Re: Social Engineering (was: Different patriarchy Model)

Todd Michel McComb (mccombtm@netcom.com)
Tue, 24 Jan 1995 18:30:34 GMT

In article <3g23dv$al8@newsbf02.news.aol.com> PioneerTom writes:
>I continue to believe that a real and rigorous science of anthropology can
>make excellent contributions to all our futures.

And just what would make anthropology "real and rigorous"? More math,
I suppose?

Hey, you know, I was never once beaten up in school, despite being
first in my class in every level from elementary school through grad
school. In fact, many of the "ruffians" were my friends -- not the
people who "studied." I have a theory as to why... because I freely
admitted that school was 95% crap.

So, then, I have to ask... is learning mathematics going to increase
society's wealth as you say? What sort of wealth would that be?
Perhaps I'd feel more satisfied if I could count my food, maybe even do
a little group theory with it. Learning math does increase an
individual's relative chance of getting one of those cushy, high-paying
jobs, however. But then if more people learnt all that stuff, there's
no guarantee there'd be jobs for them (in fact, there already aren't
jobs for many of them -- did you notice?).

What about anthropology? Perhaps we can take a hint from some of the
recent posters to this group, and leave off telling people what they
ought to be doing. Maybe we could "study" some other culture, and
perhaps increase our understanding. Hmm. When was the last time we
had an actual anthropology thread on this group anyway? Or maybe we
should just split the group into sci.bio.evolution.normative and
sci.bio.genetics.blah.blah.blah.

Todd Michel McComb
mccombtm@netcom.com ftp://ftp.netcom.com/pub/mc/mccombtm/home.html

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