[themodelplumber]

> could not grasp the idea of plagiarism being unethical

I remember experiencing this at a private religious university. At the time, my hyper-religious mind was blown to see students outright cheating in the Testing Center.

Since then I've been exposed to additional perspectives on plagiarism. It is an extremely deep and nuanced topic. A few years out of school, I ended up mentoring and then teaching college students who seem to match the sort of person you describe. This was a huge shock at first.

The more I learned about these students, the more I learned about the sheer variety of perceptions involved: One person's fairness concept is, to another person or group, a latent power dynamic which ought to be questioned.

Or, this person's concern for the big-picture ethical questions is this other person's small-picture roadblock in an economic problem which seems more urgent with each passing moment. You want a big picture? Can you justify it in seconds, with something that's not simply a subjective perception or largely-covert moral construct of your own?

Yet another person's assumption of perpetually commonly-understood contract is another's baroque exercise in cleverness and flexibility. It's the sneaky laser dance from _Ocean's Twelve_, and _that_ kind of challenge is, psychologically speaking, extremely energizing for them. Don't think they didn't notice how things work in the "real" world! (When these two see each other face to face--so to speak--there are harsh outcomes)

Anyway--sorry to hear about your experience & thank you for sharing so that others can be more educated about their choice of institution.

[infogulch]

The problem with plagiarism isn't best characterized as some sort of power struggle between teachers and students via bullshit assignments.

The purpose of learning to write is to make yourself a formidable communicator. If you can independently analyze a new topic to learn something new and apply the results of those learnings towards a particular goal, you can be amazingly effective in everything you aim for. But if you plagiarize every assignment you rob yourself of your own training of this critically important competency.

Plagiarizing some work doesn't really hurt the work, it hurts you.

[khawkins]

This is under the assumption that you see college is a program of self-betterment and not busy work for receiving a degree that says you can have a middle-class job. It feels like even the universities themselves see it as the latter these days.

[knowuh]

The cynical anti-intellectualism in this thread is bracing.

All part of the zeitgeist I guess.

News is fake. Science is fake. Schools are barriers. Everything is subjective, objective reality is nonexistent.

How do we have productive disagreements going forward?

[RNCTX]

> News is fake. Science is fake. Schools are barriers. Everything is subjective, objective reality is nonexistent. How do we have productive disagreements going forward?

Funny you describe it that way. I'd argue that young people in STEM fields, including IS/CIS/CompSci undergrad programs, think everything can be objective when that clearly is not the case.

You don't need to go to college to press buttons, fill out spreadsheets, or input code until you get the output you seek. You need to go to college to make the subjective decisions, which don't have a clear right/wrong answer.

[SuoDuanDao]

I can't word this in a non-snarky way, but it's a genuine question:

Why do you believe that college can teach making subjective decisions?

[TheOtherHobbes]

Because moral philosophy and epistemology have been a thing for well over 4,000 years, and college could easily teach the basics.

[dennis_jeeves]

>I can't word this in a non-snarky way, but it's a genuine question:

>Why do you believe that college can teach making subjective decisions?

Lol, most people actually believe that common-sense can be taught to people. I don't.

[mikecoles]

Anti-college is not anti-intellectualism. Quite the opposite. Higher education is no longer about education; it's about profit. Pieces of paper are pointless for anything other than wallpaper. Free-range education through meeting and collaborating with others is more beneficial to expanding your knowledge than handing over money to some college. Save those tens of thousands of dollars and years of your life. Spend that time and money being an apprentice, creating your own curriculum, or taking specific training.

[BossingAround]

> Anti-college is not anti-intellectualism. Quite the opposite. Higher education is no longer about education; it's about profit.

In the US, maybe. Do people take ridiculous loans for their degree outside of US? Some loans, sure, but loans that amount to 5-10x their future yearly income? I don't know...

[Junk_Collector]

While there are some truly staggering examples of US college loan debt, the average loan debt at the end of a 4 year degree in the US is $26k or about the price of a new mid range car. For the majority of people, their total college loan debt is below a single year of their first year annual income out of college and certainly not 5-10x.

[1]http://www.collegescholarships.org/loans/average-debt.htm

[Melting_Harps]

> In the US, maybe. Do people take ridiculous loans for their degree outside of US? Some loans, sure, but loans that amount to 5-10x their future yearly income? I don't know...

Yes. In the UK. I had a relationship with someone who specifically learned German in school, and went to Germany to tutor in a cross-education outreach program after she graduated to go scout for Universities she wanted to attend in order to avoid having to take out massive loans like her siblings did back home. Very smart girl.

She and I enrolled into online classes, I had already complete my Bsc but wanted to do this with her; but she felt she was missing on the 'campus life' part of the University experience and went into Pedagogy to the Masters level and now teaches back in the UK.

In a post Brexit World, that is just not possible.

The EU is still pretty favourable in terms of University costs being hidden and obfuscated via VAT for the students, but many Industries within it's local economy (PIIGS, Romania, Hungary, Slovenia in the Eurozone, and just about most of the periphery member nations) cannot provide adequate jobs let alone a career to its graduates within their sectors so they have to go to Germany, UK, Holland and as things have gotten worse France to a much lesser degree than when I was there.

The ideal being landing a job in the US or China where they can make obscene amounts of money in certain fields like Tech or Medicine with little to no debt, and subsidized advance degrees. Which still opens it up to the work visa lottery, and uprooting your life during some the most critical years of your entire Life (late 20s to early 30s) in the hopes it pans out.

The best thing that can happen is to disrupt it entirely and level the playing field and re-structure it in such a way that its both affordable and accessible to all motivated to want to go in and meet its requirements. And incentivize them to stay in their home towns a build a solid community and tie it to the needs of its actual needed labor force: hopefully doing away with the notion of studying Civil Engineering for Oil Rig drilling if you're from Iceland kind of thing. As it makes no sense, and doesn't reflect the value system or the job prospects of your community let alone the job prospects of a Nation that is entirely dependent on renewable geo-thermal.

How exactly the Lab portion of STEM gets solved is still a mystery.

I propose the building auxiliary wet-labs in Libraries within their communities. The net benefit here being that students should be required to teach children and adults of their community the topic or subject they are studying as a graded portion of their grade for the privilege of having such a model and build community in the process. Or perhaps that should be the only real on-campus (at both Universities and Community Colleges) component to what is an otherwise entirely Online system?

Just look at this example, which having to attend my midterm and practicals during one of the largest fires in San Diego History (I was literately trapped in my car on my way back home to OC for 7 hours after they closed campus when we were sitting down for the exam as the classroom filled with smoke) and during my finals during the H1N1 swine flu pandemic, I can understand this from both sides:

https://ktla.com/news/local-news/ucla-professor-suspended-af...

That hot button issue could be entirely mitigated, whether you're pro or against the BLM protests is irrelevant. On just a practical and logistical matter you could just overcome this with the current technology that we have and avoid the certain backlash to the professor, department because of it from the irate student body and opportunistic Media.

I saw a rant from a UCLA professor pretty much lining out how he, and his entire profession have not seen a single decrease in pay since he left University in the late 80s as a TA and saw how the CSU/UC extortion system was being assembled in what was once the envy of the entire US' university system--which followed the EU's model pretty well, and was low to no cost if you were local, but had the ability to employ its graduates as the California Economy could support it. Which was a net benefit that significantly contributed to CA becoming the 8th largest economy in the World.

I can't seem to find it and really wish I had saved it as the very employees in the system are to the point where they know it went too far. And are perhaps even afraid of what may happen at what an angry mob can do these days.

[quacked]

I agree with you, but the primary issue is signalling via degrees. For the elite non-college educated who already have a working portfolio of projects to reference, landing a "white-collar" job may be a possibility. For the rest of them, a non-degree holder, even if objectively competitive with a degree-holder, will be immediately discounted by a hiring manager who's looking at 250 resumes.

[SuoDuanDao]

Productive disagreement? I think to begin, we need to vet people we might have disagreements with. I don't think productive dialogue can be commodditized. Maybe it can after the fact via podcasts etc, but dialogues themselves are, I think, inherently analogue and highly personal. I think, given the realities of the attention economy, that we need to be much more selective about whom we let in to a conversation that might change our own mind. And this needs to be on a case-by-case basis, with everyone setting and updating their own standards on whom they'll let into dialogue.

I think people like the one you're responding to would agree and increasingly think that association with institutions of higher learning send a strong signal to avoid dialogue. It doesn't necessarily look like anti-intellectualism to me, any more than filtering out people who didn't graduate high school is necessarily elitism. I could see myself rationalizing either, depending on the kind of conversation I wanted to have.

[dart600]

Could you please define anti intellectualism by your standards? To me, anti intellectual notions would be just if the initial intentions of a discussion were based on a very rich topic and were dissolved in some manner. I beg a brief and graceful peer review for the poor submissions that likely seek solace in the isolation of a virus infected planet.

And at end. In my intention to post, I was solely being altruistic, informing whomever reading that if they were to read this article and consider getting a degree from U of the P that they should consider the risk. Just a gesture. However, I think my writing style might have been misunderstood as some semblance of pseudo intellectual attempt or such. Do know, for the record,that as the 1st to reply to the post, my intention was to inform.

But I am intrigued and inspired. How about we both try to post an article that invites our versions of intellectualism! Ready set go.

[zo1]

>"How do we have productive disagreements going forward?"

We are barely having any of those right now in the greater society. As long as we can't argue facts, objective-reality and do so without feelings, we'll continue descending into anarchy and divisiveness.

[tripzilch]

US is "the greater society" now??

[zo1]

I'm not from or residing in the US. My comment was aimed as commentary on what I can see happening globally.

[kerkeslager]

Your post lacks nuance.

Some news is fake, some isn't.

Some science is fake, some isn't.

Schools are barriers, but for many elements of a school, the fact that it's a barrier is a good thing--we don't want ignorant people performing in roles that where knowledge is required. The problem is that many elements of schools are barriers which are poor at achieving their purpose, or are directly counterproductive to their purpose.

> How do we have productive disagreements going forward?

That's a complicated question, but oversimplifying the opinions of people we disagree with and then labeling it ("cynical anti-intellectualism") isn't the answer.

[antepodius]

Or: Objective reality might exist, but it's not necessarily present in the universities, which are mostly there as an IQ test by proxy with a filter for the most lazy, with some social indoctrination thrown in. Any science or truth exists only at the whims of the social order of the day.

[zarathustreal]

>Any science or truth exists only at the whims of the social order of the day.

This is not objectively true but I understand what you're trying to say. I'm sad to hear that your experience of science and truth has been only that which society has given you, or at the least that you feel that others are only experiencing it in that way

[antepodius]

Sorry, I should have worded that more clearly: Only that science or truth that is doesn't contravene the current social order is allowed air, allowed to be talked about without reprisal and shunning. The degree to which this is true is a canary for how totalitarian and neurotic your micro-society is. The micro-society of universities generally seems to be becoming more, rather than less, rabid and paranoid.

A lot of it is like Bostrom's idea of the decentralized electroshock dystopia: even though a significant proportion of people are witches, everyone's afraid of reprisal for not actively hunting witches, so the witches-in-hiding hunt their own when they're unmasked.

But this is the way of things; this wave will pass, eventually, as well. And like the soviet scientists who kept their heads down and mouthed the party line, the secret iconoclasts will survive till the current order is replaced by the next, with its own peculiar tabboos.

[zepto]

This is a crucial argument. Do you have a link to something that supports your statement that “this is not objectively true”? I think it would help a lot in these debates.

[AnimalMuppet]

But if you can't do the middle-class job because you can't write, the piece of paper will only get you so far. It may get you an entry-level job, but you probably won't get much in the way of promotions. So even from that perspective, plagiarism isn't helpful.

[BeetleB]

> But if you can't do the middle-class job because you can't write, the piece of paper will only get you so far. It may get you an entry-level job, but you probably won't get much in the way of promotions. So even from that perspective, plagiarism isn't helpful.

Where do these mythical jobs exist where being able to write well is a requirement for career growth? Certainly not at engineering companies.

I wish what you said were true, but in my experience, "being able to write and communicate well is critical in the workplace" is one of the top lies taught to me when I was at university. We had to take a regular writing class, and a technical writing class to graduate with an engineering degree. And when I get to industry, I see no signs of people practicing what they're taught, and it doesn't hold anyone back.

Edit: I should say my experience is more about writing than communicating as a whole. People do need to be good speakers/presenters. But writing? Not really.

[brobdingnagians]

Yes, writing is important. I have coworkers who struggle at writing, and it takes mental overhead to try to understand them. It hurts their ability to communicate clearly, think clearly, and to be taken seriously. I have clients who struggle to write well; I was just barely looking at a legally binding document that is incomprehensible in places and would have serious repercussions on those using it. That is bad. Society is better when we are truly educated to think and to communicate. We can be enriched by each other when we understand each other. Writing coherently helps us think coherently. That improves our lives more than a degree certificate ever will.

[azinman2]

Writing and communication skills are absolutely necessary for career growth. The power of persuasion is directly linked to the ability to communicate your ideas well.

[usrusr]

Careers can be grown in many ways. In terms of career advancement, good writing will be outperformed by ruthless opportunism nine out of ten times. Cheating in education is identifying a metric and optimizing for that instead of the quality themetric is intended to measure and that strategy won't stop being effective upon getting a degree. Implication: no, "they are only hurting themselves" isn't a valid excuse.

[BeetleB]

> Writing and communication skills are absolutely necessary for career growth. The power of persuasion is directly linked to the ability to communicate your ideas well.

I've updated my original comment to reflect that I was referring to writing and not general communications in general (although I wrote it more broadly).

I've seen people really value presentation skills and PPT. Persuasion on 1:1 and via presentations is definitely valued.

But via writing? No. They're atrocious when writing emails. And they rarely write docs/briefs. If they do the latter, it's really meant to be a teaser to get someone interested, and then that person will go talk 1:1 to get the details or ask for a presentation.

My experience at work: Writing anything longer than 1-2 pages is a good way to ensure no one will read it. And again, if I have a good enough "lead", what will happen is the senior person will read the lead, stop reading, and schedule something to talk to me in person so he can understand in detail. At some level, I understand why he would do that - it can be an interactive conversation where he can interrupt, ask for clarification, etc. Whereas if he read the thing, he would have to write up a response, or even worse, make notes to ask me the next time he sees me.

I almost never get anything as well written as a typical HN comment. Even (internal) documentation/manuals/Wikis are poorly written.

[jimmaswell]

> "being able to write and communicate well is critical in the workplace" is one of the top lies taught to me when I was at university

Definitely. Communication full of casual txtspeak and/or broken English all over. I suspected my first job's recruitment emails to possibly be some kind of scam at first because they were made in 3 different fonts in the same email with random words capitalized or colored various colors for emphasis, of course full of broken English - and I'm not talking about just terms like "do the needful" which are valid Indian English, that's fine, but even evaluating as that language so much of the communication is just terrible and nobody seems to care. I guess it works out fine and ultimately doesn't matter much but it still feels unprofessional.

[chrisweekly]

I strongly disagree.

Communication skills -- especially in writing -- are increasingly important, rare, and valuable.

I've been doing software-related work for a living since 1998. The trend toward remote and async collab -- which has only ever increased in that 22-year span -- strengthens my conviction.

[jonfw]

You are seriously limited in your ability to move past being an individual contributor if you aren't able to write well. Especially in this industry where remote work, even across time zones, is so common.

I see some really brilliant problem solvers in my company, for instance, that are definitely being held back by their inability to communicate well. Communication allows you to scale your impact several times over.

[nopinsight]

Which field(s) of engineering do you talk about? What are the highest level(s) of promotion the persons who don't write well reach and continue to work in?

I would think that writing well is at least a requirement for promotion into a technical leadership role (above senior individual contributors).

By writing well, I don't mean in the style of journalists or novelists. Rather, writing clearly and concisely to effectively convey one's points and reasoning should be very valuable in engineering.

[BeetleB]

> Which field(s) of engineering do you talk about? What are the highest level(s) of promotion the persons who don't write well reach and continue to work in?

Electrical, computer, and SW.

I'm not saying communicating well is not needed. I'm saying writing well is not needed. What I've seen: A good presentation (including PPT skills) is much more valued than writing. Decisions are usually made because of them, not because someone wrote a good brief outlining positives/negatives. Emails longer than a few lines tend not to be read, so people don't focus on it. Documents are usually not read by many except those beneath them, etc. I almost never see a senior management write anything of substance unless it is required by Legal/HR - they'll always get an underling to write them (and no, writing them is not how underlings become senior management).

I'm not saying I like the state of affairs, but it is how I've seen it.

[jimmaswell]

I've gotten lots of emails from bosses and bosses' bosses like "i semt the file,pls confirm." Few seem to care about writing well in the workplace. With psychological things like how talking like someone makes them like you more, I wouldn't be surprised if "proper" writing was a hinderance to career advancement in such a scenario.

[TedDoesntTalk]

I can only believe you are trolling.

[jerry1979]

You write well. Maybe you have a blind spot because of that.

[brooklyn_ashey]

Wait...does anybody care about writing skills anymore? ——outside—or even inside—journalism? I wish they did. Writing seems to be treated like a 20th century skill of the uber-affluent layabout these days. I jump for joy when I stumble upon some great writing on the internet.

[bitexploder]

Yes. Try consulting. Information security consulting to be precise our work product is a written report. We have to communicate nuanced and complex topics to a variety of audiences. Writing well, even technical writing, is hard and it’s not as obvious as code when it is not quite right. We care deeply about it. Writing clean proposals, white papers, blog posts etc. It all matters to us. Sure your average coding job doesn’t require it, but plenty of work does. And I do believe having communication skills at a high level in a written form is a competitive advantage. It’s hard to see, but in the long run people who can eloquently write their ideas have an advantage on the less articulate.

[glenstein]

The number of people in this thread breezily dismissing the value of effective writing is taking my breath away. I don't think these confident declarations we're getting in this thread paint a remotely accurate portrayal of skills that actually help career advancement. I think everyone's kind of playing a game where it's treated as a trick question and they're looking to emphasize the exceptions as much as possible.

Any sort of work, in say, nonprofits, or public relations, or marketing, or consulting, or any institution where you're at a level of management where your job is to present plans and preside over their progress while being accountable to oversight, and these are examples of the top of my head where I have at least some sort of familiarity, are places where strong writing is an asset. And I'm sure I'm just pointing to a small slice that I know from my own experience. These aren't special exceptions. These are the norm. The counterexamples make me wonder what, if any, actual career experience people are actually drawing from to claim otherwise, or whether they have the perspective to understand how representative those counter-examples actually are.

[renewiltord]

To be honest, I arrived at university fully capable of my first job out. I think most people do. The selection process has you write essays and do math and all that shit.

Work is hard, but like most things you learn best doing the thing. Not saying SICP was shit. Just that I could have done that in high school and accelerated my time to money (and through it, contentment).

Maybe I'll let my kids do something like that if they feel the mildest desire to.

[derwiki]

Kudos to you— having started coding QBasic in fifth grade, I definitely needed 3-4 years of undergrad to be ready for my first professional SWE job.

[renewiltord]

That's really funny. We first did Logo and then BASIC at that age (~10 years). Good times, eh? Back in the day? Everything was new and fresh.

[bryanrasmussen]

If you have the skills to get the degree with 8 hours of work per day or to get the degree with 2 hours of work per day, getting the degree with the 2 hours of work does not mean you will not be able to do the job which will require you to do the 8 hours of work when you graduate.

[WJW]

There seems to be a sizable group where any job (especially an entry-level middle class job with the associated health insurance benefits and salary) would be a massive step up in income and social status. Cheating on a test to escape a life of poverty in the slums is not much of a dilemma IMO.

[imtringued]

It's actually the opposite. First generation migrants try their best because they know what happens if they fail. Cheating is easier if you can bribe authorities.

[Broken_Hippo]

Most of the jobs don't require you to be able to write well at all - especially not university level writing. Really, all most folks need is the ability to communicate effectively in person or over email. You might - just might - be required to write a letter. Of course, these skills are ones that a store manager at any random retail or dining establishment needs too, and some of these 'middle class' jobs require nothing much at all (if it is a factory that pays well enough).

Besides, plagiarism isn't really about writing. You can lump it into two categories: Cheating, which isn't most folks' intention, and more importantly, giving someone credit for an idea. This last one is something folks need to do in some professions. Don't take an employee's idea and call it your own, same for something your boss has you pass along. Don't pretend something is your own idea when it was implemented at a job you had years ago. This version of plagiarism is vastly more important than writing skills (which can be taught without needing to address plagiarism).

[tripzilch]

> This is under the assumption that you see college is a program of self-betterment and not busy work for receiving a degree that says you can have a middle-class job.

That's not really up for discussion though.

The degree itself will become utterly meaningless extremely quickly if we would actually generally accept that kind of reasoning.

The whole reason the degree is worth something is because it's perceived as a token of you having done the work and self-betterment etc.

It's not an empty token that allows you to have a middle class job. In practice it might be, but as soon as you openly accept that is just what it is, and only what it is, then you only get cheaters.

[nine_k]

To have a middle-class job, you need knowledge, not a degree. (Disclaimer: my son does not have a degree but has a pretty demanding middle-class engineering job.)

If you spend time in a university to just get a diploma and maybe some connections, you likely are wasting your time and significant money (remember, a student loan cannot be got rid of by a bankruptcy).

[leereeves]

Even if you only care about obtaining the degree, rampant plagarism also diminishes the value of that degree.

[a-nikolaev]

I think, plagiarism also harms the character. If instead of doing things right and put effort, you cheat, eventually you learn that doing things right does not worth it. And then it becomes a personal trait, so to speak.

[Melting_Harps]

> I think, plagiarism also harms the character. If instead of doing things right and put effort, you cheat, eventually you learn that doing things right does not worth it. And then it becomes a personal trait, so to speak.

Welcome to the underlying systemic problem with some of Society's more critical institutions.

Fraud and corruption have become institutionalized, and lying and cheating are just the name of the game.

Explain to me how Banks got away with what they have if not fir this very root issue; blow up the economy because of reckless, risky investments: Bonus, bailouts, and golden parachutes for all.

Default on your student loans, utility bill or car payment? We'll ruin your credit for all of your miserable existence, while you slave away anyway because the former cannot be expunged.

I'm so glad I borrowed from family and friends instead of banks or the State. It was hard paying them back, but if I had to choose a creditor of last resort I think I made the right choice.

[VLM]

Not necessarily hurt you, but doesn't help as much as it could.

From talking to people further along the plagiarism spectrum than myself, they see it as developing good taste or almost coaching.

Yeah yeah in a writing class its hard to justify not learning to write. But in any other class...

Lets hypothetically say we're in a computer science class and our assignment is to write an essay on the supremacy of the C++ language. There's all these English department goals of becoming a better writer that would be met by my pitiful attempt to glorify polymorphism. But the C++ goal of learning to be a better C++ programmer would be best met by extensive reading and research to find the best Stroustrup quote. If I were involved in the academic scene of converting papers into salary via cooperation with other researchers, I need to quote my coworkers accurately to share the revenue appropriately. However what if I don't have the goal of playing that game? In a learning environment in casual verbal conversation I might tell my C++ instructor that C++ main() returns an int. Yet if I write that down as I just did, I'm committing the academic sin of plagiarism by not properly footnoting Stroustrup, that's a direct quote from him. But I'm not trying to play the academic game, I'm trying to learn to program, and develop good taste by copying the right people. It seems a little unfair to grade students based on playing a different game than they signed up for. Even if the institutional goal is to produce little academics, in practice almost none of the kids will become academics.

That's a very authoritarian example of copying a guy at the top; but it also applies to lower level copying.

They're not necessarily wrong or self destructive, just kids on a different path with different priorities.

[cutemonster]

I was going to write sth similar -- that if a writing assignment seems pointless from a student's point of view, and s/he thinks the study time is better spent in other ways, maybe coding a software program instead,

Then to some extent I could sympathize with those who plagiarize. ... If it's to save time for something more on topic they think.

But if it's a writing class, then, no! Or writing about history or society etc

[themodelplumber]

> Power struggle between teachers and students via...

Uh, did I say that, or were you intuiting? Not exactly a learner's approach :D

> Plagiarizing some work doesn't really hurt the work, it hurts you.

Except when it benefits you? This is the subjective perception I was talking about. That their mindset differs does not instantly make them wrong, especially when you can throw a dime out the window and hit an educated professional who falls short of the best (heaven forbid the "perfect") ethical standard.

Ethics is, and should be, hard. If you put words into my mouth, is your position ethical? This stuff requires the ability to stick around, listen, learn, and stay in the game, moreso if you plan to claim the high ground.

[infogulch]

This isn't a subjective ethics problem. It's a competence problem. If you can't formulate your own thoughts into a coherent statement (the purpose of learning to write) then you'll be useless to anyone that needs new coherent arguments.

[themodelplumber]

That's a bit of an overreach, isn't it, calling my writing incoherent and incompetent? (Edit: Parent clarified that "you" is meant to mean a hypothetical student, not me.) If more information is needed, as was the case here, we can ask questions. That's got nothing to do with author competence. It's not an essay contest. And why assume we know it all, filling in the gaps like that? In a discussion of ethics, this is a qualitative issue to say the least.

The concept of competence as you describe it is also very much a vague, subjective concern out of which you've just attempted to carve a covert competence contract. This leaves your blind spot unguarded because you are unknowingly making the discussion focus on you and your own competence level.

And this is a big part of why "hyper ethical" subjective ethics people struggle--they assume their view is right and don't ask questions of others.

[infogulch]

I haven't said anything about your writing at all. Maybe it wasn't clear enough that I meant "you" as in "someone" or "one". I'm sorry it was possible to misunderstand my general statement as a personal attack.

This doesn't have to do with me either -- the market will determine whether any one person is valuable enough to employ (or promote). My only claims are that being able to write makes one more valuable, and that plagiarizing assignments at school fails to teach one to write.

[themodelplumber]

Ah, I see what you mean, that it was not meant to refer to my level of competence. :) I did indeed read the "you" wrong. Thank you for the clarification.

[jariel]

His statement was very matter of fact.

If students don't bother to do the work, they won't develop any competence in the discipline.

It would be like sending someone for Scala training, only to have them skip all of the work, buy the answers to the quiz, get the accreditation.

University is about much more than 'skill acquisition' but there is a lot of that. Cheating is almost universally pointless.

[zepto]

‘Cheating is almost universally pointless’

Except that it clearly isn’t. There are all kinds of people in positions of power who are clearly incompetent in many of the skills we would want them to be expert in.

Often cheating enabled them to pass the gatekeepers and attain their position.

[themodelplumber]

(Edit: Thanks for the clarification on the other comment--I had read the "you" wrong)

Sure, that example absolutely works. One reason why you wouldn't cheat is that you know that a specific outcome you want requires something of you that you must learn. I found it striking just how rare this was, though. We can fault students for not having made up their minds, but I found that many of them are just really open to new directions, and this can help to enable part of the plagiarism equation, but it's also something of a gift...

Anyway, talking to my students I discovered that the discipline is really often completely up in the air. So while the rhetorical / imaginary student's path for the purposes of argument might be be "study math -> work in applied math," quite often it's "study phil -> work in I don't know what" or similar.

The students who plagiarize with this mindset are really quite something. It's nuanced--they're smart about it, leaving no final question on which points against them can rest. For example, the student submits a first prospective paper in which they quote-paste for pages on end and then plagiarize not by direct-copy, but by reading and then re-hashing someone else's conclusion from a book or another paper, and they get a C+. Well, if a B- is all they need in the class, they are good to go. Then they take a reactive / tactical stance and only change this approach in the future if they absolutely have to.

This pattern happens over and over. If you attempt to pin the student down on qualitative issues, they have a number of tools to use here. You have to be ready for extreme negotiation. They _may not be able_ to learn about quality, ethics, etc. Shocking sometimes but it's a struggle for many. One of the most common negotiation techniques is, "I just...I don't understand. I'm really not that smart" and then they start crying or leave the room in a rage. This can instantly shut down a professor with average or greater levels of sympathy. The student converted the negotiating professor's original value proposition into a risky interpersonal issue. If further negotiations occur, they will find ways to illustrate why things are unfair to them. What is the prof going to do about that? Do they even have time for it at all?

Then you can go back to students who are in the "study math -> work in applied math" group. You look outside of the math classes and you can see the same pattern. They know wasted effort when they see it, or think they do. And again--some, not all. Savvy employers also weed out some of these people but then other employers hire them because they desire tactical cleverness in their organization, and they recognize it when they see it. Maybe it's how they got the boss job in the first place.

[austincheney]

It’s not an overreach. The competence is a product of originality and independence.

> And this is a big part of why "hyper ethical" subjective ethics people struggle--they assume their view is right and don't ask questions of others.

That is itself quite the assumption.

[themodelplumber]

Not an assumption at all. That's from my subjective past experience, from having conducted qualitative research experiences in this area as I interviewed and taught students. I shared that experience in my original reply and would love for anyone else to do the same, referring us to their past experiences even anecdotally, rather than forecasting woe via subjective intuition.

[renewiltord]

> Uh, did I say that, or were you intuiting?

What is it with this everywhere on HN these days where people assume every response someone makes is a refutation? It's a conversation, dude. People will take it places. Sometimes people will build on ideas you mention. Other times people will take an incident and draw their own conclusions. Other times people will draw on a similar incident or talk about a related concept.

I'll accept my off-topic downvotes since that is fair but this is so frustrating.

[themodelplumber]

Hmm, I think it's only fair that we zoom in a bit from "everyone on HN complaints" to the details in question. Otherwise it makes it appear that you want to avoid discussing details in question which directly flow into the qualitative nature of this discussion.

I just re-read what you wrote. If you're saying your response was not a refutation, given that you wrote "is not best characterized as," I think it's pretty clear as to why that could be misunderstood, to say the least. It seems clear to me that you were replying in direct disagreement and also projecting words I never said right into your reasoning. And further, it now seems as if you're claiming that I'm being assumptive. This is just compounding, not helping.

I think specifics are important here because it's unfortunately common for people to attempt to sweep pesky details under their subjective-ethical rug in the name of [hand wave]. Since this is an ethics discussion some due concern to communicating ethically seems reasonable to expect. If that's frustrating, maybe you can at least see the frustration on both sides.

[andrewxdiamond]

I wonder if a similar principle is at play when people throw links at each other in place of a debate

[StupidPeople]

> Plagiarizing some work doesn't really hurt the work, it hurts you

Except learning isn't really the reason most go. It's to get a well paid job at the end of it.

[andykx]

I returned to college after 10 years in the insurance industry. I’ve always viewed programming as a hobby, but decided to take the leap and pursue a career that I might actually enjoy.

Anyway, I notice a lot of younger students have this attitude and it frankly causes them to produce really crappy work. As long as they pass the class, they don’t really care to absorb the material.

I can’t help but wonder what kind of job they’re hoping to get when they leave school. What will happen when they get a technical interview? I can’t imagine them doing anything beyond answering phones at a company’s IT Help Desk.

I dunno. I listen to every word the professors say as if they’re telling me the secret to eternal life while half the class is dozing off.

[freeone3000]

The one class I took in college that was relevant to my job, at all, was the AI course on structured vector machines, which were irrelevant after two years. For most programs, correctness is a nice-to-have, forget speed or responsiveness or data structure choice.. and in production code, non-technical and constant factors override theoretical solutions. University computer science courses, on the whole, are quickly obsolete or obsolete to begin with, incompatible with software development as it's practiced, and are best reviewed in the week before seeking a new job to score well on leetcode. The best skills you're going to learn are the metacognition you're picking up in university, the ability to learn new languages and adapt to new environments and solve new problems, not anything that's actually taught.

[AnIdiotOnTheNet]

> What will happen when they get a technical interview? I can’t imagine them doing anything beyond answering phones at a company’s IT Help Desk.

My experience says you'd be very surprised. As in most fields, networking, charisma, and ability to bullshit play a substantial role in IT hiring.

[TedDoesntTalk]

> I listen to every word the professors say as if they’re telling me the secret to eternal life while half the class is dozing off.

This is absolutely brilliant.

[austincheney]

As a software developer my education has nothing to do with a job or my salary.

[tripzilch]

> > Plagiarizing some work doesn't really hurt the work, it hurts you

> Except learning isn't really the reason most go. It's to get a well paid job at the end of it.

There's no contradiction here.

[throwgeorge]

>Plagiarizing some work doesn't really hurt the work, it hurts you.

and a job well done is its own reward right? i think it's very pretentious to say that to a person who's attending school in order to improve their lot in life (because credentials count for so much); that what's more important than the credential is some abstract notion of improvement. you might as well cast it in terms of sin and salvation.

[coffeecat]

But isn't this abstract notion of improvement supposed to be the entire point of education? It feels to me like education's purpose is undermined by its role as a prerequisite for a middle-class career. "When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure."

[themodelplumber]

Abstract or not, it's completely qualitative / subjective. Easy to argue. Very easy. Try it: Pick a specific, abstract notion, name the institution, and talk to the students.

[infogulch]

> and a job well done is its own reward right?

Sure, if the life you want is to be at a desk for 8 hours a day regurgitating your superior's existing biases back at them, go ahead. I find employers much prefer someone that can attack a real problem and think critically about potential solutions from multiple levels of analysis. If all you're good at is chewing someone else's cud and spitting it out with a slightly different word order then you're useless to people that actually want to solve problems.

And, sorry to say, credentials are counting for less and less every year. If employers have to take a year to train you to think critically, then what use does a credential serve as a filter? I wonder why that's happening...

[HenryBemis]

(for work) I have both "plaigiarised" a policy that I found on the internet, AND written one using as source the ToC of 2-3 other policies, but did the fill-ups all by myself. I learned nothing from copy&paste, I gained plenty from typing it up from scratch myself (even added points that the ToC's were missing).

The clients got the same value (they wanted a v1 policy, and they got one). I became better by doing the work, so next time I had a discussion on the matter I felt that I controlled the discussion instead of pitching in.

Faking it till you make it has the risk that you fake it forever and you become the paradigm of the Peter Principle.

Walking the walk takes more time but always benefits in the long run.

I have met plenty of people though that take the risk to never grow/evolve and stay in their comfort zone because they just want the base salary to fund their hobbies and they get no sense of accomplishment through their work (for many reasons)(I am not getting into this discussion).

Edit: Ps: I now work like this (when asked to develop a policy for a new client): spend some time thinking of key points (technology changes fast enough in some areas), drop a couple of examples for each bullet point, and then "plagiarise" from previously made work. This way I have prepared part of the downstream Procedures. You would think that a Policy is high (enough) level so it shouldn't need frequent changes, but different clients want different things.

[tripzilch]

> a person who's attending school in order to improve their lot in life (because credentials count for so much)

If every person at the school had this reasoning, the credentials wouldn't count for anything.

The credentials only count for something if enough of the people graduating are actually fulfilling this promise of self improvement in the subject of their studies.

The cheaters are literally freeloading off the prestige of the credentials produced by the people who do put in the effort. If that group of people did not exist, the credentials would be useless to the cheaters as well.

[airstrike]

> in order to improve their lot in life (because credentials count for so much);

Those credentials only matter insofar as they describe the likely caliber of the alumni that come from that particular school. Being a terrible student isn't going to help the value of your degree a whole lot...

[xelxebar]

> Plagiarizing some work doesn't really hurt the work, it hurts you.

Funny enough, this idea is almost certainly one you are plagairising. Perhaps you could find nuance, depth, and understanding by turning those words on themself?

Somehow I feel like most of the debate here centers on these words:

> The purpose of <foo> is <bar>.

That little word "the" there at the beginning seems a bit myopic to me. I mean, clearly, something like writing functions in more ways than one. Here are some other potential purposes of writing, off the top of my head:

* Deconstruct your personal ontology,

* Intrinsic artistic value,

* Emotional expression,

* Elucidation of unconscious grammatical habits,

* Social signaling.

Any of those are perfectly functional operations of the writing act, and a few of them actually benefit by plagiarising (Identifying these is left as an exercise for the reader). Of course, saying that "university should allow students to operate under any possible goal framework" is a different matter, but hopefully that at least points toward one way of thinking with more nuance about plagiarism.

[noetic_techy]

I've seen this myself, and I think this sort of moral relativism is pretty bad for society in general. You can spin a story of victim hood or power dynamic to justify anything unethical. What should be a fair transaction becomes a game of who can backstab first and who is left holding the bag. This I think leads to a breakdown in the fabric that keep things stable eventually.

[ThrowawayR2]

The problem is that these people will plagiarize their previous employers' code when working on your codebase and your code when they move on to their next employer or will also plagiarize FOSS code without worrying about the niceties of licensing. Their perceptions are one thing but the legal reality makes these sort of people hazardous to employ.

[themodelplumber]

Except when their boss hired them because they're clever and can solve extant work problems (huge workload) via a happily-localized scope of concern. I've seen this easily placed back on the employer. Non-FOSS versions happen in various industries all the time.

You can make the argument that legal teams exist to relieve the very potent pressure of this uncomfortable situation for those on both ends. There are truths here that flow right up to the top and all the way to the bottom. Attacking those perspectives is too hard. Better in some ways to set up social norms around it. Thus, lawyers, the concept of win-win negotiation, etc. Just when your anger is boiling over you learn that the C-levels want you to drop the moral crusade.

[jariel]

This is a thoughtful comment, at the same time, it's some pretty scary postmodernism.

Advocating cheating because it helps a student from possibly lesser means achieve their 'check-box' in education is missing the point, in a very serious way.

We can always strive to have an open mind, to try and be sympathetic to the plight of others - but the Truth is pretty much still the Truth.

Plagiarism is not a controversial subject in the context you've mentioned, it's just wrong in every sense.

More pragmatically - if someone is in a situation wherein their need for the 'checkbox degree' outweighs their actual need to learn something, then they almost assuredly should not be there. It's pointless for society to be spending a lot of energy and resources only for people to waste them, and it ruins the credibility of the system. I'm not unaware of the fact that a lot of Uni may feel like jumping through hoops, but even then, if the hoops are merely jumped through, we're learning something. Uni is not meant to be enlightening at every step, it's also, like everything a grind.

A 'free public Uni' is going to attract a wide swath of students, and there will necessarily be all sorts of issues, probably very low graduation rates, challenges in communicating the material. I totally support the idea, at the same time, we should strive to maintain the credibility of our own ideals and institutions. Universities are there to help develop character, they're not just about 'absorbing data'. In the long run, it's worth it.

[throwawaygh]

The "checkbox degree" hypothesis is mostly false. Some companies do require a degrees, yes. But that's a minimum requirement. Literally zero companies promise a job to everyone with a degree.

It's a bit difficult for me to believe that there are highly competent people who would be effective employees now, but for whom cheating is easier than doing the work. Remember: cheating (without getting caught) takes time too.

I can write a few page essay on any given topic much faster than I can figure out how to copy/pasta that essay without getting caught.

I can implement most undergraduate programming assignments faster than I can figure out how obfuscate someone else's code enough to fool cheat detectors.

Etc.

The subset of people who are truly competent but for whom cheating is easier than doing the work has to be vanishingly small.

[bonoboTP]

It depends, like many things, this is very nuanced.

In my time at university, I knew many capable and bright people who cheated once in a while, but only in well-picked cases, not as their general policy. For example if there was a mandatory bullshit subject, or something that they regarded as worthless waste of time etc. and rather spent the time on the important things.

I think it's a very naive shielded "good boy" view of the world that there is some simple rigid moral rule like never lie, never cheat etc. It may work in a benevolent environment like rich protective parents and never dealing with adversity. One has to develop one's own sense of justice.

This can be easily misconstrued. The point isn't to believe in nothing, be exploitative and selfish. Rather, be mindful and don't just blindly follow someone's bullshit. Indeed much of the purpose of education is to kill this ability and to certify the capability for blind obedience and jumping through hoops without ever questioning it.

One guy I mentioned in the above parts is actually really honest in general and sometimes I wonder how he gets away with it in corporate environments, saying straight nos, not putting up with colleagues criticizing him for working too fast etc. I've usually been much more careful but he's more successful. And it's an art of picking your battles, refusing bullshit, sometimes openly sometimes secretly (at least don't lie to yourself), sometimes making a stink, sometimes just complaining to fellow students, knowing the unwritten lore of which courses are unofficially considered "cheats allowed" by most talented students and probably the teacher included.

The world is complicated, but for shielded kids with underdeveloped social skills it can be hard to learn how widespread "rule bending" is in real adult life and how much this is basically known, expected and part of life.

Again, this is not to say be selfish and disregard others. Rather, think for yourself, know when something is bullshit (there is lots of fancy official institutional stamped-and-signed authoritative bullshit out there, often coming from people who know it's bullshit but either don't care of feel their hands are tied).

[SupplyChainGuy]

I agree. I'm a CS major and am forced to take a class on history. The class is entirely online and the teacher doesn't seem to really care one bit. The entire class is just random quizzes that can easily be googled/ Just follow along on quizlet.

I have two options; Read the super boring textbook for 5 hours, take the test legit and get an 80% or I quizlett the test get 100% and spend the next 5 hours listening to Dan Carlins "Hardcore History" Podcast which i find much more informative and enjoyable.

[bonoboTP]

I had similar cases with "business" and "management" courses in my computer engineering degree. While understanding business thinking is definitely an important part of being a computer engineer, these courses were utter bullshit and everyone knew it. So everyone I knew cheated, it was an open secret.

But the university wanted to boast that they are modern and prepare students for business stuff: look, we even require business-related courses in our program! But actually it was some nonsense like memorize various lists, like the 5 different aspects of whatever, some pseudo-mathy formulas, etc. I mean, if you take me that seriously to give me this type of nonsense as "learning material" then I will take you precisely as seriously when it comes to the exam.

[javert]

> Can you justify it in seconds, with something that's not simply a subjective perception or largely-covert moral construct of your own

You are making this way too complicated.

It's honesty vs. dishonesty.

Those of us playing on team honesty are right to view the dishonest as playing on the opposite team.

Which team is actually morally right, is the complex issue.

[BeetleB]

> You are making this way too complicated.

> It's honesty vs. dishonesty.

Kind of like you're either a criminal or you're not. If you drive 58mph on a 55mph zone you are. Otherwise you're not.

Binary positions are always convenient, once you pick a side.

[sooheon]

This is a great meta level view of the moral perception landscape, the individual replies advocating for one particular prescriptive position or the other are missing the forest for the trees.

[tripzilch]

> Since then I've been exposed to additional perspectives on plagiarism. It is an extremely deep and nuanced topic.

There are deep and nuanced ways in which people tell themselves and others how ethical they think they are taking credit for other people's work.

It's not really something that is up for discussion whether it's bad. The rules are pretty clear, and for serious higher education the punishments are extremely harsh. And deservedly so.

What does it even matter what it says on your diploma if you cheated your way to getting it?

These people might pat themselves on the chest for being oh so clever in subverting the system or whatever, but what does it really mean? That you're good at cheating, unwilling to do the work, and gladly take credit for other people's work. In other words, being a useless turd.

You could have been studying astronomy, physics, math ... but instead all that you really proved is that you're good at cheating.

[cosmodisk]

People are extremely good at justifying their own actions in any shape and form. Reminds me ex's mother,who was a hard core church goer and was undeclaring profits from her company. When asked why would she do such thing,her excuse was that the taxes are way too high( the country was within top 20 countries in the world when it comes to taxes). Another thing is that usually these things don't happen all at once but rather gradually. The same is observable in companies,where corruption start from tiny things and evolve over time.

[TallGuyShort]

... the Testing Center!? Hey I went there too.

But I don't see how this is more nuanced that being honest or dishonest. I really pride myself on being able to see where a lot of opposing viewpoints are coming from, but I can't see how any of the people you describe are doing much more than lying to themselves about what they're doing.

[wisty]

How is this different to the following?

"Using counterfeit money is arguably OK because some of the people who use it might need it, or see the need to earn a living as a needless waste of time as long as there's idiots who'll accept fake currency".

[SkyBelow]

The issue with counterfeit money is that it devalues the worth of all other money.

But given who holds the majority of the money being devalued, given the extent that money is already being devalued for the benefit of some at the expense of others, and given that the idea of taking a relative to wealth portion from the group for the benefit of the poor is a form of redistribution the group already engages in regardless of the consent of the giver, I think you can easily construct an argument that it is not immoral to use counterfeit money as long as you pick the right targets.

[mrybczyn]

Plagiarism as a means to acquire a university degree devalues the worth of all other degrees...

[wisty]

Plenty of people can construct arguments that breaking the rules are acceptable when they do it.

[christiansakai]

Wait, this is interesting. I thought plagiarism is universally bad? Can someone explain?

[sooheon]

themodelplumber is a perceptive observer of human psychology, and they've described some of the ways people justify cheating with one narrative or the other. This isn't advocating for cheating or plagiarism, just hypothesizing why some brains are happy to do it.

[imtringued]

People have to justify bad things otherwise they wouldn't do them. This is how we get racism, antisemitism and discrimination in general. A lot of taboo activities have an initial moral barrier and once you break it there is nothing stopping you from doing it over and over again.

[gentleman11]

Plagiarism was very widespread in my university. The students doing it were simply not punished

[Melting_Harps]

> At the time, my hyper-religious mind was blown to see students outright cheating in the Testing Center.

Then you would have lost your mind during some of my upper division STEM courses, where the normal class average is in the mid 40% on the high end and high 30s most semesters. We had a class average of ~83% in one of them, and when the professor was in total disbelief about how blatant they were being (several didn't even try not to get 100%) he got upset and decided to stop re-using the previous year's exams that were circulating amongst the Frats/Sororities and the class average dropped back down to low 30% for the last 2 Midterms and finals. This personally helped me as I got my average to a B+ range after my Lab scores were included.

Academia, be it online of IRL, it always going to have that element of corruption, there has just been so much money to be made that it drew the worst from other sectors into its administrations. Eric Weinstein goes into the depth about the artificial scarcity within STEM that was created in the US to favour a 'race to the bottom' approach to wages since the the 90s, and he went to both MIT and Harvard!

My best professors were often disillusioned and jaded after having been in Academia for a few decades, one even having to petition and protest to the Dean of their departments to be paid for having taught back to back Summer courses during the budget cuts. A person who went to Oxford for his BSc, no less...

All of this is taking place while hearing about some high ranking official or executive is in the process of being disgraced for having plagiarized their Masters or PhD thesis decades ago, which begs the question how the hell did it pass back then? Don't they all have to go through dissertations defenses and have academic advisors who are PhD or Post Docs in the very same department?

I won't even talk about the administrative led favoritism and vetting they did for foreign students during my time there, either.

I'm a proponent of of Online Learning in general, especially as its disrupting the Brick and Mortar University exploitation model; you can now get a Masters in Electrical Engineering from CU Boulder entirely via Coursera for $20k with installments and Financial Aid available where applicable, whereas that's not even the total cost of a single year of Undergraduate studies there. Which really sucks for incoming students, but could be a net boon if they can start reaching the undergrad degrees in time now that most Universities are having to do that due to COVID.

I just think its worth keeping in mind that this institution (academia) doesn't deserve to be regarded anything more than the corrupt money-pit that it is, which occasionally avails itself to allow brilliant minds to excel in their field, after having exploited them to publish and use their labs until the can make a name for themselves and operate outside of it. I just think about the wasted Human capital, talent, and drive that you only have when you're young, naive and idealistic and determined to make make a difference in the World.

[sjy]

All universities have pretty serious problems at this point, but we can't write off all of academia as a "corrupt money-pit." It sounds like you are generalising from your own experience at a single institution, and there are a lot of bad universities out there.

[dart600]

This detailed reply is fantastic. I want to paint a narrative in acrylic. (Perhaps just my mood today). It will have a plummer modeling on a catwalk as a moral war rages of cool fashion balconies meet the vision of the dog fights in a proverbial rotation of another fresh coat to the red carpet. See u in the concrete warehouse just short of arms reach, but certainly out of the limelight. Or in. Or out. Or in. Which is real?

You're welcome!