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Harold and George Destroy the World

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Re: Harold and George Destroy the World

#151

Post by boca_honey »

cyberge99 wrote: post #129
randallsquared wrote: post #66

The "silver dollar" change isn't -- it's the dime. The design was in the works before the current administration [1], and is only intended to be for the 250th anniversary [2]. The Dept of Defense was only created in the late 1940s. Before that the US had the Dept of War, the Dept of the Navy, and other organizations. The point of calling it "defense" was not because "everyone has the right to defense", but because th…

The current preferred name is Department of Defense. Ask anyone who isn’t incompetence aligned.

That's the official name. The preferred one by the government is Dept of War. [1]

As the original poster said:

> If you're going to call people stupid or immature for making certain decisions, maybe take a couple minutes to find out who made the decisions, and/or what the history of those and similar changes has been.

[1] https://www.whitehouse.gov/fact-sheets/2025/09/fact-sheet-pr...

Re: Harold and George Destroy the World

#152

Post by amelius »

econ wrote: post #25
alecco wrote: post #16

The effects of Idiocracy are much worse than we appreciate. I believe it's hidden in part by technology (as a cognitive crutch) and part by top skilled immigration (people previously suppressed in their undeveloped countries). And education is much, much worse almost everywhere by leaning more to memorization and catering to the lowest common denominator. Student A is bad at math and good at language, student B is th…

Education is a weird field with perhaps a few thousand years of very good unimplemented ideas. Imagine training an llm by putting it in a room with other untrained LLMs? All that knowledge is sure to rubb of!

LLMs have only a very small working memory and they don't have a memory beyond the current session.

Re: Harold and George Destroy the World

#153

Post by hmmmmmmmmmmmmmm »

jeremyjh wrote: post #124
dgsii wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah, yes, the IQ test; the universal, unbiased gauge of intellect across all cultures.

It isn't that, but it is one of the strongest predictors of success in the US military.

It loses its signal once you reach triple digits. You don't want someone with <80 but it tells you nothing about someone with 120 or 160.

Re: Harold and George Destroy the World

#154

Post by whattheheckheck »

dboreham wrote: post #112
echelon wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

College and school are super suboptimal at dispensing education. We keep smart kids co-mingled with disruptive kids and bullies. We need to do what Asian countries do - entrance exams at every level. We don't let kids excel at their interest area. Math and science, obviously, but we lack programs for entrepreneurship and leadership that might be better for kids that aren't STEM-focused. Something like a scouts-type p…

You get a free education in entrepreneurship and leadership when you're born into the upper socioeconomic groups.

What's the solution to that problem

Re: Harold and George Destroy the World

#155

Post by c0balt »

embedding-shape wrote: post #126
ACCount37 wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A big part of the problem education systems are solving is not "how do we get knowledge to children", but "how do we get masses of children to learn without coercion of the ugliest kind". Some children are innately motivated to learn. Some are motivated so strongly you could give them a smartphone and watch them learn all they need to learn in life. But those children aren't the norm - they're the freaky 1 in 1000 ou…

> Some children are innately motivated to learn I don't think I've met a single child in my life that isn't excited about learning about new stuff, but it really depends on what it is, it differs a lot! And they're all different as well, someone who's really into math might hate history, or vice-versa. But they all want to learn something , in my experience. The problem occurs when you place them all in one school, a…

> The problem occurs when you place them all in one school, and force them to learn everything, even things they don't want to learn about

A difficult part is that children aren't really in the position to know what they want to learn most of the time.

Sure, many prefer sports over math but covering a broad spectrum in pre-teen and teenager education is quite important to get them develop these preferences and themselves as a person. They are given more agency/choice (electives etc.) as they grow up.

There are also topics you need to learn that aren't fun/engaging (especially as fun/engaging is quite subjective and depends on the individual). Especially when those topics are prerequisites to other potentially fun topics (you will have to learn the fundamentals before engaging with advanced topics in most subjects)

Re: Harold and George Destroy the World

#156

Post by yoyohello13 »

raincole wrote: post #75
alecco wrote: post #16

The effects of Idiocracy are much worse than we appreciate. I believe it's hidden in part by technology (as a cognitive crutch) and part by top skilled immigration (people previously suppressed in their undeveloped countries). And education is much, much worse almost everywhere by leaning more to memorization and catering to the lowest common denominator. Student A is bad at math and good at language, student B is th…

> by top skilled immigration who are mostly from countries where education is > leaning more to memorization

The trend of discounting memorization is damaging. Memorization is an incredible tool for learning.

Re: Harold and George Destroy the World

#157

Post by basedkman »

Configure0251 wrote: post #9

No need to do a drive by on Predator Badlands like that, it's a perfectly enjoyable film in its own right. I agree with the author though, there's nothing nearly as emotionally deep or socio-politically engaging as One Battle After Another, and so it would make for poor choice as a double feature to run second in the pairing.

The movie was excellent. Killer of the killers is excellent as well. I was entertained.

Re: Harold and George Destroy the World

#158

Post by swid »

thundergolfer wrote: post #123
raincole wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> by top skilled immigration who are mostly from countries where education is > leaning more to memorization

There’s a potential irony here that a commenter lamenting the decline of education in the West is leaning on the “critical thinking over memorization” trope in contemporary Western education, when that trope has contributed to a decline in educational effectiveness. The massive success of information retrieval allowed people to trick themselves that they no longer needed to remember things , and remember them easily.…

This argument is also explored by the “Quantum Computing for the Very Curious” series that uses spaced repetition to teach an advanced topic. The series has been posted to HN more than once.

I also find it convincing.

Re: Harold and George Destroy the World

#159

Post by tom_ »

linkregister wrote: post #139
randallsquared wrote: post #66

The "silver dollar" change isn't -- it's the dime. The design was in the works before the current administration [1], and is only intended to be for the 250th anniversary [2]. The Dept of Defense was only created in the late 1940s. Before that the US had the Dept of War, the Dept of the Navy, and other organizations. The point of calling it "defense" was not because "everyone has the right to defense", but because th…

Famed spy fiction writer Tom Clancy surely knows the provenance of the name Department of War.

Better to have two names for one thing than one name for two, that's my view.

Re: Harold and George Destroy the World

#160

Post by hirvi74 »

jeremyjh wrote: post #124
dgsii wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah, yes, the IQ test; the universal, unbiased gauge of intellect across all cultures.

It isn't that, but it is one of the strongest predictors of success in the US military.

Compared to what though? Also, how is success in the military even defined? Highest rank? Most years served? Least injuries? The highest body count? Lowest double-digit APR% on 2018 Mustang with a rebuilt title?
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