LOL. One of the most depressing things about being an engineering major is walking across a campus filled with hot, young women and seeing the very subpar selection of females in your class. There's usually a big,fat, middle-aged Russian woman, some class B fobs, and maybe an Indian lady with a red dot. I hope I'm not offending anyone.
You are misusing the term "chicks" when referring to female engineering students. If the non-makup wearing, bad hair, no-tan type are your cup of tea, then you should check out the local computer lab.
so true. thing is, a decent looking engineering grad (female) probably has a huge advantage when looking for a job.
Yeah, our society needs more work on showing some love for engineers so they can be idolized.... Hollywood movies should stick Tom Cruise type as the nosy engineer who solves everything instead of a Jeff Goldblum type. Instead of 50 series of cops, lawyers, and doctors, they should have a engineer show with CSI production values. "The roof is going to collapse!" "With this shaving cream foam, dry concrete, and water gun, I'm already halfway towards designing a makeshift roof with 200% tolerance!" Little known fact... MacGuyver went to engineering night classes. ESPN starts airing World Series of Engineering competitions. Fox Sports would then cover college divisions. Ugly faces would coincidentally get weeded out in the prelims. Rumors of fixing the games would run rampant, but the public doesn't seem to notice.
The system is set up so that average person doesn need to think too much, they only need to fill a roll. Or you can say, that Americans don't think too much because the system is so much better.
But if too many people go to college or get advanced science/engineering degrees, then who's going to operate your local Walmarts, McDonald's, Best Buys, and Sears? I think the education system here is designed to seperate the college-bound from the service industry-bound. Since there are a limited number of jobs available for college grads, then it's a good thing that more people don't go to college, or otherwise there will be less jobs around and more competition. Why else do you think the unemployment rate has always been pretty low here in the US? In Europe college is accessible and cheap, so unemployment is consistently higher. Just throwing this theory out there...
Very interesting thread with lots of interesting stuff here. I have a harder time judging anti-intellectualism in regard to economics. Intelligence is a huge advantage in a capitalistic system but the fact that most MBA's out earn PHD's isn't a reflection on anti-intelligence. At the same time most engineers and doctors aren't poor and I think its a mistaken comparison to compare the salaries of pro-atheletes to PHD's in any field. For one there are so few pro-atheletes out there in the top sports that its difficult to get a good statistical comparison. If we were to take pro-atheletes of all sports including all of the minor leagues then I bet you would find that the median wage of a pro-athelete might be much lower than that of PHD's. I think the issue isn't anti-intelligence but anti-intellectual and that it is more of a cultural disdain for a certain class of people rather a dislike of intelligence. For instance it takes a lot of intelligence to be the QB of a West Coast style offense and I bet that Peyton Manning would do very well on various tests of intelligence regarding spatial reasoning, pattern recognition and intuitive reasoning. Over broad categories of intelligence Manning might be as intelligent, or more, as Steven Squires or David Sedaris but if you were to ask most people you encountered walking through any large American shopping mall I bet you many more could tell you who Peyton Manning is. I think that in general American culture has been suspicious of intellectuals culturally for a variety of reasons. One is that American was founded largely by people fleeing countries with rigid class definitions where education was the only available to the upper classes. The myth of the pioneer and self-made man also makes Americans look down upon intellectuals who represent traditional higher educated and elite cultural backgrounds, ie East Coast Ivy League Establishment. Historically also since most of American culture has been based on rural ideals than urban ones brawn and intuitive knowledge (street smarts, folk wisdom) is prized over formal education (book learning). Americans are considered, and consider themselves, culturally less advanced than Europeans because we haven't had the same tradition of urbanization like the Europe. Another factor is that mass media developed in the America and by its very nature celebrates the least common denominator. We like idiocy because even idiots can appreciate it. Further mass media flattens and homogenizes cultural knowledge while the goal of intellectualism is to appreciate a culture that is by its nature elite. Another thing that I believe has led to anti-intellectualism is that the US is far more religious than other developed countries. Not only is it religious but in a way that is highly suspect of even intellectual understanding of religion and more focused on faith and devotion. This is why the mega-churches of America aren't known for being great centers of scholarships like Damascus was in the flowering of Islam or great monasteries in the Middle Ages. This isn't to say that American Christians are dumb but its saying that they practice a type of Christianity that isn't intellectually rigorous and even looks down upon esoteric and skeptical approaches to religion. A devout American Christian might know a lot about the Bible I doubt that most have studied historical commentaries, debates and interpretations of it or approached it skeptically as say a Benedictine Monk or a devout Jew would of the Torah.
Wouldn't promoting the human sciences help bridge that gap? Of course, if people thought for themselves they wouldn't dare support a party of Bush or Kerry...
America is constantly trying to find new markets or mine old ones Influencing Kids to SPEND SPEND SPEND is part of the Capitalist system Companies want kids to spend they don't want kids to not spend Hell we don't clean or REINVEST in our water system because we don't wanna break up the water selling market we don't CURE anything any more becuase of the LEGAL drug cartels We don't reinvest properly in our schools be cause we want to PRIVATIZE so a NEW MARKET is created Same with Prisons We let things go bad so we can privatize and make new markets/capitalist ventures Rocket River
I don't agree at all with the statement that Martian man made. 1. Intellectual ends at the receiving end of a fist. Don't tell me the "tai zi" in Chinese schools don't beat up on the "bookworms" over there. In many cases extortion and bullying that goes on in those schools might be much worse. 2. Engineering fields are all Asian and because Americans goes for the cold hard cash. Once again, I disagree, I think a lot of Asians actually go into enginnering and science because it's the safe field monetarily (I know I did) and they have success because its something that can be gained through hard work. In my opionion some maybe worked too hard. However the a lot of top undergraduate engineers who are non - Asian are in it because they liked it (and the ones that don't fail out or transfer very early) and are the ones that seems to do well with very good work/life balanence. In the undergraduate level, the ratio of Asians to non-Asians isn't big at all. In fact, Asians still looks like a minority. I think the graduate schools does tip the scale to Asians, but that's because most of the non - Asian classmates I've talked to want to get a MBA and start their own engineering companies. They think they can create, succeed and innovate without going through another few years of school. Also a lot of the Asian graduate, master and phd students all seems to be foreign, and alot of them are getting that extra degree because they can't get a sponsorship for VISA and that's the only way to stay in the country. They are doing it for completely different reasons. 3. Definition of intellectuals I don't know how you would define intellectuals. I look at a lot of engineers as great calculation machines, but a lot of liberal art majors as intellectual thinkers. That's not to say that engineers can't be intellectuals (some can make code writing or Cadence drawing a beautiful artform). But I see a lot of "engineering work" capable of being replaced by programs and bots. 4. Work place intellectualism Don't make the argument between the salaries of phd and stockbroker (not to mention a good engineering/science phd can command six figures right out of school). But also look at Asia, how many top college students can't find a job these days? I know I've heard several instances in China, as it starts to open up more to free economy, where street smarts and personality won over academic credentials when it comes to work place success. It's not just in America where "intellectuals" are getting the shaft.
I believe at least to some degree we all can agree that too much anti-intellectualism is ungood for the country.
I think we really need to define this. As I said I don't think there is bias against intelligence in American culture but a bias against certain groups of people who are defined by their intelligence and higher learning. As I said before I think Peyton Manning, Jason Kidd, Ivan Rodriguez and Bill Belichek are geniuses and have brilliant minds capable of analyzing complex situations and drawing upon previous knowledge to develop solutions instantaneously. Pretty much no one is going to make fun of them for being nerds and brainiacs. The people who are looked down upon by larger society though are Mensa, the literati, scientists and engineers. Those people are primarily defined through purely mental pursuits that aren't considered viscerally engaging like sports. The other part is that for people like Mensa and the literati they define themselves specifically apart from the rest of culture and people. Part of being a literati / intellectual is disdain for popular culture. At the sametime most engineers and scientists are generally indifferent to popular culture because they're too engrossed in their research. So in some ways the disdain of American culture towards intellectuals is a two way street because its difficult to widely celebrate groups of people who themselves reject popular culture.
Sishir_Chang - You made some good points and addressed the points that I was thinking along the lines of. This topic is a vast and is woven into many different areas of society. I never claimed bullying only occurred in America. You bring up some good points on Asians. My point was, however, why less and less white people are joining the engineering and science fields, NOT why more and more Asians are joining the engineering and science fields. If engineering is safe, well-paid work, then shouldn't white people want to join? Yes, my definition of intellectuals was not to replace the universal meaning, rather it was to define it for this thread. I see that example was a poor example, however, I thought the point was clear. I see it was not and I think I said that in another post before, no? A lot of people already pointed it out. I never said America was the only place intellectuals are getting the shaft. USA is probably just the most apparent.
I should probably define 'shaft' or people may argue out of context. By getting shafted, I mean marginalized.
