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Teaching Math

I don’t completely agree. My degree is in computer science and during a 37 year career i wrote exactly zero compilers or operating systems. But that wasn’t the worth of college. A good part of the worth is in teaching you - forcing you - to think.

37 years ago we could not give grade school kids tablets more powerful than the IBM 3033 mainframe that cost $3,000,000 in 1980.

37 years ago there were not 67,000 free public domain works in Project Gutenberg. PG only had 2000 works by 2001.
 
37 years ago we could not give grade school kids tablets more powerful than the IBM 3033 mainframe that cost $3,000,000 in 1980.

37 years ago there were not 67,000 free public domain works in Project Gutenberg. PG only had 2000 works by 2001.
Absolutely correct and technology puts a vast amount of knowledge at your fingertips but that’s only part of the equation. Correlating information in a coherent picture and drawing inferences from it is something machines really can’t teach you to do.
 
An 8th grade education doesn’t prepare anyone for anything. HS isn’t a whole lot better. And I’m not saying college is for everyone. It isn’t. Education IS for everyone - even if your education consists entirely of reading.
Actually there are plenty of jobs in which all one needs is basic reading/writing/arithmetic skills and a few days or weeks training in order to do. There's many people here who argue that we need many of the people who are showing up at the border to come here to work. Most of those people at best have 8th grade education, no marketable skills and don't even speak English. I do agree that HS does not provide any practical skills or knowledge unless it's a Vo-tech.
 
Correlating information in a coherent picture and drawing inferences from it is something machines really can’t teach you to do.

That is what

The Tyranny of Words by Stuart Chase

does.

Specify some books that provide a coherent picture. It is not like the nuns I had to put up with in grade school did that.

Daemon & Freedom by Daniel Suarez

Since The Tyranny of Words was published in 1938 it provides no perspective on a cybernetic society. Daemon is much more up to date.
 
That is what

The Tyranny of Words by Stuart Chase

does.

Specify some books that provide a coherent picture. It is not like the nuns I had to put up with in grade school did that.

Daemon & Freedom by Daniel Suarez

Since The Tyranny of Words was published in 1938 it provides no perspective on a cybernetic society. Daemon is much more up to date.
I might be misunderstanding you (and I haven’t read either book but I will) but my point isn’t that you take the information, analyze it yourself and come to come conclusion - not that you adopt someone else’s conclusion.
 
I might be misunderstanding you (and I haven’t read either book but I will) but my point isn’t that you take the information, analyze it yourself and come to come conclusion - not that you adopt someone else’s conclusion.

We live in a world of bullshit. The majority of books are mediocre to crap. You take your chances and make your judgement.

Another worthwhile book is:

The Screwing of the Average Man by David Hapgood
 
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