American society increasingly mistakes intelligence for human worth • Hacker News Board

Re: American society increasingly mistakes intelligence for human worth

#41

Post by tompetry » Sat, Jun 18, 2016, 2:04 AM UTC

eggy wrote: post #18

I grew up in a poor, working class, crime-ridden neighborhood of Brooklyn in the 1970s, and I remember being smart as a kid was a reason to harass, and sometimes beat on somebody who was seen as too smart in class. This wasn't happening in the wealthier, more educated neighborhoods in NYC (I had friends there afterwards). Although, all parents wanted their kids to exceed in both areas. I think there was also some ang…

I remember being tauntingly called "College boy" senior year by a few classmates. Small town, lots of poverty, majority of my classmates never studied past high school. I didn't react much to it; I felt sorry for them, really. They came from homes that not only didn't stress the value of education, but resented it. And that was the atmosphere these kids grew up in... for the first 18 years of their lives! Every time I think of that I appreciate the fact I had parents who told me I could do anything, if I just prepared myself in school. I wish every young person had that kind of support :/

Re: American society increasingly mistakes intelligence for human worth

#42

Post by octobyte » Sat, Jun 18, 2016, 2:05 AM UTC

krauthammer2 wrote: post #37

octobyte wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Men have higher quantitative reasoning ability than women. The truly magical men that should be in control of our society are being shouldered out by very intelligent women. Dear God, I never thought I'd read a comment as blatantly sexist as this on HN, but here we are. In one comment we have a theory which posits: * America is in decline because "traditional men" are being attacked by a deliberate feminist takeove…

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-1274952/Men-ARE-br... http://www.breitbart.com/london/2014/12/04/the-sexodus-part-...

Linking Breitbart and the Dailymail is... well, exactly the sort of thing I expected you would do.

Re: American society increasingly mistakes intelligence for human worth

#43

Post by guscost » Sat, Jun 18, 2016, 2:11 AM UTC

I'm a huge fan of Mike Rowe. He's done some amazing journalism with "Dirty Jobs" and his mikeroweWORKS foundation is terrific. He claims that unconditional encouragement toward intellectual dreams does not help most people, and argues that more kids should be pursuing professional trades.

This overlaps with one of the better suggestions from this article. In general I think these are hit or miss, and maybe too academic, but the problem is a real one and it's not going to go away tomorrow. People have this notion that robots will just replace all manufacturing jobs next year or whatever, but as usual it's a lot more complex and subtle than that. And it's a cultural problem as much as an economic one.

Of course I'm not able to say this from firsthand experience, having had little difficulty in school, and having accumulated enough skill with computers to find plenty of good work. And I can't really call for some given change before understanding more about the people in worse situations. I did go to a trade school though and more of those sounds like the best idea so far.

Re: American society increasingly mistakes intelligence for human worth

#44

Post by mahmud » Sat, Jun 18, 2016, 2:14 AM UTC

nickpeterson wrote: post #13

maker1138 wrote: post #10

After all human history where jocks ruled the earth, they're now upset that nerds are becoming important?

You might be surprised by the intelligence of the ruling class from a few thousand years ago..

Not too hard to be intelligent when you have a monopoly on the means of knowledge transfer (books) and the time to persue leisurely learning.

But it all changed widespread literacy. To steal a quote from Hilbert, "No one shall expell as from the paradise Guttenberg has created".

Re: American society increasingly mistakes intelligence for human worth

#45

Post by tbabb » Sat, Jun 18, 2016, 2:14 AM UTC

Intelligence is a perfectly fair criteria by which to judge a candidate, as in most jobs it will have a direct effect on the candidate's ability to perform their duties.

If an employer over-weights intelligence to the exclusion of other criteria, like work ethic or social aptitude, then she may wind up with a candidate deficient in some other important area to her own detriment.

It is important that everyone, regardless of their abilities or what they can offer for society, have access to certain basic standards of living. But it's absurd to suggest, as the author does, that we should hobble economic output just to favor creating meaningless busy work over automation. If that's important to us, we should just offer a basic standard of living directly.

If intelligence isn't a valid/fair selection criteria for job candidates, then there is no such thing.

Re: American society increasingly mistakes intelligence for human worth

#46

Post by throwaway1923 » Sat, Jun 18, 2016, 2:15 AM UTC

serge2k wrote: post #21

defen wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not a refutation of the article, unless you think that 50s-style "integrity, work ethic, and a knack for getting along" hiring practices inherently preclude women/non-whites/non-straight/non-Christian people. Your comment reads like you're just trying to score cheap diversity points against the standards of 60 years ago instead of engaging with the point of the article.

> unless you think that 50s-style "integrity, work ethic, and a knack for getting along" hiring practices inherently preclude women/non-whites/non-straight/non-Christian people. You don't?

TIL integrity and work ethic are sexist or racist.

Re: American society increasingly mistakes intelligence for human worth

#47

Post by Hondor » Sat, Jun 18, 2016, 2:18 AM UTC

It makes a valuable point that our popular culture that we think makes us "civilized" is really just a sham and we're no different from olden-days racists and homophobes but with a few extra rules applied. We're very careful not to abuse people because of their race, religion or certain types of sexuality, but for all the non-taboo classes of people, the gloves are off and we're no different from slave owners who justified mistreating blacks because they were sub-human. We can't call people niggers but we can call them retards. We can't lock up homosexuals but we can lock up pedophiles and zoophiles. We can't deny jobs or voting rights to women but we can deny jobs and voting rights to foreigners.

We really aren't any more moral than we were 100's of years ago, we just fool ourselves into thinking we are.

Re: American society increasingly mistakes intelligence for human worth

#48

Post by afarrell » Sat, Jun 18, 2016, 2:23 AM UTC

defen wrote: post #14

anortons wrote: post #7

"The qualifications for a good job, whether on an assembly line or behind a desk, mostly revolved around integrity, work ethic, and a knack for getting along"* * also being male, White, straight, Christian ...As though the 50's were the bastion of fair hiring practices.

That's not a refutation of the article, unless you think that 50s-style "integrity, work ethic, and a knack for getting along" hiring practices inherently preclude women/non-whites/non-straight/non-Christian people. Your comment reads like you're just trying to score cheap diversity points against the standards of 60 years ago instead of engaging with the point of the article.

What actually matters is perception of "integrity, work ethic, and a knack for getting along", because people can only make decisions based on their perceptions. Many* assert that the 1950s was a time when people widely believed that Negroes were shiftless, Queers were deviant, and women were hysterical. If you believe this, then it is natural to conclude that a Black man needed to be twice as hardworking in order to overcome the priors of those around him.

* including myself and pretty much everyone I know.

Re: American society increasingly mistakes intelligence for human worth

#49

Post by sixtypoundhound » Sat, Jun 18, 2016, 2:24 AM UTC

Part of the problem is inserting the same standard across multiple roles; for example, mandating all managers have a college education.

You don't need a college degree for most sales, customer service, and operations roles. Some of the best people managers and sales people I've met have sketchy degrees (or none at all).

On the other hand, putting someone in charge of a process which is highly reliant on statistics or technology who doesn't have a college degree (or real world experience which proves ample ability) can be a total disaster. I've seen what happens when you take a non-statistical director and put them over a data science process.... they hide in familiar details (project plan! communications!) and can't understand the harder decisions involved in the role. Like does the magical black-box system even work....

Re: American society increasingly mistakes intelligence for human worth

#50

Post by nononosisisi » Sat, Jun 18, 2016, 2:27 AM UTC

Hondor wrote: post #47

It makes a valuable point that our popular culture that we think makes us "civilized" is really just a sham and we're no different from olden-days racists and homophobes but with a few extra rules applied. We're very careful not to abuse people because of their race, religion or certain types of sexuality, but for all the non-taboo classes of people, the gloves are off and we're no different from slave owners who jus…

I don't think it will ever be ok to be a pedophile which unfortunately you seem to imply it should be ok. Even back then lots of people knew slavery was wrong but could not do much about.