What's the dumbest thing you heard said today?

[HavokFour]

Aaaahahahaha. That's gold.

Funny how the free market places so much more value on engineers than political scientists, eh? One might argue that most engineers are simply more in touch with objective reality, and consequently better suited to thrive in the real world.

Political science is a fascinating field, but few within it will ever contribute anything of any significance or novelty. Most will spend their careers wrangling over minor details, contest definitions and attempting to draw out snippits of causality out of masses of correllation. Engineers make things, and at the bar at night get served beer and french fries by political science graduates.

More like a waste of time. Don't get me wrong. It's OK to minor in a Liberal Art, but you're setting yourself up for failure if you major in one. No one is looking for someone to paint a picture for them, just ask my cousin. He's 28 and still lives with my aunt, and only gets an order every 6 months if he's lucky.  :-\

 

[Rogo]

Being that I am in the top Policy program in the country I would argue that there are merits to political science (though my degree is specialised and is not at all arts or specifically PSCI). I think it is largely untrue to label Psci grads as unnecessary and useless in upper level Canadian society. That being said when I start getting lectured by a psci individual before telling them my degree I do secretly feel superior with regards to politics and policy.

 

[JesseWZ]

More like a waste of time. Don't get me wrong. It's OK to minor in a Liberal Art, but you're setting yourself up for failure if you major in one. No one is looking for someone to paint a picture for them, just ask my cousin. He's 28 and still lives with my aunt, and only gets an order every 6 months if he's lucky.  :-\

I am willing to bet that there are a number of senior officers that lurk or are active on this site who have liberal arts degrees. In my opinion they are successful in life.

What do you define as success?

 

[Nostix]

I am willing to bet that there are a number of senior officers that lurk or are active on this site who have liberal arts degrees. In my opinion they are successful in life.

True, an employer who generally doesn't distinguish between different degrees is certainly a great equalizer.

 

[Sig_Des]

Today at work, talking about some hockey players on one of the other units teams:

Bloggins "...she's ok. What trade? I dunno, she's in the band, I dunno what trade that is"

Me "Musician?"

Bloggins "Oh....yeah"

 

[vonGarvin]

More like a waste of time. Don't get me wrong. It's OK to minor in a Liberal Art, but you're setting yourself up for failure if you major in one. No one is looking for someone to paint a picture for them, just ask my cousin. He's 28 and still lives with my aunt, and only gets an order every 6 months if he's lucky.  :-\

As a person with a double-major in Liberal Arts, I can tell you that it involves much more than painting still lifes or "dancing" to  the sound of someone making belly farts.  First off, a definition:

1.  Academic disciplines, such as languages, literature, history, philosophy, mathematics, and science, that provide information of general cultural concern.
2.  2.The disciplines comprising the trivium and quadrivium.

More definitions:

Trivium:  The lower division of the seven liberal arts in medieval schools, consisting of grammar, logic, and rhetoric.

Quadrivium:  The higher division of the seven liberal arts in the Middle Ages, composed of geometry, astronomy, arithmetic, and music.

So, take my degree, for example.  I have double honors from the University of Western Ontario.  My BA is "German and Philosophy".  The "German" was about the language and the literature.  So, more than just learning to read such fun authors as Goethe or Nietzsche, but also learning the culture through the language.  Part of the more difficult aspect was translation, in which one had to disect a passage and then reassemble it in the other language.
The "Philosophy" was much more than sitting in a circle as we smoked weed and wore hemp clothing asking "why are we alive?"  Instead, we covered such sub-topics as epistemology, ethics, logic as well as historical philosophy. 

Both courses combined have, in my humble opinion, given me the skill to break apart an argument to determine its truth value.  It has allowed me to employ complex problem-solving skills, which are vital in my line of work, which involves closing with and destroying the enemy.

So, though there may be stereotypes living in your aunt's basement, trust me, we're not all like that. 

 

[Nemecek]

Just to support that notion as well, I have a liberal arts degree as well. My double major in Religious Studies and Classics may not be the most popular degree, but the CF seems to love it.
I'm just beginning my career as an Infantry officer, and my 'pointless' degree impressed someone important and bumped me up a couple increments on the pay scale.

 

[Nostix]

I really think the "Liberal Arts" vs "Hard Science" is a false distinction.

The stereotype of the "useless degree" is hardly a stereotype. It's been widely discussed lately as being the cause of the devaluation of the undergraduate degree in general. You get a lot of people who exit high-school without a real career plan, and then just jump into University because it seems like the thing to do, and hope it will all sort itself out down the line. In the end, all you get is a slightly poorer individual with a nice piece of paper.

Of course, you can have a "useless degree" in anything, including the sciences. Just ask the hundreds of Biology majors that the University of Victoria pumps out every year who are competing for a handful of lab positions. I know most of them personally.

The "Liberal Arts" just happens to get unfairly singled out for having quite a few of these. I'd suggest that it is because it requires few high-level high school prerequisites, thus making it available to many more people in general. The hard "Engineering" sciences also get an unfair pass, mainly because the skill set is in such high demand that even clueless individuals can fall into a job.

To sum that all up, it doesn't really matter what your degree is. It matters that you're a driven individual with real goals, and have the capability of extracting all the relevant information out of your chosen field and applying it to your life.

Thus why we have such fine examples of successful "Liberal Arts" majors among us.

 

[DONT_PANIC]

I really think the "Liberal Arts" vs "Hard Science" is a false distinction.

I was reading a paper a while back on the evolution of "political science" as a discipline, and how it is currently divided into a number of subfields (Political Theory, Comparative, International Relations, etc...).  Looking at the curiculum from the late 19th/early 20th century, it was really quite different.  Most of the courses for the first two years were things like euclidean geometry, greek and roman classics, piles of math, history and philosophy of science, etc...  There was very little of what people today would call "political science" taught.

 

[bdave]

Different times call for different forms of teaching. I saw an example of this where an exam from the 1930s (or something like that) had many questions about geography and grammar, but very little on math/science.

I disagree with Nostix.
Engineering degrees are much harder to acquire than any liberal arts, and to become an engineer, you need 4-5 years of university (and a degree to show for it), at which point you will do work under the direct supervision of a professional engineer. He checks all your work and signs it to say it is ok. This goes on for 4 years.
So it would take 8 years for a "clueless" individual to become a professional engineer.
Hardly a small feat and those who are not fit for such work are expelled along the way - whether it be their choice or not.

I also believe that money is a valid goal. I don't understand these childish concepts that unless you're doing something for the betterment of humanity, it's a bad goal. As long as the individual is motivated, the goal is irrelevant.

Degrees are mostly irrelevant in the CF. In the civilian world, it's a different story. So there is no sense in comparing.

/rant

 

[OldSolduer]

I watched Canada AM for a minute and had to change the channel. Instead of discussing relief efforts in Newfoundland, or something with substance, the two numpties talked about
"Dancing with the Stars" (has beens or never weres) and how Michael Bolton was insulted. It was stooooopid.

 

[vonGarvin]

Degrees are mostly irrelevant in the CF.

I believe you mean to say that they are impracticable, because university degrees are very relevant in the CF.  Required, in fact, for our officer corps.

So, I add to the list of the dumbest thing I heard said today the following:

Degrees are mostly irrelevant in the CF.

 

[PMedMoe]

I think some posts here should be split off into their own thread.......  :nod:

 

[Old Sweat]

Being an old guy, I feel compelled to talk about my medical conditions. Actually yesterday morning at about 0825 my wife drove me to the ER at our local hospital because of a sudden nose bleed. (I gather nose bleeds are fairly common in seniors, and a friend has had quite a few. I had one about two years ago and now this, so I would not call it chronic.) Anyway, I plugged my nose with some toilet paper and wrapped a red towel around my neck for esthetic purposes.

The ER was empty, though anybody who was ahead of me probably was in the waiting area outside the examination rooms. Within a few minutes I was checked in, examined by the triage nurse and taken to the treatment room. I had a bit of a wait there, so to amuse myself I attempted to re-arrange the letters in each segment of an eye chart into words. The second segment was easy as the letters were something like O H C E which made ECHO, but the others were wild, and some did not even contain vowels. Frankly my attempts sounded like medical terms.

The resident appeared, did some looking up my nose. I told her I could not say "Aah" through my nose, but she seemed satisfied. Now was the time to wait for a couple of blood tests, which were taken about 20 minutes later. More words from the eye chart, helped by designating V as a wild card, but the results still sounded like exotic diseases. An other diversion was listening to the chatter on the regional EMS net. Long story short - the resident returned and packed my nose with a Rino-?, which is plug that is stuck in and injected with a saline solution. This swells it and plugs the nose. Unfortunately she had used a small when a medium was called for, so I now have two size small plugs in my snot box. These things, which are a huge step forward from the long tapey thing they used to stick up the nostril with a BBQ fork, have a tampon-like string, only longer which she taped to my cheek. Maybe I should come back on 31 October to get a free Halloween costume.

I was home by shortly after 1000, so no real medical horror story about long waits and a clogged ER. Maybe this is why people sometimes come from Ottawa to rural hospitals. Even better, the addition to our hospital opens soon and the new ER is ultra-modern.

Tomorrow I am to return to have the pugs taken out, and whatever else the medical profession does to folks like me.

Edit: For the dumbest thing, I nominate a few of my comments to the resident, including trying to say "Aah" through my nose and telling her my bat story.

 

[medicineman]

. Long story short - the resident returned and packed my nose with a Rino-?, which is plug that is stuck in and injected with a saline solution. This swells it and plugs the nose.

Sounds like a "Rhino-Rocket" - basically a tampon used in the nose to swell up and stop bleeding.  Fun to put in - as long as you're not the one getting it.

MM

 

[ModlrMike]

Sounds like a "Rhino-Rocket" - basically a tampon used in the nose to swell up and stop bleeding.  Fun to put in - as long as you're not the one getting it.

MM

I'll vouch for that. I do three or four per week. Quite the gruesome procedure.

 

[OldSolduer]

from some dweeb named "armored"

"It is to bad that he was never able to use the money which he deserved, but I don't see how his daughter and her husband receiving the money would have made things right. I would rather see the money stay with Veteran's affairs, where it  can be given to veterans who do deserve it, not some 50 or 60 something year old women who is going to use to buy as a down payment on a Winnebago. Veterans Affairs may not deal with claims very quickly but if that claim had been filed early, he could have been receiving disability payments for a number of years. It seems as if you are persistent with your claim you will eventually get what you deserve"

Mods, please find this post....oh never mind.....

 

[Cdnleaf]

I've had some challenges with meds/light sensitivity. I'm also reminded of the maxim 'everything said before the word but is usually BS.'  Anyways, I hope this exchange qualifies for this topic.

Dr. (optometrist):  well, I can see you have a definite problem with light sensitivity. It is the refraction (light) off the cornea.
Me: OK Dr. so how can this be corrected?
Dr:  well the problem is that your acquity is 20/15 uncorrected.
Me:  yes, when I'm sitting here in a dark room reading off the chart.
Dr:  well, you could go home and rub some olive oil around your eyes or get some rice, put it into a sport sock then microwave it and cover your eyes, that might help.
Me:  what about transition lenses?
Dr:  well, that's a good idea, but you have to talk to someone else about that.

 

[Arctic Acorn]

Found in the AJOSQ 'Army Technology' EdO, concerning NBC Warfare:

"...persons escaping a lethal dose of radiation may well be rendered seriously ill and or be more prone to various forms of cancer in later years. Hence, their morale and performance may be expected to slump."

I had to go for a walk after reading that.

 

[readytogo]

"i was watching the hurt locker on my ipod, into watching 15 minutes of it, i notice when the guy who play as James talked to the soldiers hidding, and one of them had shoulder pads, (might of the rest of the team)
kind of like this
http://img.redwolfairsoft.com/upload/product/img/OTV-ALL-TN_L.jpg
sorry if its airsoft version, but are the CF allowed to have such layouts as well?
i might have the idea to make a similar one but with metal instead
thanks"

courtesy of the same individual who wanted to bring a humvee to training cause the weather in edmonton is wierd!!!


Enough said

RTG