NCLB v. Spelling Bee

[via Education News]
NCLB is turning into a Harrison Bergeron juggernaut: Spelling Bees are violation of the "raising all students" ethic because there's only one winner. Excellence is not to be rewarded; students who can do better are going to be encouraged to do just a bit better, so as to not endanger the preferred gradually rising test scores. How about this: any student who drops out in the first two rounds gets extra help? How about spelling bees with teams instead of individuals? There's lots of ways to make these more NCLB-friendly. But imagination is not, I'm afraid, the first trait of educational administrators.

UPDATE: The Bee is back on [registration required]. Apparently the decision to cancel was made last year: several of the principals involved have since retired and there was "Thoughtful consideration, and lots of input...."

The five laws of stupidity

The five laws of stupidity are always relevant:

1. Always and inevitably everyone underestimates the number of stupid individuals in circulation.


2. The probability that a certain person will be stupid is independent of any other characteristic of that person.


3. A stupid person is a person who causes losses to another person or to a group of persons while himself deriving no gain and even possibly incurring losses.


4. Non-stupid people always underestimate the damaging power of stupid individuals. In particular non-stupid people constantly forget that at all times and places and under any circumstances to deal and/or associate with stupid people always turns out to be a costly mistake.


5. A stupid person is the most dangerous type of person.

There should be a corrolary, lest we get too full of ourselves:

It is almost impossible to identify oneself as a stupid person, because even people who are studiously and conscientiously non-stupid act in stupid ways (see #4) on occasion, usually without realizing the damage done. Therefore we are all, at times and potentially, stupid people.

Someone (I can't find the reference quickly) once said that "Everyone makes a few mistakes every day. The trick is to make them when nobody's looking, in trivial matters."

Addendum: The original rules were formulated under the belief that stupidity is a personal characteristic, inherent in certain individuals. I find this reductionistic and a poor match to the evidence, and I question the methods by which the original research was done. It makes more sense, given the laws of unintended consequences and the apparently consistent findings of stupidity across class, race and gender lines, to consider stupidity by its effects (which is in fact how the rules define it) rather than by its origins.

Just as it is possible for intelligent people to do stupid things, similarly dumb people (or institutions, or policies) may have unexpectedly good results for all concerned. Stupidity is contextual, not essential.

Pirkei Avot, Chapter 4, Mishna 1(b)

"Ben (the son of) Zoma said, who is wise? He who learns from all people, as it is said: 'From all those who taught me I gained understanding' (Psalms 119:99). Who is strong? He who conquers his evil inclination, as it is said: 'Better is one slow to anger than a strong man, and one who rules over his spirit than a conqueror of a city' (Proverbs 16:32). Who is rich? He who is satisfied with his lot, as it is said: 'When you eat the toil of your hands you are fortunate and it is good for you' (Psalms 128:2). 'You are fortunate' -- in this world; 'and it is good for you' -- in the World to Come. Who is honored? He who honors others, as it is said: 'For those who honor Me will I honor, and those who scorn Me will be degraded' (I Samuel 2:30)."

Quotations #036

"No one ever went broke underestimating the taste of the American public." -- H. L. Mencken

"The trouble with being tolerant is that people think you don't understand the problem." --Merle L. Meacham

"The victor will never be asked if he told the truth." -- Adolf Hitler

"No man thoroughly understands a truth unless he has contended against it." -- Ralph Waldo Emerson

"Winning is overemphasized. The only time it is really important is in surgery and war." -- Al McGuire

Ethical Committments

Ophelia Benson is trying to make a distinction between ethical principles based on whether they are individually developed in an environment of knowledge and options. Ethical principles not developed individually, or developed without broad knowledge of alternatives, or in a situation where options for action based on alternative principles are severely limited, do not qualify as "ethical committments." Its an interesting argument, though she's very carefully (and subtly) defining her terms in such a way as to preclude religious values from being valid ethical committments.

Plausible.

Quotations #035

"He uses statistics as a drunken man uses lampposts -- for support rather than for illumination." -- Andrew Lang

"Do not put your faith in what statistics say until you have carefully considered what they do not say." -- William W. Watt

"Take care of the sense and the sounds will take care of themselves." -- Lewis Carroll

"The exclusive worship of the bitch-goddess Success [is] our national disease." -- William James

"There is only one truly philosophical problem, and that is suicide. Whether or not life is worth living." -- Albert Camus

Bush, Gonzales, DUI, and coverups

[via Peking Duck, which I found via Simon World]

I'm not terribly interested in the DUI aspect, or even in the apparent attempt to cover it up. What bothers me about it is the very clear implication that Gonzales is not in any way an independent legal mind. Clever, to be sure, but compliant.

A Liberal Jewish Manifesto

Actually, he calls it an "American" Jewish manifesto. But the globalism, and reduced nationalism, is a pretty fundamentally liberal position. Still, I want to read it later.

Lawsuit Fun

Here are seven of the most egregious civil complaint awards collected over the last year. Yes, they are dumb. But are they evidence in favor of tort reform? Most of the reform proposals coming from the Bush campaign, etc., were about medical malpractice, which isn't at issue here. Is there actually a proposal in play which would address these? You can't legislate common sense, no matter how hard we try, nor can you stop lawyers (and insurance companies, who certainly paid most of these awards) from working in their own interests. What to do?

Update: Hah! Turns out that Most of those stories are both false and old. Remind me to check Snopes next time before I link to a "true story" piece like this.