Should students devote time to studying ‘useless’ subjects? The debate has been running for (at least) 127 years. The arguments often boil down to questions such as: ‘Maybe something that seems useless now, could be useful in the future?’ or ‘Who’s in a position to say what’s useless anyway?’ For an early example, see the […]
Tag: university
The ever-shortening name: When CQU?
A linguistics question: Predict the year when this university will shorten its name to be just three letters long. Here’s Wikipedia’s history of the name changes so far: CQUniversity started out as the Queensland Institute of Technology (Capricornia) in 1967, and after two years under the name of the University College of Central Queensland, in 1992 became […]
Yet another triumph for Prof. El Naschie
The New York Times reports another triumph for the illustrious Professor Mohamed El Naschie, whom we (and many others) have celebrated in the past: ….But the news that Alexandria University in Egypt had placed 147th on the list [of the world’s top universities, as ranked by Times Higher Education] — just below the University of […]
What to do if your folks win an Ig?
How should a large institutions react when its people win a significant prize? The University of Chicago Medical Center pondered that question again, but differently, in October 2009. Here’s the preface to an essay they published: Foundational Research: Our (Ig) Nobel Prize In all the hubbub over the Nobel Prizes this week, we don’t want […]