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Author Topic: Why do people shit on/dislike arts?  (Read 16670 times)  Share 

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keltingmeith

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Re: Why do people shit on/dislike arts?
« Reply #15 on: December 16, 2014, 10:27:49 pm »
0
What you learn in philosophy is not a skill that can get you a job, but something more profound - a mentality, a mindset, a Weltanschauung, that will ultimately help you to make better decisions, and live a more fulfilling life.

I would argue that philosophy does teach you skills, though. (plus everything else you wrote. A++)

As well insight, philosophy teaches logic and it helps one see both sides to the coin. I've learned more about problem solving, logic and the world simply from my discussions with friends studying philosophy than I have from any formal education I have received. I honestly can't think of a single employer who wouldn't see these as incredibly valuable skills, and it's just up to the philosophy graduate to show their employer that philosophy gave them those skills to seem vocationally capable.

kandinsky

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Re: Why do people shit on/dislike arts?
« Reply #16 on: December 16, 2014, 10:35:32 pm »
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May us well include a little anecdote from Diogenes Laertius here:

'A man once said to Aristippus, "In what respect will my son be the better for being instructed [in philosophy]?" "At least," replied Aristippus, " he will gain this advantage, that he will not sit in the theatre as a stone upon a stone"'

Education ought to be an environment of learning rather than an environment of pathetic 'I'm doing a superior degree because it will get me a job in which I will earn more cash money on average in my opinion' games.

Here's another quip from Aristippus I might as well add:

'Aristippus, being asked what he had gained by the study of philosophy, replied, "To be able to converse readily with all people."'
« Last Edit: December 16, 2014, 10:39:54 pm by kandinsky »

Chazef

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Re: Why do people shit on/dislike arts?
« Reply #17 on: December 16, 2014, 11:20:04 pm »
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From my experience, and this is just my experience, there are people who feel like there are important questions and life that need to be answered, and they go and explore those questions and get into philosophy, and there are people who don't think it's important and go without the feeling of emptiness. I don't think I've ever heard of somebody feeling empty due to not having explored philosophy in their late lives (I have heard of people feeling empty and finding religions which are largely anti-intellectual in my opinion) but again this is just my experience.

With regards to the idea of philosophy fixing emptiness, I don't think there's much of a guarantee. It sure is enjoyable for the mind to chew away at philosophical ideas and apply them to social issues, but my journey has been pretty quickly towards nihilism and I don't know if that was for the better. It was going to happen one way or another and it's sure better than believing in something like hell but what I'm saying is that some people go the route of 'you make up your own meaning of life' and 'the finiteness of life makes it all the more precious' but I can't really get around those ideas and I don't think that's an intellectual thing but more of a reflection of personality. What I'm trying to say is that if you're looking to philosophy as a cure to feeling empty, be aware of where you might end up. Just because it's intellectually fulfilling doesn't mean it will necessarily be emotionally or spiritually fulfilling.
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90+FTW

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Re: Why do people shit on/dislike arts?
« Reply #18 on: December 17, 2014, 12:05:52 am »
+4
Quote
Obviously at Melbourne University with the 'Melbourne Model' - Arts is just a gateway degree into a post-graduate (for those interested in doing it).

Exactly. I couldn't have said it better myself, many people including myself are simply doing it because it is a gateway into law, medicine or other things. Don't get me wrong, Arts has offered me things that will significantly contribute to my Juris Doctor but in some aspects, I do perceive it as an obstacle. Or rather, something that "I just have to do" (had a great convo with my professor about this). The JD at UniMelb is my dream and it offers me the perfect pathway into Oxford (an even bigger dream), with other elite universities at hand. Going to another University wouldn't have provided me with such an opportunity so going to UniMelb was necessary and completing the BA was complementary.  Now, I could've thrown myself into Law at some other University but the reality is clear, UniMelb has a fantastic reputation and sadly in this day and age that means a lot. To demonstrate, I recently visited Slater and Gorden, a law firm near my house. I asked them whether completing the JD at UniMelb was really worth the undergrad stress and they told me that if two lawyers approached them with the exact same resume, except one completed law at some uni and the other studied at UniMelb, they would take the second candidate in "a heartbeat." This seems to be the general consensus with those I've spoken to so I realized that undertaking the JD at UniMelb WAS worth it, which consequently meant that completing a Bachelor of Arts there was as well. Sometimes in order to accomplish your dreams you have drag yourself through the unpleasantries that will prepare you for success. This reinforces the notion that it's simply a gateway for many students. Then again, I can only speak from personal experiences. I feel that it's provided so many students with practical and functional skills, I can't imagine it ever being called "useless."

I really don't know why people shit on it but I have to say, I've only encountered this hatred on AN. Never have I ever met anyone whose bagged Arts on campus and I have a lot of friends from biomed and commerce who are very fond of BA :/
Funnily enough I have met a lot of people who have completed Arts and now have extremely wonderful jobs so again...I have no idea where this prejudice is coming from.

In regards to philosophy. I really think the subject is more...foundational in a sense? By that I mean, while it doesn't necessarily  look good on your resume ALONE, it can certainly be used to 'bump' up your other skills. For example, and I hate to use law again but, many law firms look fondly upon lawyers who have completed philosophy because it is a subject designed to strengthen your analytical and reasoning abilities, which is critical in law and in many other disciplines. I'm not sure if this is making sense, but it's what I mean by foundational so I don't even believe philosophy is "useless" - don't know why it's getting so much attention in this topic.

Not doing philosophy as a major or minor, so please correct me if I'm wrong.
« Last Edit: December 17, 2014, 12:58:49 am by 90+FTW »

EEEEEEP

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Re: Why do people shit on/dislike arts?
« Reply #19 on: December 17, 2014, 12:14:32 am »
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I'm still really confused as to what I should do :(.

90+FTW

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Re: Why do people shit on/dislike arts?
« Reply #20 on: December 17, 2014, 12:25:44 am »
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I'm still really confused as to what I should do
You don't whether you want to do it as part of a double degree or just a single one. May I ask what EXACTLY you want to do, in terms of a possible career or pathway? Philosophy, English Lit, Psych etc???

brightsky

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Re: Why do people shit on/dislike arts?
« Reply #21 on: December 17, 2014, 03:09:19 am »
+3
From my experience, and this is just my experience, there are people who feel like there are important questions and life that need to be answered, and they go and explore those questions and get into philosophy, and there are people who don't think it's important and go without the feeling of emptiness. I don't think I've ever heard of somebody feeling empty due to not having explored philosophy in their late lives (I have heard of people feeling empty and finding religions which are largely anti-intellectual in my opinion) but again this is just my experience.

With regards to the idea of philosophy fixing emptiness, I don't think there's much of a guarantee. It sure is enjoyable for the mind to chew away at philosophical ideas and apply them to social issues, but my journey has been pretty quickly towards nihilism and I don't know if that was for the better. It was going to happen one way or another and it's sure better than believing in something like hell but what I'm saying is that some people go the route of 'you make up your own meaning of life' and 'the finiteness of life makes it all the more precious' but I can't really get around those ideas and I don't think that's an intellectual thing but more of a reflection of personality. What I'm trying to say is that if you're looking to philosophy as a cure to feeling empty, be aware of where you might end up. Just because it's intellectually fulfilling doesn't mean it will necessarily be emotionally or spiritually fulfilling.

The first paragraph above reminds me of Plato's Allegory of the Cave, which, although rather elitist in the way that it puts philosophers on a pedestal, still has some merit. Of course, prior to exposure to questions such as 'How should one live?', 'Does induction secure truth?', 'Are moral properties objective?', and 'What is the relationship between the mind and the body?', no one would think that there is any need to ponder them. Such is the relevance of the aforementioned questions to life, however, that I believe no one would be uninterested in discovering the answers to them once they have been properly introduced to the questions. For example, many students these days go through high school under the impression that the science is moving closer and closer towards the truth. Students who have studied the scientific method would know that science is based on inductive reasoning. Prior to their exposure to the problems of induction, no student would think to question science. However, as soon as they are exposed to David Hume's critique of induction, it is impossible for students not to re-evaluate their views; if induction is flawed, then the whole institution of science would come crashing down. Clearly, a lot is at stake, which is why I think that questions such as 'Does induction secure truth?' cannot be properly ignored. Of course, there are those who have been exposed to such questions but are content to proceed through life with their heads in the clouds. I would argue that such people do experience bouts of intellectual hunger every now and then; they simply ignore these feelings by sticking their head back up into the clouds. By 'empty', I meant 'intellectual empty' rather than 'emotionally empty'. While religions such as Christianity usually do a pretty good job of mitigating emotional emptiness, for a host of reasons, I do not believe that they hold the key to alleviating intellectual emptiness, as you mentioned yourself.

I think that philosophy, if done properly, is guaranteed to make an individual intellectually 'fuller'. To me, philosophy is more a mode of thinking, rather than an exercise involving the selection of, and subsequent subscription to, a doctrine that 'sounds about right'. To many, determinism seems to be the ultimate implication of science; since science operates on the principle of induction, it also necessarily operates on the principle of cause and effect. It seems then, from the outside, that if we are to take the word of science as gospel, then we must accept that event in the world is caused by another event, and that we do not have any ability to break this causal chance. Quickly, people develop a nihilistic perspective on life; if everything I do, I do not of my own conscious volition, but rather under influence of some previous event that has already taken place, then what meaning is there to life? It seems then that life has no real meaning. Many people don't like this conclusion, and so choose to ignore the question entirely out of utility. But ignoring the question does nothing to 'fill' an individual up, intellectually speaking. Deep inside, the individual is still unsatisfied and hungry for answers. Philosophy helps to alleviate this hunger, and involves, not the mindless acceptance but the critical assessment of the doctrine of determinism. How much truth is contained within the doctrine? What are the alternatives? Which doctrine seems to reflect reality more on the basis of my experience? Until such questions are answered, the individual will remain empty, unless he chooses to stick his head back up into the clouds.

It is also important to understand that philosophy is not about finding the view that is most useful for an individual to hold. It is about finding that one view which agrees entirely with one's observations of reality. To use a hackneyed analogy, philosophy is all about choosing the red pill, rather than the blue pill. Of course, the truth might not be convenient, but denying the truth is never the way to go. It may be the case that determinism is true, and that we have no control over our own actions. Such a truth might initially be emotionally scarring, but no good can come out of actively denying this truth. Of course, if such a doctrine does not agree with everyday experience, then something may be wrong with the doctrine itself. But if one is convinced that the doctrine reflects reality as it is, then it is potentially dangerous to simply ignore it. Just like Neo had to learn to come to terms with the fact that he lives in a Matrix, one must then learn to embrace this inconvenient truth, for only then does one have any hope of obtaining true intellectual and emotional fulfilment.
« Last Edit: December 17, 2014, 03:12:08 am by brightsky »
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brenden

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Re: Why do people shit on/dislike arts?
« Reply #22 on: December 17, 2014, 06:50:04 am »
+2
Thought I'd also take the opportunity to point out that a Science degree is about as employable as an Arts degree, but lots of people don't realise this (or seem to care once it's pointed out to them) because bandwagons.
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Russ

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Re: Why do people shit on/dislike arts?
« Reply #23 on: December 17, 2014, 08:08:36 am »
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A science degree has plenty of jobs that it directly leads into though, an arts degree is much more abstract. Do Science, major in geology, get job in WA. Major in a lab-based subject, get job as lab technician.
Arts doesn't have the clear cut link/direction for graduates, although I guess it might be as employable if you looked at numbers.

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Re: Why do people shit on/dislike arts?
« Reply #24 on: December 17, 2014, 09:12:01 am »
+1
Thought I'd also take the opportunity to point out that a Science degree is about as employable as an Arts degree, but lots of people don't realise this (or seem to care once it's pointed out to them) because bandwagons.

Yep. I'd wager that there's an oversupply of people with generic 'biomed' majors at the moment, so getting a biomed degree or a BSc with a 'biomed' major is less employable then many arts majors (which at least set you up with generic reading/writing/research skills.)

Lab technician jobs do exist, but they're difficult to get into with just a pass degree.

I really don't know why people shit on it but I have to say, I've only encountered this hatred on AN. Never have I ever met anyone whose bagged Arts on campus and I have a lot of friends from biomed and commerce who are very fond of BA :/
Funnily enough I have met a lot of people who have completed Arts and now have extremely wonderful jobs so again...I have no idea where this prejudice is coming from.

Eh, I see it a lot in the popular media, making jokes out of 'useless' degrees (arts is literally the same as underwater basket weaving.) That said, a lot of more theoretical science isn't immune to this either.
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kandinsky

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Re: Why do people shit on/dislike arts?
« Reply #25 on: December 17, 2014, 10:02:25 am »
+5
Just following on from the last few posts.

I think the key is not so much the degree you do but how well you do in it. No doubt there are heaps of Biomed students who got low 50s marks who didn't get into med and are struggling to work out what to do. And no doubt it is the same with all other degree types.

Doing well is what counts more than the undergrad degree type.

keltingmeith

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Re: Why do people shit on/dislike arts?
« Reply #26 on: December 17, 2014, 11:54:28 am »
+1
A science degree has plenty of jobs that it directly leads into though, an arts degree is much more abstract. Do Science, major in geology, get job in WA. Major in a lab-based subject, get job as lab technician.

Doesn't quite work that way... I dare you to find a geology job that requires anything less than honours. You'll be searching for a while. And to be a lab technician, you're honestly better off getting a diploma at a TAFE - the person with the TAFE diploma and relevant experience will always be picked over the BSc student.

No - I reckon arts degrees are, if anything, MORE employable than someone with a science degree. If you really want to take your science degree anywhere, you HAVE to have honours - and by the end of the degree, a lot of science graduates don't want to keep that up, and so end up with a degree that can basically only land them a job in science communication. (and guess what - there's so few of those jobs around, your best bet is to do honours or masters to get there~)

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Re: Why do people shit on/dislike arts?
« Reply #27 on: December 17, 2014, 12:04:34 pm »
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I generally classify honours as part of the undergrad degree. It's an extension of what you learned, not an entirely new degree with new qualifications. What part of the job market does an arts degree streamline your entry into? You're trying to leverage the skills you learned into various different settings rather than a clearcut process.

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Re: Why do people shit on/dislike arts?
« Reply #28 on: December 17, 2014, 12:19:24 pm »
+4
I generally classify honours as part of the undergrad degree. It's an extension of what you learned, not an entirely new degree with new qualifications. What part of the job market does an arts degree streamline your entry into? You're trying to leverage the skills you learned into various different settings rather than a clearcut process.

Lol seriously?

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slothpomba

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Re: Why do people shit on/dislike arts?
« Reply #29 on: December 17, 2014, 02:06:09 pm »
+11
There are two categories of people at work here. (1) Those who take shots at arts just as a random situational joke, they probably don't really give a shit. They'll make jokes about say ice-skating too if the topic comes up. (2) Those who actually think the arts are totally useless and really do care about it, a more asshole infested but thankfully way smaller slice of people. I like how many people are talking in third person here because they're too afraid to put their neck on the line as well.

What i see here is what i believe is a problem with the wider mindset of this community. It's all too focused on the results, the prestige, the money. We've seen here time and time again students who only ultimately care about the results and the ATAR score. They don't really give a massive toss about the subject or learning for the joy of learning, they want the best way to get the best results. Now, there is nothing necessarily wrong with that but it is a single-minded focus.

What people are doing here is translating a complex thing into a mere economic transaction. If it cant be used to make you money, then of course, it is totally useless. People have studied the humanities for centuries and i can guarantee you they didn't do it to make money, even now its fairly acknowledged its not the most likely path to become extremely wealthy (which i call greed). Learning for the sake of learning is a beautiful thing, learning is a great pleasure in life. People should be allowed to further their knowledge.

As for the CSP argument, do you know how little money is spent on each students degree? Especially in light of the fact that arts is a rather cheap degree to administer (you dont need labs, workforce more casualised, etc). It probably comes to maybe $30,000 max, if not less. That's chump change, its peanuts for a one off expense. Do you know how much in taxes someone will pay over an entire lifetime? I wouldn't be surprised that if over a working life it would approach something like $1,000,000 for some people. If you are targeting waste of tax money and government expense, boy have you really, really picked the wrong battle here.

I totally disagree with those who say that you could learn it over the internet, its total bullshit. You could probably kind of learn engineering over the internet as well but it wouldn't really be the same. I know many here are young and grew up with the internet (a good internet) being omnipresent but honestly, the internet doesn't contain everything in academia or even a slice of it. There is so much that simply isn't easily accessible on the internet for your average person, it just isn't there. It's in journals, its in the mind of professors, its in academic libraries. Having studied both arts and science i can confidently say so much knowledge resides within the walls of the universities and the minds of professors which i never, ever would have otherwise came across or had access to.

I've pretty much finished the science portion of my degree and its not much more employable than arts to be totally honest. In my first year, even then still, when asked, kids wanted to be "a scientist". Here's the problem though, there is no "scientist" job, there's no neat path. You've got slim chances at anything good with just an undergrad. Only about 40-60% of science graduates end up in science in some capacity as well (they only told us just before we were going to finish as well). All generalist undergraduate degrees are fairly useless for neatly slotting you into an easy career path.

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