Is cost enough to justify an unaccredited program?

Re: Dr. Duck

Sure. If Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus could have earned Ludwig Wittgenstein a Cambridge UK doctorate without (it appears, and I may be wrong on this point!) his having any previous degrees, and without his having had any other publications in his lifetime, then I suppose anything is possible even within the mainstream -- if you happen to be a colleague of Bertrand Russell.

Last few nights, I came across more than one UK-style university of long history whose doctoral programs had a specific rule in their rosters that permitted the bending of all other rules -- given the right circumstances (and at the whole discretion of the university).

See, for an example:

http://www.newcastle.edu.au/policy/academic/doctoral/doctors.htm

Part I - Rule 8 - Relaxing Provisions:

Note the words -- may relax any provision.

So yes, indeed -- there it is in writing -- "The rules have a provision that allows them to be broken."

But the "could" is not always the desirable path for everyone, for any number of the other variables to which I referred earlier. Cost, institutional philosophy, location, personal goals, et cetera all come into play.

 

Perhaps he did and perhaps he does but, if so, he did not teach on the subject of ducks.
Jack

 

Re: Re: Dr. Duck

I'm not a Wittgenstein groupy but I believe that when he left Berlin (the Technische Hochschule) in 1908 for England he had enrolled in the Doctoral program in Engineering at the University of Manchester. Now I know that there have been many changes in the world of higher education within the last 100 years but I'm guessing that you have to have some kind of degree in something before a British university will enroll you in a PhD program. In any case, I think it's interesting that this is perhaps a time in history when degrees meant less than ability. I am reminded of Albert Einstein who, in 1905, published 5 physics papers in scholarly journals, any one of which would have earned him a Doctoral degree. He had no substantial degree at the time yet he turned the world of science upside down.
Jack

 

Soooo...what?

Where are we at this point?

COULD a duck scholar earn his Ph.D. at a recognized (accredited) school by working with FN Hayes?

Does Dr. Hayes actually enjoy the "rights and privileges" of a doctorate? Somehow, I doubt it...I would guess that his standing in the academic community is largely unaffected by the degree either way. But I have no way to know.

And anyway, that's not the question. QTJ raised an interesting idea that I hadn't thought of which is going with an unaccredited program because it is EXACTLY what the student wants.

I still don't know. Is it really LIKELY that a student would be in this position?

I will say that any American lawyer wanting a legitimate dissertation degree in American law has only one D/L choice, NWCU, and IT is absolutely unaccredited...and appears, at any rate, to be quite flexible.

 

Yes, OK, but I've also thought of two more questions which frequently come up once one steps upon this slippery slope:
1) Once a person "earns" this unaccredited doctoral degree because it is EXACTLY what one wants, what is the expectation, what is the hope as to how this degree will be regarded by others? Can a person actually use a degree from ABC University for gainful employment without the dreaded tick, tick, tick ? Will it be respected by others who actually know about the unaccredited nature of the granting institution? Or must a person forever carry with them a copy of their dissertation, offering it to whomever might question their degree, hoping that they will read it and be impressed?
2) (For me, this is the big one) If some exceptional person, let's say a person with the initials QTJ, writes a superlative piece of research, writes it according to all rules and regs and this piece of research is found to be in accordance with all standards of all universities on all continents across the globe, what does this say about the unaccredited university that grants the degree?
Jack

 

All depends. If we're talking about a research, dissertation based degree, rather than a prior-publication-only degree, here are a few questions that might point one in the right direction as to what that says:

• Is that what the university demanded of *** from the beginning, or was it an "accident"?
• Were there rules in place, and were those rules obliged?
• Were there internal standards to which *** was obliged to adhere?
• Were the people who ratified the thing given those standards, told to ratify against both those and against the international standards in place already in academia?
• Were the above people competent to make that call?

Add in a few more "was there" and "were there" and maybe it says that the university is what it says it is: a university.

Who knows? Stranger things have happened than a university calling itself a university actually being a university.

 

Yes, OK. And since these things are virtually unknowable to any aspiring applicant, not to mention anyone who might actually want to hire a graduate from ABC University, I would say that this falls into the "if a tree falls in the forest and no one hears it..." category. No one will be able to tell if it's a good degree and it will be even less clear that it's a good university.
Jack

 

Not on this board.
Jack

 

Is ABC U so opaque as all that? You didn't tell me there was a hidden presupposition: "The University in Question is Opaque and Occult."

 

Re: Re: Re: Dr. Duck

I've got a copy of A.J. Ayer's 'Wittgenstein' in my pile of books. It tells me that Wittgenstein enrolled as a "research student" at Manchester, in the then very avant-garde subject of aeronautical engineering (it was 1908, after all). But his interests turned to mathematics and then to the foundations of mathematics after he read Russell's 'Principles of Mathematics'. He transferred to Cambridge (Frege recommended him) for the the 1912-13 academic year, to study the philosophy of mathematics with Russell. Wittgenstein made a profound impression on both Russell and G.E. Moore, and Russell actually abandoned the book he was writing on the philosophy of knowledge after hearing Wittgenstein's criticisms of it.

When war broke out in 1914, Wittgenstein returned to Austria and ended up joining the army, where he became a machine gunner. In 1915 he got some kind of battlefield commission to officer. He carried notebooks with him which he filled with philosophical jottings. In 1918 he was captured by the Italians and spent 9 months as a POW, spending the time shaping his notes up into a manuscript. When he got the opportunity, he sent copies to Russell and to Frege. Frege couldn't make sense of it, but Russell was impressed.

Russell and Wittgenstein met in the Hague to arrange publication. Wittgenstein had originally given the thing the catchy German title 'Logisch-philosophische Abhandlung', but the English translation (by C.K. Ogden and F.P. Ramsey) was entitled 'Tractatus Logico-Phlosophicus', a title suggested by Moore.

At that point Wittgenstein lost interest in philosophy and attended a teacher's college in Austria, then taught elementary school there. The students liked him but their parents didn't, so he had to quit that career.

Next he went to work as a gardener at a monastery. He seriously considered becoming a monk. But while he really liked the life-style, he just didn't have any religious faith. (That might not be a big problem for a Buddhist monk, but it's kind of a snag for a Catholic monk.)

Wittgenstein's interest in philosophy was reviving and he attended the meetings of the Vienna Circle from 1927 to 1929. But Wittgenstein was a prickly character and he had a falling out with Carnap. (He remained on good terms with Schlick and Waismann, the latter serving as the sounding board for Wittgenstein's ideas during this period.)

In that year (1929) Ramsey persuaded Wittgenstein to return to Cambridge. He submitted the Tractatus as his Ph.D. dissertation and was examined by Moore and Russell. Moore wrote, 'It is my personal opinion that Mr. Wittgenstein's thesis is a work of genius; but, be that as it may, it is certainly well up to the standard required for the Cambridge degree Doctor of Philosophy'.

So I guess that... technically... Wittgenstein had entered Cambridge way back in 1912 and didn't earn his doctorate until 1929. That's 17 years. 21 years if you count the engineering work at Manchester. Of course a few little annoyances like a world war had intervened, but still. It's not like this was a quickie degree. He was a research student who did a lot of his work at a distance and whose studies were interruped by the war, I guess.

 

Tell me where you're enrolled and I'll answer your question.
Jack

 

Of course, it has not escaped anyones attention that you have not answered either of the questions that I asked.
Jack

 

Now, now, there, there. Everythin's gonna be OK. There, there, now, now.

 

Cool stuff on the other Wittgenstein. Thanks, Bill and Jack.

 

Jack, you actually asked more than two questions. For instance, the first numbered item is made up of these questions:

More than two questions, but I'll answer them with the "in my opinion" caveat. Note, however, that I will most certainly challenge the assumptions and tone as I see them.

* Once a person "earns" this unaccredited doctoral degree because it is EXACTLY what one wants, what is the expectation, what is the hope as to how this degree will be regarded by others?

That depends on the person doing the earning.

Counter-question: Why is "earns" in quotation marks?

* Can a person actually use a degree from ABC University for gainful employment without the dreaded tick, tick, tick ?

That depends on the gainful employer.

Counter-question: What is the"dreaded tick-tick-tick" scenario?

* Will it be respected by others who actually know about the unaccredited nature of the granting institution?

That depends on the others.

Counter-question 1: By "actually know" are you implying that most people don't actually know of the unaccredited nature of the granting institution?

Counter-question 2: Can you suggest a percentage of people who are presented a degree from an unaccredited institution who don't actually know of the unaccredited nature of the institution? (Supported by empirical evidence?)

Counter-question 3: What exactly is the "unaccredited nature" that people being presented these degrees should "actually know"?

* Or must a person forever carry with them a copy of their dissertation, offering it to whomever might question their degree, hoping that they will read it and be impressed?

That depends on the person and what that person wishes to achieve and/or have recognized.

Counter-question: Is it to be assumed that the goal of having a degree by dissertation is to hope that others will be impressed?

Now, the second numbered question, was, indeed, just one question:

If some exceptional person, let's say a person with the initials **, writes a superlative piece of research, writes it according to all rules and regs and this piece of research is found to be in accordance with all standards of all universities on all continents across the globe, what does this say about the unaccredited university that grants the degree?

This I already answered, with, "Who knows?"

 

Oh, lordy Lawd ......... Not again .......

Ok, my response to the original question: "Is cost enough to justify an unaccredited program?" is No.

Non. Nyet. Nada. Not-on-yer-life.

Period.

Reputation (yours, not necessarily the school's or entity's) counts, and some would argue that character counts even more.

IMHO, only a handful of unaccredited instutions provide educations and issue higher education degrees which are worth forever defending for the rest of one's life.. Is it really worth all that trouble?

No.

Non. Nyet. Nada. Not-on-yer-life.



Thanks.

 

Great question, Jack!

My response: Nothing! Absolutely nothing.

If, perchance, one is predisposed to say that a superior research work done by one who received a degree from the unaccredited entity for said work is an indication that said unaccredited entity is thus a high-quality institution, .... then one must be prepared, to grant the logical veracity of the corollary of the above statement, as follows:

If some unremarkable or remarkable person, let's say a person with the initials **, writes a substandard piece of research, writes it according to all rules and regs and this piece of research is found to not be in accordance with all standards of all universities on all continents across the globe, what does this say about the unaccredited university that grants the degree? - "it follows, then, that the unaccredited institution is unquestionably sub-par." Right?

There ya have it.

No. One cannot have it both ways. No, Sir!

Quod erat demonstratum.



Thanks.

 

Okay. Hold it right there. You're talking around the thing I want to know.

Ths isn't clear to me because this part of the discussion deals with something I've never experienced.

QTJ made me think about the effect of working with a particular scholar on a particular research topic in an unaccredited program. Doesn't the relationship with THAT SCHOLAR carry weight all by itself?

In theory, it should, I guess, but the question I'm asking now is whether it is very likely as a practical matter that this could ever happen.

Could it?

 

Well, I say, figure out how much mileage you want out of your piece of paper, then figure out how much mileage you'll get out of certain particular pieces of paper, then go for one of the pieces of paper that will get you where you want to go.

 

Nosborne, this is a great question. My, your questions have a tendency to stretch the fibres of one's mind, do they not?

The answer to your query is: of course, yes, it could. Definitely.

An institution of higher education is composed of many interacting and interlocking relationships:

professor (scholar) to student
professor to professor
student to student
school to professor
school to student
professor to course(s)
course(s) to research
school (or sourses) to accreditors
research to professor
degree(s)-awarded to school
school to professor, etc

.... and so on, ad infinitum, with the single, most-important relationship, being, in my view, that of [I[professor to ideas[/I].

The expansion of ideas, the dissemination of ideas, the critique of ideas, the development of ideas, the convesion of ideas into practical uses, the relationship of ideas to value, to quality, to utility, to relevance, to acceptance ...

There you have it. No matter how one slices it, it eventually boils down to the quality or percived quality of the institution. This is as it should be, because it is the institution that grants (or awards) the degrees - not the scholar, not the professor, not the students, not the trustees, but the institution compleat.

The student-professor(scholar) relationship derives its meritocracy from the professor's achievements, knowledge, experiences, relationships to other institutions, other ideas, other works.....

Ever thought of a professor who emanated from an unaccredited institution whose professors all have in common the fact that all of them came from unaccredited institutions, ad infinitum, down the line?

One must resist the temptation to cite examples of professors or even business magnates who excelled in spite of not possessing any accredited degrees. Keep going down the line and see where the unaccredited line freezes, kaput, ends. There is no continuity without quality reproduction,One must there?

Yes, the professor's relationship to a student is key but even in a professor-to-student in an unaccredited program situation, the value of the relationship eventually comes down to what, if any, other independent bodies / peer reviewers / quality external and objective ascertainers / regulators think of it.

Yes, the academic and professional weight which the scholar carries derives, in large part, from the work done by the professor in verified / legitimate / accredited / respected prior or current institutions.

Exceptions to this are very, very rare and extremely hard to conjure.

Eventually, the relationship must be defended, externally, to others, and to me, very few unaccredited degrees (or relationships0 are worth forever defending.

And defend, you must, because of the time-bomb's propensity to tick and tick and tick till ......... you know what.And when that happens, no professor will come to your rescue. You will be on your own.

Or so I think.

Thanks.