image by axinia
Another interesting trend that I am observing right now: technical studies/professions becoming unpopular in the West, more and more people prefer humanitarian directions. In Austrian universities, for instance, the faculties of psychology and publicist are overwhelmed, but the science/technical faculties are under-attended. The local government is worried and is trying to save the situation by some marketing complain in order to encourage the youth to change the study direction. As far as I know the situation is similar in many other western countries (opposite to the so-called “emerging markets”).
I find this trend really interesting and try to analyze the reason for it:
1. is it because people are so lazy to study hard ( it’s clear that “technical” professions need a lot more to study than any humanitarian science)?
2. is it because last generations are so fed with high-Tech since their childhood that naturally people want to balance their brains and lives and study/work something more relaxing?
3. is it because in general, the West is so “overheated” with technical stuff and all sorts of sience that we all need to look into another direction and get down to ourselves, our inner world and relationships (which obviously suffered a lot in the recent decades)?…
These are my suppositions, would love to know what you think, my dearest ones!
LOVE
axinia
axinia
1000 petals by axinia 
…and here is the evidence to the argument nr. 1:
http://s4.live4fun.ru/pictures/s3img_28884756_15065_1.jpg
They say: “Think befoe you subscribe to the studies!”
🙂
Point 3 seems to be most applicable of all. Point 1 also adds to the reason as studying hard requires cutting short of fun and is taxing on their Freedom Quotient. Do you think low pension rates in Europe find some relevance here?
In India, this New World country, it’s reverse. Everybody seems to go for Bachelor in Tech. and then Master in Business Admn. (MBA).
The US has a huge student population. The culture tells people that anyone can get ahead and education is driver. As a result university education is getting really crowded because virtually anyone–including a massive number of noncitizen resident and foreign students–can access higher education. With this as a background, the studies you referenced showing a rise in humanities and drop in technology studies is not true in the US.
Students today are much more practical in their outlook for the future than they have been in the past. They have been badly scared by the financial crisis and realize that even the highest forms of employment can disappear and along with it all the material goals that is supposed to fulfill. So they choose studies that hedge that risk. Technology is one of the best hedges because new technologies always lie ahead and nearly always create jobs and money.
However, students here are more likely to have strong religious beliefs behind their material goals. Student religious groups are a huge part of university life. Your blog makes a distinction between religion and spirituality, so from that point of view this is not evidence of greater spirituality. But most seekers have a religious past that they have outgrown so it could be a start of a new growth in spirituality.
But do you really see technology and spirituality in opposition? Or do you really see humanities and spirituality in harmony? Based on the tech people I know and the humanities people I know, I would gamble on the tech people leading the world to higher consciousness faster. Once you see the organization of the universe as the perfect computer, it is a small jump to see perfect consciousness behind the programming.
Dear Terry, by all respect – where do you see here any relevance to Spirituality? I don#t see any. It’s clear that inclination to spirituality has nothing to do with education or profession, really nothing!!! (this I know for sure).
It’s more a question of “physics or lyrics” – as it was a popular discussion several decades back in the USSA 🙂
I don’t think that in generall people are taking to a profession because it will bring money and secure future, even in capitalistic cultures… One should be not only inclined but actually be ABLE TO UNDERSTAND THE SUBJECT ( for instance, I just cannot comprehen all sientific and tech stuff – I mean comprehen deeply, I am so hopelessly lost in this and I would rather die than study all that – math, chemistry, physics, or banking and law -same).
Sorry… I assumed you interpreted this change as evolutionary,
not evolutionary, rather a kind of balancing…
i think its an amalgam of points 2 and 3
being a part of the generation myself, have felt an inclination towards humanities more, despite having loved and learnt science.
other than becoming a hard core sceintist or spending loong years learning about the know-how’s of the technology,
it seems it may take quite long to actually express or find ourselves,in what we may feel the joy from our hearts pouring out through our work or what we study
we love to work hard and similarly want to work hard to be loved and appreciated and be balanced and have time for our ownselves rather than a posh job offer and no time for life as is the case for people 5 to 15 yrs older than us
Hi Axinia, interesting topic. I get this trend totally. I’ve been working in IT for years and in many ways it has been a blessing on the material reward front but I have zero passion for it now. I regret not having pursued the Arts and Humanities in my youth. My Dad was a nuclear engineer and encouraged me to do science but my heart was never in it. I was quite passionate for computer technology at one point but not any more, heck I even wrote a book on IT! but if I were to lose my job now I would not seek another job in a technical area. Luckily I’m quite good at faking my enthusiasm for IT to my students and management but to me it is just a day job, no more, no less.
hi Steve, I know what you mean – yes, you are obvioulsy a creative Humanitarian at heart 🙂 But just too intelligent and talented, that’s why you could manage both IT and art.
Job & money guaranty is not their even in technical Jobs so that could be simply different search as I always says that now there are less people in pure science even we are not getting experts in higher studies to teach . so it is just wise searching for opportunity.any field they select they have to go to higher education level where they get ample opportunities( again problem of money is their to complete as it is most expensive)
Personally I don’t connect spirituality to any it is totally different and can be integrated day to day life by an individuals by practicing it . it is related to once ethnicity,morality and inner development. education /trainings are usually job and money oriented require to settle the person in life as it grossly accepted philosophy. But there is no guaranty that once they settle means they will turn to spirituality. I agree with Terry , religious views plays important role here. People may be religiously rigid all the time and what they find, that is correct.as they learn from childhood and society around. Practicing spirituality requires different mindset which many don’t posses.
I believe education is more of a life endeavour than a mere “job passport” or a “career visa” as is seen by many. So whether it is applied sciences and other practical studies, technology, pure science, humanities, arts, liberal arts, theology, whatever, there is more to be discovered while studying something rather than to merely treat it as a “course” that would assure one of a “well-paying job”.
If a job or a career is all what one wants, then it is best to take up an apprenticeship after high school in a chosen field that has bright prospects and become a master in it. If knowledge is all what one wants, then reading all the encyclopaediae (the internet has made it very simple now) will give one more knowledge than one can handle.
Education is much more than “a pathway to a job” or “a means of gaining knowledge”. It’s the process of learning to think and learning to learn. If one gets this basic premise right, then it really doesn’t matter whether one’s degree/diploma has technology or arts or science or humanities or whatever printed on it. A society full of humanities graduates (with very little in other fields) would be just as incomplete as a society full of scientists or a society full of artists. Skilled persons in every field are needed for a society to function.
Having said that, education must also prepare one for life and that includes earning a living. It’s here that people feel the “more practical” courses would help them better.
🙂
f students in the civilised societies are turning their backs on the technical professions in a big way when compared to the ones in the so-called “emerging markets” (the turd world), then it is all by design. It is being deliberately orchestrated by those hidden hands,
➡ so they can artificially create a “lack of supply” scenario and then blame it for the slow scientific regression of the civilised societies
➡ so they can continue with the process of rapid de-industrialisation of the civilised societies
➡ so they can off-shore even more manufacturing industries to locations where labourers work long hours to earn a pittance, a situation that resembles slave labour or bonded labour
➡ so they can outsource even more service industries to locations where they can pay their employees a tiny fraction of the wages in civilised societies
➡ so they can turn productive industrial capitalist and economies of the civilised societies into financial casino-capitalist economies a.k.a. “bubble economies” which don’t primarily rely on production but on the inflation (and unavoidable bursting) of successive speculative bubbles like real estate, stock market etc.
➡ so they can deliberately drive down wages in the civilised societies to ridiculously low levels, drown the civilised countries and enslave the peoples in a bottomless ocean called debt
➡ so they can cause economic crises and collapses in the civilised societies at will
➡ so they can achieve their dream of the destruction of civilised societies, the destruction of rights and freedoms enjoyed by civilised peoples and the egalitarianism which is a characteristic of such societies
➡ so that the entire world is reduced to one big spherical turd world trash can, where the criminalised ruling “elite” hordes in the gubmints, corporations and bureaucracies, their bloodthirsty mercenary running dogs, the mafia goons, their boot-lickers in the media etc. can lead a lavish life preying upon the masses of dumbed-down masses of servile neo-feudal serfs as it happens in any turd world society
It’s all ultimately geared towards the destruction and turd worldisation of civilised societies and with it, taking back humankind into the barbaric meadiaeval ages. They accomplish it by their notorious control of the media and the satanic control of the education system by a small, inaccessible and unaccountable cabal of fascist, criminal, power-hungry scum in the gubmint.
Civilised peoples are constantly brainwashed on how to lead the “glamourous life” like those fake-breasted models and actors or multi-millionnaire sportspersons or stock market tycoons. A scientist slogging away in a laboratory to find a cure for a deadly disease or a “hard-hat” wearing professional working in a dangerous environment is not as “glamourous” as a dancer shaking a leg on the idiot box or a professional boot-licker from the “mainstream media” interviewing a member of TPTB (the powers that be), you see. Women and girls in civilised societies are specifically targeted, constantly brainwashed that mathematics and science are “tough” and courses in those fields only for those “serious about it”. All that is a load of bull, of course! 😡
If students from even countries with a strong manufacturing, innovation and research base like Germany and France are falling for it, then it is a very sad development indeed 😦
Once the civilised societies of the West are completely destroyed by turd worldisation, there would be no hope for a mediaevalised planet & humankind for a very, very long time. Unless of course, the few civilised societies of the Far East, the likes of Japan, South Korea etc. are able to resist turd worldisation and act as a guiding beacon for the rest of humankind which would by then be wallowing in the miseries, barbarities and savagery of the mediaeval ages, thanks to global turd worldisation 😐
🙂
i dont think its all designed, because as I told you that is what the inner inclination of the young people, this generation seem not to be that success driven (at least in Europe, may be differnt in the USA), they more care for thier personal confort than achieving…
Another reason amy be as a re-action on the science-tech boom some decades ago…you know it works like a pendal.
In one informal discussion I heard that their brain are developed in such a way as they can not stand for technical work successively as Indian specially for IT works and best suited in general sciences. part of lazyness can be their for what you are calling comfort.
Another might also be that young people are seeking for something higher in life. Not that Technical studies are not good. But it might be spiritually more interesting to introspect and find things out about life. Psychology and Sociology are means to do that, although I’m not a big fan of both fields. Lazyness might be also a reason.. 🙂
What do you think?
I guess there are several factors that play role here, also laziness to some extend. On the other hand I always think that if someone is storongly inclinde to, say, physics, why should he/she study psychology? I mean either people have no clear inclinations and thus choose the “easier” studies or they are really – in masses – ´getting more inclined to humanitarian subjects. And that becomes and interesting trend then!
Perhaps Europe’s strong social security system is to be blamed. Besides Europe was always inclined to humanities; even it its hayday when they dominated the world, they didn’t look down on ancient Asian cultures…in fact, the first dictionary for my language was compiled by a German!
I like Europe’s attitude to all forms of knowledge…very balanced, I feel.
an interesting take, swaps…feels right.
If you see that enterprises who analyse our behaviour on the net make tremendously more profits with hot air in bags as enterprises who build up “real products”, you might have noticed that the delocalisation craftmanship has created a society worshipping “concepts”.
Its not a matter to split between both directions of human skills, but the next step will be to survive the crash, the ability to use all potentials.Engineering without philosophy, or psychology without the ability to understand how to preserve the environment are “expert isolationism”. To imagine also that only university’s provide wisdom is just another delusion.
good point, my friend! Surely we need a balanced knowledge, for lack of wholistic vision is always a danger of wrong development.
I wonder if you are observing the same trend in France?
I think the trend is globally, in France as elsewhere.
I am glad that I collected skills in “art&science” as much as carpentry or gardening and other craftsman( girl!) ships.
My curiosity lead me to learn like an omnivorous renaissance apprentice on pilgrimage to those who might have something valuable to tell. To know life, one has to look above his beloved books from time to time.
Dear sis,
Even though nursing is professional training we have included psychology and sociology in syllabee after Nightingale’s approach to modern nursing and curricula aiming that students will develop humanitarian approach and proper attitude but still it seems dreams and scientifically holistic approach is still far away even in India also if fact some other councils ( e.g.ANA) were already started implementing it and hope they are developing nursing care plans based on it. In India it is not existing yet( natural balance on felt need by society, as you are trying to explain ?)
Axinia, chere amie…one point in favour of France is that craftsmanship is still recognised as a worth who can even bloom up to great art worth transmitting over the generations. So, some high skill traditional craftsmanship can still resit as niche against delocalised cheap crap.
Engineers often came out of this background, but have been systematically instrumented and replaced by short therm thinking management careerist .The result is was a flow towards promising “economy” study s, but once the bubble will burst those delusions, craftsmanship will be recognised for his real worth.
The future study s will be interconnected study s, not restrain to linear university diploma teaching young humans only to “please expectations” far from useful reality , but more flexible curriculum’s helping individuals to develop their true ability s .The inner fulfilment to serve other with the own potential with be the more worthily measure of “good education”.
The people of the west have been cheated for enough time in the name of education, perhaps they realize now that anything and everything in the name of education doesn’t always sell! The people of the developing countries also realize this very soon. BTW, I am tagging you on the topic ‘My top three movies of all time’ – Pls try to do it in my comments section if you don’t want to do it here – we would like to know some good movies in Russian and Dutch.
Destination Infinity
thank you for tagging, i will try my best!
“education,education,education” is propaganda of politicians, unable to truly reflect with intelligence about complex matters.
true intelligence is beyind education!