The jinx of the north

[Mr. Big Dog 10,747]

and ranked as the sixth happiest nation in the world.[4]

This is also a meaningless rank, since the best way to increase happiness on this index would be drop coins from a helicopter on the street, since finding a coin increases a person's happiness on average one point on a scale of zero to ten.

Care to back this one up? TY

Alcohol now Finland's top killer

[Stabu 0]

Care to back that up somehow?

Sure. Olaf Gersemann book Cowboy Capitalism discusses this a bit. The book also tells that Americans gain second most university education in the whole world (Finns win this one too). This is also a direct (but translated, since I don't think that many of you read fluent Finnish) quote from Kari Raivio, the president of Helsinki University, which is the most prestigious of all Finnish universities. "Those who speak for democracy in education should be worried about the fact that lower socioeconomic groups pay an outrageous portion of the education price, which allows the children of the upper class to educate themselves into good professions. According to an OECD study the chance for a child of an academic parent to end up in the Finnish university is seven fold in comparison to those children without an academically educated parent."

(I'm sorry the quote is so hacky, as Finnish is not even an Indo-European language, it's almost impossible to come up with good translations and I really don't have more time to produce one for a single forum post.)

[GaryC 7]

I like this guy!

[Mr. Big Dog 10,747]

Care to back that up somehow?

Sure. Olaf Gersemann book Cowboy Capitalism discusses this a bit. The book also tells that Americans gain second most university education in the whole world (Finns win this one too).

So, the Finns fare better overall than the Americans when it comes to higher education. And that supports your earlier argument how exactly?

[Stabu 0]

Care to back this one up?

Well, sure, why not. The best short paper I've seen on happiness research is this one [PDF and in Swedish, but if you're fluent in German, Dutch or any Scandinavian language you can easily read it]. A longer and more precise analysis can be found here [also PDF but in English]. Just to point this out. It's very easy for you to ask "site sources" but it's not easy for me to seek sources, not even when I know precisely where to find them. Thus I hope that people on this forum would believe that I do know my social sciences. (Yes, yes, extraordinary climes, extraordinary evidences...)

[Stabu 0]

So, the Finns fare better overall than the Americans when it comes to higher education. And that supports your earlier argument how exactly?

It supports my climes in the sense that every single European country has some sort of public higher education and a half-public half-private American system still beast all of them except for this one. Furthermore I already admitted that if you subsidize it, you get more of it. If you would subsidize enough you could probably grow bananas on the North Pole, it just wouldn't be economically very smart.

[Caladan 19]

Will you be pursuing your PhD in Finland?

[Stabu 0]

Will you be pursuing your PhD in Finland?

I'm currently doing some doctoral studies in political science in Finland but I'm not sure if I'm ever going to get a degree out of it. I've also been debating about going to a university in the US in order to obtain a PhD in American history.

To be honest, the more formal education I've gotten, the less I've valued it. I had very high hopes from the university world when I first entered it; today I think that most of it is complete rubbish.

[Trumplestiltskin 5,791]

Will you be pursuing your PhD in Finland?

I'm currently doing some doctoral studies in political science in Finland but I'm not sure if I'm ever going to get a degree out of it. I've also been debating about going to a university in the US in order to obtain a PhD in American history.

To be honest, the more formal education I've gotten, the less I've valued it. I had very high hopes from the university world when I first entered it; today I think that most of it is complete rubbish.

That's a common perception given that pretty much anyone can get a undergraduate degree with a bare minimum of work. Unless its tied to a specific career choice - I'd say a lot of the courses are of limited value, especially if a person ends up going down the route of academia. Tends not to be a job at the end of it, unless you're committed to a teaching career, for example.

[Peikko 1,575]

I am not sure, but I get the feeling that there might be a bit of throwing the baby out with the bath water going on here. While the Finnish education system may not be perfect (and after all, show me a perfect system anywhere) it's imperfections could be addressed, no? A system where the students come out with an education and without vast amounts of debt has to be a good thing, at least that is my opinion.

It also seems to be somewhat of a sweeping statement to say that most high level education is 'complete rubbish'. How can this possibly make any sense? What do you really mean by this statement? Is it that you don't see an quantifiable 'end product' in terms of employablity? Of are you suggesting that those that complete a university education are no better educated than those who leave school at 16 having failed to gain any qualifications?

It is certainly true that there is a difference between acedemic education and being street savy, but the two are not interchangeble in any meaningful way.

To be honest I am somewhat nonplussed that anyone would seriously argue that higher education is boderline waste of time .

Edited September 6, 2007 by Purple_Hibiscus

[Trumplestiltskin 5,791]

I am not sure, but I get the feeling that there might be a bit of throwing the baby out with the bath water going on here. While the Finnish education system may not be perfect (and after all, show me a perfect system anywhere) it's imperfections could be addressed, no? A system where the students come out with an education and without vast amounts of debt has to be a good thing, at least that is my opinion.

It also seems to be somewhat of a sweeping statement to say that most high level education is 'complete rubbish'. How can this possibly make any sense? What do you really mean by this statement? Is it that you don't see an quantifiable 'end product' in terms of employablity? Of are you suggesting that those that complete a university education are no better educated than those who leave school at 16 having failed to gain any qualifications?

It is certainly true that there is a difference between acedemic education and being street savy, but the two are not interchangeble in any meaningful way.

To be honest I am somewhat nonplussed that anyone would seriously argue that higher education is boderline waste of time .

At the undergraduate level I would say that its quite accurate, at least from my perspective. You get the reward for not much work - and personally speaking, I learned more on my tod than I did at uni.

[Caladan 19]

Will you be pursuing your PhD in Finland?

I'm currently doing some doctoral studies in political science in Finland but I'm not sure if I'm ever going to get a degree out of it. I've also been debating about going to a university in the US in order to obtain a PhD in American history.

To be honest, the more formal education I've gotten, the less I've valued it. I had very high hopes from the university world when I first entered it; today I think that most of it is complete rubbish.

That is often a side-effect of too much schooling. Master's degrees and PhD's are all, by and large, burned out. If you can work a couple years before chasing down the PhD, do it, just for your own mental health.

The one plus to Finland's system is that at least, if I understand it, money is no bar to studying. Here that's not always the case, and you don't have to go much below upper middle class to see kids struggling to be able to afford school, even with good grades, good homes, good parents, etc. As college costs rise, I wouldn't be surprised if America's standing in higher ed plummets as more students just can't afford it.

[Stabu 0]

It also seems to be somewhat of a sweeping statement to say that most high level education is 'complete rubbish'. How can this possibly make any sense? What do you really mean by this statement? Is it that you don't see an quantifiable 'end product' in terms of employablity? Of are you suggesting that those that complete a university education are no better educated than those who leave school at 16 having failed to gain any qualifications?

Sorry about being so imprecise. I replied to a personal question which Caladan addressed me. Thus my reply was personal also. The reason why I may or may not get a PhD or more academic education is that I think that academic education is close to useless. I think that you would become better educated if you would read a ton of self selected books instead. It would also save you a lot of money (in the US at least, since university studies costs). I don't think that university studies are useless in the terms of employment. Companies' value graduates because graduates have a clear proof that they can accomplish something big in a limited timeframe. Thus they get paid more.

I am somewhat nonplussed that anyone would seriously argue that higher education is probably a big waste of time to be honest.

While I think along those lines personally, I can only speak for myself. Everyone has a plan and yours is likely completely different from mine for instance. Thus what I consider useless may be useful to you and vice versa.

Still, more objectively, I think that university studies are becoming less useful as time goes by, since the institution is itself becoming obsolete.

[Peikko 1,575]

So, you are saying that your degree has no value, that it doesn't represent anything in terms of your ability to process information, constuct arguments, evaluate abstract thought?

What kind of degree was it anyway?

[Peikko 1,575]

Ok, the idea that universities are becoming obsolete is totally new to me, would you care to explain that one?