12 ms·

>cheating hurts everyone. Not the paper writers and some of the students who can benefit from it.

by matz1 9y ago

wpietri 9y ago
I think it hurts them too. Have you even done a shitty job? It's soul-destroying. In high school I answered an ad in the paper and ended up doing "charity fundraising" by telephone. It turned out that the charity only got ~15% of the money raised. The people working there were all sleazeballs. I'm sure had I stayed there I would have ended up a sleazeball as well.
- matz1 9y ago
  Its not a shitty job for some of the right people. I can easily think few possible advantage of this job: - flexible time - potential to earn lot of money - sheer enjoyment of writing - improve one writing skills
  - dofly 9y ago
    I think it all depends on incentives. If one goes to school with a sole purpose of learning something(employment, career track being non-issues), I'd imagine, they wouldn't care about the cheaters as they wouldn't be competing with the cheaters for jobs, promotions etc. This reminded me of a Russian pop star from the early 2000s who became a philosophy major at a major Russian university. Presumably, she didn't mind the cheaters as I doubt she was aiming at tenure track or something to that effect at the school. Although, I can't be sure :)
    - wpietri 9y ago
      I went to school just to learn and I despised the cheaters. They were debasing something I valued, taking up time and attention that could have been given to somebody who gave a shit.
  - eponeponepon 9y ago
    All of those points are also true of making a living by (e-)mail fraud, and the first two are true of almost any criminal enterprise.
    - matz1 9y ago
      The difference is essay writing service is not criminal.
      - mfringel 9y ago
        Not everything legal is moral, and not everything moral is legal.
        matz1 9y ago
        And not everyone morality is the same. Morality is relative.
        wpietri 9y ago
        This is either banal and irrelevant or meaningful and wrong. Obviously, not everybody has the same morality; criminals almost always think they're justified. But if you're saying that because of that morality is somehow meaningless or not worth pursuing, that's ridiculous. Nobody ever says that when they're on the receiving end of something shitty, just when they're doing it.
      - Hello71 9y ago
        it absolutely is. it's called "conspiracy to commit fraud".
        deleted 9y ago
        [deleted]
      - RIMR 9y ago
        Just like plenty of ICO scams aren't criminal - but the people behind them lack basic integrity and should be condemned for their sleazy enterprises.
Wohlf 9y ago
One of the basic foundations of economics is competitive advantage. No one makes everything themselves, they defer to specialists. I don't see why writing papers should be any different, considering most of the work is not about technical competence, it's about proper formatting and writing skills. If scientists could spend all their time performing experiments, statisticians did all the statistics, and technical writers did all the writing, the replication crisis might not be as bad as it is and everyone wins.
- Something1234 9y ago
  "Specialization is for insects.” ~ Robert Anson Heinlein Your viewpoint is basically that we should overspecialize. I believe that the more diverse skills a person has. The better they are. Would you ask a romance author to write a highly technical piece? You wouldn't. Papers help with communication. Communication is a skill that a lot of people lack.
- komali2 9y ago
  Technical writers should write scientific experimentation papers because the purpose of the papers is to explain the experiment to people. I still talk to a rubber duck when writing code that I don't have to explain to anybody (probably). The purpose of an academic paper isn't to explain anything, it's to force the student to form an idea about a thing, then find and apply evidence to support that idea. The purpose is learning, and demonstrating to the professor proof that they have learned. None of those boxes get ticked if you pay someone to write your papers. And nah, Shakespeare lit 101 is not the place where you "learn how the world works" by demonstrating how you can "game the system" by paying someone else to do the work. The professor is concerned with the students learning about Shakespeare and maybe a bit about literary criticism, that's it.
  - norealidea 9y ago
    If you're cheating in a 101 class, you have much bigger problems than worrying about being expelled for committing fraud in a 101 class. The thing is, that isn't where people are cheating(probably), and finishing a BS in computer science is relatively easy. I'm going to stand by the fact that the hiring process is flawed, the college system is flawed, and our public school system is flawed. There's nothing motivating anyone to learn but themselves.

>cheating hurts everyone. Not the paper writers and some of the students who can benefit from it.

by matz1 9y ago

>cheating hurts everyone. Not the paper writers and some of the students who can benefit from it.

I think it hurts them too. Have you even done a shitty job? It's soul-destroying. In high school I answered an ad in the paper and ended up doing "charity fundraising" by telephone. It turned out that the charity only got ~15% of the money raised. The people working there were all sleazeballs. I'm sure had I stayed there I would have ended up a sleazeball as well.

matz1 9y ago
Its not a shitty job for some of the right people. I can easily think few possible advantage of this job: - flexible time - potential to earn lot of money - sheer enjoyment of writing - improve one writing skills
- dofly 9y ago
  I think it all depends on incentives. If one goes to school with a sole purpose of learning something(employment, career track being non-issues), I'd imagine, they wouldn't care about the cheaters as they wouldn't be competing with the cheaters for jobs, promotions etc. This reminded me of a Russian pop star from the early 2000s who became a philosophy major at a major Russian university. Presumably, she didn't mind the cheaters as I doubt she was aiming at tenure track or something to that effect at the school. Although, I can't be sure :)
  - wpietri 9y ago
    I went to school just to learn and I despised the cheaters. They were debasing something I valued, taking up time and attention that could have been given to somebody who gave a shit.
- eponeponepon 9y ago
  All of those points are also true of making a living by (e-)mail fraud, and the first two are true of almost any criminal enterprise.
  - matz1 9y ago
    The difference is essay writing service is not criminal.
    - mfringel 9y ago
      Not everything legal is moral, and not everything moral is legal.
      - matz1 9y ago
        And not everyone morality is the same. Morality is relative.
        wpietri 9y ago
        This is either banal and irrelevant or meaningful and wrong. Obviously, not everybody has the same morality; criminals almost always think they're justified. But if you're saying that because of that morality is somehow meaningless or not worth pursuing, that's ridiculous. Nobody ever says that when they're on the receiving end of something shitty, just when they're doing it.
    - Hello71 9y ago
      it absolutely is. it's called "conspiracy to commit fraud".
      - deleted 9y ago
        [deleted]
    - RIMR 9y ago
      Just like plenty of ICO scams aren't criminal - but the people behind them lack basic integrity and should be condemned for their sleazy enterprises.

Wohlf 9y ago

One of the basic foundations of economics is competitive advantage. No one makes everything themselves, they defer to specialists. I don't see why writing papers should be any different, considering most of the work is not about technical competence, it's about proper formatting and writing skills. If scientists could spend all their time performing experiments, statisticians did all the statistics, and technical writers did all the writing, the replication crisis might not be as bad as it is and everyone wins.

Something1234 9y ago
"Specialization is for insects.” ~ Robert Anson Heinlein Your viewpoint is basically that we should overspecialize. I believe that the more diverse skills a person has. The better they are. Would you ask a romance author to write a highly technical piece? You wouldn't. Papers help with communication. Communication is a skill that a lot of people lack.
komali2 9y ago
Technical writers should write scientific experimentation papers because the purpose of the papers is to explain the experiment to people. I still talk to a rubber duck when writing code that I don't have to explain to anybody (probably). The purpose of an academic paper isn't to explain anything, it's to force the student to form an idea about a thing, then find and apply evidence to support that idea. The purpose is learning, and demonstrating to the professor proof that they have learned. None of those boxes get ticked if you pay someone to write your papers. And nah, Shakespeare lit 101 is not the place where you "learn how the world works" by demonstrating how you can "game the system" by paying someone else to do the work. The professor is concerned with the students learning about Shakespeare and maybe a bit about literary criticism, that's it.
- norealidea 9y ago
  If you're cheating in a 101 class, you have much bigger problems than worrying about being expelled for committing fraud in a 101 class. The thing is, that isn't where people are cheating(probably), and finishing a BS in computer science is relatively easy. I'm going to stand by the fact that the hiring process is flawed, the college system is flawed, and our public school system is flawed. There's nothing motivating anyone to learn but themselves.