"We don't have privileged arts schools here."

Harvard Law School.
Harvard Business School

In fact most every business or law school, and the Ivy Leagues in general.

And I thought Social Science was a Science, not an Art...

The business school confers MBAs, which are technical degrees/vocational training.
A law degree is also a technical/professional degree. It's not liberal arts, it's vocational training.

A law degree is arguably an arts degree. But beyond that, you said technical science, not professional in your original quote.

And most PoliSci majors with designs on becoming a politician goes on to law school. That's what my niece (with an underfrad in PoliSci from OSU, your alma mater) is working towards at George Washington.

Your argument stands up from a business perspective, but *not* when you take into account the power hungry politicians who vote themselves pay raises and claim they are one of us but are nearly all multi-millionares.

I don't know what the hell you're talking about now. The last paragraph is gibberish. You clearly don't understand the difference between technical & liberal arts degrees. Your niece is studying liberal arts for preparation for a technical degree. So what? It doesn't change anything. She could also be studying economics in preparation to get an MBA. It's still vocational training. It's training for a particular job. You don't study law to understand legal theory or ethics or legal norms. You study case law. You study law as it is applied. There's no questioning of the law. It's the engineer's political science degree. An MBA is the scientific study of management. It's all about practice & application, not about theory.

Lots of the ivy league is what you're talking about, though, putin. To take an example, Yale is a very liberal-arts focused school, and has plenty of its grads go on to positions of both economic and political power, to cite just one example, putin. For example (choosing from many randomly, and just using an easily accessible list): Bush '41 (BA, Economics); John Kerry (BA, Political Science); Joe Lieberman (B.A., Political Science and Economics); Howard Dean (B.A., Political Science).

Or in business, Donna Dubinski (BA, History); Bing Gordon (BA, Drama and Literature); Peter Halloran (BA, History); Ben Silberman (BA, Political Science).

OK, well, I could go on and on, but you can look up "List of (Ivy League school here) people" yourself. Lots of humanities and social science people from the ivy league go on to big things.

Yes and most of those named also have other degrees. The point isn't that liberal arts gets you no where or there are no prestigious schools that focus that confer liberal arts degrees whose graduates put them to good use. The point is the Arts have no position of privilege within the US education system. For every Harvard there is an MIT, the latter of which is probably much more closely linked to the military-industrial-educational complex. Plus Harvard & Yale don't exactly do arts to the exclusion of technical & professional programs, whereas the elite schools in the UK traditionally did just that.

How is law a technical degree? And you haven't refuted the position that arts degrees do curry favor/power in the world. And my last paragraph made perfect sense. Most politicians have undergrad arts degrees at least. And depending on how the school classifies law, higher degrees in arts as well. Most politicians are extremely wealthy. There are more Congressmen, Senators, and Governors than Fortune 500 CEOs. And semck pointed out a number of high ranking business men with arts degrees as well. As far as MBAs, they are an animal all their own neing a business degree, not an arts or science degree.

A technical degree means an applied science or degree which is about career training which incorporates engineering & the professions like medicine & law as well as any other kind of vocational training that focuses on preparing people for a particular job. I think I've explained this several times and you continue to be obtuse about it. Technical degrees differ from liberal degrees in that the latter is centered on theoretical and critical thinking approaches to disciplines. The reason why in many cases, businesses might prefer liberal to technical graduates is because they believe the former are more equipped to see the big picture and think of ideas that are outside the narrow confines of their training. It's obvious why liberal graduates are inclined to be better at things like politics & public service. That doesn't mean that liberal degrees have some kind of position of privilege, only that it's better preparation for those types of careers.

17 concurrent world gunboats....

OK, that is the first timne you have explained it like that to me. I actually like that explanation and it makes sense.

But now I must ask why liberal arts degrees should have any more privilege than the technical degrees? You just made the point that busineeses often like liberal arts degrees for the "out of box" thinkers that have them and that those degrees are particularly suited to politics and public service. Likewise, technical science degrees like engineering, physics, chemistry, and IT development are particularly suited to certain areas of the business world. Should one ever have special privilege over the other? I would argue "no".

No, and I have never argued that they should. I'm just rather annoyed at all the condescending technical types who think liberal arts & social science is on par with studying astrology. Because liberal arts people tend to be interdisciplinary minded you rarely find them beating their chest about reifying artificial disciplinary boundaries. In fact one of the more exciting areas of political science is the use of computer simulation & incorporating computer science.

"I'm just rather annoyed at all the condescending technical types who think liberal arts & social science is on par with studying astrology."

Don't put down students of the history of 16th century European science and philosophy this way, Putin.

OK, well let me say I do respect liberl arts and social sciences. Especially history as "those who fail to learn from it are doomed to repeat it" is something I firmly believe in and the study and development of language and communication is just as important and the study of mathematics and expanding of scientific knowledge.

So, despite our previous headbuttings, I actually do respect those degrees and what they can do in the real world.

Additionally, as a musician, I have a serious appreciation for the classic aerts degrees as well. Science without art makes for a very dull and dry world and art without science stagnates our knowledge and progress. Both are needed and I appreciate that both contribute to society and the world around us.

I have no idea if Semck is trying to be witty or what.