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Extremely diminishing returns I imagine. Anecdotally - I was extremely miserable at university, so miserable that I could not bring myself to study. Failed com

Extremely diminishing returns I imagine. Anecdotally - I was extremely miserable at university, so miserable that I could not bring myself to study. Failed computer science papers. Hated programming more than anything I had ever come across. Mental health problems hit me hard. I could not learn. Fast forward to me being out of uni and learning it in my own time, I absorb learnings like a sponge at an accelerated rate. It all makes sense. I want to study and learn almost every second of the day. I’m 100x more efficient in my learning, faster, and retaining so much information. The difference? Happiness Passing tests, exams, does not make you smart. It makes you “another brick in the wall”. University does not make people smart. School doesn’t make people smart. In fact, I think we school too much, and it makes people regress. It’s one-size fits all. Play, and self-trials are what have led to my most major positive outcomes in education. Exams were unnecessary stress. When I have kids, I won’t be sending them to school full time. I will encourage play, self exploration, and discovery. And teach them curiosity. The world needs less academic rigour, and more curiosity

maxglute 2y ago
Education is both for personal growth and systemic human capita / talent development. System can be extremely diminishing returns on individual level, but still effective on collective/state level. Not every country in position to build workforce via brain drain of talent from elsewhere. Policy wise what's left is to brute force talent development, same way sports leagues have their own talent development system by throwing meat at problem and filtering for different tiers of talents to fill different segments of demand. A mixure of predisposed and forcefully cultivated. The goal isn't to get self actualized workforce who do what they love, but to get as much talent relevant for national priorities, i.e. east asia education bias STEM vs humanities. If you beat 6/10 kids into being competent at math when 3/6 those kids would rather be poets, but eventually get funnelled into STEM because extreme measures made them good at science, in lieu of being good at writing, then returns is function of how aligned system is with national priorities (i.e. need 5/10 workforce doing math). What I will say is culturally, preoccupation with credentialism is bad at recapturing talent like you who fall through cracks but found another way. I'm sure the system can be optimized to account for individual differences and even somewhat balance/account for individual desires, but currently even rich well administered countries rarely have resources to make bespoke curricula to ensure most flourish. That said, what's happening in east asia (especially cram schools) is IMO way past diminishing returns, but it does seem to work. I think it's important to recognize that collective of miserable peoples can still be pushed to do great things. East asia work culture is miserable people working 200% harder for 10% competitive advantage, and now they dominate in a lot of high tech sectors after relatively brief period of development. Of course they're paying for it with low birth rates. But it's crazy how much of the world does not run on happiness. And I dare suggest human progress is built more on a few people doing what they love supported by unending amount of miserable people just along for the ride.

maxglute 2y ago

Education is both for personal growth and systemic human capita / talent development. System can be extremely diminishing returns on individual level, but still effective on collective/state level. Not every country in position to build workforce via brain drain of talent from elsewhere. Policy wise what's left is to brute force talent development, same way sports leagues have their own talent development system by throwing meat at problem and filtering for different tiers of talents to fill different segments of demand. A mixure of predisposed and forcefully cultivated. The goal isn't to get self actualized workforce who do what they love, but to get as much talent relevant for national priorities, i.e. east asia education bias STEM vs humanities. If you beat 6/10 kids into being competent at math when 3/6 those kids would rather be poets, but eventually get funnelled into STEM because extreme measures made them good at science, in lieu of being good at writing, then returns is function of how aligned system is with national priorities (i.e. need 5/10 workforce doing math). What I will say is culturally, preoccupation with credentialism is bad at recapturing talent like you who fall through cracks but found another way. I'm sure the system can be optimized to account for individual differences and even somewhat balance/account for individual desires, but currently even rich well administered countries rarely have resources to make bespoke curricula to ensure most flourish. That said, what's happening in east asia (especially cram schools) is IMO way past diminishing returns, but it does seem to work. I think it's important to recognize that collective of miserable peoples can still be pushed to do great things. East asia work culture is miserable people working 200% harder for 10% competitive advantage, and now they dominate in a lot of high tech sectors after relatively brief period of development. Of course they're paying for it with low birth rates. But it's crazy how much of the world does not run on happiness. And I dare suggest human progress is built more on a few people doing what they love supported by unending amount of miserable people just along for the ride.