Importance Of Going Into A University

ViRuSKiD SG

I have been wondering if going into a University is so important , people told me that if u go into a university u will be more sucessful and have a easier life after u get the diploma but is it true that going into a University is so important? I have ask a lot of people and they said that if they only have Poly Dip. , its hard to find a job.. and very “no face” but if u have University Deg. , you can find job easily and also when people ask about your level of education u can proudly say u are university graduate. So far i have seen other exception whereby its the poly student who is more sucessful then the University students.

MooKu SG

You get a DEGREE upon graduation from a university and a DIPLOMA upon graduation from a polytechnic. Wink

Why succumb to society's standards? Just do what you desire to do most as a career and take the path that's most suitable for yourself. With enough determination, perseverance and passion, one will succeed no matter whether he or she is holding a diploma or a degree. Cool

And someone holding a diploma only can go and study for a degree mah. Aiyoh.

sgboy2004 SG

University of the Society is the best.

duotiga83 SG

experience....experience........ Cool got degreee no experience..... Rolling Eyes

sgboy2004 SG

I agree..but everyone has to start somewhere...dun need to envy those ahead of u... cos one day u will be there...and those juniors will be there to envy u one day too.

Mr. Green

CX SG

a good degree may open more doors in the first 2 years after graduation IF the economy is doing ok...

bad economy means that u won't get a job easily anyway... whether u got a dip. or a deg.

and they're two different things lah... there are job openings for deg-holders AND dip-holders... and deg. jobs don't always pay better... it really depends on where your interests lies. no point feeling "tui" only after u get your qualifications.

so the answer: just follow your interests. if a uni offers a course u are interested in, go for that. if a poly offers something u're more interested in, go for that.

Gedanken SG

Hmm - good question.

Can't say I've ever had difficulty finding a job - in the last 10 years (apart from when university semesters were on) I have been unemployed for a maximum of four days at a stretch, and I have only been turned down for a job twice. The question is, did the degrees make it easier?

Certainly, at the end of my undergraduate years, my degree paved the way for me to breeze through the selection process. However, in 2000 I beat a number of more qualified applicants for a job as well, and the reverse happened in 2002. In both cases, the decisions were close, and personal qualities ultimately constituted the deciding factor.

Certain professions require educational prerequisites, of course. Not any Tom, Dick or Harry may walk in and become a lawyer or doctor, although the rules seem to vary across countries in psychology, which is my profession. In countries like Australia, Britain and the US, you need professional registration to practice; this does not apply in Singapore.

The question is, what do you want to go to university for? If it is for future employment prospects, a degree is good for helping you get shortlisted, but ultimately your personal qualities will be the clincher.

Personally, I did my doctorate for the fun of it. Yes, it does tend to slingshot me past some other job applicants who hold Honours or Masters degrees, but I normally let my curriculum vitae do the loudest talking.

Call it indulgence if you will, but I make a point of doing something only because I want to, and never because I have to, be it education or work. Right now I've decided that I want to return to Singapore to work, but in a few years' time I will probably start a PhD in Strategic Planning - I've taken a sniff at it and it looks like it's going to be a real gas. Mr. Green

weiwei83 SG

If you have a degree, it makes you a more confident person. You also earn more than others for the same job(because of the qualification). Success cannot be measured by level of education alone. Some people who earns a lot but have no university education may say university sucks big time but they will most likely still want their sons/daughters to get into a university. Getting a degree is not a must but it will be good to have one. Plus points if you get top class honours, Masters, PHD.

gasband SG

It is important if you think it is. Nothing wrong with thinking its important neither is it wrong to think otherwise.

I think most young people nowadays do not realise that straight after ur university days, you will jump straight into the working world and most likely thats where you will stay for the rest of your life, albeit in different jobs. You got to know what you want in life. I got frens who study study study then now suddenly graduate came to realisation that its too late to regret. I also have frens who quit school early to do business, one is doing well in his transport business, one is going to fold soon...one have already given up and join the police force...

If university can give what you want in life later on, go for it. If you do not even know what you want in life, then the question does not even matter anymore.

BillyBong SG

This society sees too much in paper grades. Those of us who are in the working world know all too well that scholars move up corporate ladders faster than the average employee, that scholars are offered opportunities wider than the average employee, and more often than not, scholars are at the pinacle of each conglomerate.

It seems experience and capability fall short of 'unquestionable' As and Distinctions on your degree, along with an ink chop that stamps "scholar".

Is there anyone out there who runs a company who was not a scholar? Very few, and fewer still as this absurd trend continues. Therein lies the problem.

We think of a uni degree as a doorway by which greatness follows. We stereotype an obsolete thinking: Those that do not make it to a uni are failures.

Was it not all too recently that we looked upon normal/technical stream students as the bottom of the barrel? Do we not continue to do so?

It is in this nature that we should be deemed short-sighted. It would be conceited to think that a uni degree holds all the answers to a prosperous and comfortable life...

It merely holds a higher educational standard, but proves nothing if you already have the focus and desire of blossoming entrepreneurs like Dennis Wee.

Atobe SG

I am not sure if there are enough Scholars to spread around to provide Leadership in all the large, medium and small businesses in the various industries and commerce.

Chances are a Graduate with a Degree will stand a better then equal chance at an interview over someone with a Diploma qualification if work experience is considered with other considerations.

The question of the Importance of going into a University is equivalent to asking the Importance of Education.

At the Primary, Secondary and High School levels, the education process leaves one with little choice in the courses to study; while at the Tertiary Level, one can decide and choose the course of study that will be relevant to the intended goals in Life.

Tertiary Level of Education will certainly help to open doors to occupational opportunities; however, it will be the individual performance on the job that will count in the success of an individual at the job of choice.

The individuals performance will depend on how much the Education Process has molded the thought process, ability to think, judgment, resourcefulness, character, social process, and self-discipline.

Ultimately, whether one should obtain any level of education will depend on ones goals in Life whether you wish to work for others, or if you wish to be your Own Boss.

Whichever way that one decide, Education can only help by way of training and information.

However, not having a full education does not necessarily make one inferior to a Scholar.

While most Scholars make good Managers (up to CEO levels), it is sad that not all Scholars are good at being Entrepreneurs.

There are not too many Scholars who can withstand the 'pressure cooker' environment of investing their own money in some new unknown and untried ventures.

The Owner of Tee Yih Jia - known as the King of Popiah Skin - started out as a machine technician, and is now owning and managing several manufacturing plants in South-east Asia, PR China, and the USA; and has spread his marketing arm to Europe, UK, Australia, New Zealand, Middle-East, South Africa and Latin America.

The Owner of Creative Technology has only a basic Polytechnic Diploma when he started his business.

We should use 'Education' as a resource to achieve our Goals in Life, and not become a slave to the education and information processes.

Ah Ma SG

Please proceed to National University of Nuns (NUN)

Gedanken SG

One of the things that many people fail to realise about tertiary education is that the object is to teach one how to think, not what to think. The level at which teaching takes place moves from the concrete to the abstract you are expected to look beyond individual facts and pull all of these facts into concepts. Sadly, many university students I have seen seem to be challenged even by handling facts, and instead often lapse into opinion.

The raison detre of university is to impart the techniques of tuning ones intellect towards dealing with concepts to take individual points of information and to analyse and synthesise them into a cogent argument in favour of a concept. The question then is, is that entirely necessary?

In the case of the examples that Atobe cited, the answer would be no. They already knew these things, so putting them through university is simply overkill. On the other hand, most of us need such an environment to cultivate such qualities in us. On the flip side, I have seen many graduates leave university no smarter than they were when they entered you cant make a silk purse out of a sows ear.

CX SG

Originally posted by Gedanken:
One of the things that many people fail to realise about tertiary education is that the object is to teach one [b]how to think, not what to think. The level at which teaching takes place moves from the concrete to the abstract you are expected to look beyond individual facts and pull all of these facts into concepts. Sadly, many university students I have seen seem to be challenged even by handling facts, and instead often lapse into opinion.

what's wrong with having an opinion?

over-conceptualising and over-intellectualising is just plain lame. the most important aspect of education is not to find answers, but to formulate questions.

discrete facts are everywhere. u have to know HOW to ask yourself questions to know WHAT these facts MEANS to u... part of this is training, part of this is applying a concept/framework that at best, only fits partly, and most of it is just plain informed OPINION.

what matters is not how esoteric your concept is at the end of the day... what matters is that your conclusion makes sense and WORKS.

most of the management theories and human resource management theories that are taught are just normal insights dressed up with flashy jargon. what's there to conceptualise in that? the application of such theories again, relies on one's discretion and opinion.

i just don't like believing that there are neat little "concepts" that can conclusively group knowledge into different categories or sort them into any sort of simplistic framework that are necessarily reductionistic...

the world's more complex than that and i recognise the genius behind some opinions. they really shouldn't be forced to integrate it into some flashy theories just to make it seem more intelligent.

[email protected] SG

i think ultimately, its not about going to uni or not. its about studying something u are interested in, or even about what u want to do in life. if there is no more studying in your plan for your life, then u should start focusing on the next step. There is no must to go to uni.

nismoS132 SG

i think he probably meant opinion formed not from thorough analysing of facts, but from a gut feel coupled with some wild guesses.

uninformed opinions form weak arguments.

Gedanken SG

CX, I expect that by over-conceptualising and over-intellectualising, you mean spouting a whole lot of jargon without knowing what it really means. If that is the case, I would agree with you there are way too many snake-oil salesmen out there who crap on using heaps of syllables.

Informed opinion is an oxymoron. An opinion is a belief or judgement that is NOT necessarily based upon facts or knowledge. An informed opinion is therefore not truly an opinion, but is instead a conclusion. Trying to slip it past that opinion and conclusion are one and the same is a cheap trick, and one that is easily spotted by people who do not place their money on opinions.

Even with a cogent argument backing a conclusion, one cannot necessarily impose a conclusion upon another person. Ultimately, you present the facts and let other people assemble those facts into their own conclusions. Providing them with you opinion is only cheating them, since it does not allow the other person access to the substance from which your opinion is formed, thereby closing off any analysis, review or debate.

If you think that concepts categorise and reduce, you obviously have not taken a careful enough look at them. If anything, concepts are anti-reductionistic. Development of concepts more often than not highlight missing elements that are needed for the concepts to hang together and make sense. Categorisation, by definition, is also contrary to conceptualization you only categorise to move something from the abstract to the concrete. The very fact of your statement leads me to question if you have any clue what a concept really is.

Sure, I agree with you that things have to be made to work do you think that opinions are the way to go? Fine my OPINION is that Ill make a million bucks in a month selling pink tutus because my OPINION is that everybody loves pink, and my OPINION is that everybody loves the ballet, and my OPINION is that even if people dont dance, they will want to own a tutu for their love of the ballet.

Makes as much sense as your proposal of going with opinions, doesnt it?

To quote an old American idiom: "Opinions are like assholes - everybody's got one". The issue here is simple: what good is an opinion, if there is no substance to convert it into action?

On your point about management and human resource theorists, many people in the business tend to use jargon in place of opinions, which is just as bad as going with opinions alone, since it produces no result either. In my line of work, I absolutely loathe human resource people who have this big chip on their shoulder and try hurling a lot of useless jargon and research at me to try and make themselves look good. I simply pick at their understanding and application of the terms that they use, and debunk the methodology of the research that they quote. It was fun when I started out, but I have to admit that doing so has gotten pretty boring they keep coming up with the same tired old stuff.

As for your assertion (or is it opinion?) about management and human resource theories being normal insights, answer this simple question. If these insights were indeed normal (as if there were any such thing as normal in the first place), why do we hear people bitching about their jobs and bosses? After all, if everybody knew it already, would such problems arise?

Ultimately, the biggest indictment against opinions is how easy you have made it for me to pick your post apart. The lack of facts and logic have left gaping holes for me to take advantage of.

CX SG

Originally posted by Gedanken:

CX, I expect that by over-conceptualising and over-intellectualising, you mean spouting a whole lot of jargon without knowing what it really means. If that is the case, I would agree with you there are way too many snake-oil salesmen out there who crap on using heaps of syllables.

haha... haven't we all seen them... but no... i mean it in a sense when we force facts into a crude framework to justify our agendas and think beyond a text in interpreting meanings that were never intended by the author. it is commendable to read critically to identify biases, but its just plain retarded to make wild, loosely substantiated claims and attempt to back it up with intellectually pretentious "theories"...

Informed opinion is an oxymoron. An opinion is a belief or judgement that is NOT necessarily based upon facts or knowledge. An informed opinion is therefore not truly an opinion, but is instead a conclusion. Trying to slip it past that opinion and conclusion are one and the same is a cheap trick, and one that is easily spotted by people who do not place their money on opinions.

Even with a cogent argument backing a conclusion, one cannot necessarily impose a conclusion upon another person. Ultimately, you present the facts and let other people assemble those facts into their own conclusions. Providing them with you opinion is only cheating them, since it does not allow the other person access to the substance from which your opinion is formed, thereby closing off any analysis, review or debate.

your cynicism with regards to opinion is noted, but isn't it as futile to place blind faith in letting facts "speak for themselves"? or worse, expecting pple to come to an informed conclusion by providing them with "all the facts"?

if u ask me, facts are as contentious as opinions. what makes u think that a fact cannot be presented in such a manner that will cause the reader to come to a certain fixed conclusion? that conclusion arrived at may be the result of a faulty pre-conceived notion that has been acquired from the process of education in the first place. does it mean that a "fact" is "true" just because everyone thinks it is? didn't magellan prove that the world was round rather than flat?

knowledge is not neutral. knowledge is manufactured by a human process, and every human process contains an agenda, hidden, devious, or otherwise. pple do not "make" knowledge with the conscious intention to mislead, but we are all products and to a great extent, prisoners of our context.

doesn't the process of selecting the facts to present to your audience imply a series of omissions on your part as well? we never have perfect information despite our most noble intentions. the intention is not always devious, but we have already shaped the nature of the discussion and very possibly, the conclusions by presenting the "facts". u can't go "wrong" with "facts" right? or can you...

If you think that concepts categorise and reduce, you obviously have not taken a careful enough look at them. If anything, concepts are anti-reductionistic. Development of concepts more often than not highlight missing elements that are needed for the concepts to hang together and make sense. Categorisation, by definition, is also contrary to conceptualization you only categorise to move something from the abstract to the concrete. The very fact of your statement leads me to question if you have any clue what a concept really is.

state a concrete example on your point on "concepts"... jargons and semantics do not properly illustrate the point.

Sure, I agree with you that things have to be made to work do you think that opinions are the way to go? Fine my OPINION is that Ill make a million bucks in a month selling pink tutus because my OPINION is that everybody loves pink, and my OPINION is that everybody loves the ballet, and my OPINION is that even if people dont dance, they will want to own a tutu for their love of the ballet.

Makes as much sense as your proposal of going with opinions, doesnt it?

there is a serious difference between having an informed opinion and indulging in senseless polemics... how did u arrive at the "informed" opinion that pink tutus are gonna be all the rage this spring/summer(since i think pple won't normally wear tutus in fall/winter right? a bit the cold lah...)?

frankly, your opinion would be valid if it was packaged with some information... like your statistical basis for claiming that everybody likes pink, everybody likes tutus and everybody likes ballet... otherwise, what claims do u have that your assessment is accurate?

not every opinion is an informed opinion. not every informed opinion is a "fact". not every "factual" conclusion is true.

To quote an old American idiom: "Opinions are like assholes - everybody's got one". The issue here is simple: what good is an opinion, if there is no substance to convert it into action?

i agree with your point generally. opinions are like arseholes... everybody has one. but has it ever occured to u that some arseholes function better than others?

and why should an intellectual discussion ever have to be "converted" into action? an informed opinion should be valued because u respect the right of the person making it and he respects your rights to dispute him.

On your point about management and human resource theorists, many people in the business tend to use jargon in place of opinions, which is just as bad as going with opinions alone, since it produces no result either ... It was fun when I started out, but I have to admit that doing so has gotten pretty boring they keep coming up with the same tired old stuff.

same... i stopped trying after awhile... stubborn prigs... there's nothing worse than talking to someone who is closed-minded.

As for your assertion (or is it opinion?) about management and human resource theories being normal insights, answer this simple question. If these insights were indeed normal (as if there were any such thing as normal in the first place), why do we hear people bitching about their jobs and bosses? After all, if everybody knew it already, would such problems arise?

because everyone knows it, but different pple have different opinions about them. wouldn't that explain your point about the pink tutus as well? hypothetically speaking, even if pink tutus were all that popular, it doesn't automatically follow that "everybody" would buy them. could it be that u're applying your overly reductionistic conceptual framework onto this overly simplistic illustration to prove a weak point? could it be that u're just "opinionated" against opinions?

Ultimately, the biggest indictment against opinions is how easy you have made it for me to pick your post apart. The lack of facts and logic have left gaping holes for me to take advantage of.

i don't see how my argument has been destroyed... i find your position on facts rather dubious as well. have u ever stopped to think what a "fact" is? laying claims to factuality is in fact, more destructive to discussions because it implies the existence of one fixed truth that gives the "fact" the legitimacy to make whatever claims you are using it to make.

i do not deny that my point is nuanced and abstract. but just cos u prefer a more tangible approach doesn't mean that your point is more valid. thats just your opinion.

i'll be willing to meet u halfway and agree that opinions need to be substantiated with facts to be sensible (and what else might we call that, but an informed opinion?). and frankly, i don't see an opinion as polemical... u are free to dispute the claims and present your own understandings of the situation. thats what a conversation and a discussion is about.

nobody has a monopoly on truth.

Gedanken SG

CX, what exactly do you mean by informed opinion? If it means what you seem to be getting at, which is in fact a properly founded conclusion, then we do indeed have a meeting point. Perhaps further clarifying my terms would help here.

Lets start with facts. A fact is an observable and measurable object, action or event. For example, He accesses the Internet five times a day, spending a total of eight hours is a fact, while Hes on the Internet a lot is not. Said persons use of the Internet can be measured by frequency and duration, providing hard facts, while a lot does not constitute a fact.

A number of facts, assembled in a logical manner, can lead to a conclusion. For example, adding logic to the first statement can make the second statement a properly founded conclusion. He accesses the Internet five times a day, spending a total of eight hours. Given that the average person accesses the Internet once a day and spends half an hour, we can say that he spends a lot of time on the Internet. Even so, the use of a vague term like a lot can put this conclusion under question. If there are a number of people out there who spend 16 hours a day on the Internet, this persons usage will not seem like a lot.

If it is a proper fact, it is neutral and one can assemble a set of facts in a certain manner to reach a conclusion. That the person spends eight hours on the Internet is a measure that stands by itself. Its implications, however, can be modified according to what other facts are presented alongside it. As above, if the person is compared to an average user, he looks like a heavy user. On the other hand, next to a 16-hour-a-day user, he looks like a light user. Along these lines, you seem to have mixed facts and knowledge together inappropriately to conclude that facts are contentious. Facts stand by themselves and are therefore neutral by definition, while knowledge, as a collection of certain facts, can take a bent in a certain direction.

It is not a case of you cant go wrong with facts. Regardless of definitions of opinions and conclusions, they both attend to the question What?, which, by itself is not good enough. If someone tells me what, I would certainly want to know the why part of it. For example, if someone told me Put ten thousand dollars into stocks of X company, I would not immediately go off to the bank and sign my life away. I suspect you would not either. The first questions I would ask is Why should I do that? Has X company been doing something that is likely to make their share prices rise?. If X company has indeed been making some good moves, that might be the basis for investing in them.

My point here is: dont go providing an opinion or conclusion without backing it up. Without that foundation, they are useless. You cannot automatically trust the source of the statement. Fine, if Bill Gates was to provide an opinion of where the computer industry is going, his word may have some credence given his track record in the computer business. However, he probably knows jack squat about the pink tutu business, and I would not automatically take his word for it in that particular arena.

Hmm. You want an example of a concept? Okayyyyy

However, IRT models with more parameters may sometimes be preferable (Suen, 1990). For example, selecting a homogeneous set of items with equal discrimination may not always be possible. With sets of items with varying levels of discrimination, using the more complex 2PL model may be more suitable than attempting to apply a 1PL model where the assumption of homogeneity in item discrimination is not supported. Hambleton (1989) also notes that items that fit a 1PL model are harder to find than for other models, and a 2PL model may in this way be more attractive than a 1PL model from a practical perspective.

Okay, I took the lazy way out and cut-and-pasted from my doctoral thesis. One of the points of my thesis was to test if a two-parameter model (2PL) IRT model provides more accurate results than a 1PL model. I took actual examples of undergraduate exam results to produce mathematical models that showed that the 2PL model did indeed produce more accurate results, but that they were more sensitive to disparities between the difficulty of the exam and the ability level of the examinees. While I prefer 2PL models personally (accounting for more parameters makes more sense), I examined the facts the actual exam results, the data from the exams (and the resulting mathematical models), correlations between the model results and the actual results, estimated difficulty levels and the examinees estimated ability levels. Looking at these facts, I demonstrated the point I wanted to, which was that 2PL models indeed provided more accurate results. However, at the same time, the results revealed that 2Pl models can be twitchy and need careful use that part I did not want to demonstrate. However, being intellectually honest, one has to provides both the pros and cons, and the facts would not let me get away with providing the pros alone. If I had glossed over the limitations of the 2PL model, the examiners would have crucified me.

This leads me to my next point, addressing your issue about facts being presented in a biased manner. With the examiners, I could not have possibly gotten away with it, because their analysis of the facts I presented would have highlighted the things that I omitted. With an ignorant audience, it is extremely easy to get away with chucking out a whole lot of facts and stunning them into silent agreement. Hell, Ive done it enough times at board meetings some so-called human resources professional with a chip on his shoulder questions my assertions, and I drown him or her in a sea of relevant facts and statistics. However, it is not a cop-out; if someone of an equal level of knowledge were to analyse my facts and stats, they would see it as logical.

In my line of work, there is always the chance of someone questioning what I say, and I always make a point to be prepared to provide a detailed answer to a fine-point question. My professional reputation hinges on my ability to provide these answers, and my obligation to my clients is to provide sound advice.

This brings me to my point about students who lapse into opinion. I will not send out a student to go make a fool of himself by trying to slip an unfounded opinion by a future client. Every student that I have taught has at some point been hammered by me for doing that in their university assignments, and every single one has learned to ask themselves is this opinion or conclusion?. I had the advantage of having individual students referred to me by my lecturers, and Im not quite sure if I could have done that at a class level. However, my former students have gone on to be manage university departments, run war-trauma programs in third-world countries and set up their own consultancies. And all of them have stuck by that one simple question in everything they do: is this opinion or conclusion?, and it has worked very much in their favour.

I dont have a problem with polemic opinions if youve read my posts on previous threads, you will know that I am not at all uncomfortable with controversy. I do, however, have a problem with unfounded opinion, and again my previous posts have reflected that.

CX SG

yes... i would appear that we have much common ground.

Lets start with facts. A fact is an observable and measurable object, action or event. For example, He accesses the Internet five times a day, spending a total of eight hours is a fact, while Hes on the Internet a lot is not. Said persons use of the Internet can be measured by frequency and duration, providing hard facts, while a lot does not constitute a fact.

i'm glad you addressed that because that's a point i was trying to make. a "fact" being an "observable and measurable object, action or event" therefore, does not exist in itself.

it exists only after a process of active enquiry. so to claim that a "fact" exists by itself, in self and is self-justifying is absurd.

we would not know (nor care) how much time the subject spends on the internet unless we engaged the subject in a process of enquiry. this process might be straightforward in your case of a subject's average internet usage, but would easily be contentious within a more complex framework. ultimately, it depends on what questions u have asked yourself and what questions u are trying or able to answer.

that a subject spends 8 hours, or 10, or 15, is not a fact until u decide to integrate it into your framework to support your arguments/conclusions/opinions.

Along these lines, you seem to have mixed facts and knowledge together inappropriately to conclude that facts are contentious. Facts stand by themselves and are therefore neutral by definition, while knowledge, as a collection of certain facts, can take a bent in a certain direction.

its always nice to talk to an "old one" that has not lost their innocence in the current scholarship. so how does a fact remain "neutral" in itself if a collection of them can skew the conclusion in certain directions? there must be something inherently unstable about them in the first place now isn't it?

i'm not trying to be academically showy here... you're an intelligent and well read individual... you've probably seen or heard such views before... they're VERY popular in the social science discipline and they're not founded on loose, pedestrian opinions...

a friendly conversation doesn't require footnotes does it?

My point here is: dont go providing an opinion or conclusion without backing it up. Without that foundation, they are useless. You cannot automatically trust the source of the statement. Fine, if Bill Gates was to provide an opinion of where the computer industry is going, his word may have some credence given his track record in the computer business. However, he probably knows jack squat about the pink tutu business, and I would not automatically take his word for it in that particular arena.

no arguments with that.

Hmm. You want an example of a concept? Okayyyyy

sigh... jargons with more jargons...

This leads me to my next point, addressing your issue about facts being presented in a biased manner. With the examiners, I could not have possibly gotten away with it, because their analysis of the facts I presented would have highlighted the things that I omitted.

you are assuming the fact that one has perfect knowledge, or that your discipline is defined by a norrow corpus of knowledge... i dunno which is worse... to claim to know everything or to claim that everything u know is understood on your narrow terms... or maybe i just misunderstand the simplicities of your work.

This brings me to my point about students who lapse into opinion. I will not send out a student to go make a fool of himself by trying to slip an unfounded opinion by a future client.

i don't think anyone who prides themselves as serious thinkers does that. nobody gets away, or deserves to get away with nonsense.

And all of them have stuck by that one simple question in everything they do: is this opinion or conclusion?, and it has worked very much in their favour.

thats the basics... my discipline requires substantially more vigour in interrogating "factuality" and supposed "truths". thats probably the difference between u and me.

I dont have a problem with polemic opinions if youve read my posts on previous threads, you will know that I am not at all uncomfortable with controversy. I do, however, have a problem with unfounded opinion, and again my previous posts have reflected that.

i don't have a problem with them as well as long as the door is left open to further engagement.

its not just the controversy that bothers me. it annoys me tremendously because polemics, and pple who indulge in them, are usually closed. what more can i say if you already have an extreme, firm conclusion/fixed opinion and already know all the answers?