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L33t Links: Too Many Shoes Edition
May. 5th, 2011 12:08 pmAnime: Japanator's top 50 for the decade. An interesting selection. I've watched all of 22 of those and touched on 6 more.
Clothes: Ties! Also, the other kind of ties! umbrellas! Blue shoes! Double monks!
It occurs to me that I've gone from two pairs of shoes (running shoes, black oxford dress shoes; three if you include beach sandals) to seven (running shoes (which I still wear at least 95% of the time), black oxford dress shoes, cheap old wingtips, moar better wingtips, thrifted fringe loafer, cheap blue canvas sneakers (CVOs), casual slip-ons (I like the idea of using those as beach shoes much, much more than sandals, which I hate)). Basically, if I ever win the lottery I'm in danger of becoming this guy. (Not really. I hope.)
Education: Here's a method of learning phonetic alphabets (like Japanese kana): transliterate random things.
An interview with the Olin College president. I find the answers both interesting and disappointingly moderate.
A Wellesley student discusses Wellesley's admissions office's discrimination against transgendered students. Yet another "the writing is on the wall for Wellesley as women-only" story, there were several others during my Olin days. A good example of how overt, allegedly acceptable discrimination leads to covert, obviously shady discrimination.
An MIT researcher turns his house into a (self-directed) panopticon, with interesting results. I discussed this at length on my other blog.
A discussion of the World Peace Game, an educational game of global politics played by fourth graders.
Random Interesting: Broken lottery scratch-off games and their relation to security, math, and crime.'
Overthinking It analyzes Rebecca Black's "Friday", which must be the most successful vanity video of all time.
Playing video games while blind.
A bit of randomly interesting math: What is the highest value of n for which the decimal representation of 2^n has no 0s?
An article on a handbook for overthrowing dictators, which has evidently been quite influential this year.
An article on the psychology of (media) overabundance.
Better libertarian rhetoric with regard to "anti-privilege" liberals. Good stuff.
Dinosaur Comic's take on polyamory. Read the extra title text. I love that brand of subtle snark.
Clothes: Ties! Also, the other kind of ties! umbrellas! Blue shoes! Double monks!
It occurs to me that I've gone from two pairs of shoes (running shoes, black oxford dress shoes; three if you include beach sandals) to seven (running shoes (which I still wear at least 95% of the time), black oxford dress shoes, cheap old wingtips, moar better wingtips, thrifted fringe loafer, cheap blue canvas sneakers (CVOs), casual slip-ons (I like the idea of using those as beach shoes much, much more than sandals, which I hate)). Basically, if I ever win the lottery I'm in danger of becoming this guy. (Not really. I hope.)
Education: Here's a method of learning phonetic alphabets (like Japanese kana): transliterate random things.
An interview with the Olin College president. I find the answers both interesting and disappointingly moderate.
A Wellesley student discusses Wellesley's admissions office's discrimination against transgendered students. Yet another "the writing is on the wall for Wellesley as women-only" story, there were several others during my Olin days. A good example of how overt, allegedly acceptable discrimination leads to covert, obviously shady discrimination.
An MIT researcher turns his house into a (self-directed) panopticon, with interesting results. I discussed this at length on my other blog.
A discussion of the World Peace Game, an educational game of global politics played by fourth graders.
Random Interesting: Broken lottery scratch-off games and their relation to security, math, and crime.'
Overthinking It analyzes Rebecca Black's "Friday", which must be the most successful vanity video of all time.
Playing video games while blind.
A bit of randomly interesting math: What is the highest value of n for which the decimal representation of 2^n has no 0s?
An article on a handbook for overthrowing dictators, which has evidently been quite influential this year.
An article on the psychology of (media) overabundance.
Better libertarian rhetoric with regard to "anti-privilege" liberals. Good stuff.
Dinosaur Comic's take on polyamory. Read the extra title text. I love that brand of subtle snark.
L33t Links: Another Belated Edition
Jan. 7th, 2011 06:36 pmEducation: An essay on why going to any non-top-tier law school is a one-way ticket to penury. Ditto (most of the time) for getting a PhD. An article on the overuse of homework in elementary school.
Music: A love note sent indirectly, a twist on the multitrack music video, an OverthinkingIt essay on the song Like a G6.
The Internets Attack: An article on memetic epidemiology in the Cooks Source plagiarism scandal (more background on that), and a hypothetical story of a flash mob gone wrong.
Clowns Attack: Clowns versus clowns, an anarchist army of rebel clowns.
Politics: Why the health care bill won't be repealed (basically all of it is popular), an article on the downside of diversity, an article on the reaction to deadly airline terrorism before 9/11, an article on pilot unions and airlines.
Food: Making porchetta, omelets inside the egg.
Clothes: A post from the author of Dresden Codak on costume and character, a talk about fashion and free culture, more than you ever wanted to know about men's dress shoes.
Other Interesting: Augmented reality for the colorblind, The World's Greatest Drunk, a psychological history of David Foster Wallace, translating early modern philosophy texts from English to English, a video asking "what do sex workers want their significant others to know?" (produced by Scarlet Alliance, a sex workers' rights organization in Australia).
Finally: Denki Groove's latest video, Fake It!
Music: A love note sent indirectly, a twist on the multitrack music video, an OverthinkingIt essay on the song Like a G6.
The Internets Attack: An article on memetic epidemiology in the Cooks Source plagiarism scandal (more background on that), and a hypothetical story of a flash mob gone wrong.
Clowns Attack: Clowns versus clowns, an anarchist army of rebel clowns.
Politics: Why the health care bill won't be repealed (basically all of it is popular), an article on the downside of diversity, an article on the reaction to deadly airline terrorism before 9/11, an article on pilot unions and airlines.
Food: Making porchetta, omelets inside the egg.
Clothes: A post from the author of Dresden Codak on costume and character, a talk about fashion and free culture, more than you ever wanted to know about men's dress shoes.
Other Interesting: Augmented reality for the colorblind, The World's Greatest Drunk, a psychological history of David Foster Wallace, translating early modern philosophy texts from English to English, a video asking "what do sex workers want their significant others to know?" (produced by Scarlet Alliance, a sex workers' rights organization in Australia).
Finally: Denki Groove's latest video, Fake It!
A Few Things Remembered
Nov. 12th, 2009 04:24 pmI've switched from Mnemosyne to Anki for my kanji flashcards. The former is a simpler program, but Anki is better. It backs up the flashcards automatically, syncs over multiple systems, and builds cards from tables of facts instead of storing them individually (that way, if you make an edit to correct a mistake, all relevant cards are updated automatically). Meant to mention that a while ago, but kept putting it off.
That aside, I've been reasonably busy. This week is an off-week in my lifting. Got in a good run on Monday, went to the SIPB talk on the law Tuesday (main argument: the law is an academic tradition with tremendously complexity and power; when talking about the law, people should show the same reluctance to just make stuff up that they have when helping their peers with math homework), had lunch at the Greater Boston Buddhist Cultural Center and wandered around with Shoshana yesterday (had the day off work for Veterans Day), and am getting back to climbing today.
That aside, I've been reasonably busy. This week is an off-week in my lifting. Got in a good run on Monday, went to the SIPB talk on the law Tuesday (main argument: the law is an academic tradition with tremendously complexity and power; when talking about the law, people should show the same reluctance to just make stuff up that they have when helping their peers with math homework), had lunch at the Greater Boston Buddhist Cultural Center and wandered around with Shoshana yesterday (had the day off work for Veterans Day), and am getting back to climbing today.
I was watching this video by Peter Schiff in which he argues that the reason for the modern rise in college tuition is government-backed loans. If only college students could only get private sector loans on somewhat worse terms, then students would be significantly more price conscious and that would force schools to lower tuitions.
There are two key errors in the above:
First, he assumes that students with government loans are the ones who are pushing the bid price up, as opposed to the students wealthy enough to not need loans. Loans allow for more equality of opportunity, but it's not at all clear that even in the total absence of loans, MIT, Harvard, and the like would be unable to fill their halls with students able to pay $40k a year out of pocket.
Second, he assumes that the change from "most jobs didn't require a college degree" is due to all those high school grads going to college on a lark, on account of the government loans. He seems to have it reversed. Rather, an increasingly competitive job market* has made college an increasingly lucrative investment. So while tuition has become much more expensive, I'd look askance at libertarians arguing that it's too expensive. Why would they find it odd that a market pushes the price of something towards its value?
(Government aid has decreased due to the recession and tuition has gone up. Would Schiff argue that this is because of the psychology of dependence caused by government intervention? If less intervention makes things worse, wait (and maybe deregulate more)! Actually, I think the article is missing something, it's not just "reduced state spending on higher education and diminished campus endowments", it's also that college is a better investment (relative to not going to college) because the job market is even worse.)
He is, of course, right that government's can drive the price up by providing unlimited amounts of funding with no control over cost. His concern about healthcare reform is also justified, since mandates without regulation will have the effect of raising costs. There are countries that have universal healthcare with low cost per capita and high quality outcomes, but they didn't achieve that by just forcing people to give money to private insurers. However, I assume he'd go with the Republican solution on that issue (back to the status quo but with more deregulation, you're over-insured anyways**).
Finally, when it comes to government driving up costs by being willing to spend unlimited amounts of money on stuff, Schiff really should focus on extracting the metaphorical beam from his party's eye.
* Arguably, our real economy has been weakening for decades. Since the financial sector was expanding, people were kept riding high on a wave of consumer credit, even as the solid economic ground eroded away.
** I've seen suggestions that insurance should be replaced by high-deductible plans and health savings accounts. However, that has significant drawbacks: The high-deductible plans are as riddled with fraud and high costs as the rest of the market; health savings accounts don't help those who are too poor to save or provide a safety net for those in exceptional emergences; and people get more preventative care, saving a ton of costs in the long run, when it's just covered by their insurance.
There are two key errors in the above:
First, he assumes that students with government loans are the ones who are pushing the bid price up, as opposed to the students wealthy enough to not need loans. Loans allow for more equality of opportunity, but it's not at all clear that even in the total absence of loans, MIT, Harvard, and the like would be unable to fill their halls with students able to pay $40k a year out of pocket.
Second, he assumes that the change from "most jobs didn't require a college degree" is due to all those high school grads going to college on a lark, on account of the government loans. He seems to have it reversed. Rather, an increasingly competitive job market* has made college an increasingly lucrative investment. So while tuition has become much more expensive, I'd look askance at libertarians arguing that it's too expensive. Why would they find it odd that a market pushes the price of something towards its value?
(Government aid has decreased due to the recession and tuition has gone up. Would Schiff argue that this is because of the psychology of dependence caused by government intervention? If less intervention makes things worse, wait (and maybe deregulate more)! Actually, I think the article is missing something, it's not just "reduced state spending on higher education and diminished campus endowments", it's also that college is a better investment (relative to not going to college) because the job market is even worse.)
He is, of course, right that government's can drive the price up by providing unlimited amounts of funding with no control over cost. His concern about healthcare reform is also justified, since mandates without regulation will have the effect of raising costs. There are countries that have universal healthcare with low cost per capita and high quality outcomes, but they didn't achieve that by just forcing people to give money to private insurers. However, I assume he'd go with the Republican solution on that issue (back to the status quo but with more deregulation, you're over-insured anyways**).
Finally, when it comes to government driving up costs by being willing to spend unlimited amounts of money on stuff, Schiff really should focus on extracting the metaphorical beam from his party's eye.
* Arguably, our real economy has been weakening for decades. Since the financial sector was expanding, people were kept riding high on a wave of consumer credit, even as the solid economic ground eroded away.
** I've seen suggestions that insurance should be replaced by high-deductible plans and health savings accounts. However, that has significant drawbacks: The high-deductible plans are as riddled with fraud and high costs as the rest of the market; health savings accounts don't help those who are too poor to save or provide a safety net for those in exceptional emergences; and people get more preventative care, saving a ton of costs in the long run, when it's just covered by their insurance.
Megatrends: DIY FTW?
Jul. 28th, 2009 09:07 pm(A few months ago, I had been doing a series of chapter by chapter posts on John Naisbitt's Megatrends. Then I got busy / distracted. But since I'm not one to leave things half-finished, I'm going to get back to that.)
The sixth trend Naisbitt cites is "Institutional Help to Self-Help". While the title seems similar to that of the previous chapter, that chapter primarily discussed shifts from federal to local government, while this chapter is focused on a wider set of organizations and the behavior of individuals. Strangely, while the last chapter focused on government more overtly, this chapter seems far more political. In the intro, Naisbitt notes that the Depression was a "trauma" which shook "our traditional faith in ourselves", motivating people to ask government to "provide food, shelter, and jobs" and eventually to "regulating the environment and much of the economy", functions which in Naisbitt's view don't fall under the government's purpose "to safeguard citizens". Pointing out that that the Great Depression shook faith in large financial institutions and big business would have also fit the theme of the chapter, but Naisbitt seems a bit eager to paint government as the villain.
Some of the predictions in the chapter seem hard to evaluate: Did the proliferation of self-help groups in the early 80s continue, and to what extent did such groups make a meaningful difference in society? Did dissatisfaction with the public schools in the 80s lead to meaningful improvements (even though widespread dissatisfaction persists today)? (And do the trends in SAT scores that Naisbitt cites mean anything?) Small business remains important and entrepreneurship remains a buzzword, but the late 90s and early 2000s seem full of economic-bubble entrepreneurs, not looking to become the next [household name here] but just looking for a big company buyout, so to what extent did that represent a "self-help" trend?
There is one area where Naisbitt seems to have gotten things wrong. Regarding healthcare, Naisbitt notes that in the early 80s, more people were getting structured exercise, more people were thinking about nutrition, smoking had dropped, the idea of holistic medicine was gaining ground, and businesses were springing up to support such endeavors. Smoking, at least, continued to decline, but as to the rest... I don't know to what extent such trends have been effective in improving health, but since Naisbitt cites "diet" and "exercise", it's worth pointing out that obesity, at least, continued to rise.
I think Naisbitt makes a mistake in citing the rise of supporting businesses in this area as a supporting trend. Business can certainly support that sort of social change, but it can also co-opt it for marketing purposes. The 90s were full of "low-fat" processed "foods", fad diets, and "just a few minutes a day" exercise machine infomercials. While there's lots of sound stuff under the umbrella of holistic medicine, that too has been drowned in a sea of commercially-motivated woo ("detox pads", homeopathic remedies, etc.).
Furthermore, given political issues that are getting lot of attention recently, it's worth mentioning that there are some healthcare related problems that self-help simply doesn't solve. Sure, preventative care may reduce the rate of serious illness, but that doesn't mean insurance becomes a poor investment (especially since reducing the proportion of people ill at any one time will make insurance cheaper). Avoiding the risk of being seriously ill and financially ruined is worth some regular expense. Insurance prevents catastrophe by sharing risk, and sharing risk is something that cannot be done individually.*
* I have more than that to say on the current debate, of course. But that will wait for a future post.
The sixth trend Naisbitt cites is "Institutional Help to Self-Help". While the title seems similar to that of the previous chapter, that chapter primarily discussed shifts from federal to local government, while this chapter is focused on a wider set of organizations and the behavior of individuals. Strangely, while the last chapter focused on government more overtly, this chapter seems far more political. In the intro, Naisbitt notes that the Depression was a "trauma" which shook "our traditional faith in ourselves", motivating people to ask government to "provide food, shelter, and jobs" and eventually to "regulating the environment and much of the economy", functions which in Naisbitt's view don't fall under the government's purpose "to safeguard citizens". Pointing out that that the Great Depression shook faith in large financial institutions and big business would have also fit the theme of the chapter, but Naisbitt seems a bit eager to paint government as the villain.
Some of the predictions in the chapter seem hard to evaluate: Did the proliferation of self-help groups in the early 80s continue, and to what extent did such groups make a meaningful difference in society? Did dissatisfaction with the public schools in the 80s lead to meaningful improvements (even though widespread dissatisfaction persists today)? (And do the trends in SAT scores that Naisbitt cites mean anything?) Small business remains important and entrepreneurship remains a buzzword, but the late 90s and early 2000s seem full of economic-bubble entrepreneurs, not looking to become the next [household name here] but just looking for a big company buyout, so to what extent did that represent a "self-help" trend?
There is one area where Naisbitt seems to have gotten things wrong. Regarding healthcare, Naisbitt notes that in the early 80s, more people were getting structured exercise, more people were thinking about nutrition, smoking had dropped, the idea of holistic medicine was gaining ground, and businesses were springing up to support such endeavors. Smoking, at least, continued to decline, but as to the rest... I don't know to what extent such trends have been effective in improving health, but since Naisbitt cites "diet" and "exercise", it's worth pointing out that obesity, at least, continued to rise.
I think Naisbitt makes a mistake in citing the rise of supporting businesses in this area as a supporting trend. Business can certainly support that sort of social change, but it can also co-opt it for marketing purposes. The 90s were full of "low-fat" processed "foods", fad diets, and "just a few minutes a day" exercise machine infomercials. While there's lots of sound stuff under the umbrella of holistic medicine, that too has been drowned in a sea of commercially-motivated woo ("detox pads", homeopathic remedies, etc.).
Furthermore, given political issues that are getting lot of attention recently, it's worth mentioning that there are some healthcare related problems that self-help simply doesn't solve. Sure, preventative care may reduce the rate of serious illness, but that doesn't mean insurance becomes a poor investment (especially since reducing the proportion of people ill at any one time will make insurance cheaper). Avoiding the risk of being seriously ill and financially ruined is worth some regular expense. Insurance prevents catastrophe by sharing risk, and sharing risk is something that cannot be done individually.*
* I have more than that to say on the current debate, of course. But that will wait for a future post.
The Death of Olin College
Jun. 19th, 2009 11:21 amOlin College, by consent of the remaining former directors of the Franklin W. Olin Foundation and a majority vote of the College Trustees, has amended the Founding Precepts of Olin College, item six, to reduce the Olin Scholarship by 50% starting for the class of 2014 (entering in Fall 2010).
I would like to say that I totally called the current crisis in my letter to President Miller back in 2004. I wish I had taken a less alarmist tone in that letter, maybe if I had, it wouldn't have been ignored. But let's be honest, it probably would have been ignored anyways.
What really saddens me isn't the abandonment of the founding precepts or the charging of tuition (although that's plenty sad, too). It's the lost opportunity to respond to the crisis with an experimental, innovative, radically creative solution. By responding with a conventional business solution, the administration has dealt a real blow to the Olin ethos, one that will likely remain even if scholarships are eventually restored.
Early Olin was a risk, and the students who signed on reflected that. Now, as the memory of that time begins to fade from the minds of the student body, Olin is in a critical time of transition. But just when leadership was most needed, the administration has wimped out.
I would like to say that I totally called the current crisis in my letter to President Miller back in 2004. I wish I had taken a less alarmist tone in that letter, maybe if I had, it wouldn't have been ignored. But let's be honest, it probably would have been ignored anyways.
What really saddens me isn't the abandonment of the founding precepts or the charging of tuition (although that's plenty sad, too). It's the lost opportunity to respond to the crisis with an experimental, innovative, radically creative solution. By responding with a conventional business solution, the administration has dealt a real blow to the Olin ethos, one that will likely remain even if scholarships are eventually restored.
Early Olin was a risk, and the students who signed on reflected that. Now, as the memory of that time begins to fade from the minds of the student body, Olin is in a critical time of transition. But just when leadership was most needed, the administration has wimped out.
More Testing
Apr. 3rd, 2009 10:40 pmCS GREs tomorrow. Did the practice test, got 780, which is not a bad score (71st percentile, max is 900, I have no idea why they score the subject tests on a different scale). I think I can do better, though, I've gotten rusty on a lot of things (judging by the practice test, I could gain a fair handful of points by brushing up on grammars and actually remembering Bayes theorem).
The only real downside is that I have to wake up really early tomorrow.
The only real downside is that I have to wake up really early tomorrow.
Give Some Olin Students Your Support
Dec. 30th, 2008 12:27 pmPlease grant some of my fellow Olin students a moment of your time:
There's an organization called IdeaBlob that gives a $10k grant to whichever new non-profit idea garners the most votes each month. There's a team of six Olin students trying to start an organization called Alight Learning, which makes free multi-media software for facilitating education. They're taking a full year working without pay to start this organization. They could really use the grant money.
Go here and vote for Alight Learning, if you like the idea, and pass the link along.
There's an organization called IdeaBlob that gives a $10k grant to whichever new non-profit idea garners the most votes each month. There's a team of six Olin students trying to start an organization called Alight Learning, which makes free multi-media software for facilitating education. They're taking a full year working without pay to start this organization. They could really use the grant money.
Go here and vote for Alight Learning, if you like the idea, and pass the link along.
Verbal 710 (lower than on the practice test, the questions were harder; bit disappointing, could have done more with vocab)
Quantitative 800 (I'm surprised, some of the questions were quite hard and I was running out of time at the end; managed to keep my cool, though)
Writing (don't have my scores, obviously, but it went pretty well)
Am now at SIPB's Debian release-critical bugs hack-a-thon for the hell of it.
Quantitative 800 (I'm surprised, some of the questions were quite hard and I was running out of time at the end; managed to keep my cool, though)
Writing (don't have my scores, obviously, but it went pretty well)
Am now at SIPB's Debian release-critical bugs hack-a-thon for the hell of it.
Feeling Rather Scattered
Dec. 12th, 2008 06:21 pmThe weather is rainy and blah, which means my concentration is shot to hell. Still got a decent amount done this week, but didn't put in as many focused hours as I would like.
The new signs are up on the ITA building, big and illuminated as of yesterday, and there is an ongoing competition to see who can photograph one from the farthest away. I wonder if the ITA office is visible from the roof of the Green Building.
Virgin Mobile was finally able to work out the problem with my phone. The human element of their customer support is quite good.
GREs tomorrow. Should review vocab a bit more, but feeling somewhat confident and somewhat more apathetic.
The new signs are up on the ITA building, big and illuminated as of yesterday, and there is an ongoing competition to see who can photograph one from the farthest away. I wonder if the ITA office is visible from the roof of the Green Building.
Virgin Mobile was finally able to work out the problem with my phone. The human element of their customer support is quite good.
GREs tomorrow. Should review vocab a bit more, but feeling somewhat confident and somewhat more apathetic.
GRE Practice
Dec. 7th, 2008 03:35 pmSince I'm taking the GRE's next week, I'm getting some practice work in. Results from my practice test:
Verbal 750 (only missed vocab questions ("laconic" / "voluble", "sybarite" (guessed correctly), "pusillanimous"); I need to brush up on standardized test vocab, which I will likely never use again)
Quantitative 790 (a few ambiguously worded questions, a few stupid mistakes (including an off-by-one error on a problem I knew was about off-by-one errors, gah); also, some of the trick questions are really funny)
Writing 4/5-ish? (went okay, but need to brush up on examples)
I looked over the scoring guides for the essays, which made me feel better about my chances of doing well. On the issue essay the "6" example is not all that great, filled with probably confabulated examples (NB: okay according to the ETS) and excess verbiage (good according to the ETS), and the "5" example is short and solid but nothing to write home about. On the argument essay, the "6" example is great but misses a major weakness of the argument in question (NB: graded based on what you get, not on what you miss). The "5" example for that is brief and clear, but nothing more than satisfactory.
Verbal 750 (only missed vocab questions ("laconic" / "voluble", "sybarite" (guessed correctly), "pusillanimous"); I need to brush up on standardized test vocab, which I will likely never use again)
Quantitative 790 (a few ambiguously worded questions, a few stupid mistakes (including an off-by-one error on a problem I knew was about off-by-one errors, gah); also, some of the trick questions are really funny)
Writing 4/5-ish? (went okay, but need to brush up on examples)
I looked over the scoring guides for the essays, which made me feel better about my chances of doing well. On the issue essay the "6" example is not all that great, filled with probably confabulated examples (NB: okay according to the ETS) and excess verbiage (good according to the ETS), and the "5" example is short and solid but nothing to write home about. On the argument essay, the "6" example is great but misses a major weakness of the argument in question (NB: graded based on what you get, not on what you miss). The "5" example for that is brief and clear, but nothing more than satisfactory.
Good Times, Good Links
Aug. 18th, 2008 11:56 pmThis weekend was great. Saturday evening went to the Sunset Catina with DJ for some excellent food and drink. Sunday I went to Tropic Thunder with film club, which was good dumb fun.
A variety of things to comment on:
A variety of things to comment on:
- I've heard some people suggest John McCain secretly wants to overturn Roe vs. Wade. That's simply not the case; it can hardly be secret when it's on his website. Not worried though, as Obama continues a solid campaign while McCain continues to kick himself in the mouth repeatedly.
![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
sabotabby presents a parable about US healthcare. Also interesting is this libertarian essay on how the government created this healthcare crisis by "solving" the last one. While I'm on a libertarian bent, here's another interesting one on fiat money and why it seems to work. Really interesting history.- Bill Nye has a new TV show. Bill Nye. The Science Guy. I'm excited.
- Two blog posts on ampersands. Seriously.
- A post on why the SAT is still useless crap that colleges should drop like a bad habit.
- United Airlines bumps a family from a flight, ruining a $10k+ vacation (to visit a dying relative, among other things), lies about it, finally gives the family a refund, but refuses to write a letter allowing the family to claim the insurance on their trip.
- An immigrant dies in US custody with undiagnosed spinal cancer, deported because papers were sent to the wrong address.
- A recipe for Avocado Lime Pie with Coconut Cream.
- A bunch of MIT students ended up in a legal controversy for revealing security vulnerabilities of the MBTA payment system. The MBTA management is showing their usual preference for security theater over real security.
- A court ruled that violating copyleft licenses is copyright infringement, not contract violation. Good decision, to be applauded. Copyleft licenses are not contracts, the are unilateral statements by the copyright holder of which copyright rights they relinquish under which conditions.
On Affirmative Action for Colleges
May. 8th, 2008 03:09 pmA conversation I had this afternoon inspired the following thoughts:
The basic argument against affirmative action for colleges is as follows:
1. If a "less qualified" minority student is accepted and a "more qualified" non-minority student is rejected, this is racial discrimination, which is wrong.
2. A student with lower test scores, worse grades, fewer extra-curricular activities, less "intelligence", etc. is "less qualified".
The weakness in this position is not the logical argument in point one. When selecting applicants for a job, one should (both morally and pragmatically) pick the most qualified candidates. If college admissions is analogous to this process, the "job" of students is learning.
Rather, I would contest the second point of the argument. A student with more room for improvement may be in a better position to learn than someone ostensibly "more qualified". Likewise, the "more qualified" student is not necessarily better at learning, they may simply be better at the games of memorization and regurgitation, manipulating teachers, and managing standardized tests. Deciding which student is in fact better qualified is difficult, so I would expect admissions departments to make mistakes. Thus, the knee-jerk accusations of "reverse racism" seem suspiciously hasty and certain.
A college must also consider interactions between students when selecting a student body. Diversity of perspectives is an advantage in many team-based tasks, and education is an exemplary case.
One could argue that education is not the job of colleges, that they are a business like any other, with profit as their sole objective. In that case, schools would certainly be wise to favor wealthy students (less need to pay aid, more family wealth to give) and to look for qualifications which predict success after graduation. Whether those students learn doesn't matter, as the college can list them as alumni and receive their tuition and donations either way. That might make the matter of who is "more qualified" as obvious as people seem to think... or closer to it, anyways.
Certainly the simplicity of this perspective must be tempting for college administrators, and even benevolent administrators want to attract donations (think how much educational good could be done with all that money). Still, I hope that colleges will not become mired in that perspective. Doing so means becoming pure reputation brokers, without that reputation being the side effect of an actual productive activity. During my college search, I asked the head of one of the departments at MIT what made the school better than its competitors, and she stated (paraphrased): "Our good name attracts the best students, those students ensure our good name." This left me with a sour taste in my mouth, as I had been hoping to hear at least something about academics.
The basic argument against affirmative action for colleges is as follows:
1. If a "less qualified" minority student is accepted and a "more qualified" non-minority student is rejected, this is racial discrimination, which is wrong.
2. A student with lower test scores, worse grades, fewer extra-curricular activities, less "intelligence", etc. is "less qualified".
The weakness in this position is not the logical argument in point one. When selecting applicants for a job, one should (both morally and pragmatically) pick the most qualified candidates. If college admissions is analogous to this process, the "job" of students is learning.
Rather, I would contest the second point of the argument. A student with more room for improvement may be in a better position to learn than someone ostensibly "more qualified". Likewise, the "more qualified" student is not necessarily better at learning, they may simply be better at the games of memorization and regurgitation, manipulating teachers, and managing standardized tests. Deciding which student is in fact better qualified is difficult, so I would expect admissions departments to make mistakes. Thus, the knee-jerk accusations of "reverse racism" seem suspiciously hasty and certain.
A college must also consider interactions between students when selecting a student body. Diversity of perspectives is an advantage in many team-based tasks, and education is an exemplary case.
One could argue that education is not the job of colleges, that they are a business like any other, with profit as their sole objective. In that case, schools would certainly be wise to favor wealthy students (less need to pay aid, more family wealth to give) and to look for qualifications which predict success after graduation. Whether those students learn doesn't matter, as the college can list them as alumni and receive their tuition and donations either way. That might make the matter of who is "more qualified" as obvious as people seem to think... or closer to it, anyways.
Certainly the simplicity of this perspective must be tempting for college administrators, and even benevolent administrators want to attract donations (think how much educational good could be done with all that money). Still, I hope that colleges will not become mired in that perspective. Doing so means becoming pure reputation brokers, without that reputation being the side effect of an actual productive activity. During my college search, I asked the head of one of the departments at MIT what made the school better than its competitors, and she stated (paraphrased): "Our good name attracts the best students, those students ensure our good name." This left me with a sour taste in my mouth, as I had been hoping to hear at least something about academics.
