I once ran into a person that said no one should be able to educate themselves/be educated for free.
Guy was American. One of the weirdest things I've heard my entire life. Imagine having people with similar mindset running the show
Wouldn't higher edu degree becoming "common" invalidate it?
> it was a way to stand out and it no longer is
Education is only good if you stand out? What a discussion.
In the honors classes, the students were there because they wanted to learn, and the profs were there because they wanted to teach.
He tried both, and discovered that while he had to work a lot harder in the honors class, it was a lot more fun being in that environment.
There's always going to be people who complain about it, yeah. A small minority, though.
There's no reason why someone can't be both. Universities weren't originally designed to be job centers, that's what vocational education was for. This is also one of the problems that I see with the current system is that universities are just seen as a way to get a job rather than to be educated. The issue of people feeling shit about wasting their time or whatever also stems from this issue - they came to university to get an easy job afterwards, not to learn, and this belief is misleading.
Society needs both but I'm in full agreement that in recent decades that the trades, woodworking, etc. have been terribly denigrated and they need to be restituted to their former position in society. Even with modern equipment that's taken much of the menial work away we still need people with the skills to use those machines properly.
Also, we need creative people who are best skilled with working with their hands. We cannot lose sight of the fact that many are most suited working this way and to force them into doing a desk job is both unfair on them and on society generally. By saying this I'm not implying that they're any less intelligent - in fact I know some very smart and intelligent trades people who I'd trust with almost any work with training.
I say this as person who has been a professional/desk worker for most of my working life but also as one who also had the privilege to be trained in metalwork and woodwork and for a time working in those trades. I understand that mentality, and there's absolutely nothing wrong or demeaning about it.
It looks terrible now.
Evidently, there is something to craftsmanship :-)
Inspiration 10%, practice 90%. You're just a bit rusty - out of practice. ;-)
Like the Mikado, maybe we need a little list of society offenders who've perverted the language with stolen nouns. As the Mikado would claim, to not only steal nouns for illicit purposes but to then morph them into proper nouns is the most heinous of crimes - a crime that could only be committed by those with absolutely no imagination. As wasted space, they are deserving nothing less than the axe!
;-)
One of the advantages of oxalic acid is that it's a sufficiently strong acid but still mild in comparison to many others, notably the common inorganic ones. I've not thought much about alternatives as its cheapness, easy availability and its suitable chemistry makes it a suitable choice (someone else's already done the hard thinking ;-)). Being a dicarboxylic acid—here the simplest, just two carboxyl groups bolted together—it's reasonably strong, stronger than say acetic acid but mild enough that it doesn't suffer the drawbacks of the easily-available inorganic acids. For instance, if you forget and leave the work in solution too long then not much damage is done. For instance, compare it with phosphoric acid that one often finds in vehicle rust-removal kits. I once left a large collection of rusty twist drills in a phosphoric acid solution and although it removed (converted) the rust admirably, it actually changed the crystalline structure of the HS steel in the drills to such an extent that they became brittle and broke easily (that's sort of obvious, had I bothered to think about it I wouldn't have done it). So one leaves the phosphoric for heavy-duty rust removal like when you can't tell any difference between the metal and the rust in the floor of your car (and besides technically it's more a converter than a remover).
Being comparatively mild, oxalic is also reasonably kind to other organic materials such as wood and you won't get the 'charring' damage of say sulfuric acid (no self-respecting woodworker would be without some oxalic in the workshop). For instance, the ugly bluish-black stains wood gets from being near iron, nails etc. can often be completely removed with oxalic acid. It's often combined with chlorine bleach/Na hypochlorite when there are stains from multiple sources, mold for instance (Cl works better here).
You're right about oxalic acid being toxic but one would have to be damn stupid and careless to get an LD50 dose of it, which if I recall, that figure is in excess of ingesting somewhat more than 10g. That would be rather difficult unless one did it intentionally. It's important to realize that we have a tolerance to small quantities of oxalic acid as it occurs naturally in most of our vegetables, spinach and rhubarb for instance (that's why one's told not to eat rhubarb's leaves as the acid's concentration there is much higher than in its stems, also those prone to kidney stones are told not to eat foods high in oxalic acid due to the formation of solid oxalates).
I've been using oxalic acid for years without any trouble and don't take anything other than sensible precautions when using it. In fact, I have a 500ml bottle of saturated solution (at room temp.) with a trigger pump on it that I squirt onto rusty things as well as wood stains. I'm just careful to ensure that I wash everything afterwards. Incidentally, if you're preparing an oxalic bath (say several liters of warm water with oxalic in it to remove rust off an object), then unless you do it outdoors you'll likely notice a tiny amount of bitterness in your mouth and your teeth may feel like when you bite into a lemon from the slight 'volatility' of the solution (you've probably notice the same effect when working in the lab with sulfuric and hydrochloric acids). At most, you are unlikely to be getting more than a milligram at most (which is about the amount of oxalic acid in a reasonable helping of spinach and it's not likely to be harmful unless it's a regular occurrence/part of your job etc.). If this is a worry for you or you dislike that acidic taste then wear a chemical-removing mask (the charcoal type should suit).
(BTW, it's important to note that ethylene glycol (antifreeze) is very toxic because it's both sweet and it's metabolized by the body first to glycolic acid finally to oxalic acid. I've used this oxalic acid example (along with the ethanol/methanol one) to explain to people why one shouldn't make simple assumptions about the toxicity of a chemical based on a closely related one. Here for example, its close relative propylene glycol is essentially harmless; it even has a food E number. If one came at it from only knowledge of propylene glycol and made similar assumptions about its simpler ethylene cousin then one could get into very serious trouble (unfortunately, it's happened more than once.)
only in the US.
I really don’t see any reasonable scenario where this could be true.
> main thing is people wasting their time + becoming upset and angry at the society, perceiving themselves as the 'intellectual elite' that isn't getting 'valued' enough
If one believes that having a degree (which is 30% of the population) makes them part of the elite (which is 1% of the population), they should have spent more time in high school studying statistics. People with a degree don’t see themselves as “the elite”.
You can study history and become a bricklayer.
What is definitely wrong and abhorrent is the expectation that:
1) one is worthy of a so called “white collar” job
2) that a college degree requires full-time study and a campus.
May I also note that there are such a thing as higher trades—for example, engineering, architecture, medicine and law.
You are not studying some abstract concept when you study the above 4. You are preparing yourself to take an exam and be qualified to practice a trade.
The rest of the degrees? Open them up. Wish all of us would study minimum history and had awareness of different structures of government. To me, its so sad that Americans can’t place the specialness of their country in context and protect that which makes it unique in this world—jury duty. A plumber, a bricklayer and a cook need to know that as well as everyone else.
USA: If you’re rich and not particularly interested in the topics, you to to college to meet people.
Some Euro: I’ve met many a person who continues to “study” to keep the numerous benefits.
Many people just don’t care. That dosen’t stop me from saying my idealistic, and unlikely idea after a word like “should”.
For young people with no real financial obligations that's somewhat easy to accomplish.
For people in the midst of their lifes, working a regular job, taking care of a family, it can be very difficult to juggle all these obligations at once.
Because even when university is "free" it still requires you to invest time.
That's ever so true. I've been to university over several periods earlier in my life. The first time there were fees but they were manageable by most students (as the Government provided reasonably heavy subsidiaries). By the next time the government had changed and a more enlightened one came in and made all fees (except student union fees) free.
This was great for a time until work commitments forced me to stop before I'd finished. Then a little later another government reversed it all and it even went much further - the new fee structure went from free to like $50,000 or even double that for some degrees. Thus, my lack of time caught me out big-time.
That said, had I had the slightest notion what was going to happen then I'd definitely have managed to find the time. That's for certain! (I'd not learned the old addage don't put off until tomorrow what one can do today.)
There is when you're not the one paying for it.
A university or college degree for topics such as literature, history, gender studies, etc should not be available to you until you have done been certified in a trade (be that bricklaying, medicine, law or engineering)
This is why I highlighted that these sorts of degrees don't need to be done on a campus, full-time unless you're willing to pay for that or have been deemed worthy of a scholarship AFTER having completed a vocation.
I do think it would be quite awesome to have these available for free again after having achieved skills that are very valuable in the workplace. Kind of like going to a museum or the way Jews can go on a birthright trip.
Education is to build the person. It is to build a society of more refined members, which means, to reduce the collective damages that come from ignorance. It is both personal elevation and social duty.
The cancer of ignorance is fought also so that people are able to do their own job, the cognitive structure of which does not just stand up on its own isolated supports. Only hours ago I had to find myself in front of somebody who could not do his job owing to underdevelopment.
This is how Soviet Union ended. "Workers and peasants" were 100% OK with Communism. It's the educated masses who were too educated and did jobs that did not justify their qualification, and lived in deep poverty, ended it.
Enough culture to recognise a demagogue when they see one? Enough basic scientific knowledge to avoid falling into wellness scams and understand how climate change works? In a democracy, a well-educated people is absolutely required. You don’t need to apply all of your knowledge in your daily work; it does not mean acquiring it was a waste of time.
> This is how Soviet Union ended. "Workers and peasants" were 100% OK with Communism. It's the educated masses who were too educated and did jobs that did not justify their qualification, and lived in deep poverty, ended it.
The problem with the Soviet Union was not too much education. It is also a strange example to pick when arguing about democracies.
And Soviet Union is a good example because a democracy would fare worse in same conditions. Soviets could apply unlimited violence to keep people in check, democratic government can't do that.
I am not quite sure how rewriting history somehow validates your argument. The USSR was in a very specific situation and you'll never know how a democracy would have fared. In all likelihood, a democracy would not have ended up in that specific situation anyway.
To enable democracy, which depends on a population endowed with well developed judgement to work properly.
And to enable society, which depends on counting a large amount of members the individual will trust, professionally and personally, to be hold as a value triggering synergy.
So, to enable widespread civilization, which is required to achieve the basicmost goal of a liveable environment.
Cultivation is one of the tentative ways to increase civilization. Education shapes the person; the impacts from the environment may be random in gain or loss, while education comes out of a positively progressive effort. It shapes your neighbours and the professionals you rely on.
as it should, we humans arent here to do menial task but to solve problems both personal and societal and MAYBE we should give more value to people as factor of production?
In my view the world you (want to) live in looks bleak and sad.
You don't even a vocational degree to do those either.
You start working be it a union, or non-union, and take a test later on if you want a license. (In California)
Well, I'd certainly not let anyone with no schooling work on my home, especially so if they cannot read or write.
How the hell would they read instructions or building regulations?
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hacker_ethic , then?
Which enables aimlessly 'toying' around with (already existing) things,
discovering new (sometimes unforeseen) applications.
In opposotion to [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protestant_work_ethic
where everything has to be 'goal oriented' from the start, guided by expected
[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Return_on_investment and
[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_to_market
While I (sometimes) can see the value of 2, 3 and 4 a world without 1 is very boring and drab.
In the USA, free can be used to mean free to the consumer, but paid by someone else.
The US has uncontrolled education costs, a surplus of irrelevant college degrees, and many object to taxes to pay for others.
For example, If someone can't afford to buy a house and support a family, in part due to taxes, they understandably wouldn't want to pay more taxes to so that someone else can enjoy some fanciful degree.
There is an abundance of very good low cost colleges, but many advocate that elite colleges with marble walls that cost 1-200k+ should be payed for with public funds