Life In 19x19

Bill Spight wrote:Bottom quintile? Really?

According to the National Center for Education Statistics (http://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=98), "the percentage of 18- to 24-year-olds enrolled in college rose from 36 percent in 2001 to 42 percent in 2011." Now factor in the economy and the slightly older people who initially skipped going to college but now wish for something more than minimum wage or military service. Come to somewhere like Gary or Detroit and show me the jobs!

State colleges in Indiana, and I assume most U.S. states, have open admissions for their state residents. The only requirement is a GED or high school diploma--a diploma that is too often worthless. At commuter campuses (e.g., Purdue University Calumet, Indiana University Northwest, Ivy Tech Gary, which are some of the campuses I have taught at since retiring from Encyclopaedia Britannica), I conservatively estimate that 75-90 percent of in-state students are required to take remedial math (arithmetic/algebra) classes and maybe 30-50 percent remedial English classes before being allowed to enroll in most courses. The rise of the predatory for-profit college (Edit: e.g., Corinthian Colleges, Inc., see http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/ans ... ege-chain/) is all about catering to the weakest students--you too can have a degree in just a few weeks, no money down, government guaranteed student loans!

The problem is lack of manufacturing jobs--automation will only continue to eliminate more unskilled and semi-skilled labor.

hyperpape wrote:The younger generations (I'm no longer sure whether I fall in their ranks or not) are much more illiterate, uncivil and uncultured than their elders. Where they shine is in not believing self-serving myths about how their generation is the best. But give them time. Eventually they'll be old and will start posting crap on the forums.

Why we can't discuss such issues without some younger person deeming it a personal attack on them is beyond me. I believe that you mean "The Greatest Generation"--coined by Tom Brokaw to describe the people who fought during World War II, fathered the baby boom, and became the "silent majority" under Nixon. I'm closer to the hippie generation--we invented make love, not war. Of course, once in power many former toker/pokers seem to have succumbed to the dark side.

hyperpape wrote:The younger generations (I'm no longer sure whether I fall in their ranks or not) are much more illiterate, uncivil and uncultured than their elders. Where they shine is in not believing self-serving myths about how their generation is the best. But give them time. Eventually they'll be old and will start posting crap on the forums.

I used to think that the criticisms of the young by the old were unfounded. After all, the ancient Romans made the same sorts of complaints. But now that I have observed how the world has gone downhill in a few short years, I am convinced that there once was a Golden Age, and things have gone downhill ever since.

Bill Spight wrote:

hyperpape wrote:The younger generations (I'm no longer sure whether I fall in their ranks or not) are much more illiterate, uncivil and uncultured than their elders. Where they shine is in not believing self-serving myths about how their generation is the best. But give them time. Eventually they'll be old and will start posting crap on the forums.

I used to think that the criticisms of the young by the old were unfounded. After all, the ancient Romans made the same sorts of complaints. But now that I have observed how the world has gone downhill in a few short years, I am convinced that there once was a Golden Age, and things have gone downhill ever since.

The only difficulty being that no two successive generations have ever been able to agree on just when the Golden Age was?

ez4u wrote:

Bill Spight wrote:

hyperpape wrote:The younger generations (I'm no longer sure whether I fall in their ranks or not) are much more illiterate, uncivil and uncultured than their elders. Where they shine is in not believing self-serving myths about how their generation is the best. But give them time. Eventually they'll be old and will start posting crap on the forums.

I used to think that the criticisms of the young by the old were unfounded. After all, the ancient Romans made the same sorts of complaints. But now that I have observed how the world has gone downhill in a few short years, I am convinced that there once was a Golden Age, and things have gone downhill ever since.

The only difficulty being that no two successive generations have ever been able to agree on just when the Golden Age was?

Hesiod (8th century BCE, Greek Golden Age): “I see no hope for the future of our people if they are dependent on the frivolous youth of today, for certainly all youth are reckless beyond words. When I was a boy, we were taught to be discrete and respectful of elders, but the present youth are exceedingly wise and impatient of restraint." Now get off my lawn!

The golden age is always two generations ago. Civilization is cyclical, spanning four generations, according to The Fourth Turning by Strauss & Howe. And so after every four generations we return to where we started, and in between we are at the opposite extreme.

DrStraw wrote:The golden age is always two generations ago. Civilization is cyclical, spanning four generations, according to The Fourth Turning by Strauss & Howe. And so after every four generations we return to where we started, and in between we are at the opposite extreme.

I vaguely recall this book. Isn't it essentially an update of the cycles hypothesized by Herodotus (5th century BCE) in The Histories?

Aidoneus wrote:

DrStraw wrote:The golden age is always two generations ago. Civilization is cyclical, spanning four generations, according to The Fourth Turning by Strauss & Howe. And so after every four generations we return to where we started, and in between we are at the opposite extreme.

I vaguely recall this book. Isn't it essentially an update of the cycles hypothesized by Herodotus (5th century BCE) in The Histories?

Well, I am not familiar with The Histories, so I don't know. But its thesis is that it takes four generations for society to die off and forget the wisdom of its forefathers and so things tend to go in four generation cycles. A person's grandfather and grandchildren are in the same phase of the cycle.

First, thank you Aidoneus, I’m glad I read the post to the end because I also wanted to post that Hesiod quote

DrStraw wrote:[..] Civilization is cyclical, spanning four generations, according to The Fourth Turning by Strauss & Howe. And so after every four generations we return to where we started, and in between we are at the opposite extreme.

and

DrStraw wrote:[..] its thesis is that it takes four generations for society to die of and forget the wisdom of its forefathers and so things tend to go in four generation cycles. A person's grandfather and grandchildren are in the same phase of the cycle.

It’s a downwards spiral, I think: same phase, one level lower.

Greetings, Tom

Many cycles seem to exist: personal, generational, societal, maybe even cosmic.

As is the generation of leaves, so to of men:
At one time the wind shakes the leaves to the ground
but then the flourishing woods
Gives birth, and the season of spring comes
into existence;
So it is with the generations of men, which
alternately come forth and pass away.
- Homer, The Illiad, Book Six

cyclops wrote:

DrStraw wrote: .... As for there ability to compose a good e-mail, let's not talk about that.

Putting us for a test, Doctor?

Well, that's obviously a typo. But I am talking about people who don't even know the difference between their, there, or even they're.

DrStraw wrote:Well, that's obviously a typo.

Obviously. As was "a slightly sophisticated grammar..." Next time use a write-it-for-you app and that sort of thing won't happen.

cyclops wrote:

DrStraw wrote: .... As for there ability to compose a good e-mail, let's not talk about that.

Putting us for a test, Doctor?

Great example of Muphry's Law.

daal wrote:

DrStraw wrote:Well, that's obviously a typo.

Obviously. As was "a slightly sophisticated grammar..." Next time use a write-it-for-you app and that sort of thing won't happen.

emoji.jpg

Whether old-fashioned or newfangled, a butchered text will cause one's grandparents and grandchildren alike to cringe as if stung by jellyfish.

{For emoji, see previous note.}

The pen is not as sharp as the computer, which deleted Mr. Whipple's files, so he squeezed a cretin so hard in his disappointment that he saw stars, while the jellyfish partied like bunnies.

Right?

I am reminded of this XKCD: (hidden for size)

Having read numerous non-fictional books, I've often wonder how many ideas have really stuck in my head and how deep the thoughts were evolving about these ideas, with respect to the time invested into reading the words conveying them.

I am quite sure that the art of book writing will not be looked back upon as our peak of information transfer. While there will be little quibbling over the amount of such transfer today, I argue that even its depth will improve, once we have wielded these new instruments.

For more good stuff about the deficit of (symbolic) language and the vanishing days of pen & paper as the interface, read Bret Victor (worrydream).