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To Train Up A Child

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1.0 out of 5 stars Thoughts of someone whose mother used this book, November 15, 2010
By
M. Gray - See all my reviews
This review is from: To Train Up A Child (Paperback)
My mother was given this book while I was a child. Wanting to raise a well-behaved child, she would spank me with a belt. She is proud of me. I am a senior at Princeton University and practicing Catholic. However, today my mother would tell you that I am these things in spite of the teachings of "To Train Up a Child," in spite of the self-loathing and insecurity caused by whippings which would not end until I could pretend to be content. Pretend to embrace the necessity for my own torture.

I was abused. Please do not look to this book for guidance.
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EDIT [I was not abused. My parents were kind, loving and supportive. Sorry if my cut and pasting was not clear]

I'm guessing the current obstacle for this is that without speed they lose lift and steering. They might be able to do this by finding points to land on that are back up the other side of a cliff, and high enough they'll be able to guide themselves towards it, lose lift and guidance and just land. It's the lateral speed that will be the hardest to eliminate.>> ^dag:

Great shots. Eventually they're going to learn how to flare out and land without a parachute.

>> ^Contagion21:

>> ^hpqp:
@ponceleon
The pope did recently reject human evolution though... I guess science really doesn't deal kindly with the whole anthropocentric human-worshipping that is at the basis of monotheism, which created god in man's image.

To clarify, he rejected random evolution. That is, that it could have occured naturally and without guidance. (See Dawkins writings on why evolution should never be considered "random" to begin with, but that's another issue entirely.) So, based on what I'm reading in that link, he's not saying we don't have a shared ancestry with other primates, just that IF we do, it's not a random occurance.
So catholics are still allowed to believe that evolution has occured, even for humans, they just have to accept that God is the driving force behind it.


Thanks for pointing this out and also thanks for actually reading the article, unlike (I suspect) the other 7 people who upvoted the original comment.

>> ^hpqp:

@ponceleon
The pope did recently reject human evolution though... I guess science really doesn't deal kindly with the whole anthropocentric human-worshipping that is at the basis of monotheism, which created god in man's image.


To clarify, he rejected random evolution. That is, that it could have occured naturally and without guidance. (See Dawkins writings on why evolution should never be considered "random" to begin with, but that's another issue entirely.) So, based on what I'm reading in that link, he's not saying we don't have a shared ancestry with other primates, just that IF we do, it's not a random occurance.

So catholics are still allowed to believe that evolution has occured, even for humans, they just have to accept that God is the driving force behind it.

1. I have no problem with teachers being held more accountable in a fair manner, and that they could be let go for poor performance more easily than they are now. The fundamental problem with getting rid of subpar teachers is we don't have enough teachers as is. You can be selective when there actually is a surplus of people wanting to teach. You can't pay teachers a crappy salary, then fire them more readily for poor performance when you have class sizes of 30-40 students. That's my entire point. Right now, the problem is not that you can't get rid of bad teachers. The problem is you can't attract enough good ones, and when you do get them, they leave because the job sucks, and they're not paid enough.

2. We are born with predispositions for certain kinds of intelligence. The ability to teach well is an exceptional skillset. You have to have the right blend of intelligence to learn the subject matter you want to teach, plus the emotional and social intelligence to relate that information to other people, most of whom do not think like you do. The natural ability alone isn't enough, you are correct. But there are people who just will never be good at teaching no matter how hard they work at it. If you haven't the social and emotional intelligence to relate well to others, you won't be a good teacher.

3. The devil is in the details. If a teacher has a class of 37 8th grade students, most with special needs with learning disabilities, and the teacher gets no special education help, should the teacher's performance evaluation be negative if the kids' performances are subpar? (I faced that my last year of teaching, went to guidance dept, raised a stink about it, and their response was that's the best they could do. Thankfully, I left the first week of the school year when I got my first permanent IT job, but I raised a stink anyway because that wasn't fair to the person who would replace me. Our pay wasn't influenced by student performance, thankfully, because that's fundamentally unfair. What about the fact that the #1 factor in a student's achievement is the socio-economic class of the parent(s)? Does that mean teachers in inner-city schools should get more negative performance evaluations than teachers in suburbia? It's easier said than done. And this is the problem with comparing how the business sector works with public education. In the business sector, if these factors caused the business to not perform well, the business would get shut down, and there would be far less negative societal problems because of it. Sure, a few people would lose their jobs, but it's not as likely to cause very long lasting repercussions. If public schools' mission is to provide everyone with a basic education, you can't shut the inner-city school down. Even if you don't shut them down, if teachers realize they'll get paid less because their performance hinges on factors that are not under their control, such as the socio-economic class of the student, they'll flee inner-city schools to teach in suburbia, which means the inner-city schools who desperately need the best teachers will get worse ones.

It's really simple to say there should be merit based pay for teachers. On principle, I agree. But I haven't yet seen a merit based pay system for teachers that addresses all of these kinds of problems, which are significant fundamental problems you can't simply ignore just because such a system works in the private sector.

5.

a) There is incentive to take the risk if it also meant if teachers perform better, overall pay would on average could go up for teachers. But that's not on the table, let's be honest. The real reason teachers aren't getting paid more on average is there's not enough public support for the higher taxes that would have to be paid. And once again, it's a crappy job as is, so why would someone be in favor of making a crappy job even less secure? You don't have enough teachers, period, and even if you did, you're not attracting enough talented individuals to become and remain teachers. How does it make sense to make the job less secure then until you correct that problem.

b) I disagree with you about teacher unions. First off, I lump in any organization that collectively advocates for employees as a "union" when I hear people say "teacher's unions". Here in Virginia, there is the Virginia Education Association, which is an affiliate of the National Education Association. However, it is not a union; it can't initiate strikes. It's a professional association, just like the NEA at the national level. Some states do in fact have teacher unions, some don't. Would you call the following technically unions:

American Medical Association
American Bar Association
American Dental Association

So to lump teachers all together and say they are all unionized is not true.

The VEA and the NEA would not be worried in the slightest about a reduction of members because they still advocate for things other than pay, and teachers are fools if they don't join because, as an example, the VEA/NEA is the absolute cheapest way to acquire liability insurance (if you get sued for anything you do at your job, and there's a lot you can get sued for that makes no sense).

I'm not particularly gung ho about unions in general, nor for teacher unions and associations, but their existence is needed, and they're not nearly as rigid as you're suggesting.

The arts thing, once again, the arts can be a driver to motivation to higher achievement in other things. I won't say they are per se correct in what they advocate, but that would be towards the bottom of the list of things that should elicit that kind of reaction by society in general. There is far more pressing issues in education where you have people who fundamentally don't understand the issue and advocate horrifying policies.

Btw, thank you for actually being open to a discussion about this. I hope you're at least learning something out of it, and are open to changing your mind at least some.

Jehovah's Witnesses are rather nice. Growing up, when I was dragged along by my mother to 100 different sects, all but one repulsed me. And that was the Witnesses.

The problem for them is that they have no allies whatsoever. They preach true love (Even to their enemies) and staying away from government because it is all corrupt (They even prohibit voting.) So other Christians hate them and make fun of them (And spread lies on the internet about them.)

They don't do holidays or other "fun" stuff. So most common people disdain them.

They are very serious about their religion. Which means non-believers disdain them as cultish.

More things they do/don't believe.

They do believe that the woman is a guidance for her husband and that the husband is head of the house. He should respect, lead, treasure and provide for his wife. They do believe in loving everyone. They take back members as many times as that member shows effort to live a wholesome life. But they won't tolerate drugs, violence, etc... They do believe homosexuality is a sin (Which is about the only thing they are truly ignorant on.)

They don't believe God will burn you in hellfire, or that you are too far to save. They don't promote backstabbing, loose morals or lies (How uncool is that?) They don't yell and speak in tongues, jump around or poke dolls.

In many ways they are a very good religions group hpqp, from those I met. They saved my mother's life when she should have been dead years ago from suffering. They gave her hope. And the fact that they are mocked actually makes me mad. It seems the truer you are to "Christ" the less respected you become. Ironic.

And yes, they are mostly elderly folk. However, a large number are youthful, powerful builds that are carpenters, artisians, etc. And their younger women are very attractive too.

>> ^hpqp:
I think the Buddhism you like is the philosophy. As for the Jehovah's witnesses, ugh. From what I've gleaned off the interwebs (in only a few minutes, so I could be wrong), they seem to wait for you to grow old and senile, then suck you dry (If I were you I'd keep an eye on my mother). Moreover, people who work their whole lives for the "brotherhood" apparantly get no social security, often work voluntarily for no wages, and are left hanging when they get old.
About their publishing market: http://www.freeminds.org/organization/business/how-the-watchtower-was-financed-pre-1990.html
>> ^Lawdeedaw:
But I will upvote this on one condition hp. Religion is far different than organized religion and "other" religions. Buddhisim (My pref) is nowhere near a money pit. I doubt Hinduism is either. Amish? Jehovah's Witnesses? (My mother's prefs and damn close to a loving fellowship. They are pretty meek believe it or not.)
Change the title a bit to reflect that and I will hit that blue arrow faster than you can say "Rich on pastor."
Ps.
I don't believe anyone should have tax deductions...not since money can be "funneled" around.

Meh, you guys are missing a sunny spot in all of this, being that the game actually came out. I understand some history has to go with it, all I'm arguing is that it shouldnt carry so much weight and that we should (try to) be objective.

To be fair, I feel it should go both ways, in the same way that the history of this game shouldn't drag it down quite so much, I don't feel that Bioshock 2 deserved half of the praise it got (88 on metascore, really?). That game was mediocre, as ZP aptly points out, yet when you round out all the reviews available it gets a 9 out of 10.

@rottenseed would you say a 9 out of 10 from the average reviewer was good guidance towards purchasing a half-assed Bioshock 2?

@chilaxe
I wish I knew more about the situation in California so I could agree or disagree. The only things about California's problems that I've heard is that someone made horrible financial decisions based on a fortune teller's guidance, and that Enron bilked California out of billions of dollars, which contributed massively.

Anyway, from your comments and links here, I'm gathering that you don't see one guy making a deposition in Spanish as a problem as much as you see it as a symbol of everything you think is wrong about liberalism and the problems you perceive it to cause. Is that a fair statement?

(edited)

What I mean is that I don't really believe you. I've spoken to many atheists who claimed to be ex christians but then myteriously didn't seem to know anything about it, like you. I've had atheists tell me they were ex pastors but didn't know any verses. It's a common trick from dishonest people to have that talking point. My point still stands. Just saying you prayed a lot doesn't make you a Christian. What makes you a Christian is understanding what Christ said and following it. The scotsman fallacy doesn't apply. You can think you're a Christian and not be a christian. Mormons think they're christians..so do Jehovahs witnesses, doesn't make it true. Unless you're doing what Christ said, you are not a Christian. Ironically, the atheist who coined the fallacy convered to deism shortly after. So even if you had the label of Christian you weren't doing what Christ said, nor did you understand it. Some people become Christians for social reasons..the bible says those people are borrowing the name at a price, which they will have to repay.

>> ^MaxWilder:
>> ^shinyblurry:
Sounds like you were a pretty terrible Christian..you did as you were told and prayed a lot. lol. This a Christian does not make. The total actual knowledge you seem to have about Gods will, or what is in the bible, could probably fit on the head of a pin with room to spare. You ever stop to think that you never saw God because didn't have any real faith to begin with? Sounds like your parents didn't understand their own faith, therefore raised you in ignorance..you became worldly..and tada, you're an atheist. For the record, every ex-christian atheist I meet never knows shit about the bible..they're also usually ex-catholic.

So, I believed in God, I went to Church, I did Bible studies, I prayed for strength and guidance... and from this you can tell I was a bad Christian? With bad parents?
What happened to "Seek out God and he will reveal Himself to you"?
I guess the only answer I'm going to get is if I guess what you really mean. If God doesn't reveal Himself to you it's because you are a bad person. And you are doing religion wrong. And your faith isn't real. Nyah nyah nyah!
That is what we call the "No true Scotsman" fallacy. I invalidated your claim, and you have nothing of value to respond with, so you lash out with ad hominem attacks against me and my family, who you know absolutely nothing about.
So say what you really mean. You don't mean "Seek out God." You mean "Give your whole life, mind body and spirit, over to something you have absolutely no reason to believe exists, and MAYBE if you believe hard enough you will start to see things which kinda make it look like He might be real."
Or maybe, at that point your brain will be broken and you will start to get confirmation bias towards what you want to believe. It's especially helpful to surround yourself with people who are constantly talking about experiencing God on a daily basis. Seems to me that's about a million trillion trillion trillion times more likely.

>> ^shinyblurry:

Sounds like you were a pretty terrible Christian..you did as you were told and prayed a lot. lol. This a Christian does not make. The total actual knowledge you seem to have about Gods will, or what is in the bible, could probably fit on the head of a pin with room to spare. You ever stop to think that you never saw God because didn't have any real faith to begin with? Sounds like your parents didn't understand their own faith, therefore raised you in ignorance..you became worldly..and tada, you're an atheist. For the record, every ex-christian atheist I meet never knows shit about the bible..they're also usually ex-catholic.


So, I believed in God, I went to Church, I did Bible studies, I prayed for strength and guidance... and from this you can tell I was a bad Christian? With bad parents?

What happened to "Seek out God and he will reveal Himself to you"?

I guess the only answer I'm going to get is if I guess what you really mean. If God doesn't reveal Himself to you it's because you are a bad person. And you are doing religion wrong. And your faith isn't real. Nyah nyah nyah!

That is what we call the "No true Scotsman" fallacy. I invalidated your claim, and you have nothing of value to respond with, so you lash out with ad hominem attacks against me and my family, who you know absolutely nothing about.

So say what you really mean. You don't mean "Seek out God." You mean "Give your whole life, mind body and spirit, over to something you have absolutely no reason to believe exists, and MAYBE if you believe hard enough you will start to see things which kinda make it look like He might be real."

Or maybe, at that point your brain will be broken and you will start to get confirmation bias towards what you want to believe. It's especially helpful to surround yourself with people who are constantly talking about experiencing God on a daily basis. Seems to me that's about a million trillion trillion trillion times more likely.

1. The logic is simple; The only true God could be the being that no one else created. If a God was created by something else, then he wouldnt be a God. This points to one true God.

The Universe had an absolute beginning, including all matter energy time and space. Therefore this points to a reality beyond the Universe, a transcendent non physical immaterial reality beyond space and time. This points to a supernatural cause.

How could something come from nothing? Only nothing can come from nothing. Therefore there had always had to have been something for there to be anything. This points to an eternal cause.

The Universe appears to be designed. The are dozens of physical constants which, if altered even slighty, would result in a lifeless Universe.

Two good examples:

Imagine a ruler 14 billion light years wide, which is the length of the Universe. It's divided into one inch increments, which is the range of settings for the strength of gravity. It just happens to be set in just the right place for life. If you move the setting one inch life to any other setting as compared to the length of the ruler, life becomes basically impossible.

The cosmological constant is finetuned to 1:1 with 53 zeros behind it. It has been compared to throwing a dart at the earth from orbit and hitting a bullseyes 1 trillion trillionth of an inch.

Taken together, their level of fine tuning is to a precision of 1 in one hundred million trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion. Which is like one atom out of the entire universe.

That's just the periphery of it..

2. Sounds like you were a pretty terrible Christian..you did as you were told and prayed a lot. lol. This a Christian does not make. The total actual knowledge you seem to have about Gods will, or what is in the bible, could probably fit on the head of a pin with room to spare. You ever stop to think that you never saw God because didn't have any real faith to begin with? Sounds like your parents didn't understand their own faith, therefore raised you in ignorance..you became worldly..and tada, you're an atheist. For the record, every ex-christian atheist I meet never knows shit about the bible..they're also usually ex-catholic.

3. It's not really your fault..you're just totally disillusioned. I wasn't raised Christian so I was never disappointed by it. I made an informed decision to become a Christian after God showed me definitively He is the God of the bible. Otherwise I would just be a theist.
Because you used to be a Christian, it's in Gods hands if He wants you back. Nothing I say to you is going to make any difference what so ever. All I can tell you is that I'll pray that God has mercy on you, though with comments like "non-existant facist dictator" I can tell you you aren't helping your case.


>> ^MaxWilder:
1. You have "stated" that there can be only one God, but you have not put any logic into it. Things are created by individuals, by teams of individuals, and by natural forces without any outside assistance. There is no reason to believe that the universe could only have been created by a single force, much less a single conscious entity. It is an unknown, and you don't have a shred of evidence or logic to indicate otherwise.
2. As I have already explained here and here, I was raised a Christian. I went to church. I did as I was told. I prayed for strength and guidance. And when my natural curiosity began to reveal the flaws in Christianity and the Bible, I prayed about it quite a bit. Over the course of many years. I got no response. God never revealed himself to me. So you can shove that "God will reveal Himself to you if you seek Him out" crap. It simply isn't true. You may think that God has revealed himself to you, but as far as I know that was a total hallucination brought on by some sort of temporary brain trauma. Unless the same thing happens to me, there is absolutely no reason for me to trust your word on the matter.
3. As far as spirituality in atheists goes, there is a huge spectrum. I can only speak for myself. I often find myself wishing for some sort of insight or revelation about the nature of the universe. But for the most part I am ok with not knowing. I understand that nobody really knows, and that comforts me a little. I still hope that there is something more to life after we die, but there's no way of knowing until after it's over, and I'm not going to waste my life hoping that there's something better afterward. So yeah, occasionally I still find myself in a "prayer-like" moment, hoping that there is some force out there that may help me solve a problem I'm facing. Then I get over it and start working on the task myself. Even if there was some sort of "miracle" that fixed what I was thinking about, that wouldn't mean it was Jesus! Again, there would still be no link between what I experience and the Bible, unless like you I had a hallucination about Jesus revealing the secrets behind the curtain. Heck, even if that happened I'd probably assume I had a brain injury and go see a doctor about it as soon as possible.
By the way, your little jabs like "It's obvious you don't really know anything about the bible, or even comparative religion." and "your viewpoint is not very sophisticated" are called Ad Hominem attacks. They fail to make any point. I know I occasionally will throw in an insult when I'm feeling weak, so I don't take it personally. Just be clear that you are dodging my points without answering them whenever you dismiss them like that. To quote you, "you're just making yourself look foolish", "childish at best", and "not very sophisticated". Sheesh, this coming from a guy who seriously thinks satanists on a website are throwing spells around. Holy crap. Keep it up man, you are making my case for me.

1. You have "stated" that there can be only one God, but you have not put any logic into it. Things are created by individuals, by teams of individuals, and by natural forces without any outside assistance. There is no reason to believe that the universe could only have been created by a single force, much less a single conscious entity. It is an unknown, and you don't have a shred of evidence or logic to indicate otherwise.

2. As I have already explained here and here, I was raised a Christian. I went to church. I did as I was told. I prayed for strength and guidance. And when my natural curiosity began to reveal the flaws in Christianity and the Bible, I prayed about it quite a bit. Over the course of many years. I got no response. God never revealed himself to me. So you can shove that "God will reveal Himself to you if you seek Him out" crap. It simply isn't true. You may think that God has revealed himself to you, but as far as I know that was a total hallucination brought on by some sort of temporary brain trauma. Unless the same thing happens to me, there is absolutely no reason for me to trust your word on the matter.

3. As far as spirituality in atheists goes, there is a huge spectrum. I can only speak for myself. I often find myself wishing for some sort of insight or revelation about the nature of the universe. But for the most part I am ok with not knowing. I understand that nobody really knows, and that comforts me a little. I still hope that there is something more to life after we die, but there's no way of knowing until after it's over, and I'm not going to waste my life hoping that there's something better afterward. So yeah, occasionally I still find myself in a "prayer-like" moment, hoping that there is some force out there that may help me solve a problem I'm facing. Then I get over it and start working on the task myself. Even if there was some sort of "miracle" that fixed what I was thinking about, that wouldn't mean it was Jesus! Again, there would still be no link between what I experience and the Bible, unless like you I had a hallucination about Jesus revealing the secrets behind the curtain. Heck, even if that happened I'd probably assume I had a brain injury and go see a doctor about it as soon as possible.

By the way, your little jabs like "It's obvious you don't really know anything about the bible, or even comparative religion." and "your viewpoint is not very sophisticated" are called Ad Hominem attacks. They fail to make any point. I know I occasionally will throw in an insult when I'm feeling weak, so I don't take it personally. Just be clear that you are dodging my points without answering them whenever you dismiss them like that. To quote you, "you're just making yourself look foolish", "childish at best", and "not very sophisticated". Sheesh, this coming from a guy who seriously thinks satanists on a website are throwing spells around. Holy crap. Keep it up man, you are making my case for me.

This lady obviously does not love the life cycle and needs to work up a positive mindset and be doused with maybe a half eight of mushrooms and somehow without the guidance of others be made to gaze upon the beauty of puppydom. And feel horribly horribly regretful yet positively changed... in a positive way through connective-negative-introspection.

Also, this is a great opportunity to mention Naomi Klein's The Shock Doctrine

The New Road to Serfdom
Christopher Hayes, In These Times, November 9, 2007

In the early ’80s, as Margaret Thatcher attempted to hack away at England’s substantial public sector, she found a frustrating degree of public resistance. The closer she got to the bone, the more the patient wriggled and withdrew. Thatcher doggedly persisted, yet her pace wasn’t fast enough for right-wing Austrian economist Friedrich von Hayek, her idol and ideological mentor. You see, in 1981, Hayek had traveled to Gen. Augusto Pinochet’s Chile, where, under the barbed restraints of dictatorship and with the guidance of University of Chicago-trained economists, Pinochet had gouged out nearly every vestige of the public sector, privatizing everything from utilities to the Chilean state pension program. Hayek returned gushing, and wrote Thatcher, urging her to follow Chile’s aggressive model more faithfully.

In her reply, Thatcher explained tersely that “in Britain, with our democratic institutions and the need for a higher degree of consent, some of the measures adopted in Chile are quite unacceptable. Our reform must be in line with our traditions and our Constitution. At times, the process may seem painfully slow.”

The Hayek/Thatcher exchange is one of many revealing historical nuggets unearthed in The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism, Naomi Klein’s ambitious history of neoliberalism. Hayek isn’t the star of The Shock Doctrine—that dubious honor goes to his protegé and fellow Nobel Laureate Milton Friedman. But Klein’s totemic, capacious and brilliant alternate history of the last three decades of global political economy can best be understood as a latter-day response to Hayek’s classic right-wing manifesto, The Road to Serfdom.

More of this review here: http://www.naomiklein.org/shock-doctrine/reviews/new-road-serfdom

Agree but I don't think he's going to convert people with that attitude. I'm not really interested in continuing or escilating arugments. You'll never change someone's opinion unless you can display empathy to their position... this strategy will just steele the resolve of those opposed to you.

Progress takes time. I think we've shifted and will eventually evovlve through this nonsense, (what he's railing against) but I admit waiting is difficult. Organized religion has been with humanity for thousands of years, and shedding it's influence on our reasoning will take time. The lack of a guidance structure puts much more responsibility on the individual. This can't be achieved overnight by condemning those you disagree with.

I do think it important to speak out, but I prefer we do so in an more approachable manner.

Patience, we'll get there.