131–140 of 212 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Am I the only one that gets uncomfortable when white people are treated as an undifferentiated, malevolent mass?
Complicity is only with those willfully ignorant, I imagine. Colonialism ~is~ a malevolent mass. "Rich white persons" tend to be the force behind colonialism, but theoretically it could be anyone.
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The "optimization" characterization was invented by "aramadia". You can't assume that premise if you want to make a valid argument against the characterization of Bill Gates's method as science.
Granted, so let's put optimization out of the picture. I still claim what Gates is doing is more than unqualified "science". I suppose it is "applied science" but that seems like a weak term. My point is just there is a difference between acquiring knowledge about the world, and actively engineering change in that same world. He is doing both.
It may not be ideal but there's still a lot more value to it than just throwing up your hands and dismissing the problem as un-explainable/impossible to solve.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Am I the only one that gets uncomfortable when white people are treated as an undifferentiated, malevolent mass?
Complicity is only with those willfully ignorant, I imagine. Colonialism ~is~ a malevolent mass. "Rich white persons" tend to be the force behind colonialism, but theoretically it could be anyone.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Is year round schooling really the best way to close the literacy gap? What's the alternative in your mind? Personally, it makes complete sense to me to have year-round schooling. Especially considering the effects its been shown to have on math and reading performance. What's so bad about extra schooling? Edit: Also, perhaps it was different for you as a child, but most children are not intrinsically motivated to…
It's a great idea. Other things that help are giving books to families and encouraging parents, especially male father-figures, to read to children. That might need some adult eduction, because adult illiteracy is a bit of a problem. In the UK we have a charity called BooksTrust. Unfortunately it seems to have wider reach among middle class families (who have enough money to buy books, and who read to their children)…
Hey Bill Gates! Fix what Aron Swartz was fighting for.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Am I the only one that gets uncomfortable when white people are treated as an undifferentiated, malevolent mass?
Complicity is only with those willfully ignorant, I imagine. Colonialism ~is~ a malevolent mass. "Rich white persons" tend to be the force behind colonialism, but theoretically it could be anyone.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think it's interesting to discuss it here, the zenith of technocopian optimism and futurism. There's a host of intelligent people frequenting Hacker News, but few have any idea what sort of trouble we are in. No conscious thought at all about the value chain that's involved for them to fill up their car in the awesome Bay area with amazing people doing fantastic work to "change" the world. Why aren't you guys picki…
Many people work on these things (renewable energy, electric cars, education, you name it) and many more donate to such causes when they can't or don't want to get involved directly. We also vote for political parties that we hope may improve things. What are you doing other than posting "WE ARE DOOMED!!1" to seemingly every HN thread you come across?
I don't get the negativity in this thread. Bill Gates is trying to solve hard problems and people here are complaining. Sure, they may not be the problems that you think are most important, and I'm sure the foundation is making missteps along the way and wasting some money. But his message in this article is a good one I think: > The process I have described—setting clear goals, choosing an approach, measuring result…
>I don't get the negativity in this thread. Bill Gates is trying to solve hard problems and people here are complaining. I respect Bill Gates and think his cause is noble but they are partly childish because of the idealism and the hopes to cure disease. ilaksh's post on this thread is part of the reason why though I wanted to reply to your post instead of doing so to his. It will be far more controversial though. Da…
This isn't a particularly new idea, although recently it's been popularized with articles like this:
http://newsfeed.time.com/2013/01/11/overcrowding-nah-the-wor...
We are doing just fine limiting population growth without any difficult choices, and so is the rest of the world. Even birth rates in sub-Saharan Africa have been dropping like a stone.
Dear Bill Gates. Here's yardstick to measure residual value of your efforts: If you'd stop doing whatever you're doing, will the world continue benefit from your past efforts for ages to come? Compare "buying food for the hungry" and "teaching the man to fish" - which effort carry more residual value? You developed DOS, and then Windows. Even when you stopped - the world continued rolling with your software and build…
Invest in helping people to discover the powers within. Do not invest in making people think they need to depend on some external rich power to pull themselves out of their misery. That is misservice. This is lie. That warm, fuzzy feeling you get after spending billion on buying stuff for poor people comes with deeper unease - deep inside you know that you did not really make a lasting difference. Difference yes. Lasting - only until that billion ran out and your vaccines are used, food is eaten and very soon they will want more. This is not a difference.
Invest in helping people to learn the skills, invest in helping people to find inspiration within, invest in helping people to express their own creativity and power.
Invest in helping people to discover how each of them can help other million people without spending billion dollars.