3 ms·

And you don't find the idea that in terms of education potential, the author's assumption that there is something fundamentally different about Americans of Asi

by cletus 16y ago

And you don't find the idea that in terms of education potential, the author's assumption that there is something fundamentally different about Americans of Asian, Caucasian or African descent just a little bit creepy? Like I said: I totally buy into the immigrant argument (including the language barrier) but to only compare Whites from the US to Europe (for a supposed "like for like" comparison), you're going beyond language and culture and introducing race as a variable. And no this isn't some kind of crypto-racist accusation. I just don't see how you can reasonably differentiate between someone of Chinese descent whose ancestors came here in the 19th century to build the railroads to someone of Irish descent who came here a century ago.

yummyfajitas 16y ago
And you don't find the idea that in terms of education potential, the author's assumption that there is something fundamentally different about Americans of Asian, Caucasian or African descent just a little bit creepy? That's not an assumption, it's just a possibility the author is attempting to control for. I just don't see how you can reasonably differentiate between someone of Chinese descent whose ancestors came here in the 19th century to build the railroads to someone of Irish descent who came here a century ago. The simplest way to reasonably differentiate between them is to look at them: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Irish_Americans.jpg http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Irish_Americans.jpg http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_American http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_American You seem to be asserting that allowing for the possibility that cultural or biological factors might affect educational outcomes is creepy. Is that an accurate assessment?
- borism 16y ago
  African Americans (and Asians) are excluded from comparison simply because Finland doesn't have them. Oh yes, Finland has a lot of Africans and Asians (just not proportionally as many as the US "melting pot"). So your editorialized title should have been: After correcting for demographics, US whites fare better than EU/Asian schools and that my friend was pretty racist editorialization (if it makes any sense at all to compare apples to oranges)!
- anigbrowl 16y ago
  And what bearing would these visual differences have on education, pray tell?
  - btilly 16y ago
    People don't only have stereotypes about others. A lifetime of people looking at you and reacting to you causes you to perform differently. Performance can change surprisingly quickly. Researchers have found that reminding people of their ethnic identity before they take a test will affect their performance on the test in accord with racial stereotypes. (Asians improve, blacks get worse.) While it is politically correct to try to be colorblind, reality doesn't cooperate. You can be PC and pretend those effects aren't there. Or you can be intellectually honest and honestly look at how big an impact they have. (That said, we can and should reduce the size of those effects. However we can't even begin to have a proper discussion of how to do that as long as we shoot the messenger that tells us that the effect is there.)
  - yummyfajitas 16y ago
    Hopefully not much. The visual differences simply demonstrate that they are separate and mutually distinguishable groups. The numbers quoted in the main article demonstrate that these groups do differ in some characteristics which affect education, although they don't illuminate which ones in particular.
endtime 16y ago
>And you don't find the idea that in terms of education potential, the author's assumption that there is something fundamentally different about Americans of Asian, Caucasian or African descent just a little bit creepy? Actually, I find creepy your suggestion that this is creepy. It's obviously true that there are differences between ethnicities, both genetic and cultural, and the notion that we should pretend this isn't the case is a bit Orwellian.

by cletus 16y ago

yummyfajitas 16y ago

And you don't find the idea that in terms of education potential, the author's assumption that there is something fundamentally different about Americans of Asian, Caucasian or African descent just a little bit creepy? That's not an assumption, it's just a possibility the author is attempting to control for. I just don't see how you can reasonably differentiate between someone of Chinese descent whose ancestors came here in the 19th century to build the railroads to someone of Irish descent who came here a century ago. The simplest way to reasonably differentiate between them is to look at them: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Irish_Americans.jpg http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Irish_Americans.jpg http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_American http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_American You seem to be asserting that allowing for the possibility that cultural or biological factors might affect educational outcomes is creepy. Is that an accurate assessment?

borism 16y ago
African Americans (and Asians) are excluded from comparison simply because Finland doesn't have them. Oh yes, Finland has a lot of Africans and Asians (just not proportionally as many as the US "melting pot"). So your editorialized title should have been: After correcting for demographics, US whites fare better than EU/Asian schools and that my friend was pretty racist editorialization (if it makes any sense at all to compare apples to oranges)!
anigbrowl 16y ago
And what bearing would these visual differences have on education, pray tell?
- btilly 16y ago
  People don't only have stereotypes about others. A lifetime of people looking at you and reacting to you causes you to perform differently. Performance can change surprisingly quickly. Researchers have found that reminding people of their ethnic identity before they take a test will affect their performance on the test in accord with racial stereotypes. (Asians improve, blacks get worse.) While it is politically correct to try to be colorblind, reality doesn't cooperate. You can be PC and pretend those effects aren't there. Or you can be intellectually honest and honestly look at how big an impact they have. (That said, we can and should reduce the size of those effects. However we can't even begin to have a proper discussion of how to do that as long as we shoot the messenger that tells us that the effect is there.)
- yummyfajitas 16y ago
  Hopefully not much. The visual differences simply demonstrate that they are separate and mutually distinguishable groups. The numbers quoted in the main article demonstrate that these groups do differ in some characteristics which affect education, although they don't illuminate which ones in particular.

endtime 16y ago

>And you don't find the idea that in terms of education potential, the author's assumption that there is something fundamentally different about Americans of Asian, Caucasian or African descent just a little bit creepy? Actually, I find creepy your suggestion that this is creepy. It's obviously true that there are differences between ethnicities, both genetic and cultural, and the notion that we should pretend this isn't the case is a bit Orwellian.