The point is that if an university course offered a refund if you don’t like it after completing the course, well, a lot of folks would a: fail to get the job that they studied for, and demand a refund, and b: a lot of other folks would just go ahead and take a free ride. Why? Because effects of an university course are a: testable, and b: valuable.
With respect to A:
You seem to be in a position of arguing that universities don’t offer refunds because their courses don’t deliver and people would want them.
With respect to B:
People have lots of poor reasons for valuing things. Going to university to find yourself springs to mind, or because they were told that a degree would benefit them in the job market. You’ve yet to illustrate that university is valued for some instrumental effect.
Ghmm. I forgot that universities are (oddly enough) not a non-controversial example here. I’m not interested in debating universities, so can I change the example? Say, a painting course.
Effects of a painting course are pretty easy to evaluate, so if a painting course offers a refund if you fail to learn to paint after completing the full course, that is indeed a case of putting the money where the mouth is. Conversely, if the effects are impossible to evaluate on a personal basis, how can one talk of “putting the money where the mouth is” ?
I don’t see how you’re getting to the idea that it’s impossible to evaluate. Their exercises are meant to promote certain habits, which seem fairly easy to quantify if you wanted to. Presumably if there wasn’t anything you wanted to get better at which you thought this might address there’d be no value in your attending—and if you want to get better at something then just evaluate that. The offer of a refund, as I understand it, was if you’re not satisfied—wherein you get to choose your metric for satisfied.
You might not precisely be able to identify the mechanism of action—was it just that you needed some sort of self-help woo-woo or was it that they actually told you something worthwhile. But if you had no expected value coming out of it why would you go in the first place?
I suppose, one of the thoughts you might be having here is something to the effect of: you want to be better at thinking—without having a precise metric for what you mean by thinking. Or that you don’t see how the habits they’re talking of developing are going to translate into $$ for you down the line. Kinda like when Dropbox first asked people whether they wanted effortless syncing most of them apparently said no—but then they coded up the MVP and people learnt that they wanted it. I can see how that would be problematic if deciding whether to attend. But though it might entail that you can’t personally evaluate the effects I think that’s different from the effects being impossible to evaluate for anyone.
With respect to A: You seem to be in a position of arguing that universities don’t offer refunds because their courses don’t deliver and people would want them.
With respect to B: People have lots of poor reasons for valuing things. Going to university to find yourself springs to mind, or because they were told that a degree would benefit them in the job market. You’ve yet to illustrate that university is valued for some instrumental effect.
Ghmm. I forgot that universities are (oddly enough) not a non-controversial example here. I’m not interested in debating universities, so can I change the example? Say, a painting course.
Effects of a painting course are pretty easy to evaluate, so if a painting course offers a refund if you fail to learn to paint after completing the full course, that is indeed a case of putting the money where the mouth is. Conversely, if the effects are impossible to evaluate on a personal basis, how can one talk of “putting the money where the mouth is” ?
I don’t see how you’re getting to the idea that it’s impossible to evaluate. Their exercises are meant to promote certain habits, which seem fairly easy to quantify if you wanted to. Presumably if there wasn’t anything you wanted to get better at which you thought this might address there’d be no value in your attending—and if you want to get better at something then just evaluate that. The offer of a refund, as I understand it, was if you’re not satisfied—wherein you get to choose your metric for satisfied.
You might not precisely be able to identify the mechanism of action—was it just that you needed some sort of self-help woo-woo or was it that they actually told you something worthwhile. But if you had no expected value coming out of it why would you go in the first place?
I suppose, one of the thoughts you might be having here is something to the effect of: you want to be better at thinking—without having a precise metric for what you mean by thinking. Or that you don’t see how the habits they’re talking of developing are going to translate into $$ for you down the line. Kinda like when Dropbox first asked people whether they wanted effortless syncing most of them apparently said no—but then they coded up the MVP and people learnt that they wanted it. I can see how that would be problematic if deciding whether to attend. But though it might entail that you can’t personally evaluate the effects I think that’s different from the effects being impossible to evaluate for anyone.