4 ms·

Consider the framing of the article, using a tv show to describe the reality of the past. Is there more than a vanishingly small percentage of people who have e

Consider the framing of the article, using a tv show to describe the reality of the past. Is there more than a vanishingly small percentage of people who have ever lived as a sitcom portrays? With such an intellectually bankrupt start, and remember, this is a framing device meant to set your opinion on a guided track, what could we actually expect to get from this article?

bsbechtel 11y ago
>>this is a framing device meant to set your opinion on a guided track This is all too common with the NY Times.
- oldmanjay 11y ago
  It is common with all media. The key is to be aware of the framing and question what the author wants you to believe is true.
- tokenadult 11y ago
  People here on Hacker News set submission titles to provide framing to discussion threads all the time. It's definitely a contribution to the discussion here to read the entire fine article, whether it is published in the New York Times or in some other publication. Thorough examination of an argument based on more than just the source or the title of the submission is helpful to other participants here. As for the argument in the article, which I see online with a title "America’s Best Days May Be Behind It" and a still image from the The Dick Van Dyke Show, I think the best part of the article's argument is the yeah-but part, where optimism is expressed. "What Professor Gordon fails to account for, Professor Mokyr argues, is that the information technology revolution and other recent developments produced mind-blowing tools and techniques, from gene-sequencing machines to computers that analyze mountains of data at blistering speed. This is creating vast new opportunities for innovation, from health care to materials technology and beyond. 'The tools available to science have been improving at a dazzling rate,' he told me. 'I’m not sure how, but the world of technology in 30 to 40 years’ time will be vastly different than it is today.'" I am older than most participants on Hacker News. My family is plainly better off than my parents' family, even though we have fewer total hours of labor force participation per year than my parents jointly had, with the same number of children (four). I can remember a LOT of predictions from my youth that the world would go to hell by the time I was a young adult. It hasn't happened. Prosperity and healthy lifespan and levels of education are rising all over the world. Yeah, the world is still full of problems, but our supply of problem-solving tools and our scope of choice about what problems to solve when is better than ever.
myth_buster 11y ago
At the core of the article is the debate regarding the points that were brought up in a book. Robert J. Gordon, a professor of economics at Northwestern University who has patiently developed the proposition in a series of research papers over the last few years, has bundled his arguments into an ambitious new book, “The Rise and Fall of American Growth” (Princeton University Press). As for “If you are sitting in Silicon Valley, rich and at the frontier of technology,” said Lawrence F. Katz of Harvard, “it is probably true that things are getting better.” The same can’t always be said for the rest of us. I hope The future is already here – it's just not evenly distributed
- nether 11y ago
  Side note: reading quotes formatted with code tags is a pain on mobile Safari due to horizontal scrolling, http://i.imgur.com/o70LmZCh.jpg http://i.imgur.com/o70LmZCh.jpg. Angle brackets generally are enough to signify a quote.
  - myth_buster 11y ago
    Ah, thanks for the tip.
  - avn2109 11y ago
    Similarly painful on my OSX Chrome.
  - bebna 11y ago
    Android Firefox reports pain.
AnimalMuppet 11y ago
A TV show has to be either recognizably close to reality for the majority of people, or recognizably absurd for the majority of people. I suspect that well-chosen shows could in fact be validly used for this purpose.

bsbechtel 11y ago

>>this is a framing device meant to set your opinion on a guided track This is all too common with the NY Times.

oldmanjay 11y ago
It is common with all media. The key is to be aware of the framing and question what the author wants you to believe is true.
tokenadult 11y ago
People here on Hacker News set submission titles to provide framing to discussion threads all the time. It's definitely a contribution to the discussion here to read the entire fine article, whether it is published in the New York Times or in some other publication. Thorough examination of an argument based on more than just the source or the title of the submission is helpful to other participants here. As for the argument in the article, which I see online with a title "America’s Best Days May Be Behind It" and a still image from the The Dick Van Dyke Show, I think the best part of the article's argument is the yeah-but part, where optimism is expressed. "What Professor Gordon fails to account for, Professor Mokyr argues, is that the information technology revolution and other recent developments produced mind-blowing tools and techniques, from gene-sequencing machines to computers that analyze mountains of data at blistering speed. This is creating vast new opportunities for innovation, from health care to materials technology and beyond. 'The tools available to science have been improving at a dazzling rate,' he told me. 'I’m not sure how, but the world of technology in 30 to 40 years’ time will be vastly different than it is today.'" I am older than most participants on Hacker News. My family is plainly better off than my parents' family, even though we have fewer total hours of labor force participation per year than my parents jointly had, with the same number of children (four). I can remember a LOT of predictions from my youth that the world would go to hell by the time I was a young adult. It hasn't happened. Prosperity and healthy lifespan and levels of education are rising all over the world. Yeah, the world is still full of problems, but our supply of problem-solving tools and our scope of choice about what problems to solve when is better than ever.

myth_buster 11y ago

At the core of the article is the debate regarding the points that were brought up in a book. Robert J. Gordon, a professor of economics at Northwestern University who has patiently developed the proposition in a series of research papers over the last few years, has bundled his arguments into an ambitious new book, “The Rise and Fall of American Growth” (Princeton University Press). As for “If you are sitting in Silicon Valley, rich and at the frontier of technology,” said Lawrence F. Katz of Harvard, “it is probably true that things are getting better.” The same can’t always be said for the rest of us. I hope The future is already here – it's just not evenly distributed

nether 11y ago
Side note: reading quotes formatted with code tags is a pain on mobile Safari due to horizontal scrolling, http://i.imgur.com/o70LmZCh.jpg http://i.imgur.com/o70LmZCh.jpg. Angle brackets generally are enough to signify a quote.
- myth_buster 11y ago
  Ah, thanks for the tip.
- avn2109 11y ago
  Similarly painful on my OSX Chrome.
- bebna 11y ago
  Android Firefox reports pain.

AnimalMuppet 11y ago

A TV show has to be either recognizably close to reality for the majority of people, or recognizably absurd for the majority of people. I suspect that well-chosen shows could in fact be validly used for this purpose.