There are some pretty thick people out there

jellyroll

Anybody can "not know" something. But the aggression and certainty in the minds of people who are plainly making incorrect statements is scary*. Seems to be tied into the development of online communication. I suppose in the bad old days, those people had less of a voice. The democratisation of idiocy....

 *I know there's a name for this mental state which I can't remember. 

sev112

jellyroll said:

Anybody can "not know" something. But the aggression and certainty in the minds of people who are plainly making incorrect statements is scary*. Seems to be tied into the development of online communication. I suppose in the bad old days, those people had less of a voice. The democratisation of idiocy....

 *I know there's a name for this mental state which I can't remember. 

It’s called “being an Expert” - they are notorious for being wrong far too often, but being highly assertive that they are not 

NorthernStomps

jellyroll said:

Anybody can "not know" something. But the aggression and certainty in the minds of people who are plainly making incorrect statements is scary*. Seems to be tied into the development of online communication. I suppose in the bad old days, those people had less of a voice. The democratisation of idiocy....

 *I know there's a name for this mental state which I can't remember. 

Dunning Kruger?

boogieman

SPECTRUM001 said:

It has long amazed me that I interview graduates who do not proof read their CVs, do not know how to write a letter nor spell basic words.

That sounds pretty damning, but sadly it is the case.

The brighter sparks stand out a mile.

My stepson has a Masters degree but still can’t seem to understand how to use certain types of punctuation. His wife also has a degree and, likewise, is clueless about punctuation, especially things like how to use an apostrophe correctly. They’re both in their mid thirties, I presume it wasn’t a thing  wot woz taught in school at the time. 

rze99

There are a lot of wilfully ignorant people out there. 

Neill

WezV said:

Neill said:

WezV said:

Neill said:

Nitefly said:

I couldn't LOL the original posts, @axisus - I find it terrifying that people with such a tenuous grasp on things think they have it right.

What on earth do they teach in schools these days?

I am beginning to wonder if this is where it starts.

A couple of years ago I was talking to a young chap, maybe 20-25 about how he had taught himself to read a map and navigate with a compass.  I was a bit puzzled by this as it's something I learned at school, quite early on.  No, they don't teach map reading at school now he explained.  So how do you learn geography if you can't read a map?  It's like kids regarding punctuation as irrelevant these days.  it seems to me that for some inexplicable reason very basic and essential knowledge is being by passed, which is creating some massive blind spots in childrens' education.  "I don't need to know that" or "I can just Google it" seems to be the popular refrain these days.  I find it quite sinister.

I would argue there were just as many blind spots in you education, but it probably suited the priorities of the generation you were educated in

There has been a big push towards teaching transferable skills rather than specific knowledge during my life time.   

The geography syllabus changed, map reading isn't a big part of it.   This happened at least 30 years ago.

Punctuation is definitely still a big thing in schools, and literacy is high on the agenda.  Having spent a lot of the last year teaching at home, I think have learnt a lot of things that were missed from my education in the 80's and 90's.

Most kids over the age of 10 will be able to do long division using at least 2 different methods.  It probably looks a little different to how the older generations did it.  I remember the old school math's teachers saying you wouldn't always be carrying a calculator with you.  I bet they feel foolish now.   Either way, they still teach the manual methods in depth.





There always have been, and always will be stupid people. The only difference is these days they have a much easier way to show their stupidity to the world 

It's not that long ago that the OECD released figures on teenage literacy in the Uk and didn't we come near the bottom of the developed countries?  As for numeracy, I think were actually at the bottom.   These things might be high on the agenda but it's outcomes that matter.  

Sadly, we do rank quite low. 

Do you have evidence we have become worse as a nation?   Most sources seem to claim Literacy has increased, despite the UK's low score compared to other nations.    

There has been uk government research but it's apples and oranges, the OECD using a different definition of "illiteracy" than the government.  I'm not aware of any recent uk specific research but there was a paper in 2011 which made a comparison with 2003.  IIRC one of the conclusions was that literary standards had increased, but there had been no improvement in low level literary skills.  In other words literate people are getting more literate, but the illiterate are getting left behind.  It's far from conclusive but that's the impression I get, and that this "left behind" group remains a stubbornly high percentage despite all the resources being thrown at it.  

It just perplexes me that we find ourselves in this situation as a country, when it's been an issue, and a priority, for some time now.  Surely at some point someone has to question the methodology.

YellowLedBetterMan

As someone who is currently studying a geography degree, I can't remember ever being specifically taught how to read a map or use a compass. It was moreorless just expected that if you had half a brain and had decided to study geography that you could already do it.

In fact, I've probably spent more time in the last 10 years learning how to make new maps than how to read old ones.

And yes, it's still very much about rocks and stuff. Lots of climate science and environmental law too, which makes me think I might have a career that doesn't involve colouring in or teaching.

SPECTRUM001

boogieman said:

SPECTRUM001 said:

It has long amazed me that I interview graduates who do not proof read their CVs, do not know how to write a letter nor spell basic words.

That sounds pretty damning, but sadly it is the case.

The brighter sparks stand out a mile.

My stepson has a Masters degree but still can’t seem to understand how to use certain types of punctuation. His wife also has a degree and, likewise, is clueless about punctuation, especially things like how to use an apostrophe correctly. They’re both in their mid thirties, I presume it wasn’t a thing  wot woz taught in school at the time. 

It isn't a crime to not know something or not have skills. What slightly irks me is there seems to be an idea that it is ok in a professional environment. 

I guess there is a place at times, and I can get off my high horse - however texting and social media is certainly to blame (to an extent). I try to teach my new recruits that if we can set the bar high and they learn good business practice, then we can dumb it down when they have developed their business relationships to a more casual level.

Whilst amusing, the level of ignorance in those clips is quite worrying - hence I really wonder if they are for real ??!!

Rant over !

scrumhalf

boogieman said:

My stepson has a Masters degree but still can’t seem to understand how to use certain types of punctuation. His wife also has a degree and, likewise, is clueless about punctuation, especially things like how to use an apostrophe correctly. They’re both in their mid thirties, I presume it wasn’t a thing  wot woz taught in school at the time. 

When I was at school if you made a grammatical or spelling error in your work you could lose marks. As I understand it these things are now only penalised for English work rather than, say, geography or history essays. To me that's wrong.

What gets my hackles raised now is that we have people who have been through a decade of schooling and more and still think it's corect to write "could of bought there apple's".

TeleMaster

Opening myself up here... The 20:20 one. She’s right no?

Fuck what have I missed?

boogieman

SPECTRUM001 said:

boogieman said:

SPECTRUM001 said:

It has long amazed me that I interview graduates who do not proof read their CVs, do not know how to write a letter nor spell basic words.

That sounds pretty damning, but sadly it is the case.

The brighter sparks stand out a mile.

My stepson has a Masters degree but still can’t seem to understand how to use certain types of punctuation. His wife also has a degree and, likewise, is clueless about punctuation, especially things like how to use an apostrophe correctly. They’re both in their mid thirties, I presume it wasn’t a thing  wot woz taught in school at the time. 

It isn't a crime to not know something or not have skills. What slightly irks me is there seems to be an idea that it is ok in a professional environment. 

I guess there is a place at times, and I can get off my high horse - however texting and social media is certainly to blame (to an extent). I try to teach my new recruits that if we can set the bar high and they learn good business practice, then we can dumb it down when they have developed their business relationships to a more casual level.

Whilst amusing, the level of ignorance in those clips is quite worrying - hence I really wonder if they are for real ??!!

Rant over !

What’s slightly worrying is he writes speeches and reports that are passed on to high ranking government officials. (I won’t expand on that, mostly to save his blushes). I do wonder what they make of some of his stuff. Maybe it’s genuinely not a concern, he’s been promoted fairly recently 

thecolourbox

TeleMaster said:

Opening myself up here... The 20:20 one. She’s right no?

Fuck what have I missed?

Well presumably that happened 366 times last year. And some version of that would happen every day in the first 59 years of any century? 

mrkb

TeleMaster said:

Opening myself up here... The 20:20 one. She’s right no?

Fuck what have I missed?

Every single time is unique in history- that’s how time stamps/dates work...... and she forgot the day and month....

SPECTRUM001

boogieman said:

SPECTRUM001 said:

boogieman said:

SPECTRUM001 said:

It has long amazed me that I interview graduates who do not proof read their CVs, do not know how to write a letter nor spell basic words.

That sounds pretty damning, but sadly it is the case.

The brighter sparks stand out a mile.

My stepson has a Masters degree but still can’t seem to understand how to use certain types of punctuation. His wife also has a degree and, likewise, is clueless about punctuation, especially things like how to use an apostrophe correctly. They’re both in their mid thirties, I presume it wasn’t a thing  wot woz taught in school at the time. 

It isn't a crime to not know something or not have skills. What slightly irks me is there seems to be an idea that it is ok in a professional environment. 

I guess there is a place at times, and I can get off my high horse - however texting and social media is certainly to blame (to an extent). I try to teach my new recruits that if we can set the bar high and they learn good business practice, then we can dumb it down when they have developed their business relationships to a more casual level.

Whilst amusing, the level of ignorance in those clips is quite worrying - hence I really wonder if they are for real ??!!

Rant over !

What’s slightly worrying is he writes speeches and reports that are passed on to high ranking government officials. (I won’t expand on that, mostly to save his blushes). I do wonder what they make of some of his stuff. Maybe it’s genuinely not a concern, he’s been promoted fairly recently 

That doesn’t surprise me - one of our senior lawyers scrawls away in jargon with no punctuation at all. But that is laziness and seniority - I know he can write if he needs to. 

I also think that most of the time we are able to understand context, so perhaps your stepson’s speeches may be lacking in their precision but be elegance personified !!

I see the problem more with the graduates coming through over the last ten years or so.

TeleMaster

thecolourbox said:

TeleMaster said:

Opening myself up here... The 20:20 one. She’s right no?

Fuck what have I missed?

Well presumably that happened 366 times last year. And some version of that would happen every day in the first 59 years of any century? 

mrkb said:

TeleMaster said:

Opening myself up here... The 20:20 one. She’s right no?

Fuck what have I missed?

Every single time is unique in history- that’s how time stamps/dates work...... and she forgot the day and month....

Well that’s what I thought it was, it’s only unique to her because it’s all 20’s. But I can see how she would like the lining up of numbers. It’s like one of those things you point out in the office and someone goes ‘oh yea’ and then you talk about something else and no one remembers, but because you’ve tweeted it, the whole world will take the piss out of you forever and a day. 

TeleMaster

scrumhalf said:

boogieman said:

My stepson has a Masters degree but still can’t seem to understand how to use certain types of punctuation. His wife also has a degree and, likewise, is clueless about punctuation, especially things like how to use an apostrophe correctly. They’re both in their mid thirties, I presume it wasn’t a thing  wot woz taught in school at the time. 

When I was at school if you made a grammatical or spelling error in your work you could lose marks. As I understand it these things are now only penalised for English work rather than, say, geography or history essays. To me that's wrong.

What gets my hackles raised now is that we have people who have been through a decade of schooling and more and still think it's corect to write "could of bought there apple's".

C. And I'm being generous. 

strtdv

I sympathise with that view to a degree, however I suspect that correct grammar is a bit of a white/middle class thing these days. If we want people from a range of backgrounds to have good opportunities in life then I think it's reasonable to relax the standard a little.

Emp_Fab

.

prowla

I have to say, I encounter a lot of people in the IT world who don't know the difference between "M" and "m", "G" and g", and "B" and "b"; I'm still not hardened to seeing opinionated people expressing disk sizes in "gb" (gram-bits?) and line speeds as "mbps" (milli-bits per second).

Maybe Science doesn't teach the SI System any more.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_System_of_Units

zedhex

50% of the population is of average or below average intelligence. All of them have a vote. Most elections are decided on 50% or less of the population voting for the winner.This explains the political careers of people like Donald Trump, Nigel Farage and lots more. It could be that these kind of populist politicians have been smart enough to figure out that you don't need to convince the smart people in society in order to win elections - it's much easier, cheaper and more effective just to convince the idiots.