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For people who have specific disabilities, we should make adjustments, but I don't understand why a single way of teaching would not work for most people. Most

For people who have specific disabilities, we should make adjustments, but I don't understand why a single way of teaching would not work for most people. Most Africans have an IQ in the 80s, barely above mentally retarded. Most of them can barely be trained to even go through the motions of algebra, let alone use it to solve problems in new situations. "College material" kids need to graduate high school with a mastery of algebra so they can learn calculus, which they will be expected to use unbidden to solve novel problems they encounter in other areas. It seems unlikely to me that the vocational training of the dull can be combined with the education of the near-genius. It is like trying to teach carpentry and structural engineering at the same time. Kids also have a gigantic range of self control. About 1 in 20 are profoundly delayed, being an average of 3 years behind "normal" in planning and self control. (This is called ADHD to pathologize it, but nothing that common can possibly be a true disorder.) So a typical freshman high school classroom will have pne student who can barely keep their shit together well enough to glue macaroni to construction paper. And will have one student, usually a girl, who operates on a fully adult level. And then there are the variations in memory. One student learns the entire course in 20 hours, while another has to grind out practice for 150 hours. There is simply no way for a single process to handle the range of human variation well. Even the body is like this. My ideal bicycle could permanently cripple another normal person of the same height. Ditto for shoes.

jacalata 13y ago
uh, do you care to give a citation for that 'most africans' claim? Are you talking about people living in Africa, or about African-Americans?
aperrien 13y ago
> Most Africans have an IQ in the 80s, barely above mentally retarded. Most of them can barely be trained to even go through the motions of algebra, let alone use it to solve problems in new situations. What evidence do you have for this claim?
batemanesque 13y ago
are you fucking serious?
batemanesque 13y ago
a white supremacist w/ 1865 karma: congratulations, HN!
- Daniel_Newby 13y ago
  This is a discussion of science. Kindly take your partisan political posturing elsewhere. The science on IQ shows that European Jews > far east Asians > Caucasians > Africans. There is still some uncertainty about the exact numbers and rankings, but there is zero controversy about the existence of the intelligence hierarchy. In a few years we will resurrect the Neanderthals, who had larger brains than any living human race. It is entirely possible that in 50 years they will be winning all the physics Nobel prizes.
  - deleted 13y ago
    [deleted]
  - hef19898 13y ago
    It never occured to me that there was actual "science" behind IQ tests. And I just broke my own rule to never, never ever respond to comments like this one or people making them...
    - Daniel_Newby 13y ago
      There is. They are one of the few parts of psychology that are based on hard data. University admissions test are, in fact, mostly tests of IQ. So are military recruiting tests. (The military is super serious about weeding out people dumb enough to crash a boondoggle.)
  - yimmer 13y ago
    An extremely basic knowledge of statistics would show you that for a set of overlapping bell curves with a reasonably sized standard deviation, a difference of a few percent in the median is far too little to make a statement like "Group X > Group Y" on with a straight face. Most people you'd pick at random from any group will be fairly average, and geniuses are uncommon, but exist, in all the groups. Even differences of a standard deviation are fairly trivial compared to the differences that exist within each group; it's not like intelligence medians vary by 5 standard deviations between ethnic groups within one country... Needless to say, a black Nobel laureate such as http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sir_William_Arthur_Lewis http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sir_William_Arthur_Lewis is vastly more intelligent than the median member of any ethnic group... Underprivileged students from minority backgrounds can do quite well at calculus - some teachers, like http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jaime_Escalante http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jaime_Escalante , dedicated years to trying, with quite impressive results. This has been demonstrated again and again at schools with poor track records. Simply having a competent teacher and an environment that isn't entirely hostile to learning can do far more than many people tend to realize.
tokenadult 13y ago
I have recommended before that you read better scientific literature on this subject, but you still come here to HN with ignorant opinions like this. For onlookers, I'll recommend the latest review articles on the topic again. You should read them this time. http://people.virginia.edu/~ent3c/papers2/Articles%20for%20Online%20CV/Nisbett(2012)%20.pdf http://people.virginia.edu/~ent3c/papers2/Articles%20for%20O... http://people.virginia.edu/~ent3c/papers2/Articles%20for%20Online%20CV/Nisbett%20(2012)%20Group.pdf http://people.virginia.edu/~ent3c/papers2/Articles%20for%20O...
- Daniel_Newby 13y ago
  OK, let's read. Your first paper quotes an optimistic black IQ deficit of 0.33 sigma. Assume strong STEM students are at the 2 sigma level, which is a percentile rank of 97.72% of whites. If whites are 75% of the population, then 1.71% of the population could be a white strong STEM student. For blacks at 2.33 sigmas, the percentile rank is 99.01% applying to 15% of the population, meaning 0.1485% of the population could be a black strong STEM student. Those percentages are in an 11.5 ratio, but the actual population ratio is 5. So blacks are about half as likely to be bright as whites. But in US public schools, they must get good grades at about the same rate to avoid "racism" and "disparate impact". The only way to do this is by severely watering down the curriculum. This is exactly what I was saying about a one-size-fits-all school being unworkable. The normal distribution is a harsh mistress. The area under the tail drops off very fast, so a small difference in a subgroup translates into overwhelming victory or overwhelming defeat. Now let's revisit your -0.33 sigma black deficit. For the strong potential STEM students calculated above, the black:white ratio is about 10%. That means we would expect 2 blacks in every university STEM class, and 1 in a typical all-team engineering meeting. In reality the number is far lower. (I've only had two reasonably bright black colleagues ever.) You find equally few blacks in hands-on intellectual jobs like owning a chain of gas stations. So the -0.33 sigma number does not pass the everyday experience test. Speaking of recommended reading, you could profitably spend a few minutes studying a normal distribution Z table. The normal distribution is a harsh mistress.
  - eli_gottlieb 13y ago

jacalata 13y ago

uh, do you care to give a citation for that 'most africans' claim? Are you talking about people living in Africa, or about African-Americans?

aperrien 13y ago

> Most Africans have an IQ in the 80s, barely above mentally retarded. Most of them can barely be trained to even go through the motions of algebra, let alone use it to solve problems in new situations. What evidence do you have for this claim?

batemanesque 13y ago

are you fucking serious?

batemanesque 13y ago

a white supremacist w/ 1865 karma: congratulations, HN!

Daniel_Newby 13y ago
This is a discussion of science. Kindly take your partisan political posturing elsewhere. The science on IQ shows that European Jews > far east Asians > Caucasians > Africans. There is still some uncertainty about the exact numbers and rankings, but there is zero controversy about the existence of the intelligence hierarchy. In a few years we will resurrect the Neanderthals, who had larger brains than any living human race. It is entirely possible that in 50 years they will be winning all the physics Nobel prizes.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
- hef19898 13y ago
  It never occured to me that there was actual "science" behind IQ tests. And I just broke my own rule to never, never ever respond to comments like this one or people making them...
  - Daniel_Newby 13y ago
    There is. They are one of the few parts of psychology that are based on hard data. University admissions test are, in fact, mostly tests of IQ. So are military recruiting tests. (The military is super serious about weeding out people dumb enough to crash a boondoggle.)
- yimmer 13y ago
  An extremely basic knowledge of statistics would show you that for a set of overlapping bell curves with a reasonably sized standard deviation, a difference of a few percent in the median is far too little to make a statement like "Group X > Group Y" on with a straight face. Most people you'd pick at random from any group will be fairly average, and geniuses are uncommon, but exist, in all the groups. Even differences of a standard deviation are fairly trivial compared to the differences that exist within each group; it's not like intelligence medians vary by 5 standard deviations between ethnic groups within one country... Needless to say, a black Nobel laureate such as http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sir_William_Arthur_Lewis http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sir_William_Arthur_Lewis is vastly more intelligent than the median member of any ethnic group... Underprivileged students from minority backgrounds can do quite well at calculus - some teachers, like http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jaime_Escalante http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jaime_Escalante , dedicated years to trying, with quite impressive results. This has been demonstrated again and again at schools with poor track records. Simply having a competent teacher and an environment that isn't entirely hostile to learning can do far more than many people tend to realize.

tokenadult 13y ago

I have recommended before that you read better scientific literature on this subject, but you still come here to HN with ignorant opinions like this. For onlookers, I'll recommend the latest review articles on the topic again. You should read them this time. http://people.virginia.edu/~ent3c/papers2/Articles%20for%20Online%20CV/Nisbett(2012)%20.pdf http://people.virginia.edu/~ent3c/papers2/Articles%20for%20O... http://people.virginia.edu/~ent3c/papers2/Articles%20for%20Online%20CV/Nisbett%20(2012)%20Group.pdf http://people.virginia.edu/~ent3c/papers2/Articles%20for%20O...

Daniel_Newby 13y ago
OK, let's read. Your first paper quotes an optimistic black IQ deficit of 0.33 sigma. Assume strong STEM students are at the 2 sigma level, which is a percentile rank of 97.72% of whites. If whites are 75% of the population, then 1.71% of the population could be a white strong STEM student. For blacks at 2.33 sigmas, the percentile rank is 99.01% applying to 15% of the population, meaning 0.1485% of the population could be a black strong STEM student. Those percentages are in an 11.5 ratio, but the actual population ratio is 5. So blacks are about half as likely to be bright as whites. But in US public schools, they must get good grades at about the same rate to avoid "racism" and "disparate impact". The only way to do this is by severely watering down the curriculum. This is exactly what I was saying about a one-size-fits-all school being unworkable. The normal distribution is a harsh mistress. The area under the tail drops off very fast, so a small difference in a subgroup translates into overwhelming victory or overwhelming defeat. Now let's revisit your -0.33 sigma black deficit. For the strong potential STEM students calculated above, the black:white ratio is about 10%. That means we would expect 2 blacks in every university STEM class, and 1 in a typical all-team engineering meeting. In reality the number is far lower. (I've only had two reasonably bright black colleagues ever.) You find equally few blacks in hands-on intellectual jobs like owning a chain of gas stations. So the -0.33 sigma number does not pass the everyday experience test. Speaking of recommended reading, you could profitably spend a few minutes studying a normal distribution Z table. The normal distribution is a harsh mistress.
- eli_gottlieb 13y ago