This made me feel funny in the pantsFollow

No, that's the way you like to think it's trending. That's the way you'd like to see it trend. However, it's not moving there with any great speed.

Know what's missing from these MIT "courses"? Class credit. It's a great toy and self-learning tool but it won't get you a degree from MIT. Or even closer to a degree from anywhere. Online universities have yet to gain real acceptance. I was in my college counselor's office the other day when some girl came in wanting to transfer core courses from University of Phoenix. The lady behind the desk gave a sympathetic smile and said "Hrmm... they won't like that." A local college is derisive of UoP's English 101 course. Accredited universty online courses? Sure, they exist, but not to any great scale. The online history program from University of Illinois accepts 20 students per semester. That's not even a full brick classroom's worth of students for an entire online program. A far, far cry from a "trend" towards thousands of people getting their online PhDs.

I don't think anyone but the psycho thinks this is leading to degrees from MIT. If you read the comments, most people are using this as a resource to supplement their own teaching or learning materials (which can be sparse in less-affluent areas), or to educate themselves (not as a degree mill but honestly trying to learn). Curiosity is a basic human motivator, after creature needs are met.

I responding to you, psycho.

Credits, Degrees, Accomplishments, can be granted on-line. Is it hard to imagine taking the SAT, the ACT, MCATs, online? Students already do!

Many job interviews have tests, interviewers ask questions. Proficiency can be demonstrated in many ways, and easily moved on-line. You want to be a doctor? You can easily perform any number of operations on virtual patients to demonstrate your qualifications. Pilots train in flight simulators before taking the controls of 747s. All these skills can be greatly duplicated on-line. Is it that hard to imagine a Wi controller evolving into a scapel?

All these schools that grant degrees are accredited. All the courses have tests, have homework. Most of that can be easily replicated on-line, along with the easily posted video of lecturers, TA, sessions, student questions, teacher explantations.

Of course, on-line degrees have *yet* to gain real acceptance. The educational institution has replaced the medieval guild system. Instead of perfomring years of service as an apprentice and being granted charter by the King, you pay tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of dollars for the degree pieces of paper. It serves as a union card filter toward a multitude of better paying jobs. It locks out competition in many fields, artificially raising the wages of doctors, lawyers, etc., and of course pays the professors, pays the K-12 teachers, pays the Dean's, pays the principals, etc.

Yeah, right now this material is supplemental. Back in the 1950s, pong type games on multi-million dollar super computers was supplemental material as well. The thing is, 6 figure degrees will eventually be competing with alternative lower priced standardized courses and accredidation. It's naive for those with degrees in say computer science from say MIT to pretend that degree shields them from competition. It's all about real knowledge and real skills, no matter the manner in which they may be gained. You don't need to be in the second grade school library to play the "Oregon Trail" history game. You can just as easily pass it or fail it from home. And that holds for anything and everything in the current educational system. And it's been trending that way since ever since the Apple Macintosh in the 1980s and that grade school Oregon Trail computer game. University of Phoenix and OCW are just intermediary steps.

Do you need to take a course to build your own computer? No, you find the information, you process the information, you order your stuff from newegg and put it together. You don't need a degree to henceforth get a job on a dell assembly line. Just like it's ridiculous to pay an American worker 50k for a tech support call center job that can be done by an Indian for 25k, just like it's ridiculous to pay an American programmer 125k for a programming job that can be done by a Chinese programmer for 40k, it just as ridiculous to pay MIT 125k for a degree that can be obtained for five dollars in the not too distant future. If you think Asian scientists outnumber American scientists now, wait until you see how many more there are in 20 years because the road to becoming a scientist has gotten super cheap, super quick, and super efficient.

Huh? I gave you concrete examples. MCATs on-line. Series 7 financial qualifications, on-line. It goes on and on. Forums, like this, where ideas are occasionally debated, on-line. It's a thin string holding the government funded, government accredidation charter grants of license to perform services, together. Do you need a degree to learn Spanish? No, it's available for free on-line. Do you need a degree to put Spanish on your resume? No, you know it if you know it. Those are solid examples of a solid trend. And there's a ton more if you just glance.

Taking a multiple choice test over the internet is leagues away from the internet replacing the traditional classroom as the primary place of learning. And I'm not sure what professions you need a degree in Spanish for, aside from teaching Spanish. Which still requires an accredited degree (assuming you're not teaching privately).

Were those your best examples?

Edited, Jan 9th 2007 1:01pm by Jophiel

Sure. "Watching".

No but you can ask him because it'll be just like IRC as well!


Unfortunately, we're dealing with Monx's dream class of 10,000 people taught by one single super-elite instructor so it might take him a while to get back to you.

Good point. After all, once upon a time we used to play Pong. Based on that stirring bit of evidence, I predict we'll have super-intelligent robot overlords before June.

Elderon wrote:



You desperately need to read some Mises Human Action

Here it is, for free:

http://www.mises.org/humanaction.asp

Join the early 20th century state of socio-politico-philosophical knowledge.





Lol, once he or anyone else answers your question, it can be archived and viewed simultaneously by millions of others. What's this meager 10,000 person classroom? It's archived. If someone comes along and gives a better answer, it's archived too. If a TA session has an awesome 50 minute discussion about it, it's archived. The best is filtered in, and the old junk is filtered out.

You're getting schooled in real time right now, by me, for free. :P There's millions and millions of other examples from every other subject as well. People aren't stuck any longer in physical classrooms, physical libraries, in limited time class sessions and limited time office hours of the professor.

And worth every penny of it!

When? I said when: when there is no real time feedback. There's no living person there to see the blank looks that say, "I don't get this."

I assume you've never taught.