College - Learning or Indoctrination?

Has science taken a wrong turn? If so, what corrections are needed? Chronicles of scientific misbehavior. The role of heretic-pioneers and forbidden questions in the sciences. Is peer review working? The perverse "consensus of leading scientists." Good public relations versus good science.

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mightyno17
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College - Learning or Indoctrination?

Unread post by mightyno17 » Sat Apr 21, 2018 12:40 pm

From the EU proponent's point of view (or frame of reference, whichever you prefer :lol: ), is pursuing a physics degree in the current age an opportunity to learn, or to be indoctrinated? Or should aspiring scientists switch to engineering instead? What is the future of science if people with an interest for the natural world can not find sound instruction in the traditional education system?
"The future of scientific discovery will be determined by those eager to test new possibilities under the rigors of experimental design." -David Talbott

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orrery
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Re: College - Learning or Indoctrination?

Unread post by orrery » Sat Apr 21, 2018 2:00 pm

If you're going to University to study Physics - its brainwashing bullshit. I recommend steering clear of it and going towards Electrical Engineering or Chemistry instead.
"though free to think and to act - we are held together like the stars - in firmament with ties inseparable - these ties cannot be seen but we can feel them - each of us is only part of a whole" -tesla

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D_Archer
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Re: College - Learning or Indoctrination?

Unread post by D_Archer » Sun Apr 22, 2018 1:16 am

mightyno17 wrote:From the EU proponent's point of view (or frame of reference, whichever you prefer :lol: ), is pursuing a physics degree in the current age an opportunity to learn, or to be indoctrinated? Or should aspiring scientists switch to engineering instead? What is the future of science if people with an interest for the natural world can not find sound instruction in the traditional education system?
"Colleges are places where pebbles are polished and diamonds are dimmed." -R.G Ingersoll

Aside from this lovely quote, current "physics" education is a crapshoot.

But you can study technical/electrical engineering, industrial design, chemistry (just actual chemistry, not the theories), learn how to do/fix/make stuff.

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Daniel
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mightyno17
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Re: College - Learning or Indoctrination?

Unread post by mightyno17 » Sun Apr 22, 2018 4:29 am

orrery wrote:If you're going to University to study Physics - its brainwashing bullshit.
Eloquent.

Thanks for the replies. It appears the general opinion is to occupy oneself with more "applied physics" than "theoretical physics". The advice seems to be to study the phenomena but don't listen to the theory.

Also,I find interesting the two of you suggested chemistry as an alternative to EE, why is that so?
"The future of scientific discovery will be determined by those eager to test new possibilities under the rigors of experimental design." -David Talbott

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D_Archer
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Re: College - Learning or Indoctrination?

Unread post by D_Archer » Mon Apr 23, 2018 4:27 am

mightyno17 wrote:
orrery wrote:Also,I find interesting the two of you suggested chemistry as an alternative to EE, why is that so?
Chemistry also encompasses electrochemistry, this is relatable to electrical comets and star chemistry and planetary chemistry (ie phsysics/astrophysics). I think you do not get plasma chemistry that much, but maybe there are relatable courses or later specializations.

And in general chemistry is about material knowledge, most of its foundations are rooted in practical experiments not theory. A good chemistry background is helpful in understanding the material world.

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Daniel
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orrery
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Re: College - Learning or Indoctrination?

Unread post by orrery » Mon Apr 23, 2018 9:31 am

mightyno17 wrote:
orrery wrote:If you're going to University to study Physics - its brainwashing bullshit.
Eloquent.

Thanks for the replies. It appears the general opinion is to occupy oneself with more "applied physics" than "theoretical physics". The advice seems to be to study the phenomena but don't listen to the theory.

Also,I find interesting the two of you suggested chemistry as an alternative to EE, why is that so?
I went to college for Physics and I definitely wish I hadn't wasted my time on it. Half of the material has been taken over by the wishy washy day dream nonsense but the fact that you have to avoid half of the professor's bullshit as well as idiot day dreamer students is a supreme annoyance. If I had it to do over, chemistry and EE reveal more about the practical real world, whereas physics today has devolved into fantasy world building.
"though free to think and to act - we are held together like the stars - in firmament with ties inseparable - these ties cannot be seen but we can feel them - each of us is only part of a whole" -tesla

http://www.reddit.com/r/plasmaCosmology

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Brigit Bara
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Re: College - Learning or Indoctrination?

Unread post by Brigit Bara » Mon Apr 23, 2018 10:19 am

mightyno17 says,
"From the EU proponent's point of view (or frame of reference, whichever you prefer :lol: ), is pursuing a physics degree in the current age an opportunity to learn, or to be indoctrinated?"
Your question is difficult because the Electric Universe founders probably have not said whether it is worth it to get a degree in physics, or if it is better to pursue electrical engineering. It is just not a subject they have addressed directly. But over the years during interviews they have all made some interesting comments about K-12 and higher education. Don Scott is a professor in Electrical Engineering and Wal Thornhill has a degree in physics, and I have never heard either one discourage taking any particular coursework, if along with a grain of salt.

In my view, there are many dangers for young people who are thinking of going to University. First and foremost, there are higher and higher costs, accompanied by a decline in student skills; and there are an abundance of worthless degrees, and therefore a lesser chance of getting a job which uses the degree. When my own teenagers started talking about going to college, the first thing I wanted to teach them about is debt. Young people cannot possibly understand debt and it is important to give them some perspective on whether taking a 60,000 usd loan is right for them, in whatever field they are interested in. They are talented and hard working, and I think any one of them could begin at a good company and work their way up, rather than take a huge loan. Employers are also well aware that holding a four-year degree does not necessarily translate to either having the skills advertised, or being a solid and responsible employee. For example, some companies are spending over a billion dollars a year training college graduates because they lack skills.

ref: http://www.breitbart.com/tech/2018/03/2 ... n-college/

To illustrate to my own kids that there are other paths to success besides a four-year degree, I chose to go through this entire discussion on reddit with them (apologies: some language):
https://www.reddit.com/r/offmychest/com ... worthless/
“Oh for shame, how these mortals put the blame upon us gods, for they say evils come from us, when it is they rather who by their own recklessness win sorrow beyond what is given…”
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Brigit Bara
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Re: College - Learning or Indoctrination?

Unread post by Brigit Bara » Mon Apr 23, 2018 10:31 am

And one more reference for good measure, on the question about whether 18-24 year-olds have sufficient pre-frontal cortex development to comprehend college costs.
.
"...hilarious tuition fees sketch"
Channel: buzzy news UK
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YQ9Uq6ZhrTU
dur 59 sec
“Oh for shame, how these mortals put the blame upon us gods, for they say evils come from us, when it is they rather who by their own recklessness win sorrow beyond what is given…”
~Homer

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mightyno17
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Re: College - Learning or Indoctrination?

Unread post by mightyno17 » Mon Apr 23, 2018 6:25 pm

When I referred to "proponent" in my original post I meant everyone that agrees with a majority of the general EU theories (electric comets, electricity in space, electric star, and so on), even the forum users here. Maybe I should've worded it clearer, but I see no way to edit my own posts, but thanks for the rich reply. I've not read the links you shared in their entirety yet, but I see the general point. The way it seems to point is to get a hands on technical degree (that are generally quicker than a full 4-5 year college course) to learn and gain experience at a company solving real life issues.
"The future of scientific discovery will be determined by those eager to test new possibilities under the rigors of experimental design." -David Talbott

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nick c
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Re: College - Learning or Indoctrination?

Unread post by nick c » Mon Apr 23, 2018 7:02 pm

Maybe I should've worded it clearer, but I see no way to edit my own posts,
You can edit a post immediately after posting up until
1) about an hour has passed,
or,
2)someone makes another post to the thread.
So if someone makes a post a minute after yours the edit feature is no longer available, otherwise you have approximately an hour to edit.

Moderators can edit a post anytime, however, we only use that feature in certain situations - such as removal of an offensive remark and other violations of forum rules, to correct a grammatical error in the thread title, correction of dead links, etc, etc.
Many veteran forum members type their posts in Word Pad or Note Pad and when ready to post, copy and paste it to the forum.

Occasionally a forum member will request a moderator edit. Usually I just advise them to specify the necessary correction in a follow up post. The reason for this is that we would like to keep the record and time stamp intact. Again if there is a problem with a bad link a moderator can correct that and will make a note at the bottom of the post. Such as this:
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Brigit Bara
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Re: College - Learning or Indoctrination?

Unread post by Brigit Bara » Tue Apr 24, 2018 10:47 pm

Your heart has to go out to these people. Tuition is wildly inflated and the cost of housing is also astronomical in many cities. Most Baby Boomers were able to work their way through college, or pay-as-you-go, as generations before had done. I am pointing out that that bridge was burned down behind them.

So students must be extremely selective and deliberate in how they use higher education. It is a calculated risk which should be used only with a very specific purpose in mind.
“Oh for shame, how these mortals put the blame upon us gods, for they say evils come from us, when it is they rather who by their own recklessness win sorrow beyond what is given…”
~Homer

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Brigit Bara
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Re: College - Learning or Indoctrination?

Unread post by Brigit Bara » Thu Apr 26, 2018 1:08 pm

What is the future of science if people with an interest for the natural world can not find sound instruction in the traditional education system?
That's a fun question.

This has happened many times in history. What broke the scholastic grip on learning before?

Sometimes I read Sir Francis Bacon and I like to imagine what I would tell him if I could go back in time and talk with him. When he took stock of the state of knowledge in the 16th century and early 17th cent., he found it to be totally inadequate. The so-called education in his day was not only restricted to a certain caste, it was also in a dead prestige language, and consisted mostly in learning a bunch of Greek and Latin works. Almost everything in these works was wrong, that is to say, they did not correlate with reality.

He developed a way of discussing the impediments to a genuine understanding of nature, without offending too openly those who thought they were educated and elevated because they knew a bunch of Aristotle, Ptolemy, Galen and Plato. He had to be very diplomatic in suggesting that the Greeks were worthless, because in order to start a new school or University, he needed the patronage of the monarch and court, who were of course educated in the Greeks. So he began by creating a taxonomy of the main impediments to human understanding. And these he quaintly -- but it turns out accurately -- called "idols of the human mind." One of the idols was the over-reliance on and affection for learning because it was ancient, and one was over-reliance on any learning just because it was new. Well that was a very tactful approach. And today, it is good to look at those four idols of the human mind and realize that they are pretty timeless and speak to this generation just as clearly as to those who were memorizing Aristotle and Ptolemy.

But the most important question Bacon raised is, how could knowledge and learning advance, if it did not have a definite goal? And that is still the most important question. What is the aim of science? What is its goal?
Again there is another great and powerful cause why the sciences have made but little progress, which is this. It is not possible to run a course aright when the goal itself has not been rightly placed. Now the true and lawful goal of the sciences is none other than this: that human life be endowed with new discoveries and powers.


It turned out -- and Francis Bacon could not quite foresee this -- that most of the developments which he was anxious to see come into being (like the refrigeration he was experimenting with when he died), was developed by farm boys who learned to read in little school houses and were able to pursue their interests through reading and experimentation. A few examples include Willis Carrier, James Young, Charles Goodyear, George Eastman..and the list goes on and on. That is the surprise I would share with Sir Francis Bacon!

If you really analyze the actual goals of science under the environmental sustainability movement, it is to remove all the powers which past generations discovered through empirical science and the encouragement of the sciences through patent law. Very unfortunate. And with goals like that, the degrees will eventually be worth little more than a copy of Aristotle and Ptolemy.
“Oh for shame, how these mortals put the blame upon us gods, for they say evils come from us, when it is they rather who by their own recklessness win sorrow beyond what is given…”
~Homer

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Brigit Bara
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Re: College - Learning or Indoctrination?

Unread post by Brigit Bara » Thu Apr 26, 2018 2:28 pm

Mightyno17 says, "What is the future of science if people with an interest for the natural world can not find sound instruction in the traditional education system?"

The problem was so bad in France that Frederic Bastiat (1801-1850) suggested getting rid of baccalaureate degrees altogether!
Citizen Representatives
I have submitted an amendment to the Assembly the object of which is to eliminate university degrees. My health does not allow me to develop it from the rostrum. Allow me to have recourse to the pen.
The question is extremely serious. As faulty as the law drawn up by your commission is, I believe that it would mark a signal improvement on the current condition of state education if it were amended as I propose.
University degrees have the triple disadvantage of making teaching uniform (uniformity is not unity) and of freezing it after having imprinted it with the most disastrous orientation.
Last edited by Brigit Bara on Thu Apr 26, 2018 3:02 pm, edited 2 times in total.
“Oh for shame, how these mortals put the blame upon us gods, for they say evils come from us, when it is they rather who by their own recklessness win sorrow beyond what is given…”
~Homer

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Brigit Bara
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Re: College - Learning or Indoctrination?

Unread post by Brigit Bara » Thu Apr 26, 2018 2:45 pm

Baccalaureats and Socialism, cont'd
I, as the father of a family, and the teacher with whom I join forces for the education of my son may well believe that a proper education consists in knowing what things are and what they produce, both in the realm of physics and in the realm of morals. We may think that a person is best educated if he has the most accurate knowledge of phenomena and is most conversant with the cycle of cause and effect. We would like to base teaching on this foundation. But the state thinks otherwise. It thinks that to be learned is to be able to scan the verses of Plautus and to quote the opinions of Thales and Pythagoras with regard to fire and air.
So what does the state do? It tells us: “Teach your pupil whatever you like, but when he is twenty, I will have him interrogated on the opinions of [188] Pythagoras and Thales, I will have him scan the verses of Plautus, and if he is not schooled enough in these matters to prove to me that he has devoted his entire youth to them, he cannot be a doctor, lawyer, magistrate, consul, diplomat, or teacher.”
http://oll.libertyfund.org/titles/basti ... -1843-1850

It is worth it to read this, and any thing Bastiat wrote. As any one can see the problem of worthless degrees is the natural state of things, and that there was only a brief respite of a few centuries. We now return to darkness, in which the only science taught in high schools consists in Darwinian Evolution, overpopulation, and sustainability goals. Specialized degrees in physics and astronomy are also based on traditions which have been fixed and frozen and unified the world over. So be careful of signing any big loan contracts or hiking up property taxes for this stuff.
“Oh for shame, how these mortals put the blame upon us gods, for they say evils come from us, when it is they rather who by their own recklessness win sorrow beyond what is given…”
~Homer

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danlang
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Re: College - Learning or Indoctrination?

Unread post by danlang » Wed Oct 24, 2018 8:28 am

I also think that current colleges and universities (in most cases) are a waste of time. It's better to do it yourself or with the help of online resources, seminars, workshops, etc. Now there are a lot of such opportunities. And if you have enough experience, you can train or complete assignments on https://assignment.essayshark.com/physics-help to give an understanding of the basics for students.

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