What are some signs of the dumbing down of America that you see from your youth until now?
One of mine is news articles. They used to be full length news articles. Now they are half tweets half news. Do I need to know what ever every sports star, celebrity or bystander thinks about a news event?
Hate to see what this does to our future. Maybe people will start remembering news events by what Jay z thought about them instead of the impact of the world at large.
I shit you not- people actually do this.
pjcas, your reply is dumb, and it shows how incapable we Americans are of rational disagreement. In rational disagreement, the disagreement itself is a source of illumination, making definite the contours of contentious issues, ideas, and the dialectical resources available to the major positions which address them. In the internet age, we just label the opposition evil, enjoy the synaptic thrill of outrage, and continue on the path our cultural conditioning has laid out for us.
In short, you are an immoral asshole.
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Thomas, that you've just posted is one of the most insanely idiotic things I have ever read. At no point in your rambling, incoherent post were you even close to anything that could be considered a rational thought. Everyone in this forum is now dumber for having read it. I award you no points, and may God have mercy on your soul.
pjcas, your reply is dumb, and it shows how incapable we Americans are of rational disagreement. In rational disagreement, the disagreement itself is a source of illumination, making definite the contours of contentious issues, ideas, and the dialectical resources available to the major positions which address them. In the internet age, we just label the opposition evil, enjoy the synaptic thrill of outrage, and continue on the path our cultural conditioning has laid out for us.
In short, you are an immoral asshole.
lighten up francis, I was adding some levity to a deeper question that a Giants football message board should have to deal with; that is a quote from the movie Billy Madison.
or don't lighten up, I don't care.
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In comment 12289741 pjcas18 said:
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Thomas, that you've just posted is one of the most insanely idiotic things I have ever read. At no point in your rambling, incoherent post were you even close to anything that could be considered a rational thought. Everyone in this forum is now dumber for having read it. I award you no points, and may God have mercy on your soul.
pjcas, your reply is dumb, and it shows how incapable we Americans are of rational disagreement. In rational disagreement, the disagreement itself is a source of illumination, making definite the contours of contentious issues, ideas, and the dialectical resources available to the major positions which address them. In the internet age, we just label the opposition evil, enjoy the synaptic thrill of outrage, and continue on the path our cultural conditioning has laid out for us.
In short, you are an immoral asshole.
lighten up francis, I was adding some levity to a deeper question that a Giants football message board should have to deal with; that is a quote from the movie Billy Madison.
or don't lighten up, I don't care.
I was joking too; tried to flag it by doing the very thing I bemoaned at the end of the post.
Thanks FMiC!
I shit you not- people actually do this.
I don't remember whether it was Gandhi, Nehru, or some other prominent Indian leader who drank his own urine daily. Perhaps someone with a better memory than I can enlighten us.
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Thomas, that you've just posted is one of the most insanely idiotic things I have ever read. At no point in your rambling, incoherent post were you even close to anything that could be considered a rational thought. Everyone in this forum is now dumber for having read it. I award you no points, and may God have mercy on your soul.
pjcas, your reply is dumb, and it shows how incapable we Americans are of rational disagreement. In rational disagreement, the disagreement itself is a source of illumination, making definite the contours of contentious issues, ideas, and the dialectical resources available to the major positions which address them. In the internet age, we just label the opposition evil, enjoy the synaptic thrill of outrage, and continue on the path our cultural conditioning has laid out for us.
In short, you are an immoral asshole.
LOL. Right over your head!
The decrease in US born kids majoring in technical, engineering, science majors in college.
The acceptance of bad grammar and language.
LOL, at least I wasn't alone in dumbing down this thread.
Leave those signs up...I've overheard people asking if "there is any dairy in the cream of mushroom soup?"
Yeah Moon... it's pretty obvious you were joking too.
pj's a dweeb.
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Thomas, that you've just posted is one of the most insanely idiotic things I have ever read. At no point in your rambling, incoherent post were you even close to anything that could be considered a rational thought. Everyone in this forum is now dumber for having read it. I award you no points, and may God have mercy on your soul.
pjcas, your reply is dumb, and it shows how incapable we Americans are of rational disagreement. In rational disagreement, the disagreement itself is a source of illumination, making definite the contours of contentious issues, ideas, and the dialectical resources available to the major positions which address them. In the internet age, we just label the opposition evil, enjoy the synaptic thrill of outrage, and continue on the path our cultural conditioning has laid out for us.
In short, you are an immoral asshole.
You do know that is a movie line from Billy Madison and it was clearly a joke.
But I think it goes much deeper than that. Look at the overall picture of education in general over the past 80+ years. The purpose of education should be to stimulate and develop individual rational thinking, today this has been replaced with a collectived standard teaching method; where to succeed in school as a student critical thinking is actually discouraged.
This was probably why i became so apathetic with education at a young age and never really applied myself, until later on in life when I went back to college. Then there you realize just how dumb the majority of highschool graduates really are, and even college standards are held very low to satisfy this sad reality. I read an article lately (while I'm alway's skeptical of empirical data and studies) that said the majority of college freshmen today are reading at a 7th Grade level! Which wouldn't surprise me. So, there you have it.
Change is a tricky demon. It's much easier to find the bad in it, much harder than the good, and even harder to realize when not much has changed at all.
Yes there was a time when news articles didn't have live twitter content embedded.
There was also a time when news articles had pull quotes slapped directly in the middle of the article because editors knew no one read anything past the front page.
There was a time when journalists developed inverted pyramid writing with all the important stuff up top because no one read more than two paragraphs.
There was also a time the primary reason people bought the paper was a cartoon about a cat who eats a lasagna.
A right wing thinker can listen to talk radio, read certain blogs, and watch fox news, and consume all of one view point. The same can be said for left wingers.
I'm not sure how to define "smart", but I would agree with the idea that knowing a lot of stuff but lacking critical thinking skills is less valuable than having critical thinking stills and knowing less "stuff".
Yes, a tool of that state. What I find funny is this. Was flipping through stations on a long business trip drive, and tuned into that conservative talk guy, Rush. He had this montage of "talking point" propaganda in which each of these MSM entities were literally reading off the same talking point. The question you need to ask, is who gave them that talking point, who framed it that way, and why? Rush to judgement is another problem with some of these riots et al.
The political parties (and here I'll share my bias) particularly the Republican Party, imo, have also gotten very good at the "big lie" (Obama's a Muslim, he's not an American, etc.) and whole swaths of the public lap that up. So morality has gone out the window in politics, if it ever existed before (and to SOME extent I think it did back in the day).
Further, there's tons of market research done nowadays on how the average person will respond to different items, and that research helps to guide what is put out by the political parties. Even politicians were a bit more uninformed back in the day.
In addition, short attention spans (and not just in youth) have led people to believe sound bites without doing any research of their own on those subjects (and so-called reference materials are made available for the few who would do so...that of course reinforce the sound bite, whether these are honest or merely propaganda).
Just some thoughts on the topic, and I do believe we are a dumbed down nation, and the risks to all of us are great.
Among my concerns is how "being ignorant about a subject" (e.g. "I was told there would be no math involved ... ha, ha ...") is somehow considered a badge of honor among many.
The amount of "bandwidth" given to celebrities and celebrity athletes and the "value" given to their opinions really concerns me.
One thing that is interesting about the Internet and e-mail in general and Twitter (which I don't directly participate in, but of course I've seen tweets that have been copied) in particular is being able to see how ignorant many "celebrities" are based on their poor grammar, diction and lack of general knowledge.
I look at the "giants" (no pun intended) in my industry (Aerospace) who are in their late 60s, 70s and some in their 80s (i.e. those involve in putting Americans on the Moon) and are still working and I'm amazed at the depth and breadth of their knowledge versus someone of my generation (in my 50s). So I think the trend started even earlier.
It seems to me that too much time in schools is being dedicated to "soft stuff" and not enough to traditional, basic knowledge and skills.
Will the future doctor who is now in his/her late teens that will be treating me in 10 years be sufficiently skilled and knowledgeable? Those designing the airplane I'll fly in? The drug I'll be prescribed?
Scary times ahead IMHO.
Bad-faith mongering isn't critical thinking and doesn't help anything.
But about information, I think that ultimately you need both critical thinking and good information, but imho information without the ability to interpret and apply it doesn't help much. Lies, damn lies, and statistics . . .
Me do.
Thinking.
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Interesting,what does make you smarter?
Thinking.
Lemme amend that. Information makes you more educated. Thinking critically about the material makes you smarter.
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If you can convince people that drinking their own piss is a good idea, you can convince them of anything.
I shit you not- people actually do this.
I don't remember whether it was Gandhi, Nehru, or some other prominent Indian leader who drank his own urine daily. Perhaps someone with a better memory than I can enlighten us.
Gandhi supposedly did. It's nothing new.
But, you know, these kids, my lawn, blah blah blah.
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Interesting,what does make you smarter?
Thinking.
That Gingko Bulaga stuff.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA...aw-sum!
Kids seem dumber today because with the internet and their cell phones, they all have the ability to broadcast themselves and go viral and get famous for doing stupid, immature, uncivil, horrible, and undeserved things.
But here's one way that kid's today are smarter.
Figure 1: 30 Day Prevalence of Daily Use of Cigarettes, by Grade, 1976-2014
And yes, many likeminded kids are engineering ways for Twitter feeds to be consumed in content-managed platforms with less latency, cluttering up your news articles. And then using that same type of API interface technology to seamlessly integrate Google Maps data into your smart phone so you can figure out where the hell you are in midtown Manhattan or the countryside outside Islamabad as equally well.
The integrating that technology into GPS systems so the ambulance en route to your house can target the the quickest route based on crowd sourced information.
I can't believe these fucking kids. How could anyone ever possibly be consumed with the musings of entertainers and also do something productive. Almost as bad as someone reading a sports message board when they are at work when they could be reading Voltaire, or I don't know working.
Quite frankly, this often reeks of 50 year old males lamenting shit because it's different than their preferences, and they are trying to wash away their own failures by blaming newer generations for the ills that they have inherited and not caused.
Western society has always had low brow entertainment, knowledge gaps between the rich and poor, leaders who exploit the less fortunate.
And yet life expectancy continues to rise, quality of life by many many measures even for the very poor has never been higher.
IMO opinion it's classic friction with change. People love to point out anecdotes like kids can't find Vermont on a map, when there is a device in their pocket that can pinpoint a Pizza Hut in Vermont if they need it.
I can't change a wagon wheel, add the correct portion of lye to water and not burn my skin off when doing laundry, or navigate the Organ trail.
I guess for me the measure is how to live the most healthy, enjoyable free life. Which I don't see in great decline in our society.
When average Americans are compared against average European and "Western leaning" Asian countries, the US does very poorly in math and science.
I think the average American has almost no idea how the technology they are increasingly dependent on works.
Very different than whether we are a dumbed down country because news sites have tweets in news articles.
The way we consume, memorize and store knowledge and what types of knowledge we crave is not a great measure of our collective intelligence.
If were crushing STEM scores top-to-bottom there would be more technology, more tweets, more video in many more, faster, cooler devices.
Efficiency is a symptom of society's success.
These arguments by and large come down to; I don't like the direction things have changed, so therefore the people that have changed them are dumb.
I'd have to say one of the things that has me SMH is popular music. The musical talent isn't there anymore.
Rarely will young folks ever hear people who are experts at their instruments of choice.
It's all mass-media stuff. Here today, gone tomorrow. Hopefully it turns around soon. It can be classical, rock, jazz or something brand new. Just lets heard some master songwriters and musicians. Please.
A right wing thinker can listen to talk radio, read certain blogs, and watch fox news, and consume all of one view point. The same can be said for left wingers.
IMO, that having all those news outlets is a good thing. Thinking folks can and should listen to right & left viewpoints and draw their own conclusions. I believe by doing that, you may get a more accurate picture of what really happened with that event.
To just plug into one view that you like is done by many and you can tell by speaking with them they are ill-informed and are totally clueless that that's the case.
I'd have to say one of the things that has me SMH is popular music. The musical talent isn't there anymore.
Rarely will young folks ever hear people who are experts at their instruments of choice.
It's all mass-media stuff. Here today, gone tomorrow. Hopefully it turns around soon. It can be classical, rock, jazz or something brand new. Just lets heard some master songwriters and musicians. Please.
When was this different?
Hendrix had to open for the Monkees. ABBA dominated record sales for a decade or two.
raise your kids . The separation of class is getting to
be two haves and have nots . The Immigration of
downstate city people have created a drug infested
downtrodden Area . Morale values are gone the
poor no matter what race pump out babies and generations
of welfare families and most do not marry . Single moms
no Dad to be found its really gone downhill .
The Good Paying jobs are no longer .
Zing!
Western society has always had low brow entertainment, knowledge gaps between the rich and poor, leaders who exploit the less fortunate.
What everyone seems to be leaving out in this generational comparison is the insistent, far-reaching effect of the media.
Yes, "low brow" entertainment, for example, was always around, but in today's media culture, it's spread far and wide and faster than ever that in past generations. And what this does, IMO, is spread quickly things like "low brow" entertainment and because of its ubiquity, it becomes perceived to be the accepted standard. I think a case can be made for other aspects of the culture and this media blanketing of everything takes hold and it's usually dumber, cruder and coarser than ever before.
And yet life expectancy continues to rise, quality of life by many many measures even for the very poor has never been higher.
IMO opinion it's classic friction with change. People love to point out anecdotes like kids can't find Vermont on a map, when there is a device in their pocket that can pinpoint a Pizza Hut in Vermont if they need it.
I can't change a wagon wheel, add the correct portion of lye to water and not burn my skin off when doing laundry, or navigate the Organ trail.
I guess for me the measure is how to live the most healthy, enjoyable free life. Which I don't see in great decline in our society. [/quote]
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yatbq - I hear that a lot too, but I struggle to understand what measure shows we're significantly worse off.
Western society has always had low brow entertainment, knowledge gaps between the rich and poor, leaders who exploit the less fortunate.
What everyone seems to be leaving out in this generational comparison is the insistent, far-reaching effect of the media.
Yes, "low brow" entertainment, for example, was always around, but in today's media culture, it's spread far and wide and faster than ever that in past generations. And what this does, IMO, is spread quickly things like "low brow" entertainment and because of its ubiquity, it becomes perceived to be the accepted standard. I think a case can be made for other aspects of the culture and this media blanketing of everything takes hold and it's usually dumber, cruder and coarser than ever before.
And yet life expectancy continues to rise, quality of life by many many measures even for the very poor has never been higher.
IMO opinion it's classic friction with change. People love to point out anecdotes like kids can't find Vermont on a map, when there is a device in their pocket that can pinpoint a Pizza Hut in Vermont if they need it.
I can't change a wagon wheel, add the correct portion of lye to water and not burn my skin off when doing laundry, or navigate the Organ trail.
I guess for me the measure is how to live the most healthy, enjoyable free life. Which I don't see in great decline in our society.
MM, I'm more concerned with the effects of new tech on attention spans and the ability to tolerate non-stimulation of the senses for extended periods of time. Effective goal directed activity requires focus and the ability to tolerate a lack of pleasurable stimulation.
People think unplugging for a day is somehow meditation. It' just how everybody used to live.
How far we've come.
A right wing thinker can listen to talk radio, read certain blogs, and watch fox news, and consume all of one view point. The same can be said for left wingers.
This is an excellent and often overlooked point. People of all stripes, political, religious, conspiratorial, whatever, now have a place to go where the community is exactly like them, that supports each other and brooks no contradictory ideas.
The other side (and many of them were Harvard Educators who came in monthly to critique what we had already done) claimed that kids wouldn't stay tuned to an idea for longer than ... and they gave a general number from ten seconds to two minutes.
We writers and producers weren't held to that (there were natural exceptions, like songs, which sustain attention better than language) but if a sketch went over a certain amount of pages, we were encouraged by the in-house educators and "guardians" of the Harvard creed, to trim.
There was a TV movie back in 1991 starring Jessica Tandy. Some of it is sappy melodrama, but it centers around her wanting to do something for the community in her retirement. She stumbles upon Public Access tv and pays them $50 bucks a week to do a show in which she sits in a rocking chair and just reads a story. That's it. No visuals, no production values, just her reading beautifully a story each week. And kids loved it. Tell kids a good story, even four and five year olds, and they will shut up and listen and be using their imaginations as well.
A lot of forces at work on everyone these days. Just don't know what to make of it or how best to deal with it.
Agreed. 80HD is an epidemic.
The other side (and many of them were Harvard Educators who came in monthly to critique what we had already done) claimed that kids wouldn't stay tuned to an idea for longer than ... and they gave a general number from ten seconds to two minutes.
We writers and producers weren't held to that (there were natural exceptions, like songs, which sustain attention better than language) but if a sketch went over a certain amount of pages, we were encouraged by the in-house educators and "guardians" of the Harvard creed, to trim.
There was a TV movie back in 1991 starring Jessica Tandy. Some of it is sappy melodrama, but it centers around her wanting to do something for the community in her retirement. She stumbles upon Public Access tv and pays them $50 bucks a week to do a show in which she sits in a rocking chair and just reads a story. That's it. No visuals, no production values, just her reading beautifully a story each week. And kids loved it. Tell kids a good story, even four and five year olds, and they will shut up and listen and be using their imaginations as well.
A lot of forces at work on everyone these days. Just don't know what to make of it or how best to deal with it.
Glad I read the whole thread before responding because I was just about bring up this exact subject. Thank you for confirming my belief about CTW's influence on short attention spans.
I find that many of you agree with my opinions except I am
way behind and inferior when it comes to today's electronic devises.
I think the biggest indication is the lack of capitalization and punctuation used today...
I find that many of you agree with my opinions except I am
way behind and inferior when it comes to today's electronic devises.
Bless, you Chops. You've seen a hell of a near-century. Stay strong!
In New Jersey, where I live, there were 6 names on the Presidential ballot. Despite that, nearly 99% of the votes in NJ went to the Democratic and Republican candidates. The story was similar in other states. Why did this happen? Because these two parties fundraised over a billion dollars each. And how did they spend that money?
And the mouthbreathing public (the part of it that votes, anyway) followed the money with their votes like they were buying a fucking Quarter Pounder with cheese. Shameful.
Link - ( New Window )
I find that many of you agree with my opinions except I am
way behind and inferior when it comes to today's electronic devises.
Stay strong, man. You got at least one Giants Super Bowl win to live through.
This is a change from when?
I'm clicking thru some results--1812, 1880, etc--not seeing the difference. Don't check out 1936, it'll depress you.