From: lee@wang.com (Lee Story)
Newsgroups: misc.education
Subject: Re: Duty to graduate ?
Date: 13 Apr 92 20:41:59 GMT
	<29E1D00C.18202@noiro.acs.uci.edu>
Distribution: na
Organization: Wang Laboratories, Inc.


(Carl Edman) writes:
   Lee Story writes
   > [...]        What I find wholly objectionable about Carl's
   > statement is the notion that education is (and should be)
   > instituted and formalized so that the student can
   > provide a "service to society".  [...]

   Ah...... please, Mr Story, you should know me better. Over the years I  
   probably have spent most of my thousand or so posts refuting the idea  
   that individuals exist for the benefit of "society" in all its various  
   forms. It is this which caused me to be quite horrified when you  
   brought up North Korea as a positive example of economic development in  
   Asia in another thread in another group - there probably is in history  
   no better example for the beehive state than North Korea.

If Carl Edman will reexamine my comment on the economy of North Korea,
he will find that right at the beginning of my comments I noted that
his conclusions may well be correct (that capitalism tended to improve
individual welfare, implying that North Korea may very well be a
rather sorry place), and that I was merely objecting to his doubtful
method of buttressing those conclusions with inappropriate statistical
measurements.  I'm unlikely to cite any nation as "a positive
example of economic development", considering my general opinion of
how badly the notion of "development" or "progress" continues to run
roughshod over more worthy goals.

I do apologize if I was presumptuous enough to overgeneralize from
Carl's comments on the number of Doctorates which should be
granted, and do agree with him that "only so many Professors of
Mathematics can be gainfully employed," and that "as there are more
people who wish to become professors of mathematics than can be
gainfully employed, it only seems rational that those which have shown
the greatest talent and promise should be chosen" (from his reply).
I can even reluctantly agree that a training ground for professors of
mathematics is quite important in the context of our _present_ social
organizations.

I cannot agree that this meritocratic approach leads to the greatest
individual welfare (though this is admittedly unmeasurable).  We are
taught throughout our lives that the brightest and the quickest
deserve the greatest attention and the greatest rewards, and I suppose
the underlying justification is that these are people who can create
technology, raise "standards of living", and use their education to
benefit others.

But mathematics, like music, is not a competition.  Nor need it or its
practitioners be judged from what seems to me Carl's excessively
careerist viewpoint.  It is its own justification, and its own reward.
The truest obeisance I can offer a mathematician is to tell him that
his theorem appeared as a jewel-like extraction and generalization
from the usual morass of uninteresting detail, and that his proof was
a delight of unobvious but inevitable reasoning.  Or maybe truest is
simply to take the time to read, understand, and enjoy it without
comment.  Whether he gains rewards, income, or a professorship is a
matter of absolute indifference to me.

Carl Edman again:
   It just means that you should not organize university level
   education on the level of those probably won't make it anyway.

And he continues:
   And - yes, there is a problem with a society in which every auto  
   mechanic had a design engineers knowledge of the machines construction.  
   Much fewer design engineers can be gainfully employed than auto  
   mechanics [...]

I forget the Latin expression...it appears that Carl is arguing
from a false converse.  Surely it is not claimed that excess of
knowledge makes one unemployable as a mechanic.  Yes, I know---if a
person has learned automotive design primarily in the careerist
expectation of employment and not out of interest in the subject, he
may refuse a mechanic's job.

   However neither of us should expect to be accepted to the best  
   universities in those topics which are not our main interest or demand  
   that those universities are forced to make their curricula so simple  
   that we could pass as after all they have a "duty to graduate" us.

There are so many implicit assumptions and biases on both sides here
(yes, mine as well---Carl is forcing me to make explicit, and to
reexamine, my perhaps irrational level of anti-careerism) that I'm
baffled as to how to respond.  I agree COMPLETELY that no university
should take it upon itself to push everyone, without regard for their
skills, interest, or rate of learning, through a degree program in
one, two, or four years, or at any predetermined rate.  However, I do
think that everyone who has been initially accepted, and who continues
to evince interest in the subjects of study (and ability to pay the
bills), should be welcome to proceed at a pace chosen by the student
as compatible with his other interests.  No, not everyone should
graduate.  Some people would lose interest and leave (and the
competition-minded might choose to call this "flunking out"---that's
fine).  Others would die, perhaps at 100 years old, without having
completed the degree requirements.  Even the lazy would be
accommodated: face it---if you're not in school to gain certification
to make a better living, and if there's not a lot of social stigma
attached to leaving the school and trying something else, and if
you're not sufficiently interested to apply yourself, you'll leave.
But I must agree with Carla Ann Greis that it should not be necessary
to "flunk" anyone in the current sense.

Maybe, nay, probably, in many subjects there should be
university-level (or conservatory-level) programs for those competent
to be admitted, but NO ONE should "graduate" with a "degree" or other
certification beyond the respect of instructors and peers.

Carl Edman:
  
  By no means should you or I be discouraged from learning music or
  mathematics.  However neither of us should expect to be accepted to
  the best universities in those topics which are not our main
  interest or demand that those universities are forced to make their
  curricula so simple that we could pass as after all they have a
  "duty to graduate" us.

There is no need to simplify the subject matter.

  That would cause (possibly permanent) harm to the education of
  professional e.g. musicians whose talents and education will have a
  far greater effect than ours.

Actually I picked music not just because I'm interested in it, but
specifically because I find the effects of ANY professionalism in that
field damaging (because venal, i.e., easily corrupted).  Hint:
millions of people used to make music, however primitive on average,
at home.  Now the "intellectual" goes to concerts or listens to
classical CDs---all professionally produced.  The average Jane and Joe go
to rock or pseudo-folk concerts occasionally, and listen to another
selection of recordings---all professionally produced.

   No, my argument was not a parody. Ms Greis claims that one should never  
   drop a student out of school under any circumstances as that would mean  
   that the "system has failed the child". So I guess that any  
   kindergartner can get a PhD in mathematics simply by passing from  
   school to school each of which has a "duty to graduate" him.

And I agree she can---if that minimally-gifted student applies herself
occasionally, pays her bills, and completes the requirements (and lives
to be a thousand years old.)  That's a bit of a rhetorical exaggeration,
but not a parody either.
--
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  Lee Story (lee@wang.com) Wang Laboratories, Inc.
              (Merrimack Valley Paddlers)
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