Job Discussion Forums

[shadowfax]

I don't know how many are in your sample. Durham offers many dual programmes, but I am not sure about first year subsidiaries as I was a postgrad there. Durham was rated best in UK for literature and second for history last year.
Even if it proved true that the majority of top universities did not offer subsidiary subjects in single honours, I doubt this is the reason for their eminence.
It seems common sense that undergraduates in many subjects benefit from electives which accompany their single honours choice during the first year of study, before narrowing to greater specialisation. This has 3 apparent advantages: 1) it allows the uncertain to resolve upon the subject of their continued study; 2) it broadens the cross-disciplinary knowledge base of the student; 3) it does not in any way occlude subsequent specialisation after year one, and thereafter in postgraduate study.

[sheikh radlinrol]

[007]

[shadowfax]

Glad you brought Sheik N Bake's excellent post to my attention, 007. I managed to overlook it because of the new page.

But I don't really see the connexion between his post and what you say after quoting it. In fine, you appear guilty of ignoratio elenchi, or ignoration of the elench, a form of illusory refutation, namely ignorance of the syllogism required for the refutation of an adversary. Also, you speak as though Europe were a single person! You do seem to concede to his major premise, though, and that is perhaps a sign of advancement. Or perhaps you did so per accidens. Sorry for the Latin there (rudely translated= by accident/incidentally), but I can never resist a quotation from Dr Faustus.

The University of Paris was inaugurated in the twelfth century. I have never before heard this described as modern. Rather, the inception of the modern period could at the very earliest (and this is stretching it) be dated to the 16th century: the beginning of what scholars denominate the early modern period.

Might I also posit that substantially the Americas are part of Europe anyway? Not geographically, biensur, but per origentem populi, and through intellectual contiguity.

In futurity I prophetic see, the entry of the USA into a revised European Economic Community. And the birth of the League of Democracies. Hic labor est tuus, hic opus, praefecte Obama.

[Sheikh N Bake]

Re: the modern university, Shadow is correct. Unfortunately even Harvard, founded in 1636, was hardly "modern" for some considerable time. It was at first merely a Puritan religious training school. But at least the Puritans, like the Chinese, were sticklers for hard work and education, and innovation was to come, to the point Harvard and Yale eclipsed all others in international recognition decades ago.

In the 19th century, the German research university became the model for American state land-grant universities, but very soon, the U.S. univeristy paradigm, both in the private and public sectors, organically mutated into its own system of requiring about three semesters worth of humanities, social sciences and basic sciences for all students, in addition to their major. The received wisdom in US higher educational innovations usually "comes down" from Harvard.

As for me--well, who cares, but anyway--I went to a regional state college in Pennsylvania...but whose famous alumni include the very popular suspense writer Dean Koontz; General Tommy Franks (his master's degree); and former first woman governor of New Hampshire and now Senator Jeanne Shaheen. I always think if Shippensburg University was good enough for them, it was good enough for the likes of me!

[shadowfax]

[Stephen Jones]

The point is that there are a large number of fairly different university systems, and it is pretty silly to judge one on the basis of what the other does.

To suggest as shadowfax seems to be doing that Oxbridge Science graduates are mere technicians because they don't do basic courses in the humanities as they do in Harvard or Yale is as silly as attacking Harvard or Yale because it makes it science students spend time on low-level humanities courses.

And shadowfax's unfortunate prejudice that the humanities are more 'universal' than science based subjects means we are ignoring the elephant in the room. That both Oxbridge and the Ivy League produce a large number of graduates of limited education who lack the most basic background in important aspects of education; I am referring to the humanities and liberal arts graduates whose knowledge of science, or basic statistics, is on a level with members of innumerate Amazonian tribes. The scandalous level of science reporting on the BBC. the Guardian, and a large number of other MSM sites shows just how dire this situation is.

[Sheikh N Bake]

Actually I stand by my earlier post. I've copied the salient points here and added one (that high-school textbooks are not even chosen by the teacher).

[shadowfax]

Jones:

The two opinions you attributed to me I have nowhere said or maintained.
I suggested that a true university has both arts and science faculties and so benefits from cross-fertilisation socially, culturally and academically.

Nowhere have I said humanities are more 'universal' than sciences.

This lead me to three conclusions:

1. You confused my postings with those of others. Which would infer the next conclusion.

2. You feel a childish compulsion to drag me down with a personal attack.


3. In your absurd compulsion to cast obloquy, your dull brain unconsciously transformed what I said to suit your own ignominious
intentions.

Your ignorations of the Elench really are pitiable as well as malicious. Are you quite sure you went to Cambridge?

Grow up foolish old man.

[Stephen Jones]

My dear shadowfax if you wrote intelligibly there would be no need for you to complain about being misinterpreted. Finding meaning in your prose is like hacking one's way through all the vines and weeds and climbers in a tropical jungle. Tedious, and one's never sure one's going in the right direction anyway.

[shadowfax]

i submitted this post twice by mistake. Delete doesn't seem there so i expunge.

[shadowfax]

Switching your attack in your desperation?

None of the other well-educated persons finds any trouble with it (save perhaps the small band of harpies with whom you are perhaps associated).

I'm glad I didn't carry on with French if it turns them out like you.

I refuse to spend time to simplify my prose down to the level of dunderheads.

[johnslat]

Actually, what you may learn at ANY university is, in my opinion, useful but not all that important (except insofar as getting a good job is concerned.)

One seldom learns the really important lessons of life at school - unless one is blessed by an exceptional teacher.

I'd say it's mostly what we learn (or don't) outside of school school that makes us who we are.

Knowledge can be taught, but wisdom, I think, can only be won - and the price is often fairly steep.

Regards,
John

[shadowfax]

That's a very fertile conception. I often wonder about Wisdom, and how it is praised to the skies in the Old Testament; indeed the daughter of God in one place.

In earth (sorry for the old style, I can't abide the expression "on earth" ) one wonders what use it could be. In the light of the New Testament it discourages the pursuit of worldly riches (Solomon's wisdom, then, is superseded), so it can't be expected to fill your coffers. Maybe it can keep you out of trouble, etc., etc.

Or is its principal fruit in the hereafter? Perchance it could douse the fury of the flames in hell. I must read the Book of Wisdom again (I think it's an intertestamental with the Catholics).

"Answer a fool according to his folly, lest he be wise in his own conceit." (Proverbs). Nevertheless, I'm not talking to that Jones again.

[Stephen Jones]