NYCPHP Meetup

[Peter Sawczynec]

Think of the quickly growing popularity of tags on the internet which
show graphically the (expected and often unexpected) relationships
between ideas and concepts in the results of a topic search. 

Or think of the movie Cube (also Cube 2, Cube 3) which is essentially
about some mathematical construct that shows that when you are
positioned inside a cube that theoretically all six of the inside walls
of your cube are simultaneously acting as the outside wall of a whole
set of cubes that are all pressed against each of the walls of your
cube. And all those cubes have more cubes pressing against their walls.
Creating this infinite expanse of cubes that are all interlocked by the
touching cube walls.

I forget even the theoretical purpose of this infinite cube construct or
why scientists have devised it, but it does seem to vividly show how
everything is connected rather infinitely and complexly. And that nature
is infinitely complex and interrelated at all levels from micro to the
massively macro scale of super complex galaxy groups that are bonded by
gravitational pull. 

Bear in mind there is a known psychological profile that shows that some
people really don't want maximum success, that they purposefully
self-sabotage their maximum career success because they have deep
personal feelings that are at odds with their ambitions. Commonly, as it
turns out, on a deeply personal level many people really just don't like
the constant responsibility associated with maximum career success.  Or,
of course, many people have serious issues with money: they feel it is
dirty, not a noble objective, very material and that the desire to gain
heaps of money is a bad reflection on their otherwise more pure personal
ethic. And if money was a bitter family contention when one was a child,
those bittersweet memories may make many like kryptonite in your hands. 

The net net of this note is that this webmaster test discussion quickly
uncovered how everything that is going on in one's life is all
intertwined: business choices and paths, education history, friendship
model, the feng shui of your home and neighborhood, even your health
issues and how you eat, how you decide to express and present yourself,
even how you deal with your sleeping dreams: all these matters are
interrelated and affecting the moment by moment outcome of everything in
your life. (Did you know it has been shown that people who sleep next to
each other affect the content each other's dreams, even causing each
other's dreaming to start and stop in harmony.)

One may need to look into many aspects of their life to find where is
the crux of the current obstacle/problem/issue(s) at hand: is the
stumbling block here in the task that is before me or over there where I
never eat right at breakfast and then I cannot concentrate. Or eating
too little for extended periods makes me somewhat grouchy and sharp
tongued causing me to appear flinty with coworkers when not intended. Or
is a toothache I don't correct distracting me at all times... 

The webmaster test thread shows clearly how everything (seems like
everything) is interrelated and you cannot discuss or look for the
answer to an issue within a single sphere of life/business. Look a layer
up or down, look a strata to the left. It is all a sliding scale of
grays, even what appears black and white is just real dark and very
light gray.

Peter  

-----Original Message-----
From: talk-bounces at lists.nyphp.org [mailto:talk-bounces at lists.nyphp.org]
On Behalf Of David Krings
Sent: Wednesday, April 16, 2008 11:43 PM
To: NYPHP Talk
Subject: Re: [nycphp-talk] Re: OT: webmaster test

Christopher R. Merlo wrote:
> On Wed, Apr 16, 2008 at 5:02 PM, David Krings <ramons at gmx.net 
> <mailto:ramons at gmx.net>> wrote:
> 
>     A university is supposed to train interested candidates in a field
>     of choice with the goal to make them subject matter experts in
that
>     field.
> 
> 
> That's actually not true, and your apparent belief in this untruth is 
> probably what has led to your seemingly very strongly felt distaste
for 
> university education.

Huh? I got two university degrees and did so voluntarily. So what you
say is 
clearly not the case. My point is that someone who for example takes a
BSEE 
program at Alfred State College is required to have 132 credits for 
graduation. From those 132 credits 60 credit hours are for liberal arts 
classes and other sciences that are non-major. Not all of those may be
totally 
off topic, but I don't get why a BSEE student has to take american
history 
again or take an arts course (or even more than just one). The 13 years
K-12 
ought to have covered that. I also think that a high school graduate
should be 
capable of properly expressing thoughts in speech and writing and not
needing 
yet another round of English courses. I got my BSEE degree at a non-US 
university in a seven semester program with a total of 154 credits and
as 
mentioned before only 3 courses were not that much related to
engineering.

> The purpose of a college or university is to provide the student with
an 
> education, so that the student may go on to contribute back to
society.  

Ah, c'mon! Reading books to children or planting trees or donating blood
or 
driving people to their doctor's appointments - that is giving back to 
society. Getting a university degree is for the sake of getting a better
job 
with better pay and ideally get some more exposure to a subject that one

likes. How does getting a degree in finance and becoming a greedy
investment 
banker give back to society? I can see getting a degree in social work
being 
something that gives back to society. Or do you mean that graduates get
better 
paying jobs and thus pay more taxes and that helps funding government
programs?


I agree with the rest that you wrote and I don't think it collides with
what I 
wrote earlier. My point is that compared to other countries US
universities 
focus way too much on a broad education rather than on transferring 
specialized skills and knowledge of a specific subject. And I think that
is 
why foreign workers especially in IT have an advantage. I'm not saying
that an 
extra writing course is useless or that art history is utterly
unimportant, 
but I think that is something that shouldn't be part of a university
program.

David
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