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by lyndonh
4567 days ago
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"Real knowledge is gained from tinkering, trial and error. A degree from a recognized academic institution is largely a social credit that is earned through memorization and the ability to recall and recite those references." I find that quite insulting. This may be true if you go to some shoddy university that teaches things by rote and memorisation. I did an engineering degree where we had practical laboratory sessions that required you to build experience to get a good mark and the exams were not about remembering formula, you had to apply the knowledge that had been taught. Experience cannot be taught. However, a good teacher will teach you a lot of useful skills that help you acquire experience quickly. I have learnt foreign languages where I have done a lot of studying at home but with much less opportunity to practice using those languages. When I visited the countries where they spoke those languages I struggled at first but it didn't take long to recognise the differences between my self practice and the real pronunciation/way of using a phrase. Frequently we see these posts that say you don't need a degree to code. It's true, but if you have a good degree in programming then it's so much easier and probably your code will be much better because you know why things are done a certain way and you do them properly. |
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The real world does not work like this, and often I find that academia prepares you for a world that doesn't behave or exist like the ones described through courses and lectures which are only aimed at grading and evaluating on some set of criteria. It's not necessarily an accurate meter of how you will adapt your knowledge and skills in the real world, I belive Nassim Taleb mentions the concept of 'empty suits', or so called experts who focus entirely on a constructed model of the world they are absolutely convinced will not change with lack of accounting for black swan events (an event that is unexpected and debunks a widely accepted belief, for example swans were thought to be white until the discover of black swans in Oceania) and basically the society attributes an irrational amount of trust and credit in those that have gone to the best of the schools in the best of what they do, not necessarily based on the inevitable nature of change (earth was flat, now it's round) upon random discovery that challenges what we've accepted as "facts".
It's a question of realizing you are being taught how to think and what to think by the institution that measures efficiency on a normal curve, instead of discovering the process and the target yourself.
Now of course, university life is much bigger than just lectures and learning, you meet so many interesting people, you learn that there are more questions than answers, and I think that is the best part. Maybe if you've gone to an Ivy League, you will find yourself surrounded with individuals of influential and powerful families which you can expand your social circle for future business and collaboration and that is all the more reason to go to one, but then I question the ability of someone with middle or lower class status to be genuinely accepted amongst those that have it all already.