Selfish Ungrateful People

[harderfaster]

A well educated supermarket assistant is better than an uneducated one.

[dakyras]

Yeah, but £6,000 a year at university better?

I'm all for 'education for the sake of education', and in some/most cases every individual in the country will benefit from it, but in some cases the benefits will never be felt. The taxpayer's not getting an £18k return by having a supermarket assistant who can stack shelves a little bit better than the school drop out.

I'm not saying education for the sake of education is wrong, I'm saying that there isn't always some social benefit from it.

[eFestivals]

I'm not talking about people's considerations, I'm talking about the actual benefits from getting an education. You know, like the benefits you get from medicine.

it's not the same thing at all.

Only each individual for themselves is able to say if they consider education a benefit. You sare not in the position to dictate to them that they must see it as a benefit.

(And aside from all that, is medicine a benefit? Each progression is sold to us as "saving lives" and "saving money on healthcare costs", yet no life is ever saved it's merely extended, and the healthcare costs go UP overall and not down with each new cure that's found).

Then it's just as well that no one's doing that then isn't it. Once again, I'm not concerned in the slightest with getting people to university or the reasons why they'd want to go, I'm merely pointing out the benefits of getting an education.

You ARE doing it - you'll telling people it's a benefit to them, when that's not your decision to make for them.

[eFestivals]

They're still uneducated. Skilled, but not educated.

You don't have a f**king clue what you're talking about, you patronising and uneducated arsehole.

The level of educating available via an apprenticeship (the one I did, at least) is certainly as great as from any degree. Just because there's a different slant to what a person is educated about doesn't alter the certain fact that it's education.

Not only that, but a degree is merely 3 years, of short days and only 30 weeks a year. A traditional apprenticeship is 4 years of 8 hour days and 48 weeks a year - making the learning experience of a degree just a fraction of what is gained via an apprenticeship.

It's a bit of a myth about having to be academically minded to do a degree. You become acedemically minded after attending an academy. It's kinda the whole point really. It's a structured way of thinking, researching and formulating ideas independently. If you were this way inclined to begin with then you probably wouldn't need an education, unless you wanted to become an academic professional.

The bigger myth is what you've presented here, that none of that happens away from formal education.

[eFestivals]

A well educated supermarket assistant is better than an uneducated one.

Yeah, cos they learn lots of useful things at uni which helps them tack shelves in a better way. lol:

You're getting to show to the full extent possible how much of a waste of time education can be.

[eFestivals]

Yes, but they don't necessarily know how to hypothesise about it, research the various elements that go into it, critisise former theories regarding it, formulate alternative ways of doing it and then articulate this in a thesis of their own.

What they do know is how to execute pre-existing instructions regarding what they've been told. Hence, they are skilled tradesmen, but not educated tradesmen.

Now I wasn't saying that your idea was a bad one. What I was saying was that aprenticeships are not an alternative education, they are an alternative to getting an education.

With that in mind, the problem in pushing people towards apprenticeships that would have otherwise got a degree is that they will no longer be subsidised for an education, which is a major issue for those wanting to see education for all and things like social mobility. Essentially, we'd be back to the working classes learning trades, while the middle classes get an education and a well paid job to boot - not very progressive.

Complete and utter bullshit, written by an uneducated and patronising arsehole who doesn't have a clue what he's talking about.

[eFestivals]

I doubt going to university makes you stack shelves better.

What you get is a shelf-stacker who is educated. I know who I'd rather be served by.

So do I - someone who is happy and fulfilled in their work.

For those with blind spots to truth, that has f**k all to do with whether someone is educated or not. But the likelihood is that a degree educated shelf stacker is the more likely to feel unfulfilled, and so more likely to do poor job.

[worm]

it's not the same thing at all.

Only each individual for themselves is able to say if they consider education a benefit. You sare not in the position to dictate to them that they must see it as a benefit.

(And aside from all that, is medicine a benefit? Each progression is sold to us as "saving lives" and "saving money on healthcare costs", yet no life is ever saved it's merely extended, and the healthcare costs go UP overall and not down with each new cure that's found).

You ARE doing it - you'll telling people it's a benefit to them, when that's not your decision to make for them.

[worm]

You don't have a f**king clue what you're talking about, you patronising and uneducated arsehole.

[worm]

Complete and utter bullshit, written by an uneducated and patronising arsehole who doesn't have a clue what he's talking about.

Edited January 19, 2011 by worm

[eFestivals]

Rubbish. I'm saying that education is beneficial. I'm not saying that people should do it.

But you're wrong.

Yopu are only in the position to say that education has been beneficial to you. You are not in any place to say that education for the purpose only of education would be beneficial for everyone - that's for them to decide, and not you.

[worm]

I'm all for 'education for the sake of education', and in some/most cases every individual in the country will benefit from it, but in some cases the benefits will never be felt. The taxpayer's not getting an £18k return by having a supermarket assistant who can stack shelves a little bit better than the school drop out.

[eFestivals]

Do you have a degree? Do you have an apprenticeship?

Do I have a degree? Nope. But that doesn't mean that I don't understand degrees any less than you do.

I do have an HND (something, BTW, that USA businesses recognise as more beneficial to them than a UK degree - once they get to understand what an HND actually is, as they don't have them there).

I have also served an apprenticeship.

[eFestivals]

Do you learn how to conduct research and write a thesis in relation to a chosen topic on an apprenticehip? No.

Yes.

What they don't do within apprenticeships is use unnecessary words to make themselves seem special while doing so.

Do you learn the skills particular to a trade at university? No.

It depends what degree a person does you thick arse.

When we speak of the distinction between educated and uneducated people we're referring to graduates and non-graduates.

only if the speaker is an up-their-own-arse moron who wishes to belittle others.

Educated does not refer to people who have learned a skilled trade.

Educated refers only to having learnt things. Nothing is specified within the definition of what they have learnt.

You get to demonstrate what uneducated really means, as you're displaying here just how uneducated you really are.

[worm]

But you're wrong.

Yopu are only in the position to say that education has been beneficial to you. You are not in any place to say that education for the purpose only of education would be beneficial for everyone - that's for them to decide, and not you.

[worm]

Yes.

What they don't do within apprenticeships is use unnecessary words to make themselves seem special while doing so.

Edited January 19, 2011 by worm

[worm]

I'm not suggesting you push people towards apprenticeships, you need to provide an alternative to university. It's all very well saying that people who work in any job would do it better with a degree but the fact is not everyone in this world has either the aptitude or the desire to have one.

Edited January 19, 2011 by worm

[eFestivals]

Oh for suck's sake, what kind of argument is that. These are benefits that you will gain in becoming educated.

anything a person does has an opportunity cost - which means that if they're doing one thing, the opportunity is lost to be doing something else.

If we consider uni education on a financial basis (only cos it demonstrates 'opportunity cost' in the clearest way), then (from Sept 2012) Uni will cost people perhaps £9k a year, so a total of £27k for the standard 3 years.

Would many people consider that it would be more beneficial for them to have that £27k usable by themselves (plus the three years extra income they'd have if not at Uni), than that £27k accumulated as a debt against them?

Yes they would, because they consider that option as more beneficial to them than the alternative of extra years of education.

It is not all as simple as the simple-minded might consider it to be.

I'm saying that this is what education brings, that everyone should have the opportunity to do it and that it is better to have an educated society than to have an uneducated one.

An educated society doesn't come without its own costs back on society, both from individuals and from society as a whole.

There is (at least) 3 years lost production opportunities, which is of benefit to society. There is the 'lost costs' of education (because not everyone benefits society via that education), which would be of benefit to society if not lost.

And finally and most importantly, there is a cost to society of having raised people's expectations but then being unable to fulfil them.

It is not all as simple as the simple-minded might consider it to be.

[worm]

I do have an HND (something, BTW, that USA businesses recognise as more beneficial to them than a UK degree

[eFestivals]

So you're prejudiced against degrees. I'd never have guessed.

no, I'm prejudiced against those who consider themselves educated and belittle others as not as worthy as them, but who constantly get to show that they're no less thick than the worst cases they wrongly identify as thick.

You clearly don't know what a degree entails.

that's right. I've not helped two people get thru their degrees plus one thru a PhD, nor have I read all of their work and their references to a greater extent than they have themselves. I've never helped degree work get marked, I've never read thousands of thesis's (and laughed my way thru them, as some of these people show just how mind-numbing stupid they can be), and I've never involved myself in thesis moderation or anything like that. I know nothing at all about them.

No Neil. At that point we were talking specifically about what we could do with uneducated (non-graduate) workers. By giving them apprenticeships you don't make them educated (graduates), you make them trainees. Calling them educated will just put them in the same category as the educated and so leave us with the same problem. My point was that they would be denied an education and be stuck to a trade if you were to do this.

The problem being what exactly? PMSL.

The problem - very clearly for you - is that you wish to consider yourself above such people.

The problem - very clearly for you - is that you constantly show yourself as of a far lower education than many of them.

Get over it.

[eFestivals]

But I'm not saying this. I'm saying that everyone should have the opportunity to get an education. Pretending that training for a trade is an education is fundamentally wrong (morally and literally). One is academic for your own personal development and interest, whereas the other is for the purpose of learning a trade.

I refer you to any dictionary, which will make definitively clear to you that it's you suffering the lack of education.

[eFestivals]

As they would an apprenticeship or work experience. That's the whole point. Degrees are not about learning a trade. They're about learning. They show an employer that you can commit to and sustain three years of study. They show the academy that you are learned and had a flirting interest in a particular subject. What they give the student is the means to an academic way of thinking, researching and articulating. What they do for the individual is entirely up to them.

Not all degrees are worthless humanities subjects like you have you know.

[worm]

anything a person does has an opportunity cost - which means that if they're doing one thing, the opportunity is lost to be doing something else.

If we consider uni education on a financial basis (only cos it demonstrates 'opportunity cost' in the clearest way), then (from Sept 2012) Uni will cost people perhaps £9k a year, so a total of £27k for the standard 3 years.

Would many people consider that it would be more beneficial for them to have that £27k usable by themselves (plus the three years extra income they'd have if not at Uni), than that £27k accumulated as a debt against them?

Yes they would, because they consider that option as more beneficial to them than the alternative of extra years of education.

It is not all as simple as the simple-minded might consider it to be.

[llcoolphil]

A well educated supermarket assistant is better than an uneducated one.

[llcoolphil]

Pretending that training for a trade is an education is fundamentally wrong (morally and literally).