> The game is almost entirely revolving around maximizing your actions per minute.
Maybe for top tier play, but apm wasn’t really needed for regular play.
Just to debunk this myth, it used to be possible to get to diamond with 80-100 apm (which is very easy to achieve), efficient builds, fundamental rush defense, and a-move.
Not sure about now, but it was doable for many years.
Just 5% of the population with no hope, no future, and looking at no survival can be extremely disruptive to a society. Take away all the daydream future job options and only leave the difficult labor that breaks peoples bodies by 40 and the youth could become disruptive to society. You can't add in Mana making sure every minute of those jobs left is productive and every dollar paid in wages gets clawed back from workers. People can't function in modern hyper optimizing of all the impacts on workers but no optimization in housing affordability, food affordability, enjoyment options that benefit the average person instead of all optimizations extracting all the previous slack/dollars in life.
You can't optimize away all the slack (in affordability, in time, in things to be enjoyed, in xyz, in 123). You can't optimize away all the future opportunity. You can't optimize away all the daydreams and hope and expect society to look anything like our current society.
I hope you realize that your comments are those of a “doom and gloom” person. It’s a fairly extreme take on things that makes some pretty wild assumptions about humanity that don’t really seem to hold (e.g., assuming a complete lack of adaptability, while we seem to be actually quite adaptable).
It’s not a credible take.
> You can't optimize away all the daydreams and hope and expect society
Agree. I think only dysfunctional weirdos actually think that’s what AI will do.
> to look anything like our current society
Who says our current society is at its apex? I don’t think it is. I think we have a ton of upside left to explore.
If our society looks like it is now 10-20 years from now, I will feel like we will have failed miserably. I am willing to bet that it will be much better.
> I'm confused why americans don't do literally anything more than vote
That has been enough for a couple of centuries, and it still may be the path. Sadly, skewed voter participation rates mean that even voting isn’t necessarily sufficient to have a government that more accurately represents the electorate.
> read the New York Times
Most people don’t do this, even liberals. The NYT has lost its magic.
> and show up to glorified block parties.
Fair, but maybe that’s the right amount of protest by American standards.
> Where is the rioting over NSPM-7?
Almost no one knows what it is. If they did, many of them would support it.
> Where are the assassinations?
Well, tried and missed. There are also probably credible failed attempts that have not been publicly announced.
> Where's the fucking self respect?
No shortage of that.
> Of course capital is going to treat americans like the doormat they are.
Sure. That’s capital.
> But yes, continue to shove your head up your ass because that's more comforting than realizing that despite all the propaganda, liberals & social democrats learned absolutely nothing from the Weimar Republic
Hmmm… that’s not really constructive or accurate.
IMHO, liberals have really dropped the ball in terms of presidential candidates since Obama. They also dropped the ball by leaning hard into DEI and extremely lax immigration enforcement — two policies that are not widely supported as implemented.
A consequence of those decisions is that voters in swing states had to choose between the lesser of two evils, and it wasn’t necessarily clear to those voters at the time which one would be worse.
There are some folks, Buttigieg being one, who are talking the right talk. It really just boils down to whether the democrats can be unified in promoting universal policies that help everyone (rather than niche groups) and vote accordingly.
“Liberals” in the US can be somewhat snowflaky, so I’m not sure how likely that is to happen. That said, the ham-fisted policies of the current administration may unite them. Time will tell.
Voting hasn't been sufficient pretty much ever. Whatever improvements you're thinking of in the last couple of centuries they didn't come about by voting.
> Anyone who lives in a neighborhood with a high proportion of kids making it to the Ivy league and other top schools knows exactly what this guy is talking about.
The person whose view you endorse supports what many parents believe. I’ve seen how the sausage is made, and he has it (mostly) wrong.
Many people seem to think that being more above average is the key to elite school admissions. It helps, and it’s directionally correct (one needs to show academic competence), but the key is to be truly exceptional in something.
Five extracurriculars is almost the same as one or even none if there was no demonstration of exceptional performance or leadership.
Taking the max load of AP classes versus just a few is not as helpful as people seem to think. Using one’s time to do something unique and/or exceptional would be time much better spent.
I beat this drum as often as I can here and elsewhere, but the upper middle class folks in that particular rat race don’t seem interested in hearing what I’m saying.
It's worse, this is mostly just to be a shoe-in for a good state school, with a "maybe I'll get lucky and an ivy will accept anyways", unless you're really exception in at least one of these areas.
> Using one’s time to do something unique and/or exceptional would be time much better spent.
The fact is that most high schoolers are just not unique or exceptional but still want a shot to break out of currently very poor job prospects or hourly labor. I think many of these kids are capable of much more once they have some time to grow up, but the system is such that they need to show their color by roughly 17 to be "exceptional" along the traditional route.
I was in high school not that long ago, I understood the point you make then, but it didn't make me unique or exceptional. Most kids just want to be good enough, to do okay.
It's because it's risky and also requires actually being exceptional at something. So people choose the arduous brute force method because they know they can do it and it has a lower bound in terms of outcome.
In any case, this isn't unique to college admissions. The same story plays out in terms of career and all facets of life.
> The catch is that it is harder to brute force being truly exceptional in one thing. That often requires talent and predisposition.
That’s true for sports, music, and academics, but I think “grinding” exceptional leadership can be a thing. It’s very learnable, and effort often times makes the difference.
Some simple examples I’ve seen in various forms:
- starting a meaningful business or non-profit
- starting a meaningful arts or sports experience (literary magazine, regional film festival, regional sports event/tournament, etc.)
- many/most substantial Eagle Scout projects (not all are substantial enough)
The heuristic I tell people to use is this — the reader of the application will go “no kidding… I’d really like to talk to this person and learn more about this” (aka “have a beer with them” type of sentiment)
> Grinding 15 hours a day is a more realistic option for most children and parents.
See above… grind at the right thing. Full-time grinding academics is a fools errand unless the applicant can demonstrate their competence at a regional level, if not national or international level.
Still seems like a much more risky and challenging strategy with low chance of success.
What is the chance that a mediocre or talentless student can grind Regional success? What is the chance that mediocre and talentless parents can support that?
Grinding grades and academics is absolutely a path the top tier universities like Berkeley or UCLA, even if you won't get in the S tier private schools.
I've seen several ESL immigrant parents simply lock their kids up and make them study their way to Berkeley, despite having never graduated high school themselves.
> Grinding grades and academics is absolutely a path the top tier universities like Berkeley or UCLA, even if you won't get in the S tier private schools.
Yeah. We are talking about different types of schools.
For one, Cal and UCLA both admit a lot of students. It’s just not as competitive. Additionally, it’s fairly easy for a decent grinder student to go to a feeder JuCo and transfer to either of these schools (which would be a fine outcome for the “ESL immigrant parents” you gave as an example).
Second, while Cal and UCLA are top-tier public schools (along with schools like UMich, UVa, and UTexas), I don’t consider them elite in terms of undergrad programs [1]. Any resident of California who gets into Stanford or an Ivy would be able to get into either of those (excepting anomalies like unusually high departmental requirements at some UC schools like Cal).
So sure, if the goal (esp. for California residents) is to get into a UC school, going the grinder route is fine — overkill in most cases, but fine. This will be less than ideal if they are also considering elite schools like Stanford or Ivies.
[1] What makes an undergrad program elite? The short answer is drive and the ability to get things done.
If you take the top 1000 admits from Stanford and compare them to the top 1000 admits at Cal, you may not see much difference in terms of raw intellect — plenty of super smart people in both groups. But the Stanford students will be more ambitious, they will push each other much harder (and in most cases learn more), and they will achieve more than the Cal students. Note that this isn’t a knock on Cal students — it’s just a different way of approaching school and life that is quite apparent when you interact with enough folks from each group.
Stanford, an elite school, can and does select for these traits. Cal just can’t be as picky due to the large number of admits and certain state policies.
I understand the distinction, and agree the students are different.
I just don't think every student has what it takes to be a good fit at Stanford.
For this reason and the low admission, I don't think betting the farm on an academic strategy tailored for Stanford is a good idea for most students or parents.
Until recently you would not be correct; the covert way that elite schools did AA would disqualify lots of Asian applicants who DIDN'T have extraordinary test scores and coursework.
At some point, when the competition are starting nonprofits and playing Carnegie Hall at 13, you either end up getting in effortlessly or running the rat race.
> Until recently you would not be correct; the covert way that elite schools did AA would disqualify lots of Asian applicants who DIDN'T have extraordinary test scores and coursework.
Please don’t spread propaganda.
I’ve seen admissions evolve over decades. Your take strikes me as very uninformed and shaped by certain agenda-driven media narratives.
A generous interpretation supporting your thesis is that AA spots took away spots from very marginal asian and white students. Marginal asian and white admits even at Harvard are usually not terribly impressive, such that I’m not sure that this trade is a loss for the school or the student body.
An interpretation that doesn’t support your thesis is that the admissions process at elite schools put a tremendous amount of value on community involvement for AA candidates.
The Supreme Court has ruled that the latter is discrimination. I’m not a lawyer, so maybe it is, but I don’t think I’ve ever met an AA candidate that wasn’t bringing something else quite compelling to the table. That said, I’ve met plenty of asian and white marginal admits that did not bring much to the table (student: “woohoo, I study a lot” me: “yes, you do, and you’re bad at it”).
People act like so many deserving asians and/or whites were denied spots due to AA, when the reality is that the folks who theoretically “lost” a spot were already so marginal that admission was a bit of a crapshoot anyway. They would have just been warm bodies used to fill out the class with very low expectations of contributing to the school or the community. Snarky take, but that’s the reality.
Harvard has used tests of "character" to exclude racial and religious minorities for more than 100 years. The heart of this scandal is another test of "character" that systematically disadvantaged Asian kids. Call me misinformed if you want, but I'm going to accuse you of sticking your head in the sand.
> Your take strikes me as very uninformed and shaped by certain agenda-driven media narratives.
Please actually respond to what I'm saying. I have had these opinions for a while, definitely before the current president. I think I'm pretty well-informed (at least as well-informed as you!)
> An interpretation that doesn’t support your thesis is that the admissions process at elite schools put a tremendous amount of value on community involvement for AA candidates.
I know lots of Asian kids who volunteered, founded clubs, participated in extracurriculars, had excellent test scores, and were still rejected by Harvard. I know plenty non-Asian kids who did half that and got in. I don't believe that Asian students are systemically less personable than non-Asian kids; I do believe that a sufficiently woke admissions office can hold a lot of shitty racist opinions about Asian people.
> That said, I’ve met plenty of asian and white marginal admits that did not bring much to the table (student: “woohoo, I study a lot” me: “yes, you do, and you’re bad at it”).
So that's why Asian admits need to score 150 points higher than white kids on their SAT to get in at Harvard? Because everything else about them like their personality and achievements outside of school are so "marginal?"
> The Supreme Court has ruled that the latter is discrimination. I’m not a lawyer, so maybe it is, but I don’t think I’ve ever met an AA candidate that wasn’t bringing something else quite compelling to the table.
> They would have just been warm bodies used to fill out the class with very low expectations of contributing to the school or the community. Snarky take, but that’s the reality.
The Supreme Court correctly called a spade a spade because there was obvious racial discrimination in those admissions processes. When an Asian kid needs to score 450 more points on the SAT than a black kid to get in, there is no other reasonable conclusion.
I am finding a lot of your statements to also be sort of offensive. Asian kids are just as witty, personable, community-oriented, etc. as anyone else. Harvard lost because THEY COULD NOT PROVE OTHERWISE.
Discrimination based on that stuff is legal, discrimination based on race is not - all that Harvard actually had to do was prove this stuff you're saying, and they couldn't.
> Once you cross a certain threshold, it's luck of the draw if you're selected.
For most schools, it’s the opposite.
For folks qualified to get in, they will be selected. For folks at the marginal threshold, it’s luck of the draw.
> Clearly the entire thing is broken.
I agree with your sentiment, but for opposite reason. We need to scale down the number of people at R1 schools and develop a more robust system of technical and trade schools (imho).
The spreadsheet types have taken over the universities from the professors (it started decades ago), so I don’t think that this change will happen unless and until the current system implodes.
> can anyone here think of some better ways where we could decouple the education process from the work process?
The excessive education requirements for jobs came about mainly to provide easy legal ways to cull a large pool of applicants. This credentialism trend has grown far beyond anything that is healthy.
One possible and feasible solution is to encourage (via funding and guidance) more coop and internship programs and partnerships. This is especially true for local junior colleges, but is also useful for 4-year schools.
That doesn’t really decouple education and work, but it would be something that could move the needle from the local level to the national level.
If you want to decouple education and work, I will humbly suggest that the system already exists. It’s people using their personal networks. Many people seem to find this to be incredibly unfair (however one defines unfair), but it’s an absolute cheat code / life hack for decoupling education and work.
Simple example:
I graduated from a prestigious school (one that is known for feeding Wall Street) a year and change after a stock market collapse. Only half of the graduates from the previous year had jobs in their chosen career fields. My year was worse.
When we saw who got Wall Street jobs, it was folks in the top 10% of the class, and about the same number randomly scattered amongst the rest. Some of these folks were very low ranked, and they were known for aggressively taking advantage of the “gentleman’s C” system. What was the common thread of all of the non-top 10%? It was almost always a personal connection, often a close one like a parent, being in a position of power at the employer.
None of this was or is obvious in boom times, but in times of distress we were able to see who was swimming naked in terms of connections/nepotism.
Maybe for top tier play, but apm wasn’t really needed for regular play.
Just to debunk this myth, it used to be possible to get to diamond with 80-100 apm (which is very easy to achieve), efficient builds, fundamental rush defense, and a-move.
Not sure about now, but it was doable for many years.
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