A little Humor (10 most useless degrees)

The thesis of this thread seems to be that fields of academic study are worthless unless they serve to maximize entirely different ends.

In most cases, that seems to be interpreted as increased earnings and career advancement. People want to rise to higher and better paid positions, so they seek degrees that they think will facilitate their rise.

I'm not challenging that goal. It's a valid reason for wanting to go to college, I guess. In the ten years that I've been posting here, I've never once started a thread attacking the vocational majors.

What I am insisting upon, vehemently and non-negotiably, is the idea that study, learning, creation and scholarship are more than just means to achieving something else. I'm saying that for some of us, however few we might be in today's brave-new-academia, the so-called "worthless" subjects remain among the most meaningful and important aspects of life.

Art has aesthetic value. (It's a calling and a passion for artists.) Religion has spiritual value. (If religion is to be believed, it's the most important value imaginable.) Philosophy and science have limitless value as intellectual pursuits, as pure inquiry, and not just as sources of saleable applications.

Of course not, and I don't recall anyone saying that it did. I certainly haven't.

But laughing at people who decide to earn a degree in something because they damnably persist in seeing value in it, does suggest that the "humorous" ones might not have very much interest in or even appreciation of artistic or scholarly pursuits.

I am a little contemptuous of that.

 

(emphasis added)

I think you are assuming things again. It suggested this to you. It doesn't to me. Again, people can pursue knowledge in art, religion, philosophy, science, and more for a lifetime, regardless of the degree path they chose in college. It does not need to be, and by no means *should* be, limited to the years one is in school. And if some people feel college ought to be used to pursue a marketable degree, and indeed they laugh at some crude blog somewhere making fun of certain degrees, it simply doesn't necessarily follow that they have no (or not very much) appreciation of artistic or scholary pursuits at all. At most, you can conclude this blog appealed to their sense of humor. You can't come to the conclusion you did without further proof.

 

Yes it does.

They are saying that they don't think that the arts and sciences subjects have inherent value. If the subjects were valuable, then that would justify some students' decision to major in them.

If, as you say, college ought to be used to study vocational subjects, then that suggests that students of the conventional arts and sciences subjects ought not to be enrolling in universities.

That's the radical and deeply troubling message of this thread.

 

Here's a useless degree that will not offend anyone; remember the entire thread on the degree in Beatlemania? If I remember correctly it was a master's or a doctorate. Unaccredited, I'm sure, but out there nonetheless.

 

The message of this thread is that it is a waste to spend $100,000 (especially if it's borrowed money) on a degree in women's studies or philosophy, unless you have a very good job lined up at the end or else have endless amounts of money to begin with. That is not to say that philosophy and women's studies should not be studied. It's merely to say that, considering the limited economic prospects of the degree, such a large price tag is not warranted. And it is simple financial common sense to go into a degree knowing what you're going to get on the back end, especially if you're going to be borrowing money for the degree.

 

Not unaccredited, British.

Where to get degree in death, anime or psychic abilities - CNN.com

 

Yea, you are right...Liverpool University even. Hopefully the degree wouldn't cost $100K though.