This is a convenient dichotomy for that part of all of us that wishes to think ourselves “critical thinkers”, but not at the cost of looking carefully at the meaning of words. Math and Science are the two fields whose understanding requires this. This is the first and most important of the requirements of Math and Science: know, as precisely and accurately as you can, what you mean. Simple to express, but difficult to achieve in practice. It takes unrelenting effort. I know that for myself, all my instincts conspire against it. It is much easier for me to think I am a “critical thinker” because I can criticize what some other people think, without the discomfort of examining my own preconceptions and assumptions, or even getting a clear idea of what they are. And it is all the more easy with legions of academic departments willing and even eager to train me and support me in the practice of trading verbal tokens with my colleagues, and affirming my own notions about the folly of the notions of others. I suspect that is much of what happens with the liberal arts.

I have some experience with the teachings in math education. Here, the liberal art of teaching and the hard science of mathematics meet. In my experience, the hardness of hard science is always softened in the service of “education”; “education”, which is split into factions with zealous supporters, wins by force.

Here's how this plays out: someone observes that, say, arithmetic with integers can be modeled with, say, tiles with different colors on each side. They create a lesson to help students get a conceptual understanding, using integers of small absolute value, to get avoid unnecessary details in the computations. Than an educator “realizes”: “hey, as long as they ‘get the idea’, well, why continue with practice in difficult computations when they already ‘get it’ with the tiles, and the tiles are so much FUN?” Training and practice in more involved computations is dropped, along with practice in a lot of the trickier details of this new kind of computation. They can use calculators, anyway. The learning becomes, at best, almost exclusively qualitative, and those students who complain that the class is become boring and unchallenging are labeled malcontents---err, “resistant to modern teaching methods”. Later, high school algebra students need calculators to calculate “-3 * 4”, and a high school algebra teacher must reteach arithmetic, perhaps doing some “conceptual” lessons of his own, and the progress of learning is retarded.

Students abandon this “math” in frustration. The DOE demands more money to solve the education crisis in America. Rinse. Repeat.

Do you have any data to back up your claim that there is no difference between STEM and liberal arts skills from a source other than your two nephews? This is a huge area of research in education with a long history of detailed study - your anecdote doesn't carry much weight, and your assertions don't align our current understanding. Although the idea of "multiple intelligences" no longer has the influence it used to, there are still very clear distinctions between, for example, quantitative and analogical reasoning, and inductive and deductive logic, and some people grasp certain kinds of concepts more quickly than others. This is reality. One of your points seems to be that kids shouldn't be taught in a way that only focuses on their strengths, and I fully agree with that, but it's important to understand that there are real distinctions among cognitive skills.

> The sooner we stop complaining and start doing...

Start doing what? Just in the US, there are over 7 million teachers heavily involved in "doing" education as best they can, and tens of thousands of researchers and policymakers that are trying to structure education effectively. I agree that the author of the posted article is also not making an informed contribution to the field, but it's important to recognize that there are many people who are making real contributions, and many others who are too eager to change things based on their own intuitive (and frequently incorrect) impressions of how to teach.

My point is that we shouldn't continue to allow people to turn "I have an advantage in math" into "I'm terrible at spelling and won't bother trying to get better." My nephews illustrate that advantages don't have to become liabilities in other areas, which is how this dichotomy is presented in the OP and the article it was responding to. The scientific evidence can certainly illustrate advantages and disadvantages in different areas; getting from there to "some kids are terrible at English and the rest are terrible at math" is a huge, unwarranted leap.

I agree with everything else you have to say.

One of the highest truth/word comments I've read in a long time. The real issue with education in America is that everyone a) thinks it is someone else's problem and b) thinks if they just change x we will rocket to the top.

c) we can solve the problems by spending more money (we keep trying and it keeps not working).

We don't actually spend all that much money on public education relative to GDP. Many people consider it reasonable to spend more money on their child's collage degree than the full cost the cost of a K-12 at a public school which depending on the state can be as low as 80k.

We also still spend a lot of money on the students who least need it. Due to the influence of property values on education spending often the most affluent areas spend the most per student. We also spend a lot on 'special needs' students who have a limited capability to be educated. But, what matters most is how well the average student is educated and we don't spend a lot of money on that.

That's a silly measure, since the US's GDP is comparatively enormous. In terms of inflation adjusted or PPP dollars, the US spends a crap-ton on education, and has been spending more and more (per student) over the years, with little to show for it.

Some, US public schools are huge successes that provide a world class education at reasonable cost. Others have below 25% graduation rates...

Inflation adjusted dollars and PPP attempts to balance housing, food, and healthcare costs. But schools need to compete with the rest of the economy so it's balanced not on how expensive food is, but how much janitor's / teachers / middle managers could make working somewhere else. R&D has reduced the amount of man hours required to produce a hammer, it has not reduced the amount of man hours required to teach subtraction.

Because college is a bubble.

> To them, there is no STEM/liberal-arts dichotomy--they will be taught that by some well-meaning adult idiot.

Can you explain why you went ad hominem here? Most teachers I know are well educated and very smart people.

Who are you referring to as idiot here?

Whoever teaches them the "STEM/liberal-arts dichotomy" that he claims does not exist, presumably in the interests of making them feel less bad about being crap at one or the other.

I nominate your last paragraph to the "Best of HN" (which does not exist). So true and yet so difficult to understand for many as comments show. Also sad to see that many think that throwing technology at something will fix problems which have nothing to do with technology. Yes, we are hackers but we should know better than "if the only tool you have is a hammer you tend to see every problem like a nail".

Math and science are taught extremely poorly in our schools. It's mostly a matter of memorization (often of trivia rather than fundamentals), plug-and-chug, and rote busywork.

Liberal arts teaching is hardly brilliant for many either, although teachers have a fair bit more leeway..

Funny, that we have movements like Where's The Math lamenting that math education is collapsing because classes are doing "discovery math" (AKA goofing off and chit-chatting), instead learning fundamentals and practicing to memorize basic skills.