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This has been the strategy used by families around the world for thousands of years. Have some kids, pick the one that seems like they'll be the most successfu

This has been the strategy used by families around the world for thousands of years. Have some kids, pick the one that seems like they'll be the most successful, put all of the family's limited resources into that one kid. If that kid goes on to become successful, they are expected to help lift up the rest of the family. Another view is that I've paid back in taxes alone, many multiples of what my education cost the city. > feeding a horse a huge amount of oats results in some of the feed passing through for lucky sparrows to eat Yeah well the current strategy being employed is starve all the horses and leave the bodies in the field to rot. The harsh truth is bell curves exist. Some people are just better are things than others. Imagine a scenario with three classrooms: One classroom is full of kids who can be taught 3 years of a subject in one year A second classroom has kids who can be taught 1 year of a skills in a subject in 1 year. The third classroom is kids who are remedial and if great effort is put in, they'll be taught one year of skills in two years. The no-shit-sherlock strategy is to assign a teacher to each classroom. What we are doing instead is one of two strategies: 1. Mix all the students together, and watch as the kids who would be advanced drop out of school due to boredom, and the kids who need remedial help drop out because they aren't learning anything. 2. Fund classroom 2 as normal, take resources that would've been spent on classroom 1, and give it to classroom 3, causing incremental improvements, and again failing the kids who would be in classroom 1. Both strategies are downright stupid and inefficient. Not only that, these strategies also cause funding problems. Now the parents of kids who would have been in classroom 1 pull their kids out of school, causing a reduction in funding for everyone. Next, parents who would have kids in classroom 1 don't even move to the city, causing a reduction in the overall economy for the city, so now there is even less money for social and academic programs to help disadvantaged students. To be clear, I'm not naming the subject here because students should be independently evaluated on each subject. Someone may need remedial math help but be great at writing.

sangnoir 2y ago
Barrels of ink have been used to debunk various flavors of Social Darwinism by better thinkers and writers than I. I wouldn't commit a kid who struggles with math in 3rd grade to a life in the trades. I suppose HN has an over-represention of former gifted student commenters- but being intelligent doesn't make one better than others, or better suited for greater expectations, more deserving of resources, or more likely to succeed. Intelligence is just one aspect out of the many you can measure a human by - resilience, resourcefulness, grit, propensity to self-destruction, proneness to addictions, self-delusion, confidence, being an insufferable dick, laziness, are among the things I've seen people exhibit to their own detriment (or success) - regardless of what their baseline intelligence was. Society does better when it nurtures all the positives, and not just putting all eggs in the "very intelligent" basket. The smartest students I knew are doing very mundane jobs that can be (and are) done by far less smarter folk - the one in academia is trying to leave. I'm less smart, but I pay more on taxes than most of them - one exception is the executive at a dating app. She's probably a genius as she never had to study at all: but that's not exactly a role that moves society forward, is it? Edit: oh, and Elon Musk was a B student.
- chongli 2y ago
  being intelligent doesn't make one better than others The only issue here is with the attitude that a career in the trades is somehow inferior to getting a degree. It is not. I have many friends and family who work in the trades. They are intelligent, hard-working, resourceful people who take tremendous pride in the quality of their work. They both produce and repair useful things (houses, cars, factories, and countless other pieces of equipment). They are the backbone of our society. They also happen to earn a lot more money than many other people I know who have degrees and work those "mundane jobs" you mentioned. Why? Because there's a huge shortage of labour in the trades and people who enter that career have far more bargaining power than they did back in the early-mid 20th century. It's also reflected in the way we simply don't build the way we used to. China built an incredible high speed rail network all over their country in just a few decades at minimal cost. The US can't even manage to build one high speed link between San Francisco and LA without spending more than the GDP of most countries on the project while facing countless delays. It's one of our greatest shames that we in the West have developed such an elitist culture that we look down on the people who build things.
  - sangnoir 2y ago
    > The only issue here is with the attitude that a career in the trades is somehow inferior to getting a degree I made no such claim - the word I used (commit) was chosen with care, and is neutral. > They also happen to earn a lot more money than many other people I know who have degrees and work those "mundane jobs" you mentioned. While trades are a decent choice; let's not overly romanticize them. The ones making decent money are those who are self-employed (basically effectively consultants) and those in unions with a monopoly (like the longshoremen). The working stiffs aren't doing that great, especially if the work is hard on the body, then it means their career is going to be much shorter than the average desk jockey, and they will have considerable health costs later.
    - com2kid 2y ago
      The trades cover a wide range of fields, from car mechanics to people using CNC machines to roofers. Is the roofer going to suffer a lot later in life? Yes. Is the CNC operator going to have problems down the line? Probably not. > The ones making decent money are those who are self-employed (basically effectively consultants) and those in unions with a monopoly (like the longshoremen). Most office workers outside of tech are not doing so great either in regards to pay. Customer service roles are even worse.

sangnoir 2y ago

Barrels of ink have been used to debunk various flavors of Social Darwinism by better thinkers and writers than I. I wouldn't commit a kid who struggles with math in 3rd grade to a life in the trades. I suppose HN has an over-represention of former gifted student commenters- but being intelligent doesn't make one better than others, or better suited for greater expectations, more deserving of resources, or more likely to succeed. Intelligence is just one aspect out of the many you can measure a human by - resilience, resourcefulness, grit, propensity to self-destruction, proneness to addictions, self-delusion, confidence, being an insufferable dick, laziness, are among the things I've seen people exhibit to their own detriment (or success) - regardless of what their baseline intelligence was. Society does better when it nurtures all the positives, and not just putting all eggs in the "very intelligent" basket. The smartest students I knew are doing very mundane jobs that can be (and are) done by far less smarter folk - the one in academia is trying to leave. I'm less smart, but I pay more on taxes than most of them - one exception is the executive at a dating app. She's probably a genius as she never had to study at all: but that's not exactly a role that moves society forward, is it? Edit: oh, and Elon Musk was a B student.

chongli 2y ago
being intelligent doesn't make one better than others The only issue here is with the attitude that a career in the trades is somehow inferior to getting a degree. It is not. I have many friends and family who work in the trades. They are intelligent, hard-working, resourceful people who take tremendous pride in the quality of their work. They both produce and repair useful things (houses, cars, factories, and countless other pieces of equipment). They are the backbone of our society. They also happen to earn a lot more money than many other people I know who have degrees and work those "mundane jobs" you mentioned. Why? Because there's a huge shortage of labour in the trades and people who enter that career have far more bargaining power than they did back in the early-mid 20th century. It's also reflected in the way we simply don't build the way we used to. China built an incredible high speed rail network all over their country in just a few decades at minimal cost. The US can't even manage to build one high speed link between San Francisco and LA without spending more than the GDP of most countries on the project while facing countless delays. It's one of our greatest shames that we in the West have developed such an elitist culture that we look down on the people who build things.
- sangnoir 2y ago
  > The only issue here is with the attitude that a career in the trades is somehow inferior to getting a degree I made no such claim - the word I used (commit) was chosen with care, and is neutral. > They also happen to earn a lot more money than many other people I know who have degrees and work those "mundane jobs" you mentioned. While trades are a decent choice; let's not overly romanticize them. The ones making decent money are those who are self-employed (basically effectively consultants) and those in unions with a monopoly (like the longshoremen). The working stiffs aren't doing that great, especially if the work is hard on the body, then it means their career is going to be much shorter than the average desk jockey, and they will have considerable health costs later.
  - com2kid 2y ago
    The trades cover a wide range of fields, from car mechanics to people using CNC machines to roofers. Is the roofer going to suffer a lot later in life? Yes. Is the CNC operator going to have problems down the line? Probably not. > The ones making decent money are those who are self-employed (basically effectively consultants) and those in unions with a monopoly (like the longshoremen). Most office workers outside of tech are not doing so great either in regards to pay. Customer service roles are even worse.