Aristocracy vs Democracy

[FDG]

I know the title is repeating, but I want to know more about this.

I just come out of a very heated debate on another forum with a guy, which clearly showed what dichotomically are thought about as "aristocratic" qualities.

He was arguing that we can understand things about a person looking at the degree he has, looking at his job, looking at where he comes from.

I was arguing that none of that matters, that curriculms are mostly made up of bullshit, that people can be super smart even without an education, that there is an enormous variation inside the same population.

Now, of course I am right, this is undoubtful - but what do other aristocrats think about it? Like, I have some trouble seeing an ENFp/INFj/ISTp giving weight to degrees (even if I have noticed that my ENFp girl friend does many "official" test to prove that she knows english, and she is proud of telling me that she has done, and I tend to think "Well, but you don't know english any better, so tests are useless". No offense of ENFps just taking an example)???

[Slacker]

I think college degrees *can* tell something, but they usually don't. Too many people slide through school, and too many smart people can't be bothered with it.

I know some people who are amazingly smart but uneducated by conventional standards. And I know some shockingly dumb people with advanced degrees.

[Angel von Himmel]

You can be as dumb as a rock and have an advanced school degree, otherwise there would not be so many people with advanced school degrees.

[snegledmaca]

The knowledge you get through reading a piece of paper is as shallow as the piece of paper it is written on.

The same doesn't apply for understanding though.

[Mea]

You're SLE, wouldn't that make you an Aristocrat too?

However, I agree with you.

I was arguing that none of that matters, that curriculms are mostly made up of bullshit, that people can be super smart even without an education, that there is an enormous variation inside the same population.

I know people who graduated with First class honors but can't apply their knowledge. Yes, they appear smart on paper, but application wise, I don't see any value in them. And I have friends who dropped out of school, doing very well in their lives. Applying whatever knowledge they have, earning more than the supposedly smarter degree holders. And some of them are amazingly intelligent, they just hated the school system.

Urgh. No. I don't think you can understand many things from a person just by looking at the degree they have or their job. People do do stuff that they don't enjoy, even for a moment, or make a wrong choice in their majors, yet still excel.

And as for the specific definitions of democrat & aristocrat from the Reinin dichotomies, I relate to some of what it stated in each, however not fully.

[Mea]

Seems like everyone is basically expressing the same views so far.

[mustachio]

i don't know or can't imagine people with advanced degrees being dumb. they have to be smart somehow to maintain an average good enough to get a masters. they can be dumb in everyday life though. as if all their brainpower could only serve one purpose (school or their field of expertise) and leave them clueless otherwise (no social intelligence whatsoever).

when i turned 19, i decided to postpone my education so i could learn from the world. i consider myself to be streetsmart now. it's something that i could never have learned sitting on a bench. and it's fuckin' priceless.

[Mea]

i don't know or can't imagine people with advanced degrees being dumb. they have to be smart somehow to maintain an average good enough to get a masters. they can be dumb in everyday life though. as if all their brainpower could only serve one purpose (school or their field of expertise) and leave them clueless otherwise (no social intelligence whatsoever).

when i turned 19, i decided to postpone my education so i could learn from the world. i consider myself to be streetsmart now. it's something that i could never have learned sitting on a bench. and it's fuckin' priceless.

No. Some people just memorize all their notes/textbooks.
They don't understand it, thus can't apply it.

I have a friend like that. She literally memorized everything for a programming test. She memorized various codes & commands. And simply dumped everything during the test. (well, actually she cheated too, asked for help even though the test was over)

[Mariano Rajoy]

He was arguing that we can understand things about a person looking at the degree he has, looking at his job, looking at where he comes from.

Sure, you can make reasonable assumptions. A person with a degree probably had a middle class or higher upbringing. A person with a certain long term vocation probably holds some characteristic that makes them good at it, and depending on the job, got that job because of his background. I would not extend these things into value judgments in order to maintain an aristocracy, however.

Give me a sociocracy instead.

[mustachio]

i disagree with you Mea. i memorise everything before a test and i can easily apply it all afterwards. memorising like a pc doesn't necessarily entail that you don't fully comprehend. some people are like that they learn fast.

also, my post was mostly referring to an uncle of mine. he's a successful doctor who graduated near the top of his class. nonetheless, he seems to be clueless when it comes to the emotional side of life. he makes mistakes in his social interactions, the kind only badly behaved teens make. his social awkwardness might be due to the endless hours spent at the clinic. but at his age you'd think he'd know better.

[force my hand]

He was arguing that we can understand things about a person looking at the degree he has, looking at his job, looking at where he comes from.

I'd say this alone is entirely true. In fact, we 'thin-slice' people on this basis alone, all the time.

Tell me these three things, and I can come up with an accurate, general, picture of who this person is.

[Slacker]

Yeah I'll agree with that. You can get a pretty good idea of what someone is likely to be like based on those three things. I'd disagree that level of intelligence is one of them. But you can tell what economic status they were raised in, how much their family valued education growing up, how much they value education, etc. The "where a person comes from" thing is ambiguous. Like, regionally? Or whether the person is from a city or the country? Or figuratively where - like what kind of family the person grew up in? I suppose you can tell *something* from any of those things, but how much probably depends on the specifics.

[Mea]

i memorise everything before a test and i can easily apply it all afterwards.

Basically you read it and you understand it?

I read through notes before a test, i don't exactly memorize. I read them and just understand.

Well, not everything needs to be understood I guess.

[FDG]

Ok, thanks for the feedback everybody - there seems to be no particular relation to what I debated and aristocracy vs democracy

[eunice]

I study for a degree to learn new things rather than competing with others over how much more I know over them. Admittedly, I feel that college can be a bore sometimes 'cos I feel that what I'm learning sometimes is really common-sense and I can read more about them at the comfort of my home than listening to lecturers regurgitating the textbook.

Anyway, I feel that there's nothing special about getting college degrees these days 'cos more people are getting them and it's more of a general education to me. A good college degree is a very good stepping stone and I guess that's as far as it can get you. There are successful people in both realms (academically-inclined and not-so-academically-inclined).

Moreover, I know some friends and acquiantances who have very good results for their exams but they don't read much outside the curriculum or know much about current affairs especially if they don't correspond with the course syllabus.

Anyway, I feel that those with advanced degrees seemed to have a harder life than those with basic degrees. Others seem to expect more out of them and are less forgiving when these highly educated people make mistakes.

[misutii]

Well obviously the education system has faults. It definitely caters to the intellectual mediocrity in the sense that universities need money and there's lots of rich parents with lots of money and not especially bright children. Universities are merely used for prestige by such people whereas many more capable kids don't have a chance with their financial situation.

I'm in university right now in Canada and most people here are only here because their families said so... and our system is supposed to be decent...

But basically what it comes down to is that all having a University Degree will prove is that you can learn. doesn't matter what you get it in, a BA in business or history are both almost equally useless, on their own, unless you want some shitty office job. However, the degree is the proof, that a companies/organizations will use when they filter through their applications. They'll see your overpriced degree and their eyes will light up because they need people to enroll in their special little management course so that their company has a future and, believe it or not, the ability to grind through 4 years of university is enough to set you above like 75% (or whatever % it is) that can't immediately prove they have an attention span. It's cynical mais c'est la vie, lol.