases of billionaire dropouts as the average dropout, watching all that gives me the distinct impression that people who self identify as geeks are more likely to be anti-intellectual than not.

And no, your assertion of what you'd like anti-intellectual to mean will not change my opinion on that. You'd have to demonstrate that the average geek values learning in others, even if (or especially if) that learning was through an institution of higher education.

Re:You've misunderstood what anti-intellectualism

[lennier]

If you define "college" to be a subset of "intellectual pursuits" then geekdom is anti-intellectual (for at least some of the subset of intellectual pursuits).

Er? That doesn't seem to be a valid logical proposition at all. Are you sure you went to college?

LET COLLEGE = SUBSET (INTELLECTUAL_PURSUITS)
LET GEEK = NOT COLLEGE
GEEK = NOT INTELLECTUAL_PURSUITS
therefore ALL(INTELLECTUAL_PURSUITS) = SUBSET(INTELLECTUAL_PURSUITS)

Error: attempt to equate subset with totality of superset. Assertion failed.

Understandable confusion

[Baldrson]

Its understandable that people confuse the assertion that "college is a waste of time" with anti-intellectualism. After all, it is true that college costs both time and money but what people seem to ignore is the damage to critical thinking done to youthful developing brains by college. If people ignored the idea of "waste" and focused on the brain damage done, it would be harder to characterize such criticisms of college as "anti-intellectual".

PS: I'm not here trying to say that academia does more damage than media, mind you -- but it does make the damage a bit more difficult to cure since it has the veneer useful knowledge.

[citation needed]

[Scott Scott]

Pulling numbers and averages out of the air is a wonderful generalization: I'm glad it helps you sleep nights, but your numbers don't mean anything without context and I can think of plenty of cases where these don't apply.

Which bachelor's degrees/sectors/sources are you referring to?

Re:[citation needed]

[Antisyzygy]

I don't pull any numbers out of the air. A simple google search will get you them. Furthermore, averages by definition are a generalization. I made no claim otherwise and it should be obvious its a generalization anyway. The average wage in America is 45,000 a year. Does this mean that there aren't people making millions a year or people making nothing? No. Its obvious a BS in Electrical Engineering will make you more money than a BA in Fine Arts. However, there is such a thing as a standard deviation which will show you the range you can expect for any percentage of the population you wish. Though I didn't factor that in, it doesn't matter. A welder will make more than a BA in Fine Arts in their life, this is blatantly obvious, do I honestly need to write a statistical study on slashdot to appease anal retentive people like you? My point still stands. You will make more money with a degree than without, unless you specialize in specific trades or get lucky. Hard work plays a role too, but it doesn't matter as much as the former. There are plenty of people that work harder than any CEO, and they still get paid 10 dollars an hour.

Re:[citation needed]

[Scott Scott]

*facedesk*

How did you manage to respond to everything except my main point?

Yes, I'm aware you were responding generally - that's why I referred to it as a generalization - and I'm aware of what a standard deviation is and what they represent given various populations. What I asked for was a specific citation and what, if any, specific data points or ranges you were attempting to speak for.

What I was not looking for was a hardcore statistical analysis. What I was looking for was a citation that would point me in the direction of one, so that I could figure out how to interpret your figures. I don't know your assumptions or where half the numbers come from, and it's going to take more than a simple google search to figure those out. I'm not looking to nit pick here: I'm just trying to figure out what the hell you're referring to in a post that's mostly mathematical.

It's Generally Called Conservatism

[n8r0n]

I know many of us just associate with other geeks, but this phenomenon isn't at all confined to the geek world. Don't overthink this one. Conservatism has had a nice little rebound in the last year or so, not to mention a trend in the US that really started in 2001 with the election of the quintessential anti-intellectual, George W. Bush. Modern conservatism is, at its core, anti-intellectual. It doesn't care about facts, degrees, experts, or reason. It's all about giving in to your fear, and what your gut tells you. The masses are most easily lured by this kind of philosophy, but geeks aren't immune to it, either. Geeks are humans, too.

Maybe it is

[Tablizer]

Re: "college is a waste of time"

It may be for certain people. If you have a good business sense and are industrious, you can do quite well without college (at least financially). In my opinion, having a degree is a good hedge against the uncertainty of the future, but balancing such risk is up to the individual. It's not about logic, it's about personal choices about future career tradeoffs.

Geekdom is just getting eaten by the mainstream

[Pf0tzenpfritz]

and as every idiot who know where to get a cracked Windows 7 from claims to be a geek now, anti-intellectualism is just the logic consequence of no intellectualism at all. We gor assimilated. Resistance would have been futile, anyway. Also social misbehavious is out of seasons for geeks now, you really do not want to join a bunch of grown ups who behave like 13year old highschool dropouts to pretend procramming skills they don't have.

Re:You've misunderstood what anti-intellectualism

[AK Marc]

You are right. When you purposefully screw up what I say in order to prove your point, you can prove any point you like.

Exceptions do not disprove the rule

[watookal]

Yes, there *are* many people who went to university who know nothing; and yes, there *are* many people with no formal education who know something. Neither of those facts prove anything.

The real question is: If *I* had not gone to university, would *I* have been better or worse off?

(In my opinion, based on personal experience, the answer is that I would've been worse off without university.)

Re:Frist Psot

[SanityInAnarchy]

At least you know the difference -- the author of this blog seems to confuse the two. But I can't agree with this:

there's more point to learning than increasing intelligence,

Intelligence and willingness to learn are far more important, in my opinion, than knowledge itself. Given any problem, it's a lot easier to learn stuff about that problem domain so that I can help solve it than it is to increase my intelligence, or to learn whole new ways of thinking. On the other hand, if I lack the basic intelligence to tackle a problem, there's no amount of learning other than knowing the solution by rote that will help me.

Both make more sense. Learning is important. Learning stuff that may never be relevant is also teaching you different ways of thinking, and this is true even in pure geekdom -- learning truly different programming languages (Lisp, Haskell, Erlang), hardware design, machine code, and actually implementing the basic data structures (like in any CS2 course) all change the way you think about programming, even if you will never do those things again. And I absolutely agree about a well-rounded person.

Kind of like Naruto. Sasuke is a genius. Lee wants to match Sasuke through hard work. Naruto passes both of them by being a hard-working genius.

Still, high intelligence without broad learning gives you the kind of teenage geniuses who contribute so much to open source. Low intelligence with a degree gives you an MBA. I don't know about you, but I think the world needs a lot more open source hackers and a lot fewer MBAs.

Re:Frist Psot

[fbjon]

Technology is moving fast. Ideas are not.

Geek vs. Jock

[LongearedBat]

A jock is someone who likes to use his brawn.
A geek is someone who likes to use his brain.
A nerd is a geek who has a strong topical focus.

You're a geek if... - you study some field of knowledge (real or fantasy) because you enjoy improving your knowledge/understanding.
- you build things that require thought (whether electronics, computer software, or even advanced and complex Lego structures).
- you like to have cerebreal adventures (ex. roleplaying, sci-fi/fantasy fiction)
- you like to think up better ways for society to work.
- etc.

You're a jock if...
- you do physical activies because you enjoy improving your physique/looks.
- you build things that are strong (whether powerful engines, noisy engines, or even building strong brick walls).
- you like to have physical adventures (ex. jumping off high places, chasing a ball)
- you like drink up and socialise
- etc.

Most of us are a combination of both. The question is how much geek vs. jock you are.
Does your geek side overwhelm your jock side, or does your jock side overwhelm your geek side?

On the topic of further education: If you went to college/uni because...
- you liked to learn and understand, then you're a geek.
- you just wanted the degree, then you're not a geek.
Even if you didn't have higher education, if you like to learn, then you're still a geek.

So, if you like to think, but can't be bothered studying, then you're only part geek,
and if you're "opposed to knowledge wherever it occurs" then you're not a geek at all.

I prefer to differentiate geek from nerd

[LostMyBeaver]

A nerd is generally a highly intellectual person with a strong, if nothing else academic skill set (whether through the universities or self-taught). A geek on the other hand (and mind you the original definition of geek is "a carnival performer often billed as a wild man whose act usually includes biting the head off a live chicken or snake") is a person who lives a certain lifestyle where their method of gaining attention and possibly public acceptance is to behave in a manor which is entirely different than is considered the "public normal" for lack of an alternative wording. In many ways, being a geek is simply a way of conforming to a non-conformist group similar to the modern "goth movement" or the "Smiths' style Meat is Murder" styles of the 80's.

Geeks on the other hand are different from the other non-conformists as they are often more or less intentionally conforming to the "geek style" in order to allow themselves to "fit in" among others. In many ways, geek is a safety mechanism. If you're not particularly good at sports, self-articulation, personal presentation (grooming not excluded), style, fashion etc... upon reaching a secondary school level, in order to avoid simply being an outcast, a geek will emerge from their childhood cocoon of simply being an awkward child. It allows them to embed themselves within a larger community where they can solve the issue of finding social peers as well as being less of a target for people such as "jocks" who infamously have caused the geek community grief to attempt to make themselves seem more important before moving onto a highly lucrative career of wearing ties and misusing buzzwords (if they're lucky enough to avoid working at a gas station or McDonalds).

Nerds on the other hand are a group of people who may or may not also be geeks. A nerd is often a person whose interests and areas of specialty is academically focussed. While there are other types of nerds, generally a "real nerd" is very mathematically and/or scientifically focussed. Nerds can be found in any social group ranging from geeks to hippies to fashionistas even jocks.

A person does not actually need to be a geek to be a nerd and conversely, it is not necessarily that a geek is in fact intelligent.

Geekdom is more often labelled as opposed to seeked out. Many geeks simply were outcasts and eventually just found themselves grouped in with other geeks. Most other social groups have a special dress code that must be met and maintained as a minimum entry requirement. In most cases, geeks are simply people who don't bother with this. After a certain point, even geekdom requires a dress code be met, though it's generally much simpler as it doesn't require color coordination or fashion sense. Sometimes, it's as simple as choosing to buy the same type of clothing you'd get if your mother was doing the shopping for you.

As an adult, leaving geekdom behind can be as simple as buying a new set of clothing and frequenting a different social environment. Dressing in a suit and going to a bar where people judge how important other people by what suit their wearing is an example. Of course, in that environment, a proper haircut helps as well, often a change in eye wear as well. This group often sees glasses as an imperfection and many members of this group will choose to walk around half blind to avoid being seen in glasses. Buying some blue jeans and a few concert T-shirts will allow a person to easily integrate into a rock bar crowd. Leather, chains etc... gets you into the goth crowd. Researching fashion from magazines and dressing those styles will get you into the pop-culture crowd, this one however requires that a person can exhume a sense of confidence even if it is false.

Nerds are often geeks. In other social cultures, a person's worth is often measured by what they wear or who they know. Sometimes simply by how well they smile, laugh or tell a joke. In nerd culture (which is not geek culture), people are accepted based on either what they know or what they are able to

www.flowerdeliveryindia.com

[flower02]

Gifts bring additional enjoyment to the celebrations. It reflects the perfect accent to the occasions, and lifts the receiver to cloud nine in no time. No matter what you present, it seizes the hearts of your loved siblings in India. Come to www.flowerdeliveryindia.com/rakhi_gifts_delivery_to_india.asp and relish a treasured shopping.

Re:Frist Psot

[lxs]

Speak for yourself.

Re:Frist Psot

[testadicazzo]

I agree with both you and the writer of the article to equal extent. Conversely, I disagree with both you to a similar extent.

Calling Plato, Proust, etc fucktards really doesn't serve any kind of purpose at all. Do you think you have nothing you can learn from those people? If so, I think it's fair to call you an anti-intellectual. I agree you don't have to go to university to get a broad education and exhibit some intellectual curiosity in the human experience, but showing contempt for that curiosity is pretty contemptible.

While we agree that it's important to think, your post gives the impression that you consider only a narrow band of subjects worth thinking about -- to wit: things that will help you in a business or IT environment.

I could argue that a certain general knowledge of western culture would help you in a business environment. The Borgias and Machiavellie would almost certainly help in a strategic sense, while being well read and erudite is generally helpful unless your aim is to be chief of the cellar dwelling server maintenance tribe. That would however be missing the real point, which is this: your intellect is useful beyond IT and business. It's worth applying your intellect to issues of culture, society, economics, ethics, and humanity. It's worth reading what other people have had to say on the topics, and it's worth reading the intellectual works that have formed the basis of our society. It is especially worthwhile to read these things with a critical, analytical, intellectual mind, to see what you agree with, what strikes you as wonky, and what can be tested and disproven. It is fascinating to see how our minds work, how our societies function, and how they are developed. The more you know about these subjects, the more you can contribute to our society as a whole. In short, it makes you a better human being and a better citizen. It's also fun.

I'm reminded of a guy in my English Lit class at Georgia Tech, who complained loudly that we had to read "The Odyssey". He wanted to know why we had to read what a bunch of dumb Greek guys wrote about gods, when now we have science and understand how the world works. To this day I think on him and have to shake my head at his fat headed willful ignorence. You don't read The Odyssey to understand how the physical world works. You read it to understand how the human mind works, how western culture developed, to understand the origins of what are, even today, common elements of our culture. To understand the power of metaphor. To understand the human tendency to find patterns (even ones that don't exist) and to anthropomorphise patently non-anthropomorphic behavior. To understand how ideas of ethical behavior, culture, civilization and a good life have changed over the years, and the origins of our modern beliefs. To understand how wars start, and how they are justified... It's also very useful to see the mistakes people have made in the past, to understand how and why we make similar mistakes to this day.

In case you are interested, here's my reply the post's author:

I agree that there is a tendency to anti-intellectualism that is prevalent in our society. I also agree that this has spread to so-called geek culture. While I agree with most of your basic assumptions, and many of your conclusions, I have some issues with many of the specifics in your article.

First, your post equates intellectualism with university education. You conflate dislike, distrust, and/or contempt for traditional educational systems with anti-intellectualism. It is entirely possible to admire intellectual thought, strive for intellectual rigor, and apply a curious and analytical nature to the world at large without attending university. Particularly in America, where universities have become commercial institutions, bound tightly to our corporate masters and elite power structures, it easy to imagine losing interest a formal education. As a noteworthy example, I encourage you to read N

Re:Frist Psot

[testadicazzo]

And without guidance by a credentialed expert in the field, you will have no understanding of the scholarly context to put them in their proper place.

I agreed with you right up until you spouted this bit of nonsense. Credentials, and social recognition of being an expert in the field are neither necessary nor sufficient to guarantee the ability to confer understanding of a subject. They are social tools with that purpose in mind, and they are relatively good indicators, but that doesn't mean there aren't better alternatives. In point of fact, my experience has been that the best people in a particular field are rarely the best at teaching a particular field (be that humanities or physics).

Re:Frist Psot

[Jeremiah Cornelius]

:-)

Re:Frist Psot

[thenerd]

The simple act of reading any book doesn't make you a better person. However the subsequent incorporation of the ideas held in the book to your own life may well have an effect (just ask any Christian about the bible, a devout muslim about the Koran, any 16 year old who has just read Atlas Shrugged, Myra Hindley about the Marquis de Sade). Whether the changes result in a human who is better or not may end up being a subjective judgement, but you can definitely say the human is acting differently as a result of those ideas. They may act differently such that you appraise them as a 'better person' or a 'worse person'. Without the means of transferring ideas and knowledge to the next generation through books, I think it's fair to say that the human race would have advanced much slower. In fact picking up the right book can inform us about the effect the Gutenberg press had on our culture.

Re:Frist Psot

[Eunuchswear]

The fact is that we have *moved on* and live in the now of our own immediacy. Knowledge of these people will rarely help you in any business or IT environment.

How the hell can I respond to this?

I can't. Someone who could write such a statement is beyond help. Too many like him and we are all beyond help.

Define Your Terms

[gidds]

ISTM that this article confuses data, facts, knowledge, understanding, and wisdom.

Though I'm not sure whether that's his own failing, or whether it just reflects the attitude of the people he's discussing — perhaps especially those in the world of education.

Personally, I see external devices (reference books, handheld devices, Internet access, etc.) as a pretty good repository for data; also for facts (if you can sort out issues of trust and validation), and maybe even for knowledge. But wisdom is something very different, and can't be externalised in the same way.

To use the article's example, there's little point in memorising the data of the Battle of Hastings simply so that you can respond to questions like “When was the Battle of Hastings?” However, knowing that date allows you to relate it to other dates, events, situations, trends, and patterns; it can become part of a mental framework that gives you a broad understanding of the whole time and place, and that's the sort of thing that no external references can substitute for.

To pick a more extreme example:

• Is a dictionary useful for looking up rarely-used words and subtle distinctions? Absolutely.
• But can it substitute for learning a language at all? Absolutely not.

And any discussion of ‘knowledge’ which fails to distinguish those cases is going to get mired in misunderstanding.

Re:Frist Psot

[_anomaly_]

To be considered "intellectual", I believe you need to be knowledgeable in more than just what is applicable to your "business or IT environment".
You're saying that knowledge and "mental prowess" is only important if it's applied to a paying job.
It's a reason that the most well known intellectuals are also known as great thinkers.

That's my take on it anyway.

Big ol' reply post

[Larry Sanger]

Hi all, author of TFA here. I have a bunch of replies, which address many of the things said here on Slashdot, on my blog.

Re:Frist Psot

[Hylandr]

The exact opposite, actually: so you can analyze them for their strengths and weaknesses, and adapt their strengths to make your own new discoveries and realizations.

No. That does not happen. By and large not until a person reaches their 40's or 50's. Young impressionable ( and often very drunk ) children enter college and are indoctrinated with the discoveries and realizations of those past. Doing the least amount possible to skate by. You will not do anything new, by repeating what's already been done. I agree that philosophy must be taught, so that people learn how to think. That can also be done outside of college. We over glorify college and it's outcome and as a result we have these retards entering the workforce today. America's decline in education shows this to be true. Don't try to tell me that doesn't happen, I have had to clean up their messes more times than I like to count.

 

And yet, as your comment's parent points out, you will have zero understanding of the concepts involved: you can memorize and regurgitate facts, but that's it. And without guidance by a credentialed expert in the field, you will have no understanding of the scholarly context to put them in their proper place.

Do not twist my words. For the most part those coming out of college have zero understanding. It's almost impossible to conceive an adequate response to this. You have a terrible arrogance. I understand what I do so much more than you realize. As do Millions of my peers. You are in effect stating that no learning or understanding is possible unless you have an instructor in some educational institution. You have definitely stated that any learning or understanding outside of college is useless. I, and millions more around the world prove this concept to be false. And for you to claim I have no understanding of the material involved because I eschewed anything more than the classes I took to get the information that is relevant to the task is infuriating. I would say this action demonstrates the ability to focus on what is important, and not be distracted, or lazy.

I have to ask where you draw the line? How much do you need to know in order to program in C or PHP? Do I need to know how to process the raw Silicon and know how to etch wafers, build a motherboard, the bios, and everything that goes into making a computer? Do I need to understand every logic bit that is switched per CPU cycle to be an effective C or C++ developer? Do I need to know how to build the car from scratch in order to be a professional driver? A pilot? Granted, you aren't going to see many successful self-taught doctors out there. There are a things a college is good for. But for anyone to say I have little to zero useful knowledge because I didn't *PAY* for the privilege, or to say that college endows the student with intelligence is unacceptable.

If there weren't people with ideas that refused to accept the current taught dogma the Earth would still be flat, and that the sun would still rotate about the Earth.

- Dan.

Re:Frist Psot

[Hylandr]

Are you talking about schools not teaching the general population properly? Because I was under the impression that the topic was geeks.

A wikipedia page is a nice starting point as always, but self-teaching can lead to narrow knowledge, since there's no teacher to kick your butt and point out all the stuff you completely overlooked.

As I understood the topic, it was about geeks eschewing "Intellectual pursuits" and attributing lack of interest in outdated standards, such as college as an example.

You're an unoriginal automaton right now. It seems you're the person who should be reading some of the books mentioned. Or rather, any book from outside your current world view (the mentioned authors are by no means a requirement). "Expanding one's horizon" is something one rarely understands before actually having done it numerous times. I'm not saying you're narrow-minded, but simply latitudinally challenged on this particular topic.

This isn't about pontificating with a book and wine glass in hand, it's about experiencing ideas you never realized could exist.

Even colleges demand you focus by picking a Major. The point of my debate was the statement that you aren't considered an "intellectual" unless you had read certain works, or had a representation of the alphabet after your name. Everyone just sort of jumped on my bashing of college as a missed marker for intellectualism.

Right, so you appear to be concerned with business requirements, career, problem solving, possibly money. If this is the full extent of your interests, have fun!

In the future corporate states of America, this may well be more life saving than a gun.

- Dan.

Re:Frist Psot

[Hylandr]

This says it so much better than I could hope to.

Re:Frist Psot

[Hylandr]

I think what you are trying to say is Intelligence is separate from knowledge, College gives you knowledge but not intelligence, yet knowledge magnifies intelligence.

Re:Frist Psot

[Hylandr]

Here you are most correct, and I must admit to attacking the example provided, rather than the argument providing it. Having this pointed out I had to hang my head.

but showing contempt for that curiosity is pretty contemptible.

The rest of your post echos my sentiments very deeply, and in a few places, chastised me. However I hold one thing out. I prefer to focus as much as I can on my particular profession / interest in order to excel in every capacity that I may be called in it. I see nothing wrong with that.

- Dan.

anti-academic

[sglines]

The problem is poorly posed. There is a distinction between intellectuals and academics. What has passed here for anti-intellectual is really anti-academic. I grew up in a very intellectual environment. All of my fathers friends were engineers from the era of BIG engineering projects. Few of them had more than a BS degree some were completely self taught. Only the younger parents of my friends consistently had degrees and only because of the GI bill following WWII. My mothers friends were equally intellectual. Many were writers and poets and artists, many with household names but only a small fraction had degrees and those that did were in English Literature or Art History and only Bachelors degrees at that. I could have a good discussion about French literature with the engineers or Galloping Gurdy with the poets because they actually knew about such things and would gleefully talk to anyone from high school student to Nobel Laurette without prejudice.

When I moved to Cambridge Massachusetts to go to school (I won't mention which one) I found what I can only describe as an anti-intellectual environment. Oh there were the greatest living authorities in fill in the blank and you could get as snotty as you like but the truth is the quality of intellectual curiosity was grossly inferior to the salons and backyard barbeques I grew up with. The problem was that you encountered one of two attitudes: First, this is MY field and I am THE expert in it and I won't lower myself to engage in conversation with you. OR, That's not my field and I know nothing about it so I won't lower myself to talk to you. I can honestly say I have never encountered more bullshit than I did during my years in Cambridge Massachusetts among the "Very Smart and Important People" some of whom inhabit the highness positions in the land.

Re:Frist Psot

[testadicazzo]

If there weren't people with ideas that refused to accept the current taught dogma the Earth would still be flat, and that the sun would still rotate about the Earth.

Nooo... the earth would be (near) sphere, and would rotate around the sun, just as it does now. People might believe otherwise, but that wouldn't change the facts.