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At last weekend’s annual meeting of the Association for Psychological Science (APS) in Boston, Cornell University psychologist Robert Sternberg sounded an alarm about the influence of standardized tests on American society. Sternberg, who has studied intelligence and intelligence testing for decades, is well known for his “triarchic theory of intelligence,” which identifies three kinds of smarts: the analytic type reflected in IQ scores; practical intelligence, which is more relevant for real-life problem solving; and creativity. Sternberg offered his views in a lecture associated with receiving a William James Fellow Award from the APS for his lifetime contributions to psychology. He explained his concerns to Scientific American.
[An edited transcript of the interview follows.]
What I argue is that intelligence that’s not modulated and moderated by creativity, common sense and wisdom is not such a positive thing to have. What it leads to is people who are very good at advancing themselves, often at other people’s expense. We may not just be selecting the wrong people, we may be developing an incomplete set of skills—and we need to look at things that will make the world a better place.
-- submitted from IRC
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(Score: 3, Insightful) by DannyB on Monday June 05 2017, @02:51PM (3 children)
Instead of breaking society up into a bunch of little compartments where everyone is trying to fill theirs with the most water to float their boat the highest; how about if we just had one ocean and everyone was interested in raising the water level so everyone's boat would rise.
A society with more than enough wealth (which we already have) should be able to take care of everyone. People with obscene amounts of wealth don't seem to enjoy it as much as one would think vs people far less wealthy. So what is the point -- other than to be able to control other people's lives -- which is probably not a good thing.
Maybe if we could screen for psychopaths and sociopaths earlier we might get somewhere. I remember an article somewhere in the last few years about many MBAs qualifying as one or the other. Insatiable greed. Why is it insatiable? Isn't there some point where I've got enough?
Why is it okay to screw everyone over, including taking their investments (Enron, Worldcom, etc) and homes (2008) and health care (2017), but it's not okay to just kill off those people who get in your way? Instead of standing on the backs of so many people, wouldn't it just be better if you could get rid of those pesky inconvenient people?
Maybe you could just be all alone in the world and have the entire planet's wealth to yourself? Your philosophy seems to imply no need for any kind of tribalism or friends, or group beyond maybe immediate family.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 05 2017, @04:44PM
Maybe someone should tell the RNC that they are taking this metaphor too literally when it comes to climate change.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 05 2017, @08:25PM (1 child)
Society _is_ comprised of a bunch of little compartments, we normally call them people/families though. That's the default.
That's how humans naturally act, capitalism is the best way we've yet found to turn greed into social utility. Attempting to change human nature, a la the USSR, is --- at least for the forseeable future --- doomed to failure by our lack of understanding.
That's why society exists, it's an attempt to do so by inextricably linking our fates to a great degree and taking advantage of the synergy created by the division of labour allowing specialisation.
If we have enough to do X then we can do X. No shit.
We do take care of everyone to a large extent. Sure there are some lingering problems with homelessness, but we're working on it. The common people's quality of life is unspeakably better than it was just a century ago, hell coal miners are still in living memory here.
70-80k USD IIRC is the point were it doesn't really affect daily life in the USA. But the fact they don't need it doesn't mean you can take it. Sure I don't need both kidneys, and I'm literally killing a child by not donating one, but it would still be wrong to forcibly take one from me.
To assure their descendants well being, sure seems worthwhile. Hell, it seems like it just might be one of the strongest instincts we have, surpassing even survival.
Whether you like it or not, unless they violate someone's rights you have moral way to forcibly prevent it.
This is the opening to a dystopian novel, do you really want to have some adult come to assess you in HS and determine you're to be crippled in society and prevented from achieving great things?
Humans are bad at stats, and descendants exponentially grow.
It's only okay if you don't violate their rights while doing so, though depending on the circumstances it may be unethical.
If their rights were violated that's wrong. If by homes you mean foreclosure then its okay because their home wasn't taken from them, it was given by them. If you think that people ought not to be able to make decisions affecting their future selves... well that sucks. If by losing healthcare you mean people chose not to do business with them, I'd ask why you feel it's acceptable to force people to make bets they don't want to make, and betting is all insurance is, while compelling them to work. Not quite slavery, but compelled labour is damn close.
Because that violates their rights.
Whether it leads do a better outcome is utterly irrelevant to whether it is moral.
Economics isn't zero sum. Why do you think capitalism, a system for _maintaining societies_, is hostile to societies? It enforces societies. Capitalism cannot even exist without interpersonal relations.
A single comment pointing out a stylistic fumble of the quoted writer couldn't possibly give you any information about my ``philosophy'', so you must be basing this on the following:
Which implies nothing of the sort, but rather describes the absolute bare minimum required to be considered moral.
The fact that its possible for a hermit to be moral certainly doesn't imply the only way to be moral is to be a hermit.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 05 2017, @08:43PM
inb4 you misinterpret an offhand comment on the tail-end of a stylistic nitpick as being a complete explication of my morality, that isn't a complete description, but a relevant aspect.