Interesting article. College is a scam!

Discussion in 'General Distance Learning Discussions' started by Koolcypher, Jul 7, 2011.

Loading...
Page 2 of 2
  1. Maniac Craniac

    Maniac Craniac Moderator Staff Member

    I acknowledged that in my post. I also pointed out that there is no good reason why many jobs require a degree.
     
    Maniac Craniac, Jul 7, 2011
    #21
  2. CalDog

    CalDog New Member

    More from The Atlantic:

    Anyone who reads degreeinfo will have the impression that we have already reached "the time when a college degree isn't enough", and have also reached the time when "master's degrees are commonly sought".
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Jul 7, 2011
    CalDog, Jul 7, 2011
    #22
  3. Kizmet

    Kizmet Moderator

    I think there may be reasons that certain jobs require degrees although you may not see them as being good reasons.

    Having a degree suggests the ability to read and write on a more elevated level. It indicates the ability to sustain an effort over an extended period of time. It suggests an ability to understand and navigate a complex hierarchical social system. It suggests the ability to understand and follow directions. We can all think of people we've known who somehow got through college without displaying these qualities and we can also say that we know people who never went through college yet have all these qualities (and probably more) but we're talking about AVERAGE people, not the exceptions. As others have pointed out, it's easy to come up with a list of very successful people who never earned a degree but what does that prove? Lebron James never played college basketball yet he is quite accomplished in the NBA. Does it then follow that no one needs to play college hoops in order to get to the NBA? That's just stupid logic.

    The majority of people (kids) coming out of high school are qualified to do very little in the US marketplace. They could get jobs (flipping burgers, working at the mall, etc.) but those jobs don't pay well enough for them to live independently. I think it's especially true that they are typically not mature enough to say, "Gee, I can't make enough money working at Starbucks so I'm going to get a second job." And that's the other thing that college does, it adds 4 years to these kids, giving them a little more maturity before they have to enter the workforce.
     
    Kizmet, Jul 7, 2011
    #23
  4. CalDog

    CalDog New Member

    Nobody disagrees with those points. But that's not the issue.

    The issue is whether a college degree, which takes 4 years of full-time study and which often costs in excess of $100,000, is a needlessly expensive way to demonstrate those abilities. As stated in this recent commentary:

     
    CalDog, Jul 7, 2011
    #24
  5. Maniac Craniac

    Maniac Craniac Moderator Staff Member

    That about sums it up :smile: Four years after graduating high school (four years is an eternity for a young person), if a person can't acquire the skills you mentioned, then that person isn't likely to acquire them during school anyway. There are a lot of assumptions about what college does to help a person's development, but a little dose of real life will train you very quickly for... well... real life.

    As for the specific skills supposedly gained in college...

    I would love to compare that to people who don't go to college. Reading the news (something hardly any student in the college I work for does), being exposed to tough, real-life situations and needing to make decisions will quickly give anyone an opportunity to harness exactly those skills. Over the course of a lifetime, the college experience is, I imagine, negligible in doing so.

    We also have the time control problem, the directionality problem and the third variable problem. Does college help one to mature, or is it that more mature people go to college? Does college make one more likely to succeed (by various measures...), or are people bound for success more likely to go to college? Are college graduates smarter, or do smarter people go to college? Etc, etc, etc, etc...

    Members of [Maniac Craniac's religion] typically outperform their peers in grade school by a long shot and often go very far in their careers even if they never go to college. The reason being that all of the skills that are supposedly taught in college are encouraged from a young age and throughout one's entire life. You may be astounded to walk into a congregation such as mine and meet so many 18 year olds who can read at a high level, think critically like a much older person, are more informed and know exactly what they want out of life (I'm still working on that last one, myself :smile:). I know more than a few people who decided that college wasn't for them, yet just a few years later are now the boss of people who went through 6 or more years of school.
     
    Maniac Craniac, Jul 7, 2011
    #25
  6. Kizmet

    Kizmet Moderator

    OK, so then I guess you guys are ending your studies and will not encourage anyone else to study at the college level, right?
     
    Kizmet, Jul 7, 2011
    #26
  7. Maniac Craniac

    Maniac Craniac Moderator Staff Member

    The answer to that question appears multiple times in my posts above :smile:
     
    Maniac Craniac, Jul 7, 2011
    #27
  8. imalcolm

    imalcolm New Member

    imalcolm, Jul 8, 2011
    #28
  9. Randell1234

    Randell1234 Moderator

    Glad you can keep up :alcoholic:
     
    Randell1234, Jul 8, 2011
    #29
  10. 03310151

    03310151 Active Member

    It's like reading a list of fallacies and just checking 'em off right on down.

    I see an Ad Hominem (The_Professor), a False Dilemma Fallacy, a Poisioning the Well Fallacy (The_Professor), a Biased Sample Fallacy (Lerner), an Appeal to Popularity Fallacy (Kizmet)...and pretty quick ol' MC's gonna succumb to the Bandwagon Fallacy (Whoever comes in to argue that he says college is a waste, even though he repeatedly has said it is not). Anyone got a Red Herring (03310151)?



    Good stuff.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Jul 8, 2011
    03310151, Jul 8, 2011
    #30
  11. Kizmet

    Kizmet Moderator

    So you seem to be suggesting that I should read the whole thing? Hmm. A new idea.
    :smile:
     
    Kizmet, Jul 8, 2011
    #31
  12. Maniac Craniac

    Maniac Craniac Moderator Staff Member

    This suggests that I haven't yet committed any fallacy. If that is true, then I am very proud of myself :approve:

    It would be pretty difficult to succumb to the bandwagon fallacy, when I am in the minority with my viewpoint. Actually, the whole idea of "you must go to college or else..." is nearly always completed with either a bandwagon fallacy or a fallacious slippery slope.
     
    Maniac Craniac, Jul 8, 2011
    #32
  13. 03310151

    03310151 Active Member

    Correct me if I am wrong, but I thought the Bandwagon Fallacy was when one changed their views/arguements based on what those around them were saying. You seem to be a focal point of the perceieved anti-college bent in this thread and a few people keep directing their posts to you. When I pointed out the Bandwagon it was tongue in cheek, as I feel you are being unfairly targeted here, but you are a popular poster so only a matter of time before you hopped on the College is The Greatest in the World, LOL-ZOMG!!!!! crowd.
     
    03310151, Jul 8, 2011
    #33
  14. Maniac Craniac

    Maniac Craniac Moderator Staff Member

    You are correct. It is basically an appeal to peer pressure. The "argument" is to say, you must do what everyone else does because everyone else does it.

    I know, that was clear :smile:

    Actually, I don't think anyone has targeted me. No one has come out as strongly in favor of the viewpoint of the article as I have, so it only makes sense that if I am in the minority (I assume that I am), several others would express disagreements to what I have written. Since John Stossel isn't likely to register to this forum to defend himself, I am basically a stand in. No ad hominem has been thrown at me, so it's all fair debate so far.

    That is news to me! Unless by "popular poster" you mean I populate this forum with posts! I certainly have done that in this thread :mischievous:

    The enemy shall never wear me down... NEVER!!!! :wall:
     
    Maniac Craniac, Jul 8, 2011
    #34
Page 2 of 2

Share This Page