

End the University as We Know It - mjfern
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/27/opinion/27taylor.html

======
gaius
_A Water program would bring together people in the humanities, arts, social
and natural sciences with representatives from professional schools like
medicine, law, business, engineering, social work, theology and architecture.
Through the intersection of multiple perspectives and approaches, new
theoretical insights will develop and unexpected practical solutions will
emerge._

Interesting list. Unfortunately for the author, the people who will actually
solve the problem - the engineers - already have their act together and aren't
particularly interested in what sociologists and theologians have to say about
desalination plants...

~~~
Tangurena
I think we'll see more and more legal frameworks such as the Great Lakes
Compact where the export of water from the region is illegal. Our water-rights
laws in the US are totally messed up. For example, in CO (where I live) and
UT, it is illegal for you to collect the rainwater that falls on your roof: it
belongs to someone else.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Lakes_Compact>

Solving the upcoming water problems is a wholly political problem and not one
of engineering.

<http://anthropik.com/2006/08/israels-water-wars/>

~~~
nir
>Solving the upcoming water problems is a wholly political problem and not one
of engineering

I'm not sure I understand this. Maybe in the sense that if there was peace
among nations it would easier to apply the engineering solutions that would
solve the water problem?

Even so, directing more resources to water engineering research can be
reasonably expected to result in some useful solutions. Few will claim that
strengthening political science depts would yield more world peace.

(BTW, the 2nd article contains Reddit-level nonsense. That it is published by
academics - I assume? - says more about academia than its subject matter)

~~~
Tangurena
No, peace isn't the solution. In the western states, such as CO and UT, the
water-rights laws are tangled, messy and arcane. They even predate the
statehood and are embedded in the state constitutions.

Effectively, once you turn a pipe on, you can never turn it off. People who
have "senior water rights" are allowed under those state laws to make people
"upstream" not only stop using water from rivers, but replace the water that
they had been using.

Canada has a large number of rivers that flow north into the Arctic sea. From
the US perspective, that water is wasted. "We" would like to see it pumped
south. However, we wanted a uniform framework of laws governing that. So we
forced the Canadians into accepting water-rights laws substantially similar to
the western states' laws. Consequently, the Canadians banned such water
exports.

If you want to see how screwed up water distribution is in the US. And how
political the mess is, then I recommed that you read the book Cadillac Desert.

[http://www.amazon.com/Cadillac-Desert-American-
Disappearing-...](http://www.amazon.com/Cadillac-Desert-American-Disappearing-
Revised/dp/0140178244)

And as for the anthropik article, several of the points made in that article
(and yes, I know it rambles too much) have to do with how Israel needs the
water, and how that water is critical to the security of their nation. When
the water being pumped out of the aquifers in Gaza became too contaminated for
agriculture, then Gaza ended up getting returned to Palestinian control (and
now about all that grows are flowers and hatred). If you look at the "security
barrier" on the West Bank, it seems to follow no political nor demographic
map. When you map that security barrier against the aquifer's boundaries, then
you get a match.

Water is life. And the Babylonians had to struggle with salt deposits in their
cropland. As their fields got too salty for high yielding crops like citrus
and wheat, they had to switch to lower yielding grains like emmer (good luck
finding that outside of a health food store) and barley. Some of those fields
ended up so salty that they shine in modern day Iraqi sunlight: those are salt
deposits from more than 2000 years ago.

Food is life. Water is life. Without both, we die. Therefore they become
political.

------
nertzy
Franklin W. Olin College of Engineering in Needham, Mass. (alma mater of a
handful of YC team members) has taken several of these ideas to heart.

<http://www.olin.edu>

No tenure, collaboration with nearby institutions to share courses,
encouragement for all community members to contribute to developing and
changing all aspects of the college at any time, and no separated academic
departments. The list goes on and on.

It's a great place for entrepreneurially-minded students to find an atmosphere
that allows them to build up their skills without having to settle for
university-level bureaucracy.

~~~
krschultz
I was admitted but at the time it was very new, I really wish I had went

------
philwelch
Part of the division into departments is a good thing because it reflects a
separation of concerns. A philosophical question (what is our ethical duty as
human beings, which methods of argument and reasoning provide valid
conclusions under which sets of assumptions, what conceptions of free will are
compatible with metaphysical determinism) can't be meaningfully answered from
a scientific or artistic approach though scientists and artists are both
capable of philosophy to some extent, and in fact it would be good to see
academics publishing across related fields more often. I could easily imagine
epistemologists, philosophers of science, and scientists productively
publishing together in methodology-of-science journals and attending
methodology conferences.

Furthermore, departments allow for a deliberate separation of fundamentally
incompatible approaches. Some people who take up the dubious academic pursuit
of seeing everything from the perspective of feminism or race go to the
Women's Studies and Ethnic Studies departments, and the rest of us are often
better off without them. If we tried to close or ban the Women's Studies or
Ethnic Studies department, people would be taking that crap back into other
fields, so as a political compromise we have those departments as a
containment field (though I am speaking too harshly, there are certainly
benefits for the academics in those fields as well).

~~~
kgrin
To expand on the second point a bit more: one of the virtues of the department
model is that (most) departments teach a particular way of approaching
problems, a "discipline" if you will. They teach you to "think like a
[computer scientist|chemist|psychologist|etc]".

Certainly, there's often a great deal of value in breaking down these
disciplinary barriers and attacking the problem holistically - which is why
many institutions have interdisciplinary programs and the like. But there's
also a value in fields of study retaining some identity as disciplines, with
particular methodologies, mores and so forth.

------
alexgartrell
What about CS grad school? Don't research labs take the pressure off of PHD
candidates to find tenured positions?

(Disclaimer: This is an actual question, not 'fightin words')

~~~
dinkumthinkum
Actually, the pressure is pretty high for CS PhD students. It is a very
competitive field. Nevertheless, in terms of "actually finding a job" the
prospects are pretty good for CS PhDs ... I've never heard of any having
problems. Honestly, I don't know any masters students having issues with this.

------
csbartus
The knowledge is not for free. But you cannot buy it with money, as the
university model is stating, but with time, the learning time.

Anyway time is money

------
dinkumthinkum
Hm ... A religion professor feels like current university system is useless
and antiquated... Perhaps it is really his own field that is useless and
antiquated.

~~~
michael_dorfman
You should check out his writings-- I doubt he's the kind of "religion
professor" you suspect he is.

For example: [http://www.amazon.com/After-Religion-Postmodernism-Mark-
Tayl...](http://www.amazon.com/After-Religion-Postmodernism-Mark-
Taylor/dp/0226791718/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1240847706&sr=1-2)
[http://www.amazon.com/Erring-Postmodern-theology-Mark-
Taylor...](http://www.amazon.com/Erring-Postmodern-theology-Mark-
Taylor/dp/0226791424/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1240847706&sr=1-6)
[http://www.amazon.com/About-Religion-Economies-Virtual-
Postm...](http://www.amazon.com/About-Religion-Economies-Virtual-
Postmodernism/dp/0226791629/ref=sr_1_11?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1240847706&sr=1-11)

~~~
dinkumthinkum
Well, actually know he's exactly the kind I suspected. I'm as nonplussed by
his work as I am by Rorty. Nevertheless, I stand by my assertion. If I want to
read about deconstruction I'll read someone who knows something about it like
Derrida. This argument for things like a Water department is pretty lackluster
at best.

------
jokull
School sucks!

