Our Offspring are Mutating

[thecontributer]

[Sparky]

I tried to read all of that, but I got distracted by the pictures. Having seen the closeup, I think I preferred the other avatar to this one. You know, the one everybody thought was a dick, but turned out to be a weaner...

[AzariLoveIran]

[Tinker]

Generally this sort of hysterical academic stuff rests on the notion that yesteryear's values are necessary. A long attention span is not necessarily an important skill. Most things you need attention for are repetitive tasks and calculations. The two things that computers excel at.

The assumption here is that Vonnegut is necessary and worthwhile. In the past the kid would simply not have read the book OR watched a YouTube synopsis. Now he watched the synopsis. So that's an improvement.

Multitaskng is the more important skill. Any and all 'people are getting dumber' hysteria strikes me as stupid and sentimental. My kids will be more educated than me or any of you because of more efficient info delivery. I'm glad some people love the written word, but lovers of the written word have always been the exception and not the rule.

[Demon of Undoing]

There are a lot of ways to get to the center of this particular tootsie roll pop . I would argue that a kid bashing about doing whatever the hell he feels like is an idea inimical to education of any kind at all. Meanwhile, you could go to the " Instructional reference" section of this forum and get an education through the mojo machine that the best minds of yesteryear could could not have imagined . For free.

My nine year old spends up to six hours a day on the computer ( if she is allowed) , doing art and animation . Along the way, she will listen to music , message friends at deviantart and occasionally do hand to hand combat with the Boston terrier . But she will also bust out a book and read for two hours before bedtime and hardly move a muscle while doing so . It really doesn't have to be either/or .

What the article is talking about is what happens to the kids that are raised by the machines by default . Yes, they may in fact be mutants to an extent . However , if the optimism pays off and the world can be constructed as they expect in the not too distant future, we will be the dinosaurs , make no mistake.

[Tinker]

Am I the only one that is skeptical that the kids did the reading before?

[noddy]

[Hoosiernorm]

[Tinker]

I read more as a child than I do now. One memorable holiday reading assignment was Burma Rifles. It was a book about a kid going through Japanese internment during WWII and then joining up to fight and being sent to Burma while wondering if his service proves he's an American.