The bit of the Hoel post I could see annoyed me because 1. he was reading way too much into it and 2. he misinterpreted some of it anyway. Actually not everything the guardian publishes is original journalism - like most papers, they pay for wire copy from services like Reuters, the Press Association etc. I think the point of the bit he highlights is to say they won't use AI to mass-generate filler.
It just seemed like someone who was pro-Butlerian jihad was interpreting a fairly anodyne statement in the most negative possible light.
Disclosure: I work there (not in journalism, or in the working group mentioned in the statement)
> You say SATs, same, and the privileged go to expensive tuition centers.
Expensive SAT tutors don't actually increase students' scores much, though. Basic familiarity with the test and format can raise scores by 1-200 points, but that can be achieved at a public library.
Interesting and I'll check the paper but I don't know if I'll take it at face value. my experience, coloured by India, is that test prep makes a massive difference. People routinely take a year to study for entrance exams and it has both a red queen race effect but also impacts their score a lot.
"Test prep doesn't work" is limited to the US and to SAT/ACT. Those tests cover relatively simple math, reading, writing, vocabulary etc. under time pressure. A smart students can do reasonably well on them with literally zero prep.
In pretty much all other countries (incl. Poland) end-of-high-school exams require a lot of subject knowledge. Much of "test prep" is just learning HS math, history, physics etc. What students actually mean by "test prep" is learning common types of questions, useful strategies etc.
Of course it varies a lot. I once flipped through some IIT math textbooks and my impression was that I'd do very poorly unless I became very comfortable with many formulas, tricks, transformations and so on. In that context test prep obviously makes huge difference.
I'm reading two books by Joseph Henrich right now, The Secret of Our Success and The W.E.I.R.D.est People in the World, which are both cross-disciplinary but mostly anthropological looks at how cultures affect not just behavior but biology: the idea that the things we do in our cultures will affect the wiring of our brains and the hormones in our bloodstreams. It's been mind-opening for me; for example, the idea that ADHD is real AND that it's created by culture or environment are not mutually exclusive, because our culture and environment do reshape our impressively plastic brains. They go a lot deeper than that of course, the books cite fascinating studies both in the field in lab studies and give big picture perspective on human evolution and the relative survival values of various belief systems, including basic "shame" and fear of social consequences. Anyway, the things you said about your brain needing to assume a different configuration for different activities made me think you might really enjoy these books if you haven't already read them? :)
“writing to me isn’t separable from thinking, and in fact seems to be a very particular form of thinking which is different to all others.”
This is why I think AI taking over writing is overstated. It is the forms of writing that *dont* constitute thinking that are most under threat
The bit of the Hoel post I could see annoyed me because 1. he was reading way too much into it and 2. he misinterpreted some of it anyway. Actually not everything the guardian publishes is original journalism - like most papers, they pay for wire copy from services like Reuters, the Press Association etc. I think the point of the bit he highlights is to say they won't use AI to mass-generate filler.
It just seemed like someone who was pro-Butlerian jihad was interpreting a fairly anodyne statement in the most negative possible light.
Disclosure: I work there (not in journalism, or in the working group mentioned in the statement)
This is a very fair point
> You say SATs, same, and the privileged go to expensive tuition centers.
Expensive SAT tutors don't actually increase students' scores much, though. Basic familiarity with the test and format can raise scores by 1-200 points, but that can be achieved at a public library.
Exactly.
Here’s a classic MR post on this topic: https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2014/03/the-sat-test-prep-income-and-race.html
Interesting and I'll check the paper but I don't know if I'll take it at face value. my experience, coloured by India, is that test prep makes a massive difference. People routinely take a year to study for entrance exams and it has both a red queen race effect but also impacts their score a lot.
"Test prep doesn't work" is limited to the US and to SAT/ACT. Those tests cover relatively simple math, reading, writing, vocabulary etc. under time pressure. A smart students can do reasonably well on them with literally zero prep.
In pretty much all other countries (incl. Poland) end-of-high-school exams require a lot of subject knowledge. Much of "test prep" is just learning HS math, history, physics etc. What students actually mean by "test prep" is learning common types of questions, useful strategies etc.
Of course it varies a lot. I once flipped through some IIT math textbooks and my impression was that I'd do very poorly unless I became very comfortable with many formulas, tricks, transformations and so on. In that context test prep obviously makes huge difference.
I'm reading two books by Joseph Henrich right now, The Secret of Our Success and The W.E.I.R.D.est People in the World, which are both cross-disciplinary but mostly anthropological looks at how cultures affect not just behavior but biology: the idea that the things we do in our cultures will affect the wiring of our brains and the hormones in our bloodstreams. It's been mind-opening for me; for example, the idea that ADHD is real AND that it's created by culture or environment are not mutually exclusive, because our culture and environment do reshape our impressively plastic brains. They go a lot deeper than that of course, the books cite fascinating studies both in the field in lab studies and give big picture perspective on human evolution and the relative survival values of various belief systems, including basic "shame" and fear of social consequences. Anyway, the things you said about your brain needing to assume a different configuration for different activities made me think you might really enjoy these books if you haven't already read them? :)
I've read WEIRD book but not the other, will look it up, thank you!!