I didn't bring my son to a museum to look at screens • Hacker News Board

Re: I didn't bring my son to a museum to look at screens

#251

Post by Aeolun » Wed, Sep 10, 2025, 10:43 PM UTC

kleiba wrote: post #94

There is an incredible pressure on a lot of public facing endeavors to include digital , no matter whether it makes any sense at all or not. Take education, for instance - if it weren't such an important topic, it would be almost comical to observe how our schools are trying to jump through hoops to cram more IT into the classroom. (I wish the people responsible would take a look at Scandinavia though, where they are…

Honestly, getting a class on AI and its dangers is probably a perfectly reasonable thing to have in your elementary school right now.

Re: I didn't bring my son to a museum to look at screens

#252

Post by xeonmc » Wed, Sep 10, 2025, 10:57 PM UTC

BryantD wrote: post #154

elric wrote: post #86

I had a (now defunct) startup in this space some years ago. Maybe I can help shed some light on why things are the way they are. 1. Money. Most museums have no money. They either run on donations, on subsidies, or at the whim of wealthy patrons. They are very costly to run, especially the big ones. They are often in prime real estate areas, many require tight climate control, many also require specialised lighting to…

Good feedback. I wouldn't put "taking care" in quotes, however; my wife is a former museum worker and has graduate degrees in the field, and preservation is a key part of the role. Exhibits aren't just for the now, they're for the future. People would love to sit in the cockpit of the Bockscar bomber (little bit morbid, but true); allowing that would result in serious damage over time. This is less important for educ…

So what you’re saying is, curators should be less conservators and more exhibitionists?

Re: I didn't bring my son to a museum to look at screens

#253

Post by Aeolun » Wed, Sep 10, 2025, 11:02 PM UTC

parpfish wrote: post #4

One of my longstanding peeves is that art museums are treated as serious places for grown-ups but science museums and zoos are treated as places for kids.

Nothing about a science museum filled with kids precludes you from playing with the exhibits yourself.

Re: I didn't bring my son to a museum to look at screens

#254

Post by Aeolun » Wed, Sep 10, 2025, 11:06 PM UTC

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #71

GuB-42 wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that science museums being places for kids is a good thing. The are the ones who benefit the most. If you want science for grownups, you have conferences. Also, that it is for kids doesn't make it impossible to enjoy as an adult, especially if it is about things you are unfamiliar with. Now, if you go to a science museum and think "only a kid can enjoy that". Then the problem is not that it is a place for kid…

> science museums being places for kids is a good thing. The are the ones who benefit the most I'm not sure how you can look at the current state of scientific literacy in America and conclude this. > art museums, the problem is that they are usually just exhibitions, and to be honest, that's boring, especially if you are a kid There are historical, thematic and philosophical aspects to art that make it beautiful bey…

> There are historical, thematic and philosophical aspects to art that make it beautiful beyond the aesthetic.

Sure, but 80% of the words in that sentence are indecipherable to my 7 year old. Just like an art museum. We can absolutely go there, as long as we are prepared to hear “I’m bored” about 10 minutes in.

Personally I enjoy seeing him run around marveling and experimenting with physics a lot more.

Re: I didn't bring my son to a museum to look at screens

#255

Post by schwartzworld » Wed, Sep 10, 2025, 11:10 PM UTC

The museum of science here in Boston got a lot less interactive and a lot more screens after Covid. I get that it’s cheaper to develop new exhibits when they are all digital, but my kids aren’t even interested in it. They want to get their hands on stuff.

Re: I didn't bring my son to a museum to look at screens

#256

Post by accrual » Wed, Sep 10, 2025, 11:10 PM UTC

Al-Khwarizmi wrote: post #187

CrazyStat wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My wife and I toured our neighborhood public elementary school a couple years ago. Almost every classroom we passed the kids were staring at their chromebooks, even in the art room—digital art, I guess [1]. In the music room the kids were sitting at rows of desks with electronic keyboards and headphones while the teacher sat at the front of the class and gave them instructions through a microphone (to be heard throug…

When my kid was going to start preschool, we went to see a relatively posh private school in the neighborhood. The first thing they showed was a photo of a 3-year-old kid solving a jigsaw puzzle in a big touchscreen. A jigsaw puzzle, you know, that thing where 80% of the challenge for a kid that age is physically inserting the pieces the right way. In a touchscreen! They also boasted about not having any books until…

I wonder if there would be a market for schools or daycares offering "pre-digital" style classrooms with emphasis on books, blocks, puzzles, art, outdoor time, and policies to limit phones/screens.

On the other hand, these kids will eventually end up in a world saturated with displays and maybe even AR, so there's some argument for getting them involved with digital stuff at some point.

Re: I didn't bring my son to a museum to look at screens

#257

Post by Aeolun » Wed, Sep 10, 2025, 11:14 PM UTC

jancsika wrote: post #248

Certified wrote: post #220

Vindication! I’ve spent over a decade of my life putting physical interactives into museums. I have preached (sold) many museums on the stance that they should put unique experiences into museums that can’t happen on an iPad at home, to varying degrees of success. The museums that have listened are the ones that continue to be wildly successful to this day. They are hard to do right though. I used to compete in comba…

> A lot of those museums have knee jerk reactioned the opposite direction to touchscreen exhibits, only to see their ticket sales slowly drop. According to what you've written here something close to 100% of those touchscreen exhibits should be broken. Are they?

I think they say that because screens are really easy to make bomb proof. You just lock them in a big metal case. Even more points if you interact with them through Kinect because you can now make the layer of hardened glass in front of them a full centimeter thick.

Re: I didn't bring my son to a museum to look at screens

#258

Post by bluGill » Wed, Sep 10, 2025, 11:19 PM UTC

card_zero wrote: post #209

bluGill wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That can happen, but often the story isn't interesting (at least to me). It is the same story: someone decides the world is out to get them and they won't "sell out". I don't care, I don't agree with their world view, and in any case they are not unique. If anything they need mental help - but they are plenty of other people around who also need such help who didn't paint. Do not mistake what I said for some claim th…

I saw Da Vinci's drawings and smaller paintings and they were fun, with the investigation of flowing water and (illicit?) anatomy and various devices with wooden cogs in. Not exactly educational, but historically interesting and oddly aesthetic. Does that count? I mean, art galleries can show lots of different kinds of art. It doesn't have to be monotonous self-expression.

I have no idea how your replp fits in with my comment. I find some 'art' ugly and knowing about the artist doesn't change a thing.

I find Da Vinci the engineer makes things I find nice to look at, but he did many other paintings and I would need to see each to make a judgement on it. Knowinghis issues just makes me wish he lived with modern medicine where we might be able to treat him - and wonder what he could have done if he had modern training - many of his machines have obvious flaws that his day was not advanced enough to know about. That is me though, maybe you are different - this is a personal thing and so it is hard to call anyone wrong.

Re: I didn't bring my son to a museum to look at screens

#259

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Sep 10, 2025, 11:19 PM UTC

sethpurcell wrote: post #224

AndrewLiptak wrote: post #35

I work in a museum, so I'll add in a couple of cents. Seth isn't entirely wrong here: museums are good opportunities for hands-on activities and to see things in a real sensory way that you can't in other places. "I believe museums exist to present the real thing for the visitor to experience with their own senses" rings really true to me. That said: iPads and screens do have their place and it really depends on how…

Author here. Thank you for this comment, you make so many great points. I'd like to respond to some of them. > First up: "But these physical exhibits require maintenance, and I was dismayed to see that several are in bad repair; some of them weren’t even working anymore, some seemed worn out, or didn’t seem well-designed to begin with." > This is probably the key reason why there are so many screens in this particula…

[deleted]

Re: I didn't bring my son to a museum to look at screens

#260

Post by Aeolun » Wed, Sep 10, 2025, 11:20 PM UTC

I’m going to call out the science museum in Manchester, and the one in Osaka (Japan) as two of the best ones I’ve been to. Manchester had a whole section of old machines, and a working mainframe computer, and Osaka had a planetarium that was nearly the height of the entire building.