Good, an MBA is just a degree in exploitation. I will fight you over this take like a goddamn racoon over the last piece of food in the dumpster.
All while the skeletal, crumbling, dusty bones of an econ major pulls business backwards into hell.
Submitted 1 month ago by fossilesque@mander.xyz to science_memes@mander.xyz
https://mander.xyz/pictrs/image/21ae3b14-31d7-48e6-9a4e-3352d3e3982e.png
Comments
lemjukes@sopuli.xyz 1 month ago
fossilesque@mander.xyz 1 month ago
Econ is for soothsayers, idiots, cultists and abusers, don’t bother to change my mind.
lemjukes@sopuli.xyz 1 month ago
the entrails say… “something, something, irrational exuberance”
Jiggle_Physics@sh.itjust.works 1 month ago
I am glad you say soothsayers, I have been saying for decades, and even in this comment section before getting to this comment, that macro-economics is essentially astrology for MBA bros
mortemtyrannis@lemmy.ml 1 month ago
Political Economy is the real economics degree.
Venus_Ziegenfalle@feddit.org 1 month ago
People are often young and naive when they choose what to study. There are some decent people and some assholes among business majors, just like with most other groups of people if you look closely.
grrgyle@slrpnk.net 1 month ago
There are certainly nice and polite people everywhere, but decency is a matter of ethics in this context, I would say. At least that’s how I’m reading it.
Like I’m a nice guy, but I’m not going to pretend it’s decent of me to replace data workers with software automation, even if it’s just the natural outcome of me putting my education into practice.
Soup@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Had a friend who was, for whatever reason, in an ethics class where everyone else there was in business. Apparently the professor at one point told them outloud something to the effect of “oh my god, I have never seen a more unethical group of people”(heavily paraphrased, this was a decade ago).
Good and bad exist everywhere, but certain programs do certainly attract greater numbers of good or bad people than others. “How to generate shareholder wealth and make yourself rich” is going to attact a certain type of person more than other types.
lennivelkant@discuss.tchncs.de 1 month ago
I guess the point is that MBA systematically trains you to be unethical in order to do well
exasperation@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 month ago
Yeah but an MBA is also a post graduate degree. A huge chunk of MBAs have undergrad degrees in something like STEM or humanities.
lemjukes@sopuli.xyz 1 month ago
And with the power of that knowledge they decided to specialize and get a masters of exploitation.
jaggedrobotpubes@lemmy.world 1 month ago
But what if you’re right and I want to join?
icelimit@lemmy.ml 1 month ago
I’ll see you there
astronaut_sloth@mander.xyz 1 month ago
Everyone should have a strong base in STEM and the humanities. It irks me to no end when STEM majors can’t write, communicate, or understand a wider historical context just as it irks me when humanities majors claim to not understand basic algebra or scientific concepts. It’s fine to have a preference, but an expert engineer should have a passing familiarity with philosophy and ethics, just as a historian should have a passing familiarity with scientific laws and mathematics.
Then there’s business majors who have no familiarity with anything at all. If I had my druthers, “business school” wouldn’t even be an option at a university.
grue@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Not to knock college undergrad core curriculum, but that strong base ought to be acquired before graduating high school.
BakerBagel@midwest.social 1 month ago
No can do, gotta teach students how to pass the tests that gives the school federal funding
Whats_your_reasoning@lemmy.world 1 month ago
That’s what I’ve been saying since I was in high school. Going into college, the first year felt like High School 2.0. My English professor outright asked, “Why are you in this class? I have nothing I can teach you.” Funny how we can take a test after admission to show us which subjects we need remedial classes for, but no test for us to opt-out of subjects that we’ve already mastered. Still gotta take our money and waste our time because, you know, “requirements.”
Tomorrow_Farewell@hexbear.net 1 month ago
but an expert engineer should have a passing familiarity with philosophy and ethics
Why? In particular, why should an engineer have an understanding of how to study systems of ethics, and what first- and second-order ethics frameworks there are?
just as a historian should have a passing familiarity with scientific laws and mathematics.
As a mathematician, I would also like to ask, why? What would an average historian gain from knowing that a continuous image of a compact is a compact, or that, if a diffeomorphism’s rank is less than the maximum possible one, we can construct a diffeomorphism of the same degree of continuity that works with fewer coordinates in either the domain, the codomain, or both?
greedytacothief@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 month ago
I think we have different definitions of what passing knowledge, and familiarity. I think what OP is saying is that folks should leave college knowing how to think and reason mathmatically, philosophically, and scientifically. Everyone knows you don’t actually learn anything in undergrad, but you should at least know how to problem solve in your field. OP is just saying that maybe that problem solving should cast a wider net, I think.
Why should they? Everything is multidisciplinary. Even a pure mathematician needs to know how to communicate their ideas within their field.
lennivelkant@discuss.tchncs.de 1 month ago
a historian should have a passing familiarity with scientific laws and mathematics
A lot of history work is based on statistics and crunching numbers, apparently. For example, ACOUP is currently currently doing a series on the life of pre-modern peasants that involves a lot of calculating and modeling.
Blackout@fedia.io 1 month ago
MBAs have destroyed the world. We used to have good paying jobs and affordable rent.
_stranger_@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Itm sure there’s probably a few good MBA’s out there, using applied psychology to trick assholes into spending their money on the greater good.
I’ve never met one but, statistically, you know?
jimrob4@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Hi, 'tis me, leftist with a business degree and minor in psychology that works in marketing. 🙃
ThePyroPython@lemmy.world 1 month ago
The world is powered by a collective STEAM engine:
Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, Mathematics.
Arts is such a fundamental component for communicating advancements and inspiring the creativity that fuels further discoveries.
porksnort@slrpnk.net 1 month ago
But, but KPI’s are how we know line go up.
Checkmate, artists!
chellomere@lemmy.world 1 month ago
The artists can assist by drawing a line that goes more up. Problem solved!
technocrit@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 month ago
The real problem is believing there’s an objective difference between art and science.
It’s an artificial division under capitalism between what’s directly useful for profit, control, etc. and what’s not.
apotheotic@beehaw.org 1 month ago
Stem major checking in for an arts/humanities major to hold hands with
lemjukes@sopuli.xyz 1 month ago
Limonene@lemmy.world 1 month ago
As a STEM graduate, I would much rather hold hands with an econ graduate than a business graduate. Economists can do real good for the world, while MBAs seem to be mostly harmful.
Knock_Knock_Lemmy_In@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Economists can do real good for the world
If you put 10 economists in a room, you’ll get 11 opinions.
Jiggle_Physics@sh.itjust.works 1 month ago
Yeah, outside of some very rudimentary principals, macro-economics is basically astrology for MBA bros.
socsa@piefed.social 1 month ago
I have worked at several startups where I was like employee number ten, and you can always feel the culture shift the moment they start hiring MBAs.
lightnsfw@reddthat.com 1 month ago
Yea. I can’t think of a single MBA I’ve met that wasn’t a piece of shit.
Alaik@lemmy.zip 1 month ago
Cause theyre literally given inflated egos about “how great your business acumen is” when really theyre morally bankrupt parasites who finished (compared to real degrees) coloring books.
grrgyle@slrpnk.net 1 month ago
The ownership class and their mba lackeys have done a real bang up job not only separating the two cultures, but getting them both to think through the mental model of business and profit whenever they’re pondering how to practice their profession.
restingboredface@sh.itjust.works 1 month ago
I have a PhD in research psychology, and worked with researchers in a lot of other disciplines. I have been mansplained about topics in my field (including the topic of my dissertation) by more MBAs than any other field. More often than not they are vastly oversimplifying or just getting things completely wrong. Try telling them that though and it’s like talking to a wall.
Soup@lemmy.world 1 month ago
I wonder if their general incompetence at most things makes them desperate to be good at something that actually matters to the point that they feel the need to act smart about shit they don’t really understand. Especially when you think about the nature of their field and how horrible their peers are/also are it really starts to be a bad feedback loop. And then there’s the extra fun part about the kind of people that MBA programs attract in the first place.
It must be awful, them constantly having to justify their existence as parasites. I’d feel bad for them if they didn’t cause huge amounts of damage at all levels while avoiding therapy.
restingboredface@sh.itjust.works 1 month ago
Yeah I do think there is something to the culture of MBA programs. All the information available for current and prospective students at my university was very much of the tone that mbas change the world. The halls of the business school were filled with famous rich people who’d visited the school or gifted money along with plaques about MBA grads and the amazing things they did. It’s just full of subtle reminders about how the degree is a gateway to being some big powerful person. I’m sure that makes an impact on the students’ attitudes.
lennivelkant@discuss.tchncs.de 1 month ago
I work with one on the daily. I swear, his primary expertise is in buzzwords. Tried to tell me how much better a certain format for documenting requirements is because I can let the people that require something do the documenting for me.
Never mind that this format is neither feasible outside his example case, nor even sufficient for this specific case.
shaggyb@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Fucking finally we’re talking sense.
EightBitBlood@lemmy.world 1 month ago
As an econ major with a BS, please don’t lump me in with the econ majors who went to business school for a BA. I like cool math, not venture capitalism cancer.
DragonTypeWyvern@midwest.social 1 month ago
Prove your purity
EightBitBlood@lemmy.world 1 month ago
The only thing funny about the Laffer curve is how little it now matters.
It was used to justify Reagnomics, which then immediately proved we weren’t nearly as high on the Laffer curve as we assumed. Because of this, we have concrete evidence that lowering taxes on the rich doesn’t increase government revenues.
Yet we’re still doing that 50 years later. Despite the only vaguely scientific thing behind it proving it doesn’t work decades ago.
Imagine being in a catholic family, reading the Bible, and always walking away thinking that Judas did the right thing (despite everything else the Bible says). That’s US economic policy for the last 50 years.
callouscomic@lemmy.zip 1 month ago
When your econ program is in a business college, they push the MBA hardcore. So glad I never entertained that.
Cat_Daddy@hexbear.net 1 month ago
BodyBySisyphus@hexbear.net 1 month ago
We gotta have an economy to function as a society but rub of economics in the West is that if it acknowledged why the economy functions the way it does, it would be peeling the facade off our supposedly democratic system of governance and folks would start taking a much keener interest in why wealth is getting so concentrated. We can’t have that, so instead we get increasingly elaborate versions of economic Lamarckism and the field’s Darwins are ostracized as cranks. specter
lemmyseizethemeans@lemmygrad.ml 1 month ago
I remember joking to my philosophy teacher that my first choice for a major was business but…
Yeah lol fuck those entitled popped collar frat shitheads that were born into wealth and have zero compassion, oh and did I mention their racism
Hackworth@sh.itjust.works 1 month ago
One may draw upon the dark arts with any degree. -BA in Film, make ads
plyth@feddit.org 1 month ago
Who is holding them up in the sky?
Astrology!
halvar@lemy.lol 1 month ago
you’d like that wouldn’t you
Doc_Crankenstein@slrpnk.net 1 month ago
Just want to chime in and say that Karl Marx was also an econ major.
Yet, being an economist, he also neglected to base his theories in any real science, only in “business science”, which is why I’m a proponent of Kropotkin instead.
projektilski@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 month ago
The only problem is that VIVALDI could not implement feature of 5 minutes of work which was requested many years ago. Fuck’em.
Lembot_0004@discuss.online 1 month ago
Arts/humanities majors are useless. Nobody needs them. Nobody wants them. Except for McDonald’s, drug dealer and a crematorium.
Truscape@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 month ago
Another Lembot? Must be a cursed production line…
tigeruppercut@lemmy.zip 1 month ago
They keep getting banned for horrendous opinions and make a new account every month or two. I just find it amusing that they figured they’d get banned around 10000 times so they preemptively used 4 digits in their username
technocrit@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 month ago
^ business school level education.
Lemminary@lemmy.world 1 month ago
I love my artists. Without their graceful hands, I would’ve never made it through school with much depth!
toofpic@lemmy.world 1 month ago
As a marketeer, I’m fine with that!
lemjukes@sopuli.xyz 1 month ago
booooooooo
toofpic@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Yes, yes, release your anger!
fckreddit@lemmy.ml 1 month ago
Businesses would not be terrible if business education is actually tempered with some humanities. In fact, I am strongly of the opinion that every field of study should have some humanities component to them. None of the fields exist in vacuum, we have to have at least, some appreciation of other fields, lest we risk creating silos in the name of organization. And that is precisely happening in this age of hyper-specialization.
PotatoesFall@discuss.tchncs.de 1 month ago
100%.
Children are always told that they could become a scientist or engineer one day and that this would be a great thing to achieve. Scientists and engineers are so highly regarded, yet they are often complicit in creating the necessary technology and machinery for most of the worlds worst projects. Climate change, plastic pollution, nuclear weapons, are all created by the worlds smartest and all the while they’re being told they’re doing a great job and bettering the world.
Ethics needs to be mandatory in all STEM studies. Jesus at least just make them watch Oppenheimer.
Truscape@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 month ago
Ethics is largely mandatory for engineering majors (source: am finishing my bachelor’s in electrical engineering), but the first job or project you take will ask you to throw that out the window.
There are two areas of safety considered: Operator/client safety, and regulatory compliance. All other safeguards are optional and ignoring them is encouraged.
AtariDump@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Does it have to be Jesus who makes them watch it or is there another deity we can use?
gaybriel_fr_br@jlai.lu 1 month ago
Funny you should say that, because those very humanities aspects of what I studied, Economics, leads STEM students to disparage it as a non-scientific field built of gospel and tenets. As if Humanities diminished the quality of the research and teaching within the Economics field.
So while I agree, and it’s good to see you being upvoted, in a different scenario the application of your thoughts about this will lead the person sharing their experience to getting massively downvoted in an attempt to shame them for being a “soft science”.
Eccentric@sh.itjust.works 1 month ago
Big gripe of mine is the distinction of “soft” and “hard” science. I’m a linguist and it surprises people that I had to take advanced statistics, set theory, know the basics of acoustics, and have an understanding of calculus. But just because a field requires nuance and observational data doesn’t mean it’s automatically less rigorous than a field that deals exclusively with numbers. Can’t exclusively rely on statistical models to draw conclusions about economic trends or linguistic phenomena because the economy and language don’t exist outside of human society
fckreddit@lemmy.ml 1 month ago
I really do wish humanities were not actually considered as ‘lesser’ to the sciences. But I have actually found it to be greater of the sciences, simply because of the importance and the difficulty of questions it tackles. I have spent a fairly long time reading on philosophy, history, economics. I am not an expert, in fact, I am really far from it, but I have really come to an understanding the importance of these fields. But that’s just me. Most just consider them not important because they don’t understand. I just hope that we can rectify with better academic curriculum.
Collatz_problem@hexbear.net 1 month ago
They would be terrible anyway, because competition rewards business fucking over their employees and customers.
Tomorrow_Farewell@hexbear.net 1 month ago
That’s obviously not true. For businesses to not be terrible, they would have to not operate on the profit motive, which is impossible.
Why? And what disciplines do you want to force people to pass exams in, even if they have no bearing on a person’s skills in the area that they actually chose?
Also, why?
fckreddit@lemmy.ml 1 month ago
There are many approaches for a business to be both good and also make profit. Just as an example, in the periods of comfort, they can focus only on profit. However, in the times of crisis, businesses can instead focus on doing social good, instead of profit, until things go back to normal. This can be in the form helping people in need during floods, hurricanes, etc. Of course, there are many approaches to this and I am giving just an illustrative examples, but thing is many small businesses around the world do this because many people put humanity first and profit second, especially in the times of crises.
I am really sorry if you don’t enjoy exams, because I also hate exams. To make my argument about why, I believe, we need to be educated in humanities, first I just want to focus on the question what is the purpose of education. I strongly believe that the education helps us to be a better human being, beyond just being a better doctor or a better software developer or a better engineer. Being a good human being, I believe, transcends being a skilled doctor or engineer, etc. I am going to try to give an example from Civil Engineering to try to illustrate it. In India (where I am from and have been living my entire life), there are still villages where the access to basic necessities like clean water, electricity are either absent or rarely available. Now, when the government is planning a project to provide a more reliable access to these resources, the responsibility falls on the Engineering Team to design the project, including costs and the benefits. Beyond just the monetary cost-benefit analysis, or maybe the environmental impact (which are inevitable), there are also societal issues that are important, but are left out during the planning? But, a study in humanities will give these issues the weight it deserves. For example, caste system is a major issue in India, with population of even the tiniest villages are split into two or sometimes more groups: the so-called “upper” (let’s just called them oppressors) castes and the “lower” (let’s call them oppressed) castes. So, as it happens, the oppressors might establish a monopoly over the fresh water that reaches the village due to aforementioned project. So, despite the project providing some benefit, to the oppressors, it provides almost no benefit to the oppressed class. No engineer would consider these kinds of societal issues while designing the project, despite knowing about the casteism and understanding it’s consequences because they are not educated to combine their engineering skills and know-how with the casteism. Systematic Humanities education might actually help Engineers to understand these issues at a deeper level and might inform them on how to proceed with the project, while at least trying to mitigate the caste situation in some way.
I am trying to go beyond the exams and the academic degrees for this because the most of the life of an engineer (or a doctor, etc) is spent on practice, i.e., designing, planning and executing projects (or something equivalent). These projects should not just have economic utility, but also social utility or at least should not have negative social utility. Consider the impact of plastics, fossil fuel and their pollution on the society and individuals. However, for decades, we gladly kept building new roads to accommodate more vehicles purchased by rich people, despite knowing about them. My hope is that with a humanities education, it will make more engineers to evaluate the social utility of their projects and not just the economic utility. One interesting theory that I came across was in a book called “Development As Freedom” by Amartya Sen, a Noble Prize winning economist. In the book, he puts forward the idea that “Economic Development must increase the freedoms of individuals and society”. In essence, contrary to popular measures of economic development like GDP, Per Capita Income, he straight-up wants to quantify (or at least qualitatively) the impact of economic and market activity through their social utility.
In essence, all human activity has the goal to serve the humans (both individual and society), this world and the nature we live in. But, if we don’t appreciate this at all, can we really work towards benefiting as many people at possible, while at the same time, try to minimize or even offset the damage (both social and environmental) caused, without a humanities education, that by definition deals with humanity, both individually and as a collective?
P.S. Sorry for the long reply, but I really wanted to try to present my argument in greater detail. Not in the hope of changing your mind, but just to make you understand where my stance on this matter is coming from. Also, I am not saying that everyone should be an expert in all the fields of humanities. All I am trying to say is that with a little bit of humanities education, I just want everyone to gain some appreciation of humanities and what they do and how important it really is.