What core principles that college should teach?

"Other People's Knowledge" in IEEE Spectrum mentioned that most of the knowledge an engineer applies is learned through on-the-job problem-solving and just-in-time knowledge acquisition. Colleges only need to provide the fundamentals and the core principles of engineering. I tend to agree with this viewpoint since on-the-job problem-solving gives you immense driving force to tackle the problem and is extremely effective to imprint the knowledge you just learned in your brain for a long time. The question is "What kind of core principles of engineering that college should provide if most of the knowledge is not learned in college?"

More productivities less jobs

Never did an article from Thomas Friedman, a NY Times columnist, touch my heart so deeply from this 1/30 article. The surging of productivity is accompanied by the declining of household income. People with more skills and capital exploit more, much more, from the benefits of soaring productivity than the unskilled workers. Rapid technology advances shed substantial job opportunities; any jobs that machines can replace. Old generations only need diligence to be successful while younger generations need both diligence and skill, a skill that machine cannot replace, to be successful.

Imprinting

Today's PBS "Nature" program has an interesting episode about "imprinting", i.e., any one when an animal had seen right after they were born will be regarded as their Mom or Dad. The picture shows a group of beautiful Greylag geese following a speeding boat since one of the passengers is their parent.

NY Times under pressure?

The recent few articles in NY Times about China new leadership have some food for thought. NY Times, known for its liberal-leaning stance, never hesitated to level criticism against Chinese government in the past and was culminated by its report of the flagrant corruption of Premier Wen's family members. However, in the last few articles, they sound more like hagiography. A while ago, Chinese authority threatened to revoke NY Times journalists visa. Will that threatening make any difference for NY Times to steer clear of its usually respected "the fourth estate"?

SBTC

Economic growth or social fairness as discussed in a recent NY Times article? Before 1950s, American workers captured a solid share of the economic growth that economists call that era as "Great Compression" since income equality was minimal. Since 1979, the top 0.1% has taken in 25% of the nation's income while bottom 80% of households saw their incomes drop steadily. S.B.T.C. (skill-based technology change) should be the deciding factor to this growing income equality. Only education and abiding skill-enhancement can keep your head above water in this competitive world.

Princeton Art Musuem

Accompanying friends to have a campus tour around Princeton Uni. yesterday. Last time to visit its art museum was more than 12 years ago. Princeton Uni. is really rich with a lot of endowments from its wealthy and powerful alumni. This art museum is free and has tremendous amounts of Egyptian, Chinese, European, Japanese, American, Greek, Roman and Mayan art collections. Not all universities are created equal.

Chinese model

In today's NBC "Meet the Press", "Chinese model" was raised for discussion. Everyone dreams to have full democracy and high income growth. In reality, no political system can provide such dream for everyone in this highly competitive world. An elitist authoritarian system such as "Chinese model" may give rise to better economic growth but its insidious kleptocracy may lead to simmering social unrest.