Rob is growing and foraging 100% of his food for a year

[7Wannabe5]

@daylen:

Gotcha. I was a bit confused on the terminology. Also, “what I am going to do” would be some variant on “exploration” in Ne as opposed to too much “caretaking” in Fe. IOW, I was attempting to express the degree to which I concern myself with coming up with a solution that could work for everybody as analogous to the degree to which I strived to make sure my kids were clean, fed, and entertained before I went back to my stack of books or out on a solo adventure. Except, of course, I feel far less responsibility for all the other adults on the planet than I felt for my own children.

On that note, I was considering how easy it is for me to see some of the young disadvantaged kids I teach as vulnerable to all manner of discrimination, yet “vulnerable” would be about the last word I would use to describe any of the older African-American men I have dated, not even the one who was NF I guess this is because I viewed them as having already stood up to the challenge successfully. If/when you respect somebody, it is more difficult to perceive them as vulnerable in the same moment or role. So, always a bit of a trade-off.

[Alphaville]

speaking of “working with your enemies,” here’s the story of how a segregationist paved the way for transgender rights by adding the word “sex” to the civil rights act of 1964:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics ... eme-court/

“What’s notable here is that the Civil Rights Act didn’t initially include the prohibition on sex discrimination. It wasn’t added to the bill until the final day of debate by a segregationist congressman, Howard Smith (D-Va.).”

and later:

“To this day, some regard Smith’s amendment as a fateful miscalculation. There is little doubt that he wanted the bill killed, given he ultimately voted against it. At one point before its passage, Smith remarked that the bill was “as full of booby traps as a dog is of fleas.”

love it

[classical_Liberal]

A few agents teaching at K4 with good intentions can lead herds of K3 agents into polarizing debates or signalling battles. This is happening all the time and it is extremely interesting to observe from a bird's eye view.

I alluded to this in my post as well. I tend to think the K4's should be able to understand the consequences of "leading the herds", as in your statement. So, I'm not sure they have good intentions.

[daylen]

@c_L I think that requires K5.

[classical_Liberal]

@Daylen
I'll brush up on Kegan's theory, because now I'm curious. Thanks

[jacob]

On the privilege of having a brain that fires on all cylinders: https://www.theatlantic.com/education/a ... ty/523479/

From elsewhere, poverty (not quantified or qualified) dings you with 15 IQ points which is a full standard deviation. Depending on one's starting point this could be the difference between being able to create one's own strategy and needing someone else to provide an actionable plan. It could be the difference between being able to follow such a plan or feeling stymied until a particular [emergency] issue is resolved.

IOW, poverty is if not a trap then at least sticky.

It might be more useful to see [poverty] as an injury that requires rehabilitation rather than a lack of training?

[7Wannabe5]

I just read something that Buckminster Fuller wrote in 1964 on IQ opportunities lost due to fact that by age 8 children have already past through 3 most major stages of brain development. He makes radical suggestion that all public $$$ spent on educating over 8 year olds should be shifted to aiding development of under 8 year olds, and those over age 8 who have achieved normal/high development for that age should be set free from classroom "training" towards independent learning opportunities. I very much agree with his take.

[Frita]

@Jacob
Yes and another factor of IQ testing is the cultural and socioeconomic bias of assessment content. Children living in poverty tend to have less social and language interaction, less enriching environments (tv versus books, games, cultural experiences, etc.) and be living in a one parent situation (hence less time and resources). The lacking seems to be the cause of the injury.

If we tested people from 100 years ago with modern assessments, many “average” people would have tested sub 85 SS. (The normative curve would have most likely been stretched with the median shifted left.) Part of this reflects poverty but also IQ within context.

Because these assessments are normative, scores are distributed. If the correlation between poverty and lower IQ were to be corrected, the assessments would need to be renormed.

@7Wannabe5
Ay, a precursor to the 1965 War on Poverty...When we look at the at-best lukewarm results of Head Start, pumping funds early on and letting the chips fall where they may doesn’t actually work in practice. It is interesting that the WIC program, which focuses on nutrition and health prenatally through early years, comparatively shows more positive long-term results.

In my mind, the real question is why do we continue to create and propagate a system which produces an underclass?

[7Wannabe5]

@Frita:

I thought the studies showed that headstart works for a few years, but then results get swamped out around middle school age. I see this as being akin to promoting bilingual development at the early age when most likely to stick developmentally, but then expecting the kid to retain fluency in both languages while no longer being exposed to one over the long run.

As to why we continue to create an underclass, although I don’t believe in conspiracy, it does seem like the lack of sensible cooperation between those in power on the right and left is unnecessarily dooming the prospects of many.

[Frita]

@7W5
Head Start gains are lost shortly after starting elementary school (K-2). Most kids tread water academically in junior high/middle school with males’ reading skills declining slightly.

Yes, lack of cooperation does have something to do with the underclass. Not having enough to go around (“good” jobs, decline of the middle class, etc.), a culture of being defined by stuff and accomplishments (versus those who do not) history of underclass, and middle class jobs created to serve the underclass also seem to be contributing factors.

[7Wannabe5]

@Frita:

I agree. Also, who would take on the least desirable working class tasks if there wasn’t the need to escape underclass realm? Of course, toilet scrubbing robots might finally bring an end to that.

Main difference between cooperative environment vs pure capitalist environment being that everybody has to spend some time on toilet cleaning duty.

[Alphaville]

im so glad to see the direction this thread is taking because it points at “beyond individual” problems that need urgent solving. love the expert research linked, and it can be incorporated into renaissance toolkit.

bucky fuller was great and an early(?) proponent of ubi (was it on “spaceship earth”?). i agree with thar outline of educational ideas, age 7 or 8 was when school started to change for me. the joy of discovery turned into the misery of confinement.

and why do we produce an underclass? because it benefits the upper classes who hold the reins and the middle classes that manage the thing. i do not have a cure for it however. past attempts to remedy class differences have turned into a disaster. nevertheless we could look at places with the highest social mobility right now. one thing they seem to share in common is a
social safety network.

[7Wannabe5]

@Alphaville:

Also high level of inheritance taxes. How can we rationally preach/teach meritocracy/work-ethic absent fresh roll for each generation? I simply do not buy multi-generational Laffer curve motivational nonsense. Dynasty building is so 20 centuries ago.

[Frita]

@7Wannabe5
Ha, if everyone had to clean the toilet, perhaps people would be more aware of the condition in which it was left.

Getting out the proverbial wide paintbrush: Indeed, people don’t want gross jobs that pay poorly with no benefits. Now if that same job is well-compensated, it is a different story. (One exception would be mountain towns where many people have multiple low-paid service jobs despite being well-educated. The person waiting tables, cleaning a motel room, and/or operating the liftline may very well have a PhD.) More opportunities seem to be available to men due to physical strength for labor. Also, note that women and children being raised by single mothers are more likely to experience poverty. And being a single parent without involvement from the other is more common and acceptable.
As many blue-collared jobs are being automated or exported to countries where labor costs are low, service jobs are the only option. In general, people don’t want to pay more for goods and services, nor do mega-corps want to decrease profits, so that employees can have living wages and not need to depend upon government “handouts.”

@Alphaville
Yes, past remedies to solve class inequities have not been without problems. Just for fun, I searched where the US falls in relation to social mobility: https://www.visualcapitalist.com/ranked ... countries/ The US is ranked 27th in social mobility. Denmark is first.

Educator rabbit hole: Third grade (age 8) is typically a transitional year. Most students have mastered basic concepts and are beginning to apply these skills in order to learn. Ability for abstract thought starts to during this time. Some students will go through this stage earlier, second or even first grade, while others lag behind. As students progress in school, the gap widens and outliers’ frustrations can increase. Lack of choice and rote memory tasks begin to feel insulting at this stage too. No surprise that many kids start to dislike school at that point. (This is also the age most kids are identified and placed in Special Education or Gifted and Talented.)

[Alphaville]

@7w5

the laffer curve is for laffs, but any argument for taxes will be counteracted by arguments like “taxes are theft” in the united states, where we still have an abundance of flat-earthers, antivaxxers, and disorganized militias that shoot civilians randomly, because freedumb.

(i’m very much for freedom, but it needs to be accompanied by good sense. enter cipolla...)

@Frita
i think the pitfalls of extreme individualism and collectivism have pretty much been solved by liberal democracies and the welfare state.

the remaining problem for that system is the issue of solvency, which i believe can be tweaked rather than having to overthrow the whole system. this is the problem in the united states. 100+ years of attempted health care reform and we still can’t settle the matter.

and thanks for the education explainer. my school systems lacked a gifted anything so my boyhood felt like the pink floyd music video with the kids in the meat grinder and the gerald scarfe animations. oooof! never again...

[RoamingFrancis]

Could you elaborate on why you think these problems are solved by liberal democracies / welfare states?

[Alphaville]

Could you elaborate on why you think these problems are solved by liberal democracies / welfare states?

because they avoid the development of oligarchies on one end and the gulag on the other, with all the miseries each extreme entails.

[nomadscientist]

A priori, poverty might reduce IQ by 15 points, or a 15 point lower starting IQ might make one much more likely to be impoverished.

In the real world, it's a hard sell to me that first world "poverty" can reduce IQ, given that someone in 1750 was able to write literature, rotate crops, build steam engines. Thucydides couldn't afford glass in his windows.

[jacob]

@nomadscientist - Modern poverty is not so much an absolute lack of stuff, like glass in the windows or an inability to plow, but rather a lack of other kinds of supporting capital that results in socially coming in last, aka "losing" in the 21st century game of life. The focus or ability to concentrate is thus directed at those [other] shortcomings. It's harder to juggle five balls or whatever 21st century human trick it takes to feel adequately successful if one hand is reserved for dealing with e.g. overdue rent payments, a drug addicted relative, remembering to file for unemployment on time, worrying about paying for health issues or that one's child might get randomly shot, a parent or a peer group who insists that studying is for losers, ... that kind of issues.

Causation should be easy. Since it's difficult to increase IQ scores by a full 1sd by training, it follows that if IQ scores increase 15 points after exiting poverty then poverty caused the drop. If the scores stayed the same, then they caused the poverty.

[nomadscientist]

@nomadscientist - Modern poverty is not so much an absolute lack of stuff, like glass in the windows or an inability to plow, but rather a lack of other kinds of supporting capital that results in socially coming in last, aka "losing" in the 21st century game of life. The focus or ability to concentrate is thus directed at those [other] shortcomings. It's harder to juggle five balls or whatever 21st century human trick it takes to feel adequately successful if one hand is reserved for dealing with e.g. overdue rent payments, a drug addicted relative, remembering to file for unemployment on time, worrying about paying for health issues or that one's child might get randomly shot, a parent or a peer group who insists that studying is for losers, ... that kind of issues.

Right, so one has to make the argument that feeling bad or having a lot of stuff to do reduces IQ. But I guess Elon Musk has a lot of stuff to do, and Kurt Goedel killed himself out of despair.

Causation should be easy. Since it's difficult to increase IQ scores by a full 1sd by training, it follows that if IQ scores increase 15 points after exiting poverty then poverty caused the drop. If the scores stayed the same, then they caused the poverty.

Did you look for such a study? It seems like you think the former direction of causation is correct.