<html><head><meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"></head><body dir="auto"><div dir="ltr"><span></span></div><div dir="ltr"><meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8">On Dec 14, 2018, at 4:40 PM, William Flynn Wallace <<a href="mailto:foozler83@gmail.com">foozler83@gmail.com</a>> wrote:<blockquote type="cite"><div dir="ltr"><div dir="ltr"><div class="gmail_quote"><div dir="ltr">On Fri, Dec 14, 2018 at 6:21 PM Dan TheBookMan <<a href="mailto:danust2012@gmail.com" target="_blank">danust2012@gmail.com</a>> wrote:<br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex"><div dir="auto">On Dec 14, 2018, at 2:30 PM, William Flynn Wallace <<a href="mailto:foozler83@gmail.com" target="_blank">foozler83@gmail.com</a>> wrote:<blockquote type="cite"><div dir="ltr"><div dir="ltr"><div style="font-family:"comic sans ms",sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0)">dan wrote</div><div style="font-family:"comic sans ms",sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0)"><br></div><div style="font-family:"comic sans ms",sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0)"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34);font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif">“I’d like to see evidence showing there because there’s much evidence to show people don’t generalize well. Maybe I’ve misread the work on this, but it seems like most people don’t go from example to example well — unless primed and prompted.”</span><br></div><div style="font-family:"comic sans ms",sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0)"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34);font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><br></span></div><div style="font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0)"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34)"><font face="comic sans ms, sans-serif">It varies a lot, mostly with IQ. I have seen studies where mentally retarded Ss and normals work the same tasks and then are switched to a generalization task. Most of the normals used the skills they learned on the previous task, but the MRs did not until prompted. But I really am not aware of most research on this subject.</font></span></div></div></div></blockquote><div><br></div><div>The work I’ve seen shows average students not generalizing if not promoted or directed* in many cases — enough to undermine the argument that average people, say, being taught history will then go on and generalize to current policies or events.</div><div><br></div><div>Now if students with IQ positively correlated with generalization, then it’s likely it’s not that the student is learning to generalize so much as they already are good generalizers... In other words, it’s at least possible that had they not been schooled that they might be as good or as bad at generalization.</div><br></div></blockquote></div></div></div></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><div dir="ltr"><div dir="ltr"><div class="gmail_quote"><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex"><div dir="auto"><blockquote type="cite"><div dir="ltr"><div dir="ltr"><div><font color="#000000"><span style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);"> I will generalize: I think that if people did not generalize fairly readily the species would not have lasted nearly this. </span></font><span style="color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-size: small;"><font face="comic sans ms, sans-serif">Few things in the world present themselves as identical to what was experienced before.</font></span></div></div></div></blockquote><br><div>Given the data, I think it’s wrong to think every last human is great at generalization. <span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:"comic sans ms",sans-serif;font-size:small"><font color="#00ff00">Here you are setting up a straw man and knocking him down. I would never make such a statement about any human characteristic. </font></span></div></div></blockquote></div></div></div></blockquote><div><br></div><div>Okay, but your above statement seemed to hint at that, don’t you think?</div><br><blockquote type="cite"><div dir="ltr"><div dir="ltr"><div class="gmail_quote"><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex"><div dir="auto"><div><span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:"comic sans ms",sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0)"> </span>Instead, a better theory here might be there’s a bell curve but since humans do seem really good at imitation that all that’s necessary for a social species to survive is a few outliers perform successful generalizations that imitators can then follow. Or failing that that those worse at generalizing (who might still not be terrrible overall) can specialize in areas that don’t require heavy generalization.</div><div><br></div><div>And in fact most work doesn’t require much generalization. One can stick in a very narrow domain — hunting large game, fishing, growing wheat, fixing truck engines, coding apps on mobile phones — and not have to worry about other domains or about generalized knowledge overall. Your argument would work <span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:"comic sans ms",sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0)"></span><span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:"comic sans ms",sans-serif;font-size:small"><font color="#ffff00">What argument is that?</font></span><span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:"comic sans ms",sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0)"> </span></div></div></blockquote></div></div></div></blockquote><div><br></div><div>Your above statement: “<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">I will generalize: I think that if people did not generalize fairly readily the species would not have lasted nearly this.” My contention is most people are not good at generalization; a few are and rest generally just imitate those few.</span></div><br><blockquote type="cite"><div dir="ltr"><div dir="ltr"><div class="gmail_quote"><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex"><div dir="auto"><div>if humans were asocial or operated only in tiny groups yet still needed to generalize. (In fact, the smaller the human group, generally, the fewer skill sets overall can be maintained to any degree. A really tiny society tends to lose the skill sets because it can no longer retain the knowledge base, including tacit knowledge. I’m thinking here especially of preliterate societies.)</div><div><br></div><div><div dir="ltr"><div style="line-height:normal"><div style="line-height:normal"><span style="line-height:20px;background-color:rgba(255,255,255,0)">Regards,</span></div><div style="line-height:normal"><span style="line-height:20px;background-color:rgba(255,255,255,0)"><br></span></div><div><div style="line-height:normal"><span style="line-height:20px;background-color:rgba(255,255,255,0)">Dan</span></div><div style="line-height:normal"><span style="line-height:20px;background-color:rgba(255,255,255,0)"> Sample my Kindle books at:</span></div><div style="line-height:normal"><p style="margin:0px;font-stretch:normal;line-height:normal"><span style="background-color:rgba(255,255,255,0)"><a href="http://author.to/DanUst" target="_blank">http://author.to/DanUst</a></span></p><p style="margin:0px;font-stretch:normal;line-height:normal"><span style="background-color:rgba(255,255,255,0)"><br></span></p><p style="margin:0px;font-stretch:normal;line-height:normal"><span style="background-color:rgba(255,255,255,0)">* If they’re promoted or directed then it’s not really raw generalization happening, but following instructions. </span><span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:"comic sans ms",sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0);background-color:rgba(255,255,255,0)"></span><span class="gmail_default" style="background-color:rgba(255,255,255,0);font-family:"comic sans ms",sans-serif;font-size:small"><font color="#ff0000">No - they are not told what to do, but prompted to remember doing some other task</font></span><span class="gmail_default" style="background-color:rgba(255,255,255,0);font-family:"comic sans ms",sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0)">.</span></p></div></div></div></div></div></div></blockquote></div></div></div></blockquote><div dir="ltr"><br></div><div dir="ltr">My bad. In the case of promoting, sure, but then the problem is they’re being guided to generalize, which kind of means generalization hasn’t been taught. If you told me you can play a Bach prelude, but then need prompting each section I’d say you don’t know how to play it. Sure you might show some promise, but I doubt anyone’s going to hire you to play that piece in a concert.</div><br><blockquote type="cite"><div dir="ltr"><div dir="ltr"><div class="gmail_quote"><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex"><div dir="auto"><div><div dir="ltr"><div style="line-height:normal"><div><div style="line-height:normal"><p style="margin:0px;font-stretch:normal;line-height:normal"><span class="gmail_default" style="background-color:rgba(255,255,255,0);font-family:"comic sans ms",sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0)"> </span><span style="background-color:rgba(255,255,255,0)">And most of the evidence with education seems to show students learning to get the grade or diploma, then promptly forgetting what they learned — that is, not generalizing.</span><span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:"comic sans ms",sans-serif;font-size:small;background-color:rgb(243,243,243)"><font color="#6aa84f">Forgetting something and generalizing something are different things.</font></span><span style="background-color:rgba(255,255,255,0)"><font color="#6aa84f"> </font></span></p></div></div></div></div></div></div></blockquote></div></div></div></blockquote><div><br></div><div>That’s true, but since there’s good evidence that students are already bad at generalization and that forgetting what happens to most of what they’re taught, it remains to be shown that they can be taught generalization and, very importantly, that once taught it that they will retain it. So if the goal is to teach generalization, then presumably one doesn’t want to teach it and then having students promptly lose the skill once they’ve passed the class or gotten their diploma.</div><br><blockquote type="cite"><div dir="ltr"><div dir="ltr"><div class="gmail_quote"><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex"><div dir="auto"><div><div dir="ltr"><div style="line-height:normal"><div><div style="line-height:normal"><p style="margin:0px;font-stretch:normal;line-height:normal"><span style="background-color:rgba(255,255,255,0)">There are exceptions, but the exceptions are usually people who go into academia, which is a tiny minority of students.</span> </p></div></div></div></div></div></div></blockquote></div></div></div></blockquote><br></div><div dir="ltr"><div style="line-height: normal;"><span style="line-height: 20px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">Regards,</span></div><div style="line-height: normal;"><span style="line-height: 20px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);"><br></span></div><div><div style="line-height: normal;"><span style="line-height: 20px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">Dan</span></div><div style="line-height: normal;"><span style="line-height: 20px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);"> Sample my Kindle books at:</span></div><div style="line-height: normal;"><p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);"><a href="http://author.to/DanUst">http://author.to/DanUst</a></span></p></div></div></div></body></html>