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This report reminds me of a passage in "Thinking Fast and Slow" by Daniel Kahneman. Prestigious foundations such as the Gates Foundation pumped millions (billio
by gghootch 12y ago
This report reminds me of a passage in "Thinking Fast and Slow" by Daniel Kahneman. Prestigious foundations such as the Gates Foundation pumped millions (billions?) of dollars into smaller scale education because a report identified that the worst performing schools had large classrooms in poor, rural counties. Much later, a second review of the data revealed that the best primary schools had large classrooms in poor, rural counties. The results were merely statistical outliers caused by small sample data.
It would not surprise me if the easiest places to live have identical demographics and characteristics as the hardest places to live. The correlation might be dual, but the causation is near impossible to identify.
Edit: long term memory fail.
- mjklin 12y agoThat book is by Kahneman, not Pinker
- crabasa 12y ago> It would not surprise me if the easiest places to live have identical demographics and characteristics as the hardest places to live. I gather you haven't travelled much. The difference between poor scoring places (pick a town in Kentucky) and high scoring ones (Seattle for example) is absolutely huge. Almost to the point of feeling like being in a different country.
- gghootch 12y agoConsidering I am a European that has only traveled to the USA's west coast once in his life, you are right in this sense.
- mnarayan01 12y ago> It would not surprise me if the easiest places to live have identical demographics and characteristics as the hardest places to live. I think a big part of the problem is that the article explicitly uses "demographics and characteristics" to determine difficulty of living, so the above statement is false by definition. I think you do make a good point though, unfortunately, I'm not sure how to phrase it any better.