131–140 of 756 posts
What's weird, is that if you believe in equality , you 'd WANT to know the genetic determinants of anything, so you can truly equalize it with genetic engineering.
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I like to feel the same way as your colleagues about "everyone can learn to code". I can definitely say that there are many people for whom it is a struggle - even those on college courses. But a hundred years ago we could easily have the same conversation about simply reading and writing - they (the poor, women, or "lower class" ) luke not be taught to read. But it turns out that if you start young enough, and put e…
I can accept your belief, in principle, about putting enough effort in early education and that lack of such efforts contributes to poor outcomes in college. I also think though that some people just can’t grok algebra. You would agree that a mentally disabled person can’t learn algebra, right? So where is the line below which a person can’t learn algebra. I suspect it is much higher than being mentally disabled.
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Would you mind sharing your conclusions? Though I don't know of any studies about algebra in particular, kids show greater neuroplasticity in general than adults. So learning anything as an adult tends to be more difficult. But I live with an American who reasonably fluent in Norwegian after 2 years of study in their 30s. It's certainly not impossible. I have no doubt that math, like virtually everything, is more dif…
What is theorized to be impossible is learning a language as an adult if you did not learn a language as a child. That is, if at age 20 you know 0 languages then you’ll never be able really learn a language. For obvious reasons experiments in this regard are few. My conclusion is that some people simply can’t learn algebra. Be it genetic, environmental, lack of intellectual fortitude, lack of “intelligence”, or any c…
However that feels really different from saying a not insignificant portion of the population, inherently cannot.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Would you mind sharing your conclusions? Though I don't know of any studies about algebra in particular, kids show greater neuroplasticity in general than adults. So learning anything as an adult tends to be more difficult. But I live with an American who reasonably fluent in Norwegian after 2 years of study in their 30s. It's certainly not impossible. I have no doubt that math, like virtually everything, is more dif…
What is theorized to be impossible is learning a language as an adult if you did not learn a language as a child. That is, if at age 20 you know 0 languages then you’ll never be able really learn a language. For obvious reasons experiments in this regard are few. My conclusion is that some people simply can’t learn algebra. Be it genetic, environmental, lack of intellectual fortitude, lack of “intelligence”, or any c…
Considering that a small percentage of careers require more than basic algebra/geometry/statistics, it's not hard to see that math has a "why should I learn this?" problem more than a "am I able to learn this?" problem.
People strongly want to believe that intelligence doesn't have a strong genetic component, I think mainly for moral reasons. If not everyone can be expected to learn and be proficient in everything due to genetics, then suddenly merit itself is also based strongly on luck, and now the belief that people with greater merit should have better lives no longer seems fair. Intelligence is now just another gift to the fort…
I think you can put anyone in that environment and they would become elite in whatever you push them into if they stick with it. On the other hand when you look at people that have bad outcomes in life, they generally don't have any good role models or much parental presence in their lives, and that seems to be a much stronger factor than genetics in terms of finding success in this world.
I tried once to ask reddit's Anthropologists about what cultural artifacts are affected by genetics e.g. how lactose intolerance can affect a local culture. The question was apparently racist and then taken down. What's weird, is that if you believe in equality , you 'd WANT to know the genetic determinants of anything, so you can truly equalize it with genetic engineering.
From the article: Over the next year, a biosciences working group revised the program’s funding guidelines, stipulating in the final draft that it would not support any research into the first-order effects of genes on behavior or social outcomes. The fact that this area is controversial suggests to me that it is worth exploration. I’ve taught mathematics at community colleges for over 20 years and I’m absolutely con…
People strongly want to believe that intelligence doesn't have a strong genetic component, I think mainly for moral reasons. If not everyone can be expected to learn and be proficient in everything due to genetics, then suddenly merit itself is also based strongly on luck, and now the belief that people with greater merit should have better lives no longer seems fair. Intelligence is now just another gift to the fort…
I think time well spent is a huge factor to anyone success. Most pro athletes, chess champions, musicians, artists, etc, picked up their hobby at a young age in most cases, and just stuck with it until adulthood and enjoyed the compound effects of having a teacher or coach spend time with you multiple times a week for decades. I think you can put anyone in that environment and they would become elite in whatever you…
The reason why people on the left defend against the notion that genetics are everything is because this is the thing fascists use to divide people and make them kill each other. So cool — genetics matter, just like education, nutrition, social situation, security of ones environment etc — but what do we do with this? Argue that some people do rightfully suffer because they chose to have been born into the wrong body? Try to weed out the bad genetics? Who will decide what is bad genetics? The aryan master race? People of color?
There are so many other levers we can pull I don't think we need to bring genetics into it from a political improvement perspective. When we think about healthcare that is a different topic.