英文、創意、理論、實務、性 -- 2010雜念

A student, to my surprise, scored 240 points in 大專英檢（CSEPT）, could not understand　
"All I can and will say is: Watch out the high opportunity costs of dealing with trash."
Well, maybe he was just lying.

也驚訝現在的學生，不知讀莊子或林語堂的書，難怪沒有創意思考能力。不喜歡的，就是理論。沒有被要求到的，就是自己最喜歡追求的實務。可是，理論二字，也有保護罩的功能。假設我開一門棒球課，學期已經過了1/3，還沒教投球與揮棒。有人質疑，我就說：『理論基礎很重要啊，我要先教基礎與基本功。』
常見不入流的業界人士與政府官員，一直說學校要幫學生的未來雇主，教導學生實務的能力。自己政策推動不力或是公司虧損時，就推說：『理論上，不該這樣啊。』

Robert Solow once joked about Milton Friedman by writing something like: “Milton always writes about money (貨幣). Well, sex is constantly on my mind but I keep it away from my writing.” Since I am not Solow, I shall write a little bit about sex. And it is my blog, meaning that I can say whatever I want.
在我是學生的年代，健康教育都是偷偷地、仔細地讀完，絕大多數同學在20歲以前，還沒性經驗，也不會吹噓或假裝純真。當今的大學生，就不一樣了。請問：『關於那檔事 … 在我是學生的年代，我們是重理論；在30年後的今天，學生是重實務。』這樣敘述，可以嗎？

上週，Alex 與我幾秒鐘腦力激盪，產生一小品： 『我不是不會扣籃，只是目前還在鑽研理論的部份。』

Back to late 1980s, when I was a graduate student at Purdue. It was quite common (and possibly still is now) to see that students often shied away from taking theory courses (kind of dry). Recall that a decrease in supply will make the price go up. When theorists were hard to find, some students would brag about their expertise in theory. Professor James C. Moore, who was a solid economist (specializing in math econ and trade theory) and my role model for years, once said: “Do not claim you are a theorist unless you really are.” I still remember the reaction on the faces of those senior graduate students. It was a cold winter morning and the room was central-heated. After his words, the room was cold as outdoors and one could almost hear one's heart beat. Bingo!