Getting rid of the filibuster, adding more seats to the House, and states adopting some form of ranked choice voting, would be a good start. Ultimately we will need a broader cultural shift back to the values of the Founders: rule of law, federalism, and limited government. Unfortunately with the rise of populism on the right and left, it doesn't seem like we are headed in the right direction.

Forget about national politics and parties. Focus on the races in front of you. Irrespective of consequence. Local, primary, pre-primary informal caucusing, et cetera. It’s tedious. But there is a shocking amount of power that even small amounts of civic engagement away from general elections brings.

Unless the only issues you care about are hot button, there is a good chance you can individually sway policy outcomes in a meaningful way. (I have.)

The US can inflate it away over time, with the main cost being the US standard of living staying flat or going down (which is annoying but very much tolerable given current American living standards). Moreover, paying for the debt by inflating it is a lot more politically palatable, as people don't usually think in inflation adjusted terms. Plus, you can take measures to fudge the official inflation numbers anyway.

Now compare this with climate issues, where no amount of financial engineering or political cost is going to fix environmental damage.

The national debt has to be continually refinanced as parts of it become due. That works when investors are willing to give you money. But if investors think you are no longer a good investment they will continually ask for higher interest rates and then eventually they will stop giving you their money altogether. And if that happens then we're going to be in be trouble because we will have no means to pay what is due and we'll default.

The problem is the interest payment on the debt is starting to become a large fraction of the income of America and we are starting to look like an increasingly bad investment. And that shows in the rates we have to pay. I don't think we're in any immediate danger but spending goes up every year which means we need to borrow more and we move more toward that risky place.

And if history is to be any guide, when you hit the bad spot, everything falls apart fast in a very uncontrolled way.

So IMHO, we should ramp down spending slowly, in a controlled way to avoid having it ramped down for us in a rapid uncontrolled way. Either way, I suspect eventually spending is going to come down whether we like it or not.

https://fiscaldata.treasury.gov/americas-finance-guide/feder...

Which your proposal to abolish the filibuster further proves: it would make governing even more a "winner-takes-all" game. Or ranked choice voting: you can't even stop Republicans from gerrymandering. (And no, gerrymandering is not done by "both sides". California did it as reprisal and put provisions to get back to a fair system when Republicans stop gerrymandering. And gerrymandering is the official strategy of the GOP from bottom to top.)

I'm willing to go either way on the fillibuster; that was just one example which the article talks about. In particular, they talk about filibuster reform rather than abolishing it, so I may have worded it too strongly in my original post. Still, I think there's a legitimate argument that the increase in use of the filibuster over the past few decades has had the practical consequence of delegating legislative power to the Executive branch.

Close but it's a feature, not a bug - both sides are equally good at not fixing, and not even acknowledging, the problems which leads to relentless beating around the bush, like wrangling about the filibuster, gerrymandering, etc.

> In particular, they talk about filibuster reform rather than abolishing it

That's not a real problem, it's just noise.

Limiting gambling ads the same way might be a good step.

It's hard to fully prohibit gambling (because you can play poker around a table, and it's better if that's legalized). It's much easier to prohibit banks from interacting with casinos and TV networks from letting them advertise, as those are large businesses who want to be compliant. That doesn't make gambling itself illegal, but cuts off most of its oxygen.

I don’t really gamble. But I agree with you. Prohibition is never the answer.

Our current regime, however, is one where bartenders face zero liability for their patrons’ drunk driving. Making gambling companies liable for problematic gambling is a good start. Banning gambling ads, within apps and without, is a great end. I’d also argue for a cap on bet sizes, but I’m open to being talked out of that.

If gamblers want to gamble, is not seeing the 30 second video ad the only thing stopping them?

prohibition noun pro· hi· bi· tion ˌprō-ə-ˈbi-shən also ˌprō-hə- Synonyms of prohibition 1 : the act of prohibiting by authority 2 : an order to restrain or stop

Recognizing this fact isn't treating them like children, it's treating them like the adults they are.

If I design a chemical that will specifically make you fasterik so dependent on it that you'll do any sexually depraved things that a line up of random strangers want so that they'll give you pocket change so that you can get another hit of that chemical should it be illegal for me to surreptitiously give it to you in a product that you buy from me?

Why or why not?

Like... cigarretes aren't prohibited. But you're hard pressed to find anyone who doesn't agree that we're MUCH better off now with full advertising bans, indoor smoking bans, bans on sales to minors, steep tax, etc, than what we were in the 70s with disgusting cigarrete smoke everywhere.

On top of that, sports betting inevitably leads into match fixing, threatening of players etc.

I believe that I, as a responsible adult, should be allowed to gamble for entertainment if I want to, and my right to do that shouldn't be taken away because a small minority of the population has low impulse control.

Legalized gambling establishments do very little besides extract money from visitors and project negative externalities into their surroundings.

> I believe that I, as a responsible adult, should be allowed to gamble for entertainment if I want to, and my right to do that shouldn't be taken away because a small minority of the population has low impulse control.

You can believe that, and be correct in theory. In practice, the "small minority" doesn't appear to be small enough under the current regulatory regime.

It's no different than the regulation of controlled substances and other vices. Or do you have an issue with that as well, and feel you should have the right to consume as much heroin as you want?

Regardless, I don't think we should stretch the metaphor between gambling and drugs too far. They are fundamentally different things.

You are on an extreme fringe to put it mildly. It is your right to hold that opinion, but it also means that there's no real point in discussing this with you from what I can tell.

Prohibition was a mistake and it goes a long way of sorting how people will act stupid regardless

Even if you think adding "age indication" to a project is harmless, you have to consider the precedent this is setting for compelled speech in the future, potentially by regimes that you are not politically aligned with.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47590473

I think we should use tech in education, but in a targeted way. It's important that children gain basic technical literacy, like how to touch type and use basic software. I suspect there is a gap in the technical literacy of lower income students, whose parents are less likely to have a computer at home.

The real problem is separating reading/writing skills from tech skills. We shouldn't stop teaching handwriting just because typing exists. And being able to read long books and essays teaches fundamental cognitive skills like attention, focus, and information processing.

For those, obviously you need a computer and completely agree that those are important skills to learn... But you maybe need to spend 1h/week during last 2 years of middle school on those at the computer lab (as it's been done since the 90s in many schools around the world)

But for any other course such as Math, English (or whichever primary language in your country), second languages, history, etc. : that's where using tech is a mistake

A bit of tech is ok, but it cannot be "everyone does their homework and read lesson on a iPad/Chromebook"

It makes me think back to my writing assignments in grades 6-12. I spent considerable time making sure the word processor had the exact perfect font, spacing, and formatting with cool headers, footers, and the footnotes, etc. Yet, I wouldn't even bother to proofread the final text before handing it in. What a terrible waste of a captive audience that could have helped me refine my arguments and writing style, rather than waste their time on things like careless grammatical errors.

Anyway, I do agree with the idea of incorporating Excel, and even RStudio for math and science as tools, especially if they displace Ed-tech software that adds unnecessary abstractions, or attempts to replace interaction with knowledgeable teachers. One other exception might be Anki or similar, since they might move rote memorization out of the classroom, so that more time can be spent on critical thinking.

* Have something like 5 bins, numbered 1-5.

* Every day you add your new cards to bin nr. 1 shuffle and review. Correct cards go to bin nr. 2, incorrect cards stay in bin nr. 1.

* Every other day do the same with bin nr. 1 and 2, every forth with bin nr. 1, 2 and 3 etc. except incorrect cards go in the bin below. More complex scheduling algorithms exist.

* In a classroom setting the teacher can print out the flashcards and hand out review schedule for the week (e.g. Monday: add these 10 new cards and review 1; Tuesday: 10 new cards and review box 1 and 2; Wednesday: No new cards and and review box 1 and 3; etc.)

* If you want to be super fancy, the flash card publisher can add audio-chips to the flash-cards (or each box-set plus QR code on the card).

I'm all for going back to analog where it makes sense, but it seems wrongheaded to completely remove things that are relevant skills for most 21st century careers.

I don't think there's anything wrong with showing kids some videos every now and then. I still have fond memories of watching Bill Nye.

> Should we not teach basic numerical and statistical methods in Python?

No. Those should be done by hand, so kids can develop an intuition for it. The same way we don't allow kids learning multiplication and division to use calculators.

> No. Those should be done by hand, so kids can develop an intuition for it. The same way we don't allow kids learning multiplication and division to use calculators.

I would think that it would make sense to introduce Python in the same way that calculators, and later graphing calculators are introduced, and I believe (just based on hearing random anecdotes) that this is already the case in many places.

I'm a big proponent of the gradual introduction of abstraction, which my early education failed at, and something Factorio and some later schooling did get right, although the intent was rarely communicated effectively.

First, learn what and why a thing exists at a sufficiently primitive level of interaction, then once students have it locked in, introduce a new layer of complexity by making the former primitive steps faster and easier to work with, using tools. It's important that each step serves a useful purpose though. For example, I don't think there's much of a case for writing actual code by hand and grading students on missing a semicolon, but there's probably a case for working out logic and pseudocode by hand.

I don't think there's a case for hand-drawing intricate diagrams and graphs, because it builds a skill and level of intimacy with the drawing aspect that's just silly, and tests someone's drawing capability rather than their understanding of the subject, but I suppose everyone has they're own opinion on that.

That last one kind of crippled me in various classes. I already new better tools and methods existed for doing weather pattern diagrams or topographical maps, but it was so immensely tedious and time-consuming that it totally derailed me to the point where I'd fail Uni labs despite it not being very difficult content, only because the prof wanted to teach it like the 50s.

I found that calculators didn't help all that much once you got into symbolic stuff. They were useful for the final reductions, obviously, but for algebra the lion's share of the work is symbolic and at least the relatively cheap two-line TI calculator I was using couldn't do anything symbolic.

I know that there are calculators that can do Computer Algebra System stuff, and those probably should be held off on until at least calculus.

I would rather a teacher have to draw a concept on a board than have each student watch an animation on their computer. Obviously, the teacher projecting the animation should be fine, but it seems like some educators and parents can't handle that and it turns into a slippery slope back to kids using devices.

So for most classrooms full of students in grades prior to high school, the answer to your list of (presumably rhetorical) questions is "Yes."

The problem is that people seem to want to go to extremes. Either go all out on doing everything in tablets or not use any technology in education at all.

its not just work skills, its also a better understanding that is gained from things such as the maths animations you mentioned.

I think the latter is mostly a reaction to the former. I think there is a way to use technology appropriately in theory in many cases, but the administrators making these choices are largely technically illiterate and it's too tempting for the teachers implementing them to just hand control over to the students (and give themselves a break from actually teaching).

Maybe. Back in the day I had classes where we had to learn the rough shape of a number of basic functions, which built intuition that helped. This involved drawing a lot of them by hand. Initially by calculating points and estimating, and later by being given an arbitrary function and graphing it. Using Desmos too early would've prevented building these skills.

Once the skills are built, using it doesn't seem a major negative.

I think of it like a calculator. Don't let kids learning basic arithmetic to use a 4 function calculator, but once you hit algebra, that's find (but graphing calculators still aren't).

Best might be to mix it up, some with and some without, but no calculator is preferable to always calculator.

And Logo or BASIC >> Python in school context IMO.

I had computer lab in a catholic grade school in the mid-late 80's. Apple II's and the class was once a week and a mix of typing, logo turtle, and of course, The Oregon Trail.

What for? I've been writing computer programs and documentation since 1969 and I can't touch type. I've never felt enough pressure to do it. I can still type faster than I can think. When I'm writing most of my time is spent thinking not tapping the keys.

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

I think they're referring to the latter.

And then I became an adult and visited China and met actual Chinese immigrants and married a native chopstick holder. And half of them don’t hold chopsticks “the real way”. Somehow it all works out. As long as you can eat a peanut with them, you pass.

As an adult I learned that there’s also a whole lot of prescriptive bullshit that basically nobody pays attention to. The strict definition of touch typing seems like one of those. If you can type without looking at the keys, you can touch type.

Just never cared to get perfect at it in school. I would get absolutely crushed on typing tests though with the kids who actually learned touch typing. They all had piano experience and could reach the modifiers while holding on to the home row still. I still can't really do that on my right hand, its like my pinky doesn't reach.

I've heard this before too but apparently most people hold a pencil wrong anyway so it doesn't actually help.

You should be able to type without looking at your keyboard.

But the specific 5 finger arrangement taught often as "tough typing" isn't needed for that, some common issues:

- it being taught with an orthogonal arrangement of your hand to they keyboard, that is nearly guaranteed to lead to carpal tunnel syndrome if you have a typical keyboard/desk setup. Don't angle your wrist when typing.

- Pinky fingers of "average" hands already have issues reaching the right rows, with extra small or extra short hands they often aren't usable as intended with touch typing.

I was taught touch typing as a kid. None of it took. I dont use the home row. I developed into the gamer home row hand positioning for typing.

If you’re capable of typing quick enough to publicly take meeting notes, then it’s fine. But if you can’t, I could see it being professionally embarrassing in the same way that not understanding basic arithmetic could be professionally embarrassing.

That’s the kind of (in)capability we’re talking about when it comes to Gen Z. Like not knowing ctrl-c ctrl-v.

What could you possibly teach about touch typing besides just telling people to do typing tests or write papers over and over again?

People aren't bad typers because they weren't taught. They're bad typer because they dont type.

Recordings are one of the worse ways to store knowledge for later reference, except in usual scenarios. They're very awkward to work with. The only plus is their cheap an easy to make.

Trust me, I work at a company where "documentation" is often an old meeting recording (and sometimes you have to count yourself lucky to even have that).

I had a boss that typed with one finger on each hand, it was laughable, but he was an incredible programmer, so it didn't affect him at all.

Touch typing would probably be faster, but I've never found slow typing speeds a limiting factor in either writing or software dev.

https://entropicthoughts.com/typing-fast-is-about-latency-no...

A few years ago I invested in a rectilinear split keyboard which has a slightly different layout, but much more ergonomic. But interestingly I can now type 120wpm+.

I think touch typing is very similar to learning penmanship (and I guess cursive to an extent). If I followed the exact rules I learned about handwriting in school, I'd have much more legible handwriting but I'd write so much more slowly. Instead I my own way, which lets me get my thoughts out quickly, albeit not as neat as "correct" penmanship. Fortunately typing is much more lenient on this front.

Some of us "a bit older" seem to have gone through a golden era of tech, where we actually learned that tech en-masse. In a class of maybe 30 students, around 20, 25 of them were able to configure dial up modems, come on IRC (servers, ports, channels needed to be configured) and do a bunch of other stuff our parents mostly considered "black magic" (except for a few tech enthusiasts), and the general concensus was, that every generation will know more and be "better" than the previous generation.

A few decades have passed.. and kids can't type anymore on a keyboard, can't print, have no idea what can be changed in the settings on their smartphone, don't know how to block ads, can't cheat in games anymore (except via pay-to-win) and have no idea where to change their instagram password.

So, now you have boomers, who can't use computers and kids, who can't use computers anymore.

The latter is a fairly small demo though - supposedly around a third.

The split is more by education than by age.

Kids can use computers - phones - as app appliances, but they don't understand computers.

Peak literacy is young Gen X and older millennials.

They certainly will at home.

> I suspect there is a gap in the technical literacy of lower income students, whose parents are less likely to have a computer at home.

In which country?

I live in Mexico and even here you really need to go to the poorest families to find a home without a laptop. Even those families have multiple smartphones. Today a smartphone is not a good replacement for a laptop but maybe in a couple of years it will be.

The following article suggests that in the United States, about 59% of lower income households have a laptop or desktop computer, compared to 92% of upper income households.

https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2021/06/22/digital-d...

When I think back to using computers as a kid, both at school(starting in 1999) and at home I don't think it's all that black and white wrt just playing at home vs learning useful skills at school.

At some point in the early 00s my underfunded elementary school acquired a bunch of old windows 95 computers. We would have classes where we mostly did basic touch typing, MS Office etc. At home, my middle class parents had also managed to find me some old outdated clunker. And yes, most of my time at home was spent playing games, chatting with friends on msn, pirating mp3s etc.

But I'd say I learned orders of magnitude more from my frivolous activities than from whatever we did at school. At home I was learning things like: online research(into warcraft cheat codes or quest guides for Runescape etc); software troubleshooting(having to reinstall windows because I downloaded malware on limewire or otherwise borked my install somehow); fast typing(from chatting with friends about whatever 12 year olds like to discuss. Probably 90% of my typing practice back then came at home, not at school, and there was no touch typing. I could type 100+ wpm on just 4 fingers by the time I was in middle school. Never actually learned to properly touch type until I had force myself into it 5 years ago due to RSI); English as a second language(from various forums, irc, etc, hard to avoid back then); And I believe one of my first forays into programming was trying to get a cracked game with a broken .bat installer off TPB to work. I had a friend who got into it via Morrowind modding.

Actually, come to think of it, most of computer class was also in reality spent sneakily playing flash games and/or messing around with the computer settings just to screw with the next student/teacher to use it.

Even generalising beyond computers, I think a remarkable portion of the skills and interests that end up defining us as people, can be traced back to stuff we did trying to avoid boredom as children.

To summarise though, I do think computers have a place in school. But especially at an elementary school level, I think play should be a significant portion of their use, because play is how kids explore the world and themselves.

I ended up with a non-home-row style of touch-typing just by being forced to get chat messages out quickly in StarCraft multiplayer. So it's at least possible to learn it from that, even if most don't.

It's important to note that this isn't fixed by ad blockers. To avoid this kind of fingerprinting, you need to disable JavaScript or use a browser like Firefox which randomizes extension UUIDs.

- revenue/man-hour, features shipped/man-hour, etc.

- ms response time, GB/s throughput, number of bugs actually shipped to customers, etc.

People in the second camp use AI, but it's a lot more limited and targeted. And yes, you can always cut corners and ship software faster, but it's not going to be higher quality by any objective metric.