| ▲ | rightnutwingjob 4 hours ago |
| > An electrical engineer who has helped design robots. An organic chemist who, during the pandemic, worked on COVID-19 drugs. An education researcher, a sociologist, several political scientists, economists, physicians, and medical researchers. Diverse? Over-educated university graduates is possibly the least diverse set of thinkers one could hope to find. > Dozens of them come from the academic world, and more than half have a Ph.D. or M.D. Lord help up. This is going to be demonstration of hubris and an exercise in arrogance. |
|
| ▲ | pacija 4 hours ago | parent | next [-] |
| Whatever it is going to be it will hardly be worse than what we had for past 14 years of SNS / Vučić dictatorship. |
|
| ▲ | skew-aberration 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Yeah, there's plenty of high-profile academic politicians in Europe with debatable legacies including Thatcher and Merkel. Time will tell. A quick search suggests the economists associated with this movement are fairly 'mainstream' institutionalists of the type that's popular with government these days in the west. I don't think there will be big changes soon beyond dealing with corruption/nepotism. Later on, I imagine they will push for faster EU integration on possibly slightly worse terms. Serbia may become marginally less independent in terms of fiscal policy at least and the markets might become even more exposed/beholden to foreign capital. This process has been in motion for years now and I don't expect the student movement to care - the upsides are broadly popular with younger people globally. Personally, I think it is deeply ironic that in the age of tariffs and huge government spending by the superpowers, small countries like Serbia are still signing up to be bound by the 'free market' consensus which is rapidly disintegrating globally. |
|
| ▲ | InsideOutSanta 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| It's always funny to me when people say "overeducated", as if knowing things is only good up to a point. If you know too much, you suddenly turn bad. |
| |
| ▲ | TFNA 2 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | When people use the term, it is obviously not a reference to just "knowing things" but rather 1) the distinct socialization one gets in academia that leaves one rather divorced from the real world (and I say that as an academic), and 2) hyperspecialization to the point one loses the big picture, a problem in education today. | | |
| ▲ | InsideOutSanta 2 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | I knew one or two profs like that when I was studying, but the vast majority of people in academia are just regular people with families and interests outside of academia. It's kinda disheartening to see the anti-intellectual bent this discussion has taken. | | |
| ▲ | hunterpayne an hour ago | parent | next [-] | | I've worked and known many, many academics in my life. I'm sorry, but if you think this is anti-intellectual, then there are some basic things you don't understand about people. Academics really are naive and out of touch people. In a weird sort of way, being an academic means sacrificing your personal growth for either a) a deep love of their area of research or b) love of teaching. This means that the wider life skills one gains as an adult, they never get. They get to avoid consequences for being wrong but at quite a price. One of the worst things I have seen are what happens to academics who leave for the private sector later in their career. When they can't make it in the private sector, it is pretty crushing to many of them. That being said, one of the prices of being an academics is being very "out of touch" with the rest of society. And that will take away your ability to read political situations or govern things well. Academics injecting themselves into such situations will almost always be disastrous as a result. Its just a consequence of how academia works. It doesn't have to be that way, but unless academia changes profoundly, it will be. | | |
| ▲ | TFNA an hour ago | parent [-] | | As an OP here, I'd like to mention that I don't agree with this characterization at all. When I said academics are divorced from the real world, I was speaking of them largely conforming to particular demographics that make them a bit blind to broader trends in electoral politics and culture. Academics do just fine picking up "adult life skills". Only a small minority of academics find academic employment from their mid-thirties or so on, so everyone moves to other sectors for the rest of their lives. It is not as if they are just hapless misfits or on the dole for the rest of their lives. |
| |
| ▲ | BoingBoomTschak an hour ago | parent | prev [-] | | > but the vast majority of people in academia are just regular people with families and interests outside of academia If most people realized that, we would have much less problems: academics are often shrouded in an aura of virtue and wisdom they don't deserve in the least. Like what you see in this thread, that their narrow (or worse, illusory) knowledge will somehow help them being good rulers/leaders. |
| |
| ▲ | watwut 9 minutes ago | parent | prev [-] | | > distinct socialization one gets in academia that leaves one rather divorced from the real world It is absurd claim. Academia is part of real world. It is not an isolated island cut off from everything else. It is no more divorced from real world then any other group of people. No more divorced then rural farmer are divorced from it, businessmen are divorced from it, sports fans are divorced from it. They are all having limits of understanding other groups. Tech workers as likely more divorced from average person even. |
| |
| ▲ | OroPla 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | A Jack of all trades is a master of none, but better than a master of one because he has broad, intersectional knowledge. Academia is designed for specialization and the more you specialize in something the more you lose the forest for the trees. Everything looks like a nail if you are a hammer and all that. https://www.oglaf.com/labyrinth/ | | |
| ▲ | simsla an hour ago | parent [-] | | While the extreme "master of one" exists, most academics I know have cross-cutting interests. We also shouldn't forget that the vast majority of politicians today are lawyers by education. To whatever degree your assumption holds, it is true of the status quo today as well. Even in that case, having a more diverse set of "masters of one" would be an improvement. | | |
| ▲ | simsla an hour ago | parent [-] | | Slight correction (can't edit): law education is most common for politicians in Western countries, but not the majority. For the US, 32% of the house and 47% of the senate holds a law degree. |
|
| |
| ▲ | consensus1 an hour ago | parent | prev [-] | | Academic credentials and knowledge have very little correlation. A master electrician knows things. So does an airline pilot in charge of hundreds of lives. Yet neither has letters after their name. | | |
| ▲ | hippogod a minute ago | parent [-] | | Aren’t the letters after their names essentially signifying their level of understanding on a subject? Just like “Master” before electrician or “Captain” or “PIC” for airline pilots. |
|
|
|
| ▲ | fg137 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| There are more ardent second amendment supporters among tenured professors in US universities than you think. |
|
| ▲ | iLoveOncall 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Why are russian bots always so easy to spot? |
|
| ▲ | reeredfdfdf 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Still beats the alternative of corrupt career politicians. |
| |
|
| ▲ | dmantis 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-] |
| Average professional politician is a psychopath fighting for power no matter what. At least these guys might be honest about their hubris and arrogance and won't smile to you while slaughtering your future or robbing your family. |
| |
