Imagine what would happen if critical thinking was taught to a high standard in the first year at university / college… the following years would be characterized by endless challenges to the BS woke curriculum. Perhaps they need dumb students with child like emotions in order force the leftist dogma / agenda down their throats. The goal of global communism relies on stupid cowardly populations who are compliant. From what I witnessed here in LA during the Plandemic, they have already succeeded, at least in Southern California.
It was one of the hardest things to come to terms with - a lot of students just wanted some kind of 'recipe'. Problem variety X, apply solution Y.
If I ever set a question that was a slight variation on the ones they'd already had as examples in class, but one they should still be able to answer using the techniques taught (if they'd properly understood those techniques and why they worked), then I'd get lots of complaints.
Sometimes I'd put in deliberate errors when I was working through stuff in class - I'd get to the end and ask the students whether they were happy with the answer I'd derived for them. It was as hard as pulling hen's teeth getting them to think.
I'd then demonstrate the process of 'investigating' an answer to see if made sense (check units, apply limits, drop certain terms to see if answer still made sense etc). Some "got" what I was trying to show them - most didn't.
In the class I gave on Fourier techniques I once set a quiz question. If you've ever done any Fourier analysis you'll know that in order to do it you have to be able to integrate stuff. Anyway, in the quiz question I gave them the answer to the integral they needed to do (I wasn't testing their ability to integrate - but in whether they could apply the ideas to generate the right Fourier series). I was stunned to see over half the students wasting time by *doing* the integration again when the answer was right there in front of them.
There were so many examples of stuff like this. It was like they were afraid of using their brains. Or maybe it was a fear of being seen to be wrong and so they followed the 'safe' route?
The whole point of the 'scientific' enterprise (and it should be applicable to pretty much everything) is to argue, to interrogate, to check, to thrash it all out. And, yes, in that process you're going to say stuff that is wrong, even dumb. But that process is really what it's ALL about. It's not really about *learning* stuff - that's just a base level platform from which we launch our rockets.
I do not have your teaching experience, I was training in electrical engineering from school and then got fed up with it after 3 years and Joined the RAF. My Grandfather, Father and brother all served.
After leaving the RAF having served 3 years in the Motor vehicle section ( I hated it), I then decided I wanted to be in sales and Marketing and that lead to my business in Fulham London, ( London England for you Yanks) employing 30 people. However the point in telling you this, is that I never obtained a degree. I did however hire and fire many people with degrees. Some very bright, some very dumb. Not dumb on the surface, mostly well spoken, and apparently "well" educated, but they just lacked gumption, common sense ( seemingly not so common) and any force. They folded under pressure, they even cried on occasion. My partner (also my girlfriend) being a woman (Female Adult Human) had to deal with crying employees. Not that I was a bully, I am not, but they just had not been prepared for the real world. I found that in the business world especially with business owners that most had no education higher than an O or A level.
What is interesting though is how much I have learned post school. I have studied continuously, I study all kinds of subjects pretty much daily. There is time to study every single day. In that way by the time you reach 60 the amount you have learned is staggering compared to what you knew when you left school. I like people who learn all the time, they are usually interesting folks and of course they may be able to explain ideas and share a view point on subjects that are helpful to me. I also note that most " Conspiracy theorists are in fact very bright ( not all of course) but regardless of their IQ they do share something in common..... a developed sense of "this feels like bull shit" Regardless of their vocabulary and education, they may not be able articulate well, or be able to read a scientific paper and follow the notes and references, but they do know nonsense when it presents itself. On the other hand we have Universities in the USA packed with truly dumb people who can be programmed to regurgitate utter shite and, be proud in their ability to do so. What I do see in business, is that like your students, who do not want to put themselves in risks way, playing it safe, is in fact a problem in the majority, If it were not so, then there would be a shortage of employees. The majority want to be told what to do, they want leaders, people in authority to tell them what to do and what to think. This leads to heroes and super Villains ..... Hitler... Jesus....Thatcher....Rollo The Viking.( I know it may be an odd list) The point is People like to follow. Why they like to follow is most likely fear.
"They" (those with the collective intent to subvert the ordered society, to acquire power in the midst of created chaos) have always started their inculcation with the malleable young developing prefrontal cortex.
Entitlement. In the late 1990s I taught philosophy to degree-level students at an American liberal arts college in London. It was common - and horrified me - to have a student inform me that they 'should' have got an A grade on a paper because they'd attended all the classes. I taught in British universities at the same time and that didn't happen at all. Wouldn't have occurred to anyone to think like that. So what happened? (And is it America's fault?)
A friend of mine was an international expert in large scale survey design and analysis. He consulted to government departments, including the Australian Burea of Statistics. Back in the 1990s he was inveigled into lecturing at the Australian National University where we had both worked.
He taught for 2 years and then quit, because the department head insisted he lower his standards in order to get the required number of students to pass. His view was that he didn't want unqualified/unskilled people going into the workforce to do poor quality work. Furthermore, he didn't want those people claiming they'd passed his course, which would then damage his reputation among his clients and possibly harm his livelihood.
Sooo....the rot set in a long time ago, and is clearly gathering pace.
Hard times produce hard men. Hard men produce good times. Good times produce soft men. Soft men produce hard times. We are in the last phase of that cycle. Soft men are everywhere, and as result the hard times have started to arrive and will get harder. I suspect that in a few years time, people will have far more serious things to occupy their minds than what pronoun some purple haired idiot requires.
But as men and women are equal, does that then not mean that either men has become as soft a women, or that women are now even softer than the men?
If men and women were equals in the ways claimed and implied by feminists for over a century, shouldn't western women be harder than the men by now?
A hardness of which there's no sign.
No matter how we slice it, it doesn't look good for western feminist women. Western men have started to opt for asian and eastern women more and more because those women want a man who wants a woman, not a penis-bearing life-partner looking for a uterus-owning self-identified female.
And then there was the student who complained that it was very unfair of a professor to expect students to remember something from one class session to another. I kid you not! Classes were two days apart, Mon & Wed or Tue & Thu and the student honestly felt it unfair to be expected to be able to connect the dots and thoughts in time throughout the course.
I had a wonderful college professor who once told our seminar, “you are all lazy Americans, but Diana is the laziest of all.” Is not the greatest tragedy of our education system (she modestly suggests) that it cultivates sloth in our best and brightest? Sadly, an unwillingness to leave any child behind— noble as it may appear— is quickly perceived by the intelligent child as permission to fulfill the bare minimum requirements, because her bare minimum looks exemplary compared to the diligent efforts of the stupid. It’s worth remembering that universal schooling is a historical anomaly. And lest I sound like a horrible snob and a jerk to boot, I use the word “stupid” with loathing, for I hate a system that makes small humans feel stupid for not being widgets but don’t think the solution is grade inflation and dumbing things down. It is accepting that if we were all expected to become Olympic-level athletes, I would be “stupid.” It is only small minded bigots (the truly stupid) who think human civilization can survive and thrive if everybody travels down the conveyor belt far enough to get a phd in Gender and Sexuality Studies.
I'd describe myself as reasonably adept when it comes to some areas of physics and maths, but stupid like you wouldn't believe when it comes to lots of other things. Take me out of this weird academic 'comfort zone' and I'm about as much use as a knitted condom.
I've always had immense respect for people who can *do* stuff. They have a different kind of 'intelligence' to me - and as much as they might think what I do is some arcane mystery, I think what they are able to achieve is a kind of magic!
This comment gets to the heart of what I came to share myself. I find it incredibly disturbing to raise girls who are constantly told to “follow your dreams!” And “you can do anything!” No, you can’t. You can’t be a good mother and a career woman. Sorry. Reality check. Horrible myth leading to unhappiness. Choose what you want, I am grateful for the choice. Many don’t even have it because most economies are bent on dual earner households. Also a lot depends on your abilities and affinities. Why strive for a university degree when you might be more fulfilled and more successful as a plumber? Heaven knows we have a shortage of those. Our society is very out of balance and I am tired of the tendency to look down on pragmatic work when that is what keeps us all alive! Maybe we need to rebrand the dignity of the dust man.
When marching, the slowest sets the pace for the group; this is balanced by the tacit agreement that if the slowest doesn't do his/her best, the slowest gets left behind.
As a civilisation, we lost that balance in the 1960s and 1970s.
Thanks for the fun read! Just what I needed after regretting an email to my kid’s school today with negative feedback. Maybe it’s okay to be THAT mom sometimes. The one who wonders why you would send a pdf to a mobile phone app instead of emailing it, you know if you’d like me to actually read it.... sometimes it’s the little things that indicate quality.
Trouble is, at the very bottom of it all with these limp learners you write of, it's a matter of 'lights out, nobody home'. How can you possibly toughen that up? Nothing sticks to the wall. Maybe a better, long-run more effective idea is to teach in Africa or at the equivalent of a small state college in the US. At least more of the attendees at those places come to school having their lights on.
I don't think students have become 'dumber', as such. I just think the attitudes, motivations and drivers have changed.
Being challenged, having your cherished ideas punctured, is not comfortable for anyone. We resist it like crazy. That's entirely normal and healthy.
But the focus today seems to be about ensuring the **comfort** of the students - and that sets the expectations of the students in totally the wrong place.
I remember that during my years of teaching in higher education, I was able to keep the failing threshold at 61% in 1998, but by 2004, I had to lower it to 33%, because I would have had to fail nearly all my students. If I fail them, who is going to pay my salary? If I fail them, who is going to be sacked: the students or I?
"Bad cattitude" is a mystery to me. There is literally nothing new in "its" articles, but they are long and not particularly witty, either, yet the site is one of the most popular ones on Substack. Somebody, please, explain.
As I replied to Ray, I really like the output from EGM (and Eugyppius)
I'm not fishing for compliments here, but I think their output is in a different league to mine. I decided early on that I wasn't going to be able to reproduce their level of analyses - and so opted for a simpler approach in the main.
I wanted to try to entertain a bit, to inform a bit, to have the occasional outrageous rant, to be rude and snarky and occasionally offensive (more akin to teasing, in spirit). To have a bit of a laugh. In short, to be a Rude Old Frigger.
The other reason was simply to provide myself with some sort of release valve. Lots of the stuff associated with 'woke' and 'covid' and 'climate' makes me utterly furious. It's not healthy to be *that* angry all the time - and so I looked for a way where I could vent a bit to release some of the frustration and anger that was building up.
Your writing is sharp, witty, and entertaining. Also, you are versatile, as opposed to popular authors, who focus on the popular stuff that sells. I also cover more than those, although my "entertaining" and "academic" articles tend to be a lot less popular than the ones speculating further about the popular tunes.
Anger is not something I cherish much, either, but sometimes it can be productive. My refutation of "Do not comply" was actually quite popular:
Even Lew Rockwell is publishing him. Lew used to be good only until the deceptions in the articles became clear. The same applies to many popular "authors."
I don't mind hearing an opposing view, to the contrary. Banning because of one is always bad. But that particular debate is also not very fruitful imho. It is beyond all of us to know for sure either way.
Eu was also crude, when he banned me "for 100 years" for expressing my point of view.
Opposing views are fine and even welcome on my site (I don't pretend to be omniscient), but only as long as they are expressed respectfully and address the problems in the article. Destroying comment sections with nonsense, irrelevant ideas, misleading information, and an unpleasant tone with ad hominem attacks, however, is not welcome. I've had my experience with trolls and morons and, unless they respond to my kindly asking them to avoid those, I have to ban them. Thankfully, that hardly ever happened, but I left those comments intact in order to show other authors what such attacks look like:
I lost quite a few commenters, because the trolls were irritating other readers, and the situation became normalized only after readers understood they would never have to put up with uncalled-for verbiage, verbal violence, and sheer nonsense.
In my view he puts out articles that are of consistent high quality and interest.
But we don't all like the same movies or music.
My daughter and her hubby love Rings of Power, for example. I have no idea why - it's not very good at all. But the world would be really dull if we all liked the same stuff.
Thanks Professor Rigger. I always enjoy criticism of the “religion” which demands the opposite of its nickname. (I expect my comment to meet with your approval).
I have no explanation for how we got where we are and I see no way of progressing to the past. Instant gratification may have something to do with it.
There is good and bad in all religions that I've looked at in any detail.
Not everything about the religion which must not be named is bad. Far from it.
I can't take the claims of being some "universal truth" seriously, though - for any religion. The idea that some random bods some thousands or hundreds of years ago wrote down some stuff that is ALL true, for ALL time, is just potty.
None of the Big 3 monotheistic ones, nor any of the others, ever was or is worthy of Nathan the Wise's real ring. Let's hope one day one, more or best all will be.
Yep, somehow the concept that success in any follow on course depends on remembering things from the preceding introductory course is a foreign concept. Maybe that's a contribution to history repeating itself?
I agree about students not having become irretrievably dumber, but -- as your piece related -- trying to change 'attitudes, motivations, and drivers' at the local (teacher) scale is just cruising for a bruising. It can be done relatively simply, given the basic (the bass note and drum beat) nature of students, but eventually the **comfort** of the students, and the more important comfort (to them) of the majority of the teaching and administration staff, wins out and shuts down such local processes. We've entered something of a New Dark Ages, and it's just like pissing into the wind.
Right, this will run long, caveat lectores et lectrixes (never learned proper latin or latin proper).
What happened is we (the wider West) went as far as we could up until the 1970s when we gave up trying harder, and from then we coasted on the older generations' achievements in societal and civilisation construction until the early "naughties" when the last o the Old Guard retired.
From the generation born in the 1980s on, the majority of them has been conditioned to believe in equity and equality as meaning "all are the same, or must be made to be the same" as an objective [good], plus the rest of what we call woke. Almost all forms of competitiveness have been removed, as has all forms of struggle.
Now, we could assign blame to some nefarious plan or other (I've heard several hypotheses over the years, all equally unprovable as they are all based on the ontologival outlook of the analyst) or we could identify what apporaches are causing cumulative problems and a cascading devolution of westerners, and try to come up with sneaky methods of introducing the correct kinds of selection pressure to reverse the devolution. Not going to list such, as they will inevitably vary with nation and other context.
To paraphrase former US president Hussein: "Be the change you want to see". (And now I feel I need a 'Crying Game'-shower...)
GrumpyGit-story:
When I started my first semester at Lund university we were told by the lecturer giving the introductory speech that the first semester was intentionally designed to run us out, if possible. The reason being it is a waste ofour timeand resources to lead us on and making us think we can hack when we can't; thus better to run those who can't for whatever reason out as early as possible. They can always come back for another go later if they want to.
An example: I took english as my first subject. 75% of the first semester was english grammar. Everything about english grammar. Our course had one book, nicknamed "The Silver Bible" (Svartvik&Sager) due to its size, miniscule text, and the silver writing on the cover. And the swedish system then was thus:
If you fail to score 75%+ of all the credits one semester (so 15 out of 20) you're out and won't be allowed to move up to the second level (levels were/are labelled A, B, C, D; after D you've either graduated with a nifty title or opt for reseacher courses and doctorate degrees). And the grammar course was worth 16 out of 20. We more or less memorised that book. Also, back then the schedule was about 20-25 hours of lectures weekly with the same time required to keep up with the reading and written assignements on top - handwritten only, to make cheating harder. During the first week, we all had to write a short essay (any topic, 4-5 A4 sheets, both sides no double spacing sillyness or any such) which was archived. Later, if needed, an examiner could compare handwriting and style with that essay.
It all created an atmosphere of "shit just got real" to use US Hollywood vernacular. One thing I noted, being almost ten years older than most other students due to not going straight to uni after secondary school (age 16-20, called "gymnasium" in swedish - causes much confusion), was that a) Iand the other odd adult there had no problems adapting our ability and effort to demands which probably came from being parents and having had to work for aliving and not leeching off of Em and Pe, b) that students from Asia and the old soviet block nation out performed swedes and other westerners in anything related to rote learning - very good and the technical aspects, not much creativity - to quote a Romanian man re: first semester math at university in Sweden: "We did this when we were 16!", and c) (Rule of Three) the poorer the background or the older the student or being an easterling, the less whining was heard. Grit teeth, gird loins and get stuck in was the attitude.
Like they say out West: "Well thar's yar pro-blem!" Even a simple didactic/pedagogical principle like i+1 is now considered oppressive.
Think of it as a Bell Curve-shaped development. The left tail is the 1960s. Small, outlier and looks to have limited impact on the whole curve.
But as the people being that tail ages and establish their careers, they start moving right and start promoting more like themselves in their wake.
So in the 1970s, they are the left-of-centre thrid of the curve. In the 1980s the left half. And so on.
This is irreversible, but it also suggests (if I stick with the visual metaphor) where to attack to affect and effect change: the left tail. The very young, from birth. Gain control of children's literature/media, kindergarten curriculums, school boards et cetera is the way. Whiie home-schooling is well and good as a complement or a desperate measure to avoid brainwashing, it doesn't help create a new motion through the curve. Only participation in the struggle for supremacy does.
The reason "the left" (which is a misnomer but it's established shorthand so I'll grudgingly stick with it) won is because they didn't stop, didn't quit and always moved their goalposts: you can not beat such an opponent if you have rules, mores and codes which hampers and limits your actions.
You don't fight The Terminator using Queensberry Rules.
Imagine what would happen if critical thinking was taught to a high standard in the first year at university / college… the following years would be characterized by endless challenges to the BS woke curriculum. Perhaps they need dumb students with child like emotions in order force the leftist dogma / agenda down their throats. The goal of global communism relies on stupid cowardly populations who are compliant. From what I witnessed here in LA during the Plandemic, they have already succeeded, at least in Southern California.
It was one of the hardest things to come to terms with - a lot of students just wanted some kind of 'recipe'. Problem variety X, apply solution Y.
If I ever set a question that was a slight variation on the ones they'd already had as examples in class, but one they should still be able to answer using the techniques taught (if they'd properly understood those techniques and why they worked), then I'd get lots of complaints.
Sometimes I'd put in deliberate errors when I was working through stuff in class - I'd get to the end and ask the students whether they were happy with the answer I'd derived for them. It was as hard as pulling hen's teeth getting them to think.
I'd then demonstrate the process of 'investigating' an answer to see if made sense (check units, apply limits, drop certain terms to see if answer still made sense etc). Some "got" what I was trying to show them - most didn't.
In the class I gave on Fourier techniques I once set a quiz question. If you've ever done any Fourier analysis you'll know that in order to do it you have to be able to integrate stuff. Anyway, in the quiz question I gave them the answer to the integral they needed to do (I wasn't testing their ability to integrate - but in whether they could apply the ideas to generate the right Fourier series). I was stunned to see over half the students wasting time by *doing* the integration again when the answer was right there in front of them.
There were so many examples of stuff like this. It was like they were afraid of using their brains. Or maybe it was a fear of being seen to be wrong and so they followed the 'safe' route?
The whole point of the 'scientific' enterprise (and it should be applicable to pretty much everything) is to argue, to interrogate, to check, to thrash it all out. And, yes, in that process you're going to say stuff that is wrong, even dumb. But that process is really what it's ALL about. It's not really about *learning* stuff - that's just a base level platform from which we launch our rockets.
I do not have your teaching experience, I was training in electrical engineering from school and then got fed up with it after 3 years and Joined the RAF. My Grandfather, Father and brother all served.
After leaving the RAF having served 3 years in the Motor vehicle section ( I hated it), I then decided I wanted to be in sales and Marketing and that lead to my business in Fulham London, ( London England for you Yanks) employing 30 people. However the point in telling you this, is that I never obtained a degree. I did however hire and fire many people with degrees. Some very bright, some very dumb. Not dumb on the surface, mostly well spoken, and apparently "well" educated, but they just lacked gumption, common sense ( seemingly not so common) and any force. They folded under pressure, they even cried on occasion. My partner (also my girlfriend) being a woman (Female Adult Human) had to deal with crying employees. Not that I was a bully, I am not, but they just had not been prepared for the real world. I found that in the business world especially with business owners that most had no education higher than an O or A level.
What is interesting though is how much I have learned post school. I have studied continuously, I study all kinds of subjects pretty much daily. There is time to study every single day. In that way by the time you reach 60 the amount you have learned is staggering compared to what you knew when you left school. I like people who learn all the time, they are usually interesting folks and of course they may be able to explain ideas and share a view point on subjects that are helpful to me. I also note that most " Conspiracy theorists are in fact very bright ( not all of course) but regardless of their IQ they do share something in common..... a developed sense of "this feels like bull shit" Regardless of their vocabulary and education, they may not be able articulate well, or be able to read a scientific paper and follow the notes and references, but they do know nonsense when it presents itself. On the other hand we have Universities in the USA packed with truly dumb people who can be programmed to regurgitate utter shite and, be proud in their ability to do so. What I do see in business, is that like your students, who do not want to put themselves in risks way, playing it safe, is in fact a problem in the majority, If it were not so, then there would be a shortage of employees. The majority want to be told what to do, they want leaders, people in authority to tell them what to do and what to think. This leads to heroes and super Villains ..... Hitler... Jesus....Thatcher....Rollo The Viking.( I know it may be an odd list) The point is People like to follow. Why they like to follow is most likely fear.
"They" (those with the collective intent to subvert the ordered society, to acquire power in the midst of created chaos) have always started their inculcation with the malleable young developing prefrontal cortex.
Entitlement. In the late 1990s I taught philosophy to degree-level students at an American liberal arts college in London. It was common - and horrified me - to have a student inform me that they 'should' have got an A grade on a paper because they'd attended all the classes. I taught in British universities at the same time and that didn't happen at all. Wouldn't have occurred to anyone to think like that. So what happened? (And is it America's fault?)
No idea whose 'fault' it is - but this "participation trophy" approach isn't doing anyone any favours.
How can you blame America when Trump wasn’t even President in the 1990s?
I thought the Science had established that it's always Trump's fault?
Where was Trump when the Titanic sank, hm? Or when Rome burned.
A friend of mine was an international expert in large scale survey design and analysis. He consulted to government departments, including the Australian Burea of Statistics. Back in the 1990s he was inveigled into lecturing at the Australian National University where we had both worked.
He taught for 2 years and then quit, because the department head insisted he lower his standards in order to get the required number of students to pass. His view was that he didn't want unqualified/unskilled people going into the workforce to do poor quality work. Furthermore, he didn't want those people claiming they'd passed his course, which would then damage his reputation among his clients and possibly harm his livelihood.
Sooo....the rot set in a long time ago, and is clearly gathering pace.
Hard times produce hard men. Hard men produce good times. Good times produce soft men. Soft men produce hard times. We are in the last phase of that cycle. Soft men are everywhere, and as result the hard times have started to arrive and will get harder. I suspect that in a few years time, people will have far more serious things to occupy their minds than what pronoun some purple haired idiot requires.
But as men and women are equal, does that then not mean that either men has become as soft a women, or that women are now even softer than the men?
If men and women were equals in the ways claimed and implied by feminists for over a century, shouldn't western women be harder than the men by now?
A hardness of which there's no sign.
No matter how we slice it, it doesn't look good for western feminist women. Western men have started to opt for asian and eastern women more and more because those women want a man who wants a woman, not a penis-bearing life-partner looking for a uterus-owning self-identified female.
And then there was the student who complained that it was very unfair of a professor to expect students to remember something from one class session to another. I kid you not! Classes were two days apart, Mon & Wed or Tue & Thu and the student honestly felt it unfair to be expected to be able to connect the dots and thoughts in time throughout the course.
I had that kind of thing a lot, too.
Students had this tendency to think in terms of 'boxes'. Right, that's that course over with - put it into the box marked 'done'.
When the course I was giving **relied** on their knowledge and proficiency in one of their previous 'boxes', they'd bitterly complain.
This is X course, so why do I have to study Y course all over again?
I used to ask them whether they ran everywhere because they'd forgotten how to walk?
I had a wonderful college professor who once told our seminar, “you are all lazy Americans, but Diana is the laziest of all.” Is not the greatest tragedy of our education system (she modestly suggests) that it cultivates sloth in our best and brightest? Sadly, an unwillingness to leave any child behind— noble as it may appear— is quickly perceived by the intelligent child as permission to fulfill the bare minimum requirements, because her bare minimum looks exemplary compared to the diligent efforts of the stupid. It’s worth remembering that universal schooling is a historical anomaly. And lest I sound like a horrible snob and a jerk to boot, I use the word “stupid” with loathing, for I hate a system that makes small humans feel stupid for not being widgets but don’t think the solution is grade inflation and dumbing things down. It is accepting that if we were all expected to become Olympic-level athletes, I would be “stupid.” It is only small minded bigots (the truly stupid) who think human civilization can survive and thrive if everybody travels down the conveyor belt far enough to get a phd in Gender and Sexuality Studies.
I'd describe myself as reasonably adept when it comes to some areas of physics and maths, but stupid like you wouldn't believe when it comes to lots of other things. Take me out of this weird academic 'comfort zone' and I'm about as much use as a knitted condom.
I've always had immense respect for people who can *do* stuff. They have a different kind of 'intelligence' to me - and as much as they might think what I do is some arcane mystery, I think what they are able to achieve is a kind of magic!
This comment gets to the heart of what I came to share myself. I find it incredibly disturbing to raise girls who are constantly told to “follow your dreams!” And “you can do anything!” No, you can’t. You can’t be a good mother and a career woman. Sorry. Reality check. Horrible myth leading to unhappiness. Choose what you want, I am grateful for the choice. Many don’t even have it because most economies are bent on dual earner households. Also a lot depends on your abilities and affinities. Why strive for a university degree when you might be more fulfilled and more successful as a plumber? Heaven knows we have a shortage of those. Our society is very out of balance and I am tired of the tendency to look down on pragmatic work when that is what keeps us all alive! Maybe we need to rebrand the dignity of the dust man.
When marching, the slowest sets the pace for the group; this is balanced by the tacit agreement that if the slowest doesn't do his/her best, the slowest gets left behind.
As a civilisation, we lost that balance in the 1960s and 1970s.
Thanks for the fun read! Just what I needed after regretting an email to my kid’s school today with negative feedback. Maybe it’s okay to be THAT mom sometimes. The one who wonders why you would send a pdf to a mobile phone app instead of emailing it, you know if you’d like me to actually read it.... sometimes it’s the little things that indicate quality.
Thanks Stephenie - much appreciated
Trouble is, at the very bottom of it all with these limp learners you write of, it's a matter of 'lights out, nobody home'. How can you possibly toughen that up? Nothing sticks to the wall. Maybe a better, long-run more effective idea is to teach in Africa or at the equivalent of a small state college in the US. At least more of the attendees at those places come to school having their lights on.
I have no idea how to 'fix' any of this.
I don't think students have become 'dumber', as such. I just think the attitudes, motivations and drivers have changed.
Being challenged, having your cherished ideas punctured, is not comfortable for anyone. We resist it like crazy. That's entirely normal and healthy.
But the focus today seems to be about ensuring the **comfort** of the students - and that sets the expectations of the students in totally the wrong place.
It's the system.
I remember that during my years of teaching in higher education, I was able to keep the failing threshold at 61% in 1998, but by 2004, I had to lower it to 33%, because I would have had to fail nearly all my students. If I fail them, who is going to pay my salary? If I fail them, who is going to be sacked: the students or I?
"Bad cattitude" is a mystery to me. There is literally nothing new in "its" articles, but they are long and not particularly witty, either, yet the site is one of the most popular ones on Substack. Somebody, please, explain.
He had some good stuff in the early stages of the plandemic and 'vaccines', ditto Eugyppius.
I agree he/both have deteriorated, although EGM's latest on the biggest lie is very good again.
The same goes for Twitter though: hard to understand why some became or are so popular.
I tried to recommend Rudy's pieces to the dailysceptic round-up from time to time, but they have never gone near them. Same on Twitter.
I'll continue to try. Eventually, not just sh*t floats.
Thanks JayBee - really appreciate this
As I replied to Ray, I really like the output from EGM (and Eugyppius)
I'm not fishing for compliments here, but I think their output is in a different league to mine. I decided early on that I wasn't going to be able to reproduce their level of analyses - and so opted for a simpler approach in the main.
I wanted to try to entertain a bit, to inform a bit, to have the occasional outrageous rant, to be rude and snarky and occasionally offensive (more akin to teasing, in spirit). To have a bit of a laugh. In short, to be a Rude Old Frigger.
The other reason was simply to provide myself with some sort of release valve. Lots of the stuff associated with 'woke' and 'covid' and 'climate' makes me utterly furious. It's not healthy to be *that* angry all the time - and so I looked for a way where I could vent a bit to release some of the frustration and anger that was building up.
Your writing is sharp, witty, and entertaining. Also, you are versatile, as opposed to popular authors, who focus on the popular stuff that sells. I also cover more than those, although my "entertaining" and "academic" articles tend to be a lot less popular than the ones speculating further about the popular tunes.
Anger is not something I cherish much, either, but sometimes it can be productive. My refutation of "Do not comply" was actually quite popular:
https://rayhorvaththesource.substack.com/p/do-not-comply-no-kidding
As you know, I encourage my readers to learn from everyone:
https://rayhorvaththesource.substack.com/p/what-to-read-now-and-how
Eu personally insulted me, and he is not indispensable with all his half-truths and gaslighting. There is plenty of that elsewhere, too.
Eu is a propagandist:
https://rayhorvaththesource.substack.com/p/on-eugippius
Even Lew Rockwell is publishing him. Lew used to be good only until the deceptions in the articles became clear. The same applies to many popular "authors."
I don't mind hearing an opposing view, to the contrary. Banning because of one is always bad. But that particular debate is also not very fruitful imho. It is beyond all of us to know for sure either way.
Eu was also crude, when he banned me "for 100 years" for expressing my point of view.
Opposing views are fine and even welcome on my site (I don't pretend to be omniscient), but only as long as they are expressed respectfully and address the problems in the article. Destroying comment sections with nonsense, irrelevant ideas, misleading information, and an unpleasant tone with ad hominem attacks, however, is not welcome. I've had my experience with trolls and morons and, unless they respond to my kindly asking them to avoid those, I have to ban them. Thankfully, that hardly ever happened, but I left those comments intact in order to show other authors what such attacks look like:
https://rayhorvaththesource.substack.com/p/this-site-needs-your-help/comments
The most important parts are in the comments.
I lost quite a few commenters, because the trolls were irritating other readers, and the situation became normalized only after readers understood they would never have to put up with uncalled-for verbiage, verbal violence, and sheer nonsense.
I really like EGM
In my view he puts out articles that are of consistent high quality and interest.
But we don't all like the same movies or music.
My daughter and her hubby love Rings of Power, for example. I have no idea why - it's not very good at all. But the world would be really dull if we all liked the same stuff.
Thanks Professor Rigger. I always enjoy criticism of the “religion” which demands the opposite of its nickname. (I expect my comment to meet with your approval).
I have no explanation for how we got where we are and I see no way of progressing to the past. Instant gratification may have something to do with it.
There is good and bad in all religions that I've looked at in any detail.
Not everything about the religion which must not be named is bad. Far from it.
I can't take the claims of being some "universal truth" seriously, though - for any religion. The idea that some random bods some thousands or hundreds of years ago wrote down some stuff that is ALL true, for ALL time, is just potty.
None of the Big 3 monotheistic ones, nor any of the others, ever was or is worthy of Nathan the Wise's real ring. Let's hope one day one, more or best all will be.
yikes! That's 'edukayShun', eh? truly a MontyPython-esque world.
Agree totally - "they" need to toughen up.
The safety at all costs culture with no danger needs to go as well.
Same in Germany.
Not in India though.... httpss://www.tichyseinblick.de/kolumnen/josef-kraus-lernen-und-bildung/bildungssystem-abitur-noteninflation/
Yep, somehow the concept that success in any follow on course depends on remembering things from the preceding introductory course is a foreign concept. Maybe that's a contribution to history repeating itself?
I agree about students not having become irretrievably dumber, but -- as your piece related -- trying to change 'attitudes, motivations, and drivers' at the local (teacher) scale is just cruising for a bruising. It can be done relatively simply, given the basic (the bass note and drum beat) nature of students, but eventually the **comfort** of the students, and the more important comfort (to them) of the majority of the teaching and administration staff, wins out and shuts down such local processes. We've entered something of a New Dark Ages, and it's just like pissing into the wind.
Right, this will run long, caveat lectores et lectrixes (never learned proper latin or latin proper).
What happened is we (the wider West) went as far as we could up until the 1970s when we gave up trying harder, and from then we coasted on the older generations' achievements in societal and civilisation construction until the early "naughties" when the last o the Old Guard retired.
From the generation born in the 1980s on, the majority of them has been conditioned to believe in equity and equality as meaning "all are the same, or must be made to be the same" as an objective [good], plus the rest of what we call woke. Almost all forms of competitiveness have been removed, as has all forms of struggle.
Now, we could assign blame to some nefarious plan or other (I've heard several hypotheses over the years, all equally unprovable as they are all based on the ontologival outlook of the analyst) or we could identify what apporaches are causing cumulative problems and a cascading devolution of westerners, and try to come up with sneaky methods of introducing the correct kinds of selection pressure to reverse the devolution. Not going to list such, as they will inevitably vary with nation and other context.
To paraphrase former US president Hussein: "Be the change you want to see". (And now I feel I need a 'Crying Game'-shower...)
GrumpyGit-story:
When I started my first semester at Lund university we were told by the lecturer giving the introductory speech that the first semester was intentionally designed to run us out, if possible. The reason being it is a waste ofour timeand resources to lead us on and making us think we can hack when we can't; thus better to run those who can't for whatever reason out as early as possible. They can always come back for another go later if they want to.
An example: I took english as my first subject. 75% of the first semester was english grammar. Everything about english grammar. Our course had one book, nicknamed "The Silver Bible" (Svartvik&Sager) due to its size, miniscule text, and the silver writing on the cover. And the swedish system then was thus:
If you fail to score 75%+ of all the credits one semester (so 15 out of 20) you're out and won't be allowed to move up to the second level (levels were/are labelled A, B, C, D; after D you've either graduated with a nifty title or opt for reseacher courses and doctorate degrees). And the grammar course was worth 16 out of 20. We more or less memorised that book. Also, back then the schedule was about 20-25 hours of lectures weekly with the same time required to keep up with the reading and written assignements on top - handwritten only, to make cheating harder. During the first week, we all had to write a short essay (any topic, 4-5 A4 sheets, both sides no double spacing sillyness or any such) which was archived. Later, if needed, an examiner could compare handwriting and style with that essay.
It all created an atmosphere of "shit just got real" to use US Hollywood vernacular. One thing I noted, being almost ten years older than most other students due to not going straight to uni after secondary school (age 16-20, called "gymnasium" in swedish - causes much confusion), was that a) Iand the other odd adult there had no problems adapting our ability and effort to demands which probably came from being parents and having had to work for aliving and not leeching off of Em and Pe, b) that students from Asia and the old soviet block nation out performed swedes and other westerners in anything related to rote learning - very good and the technical aspects, not much creativity - to quote a Romanian man re: first semester math at university in Sweden: "We did this when we were 16!", and c) (Rule of Three) the poorer the background or the older the student or being an easterling, the less whining was heard. Grit teeth, gird loins and get stuck in was the attitude.
Like they say out West: "Well thar's yar pro-blem!" Even a simple didactic/pedagogical principle like i+1 is now considered oppressive.
Thanks - much appreciated.
I try my best to be a little entertaining 😆
IMNSHO, in Canada the descent into mediocrity began in the mid 1960s. But it may have begun much earlier.
Think of it as a Bell Curve-shaped development. The left tail is the 1960s. Small, outlier and looks to have limited impact on the whole curve.
But as the people being that tail ages and establish their careers, they start moving right and start promoting more like themselves in their wake.
So in the 1970s, they are the left-of-centre thrid of the curve. In the 1980s the left half. And so on.
This is irreversible, but it also suggests (if I stick with the visual metaphor) where to attack to affect and effect change: the left tail. The very young, from birth. Gain control of children's literature/media, kindergarten curriculums, school boards et cetera is the way. Whiie home-schooling is well and good as a complement or a desperate measure to avoid brainwashing, it doesn't help create a new motion through the curve. Only participation in the struggle for supremacy does.
The reason "the left" (which is a misnomer but it's established shorthand so I'll grudgingly stick with it) won is because they didn't stop, didn't quit and always moved their goalposts: you can not beat such an opponent if you have rules, mores and codes which hampers and limits your actions.
You don't fight The Terminator using Queensberry Rules.