From: nospam@example.net   
      
   On Wed, 26 Feb 2025, Salvador Mirzo wrote:   
      
   >> This was a painful read. =( I thought I saw this due to the fact that   
   >> I teach at the vocational school level and not university level. Are   
   >> yo useriously telling me that this b.s. goes one (and comes out of)   
   >> the university level?   
   >   
   > I'm afraid it is.   
      
   =(   
      
   >> If so... we'll soon enter a period of decline, if even universities   
   >> turn out CS student so ill equipped to develop new brilliant services   
   >> in todays world. =(   
   >   
   > Perhaps the crowd that's brilliant is a minority that hasn't changed   
   > much compared the previous times.  (Perhaps it has.)  Just because a lot   
   > of people are joining university and coming out of them pretty clueless,   
   > it doesn't mean that we've reduced that small group that carries the   
   > rest of the world on their shoulders.  Perhaps this group is still the   
   > same percent compared to the last centuries.  (Just guessing hypotheses   
   > here.)   
      
   That would be a comforting thought! Maybe the nr of brilliant people stays at   
   the same percentage!   
      
   In my experience, the brilliant guys hardly need a teacher. All I do is to feed   
   them problems when they get bored. Then they go away, work at it 24/7 until   
   they   
   solve it, and come back for more. When I teach, and have to keep it at a level   
   that is appropriate for the average level, they get bored and space out.   
      
   So I give them the lecture slides and material to read at their leisure and   
   keep   
   feeding them problems. Occasionally they get stuck, but very rarely, and then I   
   zoom in.   
      
   Those students give me immense joy!   
      
   > But I think you're totally right in that we've entered a period where we   
   > have a lot of people who are completely wasting their degrees, specially   
   > in an area such as computer science.  I could be wrong, but it seems   
   > that computer science is housing a lot of nonsense.  I'm sure there are   
   > declines in mathematics and physics too (likely more so on physics than   
   > in mathematics, I'd guess), but I believe computer science might be the   
   > worst.  When I look at the student body in computer science, the vast   
   > majority seems totally uninterested in computer science---they're   
   > interested in /playing/ video-games, not producing them.   
      
   When I wwas young, it was considered a virtue to expand your mind, to learn new   
   things, to develop yourself. My home was full of books, we watched   
   documentaries, went to museums. When the computer arrived, I was fascinated   
   with   
   linux, BSDs, programming.   
      
   I hope that this culture is still alive.   
      
   It would be so incredibly depressing if the majority of the young today were to   
   waste away their lives watching podcasts and playing computer games. It feels   
   they would just waste their lives that way instead of exploring it and   
   challenging their limits, and breaking through their limits.   
      
   --- SoupGate-DOS v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)