13 ms·

The Price of Discipline

203 points by rzk 5y ago

research_studio 5y ago
I’ve often wondered how my career would have turned out different if I’d learned to love learning earlier rather than being forced into it. With a baby daughter I hope I can keep an eye out for some of these flags.
- amelius 5y ago
  I wonder how ideas like this oscillate through generations, as one generation imposes them on the next, and the next forgets.
  - tartoran 5y ago
    Yes, that’s a good point. Plenty of forcefully disciplined do 180 on their kids and give them complete freedoms.
- PragmaticPulp 5y ago
  As a parent I also ponder such things frequently. I grew up with a lot of family friends who chose a hands-off or more “fun” approach to learning for their kids, while downplaying rigid formal education. I can’t think of a single case where this resulted in a natural love of learning or a natural self-discipline. I do know a significant number of people in this cluster who grew up to embrace things like alternative medicine, MLMs, and even conspiracy theories, though. I think the reality is that self-discipline and academic learning is something that benefits greatly from teaching and coaching, even if it can be uncomfortable or un-fun at times. I also don’t think it’s helpful to try to make everything as enjoyable, fun, or comfortable as possible for kids. Some amount of struggle (though not too much) is healthy for building resiliency and persistence. I grew up with a number of people who’s parents stepped in and made everything easy or comfortable for them at every step of the way, and as adults they tend to crumble when faced with the slightest adversity or stress. It’s hard to re-learn self discipline and self control as an adult.
  - inter_netuser 5y ago
    >family friends who chose a hands-off or more “fun” approach to learning for their kids >alternative medicine, MLMs, and even conspiracy theories, though. This is just trait openness in action. Have considered the obvious, they are their parents children? I know several families with strong OCD tendencies, maybe even clinical idk, and their discipline, follow up, attention to detail and organization is absolutely mindboggling. I'm talking washrooms cleaner than operating rooms. Probably in top 0.01%, def above 0.5%. None of them learned or were taught, it's just the entire family is the same way, even small kids. They also sleep 4-5 hours habitually, nobody uses alarm clocks, everyone up by 5am. Genetics is VERY real.
  - research_studio 5y ago
    I’m not out to make things comfortable and easy for my kid as I agree that can foster the wrong attitude to tough situations. Worthwhile things are often difficult. I more meant that I didn’t respond particularly well to formal schooling and it took me years to learn how to learn and if there’s a shorter route towards that it would probably benefit my daughter if she’s similar to me in that way.
  - watwut 5y ago
    > I can’t think of a single case where this resulted in a natural love of learning or a natural self-discipline. I do know such people. And also self disciplined kids from normal schools. It does not seem to me that fun learning ends up with undisciplined people.
csdvrx 5y ago
"computers" used to be like that: they gave you the freedom to create. Now they seem to have evolved in rigid walled gardens where the prospect of riches make it even worse: you are surrounded by people who do not really care about doing a great job, but just want to strike down tickets. I seriously hope the author is right, and that indeed, "the more you tighten your grip, the more star systems will slip through your fingers."
drakonka 5y ago
I went through a few different phases in my education: First, in my home country, were 6-day school weeks and hours of evening study. I remember a very specific instance of sitting at my desk at home with a light on when I was 8 or 9 years old, racking my brain over a math problem I just could NOT figure out. My grandmother, a retired math teacher, would come in once in a while to see how I was doing: no progress. I'd write out so many attempts at solutions and all of them were wrong. She grew increasingly frustrated with each visit to my room, and would then leave me to keep sitting, trying to figure it out. At some point what felt like hours later I just broke: I sat there crying onto my notebook after she yelled at me again during her last check-in. No matter how much I tried, I just could NOT figure out this problem. It felt like hitting my head against the wall and like I'd be sitting there for an eternity. I knew she wouldn't let me stop until I got the right answer. Eventually my mom came in to check on me and saw that I was basically sobbing trying to scribble something - anything - that made sense. She didn't realize how upset I was. She comforted me and we stopped the homework session for the night. When we moved to the US, my parents were more hands-off than my grandmother. I think they grew very relaxed when it became obvious that the math curriculum seemed to cover all the things I already learned in my home country. For several years I didn't need to put any effort in at all, since I already knew all the material. Sure, my classmates thought my way of writing out long division was "weird", but I was the one getting straight As. It was a breeze, and I got complacent. A few years in, I suddenly had to learn new stuff in Math and my discipline for having to actually learn new math concepts again just was not there anymore. My grades slipped really quickly after that and I became an average math student. In some ways, I wished the situation was somewhere between the strictness of my grandmother and the leniency of my parents. It's not that my parents didn't care or anything, it's just that I felt like I got into the habit of producing mediocre work with mediocre habits. I did love learning, just not learning at school. My mom would take me to the library and I'd check out a bunch of programming textbooks to tinker with my own websites and projects at home. I wish I'd put more effort into math at school, though. It was my own fault of course, but I could've used an adult to push me to put more effort in after moving to the US. Luckily, I ended up doing what I love via the self-taught route despite not ending up going to university. Looking back on it, I really lucked out with having a relatively supportive mother and a computer at home. My parents thought my computer time was a problem, but they let me pursue my interests in spending hours learning how to code websites, writing stories, and playing video games nonetheless. I think that early and ongoing practice in self-learning via hobby projects is the main reason I ended up OK despite a not-ideal formal education progression. Also luckily (for my specific case), no medication was prescribed.
keeptrying 5y ago
Better title: The price of not choosing discipline. The article assumes discipline needs to be forced on you. Which is false. The few people I know who have been able to build self discipline on their own are immensely successful. It seems to comes from an extreme form of self determination.
- anonymoushn 5y ago
  People can't increase their conscientiousness through force of will any more than they can increase their height that way. It might be helpful to believe otherwise though.
  - trinsic2 5y ago
    I could be misinterpreting your statement, if so please let me know. My understanding is that force of will is developed by repetition and it can definitely be learned. [My life](https://www.scottrlarson.com/books/book-most-improved/ https://www.scottrlarson.com/books/book-most-improved/) is a perfect example of that. A great book on the subject is "[Constructive Living](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/244742.Constructive_Living https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/244742.Constructive_Livi...)" by David K. Reynolds.
    - deleted 5y ago
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    - tonyedgecombe 5y ago
      Isn't that just habit building? The whole idea that we have some attribute (willpower or self-discipline) that we can apply to our lives seems really iffy to me.
      - trinsic2 5y ago
        Yes. My understanding is habit building strengthens the will. I consider the process re-structuring, or re-patterning the mind. Maybe I am missing something but will power and self-discipline is a skill that needs to be learned, not a quality one just has or doesn't have.
gjvc 5y ago
(self-)discipline weighs ounces, regret weighs tons
- rhapsodic 5y ago
anonymoushn 5y ago
TFA says that being prescribed ADHD meds as a child increases one's odds of experiencing ADHD in adulthood (compared to having ADHD as a child but refusing to take meds). Andrew Huberman of Huberman Lab[0] says that giving an ADHD child meds and therapy can allow them to influence their own development in such a way that lowers their odds of experiencing an ADHD in adulthood. I wonder which of these is correct. [0]: https://hubermanlab.com https://hubermanlab.com
- LoveMortuus 5y ago
  Giving psychotic medications to children feels like a very dangerous experiment, kinda like climate change. I'm not that old, but in my educational period I've never seen or experience anyone who would be ADHD or for whom one would that they need to take some medication. That being said, I come from a farm/vineyard and I've lived most of my life in a village, so my perception is certainly skewed. But I do know that you can't force a kid to do what they don't want to. I never liked vegetables so whenever we had a vegetable soup I didn't eat it, which made my mother angry. Her solution was, that I'm not allowed to leave the table until I eat everything that's on my plate. That gives you two options, either eat the food and be done with it... Or just sit there until the evening and then go to bed. What I'm trying to say is, if a child is full of energy, go outside with them and let them run around, don't give them medication to suppress that energy. I'm not certain what it's called but, it's better to prevent then to cure. It's better to prevent getting cancer then to cure cancer. Or in other words, would you rather prevent getting cancer or get cancer and then cure it?
  - SamoyedFurFluff 5y ago
    My understanding is that ADHD and it’s medication is actually one of, if not the most, well supported/researched relationships in psychiatry and neurological medicine. It’s also not at all what is being described here; it’s actually a neurodevelopmental disorder, not “full of energy”. The medication doesn’t suppress energy; the medications are actually amphetamines! If it wasn’t being used to an ADHD brain, they’d be considered recreational stimulants.
trinsic2 5y ago
I didn't ready all the way through but I gather this issue isn't really about being disciplined, which you can generate healthy qualities of in yourself, this is about toxic and violent behavior, and the unresolved responses to that.
Ostrogodsky 5y ago
Regarding Agassi,no doubt he had a hard childhood, but I always take those celebrities books with a huge grain of salt. A book that says, "I had an OK childhood, nothing wild, nothing out of the ordinary, when I won I was happy and when I lost, I was down" would not sell.
randallsquared 5y ago
Wow, these first few paragraphs are terrible. "opening message... , Open." Anger leading to resentment, leading to, uh, rage? Hm. Snorting meth "with the speed of a U.S. Open serve"? When I read that, I went to see when Agassi had died, since I thought the author was obviously implying suicide by meth... Apparently, Agassi just, you know, did some drugs in the late 90s, though. I was reminded of https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29734242 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29734242 from a few days ago. :)
- tartoran 5y ago
  Perhaps you haven’t read through till the end of the story where Agassi makes his own decision as opposed to his father’s and chooses tennis then goes on to become a champion once again.
  - randallsquared 5y ago
    I was actually only referring to the first few paragraphs; I have no comment on the rest of the essay.
mattgreenrocks 5y ago
There’s a really interesting discussion about societal values and the tendency of the ambitious to only take on goals that are safe and socially pre-approved. We see this in the dev community, where there is automatic admiration for and an an unspoken belief that our careers are just a big ladder to working at a FAANG. And there’s nothing wrong with working there. But once you adopt a goal like that, you find you’re in competition with people who are driven more by a feeling of winning rather than genuinely wanting to be there. They’d be gunning for Salesforce if it was en vogue.
- brador 5y ago
  > There’s a really interesting discussion about societal values and the tendency of the ambitious to only take on goals that are safe and socially pre-approved. Survivor bias?
oxymoran 5y ago
Good article, bad title. It’s not the price of discipline, it’s the price of enforcing discipline on others. Discipline can only be learned through personal experience, it cannot be indoctrinated as that leads to resentment. This makes sense. It’s like telling a smoker that it will kill them. That only annoys them. They need to come to that conclusion themselves. There are also two kinds of discipline, especially for little kids. There is the type of sacrificing pleasure for future rewards that can be learned naturally. But there is also the type of negative consequence for behavior in small children that is not acceptable but may not carry any inherent tangible negative consequence for the child to actually learn from and the parent needs to fill in. For example, children can be very rude and you can’t treat a rude kid the way you would treat a rude adult, but you need to show them this is unacceptable in some way so you take away toys or other privileges etc.
- andrei_says_ 5y ago
  Are toys, play, tv time, dessert… privileges? Turns out that humans learn by example. In other words, the lesson of such punishing actions is that bullying, ultimatums and generally exerting control over others, especially ones with less power, is the proper way to achieve one’s goals. Is this the desired lesson? Some additional outcomes are the loss of trust for the parent and the need to constantly police behavior.
  - sangnoir 5y ago
    Second order effects are sometimes unavoidable when driving towards a primary goal. Talking through issues requires a level of mental maturity and self-control, which needs to be built-up first
    - andrei_says_ 5y ago
      Is not doing something of fear of punishment the kind of self-control which would be useful in the absence of punishment? Drivers respect the speed limit while driving next to a police car. Does this mean that they will do so in its absence? Did the policing reform them?
anonfornoreason 5y ago
For the parents out there, there’s a really good book aimed at 5-13 year old kids on this topic. Honestly I think it’s good for adults who haven’t sorted it out either. Specifically, self discipline vs imposed discipline, and how self discipline if properly harnessed is the best way to find freedom in life. I was skeptical at first due to how the book presents itself but it’s really good. “The way of the warrior kid” by jocko willinck.
- albatrosstrophy 5y ago
  Thanks I'll check it out.
- ido 5y ago
  Checking the excerpt online, does this book include glorification of the military?
  - defphysics 5y ago
    No it doesn't. I listened to the audiobook and agree it has very good lessons. One of the big ones has to do with empathy. I wish I'd had a book like this when I was a kid.
    - deleted 5y ago
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  - anonfornoreason 5y ago
    That was my hesitation as well. My kid is young, didn't want to start that sort of thing early - he has no idea what the military is right now, only thinks guns are for hunting. They do say "Jake is a navy seal" but it doesn't go into it in any detail. It does have each division of the military's codes (along with viking codes, samurai codes, etc) as an example, but it's not a major part of the story and you can literally just skip those pages. I am a self-driven adult, but I even found value in how simply it explains the concept of self discipline. Have you ever had someone explain to you the difference between motivation and self-discipline? I was nodding along because I knew these concepts, but hadn't seen them explained in a way that was just perfectly crystal clear. Spoilers (funny to write this for a kids book): In one chapter, the kid learns how to learn, and learns that some people are naturally quick at certain things but others have to work much harder. That it doesn't mean you are dumb if you don't learn something really quick, that there are techniques you can learn that help if you just try. It also has a bunch of good stuff on humility, working well with others even if they have bullied you in the past, respecting yourself, etc. For example, the kid is getting bullied (amongst other things going wrong with his life). He trains all summer so he can defend himself, stands up to the kid in a way that isn't physical (it doesn't glorify that in any way) and then befriends him. He then invites him to come play with the other kids. The way he becomes friends with him after being bullied by him for an entire year takes an incredible amount of humility and kindness, and made me feel like I could improve in how I relate to other people I have had conflict with.
rvba 5y ago
What does "common core" have to do with school problems?
- dragonwriter 5y ago
  > What does "common core" have to do with school problems?. It's a set of educational standards, and every such set newer than the 1800s is right-wing boogeyman that is attacked for things that are completely unrelated to it's actual content. (Often for doing the exact same thing they accused the last one of doing, where they hope you forget that the collapse of civilization they are predicting from it is the same thing, for the same supposed reason, they predicted from the status quo it is replacing.)
- analog31 5y ago
  When my kids were starting school, I looked it up, just to get an idea of what was being taught these days. Each state had its own web page with the standards laid out in outline fashion. Common Core looked very much like what I had learned in school myself. I think Common Core just gave people an easy focal point of attack, like publishing the salaries of teachers.
- 8note 5y ago
  It imposes constraints on what's taught that doesn't allow for students who are ahead or behind the curriculum. Growing up and learning are messy processes that demand flexible solutions
nyanpasu64 5y ago
What's to be done now, after a childhood spent under heavy-handed parents with a singular goal of sucking away fun to optimize for college admissions, violent and emotionally abusive punishments, leaving me in a life of executive dysfunction and depression? Most of the article resonated with me. But I'm not sure I agree with the "ADHD medication is drugging children" part, since I've heard that ADHD medication can (in many cases) help adults who haven't been treated as children put their lives back together. (Sadly I was recently prescribed stimulants, tried them for a bit, and often got anxiety/panic attacks from the pills and caffeine.)
- tchalla 5y ago
  Pain is mandatory, suffering is a choice. The pain won’t go away - to suffer from the pain is an active choice we make. You clearly need therapy. Decide your values, be conscious of your choices they move to/away from your values and wholeheartedly accept the opportunity costs.
chandmk 5y ago
At the end it is very inspiring to learn that Andre chose tennis on his own to become the number one on his own terms. But somehow it feels very ironic that he chose what he was already good at! Perhaps his father saved him a lot of time by choosing for him and using that time to make him skilled at tennis. It just feels like a perspective change. He could have simply said now I understood what my father was trying to do. Because no one really knows what Andre would have chosen and done by himself.
- vkk8 5y ago
  Yes, it almost sounds like Agassi sort of showed his father was right to force him to play tennis. If I suddenly "chose tennis", it wouldn't do me much good because becoming a world class tennis player requires decades of training starting from a young age.
- ACow_Adonis 5y ago
  There's a tragic irony/flaw in the use of agassi in this article. His "enlightenment" moment didn't result in him walking away from his father's world (or the money, or the emptyness of living a life to play tennis). in many ways its the opposite lesson of the article. It helps to remember of course that the whole anecdote and narrative is likely just more commercial promotional fiction. everyone likes a redemption story, especially when it's somehow a redemption story that doesn't result in recognising the emptiness of fans and fame and money and professional sport but a kind of self- congratulatory reawakening that involves no actual change. This allows the commercial engine of a professional tennis players life to keep turning and draw in new fans and retaining old ones... presumably the whole actual point of publishing his "autobiography". I'm guessing of course agassi didn't write his biography either. I'm sure his pr team/managers just hired a ghost writer. I've got nothing personally against agassi, just for he record, don't even know or care much about him. I'm sure his father probably was overbearing: that's the harsh reality of professional sports preparation. But it does well to read these things with a critical eye and recognise the reality behind them rather than the image. At the end of the day, he's still a guy that hit balls back and forth for money just like he was brought up to.
addsubtract 5y ago
I think the idea that all people figure things out on their own and will escape a life of freedom or hedonism because “its empty and hollow” have never experienced drug addiction. Agassi might have made it out but a lot of people don’t. In a lot of ways I feel the opposite of this article. I rebelled against discipline throughout my teenage years and later came to appreciate my parents and teachers efforts way more. I wish I had stuck with instruments or tried harder in my math classes. Life is hard work and building the skill of discipline when it comes to life long learning is invaluable and fulfilling.
- pizza 5y ago
  It should be easier for people to say “I no longer feel like I have free will” and also “I now feel like I have free will again” so that others can take care of them, but also in a way that won’t take away their rights. I also think people who help people who are close to rock bottom often put a lot of skin in the game, and not always but sometimes can get hurt in the process- they should have protection too. Depressive hedonism is powerful.. The death drive is like playing a tit-for-tat strategy against one’s own lebenswelt. I hope people don’t take me as being dismissive or insensitive or ignoring the contributions of biophysics to drug dependency etiology, but from a free will frame of analysis it resembles a kind of very dark and very negative discipline itself. Imagine if it were just a thing that people could get help with as unshamefully as eg going to the dentist.
  - nefitty 5y ago
    I live in tandem with a nihilistic part of myself, the blackpilled part of me. It likes to secretly collect evidence for why it should be dominant. When it has been in control is when I have felt the freest, the most authentic. What's more, it is so developed that I can name it. I don't know the name of what society wants me to be. Domesticated citizen? Good boy? Effectless stranger? I have a project in my head of outlining my "core beliefs": "Better living through chemistry", "All knowledge is accessible through language", "Brains over brawn", etc. The shadow part of me slips things in: "If God exists, God is evil", "Life is meaningless", "Humans are untrustworthy", etc. If I could go to a doctor and point at some part of my brain, or at some chemical imbalance, it would be amazing. As it stands, I feel like each of our personal psychological maintenance entails us little individual people picking up boulders and moving them to other parts of the neurochemical pit. Sometimes we get help with big machines like lithium or whatever. It just feels like we're still in the dark ages of human neurochemistry, and we can't help piling on more confounding variables. Anyways, I just wanted to share. I don't have any answers. Or at least, the moment's struggle with my shadow occludes them.
aikiplayer 5y ago
I think I'm going to take a slightly different approach to some of the comments and the article. Notes: My wife is a long-time primary grade (think Kinder - 2) teacher and I've got 3 kids, 1 fully baked and 2 in college. 1st, regarding Agassi, there are few folks in the history of the world who get to #1 in something and have a "normal" or perhaps "well balanced" life. It takes a lot of innate skill/ability/talent, drive, luck and the willingness to sacrifice. For a really chilling take, look at Ichiro Suzuki's upbringing (baseball). From a parent's perspective, at least mine, I tried to strike a balance between letting my kids choose their own paths while trying to help avoid closing too many doors. Some kids change A LOT and it would be a shame (to me at least) if they made a short-sighted decision at age 13 that prevented them from doing something later that they might decide they love and are good at. And the reality is, despite the occasional "against all the odds" stories out there where somebody made a late decision to pivot, most of the time the odds win. I also coached youth sports for a number of years and I struggled because one of my kids was a pretty good athlete but not super intense about it and a bit of a late developer. It meant they got selected out because of these things. I could have forced them to practice more, more intensely, etc. It turned OK because they ended up getting cut from a soccer team (twice no less), decided to work stick with it, lucked into a spot on a good team w/ good coaching and ended up as the varsity keeper on their high school team (well, until COVID became a thing). Like it or not, the world is super competitive. As a parent, it's hard when you see something that you know will normally close a door for your child. Many times parents are pushing their kids because they themselves are competitive. Other times, it's just trying to keep options open for your child. From a distance, they're indistinguishable. Finally, the education system is not perfect for all children and situations. It's an XX% solution (pick your number). This didn't sound like a typical ADHD situation. It clearly didn't fit this situation. Ultimately I see it as helping your children position themselves for situations that are right for them. The hard part is that what's right for them is pretty opaque until they're about 20...
- bittercynic 5y ago
  >Like it or not, the world is super competitive. I think this is a choice, at least partly. If you have the good fortune to have been born in a place where the median income affords reasonable housing and healthy food and medical care, you're kind of set, and can get on with enjoying life and finding fulfilling relationships. As long as you're not hung up on having fancier things/higher status than the next guy.
throwaway14356 5y ago
an applausworthy article.
graycat 5y ago
Generally, I agree with the OP. From my experience, some of the claims seem right on target. There are a lot of claims in the OP, and I can't agree with all of them. I would add: In my experience, there is a small fraction of parents and teachers who really understand all that stuff, avoid the dangers, and do well as parents, teachers, whatever. Then there are the rest of the parents and teachers, and, yes, they can do a LOT of really serious damage -- I've seen too much of it close at hand. I'm an example of avoiding the dangers in the OP: My parents took the attitude that in nearly all things I should not be lectured to, disciplined, etc. and, instead, just left to my own devices. My collection of interests grew, and it's still huge. I pursued my real interests with a lot of effort with good results. In grades 1-8, the teachers talked to each other and agreed that I was a bad student. Yup, no doubt, a bad, poor, slow, not very smart student. Then there were some standardized tests, and, oops, no way saying I wasn't smart. But I was still a bad student. Then I discovered math and science, especially chemistry and physics. I was plenty interested, worked hard, and learned a lot. Some of the math teachers were torqued: I refused to show homework! That's because I found the assigned problems to be too easy and, instead, found the much more difficult supplementary problems in the back of the book and worked ALL of those, made sure I never missed one! But, there were standardized achievement tests, and again I did well and the teachers had just to swallow their belief that I was a bad student. It appears that the Principal of the school understood me and made sure I got some good opportunities -- I was sent to a math tournament and also a summer NSF funded math and physics program. When the SAT scores came back, the teacher who read them to me -- I'd had in the sixth grade, she was fully on board that I was a dumb student -- saw the Math SAT score and got confused, "There must be some mistake." I didn't miss 800 by much -- I'd love to know what the CEEB thought I'd missed. It was the city's premier college prep school and had a lot of traditional good students. So, of #1, #2, #3 on the Math SATs I came second. Poor teacher was confused! In my Ph.D. program, the department Chair was a high discipline, dot i's and cross t's, straight As type of guy. But his research didn't amount to anything. At one point I pursued my interests instead of a course beneath me, and he got really torqued! Ah, to heck with him! From an advanced course, I saw a problem in an old field and asked for a reading course to address it. I already had an idea for a solution -- "Never give a sucker an even break.". Two weeks later I had a nice solution, ready to publish -- later did publish it in JOTA (Journal of Optimization Theory and Applications). Net, doing that research got all the faculty and all the high discipline guys totally OFF my case. The rest of the way through my Ph.D. I had some secret help at least from the Dean and maybe from the President -- the department Chair was soon fired. Net: In my experience, most of all students need to be INTERESTED and, then, given maybe a little very well considered advice but a LOT of freedom. THEN the student will likely work REALLY hard and maybe do some good things. If I have to hire some people, I may reject straight A, Valedictorian, PBK, Summa Cum Laude applicants as people who worked for grades but not really for interests or learning -- someone with strong interests will likely do a LOT better.
11thEarlOfMar 5y ago
"Students benefited from college not because of the education they received, but because of sexy diplomas and tight personal networks." It did make a difference in what institution issued the diploma. But was more about getting a diploma at all. So I'd say I disagree with what this statement implies.
phlipski 5y ago
I generally enjoy reading David Perell's article but he generally frustrates me with his ad-hoc mix of science/research and his personal opinions. Example - he references the 300% increase in college degrees amongst the population since 1970 and the pressure it places upon everyone else to "get a degree" and then turns around and bashes the idea of ADHD medications with ZERO evidence of its supposed dangers: "To their credit, my parents didn’t drug me. I had all the features of a kid who would have binged ADHD medications like shots at a New Year’s party. No matter how badly I acted, my parents never caved into the twisted logic that leads doctors to hand out prescription pills faster than candy on Halloween." Maybe if his parents HAD drugged him he wouldn't have been such a mess in middle school. I find him to generally be thought provoking but his immaturity (and youth) as a human shows through in a lot of his writing at times...
- zepto 5y ago
  He does say that there hasn’t been time for evidence of the long term dangers to become apparent.
  - jtbayly 5y ago
    Like the vaccine?
    - zepto 5y ago
      If the vaccine altered behavior and was taken every day during a decade of rapid brain development, there would be a reasonable basis for comparison.
  - wswope 5y ago
    He can say that, but the drugs have been around and extensively studied using every reasonable approach for many decades. Choosing to ignore evidence doesn’t make it not exist - he’s wrong according to a well-established scientific consensus.
    - zepto 5y ago

203 points by rzk 5y ago

I’ve often wondered how my career would have turned out different if I’d learned to love learning earlier rather than being forced into it. With a baby daughter I hope I can keep an eye out for some of these flags.

amelius 5y ago
I wonder how ideas like this oscillate through generations, as one generation imposes them on the next, and the next forgets.
- tartoran 5y ago
  Yes, that’s a good point. Plenty of forcefully disciplined do 180 on their kids and give them complete freedoms.
PragmaticPulp 5y ago
As a parent I also ponder such things frequently. I grew up with a lot of family friends who chose a hands-off or more “fun” approach to learning for their kids, while downplaying rigid formal education. I can’t think of a single case where this resulted in a natural love of learning or a natural self-discipline. I do know a significant number of people in this cluster who grew up to embrace things like alternative medicine, MLMs, and even conspiracy theories, though. I think the reality is that self-discipline and academic learning is something that benefits greatly from teaching and coaching, even if it can be uncomfortable or un-fun at times. I also don’t think it’s helpful to try to make everything as enjoyable, fun, or comfortable as possible for kids. Some amount of struggle (though not too much) is healthy for building resiliency and persistence. I grew up with a number of people who’s parents stepped in and made everything easy or comfortable for them at every step of the way, and as adults they tend to crumble when faced with the slightest adversity or stress. It’s hard to re-learn self discipline and self control as an adult.
- inter_netuser 5y ago
  >family friends who chose a hands-off or more “fun” approach to learning for their kids >alternative medicine, MLMs, and even conspiracy theories, though. This is just trait openness in action. Have considered the obvious, they are their parents children? I know several families with strong OCD tendencies, maybe even clinical idk, and their discipline, follow up, attention to detail and organization is absolutely mindboggling. I'm talking washrooms cleaner than operating rooms. Probably in top 0.01%, def above 0.5%. None of them learned or were taught, it's just the entire family is the same way, even small kids. They also sleep 4-5 hours habitually, nobody uses alarm clocks, everyone up by 5am. Genetics is VERY real.
- research_studio 5y ago
  I’m not out to make things comfortable and easy for my kid as I agree that can foster the wrong attitude to tough situations. Worthwhile things are often difficult. I more meant that I didn’t respond particularly well to formal schooling and it took me years to learn how to learn and if there’s a shorter route towards that it would probably benefit my daughter if she’s similar to me in that way.
- watwut 5y ago
  > I can’t think of a single case where this resulted in a natural love of learning or a natural self-discipline. I do know such people. And also self disciplined kids from normal schools. It does not seem to me that fun learning ends up with undisciplined people.

csdvrx 5y ago

"computers" used to be like that: they gave you the freedom to create. Now they seem to have evolved in rigid walled gardens where the prospect of riches make it even worse: you are surrounded by people who do not really care about doing a great job, but just want to strike down tickets. I seriously hope the author is right, and that indeed, "the more you tighten your grip, the more star systems will slip through your fingers."

drakonka 5y ago

I went through a few different phases in my education: First, in my home country, were 6-day school weeks and hours of evening study. I remember a very specific instance of sitting at my desk at home with a light on when I was 8 or 9 years old, racking my brain over a math problem I just could NOT figure out. My grandmother, a retired math teacher, would come in once in a while to see how I was doing: no progress. I'd write out so many attempts at solutions and all of them were wrong. She grew increasingly frustrated with each visit to my room, and would then leave me to keep sitting, trying to figure it out. At some point what felt like hours later I just broke: I sat there crying onto my notebook after she yelled at me again during her last check-in. No matter how much I tried, I just could NOT figure out this problem. It felt like hitting my head against the wall and like I'd be sitting there for an eternity. I knew she wouldn't let me stop until I got the right answer. Eventually my mom came in to check on me and saw that I was basically sobbing trying to scribble something - anything - that made sense. She didn't realize how upset I was. She comforted me and we stopped the homework session for the night. When we moved to the US, my parents were more hands-off than my grandmother. I think they grew very relaxed when it became obvious that the math curriculum seemed to cover all the things I already learned in my home country. For several years I didn't need to put any effort in at all, since I already knew all the material. Sure, my classmates thought my way of writing out long division was "weird", but I was the one getting straight As. It was a breeze, and I got complacent. A few years in, I suddenly had to learn new stuff in Math and my discipline for having to actually learn new math concepts again just was not there anymore. My grades slipped really quickly after that and I became an average math student. In some ways, I wished the situation was somewhere between the strictness of my grandmother and the leniency of my parents. It's not that my parents didn't care or anything, it's just that I felt like I got into the habit of producing mediocre work with mediocre habits. I did love learning, just not learning at school. My mom would take me to the library and I'd check out a bunch of programming textbooks to tinker with my own websites and projects at home. I wish I'd put more effort into math at school, though. It was my own fault of course, but I could've used an adult to push me to put more effort in after moving to the US. Luckily, I ended up doing what I love via the self-taught route despite not ending up going to university. Looking back on it, I really lucked out with having a relatively supportive mother and a computer at home. My parents thought my computer time was a problem, but they let me pursue my interests in spending hours learning how to code websites, writing stories, and playing video games nonetheless. I think that early and ongoing practice in self-learning via hobby projects is the main reason I ended up OK despite a not-ideal formal education progression. Also luckily (for my specific case), no medication was prescribed.

keeptrying 5y ago

Better title: The price of not choosing discipline. The article assumes discipline needs to be forced on you. Which is false. The few people I know who have been able to build self discipline on their own are immensely successful. It seems to comes from an extreme form of self determination.

anonymoushn 5y ago
People can't increase their conscientiousness through force of will any more than they can increase their height that way. It might be helpful to believe otherwise though.
- trinsic2 5y ago
  I could be misinterpreting your statement, if so please let me know. My understanding is that force of will is developed by repetition and it can definitely be learned. [My life](https://www.scottrlarson.com/books/book-most-improved/ https://www.scottrlarson.com/books/book-most-improved/) is a perfect example of that. A great book on the subject is "[Constructive Living](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/244742.Constructive_Living https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/244742.Constructive_Livi...)" by David K. Reynolds.
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  - tonyedgecombe 5y ago
    Isn't that just habit building? The whole idea that we have some attribute (willpower or self-discipline) that we can apply to our lives seems really iffy to me.
    - trinsic2 5y ago
      Yes. My understanding is habit building strengthens the will. I consider the process re-structuring, or re-patterning the mind. Maybe I am missing something but will power and self-discipline is a skill that needs to be learned, not a quality one just has or doesn't have.

gjvc 5y ago

(self-)discipline weighs ounces, regret weighs tons

rhapsodic 5y ago

anonymoushn 5y ago

TFA says that being prescribed ADHD meds as a child increases one's odds of experiencing ADHD in adulthood (compared to having ADHD as a child but refusing to take meds). Andrew Huberman of Huberman Lab[0] says that giving an ADHD child meds and therapy can allow them to influence their own development in such a way that lowers their odds of experiencing an ADHD in adulthood. I wonder which of these is correct. [0]: https://hubermanlab.com https://hubermanlab.com

LoveMortuus 5y ago
Giving psychotic medications to children feels like a very dangerous experiment, kinda like climate change. I'm not that old, but in my educational period I've never seen or experience anyone who would be ADHD or for whom one would that they need to take some medication. That being said, I come from a farm/vineyard and I've lived most of my life in a village, so my perception is certainly skewed. But I do know that you can't force a kid to do what they don't want to. I never liked vegetables so whenever we had a vegetable soup I didn't eat it, which made my mother angry. Her solution was, that I'm not allowed to leave the table until I eat everything that's on my plate. That gives you two options, either eat the food and be done with it... Or just sit there until the evening and then go to bed. What I'm trying to say is, if a child is full of energy, go outside with them and let them run around, don't give them medication to suppress that energy. I'm not certain what it's called but, it's better to prevent then to cure. It's better to prevent getting cancer then to cure cancer. Or in other words, would you rather prevent getting cancer or get cancer and then cure it?
- SamoyedFurFluff 5y ago
  My understanding is that ADHD and it’s medication is actually one of, if not the most, well supported/researched relationships in psychiatry and neurological medicine. It’s also not at all what is being described here; it’s actually a neurodevelopmental disorder, not “full of energy”. The medication doesn’t suppress energy; the medications are actually amphetamines! If it wasn’t being used to an ADHD brain, they’d be considered recreational stimulants.

trinsic2 5y ago

I didn't ready all the way through but I gather this issue isn't really about being disciplined, which you can generate healthy qualities of in yourself, this is about toxic and violent behavior, and the unresolved responses to that.

Ostrogodsky 5y ago

Regarding Agassi,no doubt he had a hard childhood, but I always take those celebrities books with a huge grain of salt. A book that says, "I had an OK childhood, nothing wild, nothing out of the ordinary, when I won I was happy and when I lost, I was down" would not sell.

randallsquared 5y ago

Wow, these first few paragraphs are terrible. "opening message... , Open." Anger leading to resentment, leading to, uh, rage? Hm. Snorting meth "with the speed of a U.S. Open serve"? When I read that, I went to see when Agassi had died, since I thought the author was obviously implying suicide by meth... Apparently, Agassi just, you know, did some drugs in the late 90s, though. I was reminded of https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29734242 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29734242 from a few days ago. :)

tartoran 5y ago
Perhaps you haven’t read through till the end of the story where Agassi makes his own decision as opposed to his father’s and chooses tennis then goes on to become a champion once again.
- randallsquared 5y ago
  I was actually only referring to the first few paragraphs; I have no comment on the rest of the essay.

mattgreenrocks 5y ago

There’s a really interesting discussion about societal values and the tendency of the ambitious to only take on goals that are safe and socially pre-approved. We see this in the dev community, where there is automatic admiration for and an an unspoken belief that our careers are just a big ladder to working at a FAANG. And there’s nothing wrong with working there. But once you adopt a goal like that, you find you’re in competition with people who are driven more by a feeling of winning rather than genuinely wanting to be there. They’d be gunning for Salesforce if it was en vogue.

brador 5y ago
> There’s a really interesting discussion about societal values and the tendency of the ambitious to only take on goals that are safe and socially pre-approved. Survivor bias?

oxymoran 5y ago

Good article, bad title. It’s not the price of discipline, it’s the price of enforcing discipline on others. Discipline can only be learned through personal experience, it cannot be indoctrinated as that leads to resentment. This makes sense. It’s like telling a smoker that it will kill them. That only annoys them. They need to come to that conclusion themselves. There are also two kinds of discipline, especially for little kids. There is the type of sacrificing pleasure for future rewards that can be learned naturally. But there is also the type of negative consequence for behavior in small children that is not acceptable but may not carry any inherent tangible negative consequence for the child to actually learn from and the parent needs to fill in. For example, children can be very rude and you can’t treat a rude kid the way you would treat a rude adult, but you need to show them this is unacceptable in some way so you take away toys or other privileges etc.

andrei_says_ 5y ago
Are toys, play, tv time, dessert… privileges? Turns out that humans learn by example. In other words, the lesson of such punishing actions is that bullying, ultimatums and generally exerting control over others, especially ones with less power, is the proper way to achieve one’s goals. Is this the desired lesson? Some additional outcomes are the loss of trust for the parent and the need to constantly police behavior.
- sangnoir 5y ago
  Second order effects are sometimes unavoidable when driving towards a primary goal. Talking through issues requires a level of mental maturity and self-control, which needs to be built-up first
  - andrei_says_ 5y ago
    Is not doing something of fear of punishment the kind of self-control which would be useful in the absence of punishment? Drivers respect the speed limit while driving next to a police car. Does this mean that they will do so in its absence? Did the policing reform them?

anonfornoreason 5y ago

For the parents out there, there’s a really good book aimed at 5-13 year old kids on this topic. Honestly I think it’s good for adults who haven’t sorted it out either. Specifically, self discipline vs imposed discipline, and how self discipline if properly harnessed is the best way to find freedom in life. I was skeptical at first due to how the book presents itself but it’s really good. “The way of the warrior kid” by jocko willinck.

albatrosstrophy 5y ago
Thanks I'll check it out.
ido 5y ago
Checking the excerpt online, does this book include glorification of the military?
- defphysics 5y ago
  No it doesn't. I listened to the audiobook and agree it has very good lessons. One of the big ones has to do with empathy. I wish I'd had a book like this when I was a kid.
  - deleted 5y ago
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- anonfornoreason 5y ago
  That was my hesitation as well. My kid is young, didn't want to start that sort of thing early - he has no idea what the military is right now, only thinks guns are for hunting. They do say "Jake is a navy seal" but it doesn't go into it in any detail. It does have each division of the military's codes (along with viking codes, samurai codes, etc) as an example, but it's not a major part of the story and you can literally just skip those pages. I am a self-driven adult, but I even found value in how simply it explains the concept of self discipline. Have you ever had someone explain to you the difference between motivation and self-discipline? I was nodding along because I knew these concepts, but hadn't seen them explained in a way that was just perfectly crystal clear. Spoilers (funny to write this for a kids book): In one chapter, the kid learns how to learn, and learns that some people are naturally quick at certain things but others have to work much harder. That it doesn't mean you are dumb if you don't learn something really quick, that there are techniques you can learn that help if you just try. It also has a bunch of good stuff on humility, working well with others even if they have bullied you in the past, respecting yourself, etc. For example, the kid is getting bullied (amongst other things going wrong with his life). He trains all summer so he can defend himself, stands up to the kid in a way that isn't physical (it doesn't glorify that in any way) and then befriends him. He then invites him to come play with the other kids. The way he becomes friends with him after being bullied by him for an entire year takes an incredible amount of humility and kindness, and made me feel like I could improve in how I relate to other people I have had conflict with.

rvba 5y ago

What does "common core" have to do with school problems?

dragonwriter 5y ago
> What does "common core" have to do with school problems?. It's a set of educational standards, and every such set newer than the 1800s is right-wing boogeyman that is attacked for things that are completely unrelated to it's actual content. (Often for doing the exact same thing they accused the last one of doing, where they hope you forget that the collapse of civilization they are predicting from it is the same thing, for the same supposed reason, they predicted from the status quo it is replacing.)
analog31 5y ago
When my kids were starting school, I looked it up, just to get an idea of what was being taught these days. Each state had its own web page with the standards laid out in outline fashion. Common Core looked very much like what I had learned in school myself. I think Common Core just gave people an easy focal point of attack, like publishing the salaries of teachers.
8note 5y ago
It imposes constraints on what's taught that doesn't allow for students who are ahead or behind the curriculum. Growing up and learning are messy processes that demand flexible solutions

nyanpasu64 5y ago

What's to be done now, after a childhood spent under heavy-handed parents with a singular goal of sucking away fun to optimize for college admissions, violent and emotionally abusive punishments, leaving me in a life of executive dysfunction and depression? Most of the article resonated with me. But I'm not sure I agree with the "ADHD medication is drugging children" part, since I've heard that ADHD medication can (in many cases) help adults who haven't been treated as children put their lives back together. (Sadly I was recently prescribed stimulants, tried them for a bit, and often got anxiety/panic attacks from the pills and caffeine.)

tchalla 5y ago
Pain is mandatory, suffering is a choice. The pain won’t go away - to suffer from the pain is an active choice we make. You clearly need therapy. Decide your values, be conscious of your choices they move to/away from your values and wholeheartedly accept the opportunity costs.

chandmk 5y ago

At the end it is very inspiring to learn that Andre chose tennis on his own to become the number one on his own terms. But somehow it feels very ironic that he chose what he was already good at! Perhaps his father saved him a lot of time by choosing for him and using that time to make him skilled at tennis. It just feels like a perspective change. He could have simply said now I understood what my father was trying to do. Because no one really knows what Andre would have chosen and done by himself.

vkk8 5y ago
Yes, it almost sounds like Agassi sort of showed his father was right to force him to play tennis. If I suddenly "chose tennis", it wouldn't do me much good because becoming a world class tennis player requires decades of training starting from a young age.
ACow_Adonis 5y ago
There's a tragic irony/flaw in the use of agassi in this article. His "enlightenment" moment didn't result in him walking away from his father's world (or the money, or the emptyness of living a life to play tennis). in many ways its the opposite lesson of the article. It helps to remember of course that the whole anecdote and narrative is likely just more commercial promotional fiction. everyone likes a redemption story, especially when it's somehow a redemption story that doesn't result in recognising the emptiness of fans and fame and money and professional sport but a kind of self- congratulatory reawakening that involves no actual change. This allows the commercial engine of a professional tennis players life to keep turning and draw in new fans and retaining old ones... presumably the whole actual point of publishing his "autobiography". I'm guessing of course agassi didn't write his biography either. I'm sure his pr team/managers just hired a ghost writer. I've got nothing personally against agassi, just for he record, don't even know or care much about him. I'm sure his father probably was overbearing: that's the harsh reality of professional sports preparation. But it does well to read these things with a critical eye and recognise the reality behind them rather than the image. At the end of the day, he's still a guy that hit balls back and forth for money just like he was brought up to.

addsubtract 5y ago

I think the idea that all people figure things out on their own and will escape a life of freedom or hedonism because “its empty and hollow” have never experienced drug addiction. Agassi might have made it out but a lot of people don’t. In a lot of ways I feel the opposite of this article. I rebelled against discipline throughout my teenage years and later came to appreciate my parents and teachers efforts way more. I wish I had stuck with instruments or tried harder in my math classes. Life is hard work and building the skill of discipline when it comes to life long learning is invaluable and fulfilling.

pizza 5y ago
It should be easier for people to say “I no longer feel like I have free will” and also “I now feel like I have free will again” so that others can take care of them, but also in a way that won’t take away their rights. I also think people who help people who are close to rock bottom often put a lot of skin in the game, and not always but sometimes can get hurt in the process- they should have protection too. Depressive hedonism is powerful.. The death drive is like playing a tit-for-tat strategy against one’s own lebenswelt. I hope people don’t take me as being dismissive or insensitive or ignoring the contributions of biophysics to drug dependency etiology, but from a free will frame of analysis it resembles a kind of very dark and very negative discipline itself. Imagine if it were just a thing that people could get help with as unshamefully as eg going to the dentist.
- nefitty 5y ago
  I live in tandem with a nihilistic part of myself, the blackpilled part of me. It likes to secretly collect evidence for why it should be dominant. When it has been in control is when I have felt the freest, the most authentic. What's more, it is so developed that I can name it. I don't know the name of what society wants me to be. Domesticated citizen? Good boy? Effectless stranger? I have a project in my head of outlining my "core beliefs": "Better living through chemistry", "All knowledge is accessible through language", "Brains over brawn", etc. The shadow part of me slips things in: "If God exists, God is evil", "Life is meaningless", "Humans are untrustworthy", etc. If I could go to a doctor and point at some part of my brain, or at some chemical imbalance, it would be amazing. As it stands, I feel like each of our personal psychological maintenance entails us little individual people picking up boulders and moving them to other parts of the neurochemical pit. Sometimes we get help with big machines like lithium or whatever. It just feels like we're still in the dark ages of human neurochemistry, and we can't help piling on more confounding variables. Anyways, I just wanted to share. I don't have any answers. Or at least, the moment's struggle with my shadow occludes them.

aikiplayer 5y ago

I think I'm going to take a slightly different approach to some of the comments and the article. Notes: My wife is a long-time primary grade (think Kinder - 2) teacher and I've got 3 kids, 1 fully baked and 2 in college. 1st, regarding Agassi, there are few folks in the history of the world who get to #1 in something and have a "normal" or perhaps "well balanced" life. It takes a lot of innate skill/ability/talent, drive, luck and the willingness to sacrifice. For a really chilling take, look at Ichiro Suzuki's upbringing (baseball). From a parent's perspective, at least mine, I tried to strike a balance between letting my kids choose their own paths while trying to help avoid closing too many doors. Some kids change A LOT and it would be a shame (to me at least) if they made a short-sighted decision at age 13 that prevented them from doing something later that they might decide they love and are good at. And the reality is, despite the occasional "against all the odds" stories out there where somebody made a late decision to pivot, most of the time the odds win. I also coached youth sports for a number of years and I struggled because one of my kids was a pretty good athlete but not super intense about it and a bit of a late developer. It meant they got selected out because of these things. I could have forced them to practice more, more intensely, etc. It turned OK because they ended up getting cut from a soccer team (twice no less), decided to work stick with it, lucked into a spot on a good team w/ good coaching and ended up as the varsity keeper on their high school team (well, until COVID became a thing). Like it or not, the world is super competitive. As a parent, it's hard when you see something that you know will normally close a door for your child. Many times parents are pushing their kids because they themselves are competitive. Other times, it's just trying to keep options open for your child. From a distance, they're indistinguishable. Finally, the education system is not perfect for all children and situations. It's an XX% solution (pick your number). This didn't sound like a typical ADHD situation. It clearly didn't fit this situation. Ultimately I see it as helping your children position themselves for situations that are right for them. The hard part is that what's right for them is pretty opaque until they're about 20...

bittercynic 5y ago
>Like it or not, the world is super competitive. I think this is a choice, at least partly. If you have the good fortune to have been born in a place where the median income affords reasonable housing and healthy food and medical care, you're kind of set, and can get on with enjoying life and finding fulfilling relationships. As long as you're not hung up on having fancier things/higher status than the next guy.

throwaway14356 5y ago

an applausworthy article.

graycat 5y ago

Generally, I agree with the OP. From my experience, some of the claims seem right on target. There are a lot of claims in the OP, and I can't agree with all of them. I would add: In my experience, there is a small fraction of parents and teachers who really understand all that stuff, avoid the dangers, and do well as parents, teachers, whatever. Then there are the rest of the parents and teachers, and, yes, they can do a LOT of really serious damage -- I've seen too much of it close at hand. I'm an example of avoiding the dangers in the OP: My parents took the attitude that in nearly all things I should not be lectured to, disciplined, etc. and, instead, just left to my own devices. My collection of interests grew, and it's still huge. I pursued my real interests with a lot of effort with good results. In grades 1-8, the teachers talked to each other and agreed that I was a bad student. Yup, no doubt, a bad, poor, slow, not very smart student. Then there were some standardized tests, and, oops, no way saying I wasn't smart. But I was still a bad student. Then I discovered math and science, especially chemistry and physics. I was plenty interested, worked hard, and learned a lot. Some of the math teachers were torqued: I refused to show homework! That's because I found the assigned problems to be too easy and, instead, found the much more difficult supplementary problems in the back of the book and worked ALL of those, made sure I never missed one! But, there were standardized achievement tests, and again I did well and the teachers had just to swallow their belief that I was a bad student. It appears that the Principal of the school understood me and made sure I got some good opportunities -- I was sent to a math tournament and also a summer NSF funded math and physics program. When the SAT scores came back, the teacher who read them to me -- I'd had in the sixth grade, she was fully on board that I was a dumb student -- saw the Math SAT score and got confused, "There must be some mistake." I didn't miss 800 by much -- I'd love to know what the CEEB thought I'd missed. It was the city's premier college prep school and had a lot of traditional good students. So, of #1, #2, #3 on the Math SATs I came second. Poor teacher was confused! In my Ph.D. program, the department Chair was a high discipline, dot i's and cross t's, straight As type of guy. But his research didn't amount to anything. At one point I pursued my interests instead of a course beneath me, and he got really torqued! Ah, to heck with him! From an advanced course, I saw a problem in an old field and asked for a reading course to address it. I already had an idea for a solution -- "Never give a sucker an even break.". Two weeks later I had a nice solution, ready to publish -- later did publish it in JOTA (Journal of Optimization Theory and Applications). Net, doing that research got all the faculty and all the high discipline guys totally OFF my case. The rest of the way through my Ph.D. I had some secret help at least from the Dean and maybe from the President -- the department Chair was soon fired. Net: In my experience, most of all students need to be INTERESTED and, then, given maybe a little very well considered advice but a LOT of freedom. THEN the student will likely work REALLY hard and maybe do some good things. If I have to hire some people, I may reject straight A, Valedictorian, PBK, Summa Cum Laude applicants as people who worked for grades but not really for interests or learning -- someone with strong interests will likely do a LOT better.

11thEarlOfMar 5y ago

"Students benefited from college not because of the education they received, but because of sexy diplomas and tight personal networks." It did make a difference in what institution issued the diploma. But was more about getting a diploma at all. So I'd say I disagree with what this statement implies.

phlipski 5y ago

I generally enjoy reading David Perell's article but he generally frustrates me with his ad-hoc mix of science/research and his personal opinions. Example - he references the 300% increase in college degrees amongst the population since 1970 and the pressure it places upon everyone else to "get a degree" and then turns around and bashes the idea of ADHD medications with ZERO evidence of its supposed dangers: "To their credit, my parents didn’t drug me. I had all the features of a kid who would have binged ADHD medications like shots at a New Year’s party. No matter how badly I acted, my parents never caved into the twisted logic that leads doctors to hand out prescription pills faster than candy on Halloween." Maybe if his parents HAD drugged him he wouldn't have been such a mess in middle school. I find him to generally be thought provoking but his immaturity (and youth) as a human shows through in a lot of his writing at times...

zepto 5y ago
He does say that there hasn’t been time for evidence of the long term dangers to become apparent.
- jtbayly 5y ago
  Like the vaccine?
  - zepto 5y ago
    If the vaccine altered behavior and was taken every day during a decade of rapid brain development, there would be a reasonable basis for comparison.
- wswope 5y ago
  He can say that, but the drugs have been around and extensively studied using every reasonable approach for many decades. Choosing to ignore evidence doesn’t make it not exist - he’s wrong according to a well-established scientific consensus.
  - zepto 5y ago