If you’re not discussing your reading with other people, you’re missing out on what I considered a crucial part of my formal education. (I did attend a small college; people who do their undergrad at major universities may be in a different boat.) It’s fine and good to read things on your own, and you can learn a lot that way, but without a professor or fellow students to bounce ideas off of and argue with then it’s easy to slide into a sort of intellectual path-of-least-resistance. Or in other words, there’s no one to call you on your BS. There’s no one to challenge whether or not you really understood the reading. There’s no one to make a good case for the position contrary to the one that you believe. There’s no one to encourage you to do reading outside your personal scope of interest. There’s no one to discourage you from becoming a total crackpot.
Not that this would necessarily make any difference to your future salary or anything, but it can make a big difference when it comes to how well you understand a particular field.
I wouldn’t call a liberal arts degree worthless absolutely. What I would call a liberal arts degree is worthless comparatively, though even that’s more abusive language than I should like to use. Technical/professional study gives as much an opportunity to analyze information as humanities study, I assure you, and at the same time it gives more - a specific set of skills, as well as a greater knowledge of things mathematical and scientific (which I posit require the help of a professior more than studies in the liberal arts).
That is not to say that a liberal arts degree offers nothing to the student; I think it offers a lot. Just not enough that I think it should be worth it to most people as compared to other options.
Possibly. But with places online like the philosophy forums and a huge amount of usenet, that’s not as true as it used to be. Add to that the willingness of the occasional professional philosopher to respond to letters from hobbyists, and there is ample opportunity for the amateur to keep himself, through discussion, from crackpotitude.
And finally, the good majority of philosophy majors will pursue philosophy as a hobby and not as a profession. If my views on Spinoza are even patently mistaken, then no one is harmed - and through thinking about Spinoza I’ve still gained something, I’d wager.
Not necessarily. Just because the UPS site says they’re accepting applications doesn’t mean there are actually jobs available. I went through the whole application process, only to be told at the end of it that there were no appointments with HR available. We’re into the second week of December, here–they’ve already done their hiring for the Christmas season, most likely.
The problem with that in the last few years has been that job requirements have been so specialized; the state of the economy has been such that they can be. Jobs shoveling shit wanted a B.S. or equivalent in Shit Shoveling and five years of experience in shoveling their particular variety of shit. The idea of taking on a bright college graduate in an unrelated or tangentially-related field and letting him or her learn the job was just unheard of.
This may very well be improving, since I’ve been seeing a lot more Help Wanted signs lately–not just in the “we’ll take your application and maybe call you in six months” sense, but places that really do look like they need to hire some people.
My stepson and his wife both graduated from a college where the entire four year curriculum is the study of the “Great Books of the Western World.” I don’t know how practical it was in securing jobs, but it seems to have been marvelously helpful in educating them.
Each owns or co-owns a successful business. They are financially and personally successful. Liberal Arts need not be the curse of death.
Because in this day and age, you need a college diploma to obtain a well-paying job. Why not get it in something that interests you, and that you won’t do too badly in? If I would have majored in, say, business, I would have been bored to death. I wouldn’t have done well; I probably would have had to take another year or so. I would have had a low G.P.A., and no good references. As an English major, I went through in four years (would have been three and a half, but I needed some required classes that were only offered in the spring semester), graduated magna cum laude, and was considered one of the best students by all my professors.
I started out as a philosophy major too. My parents made me switch because they said getting a degree in philosophy was stupid. I suppose an English degree is somewhat more useful than a B.A. in philosophy, but not by much.
It sounds like this might be part of the problem. For the most part, you’re looking for work in areas where it’s tough to find work, and where the cost of living is so high, a minimum wage job puts you squarely into the “damn near destitute” class.
Looking at these stats (a bit outdated, but still…), the unemployment rate in the Santa Cruz Standard Metropolitan Statistical Area (SMSA) is one of the highest in the nation. Bad place to be looking for a job!
It ain’t easy looking for a job somewhere else entirely, of course, and you can’t afford to move someplace and just hope you’ll find something when you get there. Do you know anyone who lives elsewhere, someplace where the unemployment rate is low, where the economy is beginning to boom? Someone you might even be able to camp out with for a few months while you get started?
As the subject of this thread I have one more thing to add. At first I thought I had done something wrong and really upset someone, but upon reading fruitbat’seven sven, please give the poverty schtick a rest thread that was started in response to my being pitted, I’ve learned a thing or two.
even sven has passed up multiple opportunities for help from several SDMB users in finding a new job. even sven is not even really looking for a job. even sven decided a film major gives her reason to bitch about not having a good job. even sven has enough money to travel through India. even sven owns an IPOD, subscribes, to Netfix, and probably has a broadband connection. even sven lives in the most expensive area of the country.
even sven is known as the SDMB whiner.
even sven has $20,000 in the bank (but unfortunately owes the government $15,000).
Well I, evil bob55, can’t afford an IPOD or Netfix or a trip to India, have $2000 in the bank, and owe the government $75,000. Don’t bitch to me about being poor.
As as for the subject of minimum wage - I still wouldn’t blame Super 8 if I worked there; I would thank them for the opportunity and claw my way to the top of the company, or use them as a springboard to get going in my career.
I’m not bitter about the minimum wage. My job is literally the easiest job in the universe and isn’t worth a cent over the $6.75 I get (really…yesterday I worked eight hours and didn’t see a single customer- I spent the whole time making myself a winter hat). I’m learning a lot about managing a small business, as I am the only employee, and I am looking forward to a chance to be general manager for at least a couple of weeks in the upcoming month.
What I am bitter about is the people that look down on others in not-ideal situations and make snide comments about how much smarter and better they are than the people that get them their coffee, rent them their hotels and sell them their toilet paper. People in low-wage jobs arn’t there for you to beat on so that you feel better about your world.
I am in agreement with this. Is anyone in disagreement with this?
I know a few people who have never held down a low-wage job, and some of them (just some of them) think that people who work dead-end jobs are all mindless drudges—that they all were too stupid or too lazy to get any other kind of work. Like they had no ambition, so they just settle. Like they haven’t got a brain in their head.
Now, speaking for myself, I don’t think this is an appropriate attitude. You never know who might be bussing your table or taking your change at the checkout counter. For all you know, they might have penned the next novel that you will enjoy, or created a painting that you admired at the local art gallery, or acted in a play that you recently saw. They might be working their way through law school, or medical school, or whatever. You never know.
And you gathered this from my “people should thank Walmart for a job” comment? As I said before people are where they are as a result of the choices they’ve made, and I believe staying in school is a choice that can greatly reduce your chances of making minimum wage. I make ~$8 an hour, so don’t think I’m high and mighty here. One of my sole purposes in life is to bring down people who think they are better, more “intellectual”, or worth more than anyone else in this world. I’m anti-snooty rich, anti-snooty Hollywood, anti-snotty politician, anti-snooty trust fund baby, and so on and will bring these people down in any way I can. I have nothing against success, but have a lot against someone who lets that success go to their head.
I am probably one of the last people that deserves a “F you” pit thread and really, really don’t appreciate that language being associated with my name and really hope an Administrator can change it.
And what about the people who never had a choice about school? Even with scholarships and loans available, many people cannot go to school. I know people in my own high school who had to drop out to support the family, raise younger siblings, etc. College is still a privilege, and no amount of “striving” is going to get someone out of some seriously shitty life circumstances.
I thought your comment on the Walmart thread was pretty high and mighty. Oh, the Walmart workers shouldn’t try to unionize, shouldn’t try to get raises. They should feel lucky they even have a job. Guess those factory workers in Indonesia don’t have any cause for complaint, either; they’re lucky they have anything at all. Actually, the more I read that comment, the angrier it makes me. Are you honestly saying that if you felt underpaid and overworked and even abused at work, that you wouldn’t try to change it? If so, then you’ve got some seriously low self esteem, or major Stockholm syndrome.
Funny, the comment in the Walmart thread seems to suggest exactly the opposite to me.
Nobody’s immune to pittings. Half the threads in this forum have the “F word” in the title. I mean, really, do you not know which forum you are in? “Fuck you” is a weak insult here.