When I was a kid, none of the other kids could use a computer. I couldn't, either.
Kids can't use computers, and why it should worry you
141–150 of 433 posts
Re: Kids can't use computers, and why it should worry you
#142Kids know how to use computers, they know how to make them do what they need them to: browsing, email, some text-processing. Everything else, and I'm sorry to break it to you, it's the realm of technicians. The plumbers don't expect the average joe to know how to unblock an occluded pipe, do they? Expecting everyone to know how to configure advanced settings in a computer just because you know how to do it it's very…
Amusingly enough, in Russian there's an expression (with a certain nuance) "You have to know everything." It's simple: life is vast, complicated, and you will be fucked in every possible direction you are ignorant of. You have to know everything . Cutting off a piece of reality and saying "that's for technicians" is for schmucks.
I heard a simmilar version "Specialization is for insects".
Re: Kids can't use computers, and why it should worry you
#143Earlier quoted context omitted.
Amusingly enough, in Russian there's an expression (with a certain nuance) "You have to know everything." It's simple: life is vast, complicated, and you will be fucked in every possible direction you are ignorant of. You have to know everything . Cutting off a piece of reality and saying "that's for technicians" is for schmucks.
I heard a simmilar version "Specialization is for insects".
Heinlein. Good man.
Re: Kids can't use computers, and why it should worry you
#144Wow... "TL;DR? Why not just go watch another five second video of a kitten with it’s head in a toilet roll, or a 140 character description of a meal your friend just stuffed in their mouth. “num num”. This blog post is not for you." Snarky enough? If you start out like that I've already made the decision that you're over opinionated and probably prone to dramatic exaggeration.
TLDR is a concession to terrible human beings. They deserve the snark.
The irony is that the article was summarized in the conclusion.
"I want the people who will help shape our society in the future to understand the technology that will help shape out society in the future. If this is going to happen, then we need to reverse the trend that is seeing digital illiteracy exponentially increase. We need to act together, as parents, as teachers, as policy makers. Lets build a generation of hackers. Who’s with me?"
Re: Kids can't use computers, and why it should worry you
#145Wow... "TL;DR? Why not just go watch another five second video of a kitten with it’s head in a toilet roll, or a 140 character description of a meal your friend just stuffed in their mouth. “num num”. This blog post is not for you." Snarky enough? If you start out like that I've already made the decision that you're over opinionated and probably prone to dramatic exaggeration.
Yes. I am over opinionated and prone to dramatic exaggeration. Point taken though, and I'll remove the TL;DR.
After a little while I was able to move past the snark and start reading your post and I really like it, but the open automatically alienated every person that you are trying to reach. Everybody saying that they're glad you have it in there or that it's refreshing to see already gets your message.
By removing from the spectrum everybody that would actually benefit from reading this article it got changed into pointless a circle jerk for the tech community about how much "they" just don't get it.
It's a good article, but it's too bad that the people who need to read it will pass by it because of an opening.
Re: Kids can't use computers, and why it should worry you
#146I get the feeling that the author was judging the person he was helping far more harshly than the perceived judgement she might have passed on him. Maybe she was tired, clearly she was frustrated, but it wasn't obvious that she held the author in any disdain, though the author seemed to perceive it. What we're sure of is that the author held her in such low regard. I wonder if she picked up on that. I suspect she did…
This is how I keep myself from being angry at regular people just trying to use computers. I have a car, I just want to use my car. I don't really care all that much how it works (thought to be honest, combustion engines are pretty cool!). I'm vehicularaly inept. I can drive, but I can't diagnose and I can't troubleshoot (though I can change a wheel). In my position, It's my hope that the vehicular technicians opposite from me assist me in continuing to use my car. In response for that kindness, I'll assist them in using their computer.
Re: Kids can't use computers, and why it should worry you
#147The problem isn't that these people can't use computers. It's that they can't THINK. They do not understand what critical thinking is, or how it works. They do not know how to approach problems or explore solutions. They don't know how to do it with their computer... or their car, or their vacuuming robot, or their television, or their oven or their relationships or any thing in their life. They don't understand why…
The problem isn't that these people can't use computers. It's that they can't THINK. I find it's more specific than and not as serious as that. I got my first computer in 1982, first modem in 1985 (hence my username). I find that people who proudly state how not-technical they are actually purposely turn their brain off around computers. It's not that they can't think. They can and often do around non-technical thing…
Hmmm, it's an interesting point. I think the reason people don't even try is because they recognize that they can't tell the difference between something that might take them 15 minutes of monkeying around to fix, and something that is beyond their competency. Worse, they are not sure that they won't make things when trying to fix the problem.
I'm sure it must be similar to the feeling I get when I'm working on a new code base that I'm not familiar with, and I need to make a modification in a function so that it calls another module correctly for some new functionality. But I can't tell if that change isn't going to break something somewhere else, so making that change becomes quite scary.
In the software development world, we handle this by creating suites of automatic tests that we can run after the change to make sure that what we just did doesn't break things. We also use config managent software so that we can back out any erroneous changes. These things aren't available to nontechnical users - they can't verify that they haven't broken anything, and if they have broken something, they may not be able to put things back the way they were. This pretty much guarantees that people won't experiment with their computer.
Re: Kids can't use computers, and why it should worry you
#148The problem isn't that these people can't use computers. It's that they can't THINK. They do not understand what critical thinking is, or how it works. They do not know how to approach problems or explore solutions. They don't know how to do it with their computer... or their car, or their vacuuming robot, or their television, or their oven or their relationships or any thing in their life. They don't understand why…
The problem isn't that these people can't use computers. It's that they can't THINK. I find it's more specific than and not as serious as that. I got my first computer in 1982, first modem in 1985 (hence my username). I find that people who proudly state how not-technical they are actually purposely turn their brain off around computers. It's not that they can't think. They can and often do around non-technical thing…
Some people are vehemently proud of their limited technical experience. You can't even convince them that they should learn more so that they can solve their own problems. It's a hopeless argument to have with one of these people.
They will only change their minds if they can convince themselves that it's important. Most people remain ignorant of the value of such skills. When there's cheap access to skilled labour to fix it for them then there's almost never going to be an opportunity for them to discover this value.
Then again the same is mostly true for a lot of other technologies we largely take for granted these days. Despite not knowing much about cars we use them all the time. Same with air conditioners, televisions, radios, etc.
Re: Kids can't use computers, and why it should worry you
#149Earlier quoted context omitted.
I suppose if you want to be a cog in a machine instead of a human being, this is a reasonable position to take. Time you "waste" is time the overworked IT department doesn't have to, in a company that's not too big to function. Your knowing more is never a waste.
Another Russian expression: "You will never carry knowledge [as a burden] on your back." Can you tell I was raised by intellectuals? Heh.
This reminds me of Masha the Bear, in Misha i Masha (my own transliteration, can you tell?). That image of the old guy who lives out in the woods and can fix anything seems really Russian (also very American, actually). I want to be that guy when I grow up.
Re: Kids can't use computers, and why it should worry you
#150This is one reason I'm against the current GUI trend in Linux. By copying Apple and Microsoft blatantly, they forgot that when using the command line that they are replacing user must first understand the concept of what they are doing. Most guis i contributed to opensource have at least the console output so the user is not 100% oblivious to the concepts that are happening underneath.
I didn't downvote you, but a novice's most successful way to solve a problem using a console is "use Google to find magical incantations to type into computer", which is actually a less useful level of abstraction than navigating your way through a list of options offered by a half-decent GUI.