[jholloway7]

I'm sorry for the vitriol, but this is one of the most ignorant comments I've read on HN for a while. I read it three times and could only conclude your whole comment was just so you could spew the "couched in a faux constructionist" non sequitur at the end of it.

STEM in physical education: Biomechanics, kinesiology, nutrition science, sports psychology, probability and statistics, equipment tech.

STEM in art: physics, perspective, geometry, chemistry, music theory, acoustics, audio engineering, CAD, photoshop, Leonardo Da Vinci would like to have a word with you.

STEM in history: agriculture, Gutenberg, Isaac Newton, Galileo, Copernicus, Alan Turing WWII, industrial revolution, manhattan project, Apollo, telecommunications

Basically the entire tree of "advances in STEM" over the course of human civilization can be directly tied to salient events in art, sports and general history.

STEM advances humanities and humanities advance STEM. If anything the STEM movement is about trying to get STEM back on par with how other fields are taught. It's not a zero sum where if STEM wins, then 'humanities' lose. They complement each other and both win.

[dorchadas]

That's definitely not true. Even at the high school level, where I teach, it's very much 'do STEM at the expense of humanities'. While it doesn't have to be a zero-sum game, it is and STEM gets pushed because it's seen as more 'practical' and better at getting you jobs.

[harimau777]

I think that you might be understanding the poster's terminology differently than they intended. When people talk about physical education and art at the pre-college level they generally mean gym and the fine arts respectively. They generally do not mean the physical sciences or the mathematics behind the fine arts (although those are both very valuable things to study).

As you point out, studying STEM could be complementary to the study of history and other humanities. However, that does not necessarily mean that it always works out that way.

[hydrox24]

The zero sum game is students' time. Not contribution to society.

Whether it has to be a zero sum game is another matter, but you seem to have misunderstood the assertion of your parent comment.