>A certificate granted for mainly memorization, where no new modes of thinking or doing were involved, is not worth tends of thousands of dollars.
And here is your straw man. Nobody said they were worth that much. You haven't demonstrated that a significant portion of any major exhibits these traits.
Four years of a young person's time is worth tens of thousands of dollars. So beyond the direct cost of education, that is the opportunity cost, to the individual and to society. I think that's money well spent for e.g. a proper liberal arts degree. It isn't for a piece of paper pursued for its own end.
You haven't presented evidence or sources that any individual major is "A certificate granted for mainly memorization, where no new modes of thinking or doing were involved."
This is the basis of your entire point, and you haven't backed it up with anything of substance. You can keep tossing red herrings, but this hasn't been addressed.
Anecdotally, I have a friend who recently retired from teaching psychology and linguistics at a university level, and his observation over twenty years at the same institution was that standards were aggressively lowered to move more paying customers through the system. Not sure you'd say that's substantial or not, but I'm inclined to believe him.
> Not sure you'd say that's substantial or not, but I'm inclined to believe him.
I would certainly believe that person. However, saying "this major at this school has low standards" is not the same as saying "a bunch of majors at all schools have low standards and are thus worthless."
And here is your straw man. Nobody said they were worth that much. You haven't demonstrated that a significant portion of any major exhibits these traits.