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The presentation argues that the adverse experiences cited are outside the individual's control, some of them are and they can have negative effects, i agree, l

The presentation argues that the adverse experiences cited are outside the individual's control, some of them are and they can have negative effects, i agree, like gun violence or uninterested parents, but others are questionable, like suspensions or being held back in school, which is (in most part) derived directly from the individual's actions. Since the margins in some of the statistics are so small i wonder how would they look with the adverse experiences ignoring this 2 points. For me it is obvious that a person who was held back in school and received suspensions will be less likely to be well off when they are older.

thfuran 2y ago
>derived directly from the individual's actions. Are you saying that a person's actions aren't influenced by their environment?
- concordDance 2y ago
  Assuming a materialistic (non-spiritual) world this statement seems a bit vacuous as we are all the direct products of our environment (including womb environment, genes, nutrition, culture, etc).
- naasking 2y ago
  Of course they are, but putting the locus of control on external factors disempowers people. "These people didn't do as well as they could have due to poor impulse control" is a better explanation/reason than "these people have poor impulse control because of the environment in which they were raised"; the environment is not the cause of the poor outcomes, the poor impulse control is the cause, and pointing out the cause shows a path to correcting the issue.
  - thfuran 2y ago
    >the environment is not the cause of the poor outcomes It's not the proximate cause, but that doesn't mean it is in no way causative. >and pointing out the cause shows a path to correcting the issue Yes, it can often be most efficient to address root causes.
    - naasking 2y ago
      Yes, it's causative in the same sense that the formation of our solar system eventually caused me to write this reply. And I agree that it's typically most efficient to address root causes, but there's a sleight of hand going on here. Note how your post correctly pointed out that environment influences a person's actions where I said poor impulse control causes poor outcomes. There are causal factors in both cases, but clearly there is a clear and direct causal link in the latter and a diffuse set of uncertain possible causes in the former. I would not call environment a root cause in this case unless you can actually narrow down the specific source that causes poor impulse control (some of it is genetic and thus ineliminable).
      - thfuran 2y ago
        >it's causative in the same sense that the formation of our solar system eventually caused me to write this reply. More like in the sense that smoking causes cancer.
- fregonics 2y ago
  The person is indeed influenced by their environment, but the "adverse experiences" should factor in just that, environmental influences, not actions from the individuals. I think environment influences can increase the likelihood of those adverse experiences, contact with violent behavior for instance can make a person more likely to be suspended, but a person may have been brought up in a normal family and still be violent and be suspended (i got to know such cases, and they're more common than you imagine), and even a person that had contact with this kind of situation may think that they do not want that for their life and use this as a motivator (also have seen such cases). But the adverse experiences should focus not on the results, but the causes. What factors are we able to quantify that made this student be held back (uninterested parents? a personality disorder? ...) and how big is the influence of each of them in a person's destiny. Only looking at them we will be able to really learn something meaningful from what happened.

thfuran 2y ago

>derived directly from the individual's actions. Are you saying that a person's actions aren't influenced by their environment?

concordDance 2y ago
Assuming a materialistic (non-spiritual) world this statement seems a bit vacuous as we are all the direct products of our environment (including womb environment, genes, nutrition, culture, etc).
naasking 2y ago
Of course they are, but putting the locus of control on external factors disempowers people. "These people didn't do as well as they could have due to poor impulse control" is a better explanation/reason than "these people have poor impulse control because of the environment in which they were raised"; the environment is not the cause of the poor outcomes, the poor impulse control is the cause, and pointing out the cause shows a path to correcting the issue.
- thfuran 2y ago
  >the environment is not the cause of the poor outcomes It's not the proximate cause, but that doesn't mean it is in no way causative. >and pointing out the cause shows a path to correcting the issue Yes, it can often be most efficient to address root causes.
  - naasking 2y ago
    Yes, it's causative in the same sense that the formation of our solar system eventually caused me to write this reply. And I agree that it's typically most efficient to address root causes, but there's a sleight of hand going on here. Note how your post correctly pointed out that environment influences a person's actions where I said poor impulse control causes poor outcomes. There are causal factors in both cases, but clearly there is a clear and direct causal link in the latter and a diffuse set of uncertain possible causes in the former. I would not call environment a root cause in this case unless you can actually narrow down the specific source that causes poor impulse control (some of it is genetic and thus ineliminable).
    - thfuran 2y ago
      >it's causative in the same sense that the formation of our solar system eventually caused me to write this reply. More like in the sense that smoking causes cancer.
fregonics 2y ago
The person is indeed influenced by their environment, but the "adverse experiences" should factor in just that, environmental influences, not actions from the individuals. I think environment influences can increase the likelihood of those adverse experiences, contact with violent behavior for instance can make a person more likely to be suspended, but a person may have been brought up in a normal family and still be violent and be suspended (i got to know such cases, and they're more common than you imagine), and even a person that had contact with this kind of situation may think that they do not want that for their life and use this as a motivator (also have seen such cases). But the adverse experiences should focus not on the results, but the causes. What factors are we able to quantify that made this student be held back (uninterested parents? a personality disorder? ...) and how big is the influence of each of them in a person's destiny. Only looking at them we will be able to really learn something meaningful from what happened.