Huh. I thought the camel/needle's eye thing was about a small narrow gate into Jerusalem. You can get a camel through it, but it needs to get down on its knees and crawl. Apparently, camels don't like to do that.
But I've never seen the gate, and don't have strong views on biblical accuracy.
Much of modern medicine depends on antibiotics. The above resources give clear and compelling evidence that overuse of antibiotics in livestock is associated with increases in drug-resistant infections in humans.
Traffic flows better if played as a collective game, where the objective is to help the others get through it along with helping yourself.
This strategy, if followed by enough people, massively reduces traffic stress. It may also reduce travel time, but honestly the difference is likely just a few minutes each way.
Yes, I've driven in cities that play by the "we are in it together, let's work together to get us all out", and cities that play by "any advantage I can get regardless of the cost to others".
Problem is, once enough people start playing the selfish game, the equilibrium breaks and everyone has to go selfish.
that's how you kill a society. Kill the social contract, the care for your fellows, one form of interaction at a time.
> I doubt that the state will be more efficient in building houses than private enterprises can if allowed to do so
Depends. If the profit is in more expensive housing, than private enterprise will bias towards that and ergo be less efficient at building lower-margin "affordable" housing.
Ideally, in a perfect frictionless economy populated by spherical cows, yes, private enterprise will more efficiently allocate across the entire spectrum of market needs -- so in principle, I'm agreeing with you.
and cross-referenced with your location at all times, all of your shopping habits, your viewing and reading habits, and every person you communicate with?
In an easily searchable database?
Sooo tempted to go Goodwin here and mention a nice use of computers from the late 1930s...
The biggest US public school horror story is how we have taken a great instrument of social progress and decimated it.
Public schools in countries where schools are treated well have phenomenal success.
US schooling has been taken over (at the level of the state legislatures; blame goes to state Congress not to the schools) by companies selling "achievement" test. And also by charter schools whose success is based on only selecting high-achieving problem-free children?
Why do teachers say they are nothing but babysitters? Maybe because they aren't allowed to teach, to inspire love of learning in the children? And their classroom budgets are so tight they buy school supplies out of their own pockets, while living on an income that is close to poverty level? While facing felony charges for having the wrong book in the shelf behind their desk???
When things like "Creme de la Creme Early Learning Center of Excellence" are real institutions instead of something from a comic dystopia, you know you have a problem.
If you look at actual numbers, spending on education in the US is dwarfed by other spending (such as defense) to an extent that it's inconsistent with our stated values.
I believe you are correct that public schools are instruments of social progress, but to assume that this is good for the students is a terrible assumption. A society may "progress" at the great expense of the people it's institutions purport to care for.
By definition progress is movement in a direction. Who set the direction? Toward which destination? To achieve which aim and goals? Who benefits? To assume it is the students, the teachers, or "the people" broadly, is a naive and destructive assumption.
Social progress by one definition might include the production of obedient soldiers and factory workers. It might include the limiting of cultural diversity, creating a common core of cultural conformity and homogenization among the youth a country populated by recent immigrants. It might include training the youth to accept authority without question.
If one is interested enough to learn about the actual thinking of the founders and maintainers of public school institutions in the United States and around the world, you can read what they published of their thinking for yourself. John Taylo Gatto unearthed much of this thinking and shared it with the world in his books and lectures.
The narrative of social progress, unfortunately, is a fantasy.
Public schools were created in the US to indoctrinate catholic kids - the “unwashed masses of Irish papists.” It was an oppressive institution from the start.
They were designed with the same architecture as incarceration systems from France and to this day are mainly serviced by the same companies that service our prisons.
There have been so, so many attempts to recast public schools in the image of our aspirations - most notably Teach for America. I count many of their graduates among my edtech founder friends.
For those of us that have given a portion of our lives to improve these systems, the reality is heartbreaking. Public education is a callous political football whose primary purpose is to make sure children are being babysat so their parents can work. Genuine progress can be made but will be snuffed out by the well oiled grinder for government funding and political promotions.
Administrators determine our children’s future, not teachers, parents, or children. Any of those three would be better.
Yes, there are bright spots. But the vast majority of school systems destroy the aspirations of well-intentioned, newly educated teachers within a couple years. Most teachers leave the profession after less than a decade in it.
The best researchers I’ve found have all reached a stunningly simple conclusion on why better funding does not improve outcomes - students are living in intense poverty. Many students are homeless. Many have no safe place to sleep.
The reason homeschooling is rising is because intelligent, caring parents can give their child a better education simply by not subjecting them to the bizarre social experience that has become most public schools.
The exception to that rule is the proof of what matters - a community of parents/guardians who come together and support a mutual learning center with caring educators.
Co-op, private, public, they all work when you have that.
"Excuse me for not wanting middle schoolers taught how to use gay hookup apps."
Just the gay ones?
I don't want kids using either hookup or dating apps. But the UI's are are very simple so I don't see why removing a book from a library would prevent this?
You can google app tutorials if "swipe left, swipe right" is too complicated for you.
"Notice he isn't complaining about straight hook-up apps."
Homosexuality is just really disgusting to a lot of people who don't want their children exposed to it. If you also have to remove books about Tinder so gays don't feel singled out, you can do that too.
Anecdotally one of the people protesting these books in my area is well known for being a hyper religious wife beater who is no longer allowed see his children.
The rest are a diverse un-hirable band of racists, anti vaxxers and people that fake injuries for money.
I'm not at all conservative but i can see not all conservatives are like this. This is a recent phenomenon.
> Yes there is, it's crime. Street lights deter crime.
> Also simply driving safety. Driving with just headlights causes more accidents than on a well-lit street, since visibility is so much worse.
Accepting your points for convenience, wouldn't we get the same benefits with lights that only pointed downward? And if you further restrict to warmer colors (which interfere less with low-light sensitivity, also less diffraction reducing light pollution), with a sensible but low max intensity (again keeping the human eye more dark-sensitive, allowing better visibility into the non-illuminated spaces)?
Reducing nighttime lighting by 50% would make a huge difference in sky visibility.
There's a lot of streetlamps that switched to early versions of LED bulbs that start glowing purple as they age. I've actually really come to like the purple color illuminating streets, it's much easier on the eyes than the bright white.
> Sure, they didn't have to pay with money, past a certain point they didn't even use money, but they paid with (much) shorter lives. Money is just the cost of self-determination.
the cost of a clear night sky does not have to be "no technology". We don't need nearly as many streetlights, lighted signs, houselights, etc as we have.
I've lived in areas where regulation restricts lighting choices; it is a good thing.
Excess lighting is called light pollution, and it is a societal choice to put up with it. Society can choose otherwise and help us rediscover our wonder at the world.
But I've never seen the gate, and don't have strong views on biblical accuracy.