Read Up:
http://krieger.jhu.edu/msh/2015/01/22/new-major/
ITT We discuss the importance of taking extra humanities courses in addition to typical pre professional science courses (Pre-med in this case).
My School is considering this idea as well, but I don't know what it would mean for premeds. It looks like more courses as students would learn two disciplines and cram in required courses to be eligible for a post grad. It seems like a good idea for lawyers and ethics professors, though.
However, the article mentions core classes tailor made for the medical field. This might mean taking specialized humanities courses instead of the typical core humanities most of us take. Or it may mean in addition to those courses, we take special humanities.
Would any Uni-goers here be interested in this?
What would be your concerns or what attracts you to concentrating on both science and the humanities in an undergrad program.
>>7722744
Science may tell you how to clone a T-Rex.
Science tells you what a T-Rex is, and why it could be a bad idea to handle its kid improperly.
Science could tell you how to handle T-Rex specimens.
Humanities use concepts and tools discovered and/or invented by science and try to feel relevant when they are not.
>>7722744
>What would be your concerns or what attracts you to concentrating on both science and the humanities in an undergrad program.
I would be concerned about having to completely waste my time taking humanities courses.
OP here playing devil's advocate.
>>7722780
Charles Weiner believes the sciences and humanities have become separated to the point that
"...future physicians must be more humanistic with additional skills in critical analysis, communication, and teamwork. The new MCAT being introduced this year addresses these cultural changes. The expectations of incoming medical students are becoming much broader to include cross-cultural studies, ethics, philosophy, and a range of humanities studies—all with the goal to produce more well-rounded physicians.”
This is from the JHU article. Also from the guy heading the new major.
>>7722803
This would totally mean more hours and money.
But I think the humanities are great. I don't mind literature and history and learning another language. I could see reading about cases where science has been questionably ethical. I could also see this program as a way for researchers to work towards publishing their papers.
This just seems like a formal major saying you'd be good at international relations.
>ITT We discuss the importance of taking extra humanities courses
>>7722744
The reason taking extra humanity classes is not unimportant is not because humanities are unimportant, but because modern humanities departments are filled with leftist postmodernist, marxist retards who do no know the first thing about their field.
You are much better off reading Russel's text or similar on your own and working from there.
>the importance of humanities course
To put you around hot chicks and get you laid.
>>7722884
You can already do that by taking biology.
OP here again
>>7722803
>>7722780
>>7722851
>>7722855
So the problems with this major so far are extra irrelevant work and misguided professors. The conclusion being that we're better off with our own investigations and seeing where they take us, because the things we talk about in science are definitive. Not abstract and open to interpretation, like so in humanities.
>>7722888
And in gen chem
Apologies, which branch of the humanities predicts the behaviour of dinosaurs again?
You are in /sci/. These autistics think that humanities are irrelevant.
In my experience, the problem with trying to teach scientist-in-training the humanities is that the majority of them just don't give a shit. Not really out of arrogance but just because they are very busy, and because typically research ethics boils down to 'just follow the rules.' I'm taking a research ethics course right now and pretty much they just tell us the rules, and then our resident bioethicist goes on a long spiel about different ethics systems and why Kant is dumb and why we as a society decided that utilitarian consequentialism is the best heuristic and how virtue ethics is obsolete because 'lol virtue ethics.' Or whatever.
>>7722957
Lel, so edge. Guess all we have are extant sauropsids to draw conclusions from.
Anyway, Jurassic park was a work of art by John Crichton to be cautious with genetic engineering. He doesn't necessary have hard proof that cloning dinosaurs would be a problem.
He just writes a story about genetic experiments gone wild.
>>7722979
That's my experience as well. I honestly don't understand what the specifics of the JHU major are, but they imply being able to communicate more effectively, understanding intercultural relationships and views on ethics.
Which is why I'm personally not interested.
Then supposedly these courses teach human on human relations, but if someone lacks those, I don't think a classroom will teach them.
>>7723028
Heh, not necessarily true.
But really, possible consequences of experimentation is a conversation we shouldn't ignore. Not when we have the potential to augment humanity on a genetic level. The point of the humanities is discussion and imagination, abilities that philosophically make us human.
Good practical humanity courses like psychology would be extremely useful as anyone in the real world can tell you that what separates amazing doctors from just knowledgeable ones is that amazing doctors know how to communicate properly with their patients along with how to motivate the patient to actually do their part in the treatment.
That being said, the psychology courses do need to be up to par and focused more on practical application. And we still have the problem with basic pre med people who don't actually care about the subjects thanks to being near sighted as fuck with their usefulness. Besides psychology though, I'm not sure how the humanity courses would fit into medicine per say.
>>7723054
Thanks anon, this is what I'm thinking too. I don't want something like this program coming to my school without some sort of specificity like what you've described.
>>7722924
>the things we talk about in science are definitive
Literally nothing in science is definitive.
Not only is that the WHOLE POINT of science, but it's also only up to a number of assumptions.
>>7724403
Actually, that's wrong. It's only not definitive until it's proven to be, for example Einstein's theory of relativity E=mc^2
>>7722888
checked
>>7722961
How are they relevant?
>>7722744
why not add art too? That way we can have MASH.
>>7724403
Mathematics is definitive based on the axiomic assumptions you make (mostly)
>>7724545
Kekronyms x)
>>7722744
Humanities is shit and let me tell you why in a really short and easy to swallow phrase:
The humanities deal with words, not with numbers.
What do I mean by this? To work with numbers you need actual training. That is why doing a degree in engineering is way harder than doing it in literature. They may take as much effort because the lit guy will have to read a lot of bullshit but that is all. They don't have to learn to be perfect, like an engineer will. If a lit major fucks up nothing happens, if an engineer fucks up shit could go down.
To work with words you only need to have a capable human brain and any kind of social interaction with people. I bet you that if you take a humanities student and a STEM student and ask them to write an essay about a novel they have both read there would not be a difference in quality. Grammar mistakes will be nonexistent. Maybe the humanities guy will get to 'deeper' conclusions but deeper is relative. Ask them both to prove eulers identity and the STEM guy will either have a clue or do it with no problem and the humanities guy will know fuck all. Step down a little and ask them to prove pythagoras' theorem and the same would happen.
It baffles me how some americans pay up to 40k a year to learn stuff that they need no training for. I am working on a mathematics degree that has actual applications and will give me skills that almost no one have and I'm paying less than a thousand dollars a year.
To put this together quickly, humanities are ridiculous. They are work you should not need to be trained to do. Science actually requires hard work, dedication and a bit of natural intelligence to get through. I could switch majors right now and do just fine in the humanities. Not so much the other way around.
Why are there people who still even major in humanities? What do they expect as a job?
>>7725571
>>7722744
Makes sense, ethics dictate a lot of research, medicine particularly so.
I imagine if the method needs adjusting than a strong philosophical grounding would be important. I don't subscribe to this pissing contest mentality that a lot of majors, STEM particularly, physics, mathematics and the more general engineering fields even more, so get caught up in.
Humanities (as a secondary major, in philosophy) major here.
It's fucking useless. I can't believe colleges let people graduate with humanities degrees. All of the shit in humanities you can do on your own by looking it up on Wikipedia.
With STEM (maybe less so it math) you get hands on experience or lab experience. You're not going to find that on Wikipedia.
That being said a degree in humanities is useless, not WORTHLESS. Getting a degree from a respectable colleges (top 20) has a signalling effect. People think you're automatically smart because you got into a good school and showed you could pass classes in interesting subjects.
As long as you take some math courses, up to linear algebra and optimization theory as well as some coding, statistics, or financial accounting classes you should be fine majoring in humanities. Those are useful classes, and you don't need to major in them to learn them.
>>7722814
>all with the goal to produce more well-rounded physicians
I don't give a fuck if he speaks english if he can do surgery properly
people are getting being "nice" confused with being talented/successful/useful
>>7722744
>how to extract even MORE money from pre-med/med students
Can't really complain. They're one of the biggest cash-cows that keep universities running.
Say what you want about the humanities. They are the biggest tool that drives the university engine.
Just think about. Every single year thousands of humanities students graduate. Less than 10% of them get a job. Because of their desperate google searches their ads start getting filled with 'Want more money? Go to grad school and get a masters in shitstain state university!'. Then 90% of the graduates go into grad school and graduate a year later. Now another 10%. Because of the desperate google searches of the rest 'Want an even better job and more pay? Go to grad school for a PhD in Shitstain of Shitstate University!' and then the remainign 80% go for a PhD. After all that only another 10% gets a job and then 70% of the graduates kill themselves after 20 years, removing themselves from the economy after paying about 200 thousand dollars to the college engine that then fuels real research in mathematics, physics and chemistry.
It is just so beautiful. So perfect.
>>7725831
>>7725727
I'd like an actual comeback, thank you very much. I do not see how you think my post was autistic. It is a very legitimate complaint based on the rough economical times we are facing nowadays. You should NOT let thousands of dollars go down the drain for an education that is not even guaranteed to land you a respectable job.
>>7725945
They're not bothering to give you a comeback because what you said is completely short sited and just shows you're just someone who can only deal with objective subjects and assumes all other subjects are inferior.
Math skills while difficult are generally universal and if anything, would be much easier to learn on your own than a humanity which requires someone on a much higher level than you to give their subject insight on your work. You can google if you got a physics problem right or wrong but you need a professional opinion on if you were able to effectively get your point across to the target audience. You're also reducing humanities to only including something like an english major who even so, the writing quality between the stem major and english major would actually be quite high to anyone who is actually even a slight consumer in the area even if you can't tell. Grammar mistakes aside, there is an art to being able to masterfully convey your information to others in certain ways depending on your message.
I mean I love making fun of liberal arts kids as much as the next guy but your statement is just ignorant as fuck.
>>7722744
>Science can tell you how to clone a T-Rex.
>It can tell you its nature and anatomy.
>Basically everything you need to know about it.
>Humanities will develop the concept on the moral aspects and deeper meaning to what the T-Rex means relevant to our setting and how it affects themes in literature.
>>7724530
construct a critical opinion about the world.
>>7726123
I agree that math can be learned without teaching but you are ignoring why I said this is not the case. In any STEM field there is need for perfection. We can only get perfection by following the masters in the field. That is why we get professors who will spit on our mouth whenever we do a basic algebra mistake.
Then, as you say, the humanities are subjective. No need for perfection. It is a sort of 'everyone is right' approach. Everyone can give their 'subject insight' on something. Having opinions is NOT a skill. Much less an employable one, unless you have a fuckton of connections to e-news like buzzfeed.
Also, you can also google writing styles to reach various specific target audiences. Don't try to tell me that your skill is unique and in need of professionals because all that shit is also on the internet. Also, after you get beyond high school physics, good luck finding an answer to problems. You will be lucky if you find a pdf of a book on the subject.
You say that I am reducing my perception of the humanities to english majors but this applies to everyone. When I was in high school there was this kid who was really good at art. He did paintings and posted them online on social media and he would bring his art book to school to work on his art there too. I could find his paintings on facebook right now and compare them go undergrad art from art majors at some bullshit university and I would see no difference in quality.
The point I'm trying to make is that everyone already knows the humanities. You don't have to study them. He didn't have to study art. He went to study architecture instead because he knew this. The humanities are a scam for people who simply can't into math.
You can already write okay after high school? You don't need another 4 years doing english.
Want to be able to reach a target audience? Hire a tutor for a 30 minute session that will only cost you 50 bucks tops instead of a 40 thousand dollar english degree.
>>7725945
>I'd like an actual comeback, thank you very much.
Why? You clearly have your head so far up your own arse that nobody will be able to extract it.
Your self-superior rambling is basically the whole reason that universities are introducing required communications or philosophy courses for STEM students, there is a clear need and demand for graduates that aren't autistic, misguidedly smug monothinkers that are so deep in their box they can't even see the corners.
>>7726145
I'm not denying at all that it is more important for anyone in the STEM field to be more thoroughly taught than a humanities kid but I still hold the opinion that humanities are generally subjects that do absolutely require guidance to be efficiently taught. You can read about writing, musical or art theory all you want but your specific works need to be evaluated if you want to become anymore than above average. Also I think that the skill levels of humanities extend farther than you realize. Two books can be written about the same subject with the same overall styles and one could be an amazing read while the other intolerable just due to small differences and techniques that are acquired after only being exposed and grinding yourself to the art for much time. Hell, my writing has deteriorated greatly in terms of artistic value after only a few years of only writing scientific articles and lab reports.
Now the idea about if a degree in the humanities is a good investment or not is completely different and let's just say I wouldn't want any of my children going to college for a humanity.
>>7722744
The humanities not only waste everyone else's time, they even waste their own time. A university in my state offers a 3 year degree in learning Chinese Mandarin, but one of the core compulsory courses is completely about Aboriginal Australians.
>>7726161
Okay, I get it. You really do not care about your money. Oh wait, you are a liberal arts student. You really do not care about your parents' money.
In my thread I specified that as long as the STEM student has interactions with other human beings, he is passively studying the humanities. Conversations cover english. Political discussion about hot button topics covers the politically motivated gender studies and race studies, etc. For things like music and art, hobbies cover that. I play the piano myself and I may not be a master but I'm damn good at it. I can also write essays and creative papers with no problem.
You are giving too much credit to the humanities.
>>7726167
I'm glad you got my point. For the rest I guess we can agree to disagree.
>>7726183
Depends on the humanities and if you choose to major in it or not.
Alot of the STEM majors I knew did the 100 level courses which can be done by a blind monkey and never could develop decent writing skills and were massive spergs with no soft skills.
STEM majors I knew who took the harder intro classes designed for the major actually managed to not be massive spergs who could articulate their thoughts without looking retarded.
>>7726194
Fair enough, it's all just subjective opinion anyways.
>>7726194
>Oh wait, you are a liberal arts student.
le everyone that disagrees with me is le filthy humanities plebe
>>7722744
>science will tell you how to clone T-rex
>humanities tell you to call it racist
ftfy
Notice how all the anons saying humanities are worthless can't form a strong argument and don't know how to deal with oposition? A little ironic don't you think?
>>7726556
humanities are worthless because needing to study how to be human implies you're a potato
>>7725935
>90% go to grad school
>10% of those get jobs, the other 90% go to get PhD
>10% of those get jobs, 90% kill themselves
90% of 90% of 90% is not 70%. Your humanities degree is showing.
>>7726194
>>7725571
>>7725785
>All of the shit in humanities you can do on your own by looking it up on Wikipedia.
And you said you have a major in philosophy?
Heh...
I majored in math and philosophy, and I found the courses and feedback very much useful. You won't learnt it through Wikipedia nor books alone without any guidance and testing (am I understanding the material or am I fooling myself?).
I cannot talk much about other humanities, but I've met many people who said to be very knowledgeable in philosophy (relatively odd, over 40 years) who hardly knew philosophy at the level of a second-year undergrad. The problem is the same that happens with /lit/ and their reading lists - reading a bunch of books are not teach you the subject, specially if you read them without order (popular culture teach us that you can read any philosopher at any time, and if you don't understand it the problem is that the philosopher is an obscurantist) which is what many people do.
It can be done, but as much as it can be done in any field that requires equipment you may not have (say for example, mathematics, read the books is not going to help much, only working through the problem and studying the theory you can learn math).
Still, considering how many people are said to 'love' math, or physics, or philosophy, and the knowledge they have is considerable superficial, I don't think that getting a major is completely useless.
This said, due to the low-employment of humanities major, I wouldn't pay for it. I studied philosophy in college because college is free here so I can get into any major I want.
>>7726194
>Conversations cover english.
>Political discussion about hot button topics covers the politically motivated gender studies and race studies, etc
I wanted to post a facepalm, but this is so stupid I don't want to take my time to look for the picture.
>>7726564
it's ironic because most STEM people resemble potatoes
>>7727098
I agree with you in the general sense that you should always have a formal approach to education.
However, I do believe that any good textbook can give you this vital formal structure just as much as any university programme can. As long as it's not a subject that requires major experimental components such as chemistry, you should be fine.
The pop-cult thing of reading random phil. texts is a damnable waste of time.
I have no steak in this thread, I just saw your post on the front page.
>>7726578
I think that it is obviously implied that by 10% he means 10% of the initial whole. If not then his final result would not have been 70%.
>>7727106
It does not surprise. As a humanities major your best counter argument is to post a meme. That's what the other 3 faggots did anyways.
Your lack of critical abbility is showing. I bet you disagree with me but can't even figure out why. That is why you post your fedoras and your facepalms.
Meme on, memeable memers.
I agree with making stem students take more humanities classes on top of their full schedule already only if they start making humanities majors start taking real STEM classes.
No fucking geology for retards, no calculus for retards. real fucking stem classes. It is a travesty that people can leave college and not know calculus 1.
>>7722992
>Deriving dinosaur behavior from living sauropsids
Anon do you know what Sauropsida is? While still technically correct, you could just say extant Aves or dinosaurs, you would still be correct and wouldn't look like a retard.
>>7727110
And humanity majors end up frying potatoes.
>>7727807
Holy shit
>>7722814
>additional skills in critical analysis, communication, and teamwork
Most, if not all, of us here can count the number of times we've had to think critically in a humanities course on a single hand.
Say you got a solid grasp on Marx, the background to and early days of the Soviet Union from Rabinowitch's texts, and the authoritarian-bureaucratic degeneration from Trotsky's Revolution Betrayed among other sources. Surprise! Your high school English class is reading Animal Farm. Time to shine, right? Thirty different "interpretations of the novel" manage to be the same exact "good on paper but inherently and inevitably bad in practice" crap rephrased in different clumsy imprecise words and given absent any sort of critique accounting for what happened, why it did and what those answers would imply (The criticism here is of the superficial nature, rather than the conclusions themselves.) Say your work treated the book besides superficially. Then you've "failed to grasp the work" nevermind that Orwell was a leftist and that AF is a conspicuously leftist critique of the Soviet regime whether or not you bother to so much as google the author. Perhaps because the teacher disagreed with you, perhaps because it expected her to critically engage the same way she said she expected of her students, perhaps because it caught her off guard with background she lacked, perhaps because she felt insecure or disrespected. Most likely because she saw convincing us of a particular conclusion as a core part of her responsibilities (and hence synonymous with success in her course.) The former issues tend to fall off at any decent uni, but the last one remains in force, especially on the SJW note. Forced "diversity" electives are essentially an attack on meritocracy.
I've read a fuckton of things you could consider humanities, it's just a lot harder to respect as a legitimate field of academic study than enjoy as one would a TV series or getting high.
>Humanities
I've taken a few humanities courses. I didn't really learn everything, actually it seemed like more of a class on common sense.Though I'm not surprised, most people who can't handle STEM probably don't have common sense to begin with.
>>7728063
This antimeritocratic device becomes more conspicuous when we bring one of the best paying and most prestigious/respected occupations into the picture. Gatekeepers selecting for those with a kinder outlook on making certain sacrifices for "inclusivity" and against those most strongly opposed parallels the methods of affirmative action policies in general. Not that this is the work of some shadowy feminist cabal. Quite the contrary, this is a response to popular demand. More superficially inclusive-seeming med school placement demographics are worth quite a few PR dollars because the public treats it that way.
It goes without saying here that the "well-rounded education" line is a crock of shit. Compare the number of STEM distro reqs humanities majors have to the humanities reqs STEM majors are burdened with. The fact that literally nothing is provided by a course you cannot self-teach aside from accountability for the material, endorsement of your competence and possibly discussion (HAHAHA >inb4.) The fact that most intelligent people have broad intellectual interests they explore without being forced through a series of intellectually dishonest echo chambers. Leaving aside the question of whether or not people actually benefit from studying something they never would have voluntarily.
"Indoctrination" is over the top, but schools (more obviously primary-secondary) have always projected power in some sense. While clearly instilling absolute deference to authority and grooming fodder for an industrializing society aren't contemporary, you were probably told unsubstantiated things or outright lies about marijuana in public high school and given a "don't rape" seminar at uni. Nature abhors a vacuum and far subtler and perhaps unintentional examples should be expected. Who is admitted, why, and what you have to do to leave with anything of material value are the natural choke points we have to pay attention to.
>>7727807
Take what he says with a grain of salt
Sounds like yet another useless class to cheat in
>>7723054
So basically we teach doctors and professionals how to manipulate uneducated people better. I'm on board with this.
>>7725740
ethics are holding us back because a lot of medical research hurts peoples feelings.
>>7726167
not the guy you're replying to but most of the greatest writers, musicians and artists did not study literature, music or art. These things should probably be self studied if you have an interest
>>7728649
But you're also talking about outliers here. Majority of people would not be able to become so great at their craft without guidance. Also I have no idea if that statement is true since I don't know any particular greats in the subject.
>>7728649
>most of the greatest writers, musicians and artists did not study literature, music or art
Statistically speaking, "the greats" almost always came from parents with backgrounds in their respective "talents".
Education means less than pedigree, but it's very unlikely that self-study will yield worthwhile results without a tutor on the level of availability of a parent.
>>7722744
>>Humanities studies PhD needed. Gun in mouth good idea no?
I already require an etheics course, 3 writing courses, an art course, a history course, and an "ethnicity and race" course for my general ed next to my degree in math. Not to mention the numerous courses I tested out of from the AP system. Why do I really need more?
>>7722744
Bottom line:
The subjects that the humanities deal with are extremely important. They cover everything we could ever care about, including why science works in the first place.
But, learning them in a structured way is almost entirely pointless. Everything is either obvious or subjective.
So, think about humanity subjects, read other people's opinions, but don't think you can become an "expert". A humanity
"expert" is just a person who can put a label on 1000 different opinions, of which 90% are obviously wrong.
>>7722744
replace "Humanities" with "Common Sense"
