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Originally Posted by Scucca  The clue is in Adam Smith's quote:
"The differences of natural talents in different men is, in reality, much less than we are aware of; and the very different genius which appears to distinguish men of different professions, when grown up to maturity, is not upon many occasions so much the cause as the effect of the division of labour. The differences between the most dissimilar characters, between a philosopher and a common street porter, for example, seems to arise not so much from nature, as from habit, custom and education." |
Taking your cues on evolutionary intelligence theory and the nature v. nurture debate from an 18th century philosopher is a pretty horrible idea.
Putting that aside, no, there's actually not much of a clue there. There
is a massive difference between people who work hard, educate themselves, and become successful and those who are lazy, intellectually incurious, and unsuccessful. Smith's quote isn't disputing that. My point is that "habit, custom, and education" are pretty ****ing important. Further, nothing in that quote has any relation to my larger point, which is that mobility =/= improvement.
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And what do we have with Britain? Additional investment in education that has actually widened the income divides. That suggests that pishpot middle class divs are more able to pick the peanuts out of certification, rather than the more cunning but wealth-hampered working class sweetpeas (Note I dumbed my language down for Utah!). Mach then is correct in that the solution is pre-tertiary education sector.
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No, it actually doesn't suggest that at all.
I don't really care about the language that you use, but in the future, could you please present your claim in a way that doesn't:
a) quote extensively from someone else's work that is only tangentially related, and
b) consist of overly conclusory arguments?