[quote="Philip"]Of course, I strongly support reverse Darwinism...
On a more serious note, no. You need a lot more information just to survive in today's world as compared to 100 years ago. I believe life is much faster-paced now, people have to adapt faster and learn faster, while being bombarded with tons of useless or irrelevant information.
Still, you have to use the technology available to you in order to free your brain for something else, what you do with the spare cycles is up to you ]
I'm not completely sure I agree. First, I do agree that life is faster paced today. I also agree you need to know more.
That said, In some ways I think we ARE dumbing down as a society. Not so much with Brents example, but by our expectations of our children (which seem to be headed lower and lower) and the education we give them. I mean, consider the example of someone like Thomas Jefferson. Besides being a politician, he was also an
"agriculturalist,
horticulturist,
architect,
etymologist,
archaeologist,
mathematician,
cryptographer,
surveyor,
paleontologist,
author,
lawyer,
inventor,
violinist, and the
founder of the
University of Virginia" -Wikipedia
Granted he was unusual, but the point is still the same. There were more given expectations of individuals at that time, and people rise to expectations if given the chance. A simple thing like writing a letter was an art form, even for the non-wealthy. Here's an example I found in about five minutes from the Civil War.
Before Vicksburg June 28/63
My Dear Sister,
"Under any other circumstances than those under which I am situated I would consider myself bound to offer some excuses for the delay in answering your letter of the 8th, but as it is I will have to depend on your own good sense to exonerate me from blame. When you consider that we are fighting every day and very often the greater part of the night, and when not in action employing our time in preparing for it by mending the embrasures, making plank floor to traverse the trail on, carrying ammunition from the magazine up to the high hill on which we are in position, and doing so much work that we have no time to go to our meals sometimes, you will see that I have not much opportunity for recreation: if letter writing can be called recreation." -Thomas D. Christie
Today, you just try finding a twenty-one year old capable of writing with such grace and descriptive powers. Heck I know I can't, and I'm nearly twice that age. I think we have lost sight of the classical education needs of our children, and spend too much time on fads and social experimentation with them. We give them marvelous tools, such as PDAs and laptops and computers in every classroom... but where is the foundation of education to use it for more than instant messenging or playing a game?
By comparison, I look at the children in other countries where education is both a privilege earned and at least somewhat classical in nature, and I realize I can have more of a conversation on systems of governance with an Indian programmer in a coffee shop the middle east than I can with damn near any American I know. I wish it were otherwise. I think we are becoming a nation with our heads buried in LOLerskating IMs.
Regards,
-Bouncer-
I use to know peoples phone numbers, you HAD to memorize them! We were constantly having to deal with numbers and such. Now we just look at a cute little picture or text name and know who is calling.
