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The amount of sheer ignorance in this thread is astounding. The political-myopia of tech culture is on full display here... What is being argued here is that t

The amount of sheer ignorance in this thread is astounding. The political-myopia of tech culture is on full display here... What is being argued here is that there should be more to an education than a vocation. The purpose of a higher education is to make one a thinking, learned human being. It doesn't matter if you're Knuth when it comes to CS, if you don't have a working knowledge of history and philosophy and political theory, you're uneducated. Another theme I see is that people have to earn a living so they must learn ONLY STEM. That's false for 2 reasons. The first is that one can do non-utilitarian study in philosophy, for example, while also learning CS to get a job. It is also wrong because it is a reflection of the high cost of an American education that forces people to think about "return on investment". That is the very notion that is being criticized here! Education should not calculated solely in economic terms because there are social returns to it. The fact of the matter is that it is absolutely disastrous - morally and culturally - to uncritically accept the views of our neoliberal system. The humanities and non-utilitarian education helps you examine the system. That's what ultimately makes the world a better place.

laotzu 11y ago
>Education should not calculated solely in economic terms because there are social returns to it. Tell that to Pearson and the rest of the private education industry. They are legally obligated to view education in economic terms over social returns. Effectively infiltrating and subverting public education.
DaveWalk 11y ago
Your points are well-argued. They remind me of an article in Harper's, "The Neoliberal Arts"[0] which had a similar effect on me. Allowing for just the possibility of non-financial rewards of an education shows how shallow our "return on investment" culture is. When we see no value in learning about art, philosophy, history...what does that say about our values? [0] http://harpers.org/archive/2015/09/the-neoliberal-arts/ http://harpers.org/archive/2015/09/the-neoliberal-arts/
- wbillingsley 11y ago
  No, all of society (including the most free-market of conservatives) sees value in learning about art, philosophy, history -- in fact every single one of them at some point will have paid to learn about art, philosophy, history etc (even if it's just going to the theatre or buying a book). The debate from their perspective is simply that you only seem to see value in learning about art in education if someone else pays for it for you, but not enough to pay for it yourself. The question of "the value of your education" can never win the argument against privatisation/optimisation of education, because the more "value" there is the more the consumer ought to be willing to pay for it. The reasons for keeping education largely public and unoptimised are outside of that -- avoiding competition on price (richest-student wins), that the lecturers have a by-product that is useful to society (mulling problems where we don't yet know whether they have value or not and the market cannot price them), getting students from multiple backgrounds to bounce off each other (avoid social silo-isation by discipline) etc.
  - littletimmy 11y ago
    There is no reason to apply economics to education. "Value" is not only monetary. Your post is a prime example of someone who has absorbed the system to an extent that it becomes the very backdrop against which to analyze everything else.
    - maxerickson 11y ago
      Economics is happy to consider value that is not money. It's a lot harder to deal with, but it isn't somehow excluded from the purview of economics. It's probably even necessary to make economic considerations when it comes to education. Given limited resources, choosing to put them towards things that return more value probably makes sense.
      - littletimmy 11y ago
        Doing something because it provides a higher "return" is exactly the sort of utilitarian thinking this article is arguing against. You should really try to see this from a non-monetary, non-utilitarian perspective.

laotzu 11y ago

>Education should not calculated solely in economic terms because there are social returns to it. Tell that to Pearson and the rest of the private education industry. They are legally obligated to view education in economic terms over social returns. Effectively infiltrating and subverting public education.

DaveWalk 11y ago

Your points are well-argued. They remind me of an article in Harper's, "The Neoliberal Arts"[0] which had a similar effect on me. Allowing for just the possibility of non-financial rewards of an education shows how shallow our "return on investment" culture is. When we see no value in learning about art, philosophy, history...what does that say about our values? [0] http://harpers.org/archive/2015/09/the-neoliberal-arts/ http://harpers.org/archive/2015/09/the-neoliberal-arts/

wbillingsley 11y ago
No, all of society (including the most free-market of conservatives) sees value in learning about art, philosophy, history -- in fact every single one of them at some point will have paid to learn about art, philosophy, history etc (even if it's just going to the theatre or buying a book). The debate from their perspective is simply that you only seem to see value in learning about art in education if someone else pays for it for you, but not enough to pay for it yourself. The question of "the value of your education" can never win the argument against privatisation/optimisation of education, because the more "value" there is the more the consumer ought to be willing to pay for it. The reasons for keeping education largely public and unoptimised are outside of that -- avoiding competition on price (richest-student wins), that the lecturers have a by-product that is useful to society (mulling problems where we don't yet know whether they have value or not and the market cannot price them), getting students from multiple backgrounds to bounce off each other (avoid social silo-isation by discipline) etc.
- littletimmy 11y ago
  There is no reason to apply economics to education. "Value" is not only monetary. Your post is a prime example of someone who has absorbed the system to an extent that it becomes the very backdrop against which to analyze everything else.
  - maxerickson 11y ago
    Economics is happy to consider value that is not money. It's a lot harder to deal with, but it isn't somehow excluded from the purview of economics. It's probably even necessary to make economic considerations when it comes to education. Given limited resources, choosing to put them towards things that return more value probably makes sense.
    - littletimmy 11y ago
      Doing something because it provides a higher "return" is exactly the sort of utilitarian thinking this article is arguing against. You should really try to see this from a non-monetary, non-utilitarian perspective.