[Alberta's Child]

You've sort of made his case without even realizing it. His problem with the Japanese system is that it is so thoroughly regimented that it leaves students thoroughly unprepared for anything that requires even a modicum of imagination or creativity.

Your entire post revolves around your exposure to people in academia. Take one small step out of that academic environment and the deficiencies of the Japanese system are really exposed. I work as an engineer for a private employer, and one of the interesting things about my job is that many of the recent high school graduates who are working here as interns are far more competent and effective than some of the senior-level engineers who have graduated from top engineering programs.

[Warren_Piece]

It's funny, everyone who discusses academics seems to act like the right hemisphere of the brain doesn't exist. I said it in another thread and I'll say it here:

The US leads the world in innovation not because we are smarter (we are not), but because we are the most free. Even with the creeping nanny state, we are light years ahead of anywhere else in terms of freedom. If I need something designed and built perfectly to my specs, I'd probably turn to an Indian or Japanese. If I want someone to come up with totally new specs that no one has ever thought of, I'll turn to an American.

Some people want to beat that out of our children, to make us more like the Asians, or the Europeans with their rote "competency". They want great worker bees. I want leaders and innovators. Freedom, baby!

[GSlob]

Kishi is so uncreative and devoid of imagination that he imagined, designed, and carried out [well, his postdocs did the last part] much more complex syntheses than anyone else. I dealt with some of them - there are not many seriously creative people anywhere, but their good ones are really good, and much better prepared. Loose brains are unusable.