Random Practicality

[punkgrrrlie10]

So I was thinking today about how useful everything I've learned in law school is. It's all geared toward practice and use in the real world and I remembered how useless my major in college was (philosophy) and how I never really learned anything in high school or below that has any pragmatic value with the exception of basic math maybe for grocery shopping. All of the subjects were basically to take a more detailed academic course or to stump trivia goers. However, there was one class which I thank my counselor today for forcing me to take.

Typing. I'd be lost w/o it.

Anyone else find use for their academics in the "real world"?

[whoreable]

I fucking wish. But then again I guess I will really find out when I search for a job at the end of the summer :(

College is a scam.

[The Retro Kat]

Typing was my only useful class, too.

[Matt Harty]

Well i'm not out of school yet, but I did take a typing class my freshman year.

It just made me able to type stupid things faster. :( :(

[noob3]

I taught myself to type, I only type with my thumbs/index fingers. I type around 125 WPM.

Wop.

[punkgrrrlie10]

College is a scam.

That it is. :/

I only went to college b/c I had to in order to go to law school...Let me tell you how much of what I learned in college I use now....

Every once in a while I impress people that I speak Japanese and I impress Chinese nationals that I know about the Nanjing massacre.

Tell me that 5 years and 15 grand wasn't worth THAT!

[Blackjack]

Are you KIDDING? I pride my education in making me the well rounded asset to society that I am. Ahem.

Like, uugh, history! Yes, we got to learn about stuff like the Hundred Years war! A whole century of genocide against the French! I love the way America has this fascination with Medieval fantasy - you have to fabricate your own romantic ideas of Robin Hood and Prince Charming just because you have no real, proper history like Europe or Asia.

And what about Religious studies? Hell, when I was just 13 I got to write an essay about the fucking Holocaust! Ok, so actually doing the work sucked, but finding out about another, totally unrelated subject of genocide more than made up for it!!

Generally though, Academia is useless when it's purely for scholarly value... I fucking did three years of LATIN for christsakes! But overall, I tried to pay attention in class and just picking up on bits and pieces of info here and there, you find it comes in handy at some point.

Now I'm just babbling :(

[Sethomas]

I can hardly go grocery shopping without having to integrate complex trig functions. :(

[whoreable]

I wouldnt even mind if I had to take more math or history. but I feel like I am not only taking classes that dont teach me a damn thing that I will use but all they encompass is memorization. I wish I had a class were I had to solve a real life problem or at least learn something that interests me. I guess some of the minor accounting and finance classes could come in handy, but I dont feel like I got much outta them.

I hate school. I hate my major. I have no idea what the fuck I am gonna do. I am not nearly as educated as I feel I should be to get a good job. Well I guess the only purpose to college anymore is to get that damn job to hire you then train you :(

I wish I had taken it upon myself through out high school and college to better educate myself in useful areas instead of wasting it away staring at the fucking wall daydreaming in every fucking class now I feel like a worthless piece of shit for being an ignorant bastard.

[Les Waste]

I'm getting a double major in English and journalism (two degrees in only four and half years, baby!) which is really weird because journalism is really, really practical and useful and shit, and English is completely worthless. I think it works out well that way, having a useless degree and a useful degree.

Just look in the employment section of the newspaper for all the job openings for people with experience with Quark Xpress. Yet you never see any job openings for people who can compare the viewpoints of radical feminists versus new historicists versus new critics on J.M. Coetzee's "Foe." Funny, I guess.

[The Unseen]

You daydreamed in high school and got into college. I didnt know that. No more trying for me :)

[Helm]

...who can compare the viewpoints of radical feminists versus new historicists versus new critics on J.M. Coetzee's "Foe."

I feel a moral obligation to debate this issue now. Which means I have to read that "Foe" thing.

Anyway, my current and future dealings with the happy world of philosophy, I like to believe have some actual bearing to how I percieve life. Especially morality and ethics, I suppose are always relevant, so I'm not complaining.

[punkgrrrlie10]

Anyway, my current and future dealings with the happy world of philosophy, I like to believe have some actual bearing to how I percieve life. Especially morality and ethics, I suppose are always relevant, so I'm not complaining

Your perception will be what when you ask people if they want fries with that? Who says anything about philosophy being happy? If anything it's miserable b/c you are constantly searching for an answer which isn't there, nor will it ever be.

[Les Waste]

I feel a moral obligation to debate this issue now. Which means I have to read that "Foe" thing.
Oh God, please don't. It's not a bad book, and it's a lot more interesting take on the Robinson Crusoe story, but nothing ruins books more than literary theory. It won't really enrich your life to read something and know that T.S. Eliot thinks you should evaluate it without taking into consideration the historical context of when it was written.

:(

[kellychaos]

Especially morality and ethics, I suppose are always relevant, so I'm not complaining.

Now what "practical" use can morals and ethics be to a lawyer. That's just silly. :)

P.S. Seriously though, don't you find at least some of philosophy such as formal logic useful in legal debate?

[punkgrrrlie10]

Only the real basic modus ponens and tollens. My "metatheory of symbolic logic" doesn't do shit.

[Captain Robo]

Education is one of the most important things in this world. Nothing and no-one is sadder than a person who throws it away.

[punkgrrrlie10]

It has nothing to do with throwing it away at all. It has to do w/it not being useful in any other way than "enjoying being enlightened" which doesn't put food on the table.

If I'm at the grocery store I'm not like "damn, I should've taken calc 3 instead of stopping at calc 2.

If I'm putting together a shelf for my room I'm not like "damn, the symbolism in the Great Gatsby is so useful to me hammering in these nails".

[Helm]

Your perception will be what when you ask people if they want fries with that?

Clarify for the inept greek, please. I'm not sure I understand.

Who says anything about philosophy being happy? If anything it's miserable b/c you are constantly searching for an answer which isn't there, nor will it ever be.

That wasn't supposed to be taken seriously. If anything, philosophers are the most miserable people in the world. Ignorance is indeed bliss. I am not happy. But being happy in overrated. Being aware of what you are is more important. That's what I'm trying.


Les Waste: good point. I was being half serious anyway.

Only the real basic modus ponens and tollens. My "metatheory of symbolic logic" doesn't do shit.

The basics of a formal philosophical debate should be taught in school at the ninth grade, in my oppinion. Would make this a saner place. As to metatheory of symbolic logic(is there such a thing? I thought you were making a hyperbolized point on general post-modernistic philosophy) I agree there doesn't seem to be much in terms of practical application, but I think there is. No philosophical system is completely devoid of it's utilitarian approach, not even solipsism(the belief that nothing else can be proven than one's existance, and that thus everything else besides that is a figment of one's imagination).


It has nothing to do with throwing it away at all. It has to do w/it not being useful in any other way than "enjoying being enlightened" which doesn't put food on the table.

I'm not going to judge the way you live. But if it was me, I'd wonder more about what's the life I'm trying to support with putting food on the table, than actually doing the latter. I have no desire to live a life based on ambition instilled in me by my social enviroment and genetic makeup, without questioning it's every aspect. This is essentially philosophical seeking, and thus, the more important aspect of living. But what do I know? My father pays my bills.

[punkgrrrlie10]

Clarify for the inept greek, please. I'm not sure I understand.


It means the only job you can get with a philosophy degree is the same one you'd get w/o it, with the exception of perhaps getting your PhD and then teaching. So your philosophy degree basically is only good to get you into grad school and other than that has no monetary value in the real world.

As to metatheory of symbolic logic(is there such a thing? I thought you were making a hyperbolized point on general post-modernistic philosophy)

yes. I took metatheory at UCLA. It was the most crackhead version of logic I've ever seen and the teacher, as all philosophy teachers do, would angrily pace back and forth as he taught and looked more like a ranting madman than a professor.

My father pays my bills.

:/ . Come back to this thread when you pay your own.

[kellychaos]

It has nothing to do with throwing it away at all. It has to do w/it not being useful in any other way than "enjoying being enlightened" which doesn't put food on the table.



A perfect student of Charles Sanders Peirce and James ... and you say you don't use philophy much. :)

I've had to take a lot of mathematics towards my computer science degree and found that formal logic is pretty useful in formal proofs and, at times, some programming. Much of the other things I've learned in some basic philosophy classes more or less amounts to self-improvement and/or "enlightment" which may make you and interesting conversationalist at parties as long as you don't push it so hard that you become boorish. As for practical use in the job market, I'd have to agree with you that one of the few forms of employment that you'll find with it is in teaching it too others. It's not like you can roam the local ville like Socrates and make a living out of corrupting students ... even HE had a side job as a mason ... a fella's gotta eat ... and I'm not too crazy about the taste of hemlock. :)