Bayou Renaissance Man

We've examined the topics of IQ (theoretical and applied), education and ability on several occasions in these pages.  If you'd like to read the earlier articles:

Higher education and IQ

IQ, countries, and coping skills

IQ and potential, both individual and national

Karl Denninger warns that the flood of lower-IQ migrants across our borders threatens to lower our national competence to cope with issues and problems.  (WARNING:  He uses more profanity than usual in his article.)  Here are some excerpts.  Emphasis in original.

You won't like this and I don't care.

You're going to die if you don't take this to heart, or even worse your kids will die.

What am I talking about?

Quite simply its this: You need about a 115 IQ to build and maintain modern civilization.

Examples?  Too many to count.  How about Flint's water system?  It poisoned a bunch of kids, remember?

Why didn't it poison kids for the previous 80 years?  It had been there that long, with the same lead service lines, but didn't poison anyone ... The 115+ IQ people who built and ran the water plant at Flint all those years knew this, and knew how to keep it safe.  They drank out of the same lines and so not only did they know how they had plenty of incentive to not screw up -- and as professionals who were smart, they didn't screw up.

Then Shaqueena, or her analog with a <115 IQ took over.  And changed the water source.  And, at the same time, didn't check and make sure the chemical and pH balance remained correct because the intellectual firepower to do so was simply no longer there.  The result was a bunch of poisoned kids.

. . .

Why do I bring all this up?

Because if we do not stop destroying the incentives for those on the right end of the IQ bell curve to have kids it will not be all that long before you go to flush the toilet and it won't, your stove, heat and A/C won't work either because there's no power or gas and virtually everything we rely on in the modern world will either kill you or simply not function at all.

Its much worse when people who simply don't have the intellectual chops for a given task are passed in school and given credentials they didn't earn.

. . .

Those who built all these things we enjoy today and in fact are the reason we can have several billion people on this planet -- most of them created by white men, and all of them by persons of >115 IQ -- are going to die.  We all die; it is inevitable.  If we do not stop demonstrating to those who are of higher intelligence that the only reason to have kids is their own hedonism, and by doing so for hedonistic purpose they will screw their offspring as those kids will have a s***ty future said people will choose not to breed as they are choosing right now.  The data is clear in this regard -- those who are of higher intelligence are choosing not to have kids and since they are of higher intelligence it is obvious that they are capable of reasoning out the incentives and disincentives, weighing both for themselves and what they perceive as the future for any children they might choose to produce -- and that analysis, once complete, is unfavorable as they see it.

People often claim that as societies advance the people tend to have fewer children.  That's a true statement but did you notice that the "why" is never discussed?  As societies advance inevitably people are led to believe, often by active fraud peddlers, that you can have something for nothing and the more-intelligent discern that it is likely their children will get ****ed by this pattern.  Said persons have no means to stop it peacefully as they're out-represented (by definition > 115 IQ is at least one standard deviation out on the right side and thus they're out-voted roughly 6:1) so they simply choose not to have children at all.  This inevitably results in the average of the curve shifting leftward unless it it is stomped on hard.

There's more at the link.

Like Mr. Denninger, I and many others have warned that "If you import the Third World, you become the Third World".  We're seeing that in action right now.  Despite the progressive left's demonization of IQ as a First World approach that automatically reduces equality and diversity in our workforce, IQ remains the single best indicator of whether or not a nation, or a city, or an organization, can and will prosper.  Higher IQ = better chances of that happening.  Lower IQ = lower chances of that happening.  It's as simple as that.

Peter

I was struck by a blog post over at Come And Make It.  He's an American expat living and working in the Philippines.

Office girl took a class and was not paying attention.  Basically she failed it.  Now today I sent her to get a letter I need for my environment permit.

However since the girl did not pay attention, she has no clue what the gov regulation we are operating under, is called, much less what paperwork she is supposed to pick up.  So then she starts a whole NEW line of useless paperwork instead of just calling me, because the person with my endorsement letter is out of the office.

Meanwhile the 2 new slightly smarter jokers, are unable to comprehend that they should put one scoop of shredded plastic from one barrel, then when that is fed in the machine, a handful of shredded plastic from a second barrel.  so they just sticking it all in at once.

They fail to comprehend is that plastic from barrel number 2 sweeps the sticky stuff from barrel number one and makes the material extrude better.

Some days it is like chasing cats.

I'm very familiar with his problem, having worked for many years in the Third World.  I used to call it the "doofus factor":  employees who were absolutely incapable of doing a simple job by rote, even after it had been explained to them half a dozen times and they'd been stopped and corrected on multiple occasions.  It's as if their minds switched off as soon as the machine was switched on.

The trouble is, that seems to be more and more a common experience in America now as well.  I've spoken to several small businesses in recent weeks, and they all complain about the same thing.  Not only are entry-level American workers slow, lazy and have a sense of entitlement ("I deserve this job!  You can't fire me!" or "It's my right to use my phone/surf the Internet/carry on long private conversations on work time!  That's freedom of speech!")  They won't work hard, and they seem incapable of working accurately.  Young workers who demonstrate that they will work hard, and can work accurately, are in very high demand, which creates another problem:  employers try hard to poach them from each other, offering more money than they're currently earning.  Pretty soon they get an inflated idea of their worth, and price themselves out of the market . . . and then they have to start again at the bottom, often disillusioned and resentful.

That, in turn, seems to be giving rise to a new determination among hard-working young people to enter fields that offer them the chance to work for themselves, no matter how hard that may be.  Several have entered the armed forces, despite all the current disadvantages of doing so, because they want a good basic technical education.  For example, if one becomes an electrical specialist in the military, many of those courses and qualifications carry over to civilian life, and one can become civilian-certified in a very short time.  The same applies to many other fields.  They reckon they can survive the not-always-pleasant military life for long enough to earn their qualifications, then quit and work for themselves.  As one put it:  "I'll never have to work for an a**hole boss again!"  It's hard not to sympathize.

How about you, readers?  Has anyone else noticed this trend?  If so, please share it with us in Comments.  This is worrying in terms of the future of our country and our economy.

Peter

Way back when in high school, I was a member of the debating society.  We had the usual formal debates, plus some rather informal ones where nonsense motions were debated, usually to screams of laughter and much applause.  They were a lot of fun.

I was reminded of one of them by an e-mail from an old friend yesterday.  He reminded me of a debate in which I participated, the topic of which was:  "Should one sit face-to-face, or back-to-back, or facing in the same direction, when sharing a bath?"  Bathing etiquette (if there is such a thing) came in for heavy discussion, as did many innuendos about avoiding the plughole, what to do with the hot and cold faucets, and so on.  I argued for the face-to-face side, but I don't recall whether my team won or not.  (In my defense, it was more than 50 years ago!)  I seem to remember that biology, zoology, theology, philosophy and anatomy all featured in the arguments.

Please note that sex did not rear its ugly head, so to speak.  This was, after all, a long time ago in a much more straight-laced country than the USA.  It was all theoretical, so to speak - not prudish, but definitely not down and dirty.  (Well, being in a bath, the latter was unlikely, but you know what I mean!)  The only chemistry discussed was of the soap-bubble variety.

So, on a whim, I thought I'd throw open the subject to my readers.  Should one sit face-to-face, or back-to-back, or facing in the same direction, when sharing a bath?  You tell us in Comments (keeping it clean, of course, at least in the figurative sense!), and we'll respond as we feel appropriate (or not, as the case may be).  Have at it!

Peter

It seems that the woke virus is as virulent as ever in academia.  The Daily Mail reports:

Britain's top universities warned staff and students that saying 'the most qualified person should get the job' is a microaggression. 

Russell Group universities, including the University of Glasgow, have issued guidance and even provided training courses to educate people on how to eliminate microaggressions.

Guidance from the Scottish university alongside the engineering department of Imperial College London insisted that using the phrase was discriminatory.

Glasgow University's guidance is the latest advice from their anti-racism campaign and the university explained that the phrase ignored the idea that race plays a part in life success.

The top universities said that other examples of microaggressions - subtle or thinly veiled everyday forms of discrimination could include telling people that 'everyone can succeed if they work hard enough'.

There's more at the link.

So, if I need critical surgery, I'm not allowed to select a surgeon on the basis of his or her qualifications or experience?  I'm not allowed to choose on the basis of which university, in which country, they attended?  I'll tell you for free, any brain surgeon who qualified from an alleged university in Lower Bongo (or Havana, for that matter) won't be getting my money when I can choose one who qualified at, say, Johns Hopkins!

The trouble is, this sort of nonsense has crept into corporate hiring all over the First World.  It's no longer good enough to be a top performer.  You have to be politically correct and woke as well if you're to have any hope of advancing to upper job levels.  Personally, I don't think it's worth it.

(Of course, if I were still able to be in the job market, I could always label myself as African-American to boost my chances.  Hey, despite my Caucasian appearance, I was born in Africa, and I'm now an American citizen - so I qualify, right?)

Peter

Following my inquiry yesterday, a number of you provided useful information about conventional bows and crossbows.  Based on that, I think it would be best for me to learn how to use a crossbow before I try to write about it.  (I already know how to use a conventional bow.)

That being the case, and being on a tight budget, here are a couple more questions for the crossbow users among us.

1. What's the best entry-level crossbow on which to learn?  (By "best" I mean suitable for purpose, of reasonable quality, not a toy, not likely to break if I look at it funny.  I don't want to buy a cheap Chinesium knock-off.)  Brand and model recommendations, if you can, please.
2. How much would such a bow cost?  Is it worth looking for a used crossbow at a reduced price?  I've seen some apparent bargains, about half off the new price, but I don't know enough to tell whether they're in good condition and/or worth the money.  (If any of you know of a bargain-priced used crossbow in good condition, of worthwhile quality, please let me know.)
3. What accessories are necessary, and which are merely handwavium?  I'm sure I don't need a thermal or laser sight as a student!  I'm a total novice, so any and all input is valued.

Thanks again.

Peter

I enjoyed this exchange on Tumblr, referenced on social media.  An anonymous user asked:

I recall at least one of you guys having worked with livestock animals. Why are cows so damn indestructible while horses keel over and die if mercury is in retrograde or a dog barked in Kazakhstan?

Among others, this amusing and entertaining answer was submitted by reader gallusrostromegalus.  I've edited out most of the profanity and corrected the spelling.

My entirely half-assed understanding of Why Horses Explode If You Look At Them Funny, As Explained To Me By My Aunt That Raises Horses After Her Third Glass Of Wine:

Horses don’t got enough toes.

So, back right after the dinosaurs ****** off and joined the choir invisible, the first ancestors of horses were scampering about, little capybara-looking things called Eohippus, and they had four toes per limb:

They functioned pretty well, as near as we can tell from the fossil record, but they were mostly messing around in the leaf litter of dense forests, where one does not necessarily need to be fast but one should be nimble, and the 4 toes per limb worked out pretty good.

But the descendants of Eophippus moved out of the forest where there was lots of cover and onto the open plains, where there was better forage and visibility, but nowhere to hide, so the proto-horses that could ZOOM the fastest and outrun their predators (or, at least, their other herd members) tended to do well.  Here’s the thing- having lots of toes means your foot touches the ground longer when you run, and it spreads a lot of your momentum to the sides.  Great if you want to pivot and dodge, terrible if you want to ZOOM.  So losing toes started being a major advantage for proto-horses.

The Problem with having fewer toes and running Really ******* Fast is that it kind of ***** your everything else up.

When a horse runs at full gallop, it sort of... stops actively breathing, letting the slosh of it’s guts move its lungs, which is tremendously calorically efficient and means their breathing doesn’t fall out of sync.  But it also means that the abdominal lining of a horse is weirdly flexible in ways that lead to way more hernias and intestinal tangling than other ungulates.  It also has a relatively weak diaphragm for something it’s size, so ANY kind of respiratory infection is a Major ******* Problem because the horse has weak lungs.

When a Horse runs Real ******* Fast, it also develops a bit of a fluid dynamics problem- most mammals have the blood going out of their heart real fast and coming back from the far reaches of the toes much slower and it’s structure reflects that.  But since there is Only The One Toe, horse blood comes flying back up the veins toward the heart way the **** faster than veins are meant to handle, which means horses had to evolve special veins that constrict to slow the Blood Down, which you will recognize as a Major Cardiovascular Disease in most mammals. This Poorly-regulated blood speed problems means horses are prone to heart problems, burst veins, embolisms, and hemophilia.  Also they have apparently a billion blood types and I’m not sure how that’s related but I am sure that’s another Hot Mess they have to deal with.

ALSO, the Blood-Going-Too-Fast issue and being Just Huge Mother******s means horses have trouble distributing oxygen properly, and have compensated by creating ****** up bones that replicate the way birds store air in their bones but much, much ****tier.  So if a horse breaks it’s leg, not only is it suffering a Major Structural Issue (also also- breaking a toe is much more serious when that toe is YOUR WHOLE DAMN FOOT AND HALF YOUR LEG), it’s also having a hemmorhage and might be sort of suffocating a little.

ALSO ALSO, the fact that horses had to deal with Extremely Fast Predators for most of their evolution means that they are now afflicted with evolutionarily-adaptive Anxiety, which is not great for their already barely-functioning hearts, and makes them, frankly, ******* mental.  Part of the reason horses are so aggro is that if denied the opportunity to ZOOM, its options left are “Kill everyone and Then Yourself” or “The same but skip step one and Just ******* Die”.  The other reason is that a horse is in a race against itself- it’s gotta breed before it falls apart, so a Horse basically has a permanent terrorboner.

TL;DR: Horses don’t have enough toes and that makes them very, very fast, but also sickly, structurally unsound, have wildly OP blood that sometimes kills them, and drives them ******* insane.

There's more at the link, including illustrations.

I did a brief check, and it looks as if the explanation given is basically anatomically correct (minus the profanity and simplified breakdown).  Interesting!  I didn't know any of that - but I do now (and so do you, dear reader).  It also made me smile;  an added bonus when discovering something new.

Peter

Last September the Intercollegiate Studies Institute held its 70th anniversary gala in Wilmington, Delaware.  One of the presenters was Tucker Carlson.  I recently had the opportunity to listen to his speech, and found it very worthwhile.  If you missed it, I highly recommend making the time (it lasts about 40 minutes) to watch and/or listen to it now.  I think you'll find it worthwhile.

In particular, note his emphasis that since we're going to die anyway, why be afraid of death?  Whether we like it or not, it's coming.  That should also affect the way we live.  If death is inevitable, and therefore there's no reason to fear it, why not live in such a way as to give our lives - and deaths - greater meaning?  Why be afraid of contrary opinions, philosophies or political views?  We should stand up for what we believe in, and be unafraid to make our case.  In our present benighted state, I think that's a very important lesson which all of us should heed.

I was pleased that Mr. Carlson gave his entire speech without any note or teleprompter in sight.  It was all off-the-cuff, extemporaneous.  I'm sure he prepared his speech beforehand, but to deliver it that fluently, that smoothly, without a single prompt, was a tour de force.  I wish more people would do that, or were able to do that.  I've tried to do it myself throughout my life, but I'm nowhere near as fluent as he is in converting thought to speech.

Worthwhile thoughts, IMHO.

Peter

I'm not by any means a knife and sword aficionado.  I know a moderate amount about them through research for my books, and I've seen rather too much for comfort of how primitive knives and makeshift swords are used by thugs and wannabe terrorists in the Third World.  (Hint:  Don't bother trying to reason with a machete-wielding uneducated gangbanger teenager stoned out of his mind on alcohol and marijuana, to say nothing of other substances.  It won't work.  Stronger methods are required.)

Despite that limitation, I can still appreciate the craftsmanship that went into medieval and Renaissance weapons and armor.  Working only by hand, with charcoal forges and not a mechanical tool in sight, the weaponsmiths of those days produced some weapons that were spectacular works of art as well as very efficient killing machines.  You'll find a lot of them on display in European museums.

Japan was no exception.  Some of the swordsmiths in that country have become legendary historical figures, and the few examples of their work that have survived have been designated as National Treasures.  An exhibition has just opened at the museum of the Kasuga Taisha Shrine in Nara, highlighting some of their creations.

The winter exhibition at the shrine’s museum showcases 30 blades forged between the Heian Period (794-1185) and the Edo Period (1603-1867). Some of them are designated as national treasures.

The two-part “Pride of the Aristocracy, Soul of the Samurai” event runs through March 31.

Some of the highlights include ornamental swords produced between the mid- and late Heian Period, four of which are designated as national treasures. They were worn by aristocrats to display dignity when they were dressed in formal attire.

. . .

Swords dedicated to Kasuga Taisha are deemed to be extremely valuable because many of them were never used in real fights or were newly forged, retaining their original state.

There's more at the link.  You can see more of the National Treasure swords of Japan at Wikipedia.

The Heian Period ran from 794-1185 A.D.  That means some of those swords are more than a thousand years old, and are still in just as good a condition as the day they were dedicated to the shrine.  What's more, they were made as combat weapons, not just as display pieces - they were merely decorated and embellished to a higher level than the identical blades carried in battle by those who presented them.  Very few Western museums can boast genuine martial exhibits that old, and that well preserved.

An acquaintance of mine has one of those historic Japanese swords.  His grandfather brought it back from the Pacific after the Second World War.  He took it off the body of a Japanese officer, thinking it was no more than a standard-issue Japanese Army sword.  However, some decades later he showed it to an expert in the field, who frothed at the mouth with excitement.  He identified it as a centuries-old sword, its blade possibly dating from as early as the Kamakura Period.  He said it was probably a family heirloom that had been fitted with a less decorative tsuka or handle, placed in a utilitarian military saya or scabbard, and sent to war with one of the family's scions (a rare practice, but not unknown, apparently, as a symbol and continuation of a cherished family martial tradition).  The bearer died wielding it in a charge on American positions on one of the islands of the Pacific.  Apparently such swords can be identified by markings underneath the tsuka.

Naturally, having been carried and used in wartime, and brought back over thousands of miles aboard a troopship in a GI-issue kitbag, the sword was not in pristine condition.  Having learned of its antique status, the family approached a local specialist to clean and preserve it.  He, in turn, informed his contacts in Japan of its existence.  Next thing you know, the family was approached by a Japanese firm that was anxious to "restore the sword to its original glory" at what seemed like a very reasonable price, if they would send it back to that country for expert attention.  Fortunately, the local specialist warned them that if they sent it to Japan, they might never get it back, because if it were to be classified as a National Treasure, it would not be permitted to leave the country again.  I'm told this has happened more than once to people who didn't understand Japan's obsession with its historical treasures.  At any rate, the family declined the offer, and retain the sword to this day.

Peter

In this country, we're accustomed to academics moaning and groaning about their "inadequate" salaries, or their teaching workload, or the number of classes they have to present, or whatever.  Since most of them aren't worth the cost of their courses, I tend to disregard their kvetching.

However, a professor in Nigeria doesn't moan - he finds a way to set an example, even when his academic income is lacking or not paid at all.  The BBC reports:

Kabir Abu Bilal is not your regular Nigerian university professor - he has a second job working as a welder in the northern city of Zaria.

Welding is widely seen as a menial job across Nigeria and he has shocked many - especially his colleagues - by opening up his own welding workshop.

"I am not ashamed that I work as a welder despite being a professor," he tells the BBC. "I make more money from welding."

The 50-year-old teaches and supervises research students at the faculty of engineering at Ahmadu Bello University, Nigeria's largest and one of its most prestigious universities.

He has worked there for 18 years and published several books on physics and electrical engineering.

. . .

Not only has the workshop satisfied his need to get his hands dirty, but it has really helped him on the financial front.

Academics in Nigeria have long struggled on modest salaries, most earning between 350,000 naira ($390; £305) and 500,000 ($555; £435) a month - and there are often long battles with the government to get a pay increase.

Prof Abu Bilal says his welding job has allowed him to be more self-sufficient and he has even been able to buy a more reliable car - a Mercedes.

In leaner times, he has even helped those who frowned on his joint career.

"When university lecturers went on strike for eight months in 2022 and we weren't paid, I always had money because of this job and a few colleagues came to me for help."

Prof Abu Bilal hopes to inspire other people to take on jobs like the one he does.

He has 10 apprentices - aged between 12 and 20 - at the workshop where he is teaching them the skills of the trade.

Those who are not at school during the day take care of the workshop when he is away at university.

The apprenticeship tends to take about a year - and then when they have the skills they can go off and set up their own businesses.

There's more at the link.

Well done, Professor!  I wish there were more like him at American universities.  I'd be much more likely, as a student, to have respect for a "let's-get-it-done" go-ahead teacher like him than I would most of the liberal, left-wing, progressive, knee-jerk-reactor types who pass for professors here.  I bet he turns out above-average graduates, and above-average welding apprentices, too.

He sets an example American educators would do well to follow.

Peter

IQ ("Intelligence Quotient") is a hotly debated topic.  Some (usually of left-wing/progressive ideology) maintain it's a chimera, a meaningless assessment.  Others (including myself) regard it as a valid predictor of academic capability and likely future prosperity.

I've written about IQ and the developing world (specifically Africa) in years past, including these two articles:

IQ, countries, and coping skills

What to do about Africa?

In the first of those articles, I reproduced this graphic.  Click the image for a larger view.

I ended it by saying:

There are many who decry such statistics as meaningless, racist, discriminatory, and all the rest.  Trouble is, for those of us who've been "on the ground" all over the world, in many of those countries, the IQ statistics are a very accurate predictor of how much we'll be able to do in a given location, and how well the locals will be able to assimilate what we do with them, and take control of their own destinies once we're no longer there to hold their hands.  The correlation, in my experience, is as close to 100% as makes no difference.

Last week we looked at an article from HMS Defiant, in which he posed the question:

What do you do in a modern society with an entire underclass of useless people that can't read, won't work, aren't qualified temperamentally to behave like civilized beings and actively harm/destroy civilization wherever they run into it?

We talked about that in the context of education, and agreed that "public schools are the breeding-ground, and their "graduates" are the cannon fodder, for the "underclass of useless people" identified by HMS Defiant . . . yet we, the taxpayers of America, continue to sit back and accept the situation.  That applies to all taxpayers everywhere, by the way;  left-wing and right-wing taxpayers are equally deficient in not acting to correct matters.  It's not a political thing, it's a complacency thing (particularly because most of us wouldn't even dream of sending our children to such schools - we'd ensure they had better options)."

IQ definitely plays into that conclusion.  If one examines the academic record of success of every school in America, and correlates that with the average IQ of the students in each of those schools, the correlation appears to be very high indeed.  High average IQ = good record of success.  Low average IQ = poor record of success.  Of course, it's politically incorrect to conduct such studies these days, more's the pity.  Truth appears to be less important than "woke" ideology to the powers that be.

In his most recent article, John Wilder examines "IQ, Lies, and National Wealth".  Among other things, he points out:

On a societal level ... we’re busy sending people off to college that have no real business being there. The result is a large number of people in society today who think that they have all the tools necessary to be exceptionally successful at intellectual pursuits and it’s just not so. This creates a society-wide level of bitterness. It’s especially bad when those college kids with no intellectual prospects get worthless degrees (if it ends in “studies” it’s a worthless degree) and are then saddled with huge amounts of student loan debt.

. . .

Society has a very, very particular relationship with the concept of the heritability of intelligence so much so that this is a huge hot button issue. Certain incentives in our current system encourage mothers of lesser intelligence to have even more not-so-bright babies. This is, of course, as featured in the documentary movie Idiocracy. Since this idea has such significant implications, not the least of which is the fate of nations: smart nations do better than, um, less bright ones. Here’s the data:

The data is from the book IQ and the Wealth of Nations, so it dates back to before the year 2000, as far as I can tell. That really shouldn’t matter much, since the relationship is so strong. Smarter countries are richer – a lot richer.

We’re entering a period of time where resources will be far more constrained than at any point in my lifetime. We’re entering a time where we will have no choice but to stop lying to ourselves about IQ and its impact.

There's more at the link.  It's worth reading his entire article in full.  Recommended.

It bears saying again, and repeating, that our typical inner-city society is screwed up to the point of absurdity.  As a pastor and chaplain, I soon lost count of the number of kids (both "on the street" and in our prisons) who aspired to be basketball stars or rap "musicians".  They didn't have the athletic ability to be the first, and completely lacked the talent to be the second (not that much "talent" is involved in that field), but they didn't stop to consider that at all.  If they wanted it, it's what they were going to get - practicality be damned.  Any failure to do so wasn't their fault, but because "the system" or "the Man" or "racism" or whatever was against them.  That was the compass of their world view, and nothing and nobody would shake them out of it.  Reality was irrelevant.

Yet, as John Wilder points out, people like that are doomed to disappointment:

If anyone told Zeke he was five inches taller than he was, he would have laughed. But people told him he was smart, and he believed that.

I can understand how that might seem to the compassionate thing to do – to tell someone that they’re smart. The downside of that is simple – if Zeke feels like he’s smart because everyone told him he was just as smart as anyone else, what happens when he doesn’t have the success that other people have?

He becomes resentful. He sees others succeeding because of things he can’t fathom happening around him. What, then, must be the reason that other people are successful? They must have some sort of system that is rigged against Zeke.

That's the problem, right there.  People like that can't accept the fact that each and every one of us has a certain potential.  Some few of us work so hard, and are so motivated, as to exceed that potential, but most of us don't.  We should aspire to succeed to the fullest extent of our potential, but we shouldn't be surprised to find that we have limits.  Unfortunately, nobody is telling our kids that they have limits.  Instead, they're encouraging them to believe they can achieve anything they want to.  When life stops them dead in their tracks, they don't learn from that - instead, they grow resentful and angry, because they know they can do anything.  They've been told that almost from birth.  How can we expect them believe anything else?

That's the problem with our country right now, too.  Too many people like that are running things.  They believe that because this is the USA, with its track record of success, this country can do anything it wants.  Government has only to decree something, and it will happen.  That's how they see our society, and the world as a whole.  They ignore the fact that our economy is vastly less capable and flexible than it was even a generation ago, and our workers are on average a lot less smart and less capable than they were then.  Therefore, they're pushing our nation into an untenable situation, where they're gleefully seeking to remake everything without the resources and skills needed to make that work.

We're all going to pay the price for that insouciance.

Peter

HMS Defiant notes:

In this country the law is taking a beating and that it is mostly at the hands of the law is a surprise to me. This society has not even begun to try to control unlawfulness and it is allowing it to spread unchecked from the streets to the courts to the universities and to all the rest. This is how vigilantism works. When the law has irretrievably broken down and there is no justice, people will start to make it themselves.

. . .

The world gets used to a certain number of youths blown away every single day doing something wrong or just being in the wrong place. Simply look at Chicago. Nobody riots about the 15-20 shootings every day there because by and large nobody really cares. By the same token, nobody really cares if hamas rock throwers and missile men get shot and blown up every day. It's just another day of shooting a minor irritant that nobody really cares about.

They share an underlying problem. The people doing all the violence? They're otherwise completely and totally useless to society. Only an absolute moron would employ them, befriend them, allow them in their home and so society is finally forced to wonder, just what the Hell do we do with this thing we let our school teachers and news media create?

What do you do in a modern society with an entire underclass of useless people that can't read, won't work, aren't qualified temperamentally to behave like civilized beings and actively harm/destroy civilization wherever they run into it? 

Think about it. At this moment they are the punishment. I still feel some sympathy for the original inhabitants of Seattle and Portland and the other cities ruined by barbarians run amok.

There's more at the link.

I'm reminded of the mess produced by so-called "Bantu Education" in South Africa.  The apartheid government there deliberately "dumbed down" education for black people, ostensibly on the grounds that they didn't need it.  Prime Minister Hendrik Verwoerd actually made a statement in Parliament to the effect that blacks were the biblical "children of Ham", intended by God to be "hewers of wood and drawers of water", and he was going to see to it that they received only the education needed for those tasks.  It's estimated that a black school-leaving certificate (the equivalent of US grade 12) was roughly equivalent to a white grade 6-8, depending on the school(s) involved.  As a result, a vast mass of people built up in society that were not only unemployed, but unemployable in a modern economy, because they didn't have the educational background and skills required to function in it.  As a further result, the levels of crime and violence in that society skyrocketed, until they're today among the highest in the world.  What else do such people have to turn to but crime?

Contrast that with the state of black education in America today.  Some headlines:

• At 13 Baltimore City high schools, zero students tested proficient on 2023 state math exam
• Detroit Schools: District Is Failing Its Students According To Test Scores
• Not A Single Student Is Proficient In Reading Or Math At 55 Chicago Schools

I could provide many more links, but why bother?  The problem is the same everywhere.  Public school systems are producing vast numbers of uneducated, unemployable students who will probably depend for a basic, unfulfilling existence on entitlement programs and other welfare supports for the rest of their lives.  Who pays?  You and I, dear reader:  the taxpayers of America.

Such public schools are the breeding-ground, and their "graduates" are the cannon fodder, for the "underclass of useless people" identified by HMS Defiant . . . yet we, the taxpayers of America, continue to sit back and accept the situation.  That applies to all taxpayers everywhere, by the way;  left-wing and right-wing taxpayers are equally deficient in not acting to correct matters.  It's not a political thing, it's a complacency thing (particularly because most of us wouldn't even dream of sending our children to such schools - we'd ensure they had better options).

HMS Defiant's question remains:

What do you do in a modern society with an entire underclass of useless people that can't read, won't work, aren't qualified temperamentally to behave like civilized beings and actively harm/destroy civilization wherever they run into it?

I don't know the answer . . . but we're going to have that question violently shoved into our collective faces by the growing rate of crime and violence on our streets.  Perhaps we should be looking for constructive answers before we're forced to default to a less ideal but more hands-on practical solution.

Peter

Over the past couple of weeks I've put up two articles on this subject:

You can no longer entrust your children to the state

When the State decides it, not you, "owns" your children

Now we find that even if the state passes laws "protecting" our children, teachers' unions will cheerfully ignore and/or undermine them - and the state will do nothing about it.

Some parents in Jefferson County [Colorado] say teachers are breaking state and federal laws and their union is helping them get away with it.

. . .

Denice Crawford, who has three kids in the school district, says she was encouraged when the district sent an email to all employees before the school year started reminding them state and federal law prohibits mandatory surveys that ask kids about protected information and even voluntary surveys, it said, are illegal unless parents can opt out.

When her son came home with a survey asking about his gender identity she was more than surprised.

"Deceived, lied to, taken advantage of," she said.   

She's not alone. Parents with Jeffco Kids First say dozens of teachers have conducted the surveys after their union advised them how to hide evidence of them.

"The leadership actually provided an avenue to get around the law and basically saying it was OK," says school board member Susan Miller.

. . .

JCEA President, Brooke Williams, wouldn't say why she directed teachers use paper and get rid of surveys after noting students answers. She claims people are politicizing the issue.

. . .

Parents say they're not questioning whether students should be able to share their preferred pronouns or whether transgender people should be outed, but rather why the union told teachers to break the law and hide the evidence.

There's more at the link.

There you have it.  Even when laws nominally protect our children from such politically motivated intrusions, if the teachers who are supposed to obey the laws refuse to do so, we can do little or nothing to stop them - particularly when they deliberately conceal evidence of what they're doing.

Schools run according to local and state government rules simply can't be trusted to do the right thing for our children.  They've become corrupted by moonbattery, political correctness and progressive extremism.  There may be exceptions to that, but I submit they're exceptions that prove the rule.

Many of my readers no longer have children of school age, so they're insulated from this;  but their children's children are not.  Please, friends, tell your children and grandchildren about what's going on, and make sure they understand that the state-run educational system has been hijacked by progressives and transformed into a machine designed to undermine the traditional family and its values, coercing our kids into the progressive mold championed by far too many of their teachers.

I believe it's now our moral responsibility to ensure that our children and grandchildren are educated anywhere but such a school system.  Laws won't work, so "opting out" is the only defense we have against such manipulation.

Peter

Last week I published an article titled "You can no longer entrust your children to the state".  In it, I highlighted how warped and deviant sexual mores and practices were being effectively imposed on families and children by State educational and health care authorities.

The latest development in this nightmare comes from Massachusetts.

In June 2023, the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE) unveiled the draft of its new “Comprehensive Health and Physical Education Curriculum Framework” document ... Note that this is officially just “guidelines” for schools. But don’t be fooled. The clear intent down the line is for the legislature to mandate these guidelines.

. . .

The idea of “trauma-sensitive” and “safe and supportive” schools reveals the education establishment’s attitude that schools are equally, if not more, concerned about a child’s safety and emotional support than parents. (And, that the home may not be a safe place.)

The new “equity” emphasis relates to pushing ideas on supposed discrimination (re: race, ethnicity, economic status, and LGBTQ+ identities).

. . .

Throughout the document, sexual orientation and gender identity are treated as valid and legitimate “identifications” which cannot be disputed or challenged in any way. (No alternative moral or scientific perspective is mentioned.) Likewise, systemic discrimination and inequities are presented as fact.

Students will be given resources for support in pursuing LGBT identities, STD testing and treatment, birth control, or abortion, and instructed in how to get help from others if their parents are not in agreement.

Other topics to be addressed in the classroom include rape, sexual consent, sex trafficking, sexual abuse, trauma, domestic violence, dating violence, illicit drugs, community standards, and public and school policy.

There's more at the link, including many examples of such policies and their implications.

In all seriousness, if you take your children's upbringing seriously;  if you want them to adhere to the moral and ethical standards and norms that a traditional (particularly a Christian) upbringing espouses;  if you don't want them exposed to the moral filth that permeates modern society;   then you cannot risk exposing them to the cultural environment being deliberately created and promoted in many State school systems.  The report above refers to Massachusetts specifically, but similar policies are being proposed and implemented in many other states as well.  (To name just one example, see what's happening in Maryland right now.)  The education departments in many states have been infiltrated and overwhelmed by those with ulterior motives and radical progressive agendas, and they're targeting our children.  Even private schools, such as those run by churches, are often forced to follow (or willingly adopt) state curricula including such subjects.  They can no longer be blindly trusted.

It's reached the point where I'm recommending to friends and those who reach out to me for advice that they should not put their children into state-run schools, or those that use a state-approved curriculum, without first checking and double-checking that the curriculum doesn't include this moral trash.  If it does, don't send your kids there!  Home-schooling is fortunately still an option for most Americans, and it's fast becoming the only one where you have a say in what your kids are taught and how they are raised.

I'm aware of a number of families that are banding together to homeschool their children as a group, hiring a trusted teacher (paying partly in cash, partly in kind) to oversee their learning, sharing the burden of supervising them at a central location each day, and planning joint extra-curricular activities.  They see it as defending their kids - and I can't disagree.  I only wish more families were following their example.

Peter

Here's a real treat for history buffs (and writers interested in the late medieval/early modern period in Europe).  It's a map of Europe in 1444, done in immense detail and available online.  Here's a small-scale representation:  click the image for a larger view.

The full-size map (7700x5445 pixels) is available at this link.  Open it in a new tab to see it full-size.  The introduction on Gab reads:

If you’re a bit of a cartophile like me then you’ll love this utterly fascinating map of 1444 Europe.

It does help if you’re familiar with European geography and history because there’s a lot to take in here, but I thought I’d share it with you because one dedicated soul out there has spent a long time creating this late-medieval HD map.

It’s not often you see a period map with such clarity, and I have to admit I spent at least an hour staring at it in bed last night. Hopefully it won’t lose too much resolution because this map is really worth saving and having a good look at.

This is a highly recommended reference point for all you homeschoolers out there.

Highly recommended for everyone interested in the period.  It makes so much of history come to life if you can understand the actual geography of the area concerned, and where and how individuals, groups and armies had to move to accomplish something.  It's also very enlightening to see how Europe has changed since then, and how old influences and cultures can sometimes change other areas in surprising ways.

Peter

I was startled to read this article in the Wall Street Journal.

Roman Devengenzo was consulting for a robotics company in Silicon Valley last fall when he asked a newly minted mechanical engineer to design a small aluminum part that could be fabricated on a lathe—a skill normally mastered in the first or second year of college.

“How do I do that?” asked the young man.

So Devengenzo, an engineer who has built technology for NASA and Google, and who charges consulting clients a minimum of $300 an hour, spent the next three hours teaching Lathework 101. “You learn by doing,” he said. “These kids in school during the pandemic, all they’ve done is work on computers.”

The knock-on effect of years of remote learning during the pandemic is gumming up workplaces around the country. It is one reason professional service jobs are going unfilled and goods aren’t making it to market. It also helps explain why national productivity has fallen for the past five quarters, the longest contraction since at least 1948, according to the U.S. Labor Department.

The shortcomings run the gamut from general knowledge, including how to make change at a register, to soft skills such as working with others. Employers are spending more time and resources searching for candidates and often lowering expectations when they hire. Then they are spending millions to fix new employees’ lack of basic skills.

There's more at the link.

Frankly, I'm baffled.  If possession of a degree, or a certificate, or a qualification, is supposed to imply a certain basic level of knowledge and/or skill, why is it being awarded at all in the absence of that knowledge or skill?  When I was studying, that certainly wasn't the case.  You had to demonstrate that you'd mastered the required level of knowledge, and if you couldn't do that adequately, you didn't graduate.  It was as simple as that.  Today, it seems that's no longer the case.  Why???  Why are institutions of learning allowed to get away with what is, essentially, fraud, by sending their "graduates" out into the workplace without the level of knowledge or skill that employers assume they have?

As for "learning by doing", I entirely agree with Mr. Devengenzo.  When I was a supervisor and manager in the computer industry, I made a point of always (when possible) hiring those with practical experience as well as (or even instead of) academic qualifications.  I invariably found that a programmer who'd learned to code "on the job" and had built up three or four years' good-quality experience would be far more productive and stable than a newly graduated BS in computer science.  I hired accordingly.  As for MBA's . . . I hold such a qualification myself, but I didn't expect it to make me a "guru" or know-it-all consultant.  I looked to it to round out my business knowledge in areas to which I hadn't been exposed.  I completed it part-time, as I did all my university qualifications, and kept on working while studying.  That kept me grounded, and stopped me going off into academic flights of fantasy.  Again, I found that those who took time off work to study for such degrees took several years to get their feet back on the ground afterwards.  I tried not to hire (or work for) them.  (Then there are those who take an MBA or equivalent without ever having worked "at the coalface" in business and commerce.  How is that even possible?  They've never "done", so how can they learn?  It's not like medicine or high-tech stuff, where one can learn the theory and then put it into practice.  Management is different.)

Maybe I'm just an old fart, but in the military and in business, if one held a certain position or rank, competence was assumed.  Whenever that competence was absent, the person(s) concerned usually screwed up by the numbers, leading to endless problems.  Life became a "blame game", pointing fingers and trying to avoid being held responsible for the fall-out.  Sound familiar?  I'm sure many of my readers have experienced something similar.

I'm certain you know the old saying:

• Those who can, do.
• Those who can't, teach.
• Those who can't teach, lecture on the psychology of education.

Peter

The Supreme Court appears to have made it all but impossible to use race as a criterion in selecting or approving students for tertiary education.  CNN reports:

CNN Chief Legal Analyst Laura Coates said the Supreme Court's decision to gut affirmative action in college admissions will have sweeping changes to education in the US.

"This opinion, make no mistake about it, it is going to change the landscape of education, and this is what the majority has asked for," she said.

The fact that almost every liberal and/or progressive and/or left-wing voice out there is currently screaming in protest at the decision makes it all the sweeter.  Those people have made it very difficult, to the point of impossibility, for certain students (Asian in particular, but including whites) to get fair, even-handed consideration when applying for places at university.  Hopefully, that will go away Real. Soon. Now.  It's long gone time that happened.

I'm absolutely in favor of removing any shape, shade or form of discrimination on the grounds of race.  The fact that universities have been able to use it as a back-handed form of "reverse discrimination" is as disgraceful as its former use to "hold down" black and hispanic candidates.

No racial discrimination means no racial discrimination, period.

Peter

Last week, we asked:  "What happens when the competent opt out?"  The topic aroused a fair amount of interest, to judge by the comments from readers.

As if in reply, Palladium published an article a few days ago titled "Complex Systems Won’t Survive the Competence Crisis".  Here are a few excerpts.

At a casual glance, the recent cascades of American disasters might seem unrelated. In a span of fewer than six months in 2017, three U.S. Naval warships experienced three separate collisions resulting in 17 deaths. A year later, powerlines owned by PG&E started a wildfire that killed 85 people. The pipeline carrying almost half of the East Coast’s gasoline shut down due to a ransomware attack. Almost half a million intermodal containers sat on cargo ships unable to dock at Los Angeles ports. A train carrying thousands of tons of hazardous and flammable chemicals derailed near East Palestine, Ohio. Air Traffic Control cleared a FedEx plane to land on a runway occupied by a Southwest plane preparing to take off. Eye drops contaminated with antibiotic-resistant bacteria killed four and blinded fourteen. 

While disasters like these are often front-page news, the broader connection between the disasters barely elicits any mention. America must be understood as a system of interwoven systems; the healthcare system sends a bill to a patient using the postal system, and that patient uses the mobile phone system to pay the bill with a credit card issued by the banking system. All these systems must be assumed to work for anyone to make even simple decisions. But the failure of one system has cascading consequences for all of the adjacent systems. As a consequence of escalating rates of failure, America’s complex systems are slowly collapsing.

The core issue is that changing political mores have established the systematic promotion of the unqualified and sidelining of the competent. This has continually weakened our society’s ability to manage modern systems.

. . .

By the 1960s, the systematic selection for competence came into direct conflict with the political imperatives of the civil rights movement. During the period from 1961 to 1972, a series of Supreme Court rulings, executive orders, and laws—most critically, the Civil Rights Act of 1964—put meritocracy and the new political imperative of protected-group diversity on a collision course. Administrative law judges have accepted statistically observable disparities in outcomes between groups as prima facie evidence of illegal discrimination. The result has been clear: any time meritocracy and diversity come into direct conflict, diversity must take priority. 

The resulting norms have steadily eroded institutional competency, causing America’s complex systems to fail with increasing regularity. In the language of a systems theorist, by decreasing the competency of the actors within the system, formerly stable systems have begun to experience normal accidents at a rate that is faster than the system can adapt. The prognosis is harsh but clear: either selection for competence will return or America will experience devolution to more primitive forms of civilization and loss of geopolitical power.

. . .

Promoting diversity over competency does not simply affect new hires and promotion decisions. It also affects the people already working inside of America’s systems. Morale and competency inside U.S. organizations are declining. Those who understand that the new system makes it hard or impossible for them to advance are demoralized, affecting their performance. Even individuals poised to benefit from diversity preferences notice that better people are being passed over and the average quality of their team is declining. High performers want to be on a high-performing team. When the priorities of their organizations shift away from performance, high performers respond negatively.

. . .

As older men with tacit knowledge either retire or are pushed out, the burden of maintaining America’s complex systems will fall on the young. Lower-performing young men angry at the toxic mix of affirmative action (hurting their chances of admission to a “good school”) and credentialism (limiting the “good jobs” to graduates of “good schools”) are turning their backs on college and white-collar work altogether. 

This is the continuation of a trend that began over a decade ago. High-performing young men will either collaborate, coast, or downshift by leaving high-status employment altogether. Collaborators will embrace “allyship” to attempt to bolster their chances of getting promoted. Coasters realize that they need to work just slightly harder than the worst individual on their team. Their shirking is likely to go unnoticed and they are unlikely to feel enough emotional connection to the organization to raise alarm when critical mistakes are being made. The combination of new employees hired for diversity, not competence, and the declining engagement of the highly competent sets the stage for failures of increasing frequency and magnitude.

. . .

The path of least resistance will be the devolution of complex systems and the reduction in the quality of life that entails. For the typical resident in a second-tier city in Mexico, Brazil, or South Africa, power outages are not uncommon, tap water is probably not safe to drink, and hospital-associated infections are common and often fatal. Absent a step change in the quality of American governance and a renewed culture of excellence, they prefigure the country’s future.

There's more at the link, and it's all worth reading.

It's worth noting that this is also going to affect many other countries.  In another article last week, I raised the question of First World countries recruiting (relatively) highly qualified Third World personnel such as nurses, technicians, etc.  As fewer local recruits can be found to do these jobs, so efforts to recruit foreigners to do them will increase - but that will have the knock-on effect that the nations from which they come will also face increasing shortages of qualified, competent personnel.  In a sense, by importing a (partial) solution, we're simultaneously exporting the problem.

China is finding a similar problem in its drive to control raw materials and strategic imports around the world.  When it starts a mine or a factory, it typically imports Chinese management and labor, rather than hire locals who simply aren't competent to do the work involved.  That not only deprives the host country of education and training for its own people, but drains competence out of China into its economic "colonies", where it's no longer available to mainland employers.  If one has a sufficiently broad-based and competent pool of workers and managers, that's not a problem:  but not many countries can boast that anymore.  We certainly can't.

There are wheels within wheels on this problem, and it's not going to go away - it's going to get worse.  I'm reminded of a saying in the information technology industry back in the 1970's, when I first got involved in it:

True dat.

Peter

This report from the BBC caught my eye.

The recruitment of nurses by high-income countries from poorer nations is "out of control", according to the head of one of the world's biggest nursing groups.

The comments come as the BBC finds evidence of how Ghana's health system is struggling due to the "brain-drain".

Many specialist nurses have left the West African country for better paid jobs overseas.

In 2022 more than 1,200 Ghanaian nurses joined the UK's nursing register.

This comes as the National Health Service (NHS) increasingly relies on staff from non-EU countries to fill vacancies.

Although the UK says active recruitment in Ghana is not allowed, social media means nurses can easily see the vacancies available in NHS trusts. They can then apply for those jobs directly. Ghana's dire economic situation acts as a big push factor.

Howard Catton from the International Council of Nurses (ICN) is concerned about the scale of the numbers leaving countries like Ghana.

"My sense is that the situation currently is out of control," he told the BBC.

"We have intense recruitment taking place mainly driven by six or seven high-income countries but with recruitment from countries which are some of the weakest and most vulnerable which can ill-afford to lose their nurses."

The head of nursing at Greater Accra Regional Hospital, Gifty Aryee, told the BBC her Intensive Care Unit alone had lost 20 nurses to the UK and US in the last six months - with grave implications.

"Care is affected as we are not able to take any more patients. There are delays and it costs more in mortality - patients die," she said.

She added that seriously ill patients often had to be held for longer in the emergency department due to the nursing shortages.

One nurse in the hospital estimated that half of those she had graduated with had left the country - and she wanted to join them.

There's more at the link.

That report was about nurses;  but one could find similar reports about almost every skilled profession in Third World countries.  To many students there, a professional qualification is a ticket to a better life in a First World nation, and they pursue it avidly.  Across the Third World as a whole, I doubt whether even one in three professionals - medical personnel, engineers, architects, computer specialists, whatever - stay there more than a few years after they qualify.  Their skills are in high demand in other countries that offer a better life, and they'll willingly accept lower wages than local personnel in exchange for an immigration visa and the vastly improved living conditions that go with it.

One can't blame them, of course;  but it's devastating many poorer countries, who simply can't afford to educate their brightest and best students, only to lose them to richer nations who can offer them more.  I know that several countries in Africa now make medical students sign agreements that they'll work for at least a certain number of years in their countries of origin after graduation, or lose their student subsidies and be forced to repay them.  This hasn't stopped the problem:  many of those students simply abscond without bothering to go through emigration formalities, then refuse to pay.  Attempts to coerce them by making their parents co-responsible for repaying study subsidies haven't worked, either, because many of their parents are so poor they can't do so, no matter how much pressure is applied.  (Besides, once established overseas, many professionals bring their family over to join them, nullifying such pressures.)

Even churches face such pressures.  The Catholic Church in the USA can't find enough candidates for the priesthood to meet local demand, so it "imports" priests from India and elsewhere to fill the gaps.  I'd estimate that there are currently at least several hundred of them, if not into four figures worth.

On the receiving end of such emigration, there are problems too.  Cultural differences, work ethos, etc. are very different, making it awkward for new arrivals to fully integrate into their professions here.  There's also the problem that professional standards are often not the same.  What might be acceptable treatment, or management practices, or whatever, in the Third World may not be at all appropriate in the First.  I've heard several complaints about foreign doctors from Americans that I'm pretty sure amounted to not much more than cultural differences.  Being an immigrant myself, I could perhaps weigh up the nuances better than those born and raised here.

There's no real answer to the problem.  It's been in progress for a long time, and as long as the First World is richer and more comfortable than the Third, it'll continue.  Sadly, that means a lot of Third World nations will continue to lose their brightest and best citizens to countries that can offer them more, leaving the rest of their citizens to cope with shortages and an infrastructure that's breaking down under the "brain drain".

Peter

A friend sent me a link to an article titled "Return of the One Room Schoolhouse".  I found it very interesting, particularly because it gave examples of eighth grade final examinations from 1895.  I doubt most of our modern schoolchildren could pass them - in fact, I think most of us adults would have a hard time with them too!

Here, for example, is the Geography exam.

Geography (Time, one hour)

1. What is climate? Upon what does climate depend?

2. How do you account for the extremes of climate in Kansas?

3. Of what use are rivers? Of what use is the ocean?

4. Describe the mountains of N.A.

5. Name and describe the following: Monrovia, Odessa, Denver, Manitoba, Hecla, Yukon, St. Helena, Juan Fernandez, Aspinwall and Orinoco.

6. Name and locate the principal trade centers of the U.S.

7. Name all the republics of Europe and give capital of each.

8. Why is the Atlantic Coast colder than the Pacific in the same latitude?

9. Describe the process by which the water of the ocean returns to the sources of rivers.

10. Describe the movements of the earth. Give inclination of the earth.

All that in one hour?  I'd be very hard pressed to answer that many questions, concisely enough, in that time limit.

Click over to the article to look at the examinations for English, arithmetic and other subjects.  They're interesting and thought-provoking.  Why are modern children taught so much less factually, and so much more about irrelevant, touchy-feely subjects that will do nothing to help them as adults?

Peter

That's a quote from William Briggs, who cautions us:  "Do not get sick".

It’s clear enough the Experts at the FDA with their “food pyramid” cannot be trusted. And the CDC? I cannot say here what I really think of the CDC because this is a family blog.

So while our side might be wrong about all or some of those things above, it’s clear—look out your window and see for yourself!—the other side is offering only continued pain. There seems only one way to bet.

Here’s the thing. You have to make that bet. You have no choice. You really need to get healthy and stay that way. Listen to your Uncle Sergeant Briggs. You cannot get sick anymore. Maybe in the old days you could. No longer.

Doubt me? Then gaze and wonder at this opening sentence from a recent New England Journal of Medicine article: “As academic medicine begins to recognize and examine racism as the root cause of racially disparate health outcomes, we need curricula for training physicians to dismantle the systems that perpetuate these inequities.”

Once you stop gagging, you will realize this sentence is perfect. It contains the seed, the core the pearl, the very key to understanding what has gone wrong and why. It’s right here—and in the first three words.

Academic medicine.

Ah, yes. Academic medicine. That’s it. Not medicine! Academic medicine. Medicine is the practice and art—art, not science—of healing. Academic medicine is to medicine as logic is to feminist logic.

We know this is true, that academic medicine is something far removed from medicine, because of the rest of the sentence. Which says academic medicine recognizes “racism” as the “root cause of racially disparate health outcomes”.

There's more at the link.

That's about the size of it.  Medical education has been trampled beneath the jackboots of political correctness and "woke" indoctrination.  Doctors in training are now being taught that race is at the root of most disparities in medical care, and of most outcomes - i.e. members of one race are more likely to recover and/or survive than another, due solely to the influence of their race on the treatment they receive.

It's complete and utter bullshit, of course . . . but the young doctors entering practice today are taught that, and many of them don't (yet) know enough to realize that it's all a lie.

If you aren't one of the "chosen" race(s), your care is likely to be deliberately sub-standard as a means of "rectifying" that institutional racism, or "balancing" medical care across races.  Does that make you feel happy?

Peter