by Nosferatu 40 Replies latest jw friends
The General Social Surveys says active Witnesses score, on the 10-word vocabulary test, as well as members of the general population who have attended college and almost as well as those who have graduated-- inactive Witnesses do not perform nearly as well.
I was born in Missouri.
Show me.
Do you think this is because of the discouragement of getting a higher education?
How high does an education have to be in order to spell "the"?
Joker: We all know you're just making up your survey data. Why do you lie to us?
Runningman, you wish I'm making this up. One would think a person who reads a lot would spell better than one who doesn't.
The average Witness with only high school education is probably better educated than others with similar amounts of schooling. The General Social Surveys says active Witnesses score, on the 10-word vocabulary test, as well as members of the general population who have attended college and almost as well as those who have graduated-- inactive Witnesses do not perform nearly as well.
I did a simple google search and found the webpage for General Social Surveys. http://webapp.icpsr.umich.edu/GSS/ Now quote the survey that says this. It has a search feature. I could find nothing of what you say. I want to be proved wrong by you Joker.
Runningman, you wish I'm making this up.
Correction: he KNOWS you're making it up. If you weren't, you could give us a relevant URL, or paste an extract of the study here.
One would think a person who reads a lot would spell better than one who doesn't.
Only a Witness would think that 32 pages a week, written at a grade 9 level, is a "lot" of reading.
I've heard that the next book to be studied for the weekly Bookstudy is entitled Hooked on Phonics.
This is just my opinion, okay, but--I think education is a function of three things:
1.Curiousity about a variety of things
2.Dilligence in investigating beneath the surface
3.Willingness to be wrong, frustrated and yet, undaunted by obstacles
Abraham Lincoln, as we've all been told a million times, came from the humblest origins. He was indefatigable about teaching himself. He learned one new word every single day. He walked miles to borrow and return books.
Let us face it, anybody can have a lazy streak right down the middle of their intellect. Laziness and a "don't care" attitude can hold down the mightiest mind. Slackers are everywhere. You can tell them easily. They are the first to excuse their own shortcomings and pretend details do not matter.
The poorest of thinkers is a poor reasoner as well. Poor thinkers have not exposed their minds to variety of thought, opinion, data and expression. The toolkit of the mentally lazy has a one-size-fits-all swiss army knife world view.
Socrates was no slouch as a thinker; but, he was humble as well. He said that he only knew one thing and that was that he knew nothing. Yet, his "nothing" is mighty indeed. He asked questions and then more questions. His curiousity was boundless.
There are two kinds of people I cannot respect.
1.The person who says, "I don't know and I don't care that I don't know".
2.The person who excuses their bad behavior by pointing to worse behavior.
All the rest of us fall somewhere in the middle of idiot----------------------genius.
As long as we "care"--we can improve our mind.
Joker: Studies? Data? Conclusive proof? Kind of a blanket statement you make without anything concrete to back you up. At least the person who started this thread had provided an example. Your comment *looks* like a knee jerk reaction and a deliberate dig at those of us who are no longer involved in the religion of *your* choice. That would be a very unloving and small-minded thing to do to another of God's creatures, don't you think?
General: I'm hesitant to put spelling and grammar categories onto a "JW" or "ex-JW" label. I'm working on a Bachelor of English (and so very "into" English, spelling, grammar and the like), and find that most people on message boards don't worry so much about that kind of thing. Personally, I do so much "proper" writing for school and work and my home business, that when I'm on internet boards I'm not as picky with myself, or others (hey...everyone needs a break sometime! *grin*).
I took a creative writing course where the teacher said it's okay to break the rules of spelling and grammar...provided you know what rules you're breaking. In other words, intentionally choosing to 'slack' can be part of your own creativity. I'm not saying that's what people do...in fact, I think in most cases people don't really learn the rules in the first place. I do think, along the lines of the poster, that a lack of higher education certainly doesn't work in anyone's favour.
I understand the Watchtower Society is now advocating for 'some' higher education...it's never a bad thing and I'm glad they're not setting this generation of JWs up like they apparently did the last one, who they told to not bother because 1975 was coming...
Don't they all learn everything from Awake! University?
After all, that's like a college edumacation.
