I'm sick of STEM snobbery

The snobbery comes from the fact that many humanities students have problem finding jobs. True, people should do what they love, but they should also be realistic about their prospects. Most humanities students know this though.

Oh and I call BS on STEM subjects being harder...Try reading a 50 page academic text and picking out the main points in 10 minutes. No joke. If it gives background, I'm from a specialist social science uni.

Reply 781

DagenhamDaisy

10

I haven't read the full post and may be off current conversation whilst on track with thread. I guess you look at societies biggest issues to consider the range of people we require.

Crime - significant feature including mental health problems, born of lack of attachment and my opinion is that a higher weighting of nurture. Therefore psychology and sociology, criminology subjects become vital in our strategic response.

Maths - obviously the financial crisis requires those with an understanding in numeracy includes accountancy, economics etc

Medicine - all sciences continue to shape the reason we are living longer, also nutrition and exercise so in addition to sciences, the sports science, food technology can assist the obesity and malnutrition issue we have.

Legal issues - obviously law

Technology - computer science

Prevention of war - the need to understand the political issues and our strategic response. I'm sure even the physicists will struggle day to day if we are under attack. We need politics, foreign languages, history in this regard

We will never not need nurses, police officers, social workers, supermarkets, fuel, Drs, education, mechanics, clothes. Whilst much functioning requires science understanding, the other areas also have vital importance so I'm happy that our future politicians really understand the leadership this country requires

Reply 782

Powertenrec

2

Well philosophers rank high in iq tests. And most of you STEM people beg the question. Why should we asume the ultimate provider of value is having more tech? Our lives are easier thanks to science, but the must useful thing is art in the sense that has been used by every human since the beginning of time one way or another. You are very bad at making sound arguments an yet think you are more logical. Having use means you are being used for something, it doesn’t have to be about being an artifact, it can be use by consumption, and art has always been consumed and it would be even long after robots make better scientists than humans. Which is must useful, then?

Reply 783

username5706823

20

Original post by Powertenrec

Well philosophers rank high in iq tests. And most of you STEM people beg the question. Why should we asume the ultimate provider of value is having more tech? Our lives are easier thanks to science, but the must useful thing is art in the sense that has been used by every human since the beginning of time one way or another. You are very bad at making sound arguments an yet think you are more logical. Having use means you are being used for something, it doesn’t have to be about being an artifact, it can be use by consumption, and art has always been consumed and it would be even long after robots make better scientists than humans. Which is must useful, then?

Um... hate to break it to you but this thread is ancient.....

Reply 784

Powertenrec

2

Original post by Powertenrec

Well philosophers rank high in iq tests. And most of you STEM people beg the question. Why should we asume the ultimate provider of value is having more tech? Our lives are easier thanks to science, but the must useful thing is art in the sense that has been used by every human since the beginning of time one way or another. You are very bad at making sound arguments an yet think you are more logical. Having use means you are being used for something, it doesn’t have to be about being an artifact, it can be use by consumption, and art has always been consumed and it would be even long after robots make better scientists than humans. Which is must useful, then?

Many of the people here are missing a couple of premises and usually begging the question. Like tech related fields are more important because tech is the most important aspect of human culture, yet you haven’t explained why without referring to your own accepted values.

Reply 785

Powertenrec

2

Original post by SuperiorGenius

That's fine, it's your opinion. I'm in my education purely for financial gains and that's why I prefer subjects that will help me achieve that goal. Tbh I'm not sure what you're trying to say but it's well past midnight, I'm tired and you're a music student so it can't be that important.

He/she kicking your ass, isn’t he/she?

Reply 786

username4522078

20

Original post by Short_Round

I am sick and tired of the snobbery that accompanies and influences people's subject choices. This belief of superiority comes especially from the sciences. On TSR, it's not hard to find people who parrot the opinion that:

"maths > physics > chemistry > biology > all the humanities in the whole world"

or something similar in such a childish "I'm better than you" way. But this goes far further than TSR - my experience of academic staff at university is the same. Lecturers frequently make jokes about "our colleagues in the chemistry department" or "those humanities students" or similar, at which everyone laughs heartily - purely for the reason that it makes them feel good to put other people down.

It is my view that every single subject has value in our society, and that we should stop putting things into a hierarchy. Why can't people choose subjects or a degree they love, instead of feeling pressured into choosing something more "respectable" by general public opinion that their subject is "worthless"?

Any thoughts?

You were always my favourite sidekick in Indiana Jones and with takes like this it's not hard to see why.

Reply 787

Powertenrec

2

Original post by poohat

There are a few intellectually demanding humanities and social science subjects - Economics, Philosophy, Classics, History for example - but on the whole its true to say that the typical humanities/social science student is less smart than those in STEM, particularly when it comes to joke fields like sociology, media studies, communications, etc. This isnt 'snobbery', it is just truth and backed up by data:

http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/gnxp/files/2010/12/gre1.png

http://www.potsdam.edu/academics/AAS/Phil/upload/LSAT-Scores-of-Majors.pdf

www.iup.edu/WorkArea/DownloadAsset.aspx?id=119342

Well biology doesn’t necessarily rank as high as other stem subject (I am a biologist by the way) so is not a matter of being stem or not. First of all stem is a made up term that doesn’t include the whole of science, and depending on the definition of science, it includes other things that are not science. To be honest it should be call TEM, science is the list important thing on which people separate stem subjects. The only thing that groups together what people refers as stem conventionally is math and technological use, and as a matter of fact is the only skills that non stem major don’t provide. Non stem majors give you critical skills just like stem, problem solving skills, data analysis skills, argumentation skills, research skills, experiment planning skills (psychology, sociology and even biology if you don’t consider it a science) and so on and so forth. So, if you are a non stem major trough in math and some programming and you basically have the same set of skills an engineer have hahahaha