Activity feed

I also recall Deutsch saying somewhere that there is no such thing as being “fully rational” anyway – that there is no ceiling to how rational one can be.

Deutsch would know that children generally can’t help with a chemistry problem that requires a PhD, say, so this criticism can’t apply.

Deutsch doesn’t claim that children are “fully rational”. His article is compatible with children being only partially rational but still able to solve problems as long as they’re not prevented from doing so. That sounds a lot more realistic.

Since your child has never done chemistry, he hasn’t yet been coerced about chemistry, so he should be fully rational about it and “easily” find a solution.

The implication here is that Deutsch thinks children are “fully rational” and could help even with the most difficult problems, which isn’t realistic, as is then stated explicitly.

Lack of coercion damage/irrationalities may not be sufficient to solve problems, but it may well be necessary, or very nearly necessary.

The key to problem solving is not lack of coercion damage. Rationality and problem solving are positive skills to be developed.

It’s true that problems at the forefront of science are often extremely difficult; it may take a genius a lifetime to solve even one of them, if he's lucky.

But everyday problems in the household are typically much easier to solve.

For example, parents may want to get their child to eat broccoli for dinner, against the child’s wishes. They then take away his dinner altogether so that the “natural consequence”, as the OP in the original article called it, of the child going hungry that night ‘teaches’ the child that he should eat his broccoli.

In such cases, which are common, Deutsch is right that simply letting the child’s creativity take over really does solve the problem easily. The child simply picks something he wishes to eat instead. If the parents just got out of the way, the problem would practically solve itself.

As I recall, the insight that major scientific discoveries may not be achieved in one’s lifetime is Popper’s. While Popper is referenced in the surrounding context, on this issue, the author of this article claims to have originated this point (“My point is that [...]”).

IIRC, it’s in his autobiography that Popper says that scientific discovery is often extremely difficult, never guaranteed to happen, requires luck, and may evade even the best scientists. If that is true, this point should be attributed to Popper, ideally with a source.

The article says that solving problems is generally difficult and “could take centuries”; “[...] you might not make a major scientific discovery in your lifetime.”

It then says that having the child solve a problem that the parent is unable to solve, as the referenced article suggests, is unrealistic because you wouldn’t expect a child to be able to help with a hard chemistry problem either.

I don’t think it’s “a lot like” doing science – the underlying logic is the same, science being just one particular instance of problem solving. This is then acknowledged in the subsequent sentence:

[...] Popper’s epistemology applies to all problem solving, not just to science.

So why mention science if you’re just going to generalize the restriction away regardless?

Looking at it in a Popperian way, I think problem solving is a lot like doing science.

This is true. Unfortunately, it also means that adults have an advantage at solving the ‘problem’ of how to coerce or coax their child into doing things he does not want to do – in other words, adults are more practiced at using their creativity coercively.

By the way, I have personal knowledge of Deutsch failing to be organized and to plan projects, as well as signing up for things that are too difficult for him and coercing himself to do them anyway, which is a kind of irrationality he has criticized in the past. He should know the difficulty of solving problems without those skills, which children typically don’t yet have.

Children know less about avoiding biases, logical fallacies, being organized, project planning, and many other skills that can give adults an advantage at problem solving.

That should be ‘primary’ not “primarily”.

Parents need to take primarily responsibility for problem solving instead of delegating that job to their children.

In addition to not yet having the hangups Deutsch mentions, I do think children are often more rational than adults in important ways, such as:

• being able and willing to refuse the unwanted loudly and clearly – children are often better at his than adults
• not sacrificing one’s own problem situation for the teachers’ and parents’ problem situations (ie focusing on one’s own goals without compromise)
• disliking and rejecting the arbitrary, including authority

Due to this last point in particular, children are sometimes better scientists than adults!

Also consider how fantastically creative children are, often way more creative than adults. (For example, it is extremely difficult for most adults to lose their native accent when they speak a foreign language, but bilingual children often do this effortlessly.)

There seems to be a general rule of thumb that, the older a person gets, the less knowledge he creates. So who’s the better problem solver, children or adults?

Sudden switch/moving goalposts from children being “fully rational” to just “more rational”.

In addition to the book All Life is Problem Solving (which is referenced, albeit spelled “Is” instead of the correct lowercase ‘is’, see https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/all-life-is-problem-solving-karl-popper/1128336063), Popper also wrote a book called All People Are Philosophers (Alle Menschen sind Philosophen in the original German, https://www.piper.de/buecher/alle-menschen-sind-philosophen-isbn-978-3-492-24189-2).

If all people are philosophers, then that includes children. Children are natural problem solvers.

It follows from Popperian epistemology that there can be no reliable way to get solutions to problems, let alone great ones. So holding Deutsch or TCS to that standard – ironically while referencing Popper – can’t be right.

Just having the child take the lead on problem solving, on the assumption that he’s more rational, is not a reliable way to quickly get a great solution.

Should be “easily” instead of ”easily” (the opening quotation mark).

Slighly modified archive of a discussion tree from the old Veritula site, Nov 2023.

The creation dates of the ideas were not retained but newly set. The old ‘about’ section said:

Here are some criticisms of, and comments on, an article called ‘Children “Easily” Solving Family Problems’.

Read the linked article and the one it references before you continue reading here.

If you don’t think your child can ”easily” use his creativity to solve any family problem, [...].

I agree that Veritula deserves to scale to something huge.

Looking through the history of Wikipedia, I see that its core concept is that of “compiling the world's knowledge in a single location […]”. To be clear, I think the core concept of Veritula is to be a programmatic implementation of Popper’s rational discussion methodology; it then becomes a dictionary for ideas as a result. It’s also less about listing facts and more about listing ideas and their logical relationship (though criticisms do provide built-in fact-checking mechanisms). That said, with enough users, Veritula could become a place with a lot of knowledge.

The linked site traces some of the success of Wikipedia to volunteers: “The use of volunteers was integral in making and maintaining Wikipedia.” So early adopters such as yourself are crucial.

In addition, 9/11 apparently played a role in making Wikipedia famous:

The September 11 attacks spurred the appearance of breaking news stories on the homepage, as well as information boxes linking related articles. At the time, approximately 100 articles related to 9/11 had been created. After the September 11 attacks, a link to the Wikipedia article on the attacks appeared on Yahoo!'s home page, resulting in a spike in traffic.

Veritula could be a place where people break news stories and others can quickly fact-check and improve upon reports by revising them. An urgent story would draw a lot of users to the site, too.

Something like Wikipedia’s arbitration process could be interesting, too.

Something similar to Wikipedia’s page-protection feature to combat “edit warring” and “prevent vandalism” could address the issue of people posting criticisms in rapid succession to protect their pet ideas.

Your suggestion to look to Wikipedia for inspiration is spot on. Thanks.

Superseded by #448.