V
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6051041
me
so, what do you make of it?
V
It's great link bait for the HN crowd
It's a tough choice, though
On the one hand, you can be a robot, working 12 and 14 hour days at your iBanking job, slaving away at the system making a 250k$ pittance
Or you can be one of the free thinkers, working your part-time Starbucks job for 10$/hr between house parties, oh, and, by the way, no health insurance
V
The speech is actually quite self-aggrandising
It hints at all these truths we know but won't admit
Like how the slackers who lived a better life probably are mostly losers and only 1% hidden geniuses
me
I think the original intent was to question the industrial process of education
V
But clearly the industrial process reflects an industrial thinking about society
This is the thinking that the people who will love this speech will also espouse
The utilitarian approach
me
it may be questioning the efficacy of this process, after all, there's only one valedictorian
the industrial education process may or may not be dehumanizing, but the larger problem is that it is actually incredibly inefficient
V
How do we improve efficiency?
me
I don't know, but I think that is where a lot of the angst is really coming from
V
But the HN appeal seems to show that the angst is at efficiency at the wrong end
Who cares if the gifted & talented are underserved by the system?
They'll probably succeed anyway
The slightly gifted may be left behind
But they're really not as special as they want us to think
But at the other end, you have direr situation, and there seems to be less focus or interest on what to do about them
