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I really like the wide range of ideas held by the college students and faculty!
Education doesn't only happen within the confines of an institution, so I can't say that an educated person is necessarily one who has X degree. I also disagree that formal training automatically trumps hands-on experience. A well-educated person has done some traveling or has otherwise exposed himself to cultures other than his own, considers all possibilities (including the possibility that he doesn't know what he's talking about!), pays attention to current events, has lots of questions and actively seeks out answers, and can use his knowledge in real-life applications.
Education isn't a storehouse of knowledge in one's brain. It is a mastery of learning itself, the ability to acquire information, analyze it, and then plan accordingly. That's why I have a big problem with so many career-training majors, for they teach people how to perform jobs rather than how to think.
Another interesting definition is that one's education is really the measure of the ability to entertain oneself without a television handy.
Not so fast. Depending on where you go to school and what you major in, you can take a "vocational" major and put your liberal arts education and electives to good use to make you well-rounded.
When in grad school, one of our capstone classes involved writing a fairly involved policy paper. When the prof handed them back, I saw the A, and he muttered "obviously a previous liberal arts major." I said "hardly," but that was flattering.
An education is a framework for future thinking and problem solving. It teaches one to learn even more. I have a few friends with business degrees who should wipe their a$$es with them and whose reasoning skills are wanting. I have a childhood friend from my street who wanted to go to UNLV to major in accounting and try to dance (not like that) while going to school. She never did go, but she runs circles around my friends who did go for undergraduate business degrees and were/are completely vapid.
Education isn't a storehouse of knowledge in one's brain. It is a mastery of learning itself, the ability to acquire information, analyze it, and then plan accordingly. That's why I have a big problem with so many career-training majors, for they teach people how to perform jobs rather than how to think. .
IMHO, this is a pretty simple-minded stereotype of career-training. Carpenters know how to think or my house wouldn't end up "fitting" together, nor wood my carpet line up right, nor would my roof withstand winds. (algebra, proportions, science)
Auto mechanics definitely know how to think how all parts work together, how to think to troubleshoot my specific problem, etc.. I could go on and on, but the examples will be the same.
Compare that with an English major who learns to think by analyzing Shakespeare. The English teachers in our school argue students learn to problem solve better by studying Shakespeare than by studying applied career skills. hmmmmmm....
Quote:
Originally Posted by cpg35223
Another interesting definition is that one's education is really the measure of the ability to entertain oneself without a television handy.
I know plenty of adults who can entertain themselves just fine without a television handy, but they aren't even a little educated. Think about that one for a minute......
I personally feel that a person's character is their definition, not their level of education.
As for whether another person is educated, one has to have achieved a level of education in their chosen field to determine that answer.
Your question can be answered, generally, other than to say that if a qualified academic board of experts acknowledges a person's educational achievements then that person is educated.
How utterly disasppointing. Every one of them was wrong, and I fear for the world they are setting out to create.
Not a single one of them said one word about an exposure to the cumulative knowledge that human civilization has assembled. Not one person referenced a familiarity with world history or literature or philosophy or scientific method or comparative religions or the process by which we have arrived at today's human condition.
I would have said, if pressed for brevity, "An educated person is one who has the background knowledge to sit down and interview any person on earth with intelligent, salient questions, and a willingness to learn something new from the answers. Education is not the mastery of one idea, but familiarity with all ideas."
Education is going to vary depending on the realm we are discussing.
I am well educated in science and readily admit I have far less education in most anything else. One thing that bothers me is people forget the understanding component of education. This comes up frequently in public debates of scientific issues. In debates regarding evolution advanced concepts like say, adaptive landscapes are mentioned and someone goes and googles the term. They then think parroting back what they read on wiki makes them educated on said topic. It doesn't. For some reason in this country we think every opinion on a subject is as valuable as every other. That is inherently not true. Some opinions are worth more because they know far more about a subject than another.
I have opinions about investments, and I have done some basic reading on such. That does not remotely mean my opinion is as valuable as that of a financial advisor.
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