Education
For decades scientists, doctors and educators have struggled with separating innate intelligence from the effects of training and education.
I am reminded of a study [i]Anthropologist Jarod Diamond makes similar references in “Guns, Germs and Steel”. from some years ago that asked of a primitive jungle tribe, forever isolated from Western learning, how to complete the following sequence; one, two, _____? Of course any 6 year-old in the Western world would have said three, but nearly everyone in the study said, four. Was that a lack of intelligence or did it reflect the fact that these people thought of “sequence” as being algebraic rather than linear. The answer of course was revealed with the next in the sequence, to which they all responded “eight” rather than “four”.
to be continued
By: Jim
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footnotes
↑i | Anthropologist Jarod Diamond makes similar references in “Guns, Germs and Steel”. |
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