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US High school students' scores fall in reading and math

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Re: US High school students' scores fall in reading and math

#551
post #530
post #529

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Teenage boys everywhere have a widespread bias against putting in the effort to get good grades. They might call it "gay" or "sissy" or "acting white" or whatever, but the root cause is usually their perception of what masculinity should look like. The men they look up to are anti-intellectual. This exists in all communities, race is not the main problem here.

That must be dealt with full spectrum crackdown on national level.

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Re: US High school students' scores fall in reading and math

#552

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is in fact not good evidence for IQ being "highly linked to genetics".

It still amazes me that people believe that intelligence has no link to genetics. Down's syndrome is not simply a social construct, Trisomy 21 is a genetic disorder from a third copy of chromosome 21, distorting gene dosages and resulting developmental pathways. Nearly all phenotypes are a mixture of genetics and environment, yet some traits have a much higher degree of heritability. For example, height has a heritab…

> The most elegant proof of IQ being linked to genetics: > > The same person taking an IQ test twice has mean correlation of 0.85 or above in their scores. Identical twins reared together: 0.86 Identical twins reared apart: 0.76 Biological parent and child: 0.42 Adoptive parent and child: 0.19 And of course, any two random people will have a correlation close to 0.

How is this proof of IQ being linked to genetics if adoptive parents can have 1/2 of the correlation that identical twins have? I think this proves that genetics only has a minor part, and upbringing/environment seems to be the most important factor.

Re: US High school students' scores fall in reading and math

#553
post #512

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not what the article is discussing (decline over time). We (all?) know white American have over average performance due to whatever reasons. The question is: Are they declining alongside the overall group. That might suggests that the reason(s) for this decline is cross-culture/ethnic/race.

> We (all?) know white American have over average performance due to whatever reasons. [citation needed]

(I'm not american) so I don't have a horse in this race.

These reports are becoming to find because measuring racial differences is considered racist, so you'd be asking for something that would not be acceptable in modern studies.

Re: US High school students' scores fall in reading and math

#554
post #529
post #522

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>"acting white" Honestly this is one of the biggest bullshit I've ever heard. Assuming that this mentality is quite widespread(not necessarily universal) among non White, then any attempt to introduce affirmative action or other equalizer practice would be futile. That kind of mentality must be purged hard from yesterday.

Teenage boys everywhere have a widespread bias against putting in the effort to get good grades. They might call it "gay" or "sissy" or "acting white" or whatever, but the root cause is usually their perception of what masculinity should look like. The men they look up to are anti-intellectual. This exists in all communities, race is not the main problem here.

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Re: US High school students' scores fall in reading and math

#555

The US is just one giant corporate playground that companies force people to move to for the regulatory climate. It isn't meant for raising a family. People will either be transplants or neo-feudal serfs working in kitchens. The whole thing will turn into the Bay Area People will get to choose between a vibes-based "equity" ideology where achievement is disregarded or the republican woodchipper of austerity. Either t…

It's fine. The required and qualified people for the upcoming jobs will be imported from the bountiful overseas.

Re: US High school students' scores fall in reading and math

#556

As someone old (60+) who was a teacher in school and thinking a lot about it: - It's mostly a cultural shift in the western world – we don't value personal responsibility any more. When I was in school in seventies, it was my responsibility to study no matter what since grade 1. It didn't matter whether I liked a teacher, topic or whatever. It's not the case any more. - Since nineties there has been a shift in educat…

Your first point is a favorite of a lot of people, but doesn’t make a lot of sense to me: how is your generation with the ostensibly correct culture producing a generation with the wrong culture?

Parents are apparently raising their children wrong en masse, so was the parents’ generation rotten too? Which raises questions about the character of the generation that raised the parents…

Re: US High school students' scores fall in reading and math

#557

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only if the US is a monoculture but we're a diverse multi-cultural society. Different cultural groups have different values and priorities.

And different individuals within those cultural groups also have different values and priorities. A good education system supports everyone equally in achieving their goals.

And when those goals are orthogonal to educational achievement, then what?

The greatest predictor of academic success is the education level of a student's parents.

Re: US High school students' scores fall in reading and math

#558
post #403

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just look at HN. Nominally an educated crowd, but talk about physics, and you immediately see terms like "ivory towers" or "return on investment", despite the fact that most on HN doesn't understand in fundamental science works.

A lot of the complaints here about physics have to do with focusing so heavily for decades on string theory (or M-theory) which hasn't produced much in the way of practical results. At some point we have to quit throwing good money after bad and redirect funding towards other lines of inquiry.

Yes, but this is cartoon shit. String theory was a major research program in theoretical physics for a few decades but theoretical physics involves quite a lot more than string theory and physics involves quite a lot more than theoretical physics and if you stacked up all the budgets you'd find that string theory is a minor footnote. And also, its been a few decades since people took it very seriously as a strong candidate for a TOE.

I really don't get it. As a total amount of any budget from any perspective, string theory has always been a blip whose cultural impact is much wider than its actual budgetary one. Like this critique about string theory is just a thing that people who are physics "enthusiasts" say and even to the extent that it is true, its really been more than a decade since it was a problem.

Re: US High school students' scores fall in reading and math

#559

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are _plenty_ of areas in physics where investment is paying off. Condensed matter physics, optics, material research and so on. We mostly question the fundamental subatomic particle physics that is not producing any returns on the investment. E.g. the galvanic effect was discovered in 1780, and there were long-distance telegraph lines by 1845 - so 65 years. The last major theoretical advance in particle physics…

There's at least one actual physicist who will provide you with appropriate counterpoint. Here they are. And you're welcome. a physicist responds: physics has done very little for like 70 years [0] [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d_o4k0eLoMI

She is speaking about physics in a very narrow sense.

Re: US High school students' scores fall in reading and math

#560

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Parent here with school-aged kids. I think this sub-thread blaming the parents is particularly depressing and not founded in reality. Here is the way I see it. The social media companies with quasi infinite resources have won. They hired the best and the brightest engineers to hack our minds and steal our attention and they have succeeded beyond expectations. As evidence look that the market capitalization of Meta, e…

My friend has kids, 8 and 10, who run around outside and play with neighborhood kids as well as read books. They are very active in their kids lives and constantly bring them to events and other social gatherings. This keeps them active physically and socially making things like screen time seem boring. The shitty parents are the ones who let meta and the like hack them to the point where their children are just foll…

If the system is such that you have to be an exceptional parent not to fuck up your kids, the system is the problem. Like I applaud your friend with kids, but I think its worth considering that their might be an issue if you need to be working very hard to give your kids a stimulating, healthy, childhood.
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