4 ms·

I think both? At least, when I was in school, I thought one of the first-order lessons they were trying to teach us was to not cheat, while also teaching us oth

I think both? At least, when I was in school, I thought one of the first-order lessons they were trying to teach us was to not cheat, while also teaching us other things.

catapart 3y ago
Yeah, but WHY would they want to teach you not to cheat? It's not a virtue, in and of itself (cheating has to be defined for each context it's in so "don't cheat" is like saying "don't be bad"). They teach you not to cheat because if you cheat, you won't know the answer when you need it. If you're a doctor, and don't know the answer to a question when you need it, you might kill someone. A lawyer has problems there, too. There are great values in keeping people from relying on deferred knowledge, in a great many applications. I just don't see how philosophical ethics - especially not a mid-level course - benefits from those same lessons/limitations. If a software developer isn't expected to know every language pattern; only how to look up the patterns they need, when they need them, then why would then be disallowed from doing that on a test? A better test would target different metrics than "correct answer" or "incorrect answer". The same thing applies here. You can do software dev without being able to pass an "internal knowledge only" test. You can be productive with ethical philosophy without being able to pass an "internal knowledge only" test. So yes, both is the goal. What I'm getting at is that both SHOULDN'T be the goal. In a lot of cases. Most, I'd hazard to guess.
- sanderjd 3y ago
  That's not why they teach you not to cheat. That's why they teach doctors (and other kinds of students) that they need to memorize some things in order to have fast recall without requiring a reference. But they teach you not to cheat because cheating is bad, on its own terms. The purpose of education is not just to teach facts, but also to teach young people how to be net-positive members of society. (This is why society subsidizes education.) Teaching not to cheat to get ahead falls within that part of the curriculum.
  - catapart 3y ago
    Nothing I said implies I think education only teaches fact. Obviously I believe the contrary, as evidenced by my comments. As far as education teaching people how to be net-positive members of society, I agree that's what the education we subsidize is intended for, but that doesn't apply to this situation. A mid-level psychology course at a higher learning institution. If you honestly think that the GOAL of that course is to teach children not to cheat, I think you're grossly mistaken. First and foremost by the fact that not all students are "young people". And then by the fact that we have other courses, even in higher learning institutions, that deal with teaching the students ethics. In the other classes, as with all other areas of life, you're just expected to employ the ethics of the society. It's a meta-reinforcement of those lessons, but the reinforcements are not the lessons of the other classes. If a student fails in their ethics classes due to their ethical decisions, that makes sense. If a student fails math with the right answers but the wrong "ethics", that doesn't make sense. Unethically sourced math answers can still provide the solutions to problems. Just ask NASA. So then, if a professor of an unrelated or tangentially related field takes it upon themselves to make a lesson out of what should be a meta-reinforcement, in a field that they readily admit that they are unprepared to work in or do data analysis for, that is not a reasonable source of ethical education. Especially not when done without prior social experiment approval and safeguards.
    - sanderjd 3y ago
      There are two different questions: 1. Are these the right rules? and 2. Should students be taught to follow well defined rules? You're almost entirely talking about #1, and I totally agree. The vast majority of classes should not forbid looking stuff up because it is an artificial constraint that doesn't reflect the reality outside school. But I think #2 is also important. I know it's passe, especially in the silicon valley milieu that we swim in here, but I think "not following rules you personally think are stupid is good" is a bad lesson for students to learn. (FWIW: I thought the opposite when I was a student, but I was a short-sighted idiot when I was a student.)
  - warkdarrior 3y ago
    > But they teach you not to cheat because cheating is bad, on its own terms. The purpose of education is not just to teach facts, but also to teach young people how to be net-positive members of society. (This is why society subsidizes education.) Teaching not to cheat to get ahead falls within that part of the curriculum. That is highly debatable. Cheating most often affects the cheater, if anything, because when they need a skill they pretended to have, they'll fail at real-life tasks. But nobody else is affected by cheating.

I think both? At least, when I was in school, I thought one of the first-order lessons they were trying to teach us was to not cheat, while also teaching us other things.

catapart 3y ago

Yeah, but WHY would they want to teach you not to cheat? It's not a virtue, in and of itself (cheating has to be defined for each context it's in so "don't cheat" is like saying "don't be bad"). They teach you not to cheat because if you cheat, you won't know the answer when you need it. If you're a doctor, and don't know the answer to a question when you need it, you might kill someone. A lawyer has problems there, too. There are great values in keeping people from relying on deferred knowledge, in a great many applications. I just don't see how philosophical ethics - especially not a mid-level course - benefits from those same lessons/limitations. If a software developer isn't expected to know every language pattern; only how to look up the patterns they need, when they need them, then why would then be disallowed from doing that on a test? A better test would target different metrics than "correct answer" or "incorrect answer". The same thing applies here. You can do software dev without being able to pass an "internal knowledge only" test. You can be productive with ethical philosophy without being able to pass an "internal knowledge only" test. So yes, both is the goal. What I'm getting at is that both SHOULDN'T be the goal. In a lot of cases. Most, I'd hazard to guess.

sanderjd 3y ago
That's not why they teach you not to cheat. That's why they teach doctors (and other kinds of students) that they need to memorize some things in order to have fast recall without requiring a reference. But they teach you not to cheat because cheating is bad, on its own terms. The purpose of education is not just to teach facts, but also to teach young people how to be net-positive members of society. (This is why society subsidizes education.) Teaching not to cheat to get ahead falls within that part of the curriculum.
- catapart 3y ago
  Nothing I said implies I think education only teaches fact. Obviously I believe the contrary, as evidenced by my comments. As far as education teaching people how to be net-positive members of society, I agree that's what the education we subsidize is intended for, but that doesn't apply to this situation. A mid-level psychology course at a higher learning institution. If you honestly think that the GOAL of that course is to teach children not to cheat, I think you're grossly mistaken. First and foremost by the fact that not all students are "young people". And then by the fact that we have other courses, even in higher learning institutions, that deal with teaching the students ethics. In the other classes, as with all other areas of life, you're just expected to employ the ethics of the society. It's a meta-reinforcement of those lessons, but the reinforcements are not the lessons of the other classes. If a student fails in their ethics classes due to their ethical decisions, that makes sense. If a student fails math with the right answers but the wrong "ethics", that doesn't make sense. Unethically sourced math answers can still provide the solutions to problems. Just ask NASA. So then, if a professor of an unrelated or tangentially related field takes it upon themselves to make a lesson out of what should be a meta-reinforcement, in a field that they readily admit that they are unprepared to work in or do data analysis for, that is not a reasonable source of ethical education. Especially not when done without prior social experiment approval and safeguards.
  - sanderjd 3y ago
    There are two different questions: 1. Are these the right rules? and 2. Should students be taught to follow well defined rules? You're almost entirely talking about #1, and I totally agree. The vast majority of classes should not forbid looking stuff up because it is an artificial constraint that doesn't reflect the reality outside school. But I think #2 is also important. I know it's passe, especially in the silicon valley milieu that we swim in here, but I think "not following rules you personally think are stupid is good" is a bad lesson for students to learn. (FWIW: I thought the opposite when I was a student, but I was a short-sighted idiot when I was a student.)
- warkdarrior 3y ago
  > But they teach you not to cheat because cheating is bad, on its own terms. The purpose of education is not just to teach facts, but also to teach young people how to be net-positive members of society. (This is why society subsidizes education.) Teaching not to cheat to get ahead falls within that part of the curriculum. That is highly debatable. Cheating most often affects the cheater, if anything, because when they need a skill they pretended to have, they'll fail at real-life tasks. But nobody else is affected by cheating.