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[Sheb]

Materializing faculty out of thin air isn't exactly possible just yet, as far as I know atleast. Most people that are educated enough are usually already working in the private or public sector where the pay is much better for less workload by most accounts. Assistants are easier to come by but even then, there's only so much you can do if you run out of space.

There are litterally hordes of postdocs out there looking for tenure-track positions (something like a fourth to a third of postdocs end up with one). So no, not really hard, unless you need to double the size of your uni overnight.

[martinuzz]

-snip-

While I understand having a cap on the number of students, the lottery part surprised me. If you don't want to oversaturate the market with professionals, then you should at least be selecting based on skill (by applying tests and letting those 175 best enter the course) rather than sheer luck.

They do nowadays, but they didn't 20+ years ago when I finished highschool. Still, there's something to be said against that system too.
There's many a good professional that didn't find his motivation, or field of excellence yet in highschool.
Your proposed system would have excluded Einstein from academic studies with numerus fixus, for example, his highschool grades sucked balls (or well, maybe not that bad, but he certainly wasn't an A+ student)

the random lottery in my days did make some sense, in that our highschool education was that good, that finishing the high level (VWO) was a pretty good indicator that someone would be able to finish an academic grade too, regardless if they finished it with a C+ average or an A+ average (well, we don't use letters actually, we use a scale from 1.0-10.0, where 5.5 is the minimum to pass)

[Teneb]

-snip-

While I understand having a cap on the number of students, the lottery part surprised me. If you don't want to oversaturate the market with professionals, then you should at least be selecting based on skill (by applying tests and letting those 175 best enter the course) rather than sheer luck.

They do nowadays, but they didn't 20+ years ago when I finished highschool. Still, there's something to be said against that system too.
There's many a good professional that didn't find his motivation, or field of excellence yet in highschool.
Your proposed system would have excluded Einstein from academic studies with numerus fixus, for example, his highschool grades sucked balls (or well, maybe not that bad, but he certainly wasn't an A+ student)

I'm not talking using high school grades as the test, but rather making an actual written test that prospective students have to take to get in, whose result is not affected in any way by their high school grades (well, other than of course the student's aptitudes).

[martinuzz]

We don't use that system, research showed it to be unreliable, because it's such a snapshot. Too easy to score below your capacity just because of stress, pressure, illness, headache, being attracted to the girl making the test next to you etc.
Highschool grades are more reliable, they're a cumulation of 6 years of highschool education and mentoring.

[smjjames]

*temporarily melds Ameripol and Europol together*

So, Trump just started those tariffs with exceptions to Mexico and Canada during the NAFTA negotiations. However, for other allies, he's talking about looking at who's treating the US nicely etc and who's paying the bills, particularily military because 'rich countries are subsidizing us for protecting them'. Sounds like he's going to use the 'do they meet the 2% NATO defense thing?' reason, which is a completely BS reason as it has nothing to do with trade.

Trade war incoming.....

[martinuzz]

Not good. Now to see if Congress forbids it, like Paul Ryan said they would.

[smjjames]

Not sure if they actually can due to the method that was used to bypass Congress, but that won't stop them from trying.

[martinuzz]

Meanwhile in Spain, the candidate to become the new regional president of Catalonia, Jordi Sànchez, cannot be sworn in.
The Spanish justice department does not allow him to leave prison, because 'he could start inciting people again'.

Sànchez is the number two on the list for the ANC, Puigdemont's party. After Puigdemont decided it was senseless for him to try and pursue his candidacy any further, Sànchez was next in line to become the new elected regional president.
He is facing charges for rebellion (upgraded from incitement since he was arrested in oktober), and has been in prison since his arrest. He can face up to 25 years in prison.
Sànchez has taken his case to the EU Court of Human Rights, claiming his right to partake in politics is being violated. The chairman of the Catalonian Parliament has decided to stall the appointment of a new president until the EU court has ruled in the case.

Meanwhile, Amnesty International is urging the EU and UN to take action against Spain for taking political prisoners.

[Maximum Spin]

A discussion on this topic I participated in elsewhere yielded the conclusion that it would come to nothing because "Catalans are a bunch of pussies".

Please discuss.

[SaberToothTiger]

Obviously, strongly worded letters from the UN to everyone involved will prove to be helpful.

[hector13]

A discussion on this topic I participated in elsewhere yielded the conclusion that it would come to nothing because "Catalans are a bunch of pussies".

Please discuss.

40% participation rate, with 90% of that being pro-independence, in the illegal referendum despite knowledge you’d likely get the shit kicked out of you by the stormtroopers Spanish police is pretty good evidence to the contrary I’d say.

Also the returning of a majority of pro-independence politicians to heir parliament after that and then trying to re-install the guy who was kicked out to trigger that election is a massive double-bird to Madrid.

Where is this elsewhere what said that?

[smjjames]

I think I recall Rajoy saying that he'd accept whatever government is formed after the snap election.

And yes, the fact that they went right back to square one should have been a cue that they should try different tactics, like, I dunno, talking to them about their grievances?

[hector13]

He also said he’d allow Puigdemont to run if he wasn’t in jail at the time of the election, so I’m disinclined to say he was interested in a fair and free election at least for independence supporters.

[ChairmanPoo]

A discussion on this topic I participated in elsewhere yielded the conclusion that it would come to nothing because "Catalans are a bunch of pussies".

Please discuss.

Out of curiosity, who were you discussing the situation with? 



Anyway, so yeah, situation is complex and getting more complicated by the minute.

By the way, the whole ordeal is also complicated by the fact that Rajoy's party is trying to outcompete in "Spanish"/Castilian* nationalism another national right wing party, and at the same time both major Catalonian nationalist parties are engaged in a cold war (we might want to discuss these two things later... I dont think these events trascended to the international press, and they kind of explain the reason why certain things happened like they did)

[Maximum Spin]

Out of curiosity, who were you discussing the situation with?

Some people at another place. I'm not going to name them or anything.

I will say, however, that it has further been argued since then that "the Basques would have blown some shit up by now".