The analogy fails because guns can only do one thing -- hurt. Their primary (and often, only) purpose is to kill and maim. That they may be a deterrent is an epiphenomenon because first and foremost, they are weapons with one intent.
Tools are different. That they can be used to harm is incidental. Their purposes are many and varied, but often productive.
A better analogy would be knives. You regulate those in areas where they could be used to cause harm (e.g. planes), but allow them elsewhere (e.g. kitchens). Even so, less powerful versions are allowed even on planes (e.g. first class dinners).
I like using combinations of interesting numbers and math/physics constants. If you use the more esoteric ones (think Ramanujan's number or the first 3 Fermat numbers), then you also learn new and interesting numbers.
Not really. I had the Japanese earthquake in mind, and nowhere in my post do I try to connect the planet's forces and meddlesome mankind. Any connection that you assume is entirely in your head.
But just so I'm clear, let me reiterate. We're dependent on the stability of the planet and its climate and ecosystem. This has been demonstrated by countless natural disasters that we've been powerless to stop, and has taken us gargantuan efforts to even get back to a semblance of normalcy. Our interference in the natural order of things without truly understanding our impact seems unwise at best, given this.
So, how about leaving the planet the way we found it -- nicer would be great, but how about just minimizing how much we foul up the planet's ecology? It's not hard to do, and it's certainly possible with in parallel with technological progress. In fact, I'd say that it challenges our technological prowess to be sophisticated enough to coexist with nature while providing us with the fruits of our scientific and technological progress.
That is all I meant, and in the nicest possible way -- there's no reason to be belligerent and accusational, and I certainly apologize if I offended you in some way.
I was going to moderate this discussion, but wanted to respond to your trollish comment.
Here's the reality of the situation: we do not know the effect of mankind on the climate and the ecology. However, we do know that certain activities *have* an impact. The fact remains that complex systems, be they markets, ecologies, or climate, remain unbelievably complex, and we have no way of knowing what our actions could do.
And as far as banalities go, how about this -- do not mess with complex systems you don't fully understand. Do not mess with the ecology of the planet without understanding the consequences. Do not mess with things that could screw up the climate without understanding its effect.
"Evil mankind" is a subjective term, but meddlesome mankind is certainly not. The fact is, even in this day and age, we live in a highly complex and fickle ecosystem that can be torn asunder by the planet's forces, as shown by several of the earth's recent natural disasters. What happens if bees stop pollinating altogether tomorrow? What about hurricanes and tornadoes all over the planet?
It doesn't hurt to treat the planet with respect, because it's not just yours, but also the future generations'. And more importantly, it belongs to every single living thing growing on it.
I wish I had mod points to mod you up. Well said. Hats off, sir.
Even though I do not believe in legislating morality, in an ideal society where you could be whatever you want, odds are that no one would want to be a prostitute or a porn star.
Chances are, a hooker will sleep with you if you paid her enough. Money is the motivator. But odds are, an interesting and decent looking girl at a bar is not going to sleep with you unless she finds you attractive and interesting.
That makes a huge difference in terms of social validation, and gives an ego boost. And that, combined with the anticipation, makes the experience and the encounter all the more interesting.
On one hand, I couldn't agree more with one of the posters who said something along the lines the how people make a bog deal out of sex between consenting adults, including the watching of it. The Victorian-esque morality that most aspects of sex are something that people should be ashamed of, including porn, is not something I can relate to.
That said, I have to wonder about the kind of people who would be paying for porn. Even if you are particularly desperate, there's so much free porn on the Internet that it's almost pointless to pay for porn. Plus, if you're that desperate, just how hard is it to pick girls up at a bar (or if you're a geek Don Juan, Craigslist)? Paying for sex in any shape or form has to be one of the silliest things, given how easy it is to find women who are more than willing if you just looked around.
Ha! Real as that may be, some of us don't read the other sites. I read Slashdot, BoingBoing, WSJ, and a few other blogs. And I hang out in a couple of other esoteric fora (motorcycles, math, style), and haven't visited Digg/Reddit or other sites except when they're linked to somewhere. I find it necessary to simplify your life, and Slashdot is an excellent social filter.
Most mathematicians, even the pure one, have a knowledge of applied math related to their domain. This is inevitable. But even so, it was not something radically different, it was something concretely related to his area of expertise.
Secondly, you cannot just count the amount of time he took to solve the problem. He has been a mathematician all his life -- only considering the time that he spent solving the problem is disingenuous at best.
The point is, while you may gain a superficial understanding, you will not ever be an expert in the subject to understand some of the more complex (and often, worthwhile) problems.
Renaissance men are great -- and we all aspire to be that way. But the reality is that we can only focus on any one thing. We may be able to dabble in many others (as distractions, nothing more), but our real dedication can only be in one area, unless you're a polymath and a savant.
You're not talking about a free moving object where momentum needs to be considered -- you're talking about objects with the ability to decelerate and stop, if necessary.
Plus, assuming you were big enough to actually matter and were moving fast enough that you could not slow done enough to stop safely, you are most definitely going too fast. Most zones with stop lights are usually less than 50mph zones. You'd have to be completely disregarding the margin of safety as a heavy vehicle to be traveling so fast that your momentum will take you ahead even if you stopped.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
Slashdot Mirror
The analogy fails because guns can only do one thing -- hurt. Their primary (and often, only) purpose is to kill and maim. That they may be a deterrent is an epiphenomenon because first and foremost, they are weapons with one intent.
Tools are different. That they can be used to harm is incidental. Their purposes are many and varied, but often productive.
A better analogy would be knives. You regulate those in areas where they could be used to cause harm (e.g. planes), but allow them elsewhere (e.g. kitchens). Even so, less powerful versions are allowed even on planes (e.g. first class dinners).
Indeed. And I think we can use black hat vs. white hat to distinguish the intent of the hacker.
That's something that the public can relate to a lot more easily, and in fact I've seen the terminology used in non-technical journalism as well.
I like using combinations of interesting numbers and math/physics constants. If you use the more esoteric ones (think Ramanujan's number or the first 3 Fermat numbers), then you also learn new and interesting numbers.
Not really. I had the Japanese earthquake in mind, and nowhere in my post do I try to connect the planet's forces and meddlesome mankind. Any connection that you assume is entirely in your head.
But just so I'm clear, let me reiterate. We're dependent on the stability of the planet and its climate and ecosystem. This has been demonstrated by countless natural disasters that we've been powerless to stop, and has taken us gargantuan efforts to even get back to a semblance of normalcy. Our interference in the natural order of things without truly understanding our impact seems unwise at best, given this.
So, how about leaving the planet the way we found it -- nicer would be great, but how about just minimizing how much we foul up the planet's ecology? It's not hard to do, and it's certainly possible with in parallel with technological progress. In fact, I'd say that it challenges our technological prowess to be sophisticated enough to coexist with nature while providing us with the fruits of our scientific and technological progress.
That is all I meant, and in the nicest possible way -- there's no reason to be belligerent and accusational, and I certainly apologize if I offended you in some way.
I was going to moderate this discussion, but wanted to respond to your trollish comment.
Here's the reality of the situation: we do not know the effect of mankind on the climate and the ecology. However, we do know that certain activities *have* an impact. The fact remains that complex systems, be they markets, ecologies, or climate, remain unbelievably complex, and we have no way of knowing what our actions could do.
And as far as banalities go, how about this -- do not mess with complex systems you don't fully understand. Do not mess with the ecology of the planet without understanding the consequences. Do not mess with things that could screw up the climate without understanding its effect.
"Evil mankind" is a subjective term, but meddlesome mankind is certainly not. The fact is, even in this day and age, we live in a highly complex and fickle ecosystem that can be torn asunder by the planet's forces, as shown by several of the earth's recent natural disasters. What happens if bees stop pollinating altogether tomorrow? What about hurricanes and tornadoes all over the planet?
It doesn't hurt to treat the planet with respect, because it's not just yours, but also the future generations'. And more importantly, it belongs to every single living thing growing on it.
That's not such a hard concept, is it?
I wish I had mod points to mod you up. Well said. Hats off, sir.
Even though I do not believe in legislating morality, in an ideal society where you could be whatever you want, odds are that no one would want to be a prostitute or a porn star.
I met mine at a coffee shop. Serendipity is funny that way.
There's a bit of selection-bias involved there.
Chances are, a hooker will sleep with you if you paid her enough. Money is the motivator. But odds are, an interesting and decent looking girl at a bar is not going to sleep with you unless she finds you attractive and interesting.
That makes a huge difference in terms of social validation, and gives an ego boost. And that, combined with the anticipation, makes the experience and the encounter all the more interesting.
Who said anything about lying? As an adult, it is quite easy to be straightforward when picking up someone bar -- she knows it, you know it.
I mean, you think one-night stands happen because the girls think they are desiring to be in a "relationship"?
On one hand, I couldn't agree more with one of the posters who said something along the lines the how people make a bog deal out of sex between consenting adults, including the watching of it. The Victorian-esque morality that most aspects of sex are something that people should be ashamed of, including porn, is not something I can relate to.
That said, I have to wonder about the kind of people who would be paying for porn. Even if you are particularly desperate, there's so much free porn on the Internet that it's almost pointless to pay for porn. Plus, if you're that desperate, just how hard is it to pick girls up at a bar (or if you're a geek Don Juan, Craigslist)? Paying for sex in any shape or form has to be one of the silliest things, given how easy it is to find women who are more than willing if you just looked around.
Ha! Real as that may be, some of us don't read the other sites. I read Slashdot, BoingBoing, WSJ, and a few other blogs. And I hang out in a couple of other esoteric fora (motorcycles, math, style), and haven't visited Digg/Reddit or other sites except when they're linked to somewhere. I find it necessary to simplify your life, and Slashdot is an excellent social filter.
Most mathematicians, even the pure one, have a knowledge of applied math related to their domain. This is inevitable. But even so, it was not something radically different, it was something concretely related to his area of expertise.
Secondly, you cannot just count the amount of time he took to solve the problem. He has been a mathematician all his life -- only considering the time that he spent solving the problem is disingenuous at best.
The point is, while you may gain a superficial understanding, you will not ever be an expert in the subject to understand some of the more complex (and often, worthwhile) problems.
I find math to be an excellent example. Sure, you can learn all kinds of stuff about math on a superficial level. But if you want to prove the Poincaré conjecture or Fermat's last theorem, you're not going to be able to do that overnight, and certainly not without dedicating a lifetime to the problem (and even then, you'll fail).
Renaissance men are great -- and we all aspire to be that way. But the reality is that we can only focus on any one thing. We may be able to dabble in many others (as distractions, nothing more), but our real dedication can only be in one area, unless you're a polymath and a savant.
You're not talking about a free moving object where momentum needs to be considered -- you're talking about objects with the ability to decelerate and stop, if necessary.
Plus, assuming you were big enough to actually matter and were moving fast enough that you could not slow done enough to stop safely, you are most definitely going too fast. Most zones with stop lights are usually less than 50mph zones. You'd have to be completely disregarding the margin of safety as a heavy vehicle to be traveling so fast that your momentum will take you ahead even if you stopped.
What are you talking about? Women using Mac are usually the hot and artsy/designer ones.
The ones using Windows are the fat moms, and the ones using Linux are almost certainly the fat geeks.
Nicely done. Although, I've always thought that Solaria was modeled after the erstwhile xeno-phobic Japan.
"My penis is like a coffee cup! Too hot to hold and full of bitter liquid that's oh-so-good.
You can always add some sugar and you're good to go..."
Alright, alright, I'll stop. Enough top0rn for a day.
You must be new here.
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.
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.
Nice straw man. That is not an argument against college, that is an argument for better economic conditions.
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.
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.
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.
The "aside" is what makes it new. Oh, cars are nothing new, except they don't have horses and use gas.