Quote:
Originally Posted by ModusOperandi
You're not being naive. You're being very realistic. Life is definitely not fair. My question however, was designed to place more emphasis on just how much the degree factors into this entire thing. The so-called "cheater" was more than ready for the job. He has the same degree the qualified person has, thus gaining him the job he didn't really deserve. That's why I argue that "degrees" generally prove nothing except that you have them... whether or not you put the work into them.
EDIT: And I think you're giving degrees too much credit.
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While I find it hard to disagree with drop rates and success rates, How do you measure the skill of an individual who might be gifted theoretically but can't work practically?
How do you begin assessing how the drop/success rates in your particular institution compares to another institution that might produce an equally, if not skilled, individual of the same field of study?
You can have an education in a certain field of study whether or not you have a degree. I'm assuming your friends are more skilled to a specific field of study that does not pertain to yours. If what you say about them is true, then they can be capable in their respective area of knowledge and not yours. If I somehow misunderstood and you meant that they're more skilled than you in the same filed, but you only have the paper to show it...then I fail to see the argument here.
I may be reading too much into this but, judging from your statement about sociology and your considering your friends knowledge as useless, I seem to get the notion that because you're pursuing an education in mathematics and physics, you think you're more important. I apologize if I'm reading you wrong.
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While reading your first paragraph, I can't help but wonder... Do you believe that there really are a lot of people that cheat to get their degrees? I don't know where you're from, and how exams are taken, but from my experience, where I've had exams, it's really hard to cheat. And even the people that do cheat, they hardly ever cheat to get really good grades... most of them do it just to secure a pass. So in the end, things are still very different between, someone that cheats to gets a 10/20, and someone that studies to get 17/20.
Another thing I couldn't help but wonder is; so what if the cheater gets the job? If it's a job related to his degree, sooner or later he'll get caught out, he'll get fired, and someone that deserves the position gets it.
lol, touché! I think you're not giving degrees enough credit, so it's obvious you think the opposite of me!
You know, you seem to be getting into way too much detail with this. It seems like you think I'm saying the current system is perfect! No one is saying that without qualifications you're screwed because it proves that you're stupid. Heck, if we take the amount of money you make as a decider for your success in life, I think it's 4 or 6 of the worlds 10 richest men either didn't go to university or they dropped out! Obviously these people are very talented, they don't have degrees, and they're successful! No one said you're screwed without a degree. But until we find a perfect system that judges ALL our abilities, from theoretical, to practical, to physical, to concentration, to linguistics etc etc, we have to use higher education and degrees.
Yes, you can have a certain field of education with or without a degree, but the friends in question, they're smart, and they don't have a specific field of education. They just have the ability to understand and assimilate things.
If look at our brains as hard drives. They would have something like 100Gb of data, where as I would have 20Gb of data. My 20Gb is full of Math and Science, theirs is full of a million different subjects, but never knowing any of those subjects well enough! So to an employer searching for someone smart with knowledge of Math, I'd be a better candidate. My friends are smarter than me, but they haven't proved their competences in Math. They could end up sucking at Math if they tried studying it deeply!
You're judging society! Not me! As I said in previous post, it's not me that decided the A-level qualification of Social Studies is useless. I only spoke about the qualification, not the field of study! As for the useless knowledge, that's just common sense. If I have knowledge about psychology, Math, Engineering, history, football, basketball etc and I go to apply for a job as lifeguard, my knowledge is useless!!
The only person that's ever thought that math and physics makes me part of the "elite" is my old fashioned parents! You probably didn't read my posts before, that's why you think what you think! I hope I've cleared things up!