<p>STEM majors are usually intelligent in their respective fields and necessary for innovation and progression. </p>
<p>LA majors are usually knowledgeable in their own areas of interest and other areas that correlate to their interests. Many of them are capable of producing things and introducing ideas, just like any other educated and driven person. They can be useful and so are by no means obsolete. </p>
<p>Major doesn’t make you who you are. No one group can be deemed better, worse, smarter, or dumber than another just because of what random people choose to study undergrad. Just my two cents.</p>
<p>Because we’re sick of the myths being bandied about and we don’t like seeing innocent young people being duped into buying an education which may not serve them well. LAC defenders usually make the following defenses:</p>
<p>1) Not all liberal arts degrees are fluff, as economics, math, and the natural sciences are considered liberal arts. Thing is, you rarely hear actual math, economics, or science majors use this defense to defend liberal arts degrees, because more often than not they don’t even think of themselves as liberal arts majors. This defense is usually mounted by people majoring in the humanities or other fluff who are trying to glom on to the respect given to majors like math.</p>
<p>2) LAC defenders begin by pointing out that money isn’t everything, that it’s very narrow-minded to see education solely as a means to a career, and then in the next sentence they try to point out all of the financially successful humanities majors they have heard of or known personally, ignoring the facts that A) anecdotal evidence does not belie an empirically documented trend that liberal arts degrees tend to not pay not much more than a high school degree and B) the statistics are liberal arts majors are buffeted by outliers like people who went on to law or medical school or people who attended fancy private schools and used their connections to succeed (Carly Fiorina, for example, who is held out as proof that you can major in something fluffy and still succeed, also went to Stanford and had well-to-do parents).</p>
<p>3) Possibly the most annoying defense is that LACs “teach people to think” and do “critical thinking,” etc. This is annoying because it is almost meaningless and implies that the solid problem-solving skills and reliance on facts and reasoning that a “harder” major provides is somehow worthless beyond the narrow confines of the lab or the drawing board, and <em>that</em> is ignorance and poor thinking.</p>
<p>Speaking for myself, I’ve made it very clear on this board before what my feelings are on liberal arts majors, so before anybody jumps to conclusions about what I’ve said, assuming the above is meant to be my entire, complete statement on LACs, at least read what I’ve said before on them by doing a search.</p>
<p>For clarification, liberal arts degrees, as the almighty Wikipedia say, provide a “general” education “comprising” math and science. It can vary widely by school, sometimes a BA in physics at one school is as rigorous as a BS in physics at another. A key aspect of a liberal arts degree, as I understand it, is that it is not a professional degree. If this is true, then let’s not fool ourselves, a degree in math is more often than not a degree to become a professional, ditto for physics, chemistry, and economics.</p>
<p>In modern parlance, “liberal arts degree” has evolved to more often mean a humanities degree, as math and science have been enveloped by the “STEM” term.</p>
<p>As opposed to what? Almost every physics and chem major I know plans to go to grad school, because the only job someone with a BS in those subjects can get that, say, a Philosophy major can’t get is doing menial labor in a research lab. Math majors can pass actuarial exams, or if they have an extensive programming background they can go into software. But again, there are very few jobs specific to the major.</p>
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<p>I’ve actually never heard anyone use that defense. And any econ major that doesn’t think they’re a liberal arts major is an idiot.</p>
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<p>Frequent erroneous usage on this board does not imply evolution of the meaning of the term</p>
<p>I’m just going to pause here, and remind Mr. Pacifist of who exactly posted this. Clearly he doesn’t know who it is or he wouldn’t have made such a juvenile statement. I find it funny 5 pages in that nobody saw fit to correct him when it was mentioned less than 5 comments prior to his post.</p>
<p>It looks like you are in dire need of a liberal arts education.Mainly because,moments after dismissing anecdotal evidence as an unworthy rebuttal in an argument,you go on to
-<em>gasp</em>- cite anecdotal evidence yourself,as evidenced by this:</p>
<p>You just capitulated right into the argumentative ditch that you had just shown overboiling disdain for.Brilliant work.</p>
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Unfortunately,your lordship,the fact that a fact “annoys” you is not going to change the educational landscape neither is it going to invalidate the fact that liberal arts colleges do foster skills of "critical thinking ".Nomatter how lowly you think of critical thinking(as has been evidenced by your hideously wild arguments in this thread) it doesn’t change the fact that it is a valuable skill,one that has no doubt totally escaped from your grasp.</p>
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<p>Your lordship,according to your theory only engineers can have careers?That’s right,because there is absolutely no way chemistry graduates can dare work in the pharmaceutical industry,in research and development or medicine.Neither should economics grads dare set foot in banking,consulting,advertising,retail,operations amongst numerous other fields.Indeed,your majesty,all humanity should immediately abandon all other pursuits and strive to be “STEM” majors like the almighty you. </p>
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<p>LOL,my lord.Are you really that self absorbed?I wonder why anyone with a functional brain would go through the tedium of digging through what will undoubtedly be the most nonsense infested,putrid garbage ever to be posted on the internet.</p>
<p>“Liberal arts” includes math and science as well as the subjects deemed “fluff” on this thread. If you are talking about “liberal arts” minus math and science, then you aren’t talking about “liberal arts” at all. </p>
<p>Don’t try to pass off your bad-talking about the humanities as you trying to warn people from wasting their money and time. You have a bias and that’s fine, but realize that not everyone cares to be a STEM major. They want to study something that interests. And most people know that their is no set career path for “liberal arts” majors. You aren’t saying anything that anyone on this board doesn’t know already. </p>
<p>And “liberal arts” majors usually learn critical thinking and more writing skills then STEM majors, who for the most part can also think critically and write good enough to do whatever they do in their fields.</p>
<p>Well then we should compromise right here. Let’s invent a name for all the Liberal Arts classes minus STEM overlaps and Economics. We can create a term for these classes and bash these classes. That way the main argument against us, “there’s more LA classes than that” won’t matter because we’ve focused our attack. And since its wrong to just say “LA classes minus STEM” for some reason this one term will clear eveything up and we can go back to arguing.</p>
<p>How about… Super Liberal Arts? or… Liberal Farts… or… Social Arts or something</p>
<p>and… why do people think STEM majors have no critical thinking or writing skills… that makes no sense to me. Its like, someone said,
“STEM majors learn all of this practical stuff that we don’t, there must be some subjective thing that we can say we learn and they don’t.”
“How about writing skills?”
“Good one anything else?”
“Ummm… critical thinking skills”
“Oh I love it! Its just dripping with BS, perfect.”</p>
<p>"So can anyone explain to me why we analyse and interpret literature in ways that the authors could never even have imagined? "</p>
<p>I never understood that either. I mean, in High School, why are we reading fictional books and then going into their theme, symbols, etc. Outside of that little, fake world within that book, why does it matter? </p>
<p>We could have been doing much more productive stuff in High School than spending weeks in my Honors English class on Huck Finn and the symbolism of the river… who cares?</p>
<p>Why are liberal arts being attacked anyway? Okay, we get it, <em>you</em> are not interested in their content and <em>you</em> don’t understand why anyone else would be. That’s fine. It’s great that you have an opinion. What are you trying to say that you haven’t already said a dozen times before?</p>
<p>Some people like to analyze literature to death and that’s their prerogative. It also ties into critical thinking, a huge component of a liberal arts education. </p>
<p>STEM majors are usually smart people, no one is denying that. Are they actively taught to think critically outside of their given tasks? Or are they just taught to be good at the job they intend to do?</p>
<p>LA majors are actively taught to think critically through analyzing texts (regardless of if they are fiction or not) to recognize underlying tones, themes, and meaning. They are taught to write effectively. That’s not to say that STEM majors can’t do these things and therefore LA majors are better, it’s just an observation.</p>
<p>We’re concerned that people will read opinions like yours and decide that hey, maybe it’s all right if I major in Women’s Studies, I’ll get a good job - and then they graduate from college and sit around miserable, unemployed and in huge debt all thanks to some feel-good liberal arts proponents who gave them the misinformation that having a good job/salary with a liberal arts degree was the rule rather than the exception. Look we’re just as entitled as you to express our opinions. </p>
<p>My problem with liberal arts people is that they ignore reason - statistics SHOW that most liberal arts graduates have low-paying jobs. "But but but my brother majored in philosophy and and - " I don’t ****ing CARE. if you want to improve your ability to solve problems, work in groups, think logically and rationally while at the same time contributing to technological progress and maximizing your money making potential, major in STEM. Read Simone de Beauvoir on your own time and quit wasting taxpayer money. </p>
<p>buriedalie: shove it. If you don’t want to read this thread then throw away your damn computer and quit bothering everyone.</p>
<p>If someone wants to major in Liberal Arts they should be able to. Cuz let’s be honest antipacifist, you don’t really give a **** about people that do and end up in debt, I know I don’t.</p>
<p>I just don’t like seeing STEM majors bashed and saying ridiculous things like we have no critical thinking skills. I also don’t like seeing LAs get too much credit. IDK, It’s probably just me.</p>
<p>Wow this argument is really heating up. Personally I’m in love with the liberal arts, but I also am skeptical about a History degree’s ability to qualify me for anything other than high school teaching (oh God) or further education. For that reason I’m looking to double major in Finance along with History. </p>
<p>I think people should indeed follow their dreams in choosing a College major, I just wish people would be somewhat more realistic. Whether or not $100k+ debt is worth the satisfaction of studying what you love is a personal decision, but for most people the answer should probably be no.</p>
<p>I also think we’re quick to mischaracterize STEM majors as idiot savants who don’t understand society. Most of them I know seem to have an above average EQ and creative skills, and seem just as good at marketing the technology they develop as supposedly more creative liberal arts kids such as myself. </p>
<p>To be honest, the job market doesn’t look to hot for any of us, including finance majors btw, meaning all of us will have to excel all the more on what we do choose to study.</p>
<p>That’s a really immature thing to say.It’s like saying,why do mathematicians have to learn the binomial distribution?Outside of the world of statistics,who cares?If you think like that maybe you have missed the whole point of an education.
For your information,literary criticism is a way of training the mind to develop multilateral ways of approaching a subject and to analyze situations <em>critically</em>,and to be able to “spot” the loopholes, and promulgate possible solutions on the basis of that.These are the kind of skills that align with careers such law,international politics,business strategy et cetera.Few engineers could possibly have the wherewithal to write an eloquent and meaningful foreign policy strategy,for instance without struggling immensely.Different strokes for different folks.</p>
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<p>Adolf,until and unless you are installed as the global authority on anything and everything,your maniacal opinion remains as the phlegm that it is.You are hallucinatory if you think that people should revamp their whole career prospects on the basis of your ■■■■■■■■ recommendation.Furthermore,of what relevance is indebtedness to this argument?Stem majors are not in any way precluded from the possibility of educational debt.</p>
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<p>^And who are you?Oh,an anonymous poster on college confidential.I am trembling at the thought of your wrath.</p>
Liar. Statistics are practical by definition. Literary criticism doesn’t “train the mind” to do anything that couldn’t be learned by spending time doing other things. It’s a way for the liberal elite to foist their worldviews on others and to teach them to close their minds to dissenting opinions. </p>
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I was tempted to quit reading after that because it’s a Godwin and I don’t need to waste my time with people who make ad hominem arguments. </p>
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<p>“Stem” majors make more money than liberal arts majors, almost as a rule (again, just look at the statistics), so if they get into debt they have a greater possibility of being able to pay it off quickly. Also, people that major in absolutely worthless undergrad subjects like philosophy, polisci, psychology, anthropology etc tend to go do grad work, which is more and more and more debt - and STILL they end up with low-paying jobs. An engineer, for example, has such a high mid-career salary that he could go back to school and have no debt issues.</p>
<p>I would never have guessed given your lengthy,and laughably poor response.You sure showed me!</p>
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[quote=antipacifist]
Liar. Statistics are practical by definition.<a href=“–spot%20the%20ad%20hominem”>/quote</a></p>
<p>Oh,brother.</p>
<p>Learn to T-H-I-N-K.This is why I specifically underscored in my example that "it is LIKE "----->A C.O.M.P.A.R.I.S.O.N.That statistics is a practical subject is beyond obvious.I was only stressing the fact that just because something may not have wide ranging applicability beyond the confines of it’s own genre does not make it unworthy of study.That’s a very simple statement which you have misconstrued tragically.</p>
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Your thought process is linear and constricted.Anyone with motivation can find opportunities if they seek them.It takes a really unimaginative person to write off opportunities in a world in which they are abundant for those who have the imagination to locate them.You and the the other bigots in your company are severely lacking in both imagination and enterprise,which is why you are scrambling to convince everyone else that it’s worth their while to become mediocre scientists like yourselves rather than be extraordinary in their field of choice.</p>
<p>Why would you need to invent a name? They’re called Humanities and Social Sciences (Statistical humanities would probably be a better name for the latter, but that’s a separate thread).</p>
<p>If you want exclude econ too, you can just add that, since there’s no rational grouping that includes Economics with Science and Math instead of Humanities and Social Science.</p>