[cinquemb]

It will be great when individuals learn to not conflate institutionalized schooling with education; they may overlap in the best of times, but stick you with a raw deal if one is made to think they must take out a bunch of un-dischargable debt in order to pursue knowledge…

Though that will never happen, masses of people will always seek the easy solutions that fill the void, and opportunists will be willing to sell them it along the way.

[Retric]

It’s really not about education it’s about credentials.

Workers who can decide to stop playing that game.

[cinquemb]

> It’s really not about education it’s about credentials.

Credentialisim, yes, even better…

The trite Robin Hanson argument goes "X is not actually about X", where here X is education.[0]

>It’s really not workers who can decide to stop playing that game.

It's about people making choices. A lot of people choosing to go in debt without realistic options to pay it off, a lot of people thinking un-dishcharable debt by the federal government is a good thing, and a lot of people thinking they must enforce the above because reasons.

[0] http://www.overcomingbias.com/2016/04/who-wants-school.html

[Retric]

Interesting, but it’s missing the human factor. People that gather credentials have incentives to make them more important.

You can look at how quickly the MBA took off as a product of many things. But a huge factor is MBA programs convincing people taking them to higher other MBA’s.

Or how lawyers have made it illegal for people without the right credentials from practicing law.

[cinquemb]

> missing the human factor.

because reasons addresses this, each individual reason given is not really that important to understand what can come from it over time.

> Or how lawyers have made it illegal for people without the right credentials from practicing law.

This might be true now, and for when it comes to representing others that are not yourself, but this does not have to remain true.

[Retric]

By human factor I mean: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Choice-supportive_bias

If you get X degree you overestimate it’s importance and want to build a team of others with X degree. Thus the bias moves the equilibrium point. Further when asked you end up promoting the credentials to others considering getting them.

[cinquemb]

Yes, I get that. What I am saying is that one will ultimately have to face whatever downsides will be from engaging in what Hanson would call "Prestige-Based Discretion" if one actually cares about X and not just the signals of X https://www.overcomingbias.com/2016/06/beware-prestige-based...:

"In the rest of society, however, we often both try to hire people who seem to show off the highest related abilities, and we let those most prestigious people have a lot of discretion in how the job is structured. For example, we let the most prestigious doctors tell us how medicine should be run, the most prestigious lawyers tells us how law should be run, the most prestigious finance professionals tell us how the financial system should work, and the most prestigious academics tell us how to run schools and research.

This can go very wrong! Imagine that we wanted research progress, and that we let the most prestigious researchers pick research topics and methods. To show off their abilities, they may pick topics and methods that most reduce the noise in estimating abilities. For example, they may pick mathematical methods, and topics that are well suited to such methods. And many of them may crowd around the same few topics, like runners at a race. These choices would succeed in helping the most able researchers to show that they are in fact the most able. But the actual research that results might not be very useful at producing research progress.

Of course if we don’t really care about research progress, or students learning, or medical effectiveness, etc., if what we mainly care about is just affiliating with the most impressive folks, well then all this isn’t much of a problem. But if we do care about these things, then unthinkingly presuming that the most prestigious people are the best to tell us how to do things, that can go very very wrong."

[nickthemagicman]

That's why universities should be socialized.

Knowledge and credentials to better oneself and the economy at large should be available to anyone who is willing to put in the work.

Intellectual capital of a countries citizens is the best investment of tax money there can be.

[cinquemb]

And many years later when an increasingly non productive citizens can no longer be expected to reasonably shoulder the tax burden, when governments can no longer borrow agaisnt the future, the piper will be paid… but somehow, this time is different… yawn…

[Jedi72]

The many successful countries around the world with socialized education are counter-example proof that this thinking is flawed.

[cinquemb]

If you are referring to certain privileged european countries compared to others, the piper has yet to be paid… unless you think negative real interest rates on government debt will last forever with no repercussions…

[nickthemagicman]

This is complete fear mongering with no basis in reality.

[nickthemagicman]

I think that's cynical. Even if it's about the degree you gain alot of benefits along the way.

That's like saying people work ONLY for the money.

[nickthemagicman]

Yeah but most people don't have the environment growing up to appreciate learning and knowledge.

Learning itself is a skill...and University teaches you how to learn and to appreciate knowledge...no matter what degree you get you're better off afterwards.

It's sad the capitalistic cynicism about University these days.

I have a feeling it's going to hurt us massively in the long run.

[cinquemb]

> Learning itself is a skill...and University teaches you how to learn and to appreciate knowledge

True that learning is a skill. University is not the only place people can "learn to learn", it is one option out of innumerable many that people can think of if they can so dare to imagine.

>...no matter what degree you get you're better off afterwards.

I think some people would question this when they get to the point where they are destitute trying to pay off loans that they can't discharge, which I'm not sure how capitalist non discharagble loans are. Usually, a lendee being able to default on a loan is the risk lenders take when underwriting…

> I have a feeling it's going to hurt us massively in the long run.

I disagree with that statement, the church (like universities are now) use to be a massive powerful force that acted as a gate keeper to knowledge, and over time, became mostly irrelevant to such ends…

[DrJones1098]

>University is not the only place people can "learn to learn.

I disagree. There are no institutions in modern capitalism that teach you how to learn if you don't already know how. It's extremely rare for them to even train you in skills they need if you already KNOW how to learn.

>think some people would question this when they get to the point where they are destitute trying to pay off loans

Hence my original point...

> Claiming that universities are a gate keeper to knowledge in the age of the internet...

You are missing the point of universities and basically everything I've just said.

[cinquemb]

> I disagree. There are no institutions in modern capitalism that teach you how to learn if you don't already know how. It's extremely rare for them to even train you in skills they need if you already KNOW how to learn.

Man, how did people ever learn to do anything before institutions arise? Oh yes, the glorious institutions of spear making and rock chucking.

> Hence my original point...

Calling something capitalist when it is not? Seems like a straw man… no matter what the institution, perverse incentives will corrupt it if left unchecked, society will either put a bullet to its head, or make it irrelevant in the long run except to the most ardent believers.

> > Claiming that universities are a gate keeper to knowledge in the age of the internet... You are missing the point of universities and basically everything I've just said.

I said nothing about the internet, you added that.

I'm sure there were priests proselytizing in the past to others about the point of the Church in the pursuit of knowledge…

[nickthemagicman]

Comparing spear making and rock chucking to modern knowledge acquisition...

It's actually a perfect metaphor for conservative vs progressives views of the world.