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Lie-to-children

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Re: Lie-to-children

#31

Post by javawizard »

Leave it to HN to spend checks 57% of the toplevel comments debating whether the word "lie" in the term "lie to children" is in fact literally correct.

My bleeding linguistic descriptivist heart dies a little every time I walk into a debate like this. Does it really matter what we call it, as long as we can all agree on what it is we're talking about? At which point we can have insightful debate about whether the concept to which the term refers is a helpful, or unhelpful, one to engage in.

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Personally I think it is; as another commenter already mentioned, "all models are wrong; some are useful". Any oversimplification of a real-world concept is bound to fall down at some point, and lots of oversimplifications are useful right up to that point.

Many times as a kid I asked for an explanation of a real-world phenomenon from a grown-up and received something that had way too much detail or nuance to hold my attention span, or for me to comprehend at the time. Usually I dropped pursuit of whatever had led me to ask the question in the first place, and as a result it would take years for me to accomplish something I could have accomplished much earlier.

Other times I asked for an explanation and received one that was oversimplified but perfect for what I needed, and was able to stay focused on, at that point in my life. Those were golden moments; more often than not they resulted in leaps in my education, and I was later able to "correct" the explanation I'd received once I ran up against its limitations.

And it's not just children; many adults who aren't subject matter experts get overwhelmed if you try to present things in a way that's as technically correct as possible. I honestly believe the ability to simplify to exactly the level one's conversant needs for their situation is one of the most underrated skills on the planet.

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(There's an undeniable irony to how long this comment is. Ah well; to paraphrase Mark Twain, if I'd had time I would have written a shorter comment.)

Re: Lie-to-children

#32

Post by ifdefdebug »

verisimi wrote: post #26
fifteen1506 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As I'm kinda against lies but don't to deprive my kids of Santa, in my world all Santas you see are franchises/agents of the main Santa. I also add I have never seen the real Santa because he is insanely fast to go to all locations of the world.

You will inevitably trigger a loss of trust - your kids will know that there are things you will lie to them about, as you are indeed lying to them to support a cultural norm. I suggest it is better not to lie - why bring deceit into that relationship? - but keep the idea of Santa, if you like.

No, you won't trigger a loss of trust if you do it the right way. This year, my 7-yr-old, for the first time in his life, asked me clear questions about Santa and all this stuff (we had more of that going on). Having been asked a clear question, I of course gave him a clear answer.

First he was sad - he liked the world of Santa, little gnomes hiding sweets for him in the woods when we were out hiking, things like that. But my clear answers just confirmed the suspicions he already brought home from school.

Then we talked about how this was a nice game adults and older kids play for the younger ones - and he got that immediately, kids inherently understand (and like) role playing games. So now he's in the role of those who know and play the game for the younger kids in our broader family - and he's proud of it :)

Before that happened, I actually was afraid and unsure about how to get out of this storyline without breaching trust. But it all played out smoothly.

Re: Lie-to-children

#33

Post by bilvar »

tsm wrote: post #18
speeder wrote: post #5

When I was a child myself I hated this and as adult I am still unconvinced it is necessary. Also this sort of stuff made me lose lots of trust for educators in general, even university level ones are willing to teach junk.

It's absolutely useful to tell 4th-graders that x(t) = vt + x₀ (assuming no acceleration) since they're probably not on top of exponents yet. It's also absolutely useful to tell 8th-graders that x(t) = at² + v₀t + x₀ since now they can handle exponents. And it's useful to tell 12th-graders how to do the calculus to get x(t) for variable acceleration. But that's also inaccurate for very large values of v (or a) due to…

> It's absolutely useful to tell 4th-graders that x(t) = vt + x₀

Why is this useful? Where and when are they going to use this equation until they learn the correct one?

Re: Lie-to-children

#34

Post by scoutt »

verisimi wrote: post #26
fifteen1506 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As I'm kinda against lies but don't to deprive my kids of Santa, in my world all Santas you see are franchises/agents of the main Santa. I also add I have never seen the real Santa because he is insanely fast to go to all locations of the world.

You will inevitably trigger a loss of trust - your kids will know that there are things you will lie to them about, as you are indeed lying to them to support a cultural norm. I suggest it is better not to lie - why bring deceit into that relationship? - but keep the idea of Santa, if you like.

I have 1 one year old boy and I often think about how should I behave. While the Santa issue is trivial to me, I decided I will lie, or hide the truth for that matter, about some topics to protect his innocence until he's mature enough to understand.

> your kids will know that there are things you will lie to them about

And that's part of growing up. I now know that the dog I barely remember (when I was almost 3 years old) didn't "went with his mom that came to pick him up one day", and understanding why they lied is part of growing up. Instead of triggering a loss of trust now I can say "I see what you did there, now I understand".

Re: Lie-to-children

#35

Post by roel_v »

speeder wrote: post #5

When I was a child myself I hated this and as adult I am still unconvinced it is necessary. Also this sort of stuff made me lose lots of trust for educators in general, even university level ones are willing to teach junk.

I have a working mental model for how electricity works that is useful enough to let me do (some) electrical work, figure out simple electronics circuits, have some sort of understanding of how electrical devices like light switches, light dimmers (of the mechanical and the electronic kinds), motors, batteries etc work, ... All of these are useful skills.

Yet I know for sure I do not understand electricity, as I do not even understand most of the answers given to me when I ask about whether electricity has mass. And, apparently, many people who claim to know about physics don't either, because I get all sorts of answers that contradict each other.

Should I not know what I do know about electricity because my mental model is a simplification? I think your position is needlessly absolutist. I don't think my teachers ever taught me 'junk', just a (useful) simplification/model of reality.

Re: Lie-to-children

#36

Post by WilTimSon »

verisimi wrote: post #26
fifteen1506 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As I'm kinda against lies but don't to deprive my kids of Santa, in my world all Santas you see are franchises/agents of the main Santa. I also add I have never seen the real Santa because he is insanely fast to go to all locations of the world.

You will inevitably trigger a loss of trust - your kids will know that there are things you will lie to them about, as you are indeed lying to them to support a cultural norm. I suggest it is better not to lie - why bring deceit into that relationship? - but keep the idea of Santa, if you like.

I can't imagine a child would develop long-term trust issues based on a parent lying about Santa Claus. If it's a pattern of the parent constantly saying things like "your doggy went to a farm" or "if you swallow gum, it will kill you", then they'll understand that the parent is untrustworthy. Otherwise, a single make-believe story isn't harmless on its own.

Re: Lie-to-children

#37

Post by genman »

javawizard wrote: post #31

Leave it to HN to spend checks 57% of the toplevel comments debating whether the word "lie" in the term "lie to children" is in fact literally correct. My bleeding linguistic descriptivist heart dies a little every time I walk into a debate like this. Does it really matter what we call it, as long as we can all agree on what it is we're talking about? At which point we can have insightful debate about whether the con…

> Leave it to HN to spend checks 57% of the toplevel comments debating whether the word "lie" in the term "lie to children" is in fact literally correct.

And it is not and it is hurting the debate and is causing secondary problems like it will hurt the scientific world view in general because they equate actual lies like made up stories created to deceive masses with scientific simplifications.

Re: Lie-to-children

#38

Post by genman »

rvnx wrote: post #7
badcppdev wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I sense a paradox there. They are insisting on calling it a lie but really it isn't

The models that they call "lie" are, in fact, mostly correct, they are good approximations, with limited scope, and sometimes don't handle edge cases, the same with Newton's gravity and many topics. The same way that Pi is not 3.14159, nor it is 3.141592653589793238462643383279502884197169399375105820974944592307816406286, and it's not a lie, just an approximation. The reality is that we don't know the https://en.wik…

And these authors are hurting science because they equate actual lies like made up stories created to deceive masses with scientific simplifications.

Re: Lie-to-children

#39

Post by verisimi »

scoutt wrote: post #34
verisimi wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You will inevitably trigger a loss of trust - your kids will know that there are things you will lie to them about, as you are indeed lying to them to support a cultural norm. I suggest it is better not to lie - why bring deceit into that relationship? - but keep the idea of Santa, if you like.

I have 1 one year old boy and I often think about how should I behave. While the Santa issue is trivial to me, I decided I will lie, or hide the truth for that matter, about some topics to protect his innocence until he's mature enough to understand. > your kids will know that there are things you will lie to them about And that's part of growing up. I now know that the dog I barely remember (when I was almost 3 year…

Yes - but I agree with your dog story - kids can't really understand about a death. Its not a lie - its an attempt to explain at the level you were at when you were 3.

Its a different thing to go along with the social convention of tricking the younger generation, and allowing these external conventions to cleave the trust between a parent and child.

Re: Lie-to-children

#40

Post by mellutussa »

koliber wrote: post #28

I hated chemistry in high school. It did not make sense. It was hand-wavy and incomplete and lacked foundations. It got to the point where I consciously stopped doing work and learning, and began failing tests. Thankfully, my teacher noticed. She had a conversation with me, and I shared my frustration. She was direct and said something to the effect: "This won't make sense right now. There are a bunch of other things…

Lucky you. I just got iterate answers like "it's just the way it is" and "oh it's too advanced and you wouldn't understand it".

Pardon my language, but seriously fuck those teachers. If it's too advanced then at least let me come to the conclusion myself and have something to look forward too.

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