AMERICAN CONSERVATISM IN 2008 AND BEYOND

H2O MAN wrote:

Diest TKO wrote:

Why don't you just make this your signature, and save yourself the time?

Why don't you?

It's not my idea. Why would I put it on my sig Waterboy?

Foxfyre wrote:

Unless somebody can give you a verifiable, real life example, you are incapable of drawing a conclusion re whether reward or lack of same affects human behavior? You honestly never had any education on that in all your years of schooling?

It's not that, it's that you basically misunderstand the rewards of taking the class; the reward is not good grades, it is learning the subject. A large percentage of the class is presumably going to study whether you average the grades out in any way or not. Unless you are taking away the students ability to retain the info presented, you aren't reflecting their compensation; and it isn't at all clear that the level of the grades would drop the way your author claims they would. It takes a pretty cynical view of the world to believe that all people at all times are looking for the quick buck with the least work, though now that I think about it, that seems to be exactly what you Conservatives believe.

There are several problems with the scenario presented -

1, the method of averaging does not represent actual wealth redistribution as it's done in America.
2, the students likely would not engage in the behaviors which are listed.
3, a real-life example of this would be required to provide usable data; otherwise, it's just the opinion of the writer regarding the effects of rewards on human performance.

My knowledge of reward vs. work, and the complexities of human involvement in this scenario, were not learned in any classroom, but in real life. People do things for a wide variety of reasons and cannot be expected to act predictably under given stimuli. The prospect that your chain email provides a usable data point for us to discuss is a little laughable. I could just as easily write up a scenario which has a completely different outcome, one in which everyone ends up with a B but with greater learning and less stress due to the grade redistribution; somehow I doubt you would accept my invented scenario as the starting point for a discussion of the merits of a socialized society, without quibbling with it.

Cycloptichorn

Yes you could write up a different scenario that might or might teach a universal truth. Claiming far longer experience in roles of both receiving reward for effort expended and dispensing reward for effort expended, I know first hand that if you remove the reward, you also remove a lot of effectiveness, efficiency, and initiative. I agree that not all people work for the same kind of reward, but everybody expects one for effort expended just the same whether it the reward is material, aesthetic, emotionally satisfying, ego building, or achieves penance. Having participated in and taught management workshops in which interactive games were included, we demonstrated again and again that the structure broke down whenever the expected result was denied the participants.

The illustration of the class exercise was not without merit in demonstrating the normal effect on human nature when you reduce or eliminate the expected reward for effort expended.

Having participated in and taught management workshops in which interactive games were included, we demonstrated again and again that the structure broke down whenever the expected result was denied the participants.

Quote:

Yes you could write up a different scenario that might or might teach a universal truth. Claiming far longer experience in roles of both receiving reward for effort expended and dispensing reward for effort expended, I know first hand that if you remove the reward, you also remove a lot of effectiveness, efficiency, and initiative. I agree that not all people work for the same kind of reward, but everybody expects one for effort expended just the same whether it the reward is material, aesthetic, emotionally satisfying, ego building, or achieves penance. Having participated in and taught management workshops in which interactive games were included, we demonstrated again and again that the structure broke down whenever the expected result was denied the participants.

The illustration of the class exercise was not without merit in demonstrating the normal effect on human nature when you reduce or eliminate the expected reward for effort expended.

But, you ignore the fact that the expected reward isn't grades, but knowledge. The point of college or schooling isn't to make good grades, it is to learn. Averaging the grades out doesn't change that at all.

Let us say however that the students DID expect the grades; even then, it is a bad example (as it relates to real life), because in reality, those making A's would lose a few points and those making D's would be brought up to C's. This isn't going to make anyone who goes for A and B marks, stop studying and stop working; you have to Appeal to Extremes in order to make some sort of point. When you have to do that, it isn't a great point.

Cycloptichorn

What they do look at is your performance once hired.

Now you take a small business owner who is offered a nice contract, but if he accepts it he will push himself into a substantially higher tax bracket and subject himself to all manner of government regulations, mandates, and red tape that he doesn't have as a Mom & Pop operation. He decides he doesn't need the aggravation or the reduced income so he doesn't hire the half dozen people he would have otherwise hired. And the next guy lays off a few employees to keep himself under the threshhold where the government would have socked it to him.

How many people would work hard at a job for which there was little or no appreciation, no recognition, no opportunity for advancement, no acknowledgement of a job done competently and there was even less reward when you expended extra effort? When there are no consequences for not working hard or not working at all? When coworkers get paid the same as you and are awarded the same recognition as you for doing little or nothing? What if you were doing all the work and they were getting bonuses and perks for the work you were doing and you were receiving less reward or recognition each day or week or month or year that went by? How many people would keep putting out the effort? How many would not leave if they could and find something more satisfying?

the dumbmasses never considered his resume,

Would you like to show your future employer that C or D or F

Perhaps they are incapable of understanding it?

Foxfyre, what I strive to do here is continue a debate with a Statist on a particular topic until I am convinced that the Statist has adequately demonstrated his sophist irrationality on that topic. The most frequent and most effective way for a Statist to demonstrate sophist irrationality is to resort to libeling those they disagree with.

Foxfyre wrote:

Perhaps they are incapable of understanding it?

How many times has Foxy used this line to suggest those who disagree with her are too stupid to understand the intellectual complexity of her point? I think the number is in the thousands.