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I agree as regards four year-olds. That said, the usefulness of older children, even ~8-10, is frequently underestimated. There was a time when they made useful
by abalashov 9y ago
I agree as regards four year-olds. That said, the usefulness of older children, even ~8-10, is frequently underestimated. There was a time when they made useful apprentices and assistants, though admittedly at crafts that were probably less abstract and specialised.
Still, I started programming and using UNIX when I was 9. I imagine I was probably capable of some amount of useful output by 11-12, though it would have to be carefully directed by a pragmatic mentor with a view to bottom-line impact.
- animal531 9y agoI'm not sure why you're getting downvoted, perhaps because people don't want to imagine modern child labour. From my side, in the company where I work there are a small handful of people who could easily be replaced with fully unskilled labour (ie. an 8-12yo) with no negative effects.
- Asooka 9y agoExcept for negative effects on the children? How do you schedule that with school and homework?
- animal531 9y agoOf course. I was only showing it as a comparison from the adult side to show that some adults are easily replaceable with children. I wouldn't want to actually implement it.
- abalashov 9y agoI wasn't proposing that we employ children! My statement was made in the context of the discussion about the practicality of engaging and occupying children of certain ages in higher-order cognitive tasks.