Why are the humanities still competitive?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:In my anecdotal experience, the engineering students tend to be much more curious about the world and better read than the humanities students.

Ivy interviewer -- not at all true in my experience.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Stem folks know plenty about philosophy and humanity.

I majored in engineering and took multiple philosophy classes, a religion class, studio art class, writing in classics, sociology, history, and more.

The writers are easily replaced by AI- whether they’re writing text or code. My stem job is human facing and will be one of the last replaced, if ever. You people have no idea what stem majors even do. Humans could survive without humanities majors but could not survive without stem majors.
In fact, some of the most unethical people are humanities majors you praise- the lawyers and politicians.

Here’s the difference between STEM folks and humanities folks: STEM folks take a hodgepodge of humanities classes and “think they know plenty.” Humanities folks double major in humanities and know they have a lot to learn. STEM folks look at things…simply. It is how they are trained.

This is the big difference. As a statistician, you’d be surprised how many physicists and engineers have tried to talk over me about my job. There’s an arrogance and confidence to those in the sciences that really is encouraged by their staunch belief that they know everything and can do anything. I think other fields are a lot more humble about what they do and don’t know.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:STEM majors have 40-50% of courses that are humanities.

It is the humanities majors who are having serious gaps in education.

Engineering is the liberal arts education of the 21st century.

LOL wut?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:In my anecdotal experience, the engineering students tend to be much more curious about the world and better read than the humanities students.

Sure--there's curiosity about "how did they manage to build that bridge?" and there's curiosity about "why do we consider that bridge beautiful and where do such judgments come from?" (Or something like that.) I'd take the latter any day as a more compellingly curious way to approach the world and humankind. FWIW.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:STEM majors have 40-50% of courses that are humanities.

It is the humanities majors who are having serious gaps in education.

Engineering is the liberal arts education of the 21st century.

This isn't universally ture. I know many engineering students who took zero humanties courses, especailly at state colleges tha tlet them use APs to opt out of the core. Less likely at a school where APs only count as placement or an elective though.

Also, you realize that schools with a strong core curriculum also include math and science requirements, right? So the humanitiies students are also taking STEM classes.