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Comment by rohamg | Hacker News Reader

Hah! Everyone would indeed benefit from learning some biology, quantum mechanics, philosophy, and fighting! This is the principle upon which the US higher education system is based - and as someone who came to the US for higher education, I have to say it's the best setup in the world (as compared to the silo'd, short-sighted, and quickly obsolete teachings you pick up as an undergrad anywhere else). Were you kidding?

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No, not really kidding. I resent having to study some superficial biology to satisfy somebody's notion of a good rounded education. I grew up in a University town with a large teaching hospital. We had biology inflicted upon us by well-meaning folk who wrote curriculum and were all related to the University in some capacity.

I'm not anti-learning. I object to somebody else dictating the set of superficial knowledge I need to learn.

Agreed, I had to learn Shakespeare and poetry in english classes at school. That has had absolutely zero positive impact on my life since then.

(I was good at science and maths type things, so it was painful to learn as well as me being really bad at it. I failed the exam two years in a row.)

Actually thinking back, being forced to read some books that I was not interested in (chosen by someone else), and write a report about what was great about it probably put me off reading novels for a good few years afterwards. It was a like an enlightenment when someone described a book to me that sounded interesting to me, I read it and enjoyed it (even learned from it).

It's not a demand it's advice. Advice that I believe is very valuable and have been for me as I am working as a designer i a technology driven industry.

Each to their own but you seem to be against this for the wrong reasons.

SOrry, I meant the well-meaning curriculum writers in my hometown. No offense!

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