Math and Science are bullshit.

[stpalm]

Seriously. Fuck them. I am not going to become an engineer, why do I have to waste my time studying things I don't like and am not good at? I think the Math curriculum should stop one year after Geometry, so everyone will forget the stuff they learned the last year and retain Geometry and previously learned math stuff. Science sucks too- I hate it! Hate it so much! I love English, History, Music Social Studies, etc. Those subjects are the ones that breed truly independent thinkers and allow students to learn the most! Math and science are just arbitrary systems forced upon students to figure out if kids can organize their brains, when frankly, I think kids should be able to organize their mind however they want!

[Lucky Luciano]

1. Sure, and never learning problem solving skills

sounds like a damn good idea!

:eyes:

Signed,
A mathematician putting his skills to extremely good use :)

[papau]

12. mathematician or mathemetician - always a question I couldn't answer

:-)

[Lucky Luciano]

13. oops! You are indeed right!

I do that all the time, but I know how to spell the damn word! I do it when typing....not writing :)

[tx_dem41]

34. Ummm...you spelled it right the first time.

It's mathematician.

[Lucky Luciano]

42. correctly spelled due to editing

:)

[tx_dem41]

46. D'oh! n/t

[Bouncy Ball]

2. Some people in GD who believe the brain, even when missing

can spontaneously re-grow itself, would agree with you. They definitely missed a year or two of science in school.

[Name removed]

8. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Left Is Write]

18. I think you're overreacting to her post.

She's neither an asshole nor pompous.

It would certainly appear that the people she's referring to have rejected at least one scientific certainty.

[Bouncy Ball]

22. I'd agree with Left is Write, you are overreacting.

My post was much more of a dig at those people than you. You just gave me a nice intro for it. ;-)

Now if you keep this up, I'm gonna start lumping you in with the drama queens of DU, too.

I'm KIDDING!

[Bok_Tukalo]

23. Drama queens?

We have drama queens?

[Bouncy Ball]

25. Heck yeah!

LOL

[intrepid_wanderer]

31. Uhmmm.. yeah!! n/t

[datasuspect]

48. bouncy

in all seriousness, i have a deeper respect for you because of your valiant efforts in that thread.

for those about to rock, i salute you . . .

[depakid]

3. Math is an integral part of the language of music-

and a working knowledge of analytic methods (statistics) is vital to any kind of critical thinking- especially in areas like history and "social studies."

Actually, I'm pretty sure you know that and were just being sarcastic...

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

4. Sure. That's what I thought when I was in high school, too.

And now, many years later, I have a good job in a field that requires a working knowledge of physics. You just never know how life will turn out. Why limit your future by cutting yourself off from a whole world of knowledge?

[NightTrain]

5. My strong points in school were English and Social Studies.

Those were the two classes in which I almost always got an "A." As far as Science went, I usually got a "B" or a "C," and I was pretty much a straight "C" math student.

Guess I'm just not a left-brain person. :shrug:

[Allenberg]

27. We have something in common, you and I.

[WindRavenX]

6. no way dudeq

Biology has transformed my life for the better- I write better, I think better- and come ON, mitochondria are just *darling* :D

[Wonk]

7. Ok, kid, turn off your computer and log off from the internet now

because there's an awful lot of math and science that went into making this discussion possible in the first place which you clearly don't appreciate yet.

[Name removed]

9. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Wonk]

15. Sarcasm is the apotheosis of genius

[Amfortas]

16. If there was sarcasm in your post ....

I don't see it ?? :shrug:

[Name removed]

26. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[intrepid_wanderer]

32. since you understand "sarcasm"

.. you should understand the facts many of the responders have embedded into sarcasm or at least some for of wit. your sarcasm is "cool & light-hearted"... theirs are "being assholes"

your turn to 'lighten-up'

[alwynsw]

41. Pay closer attention in your English classes.

There's a fine line between ranting and sarcasm. You fell a bit short.

You may have been dripping sarcastic inflection in your mind when you wrote it, but transferring it into "print" takes a bit more effort.

It came out as a rant. How do I know? I asked my wife, the retired teacher with an M.S. in Earth Sciences and an M.S. in English to grade it. BTW. She hated math as well.

[khashka]

10. You need 'em

Math and science teach you to think clearly, logically and rationally. Oh yeah, and understand how the world works.

It's only boring and stupid in the early days, once you really get into it it's fascinating.

I think walking is overrated. I did perfectly fine crawling as an infant. Walking is just a fascist plot. And don't even get me started on running or skipping.

Khash.

[stpalm]

11. Everyone can read my incredible thread

about the Democratic party before they leap to the conclusion that I am stupid.


http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=104&topic_id=3264831&mesg_id=3264831


careful people... this thread is HOT

[punpirate]

14. It's all meant to train your mind...

... and make it work well. Considering a variety of different problems helps make you sharp and keep you sharp.

You seem to be saying that only the humanities creates independent thinkers. Einstein had a pretty good grasp of world politics, music (though he didn't play violin particularly well himself, he did understand it) and sociology.... Some of the most engaging and entertaining writers have technical backgrounds in varying degrees--Stephen Jay Gould, Carl Sagan, John McPhee, etc. Some of the most serious physicists in the world think rather deeply about the ethics of their work (look at, for example, the origins of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists). I don't think, for example, that Thomas Pynchon could have written Gravity's Rainbow if he didn't have more than a passing knowledge of technical matters.

In the 18th and 19th centuries and well into the 20th, one had to study the "natural philosophies" for the reasons I mention above.

And don't think you'll ever need these skills again. I have two degrees in English, but I've kept myself alive for decades doing technical jobs of one sort or another.

It's frustrating to have to use your mind in new ways, but it isn't a waste. One of the great problems with education today is the compartmentalization of knowledge, in terms of occupational specialty and educational specialization. It's a hindrance to good citizenship, in large part because no one knows what others are talking about or proposing. Can't ask good questions if you're completely clueless.

Concerned about voting procedures? Helps to know some statistics. Want to fight the proposed waste dump in your area? Helps to be able to read legal language and know some environmental science.

Here's what I used to tell my students when they complained about their coursework (and English, too). The purpose of a good liberal education (gasps here, so I also had to explain what that was) is meant to do two things: it's meant to teach you how to think, and second, to give you all the tools you need to go on learning and teaching yourself all your life.

Right now, you think many of those tools are completely unnecessary. Check back in forty years or so, and see if you feel the same way. :)

Cheers.

[kodi]

28. "wax on, wax off" KK

math and science are just hard whetstones to sharpen the mind.

old teacher too, of chemistry.

know why our young friend is upset at math ansd science yet loves the humanities? he likes stories, narratives that hook him. math and science are less prone to understanding as narratives.

i used to tell my sudents that they could remember the punch line to a dirty joke decades later, but not a simple series of 10 alpha-numeric characters, because the former was processed as a narrative and the latter wasn't.

i would tell anyone that they can live a rich and full life without any knowledge of math and science. but that by understanding the natural philosophies, the world around oneself, a person understands better themselves and their place in the universe.

why, if sentience is such a prrecious gift would anyone want not to know things?

[CanuckAmok]

17. I suppose you don't like the Metric System, either!

It's the tool of the Devil, you know. My car gets thirty drams to the hogs-head, and that's jus' the way I likes it.

[Lisa]

19. you might have liked science better if you'd been born a century earlier

I feel your pain, stpalm.

The math-based, quantitative approach didn't become dominant in many scientific fields until well into the 20th century. Economics, anthropology, biology, and geology (among others) were a lot more descriptive and humanistic back then than they are now. If you look at textbooks from the 1920s and 30s, you'd see plenty of allusions to philosophy, history, and the arts. Scientists were expected to be all-round educated people who KNEW about the plays of Shakespeare, the end of the Roman republic, and even the Bible. Check out the books and diaries of Charles Darwin. I've seen more graphs and tables in a single 2005 "Ecology" article than "The Origin of Species".

Rising industrialization, the drive towards "efficiency", the invention of computers, and the pressures (from parents, administrators, and the educational "marketplace") to teach science as a marketable skill -- they've pushed the natural and social sciences into directions which many of the most revered scientists might not recognize. I sometimes wonder what people like Einstein or Bethe (who died not long ago) thought about this -- they got into physics out of the love of discovery of cool, interesting stuff -- not to put money in their pockets or even worse, to have power over other people.

I've seen my profs agonizing over lab and research accounting, or schmoozing for grants, when they should have been out in the field investigating things. Those who want to focus on teaching have to fill out endless "learning outcomes" sheets -- I've taken flak from parents, administrators, and even students, when I send classes out into the woods to sit there for 60 minutes and write a poem about what they observe and feel. That sort of thing doesn't fit into the "memorize trivia for the midterm" mindset that is only a tiny component of REAL learning and discovery. My course is facing termination, while the remote sensing and GIS people have millions of dollars being poured into their new lab (plus corporate endorsements) and graduates who make big money working for military contractors. I have multiple science degrees, in physical geography and climatology, but because I cross-trained in the social sciences and humanities, many of my co-workers assumed that I therefore don't know much about math and the hard sciences. (They were kind of shocked when I was lead author on a dendrochronology paper a while ago! Especially since one of my previous publications had been about the use of mystery novels for teaching cultural geography.)

It's depressing to observe battle lines being drawn before people even finish their degrees. I teach in a geography department, so we're used to having an interdisciplinary faculty -- geologists, meteorologists, anthropologists, economists -- in my 3rd-year methods course, the physical and human geographers were already in little cliques, and dissing each other about being "Luddites" and "ignorant technocrats". Both sides were missing out, because they'd already decided that the other people's ideas were stupid and useless. Students tuned out whenever I talked about something important to "the other side" -- I ended up having to basically make up things that would get them to consider that it might be relevant to a) the final, or b) their job prospects. That was the only way I got their attention!

Thinking/contemplation in science IS possible, and you can find many people who are passionate about it. You just have to hang in long enough to get past the intro stuff. I swear that they must make it hard on purpose, to whittle down class sizes. Take my word for it -- the work being done in advanced classes, and in postgraduate studies, often bears no resemblance to what is taught in high school and undergrad!

[Lucky Luciano]

20. nice post...

Addressed a little to the above poster, but mostly to the OP (skip to the last paragraph if you want):


I actually take far greater appreciation in the advanced stuff myself. I did well in HS math, but I did not raise eyebrows too much other than being in the honors class until the AP exam approached - then suddenly my math teacher approached me and asked to write a recommendation letter for college becasue come exam time I stepped up to the plate - I thought that was nice of her.

In college I was such a party boy and the lower division math classes I took did not go as well as they should have - mostly B through A- grades (minimal studying).....then in my junior year, I took an advanced linear algebra class - I got a B+ in the first lin alg class my freshman year - but the advanced class was far more interesting and I dominated the class. Then in my senior year of college, I needed to declare a major - I was half way through a math major and I needed 7 more of the hardest math classes to graduate with a BS - 2 each of real analysis, topology, abstract algebra and something else I cannot remember offhand....These classes are what made me interested in math - I saw the light - I still partied a lot, but now I did all the HW assignments and actually showed up to class 80% of the time (as opposed to 30% - or less). I really slaughtered these classes....things liek a 92 on an exam and the second highest grade a 49......then the chairman asked me to go to grad school - something I never considered before...Also, the summer before grad work I did a research program for undergrads - and co-authored a paper. I decided to go to grad school on a whim and I did well my first year, though it wa a shock because grad school gives you the feeling that you are not in Kansas anymore! Each grad class is like 3 undergrad classes as far as the workload goes...then it was off to Europe for a summer of good times....then I had to bartend 4 nights a week(to pay for Europe - actually it was 3 math grad students that ran the most popular bar for undergads at my school - it was fun), TA, and do grad work....I faltered a little because of the bartending - lots of partying and chasing girls and time not studying to make the required money to pay down the CC bill - I served many of my students a lot of drinks! LOL

Then I transferred to UCLA - I might have gotten into an Ivy if I did not falter as a result of my bartending the second year...(Actually, to go to an Ivy grad program, you have to plan better than I did - you have to know well in advance you want to do that so that you prepare properly.) Things went well since UCLA is actually quite strong in math - ranked 10th - thoguh it is no Berkeley (#1) or Harvard(#2)...I finished a pure math PhD...Then, I wanted to get into finance, but they do not like pure math people - they only like applied people who know computer programming ....I had to suck it up. I gave myself a vicious crash course in financial mathematics (There is actually high level PhD math in certain areas of finance - I was delighted to discover this) and options pricing and C++ over the course of 6 months - it was the most grueling thing I ever did, but I needed, and was totally dedicated to getting this uber-competitive job....Partly because I took out large student loans to travel to 30+ countries as a grad student - this high finance job would pay off the loans - plus I enjoy gambling with a mathematical edge quite a bit - I like when the dice are loaded in my favor!


Moral of all this - Sometimes these so-called boring subjects are only boring because you have not gotten to the advanced parts. The advanced parts are the most interesting - always....Also, because i had studied a grueling PhD subject, it prepared me well enough to take the bull by the horns and train myself for whatever I wanted to do afterwards - finance. My one regret was that I should have taken the Post-Doc that my advisor could have gotten me - then I would have gotten paid while I prepared for the finance interviews. 6 months of not getting paid after grad school knee deep in debt sucked big time - especially while busting my ass harder than I ever did during grad school - it is hard to bust your ass much harder, but I had to - it was make or break.

[crispini]

44. You are so correct, the advanced stuff is fun.

I will never forget the day in modern physics when the prof derived E=mc2 for us. WOW. That was so cool. Also optics lab rocked; we got to make holograms. I was almost a physics major, but third-semester calculus just kicked my ass. Still, though, the grounding I got was great and the logical reasoning skills have served me beautifully for the rest of my life.

[autorank]

21. Simple solution (you're right BTW): faith based math; faith based science

If it's good enough for 1/2 the voters in this country (well less than 1/2) it's good enough for you and me.

[BeatleBoot]

24. "Math is Everything"

My Dad used to tell me that when I was in high school.

I hated it then.

But after high school I quickly learned that my Dad was right.

So I re-trained myself at college and even Aced Calculus.

Now I use it every day at work. And I mean every day.

My Dad is right about so many things. And he's a great Democrat, too.

[nuxvomica]

29. All learning is useful

Math and science are extremely so regardless of whether you are good at them. I know a person who dropped out of college cuz he thought he pretty much learned all he needed to know. He's a successful programmer who has a real knack for writing code and is actually well known in the Java community for his accomplishments. He feels that English and History are unnecessary and has avoided any study of them. The result is that his use of language, both in speech and writing, is downright embarrassing. He fails to understand requirements sometimes and often becomes frustrated when arguing a point because he can't communicate it adequately. For example, when he spoke of something called "exerexcess" I had no clue what he was talking about until he spelled it out as "X-E-R-X-E-S". Any survey course on ancient history would have prevented that.
Intellectual isolationism is bad all around. Whether one has restricted himself to the technical against the humanities or vice versa, the effect is to ultimately limit one's understanding of even the field in which he excels. Remember that all these distinctions are arbitrary anyway. Knowledge is like gold, it is hard to collect not because it's buried someplace deep but rather because it is scattered everywhere.

[Burma Jones]

30. Oh, I'm Sorry............

When I read the title of your post, I thought you were a freeper fundie and I was going mock you.

Well, you should learn everything you can. I got my B.A. in Theatre and now hold a PhD in Computer Science. Life takes a long time to unravel and the more weapons you have in your arsenel, the more choices you will have as you tread inexorably toward death...........

[Deja Q]

33. You never know until you try. And as a network engeineer, you'd need math

in order to work on TCP/IP addressing.

I prefer arts myself, but in a "society" where making money is more important than being human for God's sakes, we have to do things we don't like or want to be - even if it ruins our health over time.

Money isn't natural.

You'd think we'd learn from the experiment where, in a group of 5, one ape was given a fruit and the other 4 zilch. The other 4 wanted the same thing... but didn't so they all went bonkers.

If you want to be a network engineer of course. I grasped some of the TCP/IP addressing stuff, but not others.

[alwynsw]

35. I'll see you at the drive thru.

Don't forget my straw and condiments when you pass me my order.

[Tektonik]

36. What would life be without lemmas?

:o

[immoderate]

37. I've never found any body that knows calculus, that...

wishes they could forget it. Opportunities to use higher intellectual functioning may not come every day. But when they come along, you should at least be able to recognize them.

Pasteur said, "Luck favors the prepared mind."

--IMM

[knitter4democracy]

38. Don't forget the most important lesson of high school:

"Those who know and understand will always take advantage of those who don't."

I taught high school English before kids, and I would put that up on my board every once in awhile because it's true.

If you don't understand math, banks, politicians, the media, and pretty much anyone else will take advantage of you. If you can't fathom basic scientific concepts, the same thing will happen.

Look, I understand what you're saying. I never felt comfortable in my science or math classes, but my dad was right to make me take up through Calc II in college (he refused to pay for it otherwise). Yes, I cussed a lot. Yes, I struggled, and no, I still don't understand the vast majority of it. That said, I can still figure things out and work things through in the logical manner they use in those disciplines.

If you think English encourages independent thinking, you need to talk to your science teacher again. Yes, there are basic rules and laws in science (just like in English and all good writing), but they are framework for great thinking. Issac Newton made calculus up in his head! You can't get much more independent than that, even if you're Shakespeare.

Side note: Shakespeare obviously put his science and math classes to good use. Check all his references--you won't get as much out of his writing if you don't understand what he's referring to.

[ulysses]

39. no, they're not.

One must understand the dragon before one slays it, grasshopper.

[barackmyworld]

40. Has anyone read "Innumeracy"

by John Allen Paulos? It is a great book about how people don't understand statistics, and the horrifying real-world consequences. Knowing basic statistics can help you make decisions in EVERY area of your life.

[Padraig18]

43. No human is fully literate, who does not understand mathematics.

:hi:

[crispini]

45. This thread is funny.

OP obviously posted this rant out of some frustration, maybe wanting a little tea and sympathy.... and boy howdy did he not get it. Hee! And I am quite impressed by the quality of all of the responses. DU is full of intelligent people.

[stpalm]

49. boy howdy

this thread exceeded my wildest expectations. I got quite a reaction

[yellowdogintexas]

47. I really suck at math. REALLY..REALLY, but Biology swept me

off my feet. I loved it in high school and college, excelled in it and if it weren't for the math and physics I probably would have tried for med school. But the biology passion never left me and the interest in all things medical that came with it. I sort of fell into a position in health insurance claims, and all that biology made me really good at it. I got to do a couple of data extraction projects for some doctors too.

I was never good at foreign languages either.

I do very well with logical things, so basic arithmetic is easy for me. It makes sense, I use it in my everyday life and I need it. I need basic geometry to figure out how much tile or carpet I need or how much wallpaper, but beyond that it freaks me out totally. I always resented that I had to bother with it at all, beyond the basic needs of life.

So I was an English major with a double minor in History and Biology. Go figure. The writing and verbal skills and the biology knowledge were a good combination for the health insurance field.