This weekend was my scheduled time to register for Summer and Fall classes for “da college”.
Because I forgot most of my maths in the twenty-plus years between high school and college, I have to take yet another quarter of the Algebras over the Summer before I can start in on the Calculus this Fall.
I’ll be done with my English requirement in a few weeks, which means that I can begin to take some of my other, more interesting, “Specific Requirements” towards my Associate in Science degree. Case in point:
PHILOSOPHY 106 – Introduction to Logic
Introduces students to the quantitative techniques used in symbolic logic, including both propositional and predicate logic. Topics may include recognizing arguments, translating from a natural to a formal language, validity of arguments, logical implication, equivalency, and consistency. Satisfies a natural science requirement or, under certain conditions, the quantitative component of the basic skills requirement for AA degree. Formerly PHIL 120.
Sounds like a fun Summer Quarter to me!
Since folks seemed to enjoy it when I posted my Geography essays up, this will definitely be another class that I’ll post my essays from after the end of the quarter. Which is good, because y’all aren’t ever going to see the crap I’m having to write for my English 101 course. They bore me to death to write and I don’t want the leftosphere crying for me to be brought up on human rights violations for posting them. My apologies.
As for Fall Quarter, I had a number of choices for my non-Mathematics class. They included:
Anthropology 100 – Survey of Anthropology
Provides a basic understanding of the four subfields of anthropology: Physical anthropology, archaeology, linguistics, and socio-cultural anthropology. Units of study include evolution, culture, human biological and cultural origins, primate behavior, pre-history, language acquisition, and cultural development.
I would really like to take that one (and maybe more) sometime in the future, however, it is a “Social Science” credit and my current degree plan doesn’t require another one of those.
Then there were
English 165 – Introduction to the Myths of the World
English 183 – Literary Approaches to Mystery/Detective Fiction
English 185 – Literary Approaches to the Bible
English 187 – Paradise and Hell as Literary Concepts
Any one of those sounds like fun to me. But again, they’re in the wrong column.
My main problem here is that I plan on transferring to a Washington four year college (probably the University of Washington) and by Dept. of Public Instruction regulations they all require proficiency in a foreign language. Now, I took two years of German in high school, but that was, again, two decades ago and I currently have the same skills as JFK did in June of 1963. So I have to use my two remaining Humanities/English/Social Science credits for foreign language.
And then I have another problem: The college doesn’t offer any languages I am interested in. I want either Latin, Greek, Italian or Russian. They offer Spanish, French, German, Japanese and Chinese. So, I’m going to wait to talk to my “Official Adviser” when he comes back from getting his Ph.D at the beginning of Fall Quarter and we’ll mull over some options.
The other class I had in mind was
Political Science 200 – Introduction to Law
Introduces legal system through an examination of several substantive areas that interest both business and non-business students. Covers constitutional law, contracts, torts, product liability, and criminal law. Uses business environment perspective, but also considers general social context within which these laws have emerged. Discusses structure of American legal system and investigates sources of law for that system.
Now that is a class I could dig into over a quarter, though I may not come back out the other side with anything other than the want of a law degree (which, as I explained to Mrs. David at Boomershoot, would be a “Bad Thing”).
The online version of this course is also supposed to be taught by a “Michelle Malkin”. Hence my question last week. As of today, I am sure that it is not the Mrs. Malkin we all know, but how cool would it be if it were?
So, in order to fill up another of my “Specific Requirements” (aka: Science Req’s), I chose
Environmental Science 204 – Natural Science and the Environment
Investigates the interaction of physical and biological systems in the environment. Examines the scientific principles which are involved in modern environmental problems and issues. Scientific topics could include energy, climate, soils, water, animal studies, local plants, and the dynamics of plants and animal populations and the communities they form. For students wishing to obtain a broad picture of human activities and their relationship to basic processes of ecosystems.
Yes! Another eco-weenie class where they stuff Glowball Warmening down my throat and I vomit up frustrating essays for them to read! I had an Epic Win last quarter, and in Fall Quarter I’ll be going for a gold medal made out of drowned polar bears!
Wish me luck!
You’re a man after my own heart (and name, come to think of it). I remember a course very much like your Philosophy 106 as a favourite from my degree, and I too took German in high school. And as for Latin, well, I’m now in my thirteenth year of studying it.
(I bridle rather at seeing linguistics, which is my present preoccupation, described as a “subfield” of anthropology, but that’s another matter 🙂
Best of luck in your studies!
Linguistics? When I took it thirty-odd years ago we got a heapin’ helpin of that nasty-ass Chomsky. UI think only Levi-Strauss helped relieve the opressive tedium of Chomsky.
One can only hope. Interestingly, Physical Anthro (primatology) was dominated by women at UCSC (heh!), but was even more popular still in Europe where they retained an obsession with “race” and measuring skulls and such. Has the spin-off Socio-Biology (which was an up-and-coming Multicultural push back when) become a Fail? I guess I remain a structuralist…
I had an “Intro to Logic” class at UW which I really enjoyed. I find that I use it often because it wasn’t just symbolic logic but linguistic too. I find it quite helpful when reading legalese.
My anthro class was a lot of fun too, though it helped that my professor had a lot of fun teaching the class too.
It was my US history classes I hated, and it wasn’t because I dislike history. It was because it was revisionist and manipulative. The instructor got nasty when I brought up the bonus march when talking about the depression and said it never happened.
End rant, enjoy the classes and remember you’re there to learn how to think, not what to think… Challenge Everything!
I loved my Anthropology 101 class.
It was incredibly interesting and the instructor was amazing. Dr Green at UW.
Say what you like about Chomsky (I know I do), but at least he keeps his politics out of his linguistics, so you can be disgusted by the one while still acknowledging the influence the other has had on the field.
I didn’t like him BEFORE I knew anything about his politics, back when I agreed with his politics. All I can say is there was a creepy odor of smug elitism and contemptuous intellectual self-righteousness about his writing – and stuff I didn’t agree with in terms of language acquisition. Even though I was a rank student and amateur, by that time I had exposure and learned parts of a couple Indian languages (Oriya, Hindi, and Tamil), and taken language classes in German, French, Italian, and Indonesian. I was better with German more than the others – there was just stuff in his writing that made me bristle. I think his contribution to the field was via intellectual bullying and ego-dominance.
I have nowhere near Dirtcrashr’s exposure or knowledge of languages, but I have discussed language acquisition with several fellow students and several of the arguments they advance in Chomsky’s name really seemed to fly in the face of common sense.