So - is it true? :biggrin:Holland and/or Amsterdam seemed to mostly trigger envious questions about drugs, if it was true them beiing available all over the place
US people's rest of the world knowledge, is this for real??
- Thread starter rsevo6
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I have been on long vacation trips to the US 6 times over the last 20 years, making extensive travels through 9 or 10 states, probably covering more of the country than most US citizens seem to do during their lifetime :tongue:.
I did find out first hand that quite a lot of the people that I met generally had very little knowledge of what was (happening) outside of the US.
Strangely, especially the last few years, Holland and/or Amsterdam seemed to mostly trigger envious questions about drugs, if it was true them beiing available all over the place
Well just like the clip in this thread even the news can be edited to only give out the intended information.
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What? I thought all republicans were racist!!! :tongue:
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"57" states still takes the cake, though. :biggrin:
Yeah. It's from 2009.
Of course, I am serious! English is my second language!:tongue:
In elementary school in Hong Kong, we learnt Chinese by reading stories of famous people and trivials. We read about Washington's apple tree, Lincoln's involvement Civil War, Newton's apple, Edison's being slapped, Einstein's intelligence, Ben Franklin, World geographies, famous musicians, artists and many, many, many more of what we consider just common knowledges.
Steve
I thought it was a trick question and would have said whig. Honestly I suck at american history and hated that subject in high school. I am sort of sorry now and have found that in the past couple of years I have developed an appreciation for history and am sort of sorry I never spent more time reading about it earlier in my life, but I do have to agree with some previous posters that it really isn't relevant in most jobs or anything you do in life. It is just memorization and regurgitation of facts.
LOL Vance, nice to have you back. I think we went over this ad nauseam during Election 2008 and obviously our opinions have not changed. 57 states? Yeah it was a gaffe; Obama probably meant 47 states that he had traveled to recently but did not want to exclude the other 3, and jumbled 50/47 in his exhausted mind as he spoke. I still stand by my American ignorance claim and you keep confirming it by comparing a former Harvard Law Review Editor who graduated near the top of his Harvard Law class with a person who enrolled into some no-name colleges 7 times to finally graduate with a bachelor degree. She continues to be the standard bearer for American ignorance that you so blindly follow. I've never been a fan of Hillary but you're barking up the wrong tree there too.
Before you point to your edited version that makes it look like I said Harvard students are stupid, think again about why I included it in this discussion. You of all people should appreciate this most, being of Chinese descent. Yes, we as a society are falling behind badly in the education race. The typical Chinese grade school student is either in school, studying, or being tutored in additional courses (including music) for most of the day, at least 6 days a week. This is the norm and the very very best of this, from a much larger pool than ours, ends up at Beijing or Ching Hua University. The running joke about Harvard students comes from these students, not me. Same can be said for the Koreans, Japanese, Singaporeans and northern Europeans:
http://www.nytimes.com/imagepages/2010/12/07/education/07education_graph.html?ref=education
It is very easy to point to a failing school system and blame the teachers, whether they are earning 100k or 30k. The real fault lies with you and the rest of our society who have absolutely no appreciation for education, the value there of, and for those who have displayed excellence in education. These are the people who should be our "rock stars", not some ignorant, unintelligent person whose only appeal are her looks and a talent for maintaining her composure while talking nonsense that you believe in. Being wrong isn't being stupid and being stupid doesn't make you wrong, but being stupid about stupidity is very very wrong.
Fast Five lives! Congrats Vance
Danny
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just came across this thread and saw that youtube video
likely a biased video...seems like they looked for the dumbest looking person in hopes of getting the dumbest answer....however i will go on a limb and state this much ---> i have traveled quite a bit and have lived in the middle east, europe and the carribean and i must say that the average CAB DRIVER in those countries is more aware of what goes on in the world than our kids coming out of college.
as a whole i think most americans are ignorant of the world around them..maybe its our subconcious belief that we are the world and the world is us.
PS. as a side not..why do our professional sporting leagues label their winner as the "world champions" be it MLB, NFL, NBA, ect...What other countries did they beat to earn the title world champion?
likely a biased video...seems like they looked for the dumbest looking person in hopes of getting the dumbest answer....however i will go on a limb and state this much ---> i have traveled quite a bit and have lived in the middle east, europe and the carribean and i must say that the average CAB DRIVER in those countries is more aware of what goes on in the world than our kids coming out of college.
as a whole i think most americans are ignorant of the world around them..maybe its our subconcious belief that we are the world and the world is us.
PS. as a side not..why do our professional sporting leagues label their winner as the "world champions" be it MLB, NFL, NBA, ect...What other countries did they beat to earn the title world champion?
lowellhigh79 said most of what I wanted to say, and he did it better than I would have.
But there is one thing I don't understand, how can people compare "57 states" with not knowing the "Bush Doctrine"? One was an obvious misspeak, and the other is complete ignorance of a world changing policy that concerns the US stance and attitude towards the rest of the world.
The two are not even remotely equal, "57 states" was a terrible sound byte, not knowing the "Bush Doctrine" is dangerous on the highest levels.
But there is one thing I don't understand, how can people compare "57 states" with not knowing the "Bush Doctrine"? One was an obvious misspeak, and the other is complete ignorance of a world changing policy that concerns the US stance and attitude towards the rest of the world.
The two are not even remotely equal, "57 states" was a terrible sound byte, not knowing the "Bush Doctrine" is dangerous on the highest levels.
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My question is, did he say it or did he read it? Obama gets fed more lines than one of Jeff Dunham's puppets. How can you hold him responsible for "saying" anything? LOL!
B, I knew you would have the answer..Tiger MILFs! Vega$ NSX FTW!
You folks know it's always been like this, right?
The only difference is that now we have the internet to complain about it and then be even less productive than our forefathers.
Dave
The only difference is that now we have the internet to complain about it and then be even less productive than our forefathers.
Dave
Possibly, but there seems to have been a fundamental shift in our society. We once wanted to acquire knowledge and respected intelligence and wisdom. Now there is a celebration of ignorance.
In 2000 I went on a tour of Japan, China, South Korea and Russia. The tour had Brits, Canadians and Americans on board. The tour was about a month long.
We all had stupid questions to ask of our tour guides. Really it didn't matter where we were from. It did seem the Brits were more worldly and the better educated. than the Americans. The Canadians seemed to fall in the middle. The Americans knowledge seldom left the boarders of their own country.
I will always remember a tour guide we had in Russia. She was in her late 40's and her knowledge of Canadian, and American geography, politics, culture, local news and education was amazing. I would bet she knew more than most Canadian's did about Canada. And her American knowlege was like a Google search site. Some American's were trying to stump her, but never did, because they didn't know more than she did about the U.S. Her English was perfect as well. All very impressive. I took her aside and asked here where she got her education. She told me she went to the University of Vadisvostok to become a teacher, but being a tour guide was more fun, because she was able to meet people from around the world.
She mentioned that most of her knowledge about the west was taught to her when she was in the Russian military. Now, this was 10 years or more since the Iron Curtain fell and Russia was no longer a communist country and she had not been in the military for 20 years.
The comment from her I will alway remember. "when in the military, you learn as much as you can and the language of your enemy". And she could say that with NO Russian accent! I went away thinking she should use all this knowledge as a teacher, not a tour guide.
We all had stupid questions to ask of our tour guides. Really it didn't matter where we were from. It did seem the Brits were more worldly and the better educated. than the Americans. The Canadians seemed to fall in the middle. The Americans knowledge seldom left the boarders of their own country.
I will always remember a tour guide we had in Russia. She was in her late 40's and her knowledge of Canadian, and American geography, politics, culture, local news and education was amazing. I would bet she knew more than most Canadian's did about Canada. And her American knowlege was like a Google search site. Some American's were trying to stump her, but never did, because they didn't know more than she did about the U.S. Her English was perfect as well. All very impressive. I took her aside and asked here where she got her education. She told me she went to the University of Vadisvostok to become a teacher, but being a tour guide was more fun, because she was able to meet people from around the world.
She mentioned that most of her knowledge about the west was taught to her when she was in the Russian military. Now, this was 10 years or more since the Iron Curtain fell and Russia was no longer a communist country and she had not been in the military for 20 years.
The comment from her I will alway remember. "when in the military, you learn as much as you can and the language of your enemy". And she could say that with NO Russian accent! I went away thinking she should use all this knowledge as a teacher, not a tour guide.
Yeah, as I have said in the past, one man's trash is another man's treasure. I don't think Havard grads are are stupid, it is what they are taught that's is stupid. Excluding science related fields. Subhects such as political science, history and public policies can be manipulated by the instructors, and it is a fair assumption to say since theses kids accomplished the the feat to attend Harvard, or any other Ivy leagues they don't challenge the professors simply because they either don't know better, too prideful to be different, or believe in that these teachers are simply right all the time.
The trusty of matter is, people who have the ability to change the world often attend these institutes because of their brilliance, but often drops out because they don't follow what is being taught, and there aren't many of those. I know a Harvard and Standford grads work as finance and sales managers at car dealerships, and they are just just as big of a jackass as most of the people on the lot, except they make $250k a year, same as some of the managers of the job title but graduate only from high school. I guess what I'm saying is, people go to college for one simple reason, to have a bright financial future, and the probability of making it is greater through theses institutes.
However, most of them enters the public sector often understand the naiveness of the public and will exloit that to gang power, which is the next logical step when the person is financially set.
It is easy to rally the people by telling them what rights they have, but in reality, the only only true Right we have is liberty, every thing else are privileges. Just like being an Ivy leaguer. You know people often say "You pay USC to get that C so you can gain that connection.".
The only people who really succeed financially without using the buddy system through academic connections are the people who figured out how to make big bucks through entrepreneurship, even with that, most of them still required to have good people skills and honesty, and that is something you don't learn from school.
I would be happy to vote for high salaries for any educative if they pump good and legit academic results. In Washington DC, it cost the tax payer $15k a year per student and a huge chunk of them will drop out before graduating HS, but through charter schools, that cost is dropped to $7.5k and creates better results. Those teachers in Wisconsin have shamelessly ditched school and demand something the public disapproves after producing one of the worse result in the country, while shut down the school system. Not to mention the teachers in Wisconsin have one of the worse literacy rate in the country, something even their union can't challenge. I offer no support and sympathy to what is happening.
Simply put, give us the result and we the people will show our appreciation through finacial return.
Regardless, when are you going swing by again? Any more NSX related stuff to do at AW?
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It's been a while. Secret is out, I get my mods at Autowave as an excuse to hang out at the coolest Hookah Lounge in OC. BULLDOG LOUNGE!
Best Regards,
Danny
Actually, it shouldn't be "just memorization and regurgitation of facts", although it often is. History should be the study, not of facts, but of events and people, and how they influenced each other. The biggest mistake people can make, when looking at other eras, is forgetting that those were lived by real people in real places. People today can easily tell you how our outlook and our lives were changed instantly by the 9/11 attacks. But unless you're at least eighty years old, you can't tell how the same thing happened as a result of the 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor. People who lived at that time were shocked, and most realized instantly how our country would change from sitting on the sidelines as an arms supplier to becoming fully engaged in a war that much of the world was fighting. That's only one example. To cite another, there have been earlier eras in which our country's politics were fraught with hostility and divisiveness, just like today, and lessons on how it was handled at that time can be useful in understanding possible directions and solutions. There are plenty of similarities between our past and our present and future.
I understand that memorizing dates and "facts" can be not very revealing - and unfortunately, that's an easier way of teaching (particularly by teachers who don't understand all the cause and effect involved in history) - but there is so much more than that to history.
Disclaimer: I am not a historian, but like Rob, I have developed a greater appreciation of history over the years.
Just a less than gentle reminder boys and girls that Big Brother (a/k/a moderators) do pop in and out of these threads so:
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1. please refrain from personal attacks
2. please remember to tread lightly on politics
3. and even though this forum is "off topic", please stay "on topic" within the thread
And now back to your regular programming..........
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Yes it is. Because the unions, teachers and administrators are the individuals directly responsible for the failure of the system.
Execs at Enron ran Enron into the ground, as did the execs at WorldCom and BP. We know this and they know.
Why then, is it so taboo to blame the teachers, administrators and everyone else directly involved in the educational system for its overall failure?
The purpose of the public education system is to educate children...period.
Now the public education system has evolved into a politically charged "me first" organization that doesn't care about the kids at all.
We guarantee the teachers a lifetime of 8 month work years, free health benefits and an 80% pension guarantee after 25 years of service without any accountability. Your kids aren't learning? Meh, give me my raise.
Where else would this blatant failure be acceptable?
The real fault lies with the teacher's unions. The organization that has absolutely no vested interest in your children at all.
The organization that makes it impossible for an ineffective and a lot of times, dangerous, teacher to be fired.
The organization that works to reduce the time your children spend in the classroom.
The organization that guarantees your hard earned tax dollars go towards raises of unproven, ineffective teachers.
The organization that condones mediocrity and status quo.
I give teachers a break simply because they've been given the wrong set of incentives. When its impossible to get fired, you are only going to put in as much effort needed to keep things going. Add to that mandatory raises directly correlated to your years of service and education attained, free healthcare and guaranteed retirement and you have a recipe rich with complacency and lack of initiative. A lousy environment for our children.
Its pitiful. :frown:
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It is pitiful where our educational system is going but I disagree with pretty much everything you have stated. I've never been a union member but it seems like they are the current scapegoats to our financial woes. Abuses exist in any organization and I'm sure the teacher's union/school system is no exception, yet you make it sound like teachers are selfish, lazy people only interested in living comfortably while neglecting the children we have entrusted them to educate. I believe most people become teachers because they like to teach and do have a sincere interest in affecting the young minds they are entrusted to educate. They surely didn't do it for the big bucks.
If students were automatons able to regurgitate knowledge and display comprehension, then an objective test should have a place in the evaluation of the current system and all within it. But children are not automatons and your myopic view wrongly focuses the blame on the most convenient part. It is our society that is at fault, not just the teachers and parents, but society as a whole, including the students. Our priorities are wrong. Let's try this little exercise I will shamelessly borrow from the movie "White Man's Burden". Let's call it "The Alpha Nerd".
In the Alpha Nerd world, everything exists as in our world as we are living in it, but priorities are different. Sports and Entertainment are present but hold very little value. Sure some guys are on the football team, but no one goes to any of the games and the program might get cut. A bunch of guys play basketball for fun, but they don't have that sport at the college level. BIG things on campus are: Chess club, Math Club, Music, but above all, the High School Olympiad Team! All the chicks dig the guys with the big 4.0 GPA. The hero of the 2008 Olympics didn't run the 100 meters in 9.69 (who cares?!), but he did correctly answer 100 Wonderlic type questions in 9.69 minutes. Instead of boxing, there is debate etc. etc. You get the point. In Alpha Nerd world, Nobel laureates are the "Rock Stars" and everyone wants their child to get into Harvard, and every Harvard graduate is "special and revered" (not some "brainwashed student taught by liberal professors"). Do you think we would have an education problem then? Rather than worry if the school will be shut down due to "No Child Left Behind", you will have parents clamoring to make Algebra a 5th grade subject (that's what the South Korean parents are pushing for). The best and brightest (including those who are currently teachers in our world) will be filling the ranks of the teaching staff for a wonderful, fulfilling and lucrative profession, not some unappreciated union reliant teaching position with a room full of unappreciative and unmotivated students who don't value what you are trying to do for them and are about to drop out.
Actually, you don't have to make believe Alpha Nerd World, it already exists in some form in the countries that just kicked our butts.
Best Regards,
Danny
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