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This comes down to a philosophical question: what would be the ideal way to give access to opportunities? Should only smart and hard working people people get t

This comes down to a philosophical question: what would be the ideal way to give access to opportunities? Should only smart and hard working people people get them? Both of those things are in large part determined by genes. If you take this to the extreme we could give every child a gene and IQ test and determine based on that if they should live in a slum or in luxury. I don’t think that there is a good answer.

michaelscott 6y ago
> what would be the ideal way to give access to opportunities? Should only smart and hard working people people get them? As opposed to just getting access by virtue of where you were lucky enough to be born or how wealthy your parents are?
- shadow28 6y ago
  But one could argue even intelligence is based purely on luck.
  - ma2rten 6y ago
    Actually the same is true of "hard work". Conscientiousness is the personality trait of being careful, or diligent. Conscientiousness implies a desire to do a task well, and to take obligations to others seriously. Conscientious people tend to be efficient and organized as opposed to easy-going and disorderly. They exhibit a tendency to show self-discipline, act dutifully, and aim for achievement; they display planned rather than spontaneous behavior; and they are generally dependable. It is manifested in characteristic behaviors such as being neat, and systematic; also including such elements as carefulness, thoroughness, and deliberation (the tendency to think carefully before acting) [...] With the advent of the FFM (Five-Factor Model), behavior geneticists began systematic studies of the full range of personality traits, and it soon became clear that all five factors are substantially heritable. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conscientiousness https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conscientiousness
proverbialbunny 6y ago
IQ ≠ intelligence, and intelligence has only a fraction to do with genes. Overly simplistic summary: Intelligence is how quickly you can learn, how well you learn it, and how well you retain it. Learning skills has to do with meta-learning and how you're taught to learn. Liquid intelligence is a skill that can to a degree be taught. Retaining knowledge has quite a bit to do with how you learn it. Some people are gifted and remember everything by default, but for everyone else there is meta-learning. Of course, I'm being overly simplistic, due to intelligence being a complex topic, but the point is, intelligence isn't all genes. If you want to increase your intelligence, you can make that a hobby.

michaelscott 6y ago

> what would be the ideal way to give access to opportunities? Should only smart and hard working people people get them? As opposed to just getting access by virtue of where you were lucky enough to be born or how wealthy your parents are?

shadow28 6y ago
But one could argue even intelligence is based purely on luck.
- ma2rten 6y ago
  Actually the same is true of "hard work". Conscientiousness is the personality trait of being careful, or diligent. Conscientiousness implies a desire to do a task well, and to take obligations to others seriously. Conscientious people tend to be efficient and organized as opposed to easy-going and disorderly. They exhibit a tendency to show self-discipline, act dutifully, and aim for achievement; they display planned rather than spontaneous behavior; and they are generally dependable. It is manifested in characteristic behaviors such as being neat, and systematic; also including such elements as carefulness, thoroughness, and deliberation (the tendency to think carefully before acting) [...] With the advent of the FFM (Five-Factor Model), behavior geneticists began systematic studies of the full range of personality traits, and it soon became clear that all five factors are substantially heritable. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conscientiousness https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conscientiousness

proverbialbunny 6y ago

IQ ≠ intelligence, and intelligence has only a fraction to do with genes. Overly simplistic summary: Intelligence is how quickly you can learn, how well you learn it, and how well you retain it. Learning skills has to do with meta-learning and how you're taught to learn. Liquid intelligence is a skill that can to a degree be taught. Retaining knowledge has quite a bit to do with how you learn it. Some people are gifted and remember everything by default, but for everyone else there is meta-learning. Of course, I'm being overly simplistic, due to intelligence being a complex topic, but the point is, intelligence isn't all genes. If you want to increase your intelligence, you can make that a hobby.