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I don't doubt that the people crafting these proposals care. I think they truly believe they are doing the right thing. I personally think it's just increasingl

I don't doubt that the people crafting these proposals care. I think they truly believe they are doing the right thing. I personally think it's just increasingly popular, mistaken moral beliefs that inform these types of proposals. Some of the underlying beliefs: 1. Blank slate - All humans are of equal ability 2. Any observable differences between humans are merely the result of social factors 3. Any observable differences in outcomes between groups of humans are the result of oppression from the majority group 4. If you observe differences at your org/institution, it's your moral duty to create policies which disfavor groups of humans performing better and to favor groups of humans performing worse, as those performance differences are due to oppression. If these beliefs undergird your worldview, and your social groups/information environment reinforce and reward these beliefs, it is of no surprise that we'll see a lot of people soberly propose the types of policies we see here. I can empathize that they really do think they are fighting the good fight, and are doing the right thing for society.

devindotcom 4y ago
- cool_dude85 4y ago
  No, even Ayn has never claimed to be a psychic, able to penetrate the deepest thoughts of school board members to distill their entire world view down to a bulleted list.
innagadadavida 4y ago
You are leaving out who is involved and what commercial interest will be benefitted from these policies. It is likely those commercial interests are the ones sponsoring and pushing these by finding sympathetic folks. The important thing to note here is- if you reduce the bar in high schools, a lot more students will end up in college - more money will spent, more loans will be written out etc.
- leaflets2 4y ago
  > commercial interest Or political interest? I wrote sth about that here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31176276 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31176276 (Namely, foreign state psyops? -- I do not think so, just a thought)
wonnage 4y ago
1. This is kind of a founding principle of the country, so... 2. This follows from #1, if we rule out nature then it must be nurture. Also, you must not be a parent if you'll accept "some kids are just dumb" as an excuse 3,4. Replace "oppression" with "competition". I think it might sound better to you. But the conclusion is the same. You want to prevent winners from accumulating an advantage, eliminating all others (which sounds vaguely genocidal in this context), then you have to handicap winners and support the others. And the fact that the wealth distribution in America is so uneven certainly suggests that the initial premise is true (i.e, winning allows you to accumulate and compound advantages with repeated victories).
- adamrezich 4y ago
  > 1. [All humans are of equal ability] is a founding principle of the country, so... curious to learn how you arrived at this conclusion?
- tonguez 4y ago
  “ 1. Blank slate - All humans are of equal ability” “ 1. This is kind of a founding principle of the country, so...” yes those slave owning people really thought their slaves were the same as them, totally dude
  - wonnage 4y ago
    Yeah I heard we tried to end the slavery part somewhere along the way and have been somewhat successful, but we definitely kept the first one.
  - CryptoPunk 4y ago
    The founding fathers almost all believed slavery was wrong but they were born into a society where it was a core institution and it wasn't obvious how exactly to reform it. Entitlement principles are why the West was the 1st place in the world to abolish slavery and then went about and abolished it throughout the world.
- mindcrime 4y ago
  1. This is kind of a founding principle of the country, so... Is it? Saying "all mean are created equal" has a lot of interpretations, of which many valid ones do not include "all men are born of equal ability in every regard." Given that some people are born to grow up to be 5'4 and weigh 100lbs and others are born to grow up to 6'7 and 320lbs, it should be clear that not everyone is "equal" at least in terms of their physical abilities. I'm pretty sure the Founders were aware of this, making it highly unlikely that their version of "created equal" meant "exactly equal in all terms of ability."
klodolph 4y ago
I don't think that those beliefs are a workable explanation here. These proposals come from committees and groups of people, and it's just not realistic to write off the entire group of people behind these proposals as having some uniform set of beliefs like that, especially when they give other rationales for the proposals! The current school system makes decisions in middle school (8th grade and earlier) which determine whether or not each particular student will be able to take calculus in high school. This is, simply put, insane. Because it's obviously insane, when you introduce questions of race and class into the mix, then it's easy to apply pressure to the department of education to come up with a proposal that changes things. And then you end up with bad proposals... why? Because these proposals are produced by poorly-shepherded committees full of government employees under political pressure, and it's much easier to come up with a bad proposal that responds to political pressure than it is to come up with a good proposal. There's just no need to try and explain that this proposal is bad because the people who made it have bad beliefs. I'd characterize this as fundamental attribution error here... "the committees made a bad proposal because of wrong beliefs" versus "the committees made bad proposals because it's easier to respond to political pressure than to write a good proposal".
- ravi-delia 4y ago
  I feel like in this case fundamental attribution error would go the other way, no? The explanation you offer is that there aren't circumstantial factors dominating the decision (the beliefs on this particular issue), but a fundamental flaw in how committees work. To be clear, I agree that this is an inevitable result of the decision-making structure, I've just only ever seen fundamental attribution error referring to mistakes in the other direction.
  - klodolph 4y ago
    That's an interesting way of looking at it. I would never describe someone's beliefs as "circumstantial", and I would also never think of being on a committee as something "intrinsic".
    - 4y ago
hintymad 4y ago
I don't understand how these people could consistently ignore facts. Case in point, I could earn way more than Scott Aaronson or had way more social privilege than him, but you'd think I'm crazy if I claim that I can be as good at maths or quantum computing as Aaronson.
- mirceal 4y ago
  it’s not about being better than him. it’s about the theoretical possibility of being better + the virtue signaling that comes with the theoretical possibility
- aaplok 4y ago
  That kind of arguments goes in favour of the CMS. If you assume that only a handful of geniuses can do maths then as a society it makes little sense to allocate resources toward something completely inaccessible to the masses. Designing the education system for Scott Aaronson to the detriment of everybody else would be a mistake socially and economically. That is how these people think, not some nonsense blank slate theory. In reality it's not quantum computing that we're talking about, it's high school calculus and algebra. You don't have to be a hardcore blank slate proponent to believe that most people can learn it. And that is what these people don't believe. It's important to consider the goals of this committee. They propose this reform because they oppose the blank slate theory. The current structure really isn't appropriate to most people. Because it relies on a wrong form of the blank slate theory. They offer the wrong solution in my opinion, because they end up going too far the other way.
  - zozbot234 4y ago
    They're working with a bizarro Blank Slate theory according to which every student should simply be learning their math by themselves, and if they fail it's their own darn fault, or perhaps society's fault, or anyone else's fault, but certainly not the teacher's fault. Because the teachers all have Education degrees, and that's what they were told in Ed School. So don't anyone dare "demean" their job by suggesting that they have actual work to do in properly educating their students.
paulcole 4y ago
> Blank slate - All humans are of equal ability This is generally true. People can find extreme examples that “disprove” this but they’re generally wrong. Most things people do aren’t that hard and people have the ability to learn to do them — they either choose a different path, have fewer choices, or just don’t care. And yes, before you ask, this includes computer programming.
- mirceal 4y ago
  yes and no. the old nature vs nurture + not all people are genetically gifted and a small generic advantage can mean a huge difference in capabilities.
- hintymad 4y ago
  I don't know. Have you observed multiple kids in the same family? Same parents. Same "privilege". Same pressure. Same education down to the same teachers, tutors, books, and parent temperament. And you know what, some of the kids simply beat their siblings who can be years older, in STEM or writing or reading or leadership without even trying. Have you observed your classmates? Some are driven, ambitious, self-disciplined, had access to all the education they needed, and got perfect grades before grade 8 or whatever. Then just one day, he simply couldn't understand maths or physics or chemistry or computer science, and they simply got left behind and couldn't even study STEM in college because they couldn't pass the placement test. In the meantime, their classmates, less privileged, didn't really understand everything taught in elementary school, didn't have nor need tutoring or even challenging text books, simply became the best students at anything STEM in high school and in college, and again, without much trying. Or, do you really think every 2-year old kid can teach their neighbor kids maths and then explained what groups are when he was 7-year old like Terence Tao did? I tried my own kids. Needless to say, I failed, miserably.
  - deathanatos 4y ago
    Me & my sister grew up, like you say, in the same family, same parents, same pressure. We largely went to the same schools, even. She probably acceled further, academically, than I did. (She probably went to the more prestigious college, her GPA/SAT/etc. were better, she earned a doctorate, while I got a BS…) Without pointing to a vague notion of "we're different people", I think there's a few key things that were different, despite everything that was the same: * She's the second child, I'm the first: there were some things in my education that my mother literally said "we are fixing that for her". (And I should note that I don't resent this: my mother was clearly doing the best she could with the information she had — and because she loved us. But she had more information during Round 2.) * Education is a finite resource: in my home state, whether I got into a decent school (i.e., a magnet school) was dependent on the literal roll of a dice. (Literally literally. I.e., list of names goes in, gets shuffled, top n go to good school & gets educated, bottom m talent gets wasted.) In the worst case I was 5th? 6th? from the bottom of a several hundred person long wait list. She got in. She got a year in the magnet system that I didn't (I got entry a little over a year later). That missing year was an enormous detriment to my education and growth; it was such a clear detriment my parents were contemplating whether they could afford a Catholic private school (we're not Catholic) or simple home-schooling. Had they had the gift of clairvoyance, I think they would have the moment I was denied. * Almost certainly the gift of a computer got me interested in CS. She didn't get one, and her interests are different. (She's still STEM, likely due to our parents.)
pfisherman 4y ago
I never understood why people try to make “blank slate” into a binary thing. Can people not have varying degrees of physical and neural plasticity? Perhaps some people are more like blank slates and can adapt more readily than others? Maybe plasticity changes with age?
- dionidium 4y ago
  There's almost no opponent of the blank slate theory who thinks societal factors never matter. There's only one side that takes a hard-line dogmatic view on this issue and it's the blank slatists.
  - ghostInTheSSH 4y ago
    Blank slatists?
- jollybean 4y ago
  Of course they do. Even if someone actually believed in some 'hard' type of ideology, they might not act that way. It's just a 'general set of principles', intuitions, pop culture ideals that lead a large group of people to assumptive believe that 'unequal outcomes are driven mostly by systematic racism' and that's that. Ergo 'the world is deeply racist' and 'there is racism around every corner' including in your math textbooks and teaching. Ad nauseum. Some of it is actually correct. Some of it is reasonable from an intellectual perspective, but it's hard to take anything from it. Much of it just ends up being toxic.
temp8964 4y ago
I don't think it has to be related to any point you put in here. I think when STEM people comment on math education, they easily forget K-12 math education is for all students, not future college STEM students. Lots of controversies in math education between STEM professors (especially mathematicians) and K-12 math educators/researchers are rooted in this. In the community of math and science education, we educators/researchers always focus on average students who will grow into future citizens, not STEM workers. This is really a different mindset to STEM professors.
- zmgsabst 4y ago
  That logic isn’t used in any other discipline: “We only cover bad art — we don’t focus on students who go on to be professional artists.” “We only focus on bad English — we don’t focus on students who go on to be professional writers.” “We only focus on bad history - we don’t focus on students who go on to study history or social science.” Each of those has an AP and IB track, competitions to find elites, etc — just as mathematics should for high performers. If as an educator, you only teach to the lowest common denominator, then you’re failing the children you’re supposed to educate. To me, your post reads as if you’re bragging about failing at your job.
  - temp8964 4y ago
    Students do learn art in K-12, but they could be considered as "bad art" by professional artists...
    - zmgsabst 4y ago
      No — you should fact check that. Middle and high schools start auditioning and training students into “advanced” art, preparing them to go onto competitions and onto serious careers in programs differentiated from the casual art classes. Learning calculus won’t be enough as a professional in STEM either — but AP Calculus is the equivalent of audition-only advanced art classes. (Which exist all over.)
      - 4y ago
deleted 4y ago
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bjt2n3904 4y ago
It feels so good seeing this utterly ridiculously ideology so thoroughly debunked, and rightfully attributed for the destructive attacks on education. I've run into it so often by a vocal minority who slander anyone who objects. Fortunately, the popularity is waning.
dragonwriter 4y ago
> Blank slate - All humans are of equal ability Not only does the earlier version of the framework explicitly reject this view, it cited specific empirical studies that the broad approach targeted (which I gather had not changed in the revisions which is why the complaints remain despite some revision to details) was better for people across the ability spectrum. Similar points apply to each of your bad-faith assumptions about the underlying beliefs.
- FFRefresh 4y ago
  > Not only does the earlier version of the framework explicitly reject this view Can you share that explicit rejection of the idea that there are not innate differences in ability, in the CMF? I have not seen it myself, thank you ahead of time. To share what I've read, and colors my views a bit, is the following, from 'Chapter 1: Mathematics for All' of the Second Field Review [1]: > An aim of this framework is to respond to the structural barriers put in the place of mathematics success: equity influences all aspects of this document. Some overarching principles that guide work towards equity in mathematics include the following: > All students deserve powerful mathematics; high-level mathematics achievement is not dependent on rare natural gifts, but rather can be cultivated (Leslie et al., 2015; Boaler, 2019 a, b; Ellenberg, 2014). ... > All students, regardless of background, language of origin, differences, or foundational knowledge are capable and deserving of depth of understanding and engagement in rich mathematics tasks. > Hard work and persistence is more important for success in mathematics than natural ability. Actually, I would give this advice to anyone working in any field, but it’s especially important in mathematics and physics where the traditional view was that natural ability was the primary factor in success. —Maria Klawe, Mathematician, Harvey Mudd President (in Williams, 2018) > Fixed notions about student ability have led to considerable inequities in mathematics education. Note that my pointing to this doesn't mean I inherently disagree that hard work/education can't help improve outcomes. I show the above citations to show that the CMF is not explicitly denying the Blank slate theory, which is what you are suggesting. If anything, they go out of the way to view ideas of innate ability negatively. I'm happy to also look at the references that you alluded to but did not cite. [1] https://www.cde.ca.gov/ci/ma/cf/ https://www.cde.ca.gov/ci/ma/cf/ (it's in the bottom section, the format is .docx, so don't want to directly link to it as that format can sometimes be cause for concern on random links shared on the internet)
majormajor 4y ago
It's hard for me to square your claim that there's a dominant belief that all humans are blank slates of equal ability with the sheer volume of messaging I see in both government-sponsored and private media about embracing differences, follow your own goals, find your talent, etc. I see a lot more stuff that would lead a kid to believe "it's ok that I'm not good in math" rather than "I could be good in math if I wanted to be." Frankly, I think this is actually worse educationally than what you suggest. We need to find more ways to reward effort instead of pre-existing ability (regardless of how that pre-existing ability is gained... the kid whose parents got him ahead of the curve through high school math and then bombs out after taking university-level Calculus is similarly harmed by the current system as the one who's shunted away from ever being challenged).
majormajor 4y ago
Do you disagree with the following re-formulations: Some observable differences are due to social factors. Some observable differences by certain groups are the result of past actions by other groups. You should favor policies to correct for the result of past harms. One cannot reasonably claim that no groups in the US are still disadvantaged today due to actions taken on a centuries-long timescale. It seems willfully unfair to stick your fingers in your ears and just say "I'm not actively discriminatory, so there's no need to try to mitigate things, everything is peachy."
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- klabb3 4y ago
  Not parent, but I agree with them. > Some observable differences are due to social factors. > Some observable differences by certain groups are the result of past actions by other groups. Agreed with this as well. > You should favor policies to correct for the result of past harms. Mostly disagree. I'm wholly convinced there's never going to be even remote consensus about ancestral oppression and victimhood. I think that if you want to correct harms, you should focus on the current social issues. Not only do I think that has much less shitty side effects (such as exacerbating group identity), but I also think it will be more effective at reaching those that have been mistreated in the past - both directly and their ancestors. The US in particular has, let's say, a decent amount of low-hanging fruit in terms of social issues to address (homelessness, lack of preventative health care, incarceration for victimless crimes etc etc). > there's no need to try to mitigate things, everything is peachy This is not the only option. You can recognize that things are fucked but have a vastly different opinion on how to improve.
cryptonector 4y ago
> I think they truly believe they are doing the right thing. The alternative would be awful, no?
- alach11 4y ago
  There are lots of people who advance agendas (whether in the office or in the government) that they think are best for their careers. Whether they believe the agenda is right or wrong is secondary.
  - leaflets2 4y ago
    Edit: moving.... Moved to here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31176346 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31176346
- leaflets2 4y ago
  I've sometimes wondered if these anti maths things, could partly be psyops by a foreign nation state that wants to long term damage STEM in the US. I really don't think it is. And if it was, it'd be only partly, since apparently lots of this is coming from people inside the US. But what if there're foreign state controlled FB groups that try to manipulate people in the US, spreading these anti maths ideas? I'd be surprised but not super surprised. Still, if you were Putin or Xi, why would you not want to damage STEM in the US? And even if you didn't start these ideas in the first place, why not try to amplify them, once they already exist
  - StopDarkPattern 4y ago
    It hugely is, and everyone in the most peaceful, free, and prosperous time is being 100x tricked, duped, and screwed out of realizing what they already have.
StopDarkPattern 4y ago
And this is dog shit trash. Meant to destroy our freedom and statehood in general.
- leaflets2 4y ago
  > Meant to destroy I wrote sth along those lines here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31176276 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31176276 (Foreign state psyops -- I do not think so, just a thought)
alsetmusic 4y ago
> 4. If you observe differences at your org/institution, it's your moral duty to create policies which disfavor groups of humans performing better and to favor groups of humans performing worse, as those performance differences are due to oppression. I don’t know anyone who seems to disadvantage high-achieving individuals. Only people who wish to raise the performance of as many as possible to the same level. And yes, I see oppression everywhere, including education. It would be a net loss to society to deliberately reduce the performance of anyone.
Siira 4y ago
The assumptions above should result in ensuring educational resources are available for people who are struggling. They should also show people in which careers calculus is useful, to motivate people. Making calculus mandatory for everyone might also help on the margin, though this bears empirical investigation. This is laziness of the moral clowns who know the easiest way to remove a difference in success is to eliminate the successful. As they don’t care about anything but the theatrical performance, they naturally take this route of least resistance.
random314 4y ago
You are simply attacking a strawman. Absolutely no one I have met believes 1 and 2. As for 3, "average observable differences" in mental ability can largely be explained by socio economic factors. Case in point, East Asian IQs stagnated behind US IQ averages 50 years ago, but are significantly ahead now. I dont think they underwent a general transformation in 50 years time. 4. Is again a strawman. Affirmative action is used for a limited number of historically discriminated populations in very limited contexts. If you are interested in an actual debate don't invent a caricature of the opposing position.
- FFRefresh 4y ago
  > Absolutely no one I have met believes 1 and 2 Admittedly I am a little confused by your comment. You made the above statement, and then follow up with this statement: > As for 3, "average observable differences" in mental ability can largely be explained by socio economic factors If we are to assume you are being earnest here in your first statement in that you believe there ARE innate ability differences between humans and social factors don’t explain everything, can you explain how much innate ability differences are a factor in intelligence differences (using it since you brought it up)? And how do you determine it? What methodology are you using for that, and if you aren’t basing it on anything, what methodology should we use? If you are going to dodge the question and suggest you were talking about averages between groups (for which the question does still apply) and that between groups are a special case, then please share how much of a factor innate ability differences are in intelligence within groups? And how you determined that?
  - random314 4y ago
    Before I start, you really need to watch your tone and not pretend that you are a hunter on a hunt about to kill a nasty prey. My responses are clear, comprehensible and from your reply it is clear that you understood all of my points perfectly well, yet chose to use phrases like 1. If we are to assume you are being earnest 2. If you are going to dodge the question etc. I am a statistician and all of your questions have banal answers. For individual differences you can plot the bell curve and the standard deviation gives you the individual variances. I was clearly talking about population averages in 3. > can you explain how much innate ability differences are a factor in intelligence differences (using it since you brought it up)? And how do you determine it? AFAIK remember, heritable IQ/ height is estimated to be a bigger factor at an individual level. However, there is no existing causal methodology to determine it. Instead we have correlational regression models that make a lot of strong assumptions that are practical. There are various papers but it is clear that IQ is highly heritable like human height. Also, I am going to replace "innate" ability with "inherited" ability because there is no methodology that can tell you how much of Roger Federer's tennis ability is "innate" and how much is "coached". > talking about averages between groups Your wording is ambiguous. But assuming you are talking about intergroup differences. When you sum up IQ or height within a group, the observation from regression models is that individual hereditary differences cancel out, and intergroup height and iq differences are easily explained by socio economic factors in a correlational regression model and heritable height/iq is an insignificant factor. Once again- this is not a causal model. Only correlational. And this is just common sense. We know from life experiences that different people have differing IQs and heights from an early age. We are also aware of how important it is to have a school system - instead of just letting the kids figure things out on their own. The environment matters because we do have to work to nurture the inherent talents of a kid, otherwise that potential will be lost. > please share how much of a factor innate ability differences are in intelligence within groups? I expect the per sample standard deviation to be the same across different ethnic groups. For inherited "ability" i expect the total variance explained by "inheritance" factor to be the same across ethnic groups. I doubt if such an analysis has been conducted, because I don't see the value in this kind of subgroup analysis. Do you have any references to such studies? Have you seen data that contradicts this?

devindotcom 4y ago

cool_dude85 4y ago
No, even Ayn has never claimed to be a psychic, able to penetrate the deepest thoughts of school board members to distill their entire world view down to a bulleted list.

innagadadavida 4y ago

You are leaving out who is involved and what commercial interest will be benefitted from these policies. It is likely those commercial interests are the ones sponsoring and pushing these by finding sympathetic folks. The important thing to note here is- if you reduce the bar in high schools, a lot more students will end up in college - more money will spent, more loans will be written out etc.

leaflets2 4y ago
> commercial interest Or political interest? I wrote sth about that here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31176276 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31176276 (Namely, foreign state psyops? -- I do not think so, just a thought)

wonnage 4y ago

1. This is kind of a founding principle of the country, so... 2. This follows from #1, if we rule out nature then it must be nurture. Also, you must not be a parent if you'll accept "some kids are just dumb" as an excuse 3,4. Replace "oppression" with "competition". I think it might sound better to you. But the conclusion is the same. You want to prevent winners from accumulating an advantage, eliminating all others (which sounds vaguely genocidal in this context), then you have to handicap winners and support the others. And the fact that the wealth distribution in America is so uneven certainly suggests that the initial premise is true (i.e, winning allows you to accumulate and compound advantages with repeated victories).

adamrezich 4y ago
> 1. [All humans are of equal ability] is a founding principle of the country, so... curious to learn how you arrived at this conclusion?
tonguez 4y ago
“ 1. Blank slate - All humans are of equal ability” “ 1. This is kind of a founding principle of the country, so...” yes those slave owning people really thought their slaves were the same as them, totally dude
- wonnage 4y ago
  Yeah I heard we tried to end the slavery part somewhere along the way and have been somewhat successful, but we definitely kept the first one.
- CryptoPunk 4y ago
  The founding fathers almost all believed slavery was wrong but they were born into a society where it was a core institution and it wasn't obvious how exactly to reform it. Entitlement principles are why the West was the 1st place in the world to abolish slavery and then went about and abolished it throughout the world.
mindcrime 4y ago
1. This is kind of a founding principle of the country, so... Is it? Saying "all mean are created equal" has a lot of interpretations, of which many valid ones do not include "all men are born of equal ability in every regard." Given that some people are born to grow up to be 5'4 and weigh 100lbs and others are born to grow up to 6'7 and 320lbs, it should be clear that not everyone is "equal" at least in terms of their physical abilities. I'm pretty sure the Founders were aware of this, making it highly unlikely that their version of "created equal" meant "exactly equal in all terms of ability."

klodolph 4y ago

I don't think that those beliefs are a workable explanation here. These proposals come from committees and groups of people, and it's just not realistic to write off the entire group of people behind these proposals as having some uniform set of beliefs like that, especially when they give other rationales for the proposals! The current school system makes decisions in middle school (8th grade and earlier) which determine whether or not each particular student will be able to take calculus in high school. This is, simply put, insane. Because it's obviously insane, when you introduce questions of race and class into the mix, then it's easy to apply pressure to the department of education to come up with a proposal that changes things. And then you end up with bad proposals... why? Because these proposals are produced by poorly-shepherded committees full of government employees under political pressure, and it's much easier to come up with a bad proposal that responds to political pressure than it is to come up with a good proposal. There's just no need to try and explain that this proposal is bad because the people who made it have bad beliefs. I'd characterize this as fundamental attribution error here... "the committees made a bad proposal because of wrong beliefs" versus "the committees made bad proposals because it's easier to respond to political pressure than to write a good proposal".

ravi-delia 4y ago
I feel like in this case fundamental attribution error would go the other way, no? The explanation you offer is that there aren't circumstantial factors dominating the decision (the beliefs on this particular issue), but a fundamental flaw in how committees work. To be clear, I agree that this is an inevitable result of the decision-making structure, I've just only ever seen fundamental attribution error referring to mistakes in the other direction.
- klodolph 4y ago
  That's an interesting way of looking at it. I would never describe someone's beliefs as "circumstantial", and I would also never think of being on a committee as something "intrinsic".
  - 4y ago

hintymad 4y ago

I don't understand how these people could consistently ignore facts. Case in point, I could earn way more than Scott Aaronson or had way more social privilege than him, but you'd think I'm crazy if I claim that I can be as good at maths or quantum computing as Aaronson.

mirceal 4y ago
it’s not about being better than him. it’s about the theoretical possibility of being better + the virtue signaling that comes with the theoretical possibility
aaplok 4y ago
That kind of arguments goes in favour of the CMS. If you assume that only a handful of geniuses can do maths then as a society it makes little sense to allocate resources toward something completely inaccessible to the masses. Designing the education system for Scott Aaronson to the detriment of everybody else would be a mistake socially and economically. That is how these people think, not some nonsense blank slate theory. In reality it's not quantum computing that we're talking about, it's high school calculus and algebra. You don't have to be a hardcore blank slate proponent to believe that most people can learn it. And that is what these people don't believe. It's important to consider the goals of this committee. They propose this reform because they oppose the blank slate theory. The current structure really isn't appropriate to most people. Because it relies on a wrong form of the blank slate theory. They offer the wrong solution in my opinion, because they end up going too far the other way.
- zozbot234 4y ago
  They're working with a bizarro Blank Slate theory according to which every student should simply be learning their math by themselves, and if they fail it's their own darn fault, or perhaps society's fault, or anyone else's fault, but certainly not the teacher's fault. Because the teachers all have Education degrees, and that's what they were told in Ed School. So don't anyone dare "demean" their job by suggesting that they have actual work to do in properly educating their students.

paulcole 4y ago

> Blank slate - All humans are of equal ability This is generally true. People can find extreme examples that “disprove” this but they’re generally wrong. Most things people do aren’t that hard and people have the ability to learn to do them — they either choose a different path, have fewer choices, or just don’t care. And yes, before you ask, this includes computer programming.

mirceal 4y ago
yes and no. the old nature vs nurture + not all people are genetically gifted and a small generic advantage can mean a huge difference in capabilities.
hintymad 4y ago
I don't know. Have you observed multiple kids in the same family? Same parents. Same "privilege". Same pressure. Same education down to the same teachers, tutors, books, and parent temperament. And you know what, some of the kids simply beat their siblings who can be years older, in STEM or writing or reading or leadership without even trying. Have you observed your classmates? Some are driven, ambitious, self-disciplined, had access to all the education they needed, and got perfect grades before grade 8 or whatever. Then just one day, he simply couldn't understand maths or physics or chemistry or computer science, and they simply got left behind and couldn't even study STEM in college because they couldn't pass the placement test. In the meantime, their classmates, less privileged, didn't really understand everything taught in elementary school, didn't have nor need tutoring or even challenging text books, simply became the best students at anything STEM in high school and in college, and again, without much trying. Or, do you really think every 2-year old kid can teach their neighbor kids maths and then explained what groups are when he was 7-year old like Terence Tao did? I tried my own kids. Needless to say, I failed, miserably.
- deathanatos 4y ago
  Me & my sister grew up, like you say, in the same family, same parents, same pressure. We largely went to the same schools, even. She probably acceled further, academically, than I did. (She probably went to the more prestigious college, her GPA/SAT/etc. were better, she earned a doctorate, while I got a BS…) Without pointing to a vague notion of "we're different people", I think there's a few key things that were different, despite everything that was the same: * She's the second child, I'm the first: there were some things in my education that my mother literally said "we are fixing that for her". (And I should note that I don't resent this: my mother was clearly doing the best she could with the information she had — and because she loved us. But she had more information during Round 2.) * Education is a finite resource: in my home state, whether I got into a decent school (i.e., a magnet school) was dependent on the literal roll of a dice. (Literally literally. I.e., list of names goes in, gets shuffled, top n go to good school & gets educated, bottom m talent gets wasted.) In the worst case I was 5th? 6th? from the bottom of a several hundred person long wait list. She got in. She got a year in the magnet system that I didn't (I got entry a little over a year later). That missing year was an enormous detriment to my education and growth; it was such a clear detriment my parents were contemplating whether they could afford a Catholic private school (we're not Catholic) or simple home-schooling. Had they had the gift of clairvoyance, I think they would have the moment I was denied. * Almost certainly the gift of a computer got me interested in CS. She didn't get one, and her interests are different. (She's still STEM, likely due to our parents.)

pfisherman 4y ago

I never understood why people try to make “blank slate” into a binary thing. Can people not have varying degrees of physical and neural plasticity? Perhaps some people are more like blank slates and can adapt more readily than others? Maybe plasticity changes with age?

dionidium 4y ago
There's almost no opponent of the blank slate theory who thinks societal factors never matter. There's only one side that takes a hard-line dogmatic view on this issue and it's the blank slatists.
- ghostInTheSSH 4y ago
  Blank slatists?
jollybean 4y ago
Of course they do. Even if someone actually believed in some 'hard' type of ideology, they might not act that way. It's just a 'general set of principles', intuitions, pop culture ideals that lead a large group of people to assumptive believe that 'unequal outcomes are driven mostly by systematic racism' and that's that. Ergo 'the world is deeply racist' and 'there is racism around every corner' including in your math textbooks and teaching. Ad nauseum. Some of it is actually correct. Some of it is reasonable from an intellectual perspective, but it's hard to take anything from it. Much of it just ends up being toxic.

temp8964 4y ago

I don't think it has to be related to any point you put in here. I think when STEM people comment on math education, they easily forget K-12 math education is for all students, not future college STEM students. Lots of controversies in math education between STEM professors (especially mathematicians) and K-12 math educators/researchers are rooted in this. In the community of math and science education, we educators/researchers always focus on average students who will grow into future citizens, not STEM workers. This is really a different mindset to STEM professors.

zmgsabst 4y ago
That logic isn’t used in any other discipline: “We only cover bad art — we don’t focus on students who go on to be professional artists.” “We only focus on bad English — we don’t focus on students who go on to be professional writers.” “We only focus on bad history - we don’t focus on students who go on to study history or social science.” Each of those has an AP and IB track, competitions to find elites, etc — just as mathematics should for high performers. If as an educator, you only teach to the lowest common denominator, then you’re failing the children you’re supposed to educate. To me, your post reads as if you’re bragging about failing at your job.
- temp8964 4y ago
  Students do learn art in K-12, but they could be considered as "bad art" by professional artists...
  - zmgsabst 4y ago
    No — you should fact check that. Middle and high schools start auditioning and training students into “advanced” art, preparing them to go onto competitions and onto serious careers in programs differentiated from the casual art classes. Learning calculus won’t be enough as a professional in STEM either — but AP Calculus is the equivalent of audition-only advanced art classes. (Which exist all over.)
    - 4y ago

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bjt2n3904 4y ago

It feels so good seeing this utterly ridiculously ideology so thoroughly debunked, and rightfully attributed for the destructive attacks on education. I've run into it so often by a vocal minority who slander anyone who objects. Fortunately, the popularity is waning.

dragonwriter 4y ago

> Blank slate - All humans are of equal ability Not only does the earlier version of the framework explicitly reject this view, it cited specific empirical studies that the broad approach targeted (which I gather had not changed in the revisions which is why the complaints remain despite some revision to details) was better for people across the ability spectrum. Similar points apply to each of your bad-faith assumptions about the underlying beliefs.

FFRefresh 4y ago
> Not only does the earlier version of the framework explicitly reject this view Can you share that explicit rejection of the idea that there are not innate differences in ability, in the CMF? I have not seen it myself, thank you ahead of time. To share what I've read, and colors my views a bit, is the following, from 'Chapter 1: Mathematics for All' of the Second Field Review [1]: > An aim of this framework is to respond to the structural barriers put in the place of mathematics success: equity influences all aspects of this document. Some overarching principles that guide work towards equity in mathematics include the following: > All students deserve powerful mathematics; high-level mathematics achievement is not dependent on rare natural gifts, but rather can be cultivated (Leslie et al., 2015; Boaler, 2019 a, b; Ellenberg, 2014). ... > All students, regardless of background, language of origin, differences, or foundational knowledge are capable and deserving of depth of understanding and engagement in rich mathematics tasks. > Hard work and persistence is more important for success in mathematics than natural ability. Actually, I would give this advice to anyone working in any field, but it’s especially important in mathematics and physics where the traditional view was that natural ability was the primary factor in success. —Maria Klawe, Mathematician, Harvey Mudd President (in Williams, 2018) > Fixed notions about student ability have led to considerable inequities in mathematics education. Note that my pointing to this doesn't mean I inherently disagree that hard work/education can't help improve outcomes. I show the above citations to show that the CMF is not explicitly denying the Blank slate theory, which is what you are suggesting. If anything, they go out of the way to view ideas of innate ability negatively. I'm happy to also look at the references that you alluded to but did not cite. [1] https://www.cde.ca.gov/ci/ma/cf/ https://www.cde.ca.gov/ci/ma/cf/ (it's in the bottom section, the format is .docx, so don't want to directly link to it as that format can sometimes be cause for concern on random links shared on the internet)

majormajor 4y ago

It's hard for me to square your claim that there's a dominant belief that all humans are blank slates of equal ability with the sheer volume of messaging I see in both government-sponsored and private media about embracing differences, follow your own goals, find your talent, etc. I see a lot more stuff that would lead a kid to believe "it's ok that I'm not good in math" rather than "I could be good in math if I wanted to be." Frankly, I think this is actually worse educationally than what you suggest. We need to find more ways to reward effort instead of pre-existing ability (regardless of how that pre-existing ability is gained... the kid whose parents got him ahead of the curve through high school math and then bombs out after taking university-level Calculus is similarly harmed by the current system as the one who's shunted away from ever being challenged).

majormajor 4y ago

Do you disagree with the following re-formulations: Some observable differences are due to social factors. Some observable differences by certain groups are the result of past actions by other groups. You should favor policies to correct for the result of past harms. One cannot reasonably claim that no groups in the US are still disadvantaged today due to actions taken on a centuries-long timescale. It seems willfully unfair to stick your fingers in your ears and just say "I'm not actively discriminatory, so there's no need to try to mitigate things, everything is peachy."

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klabb3 4y ago
Not parent, but I agree with them. > Some observable differences are due to social factors. > Some observable differences by certain groups are the result of past actions by other groups. Agreed with this as well. > You should favor policies to correct for the result of past harms. Mostly disagree. I'm wholly convinced there's never going to be even remote consensus about ancestral oppression and victimhood. I think that if you want to correct harms, you should focus on the current social issues. Not only do I think that has much less shitty side effects (such as exacerbating group identity), but I also think it will be more effective at reaching those that have been mistreated in the past - both directly and their ancestors. The US in particular has, let's say, a decent amount of low-hanging fruit in terms of social issues to address (homelessness, lack of preventative health care, incarceration for victimless crimes etc etc). > there's no need to try to mitigate things, everything is peachy This is not the only option. You can recognize that things are fucked but have a vastly different opinion on how to improve.

cryptonector 4y ago

> I think they truly believe they are doing the right thing. The alternative would be awful, no?

alach11 4y ago
There are lots of people who advance agendas (whether in the office or in the government) that they think are best for their careers. Whether they believe the agenda is right or wrong is secondary.
- leaflets2 4y ago
  Edit: moving.... Moved to here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31176346 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31176346
leaflets2 4y ago
I've sometimes wondered if these anti maths things, could partly be psyops by a foreign nation state that wants to long term damage STEM in the US. I really don't think it is. And if it was, it'd be only partly, since apparently lots of this is coming from people inside the US. But what if there're foreign state controlled FB groups that try to manipulate people in the US, spreading these anti maths ideas? I'd be surprised but not super surprised. Still, if you were Putin or Xi, why would you not want to damage STEM in the US? And even if you didn't start these ideas in the first place, why not try to amplify them, once they already exist
- StopDarkPattern 4y ago
  It hugely is, and everyone in the most peaceful, free, and prosperous time is being 100x tricked, duped, and screwed out of realizing what they already have.

StopDarkPattern 4y ago

And this is dog shit trash. Meant to destroy our freedom and statehood in general.

leaflets2 4y ago
> Meant to destroy I wrote sth along those lines here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31176276 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31176276 (Foreign state psyops -- I do not think so, just a thought)

alsetmusic 4y ago

> 4. If you observe differences at your org/institution, it's your moral duty to create policies which disfavor groups of humans performing better and to favor groups of humans performing worse, as those performance differences are due to oppression. I don’t know anyone who seems to disadvantage high-achieving individuals. Only people who wish to raise the performance of as many as possible to the same level. And yes, I see oppression everywhere, including education. It would be a net loss to society to deliberately reduce the performance of anyone.

Siira 4y ago

The assumptions above should result in ensuring educational resources are available for people who are struggling. They should also show people in which careers calculus is useful, to motivate people. Making calculus mandatory for everyone might also help on the margin, though this bears empirical investigation. This is laziness of the moral clowns who know the easiest way to remove a difference in success is to eliminate the successful. As they don’t care about anything but the theatrical performance, they naturally take this route of least resistance.

random314 4y ago

You are simply attacking a strawman. Absolutely no one I have met believes 1 and 2. As for 3, "average observable differences" in mental ability can largely be explained by socio economic factors. Case in point, East Asian IQs stagnated behind US IQ averages 50 years ago, but are significantly ahead now. I dont think they underwent a general transformation in 50 years time. 4. Is again a strawman. Affirmative action is used for a limited number of historically discriminated populations in very limited contexts. If you are interested in an actual debate don't invent a caricature of the opposing position.

FFRefresh 4y ago
> Absolutely no one I have met believes 1 and 2 Admittedly I am a little confused by your comment. You made the above statement, and then follow up with this statement: > As for 3, "average observable differences" in mental ability can largely be explained by socio economic factors If we are to assume you are being earnest here in your first statement in that you believe there ARE innate ability differences between humans and social factors don’t explain everything, can you explain how much innate ability differences are a factor in intelligence differences (using it since you brought it up)? And how do you determine it? What methodology are you using for that, and if you aren’t basing it on anything, what methodology should we use? If you are going to dodge the question and suggest you were talking about averages between groups (for which the question does still apply) and that between groups are a special case, then please share how much of a factor innate ability differences are in intelligence within groups? And how you determined that?
- random314 4y ago
  Before I start, you really need to watch your tone and not pretend that you are a hunter on a hunt about to kill a nasty prey. My responses are clear, comprehensible and from your reply it is clear that you understood all of my points perfectly well, yet chose to use phrases like 1. If we are to assume you are being earnest 2. If you are going to dodge the question etc. I am a statistician and all of your questions have banal answers. For individual differences you can plot the bell curve and the standard deviation gives you the individual variances. I was clearly talking about population averages in 3. > can you explain how much innate ability differences are a factor in intelligence differences (using it since you brought it up)? And how do you determine it? AFAIK remember, heritable IQ/ height is estimated to be a bigger factor at an individual level. However, there is no existing causal methodology to determine it. Instead we have correlational regression models that make a lot of strong assumptions that are practical. There are various papers but it is clear that IQ is highly heritable like human height. Also, I am going to replace "innate" ability with "inherited" ability because there is no methodology that can tell you how much of Roger Federer's tennis ability is "innate" and how much is "coached". > talking about averages between groups Your wording is ambiguous. But assuming you are talking about intergroup differences. When you sum up IQ or height within a group, the observation from regression models is that individual hereditary differences cancel out, and intergroup height and iq differences are easily explained by socio economic factors in a correlational regression model and heritable height/iq is an insignificant factor. Once again- this is not a causal model. Only correlational. And this is just common sense. We know from life experiences that different people have differing IQs and heights from an early age. We are also aware of how important it is to have a school system - instead of just letting the kids figure things out on their own. The environment matters because we do have to work to nurture the inherent talents of a kid, otherwise that potential will be lost. > please share how much of a factor innate ability differences are in intelligence within groups? I expect the per sample standard deviation to be the same across different ethnic groups. For inherited "ability" i expect the total variance explained by "inheritance" factor to be the same across ethnic groups. I doubt if such an analysis has been conducted, because I don't see the value in this kind of subgroup analysis. Do you have any references to such studies? Have you seen data that contradicts this?