5 ms·

My children (8, 4) have daily chores, responsibilities, time for free play, time for screen time, and yet they manage to learn musical instruments, read books m

My children (8, 4) have daily chores, responsibilities, time for free play, time for screen time, and yet they manage to learn musical instruments, read books multiple hours a day, their vocabularies, linguistic creativity, and personalities grow in ways not seen in the vast majority of adults I know, and they manage to learn about scientific principles, grammar, math, music, geography, art, culture, engineering at crazy rates, social dynamics, etc. My kids are smart, but they are not so smart that they are marginal outliers. Kids manage to learn in 1 year the amount any demographically comparable adult learns in 10.

rowanG077 4y ago
I would be very surprised if the total time your children are tied up doing chores, responsibilities, free-time etc is even a fraction of the time an adult that has a full-time job and has to manage their household is. The average adult dedicates approximately 0 time to growing as a person. So it's expected that the vast majority of adults don't grow in ways that you see in your children. My point is that I expect under similar situations adults can grow as much as children.
- ryanklee 4y ago
  Most of my own life is dedicated to growth both domestically and in my career. I can tell you that I don't learn even close to the rate my own children do.
  - rowanG077 4y ago
    Then I think it's time to rethink your approach. Maybe it would be good to join a university and get a few more degrees. A career is antithetical to personal growth. A family is antithetical to personal growth. They cost way too much time.
    - ryanklee 4y ago
      That is a very narrow and counterintuitive view of personal growth. What utility function underlies it? Personhood is vast and mysterious. It commonly encompasses engagements with many domains that compete for one's time. Often, the values of these domains are not mappable or comparable. We are all of us tangled by wicked and wild problems, shooting from the hip, in the dark, at moving targets which we aren't even sure exist. Given the complications, I find it very dubious to say that family and career are thieves of time. Much of the profound value of my own time and the core of my growth is driven by taking these parts of my life as seriously as I can.
      - rowanG077 4y ago
        Having a family and having a career are without a shadow of doubt thieves of time from the perspective of personal growth. I'm not saying you won't learn anything by having either. But it's a side effect, nothing more. All the time spend in your career could have been spend learning most musical instruments. All the time spend with your family could have made you a master mathematician. I'm not saying these are worthwhile choices to make. But if you want to maximize personal growth these are choices you should make. The fruit of youth is that you actually are encouraged, and in the position, to maximize personal growth. Of course it's a self full-filling prophecy children actually do grow the most. That doesn't mean children are actually better at it. There are studies that show exactly this for language acquisition. For example: https://core.ac.uk/reader/148309780 https://core.ac.uk/reader/148309780.
        ryanklee 4y ago
        Again, my point is not that children are faster at learning any given thing, but the total volume of learning is much greater. Further, how is it possible for you to evaluate the quality of personal growth independently from all the nonoverlapping magisteria out of which every every life is composed? When you recommend that someone not have a family or a career because they detract from personal growth, it must be because you have some other metric by which personal growth is measured. Unless you have a simple, reductive utility function, I don't see how that's possible. And if you do have a simple reductive utility function, it's very like incorrect.
    - kbelder 4y ago
      A family can fuel personal growth, as can a career. Focusing on growth in isolation will probably retard you. Think of all the most advanced people you know.

rowanG077 4y ago

I would be very surprised if the total time your children are tied up doing chores, responsibilities, free-time etc is even a fraction of the time an adult that has a full-time job and has to manage their household is. The average adult dedicates approximately 0 time to growing as a person. So it's expected that the vast majority of adults don't grow in ways that you see in your children. My point is that I expect under similar situations adults can grow as much as children.

ryanklee 4y ago
Most of my own life is dedicated to growth both domestically and in my career. I can tell you that I don't learn even close to the rate my own children do.
- rowanG077 4y ago
  Then I think it's time to rethink your approach. Maybe it would be good to join a university and get a few more degrees. A career is antithetical to personal growth. A family is antithetical to personal growth. They cost way too much time.
  - ryanklee 4y ago
    That is a very narrow and counterintuitive view of personal growth. What utility function underlies it? Personhood is vast and mysterious. It commonly encompasses engagements with many domains that compete for one's time. Often, the values of these domains are not mappable or comparable. We are all of us tangled by wicked and wild problems, shooting from the hip, in the dark, at moving targets which we aren't even sure exist. Given the complications, I find it very dubious to say that family and career are thieves of time. Much of the profound value of my own time and the core of my growth is driven by taking these parts of my life as seriously as I can.
    - rowanG077 4y ago
      Having a family and having a career are without a shadow of doubt thieves of time from the perspective of personal growth. I'm not saying you won't learn anything by having either. But it's a side effect, nothing more. All the time spend in your career could have been spend learning most musical instruments. All the time spend with your family could have made you a master mathematician. I'm not saying these are worthwhile choices to make. But if you want to maximize personal growth these are choices you should make. The fruit of youth is that you actually are encouraged, and in the position, to maximize personal growth. Of course it's a self full-filling prophecy children actually do grow the most. That doesn't mean children are actually better at it. There are studies that show exactly this for language acquisition. For example: https://core.ac.uk/reader/148309780 https://core.ac.uk/reader/148309780.
      - ryanklee 4y ago
        Again, my point is not that children are faster at learning any given thing, but the total volume of learning is much greater. Further, how is it possible for you to evaluate the quality of personal growth independently from all the nonoverlapping magisteria out of which every every life is composed? When you recommend that someone not have a family or a career because they detract from personal growth, it must be because you have some other metric by which personal growth is measured. Unless you have a simple, reductive utility function, I don't see how that's possible. And if you do have a simple reductive utility function, it's very like incorrect.
  - kbelder 4y ago
    A family can fuel personal growth, as can a career. Focusing on growth in isolation will probably retard you. Think of all the most advanced people you know.