c**i
发帖数: 6973 | 1 Jonathan V Last, Go Ahead, Have Another. Wall Street Journal, Apr 16, 2011.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703
806304576242661295724864.html?mod=WSJ_Books_LS_Books_5
(book review on Bryan Caplan, Selfish Reasons To Have More Kids: Why Being a
Great Parent is Less Work and More Fun Than You Think. Basic Books, 2011)
Quote: "Bryan Caplan's 'Selfish Reasons to Have More Kids' is the antidote
to Amy Chua's best seller, 'Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother.' Whereas Ms.
Chua insists that parents should have few children and then drive them
relentlessly toward perfection, Mr. Caplan argues that people should have
more children; that they are cheaper than we think; that parenting is less
important than we imagine; and that kids can basically raise themselves.
"But it turns out that parenting has almost no effect on children's life
expectancy, intelligence, happiness or success.
"But the biggest effect of nurture, it turns out, is on how children
perceive their parents. So you can greatly increase the chances of your
children * * * thinking fondly of you.
"'You can have a better life and a bigger family,' he [Caplan] says, 'if you
admit that your kids' future is not in your hands.'
"In study after study, researchers find that parents are consistently less
happy than non-parents. No matter how you control the sample, if you have
two identical people—one with a child and one without—the parent will be 5
.6 percentage points less happy.
"The average college- educated woman today [in US] has just 1.7 babies over
the course of her life, which is not enough to sustain America's population
in the long run.
Note:
(a) Bryan D Caplan, Professor of Economics, George Mason University
http://economics.gmu.edu/people/details/bcaplan
Education: BA Economics, University of California at Berkeley, 1993; Ph.D.,
Economics, Princeton University, 1997
(b) scad(n): "a large number or quantity —usually used in plural
money>"
(c) capoeira (n; Brazilian Portugese): "a Brazilian dance of African origin
that incorporates martial arts movements such as kicks and chops"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=51q1VB_dDik
(d) huzzah (n; origin unknown; First Known Use 1573): "an expression or
shout of acclaim —often used interjectionally to express joy or approbation
"
http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/approbation
(Approbation and approval have the same general meaning)
(e) schlep (vt; Yiddish): "DRAG, HAUL"
(f) staycation
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Staycation
(a neologism for a period of time in which an individual or family stays and
relaxes at home, or vacations in their own country, possibly taking day
trips to area attractions)
(g) tendentious (adj): "marked by a tendency in favor of a particular point
of view : BIASED"
(h) For "natalist," see
natalism
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natalism
(also called pronatalism or the pro-birth position; a belief that promotes
human reproduction)
etymology: "Latin natalis, from natus, past participle of nasci to be born
— more at NATION"
All definitions are from www.m-w.com, except otherwise identified.
(i) The "atomize" in "atomize their lives"
(vt): "to subject to attack by nuclear weapons"
Random House dictionary 2011: "to destroy (a target) by bombing, especially
with an atomic bomb"
(j) 儿孙自有儿孙福，莫为儿孙作远忧。
——元•关汉卿《包待制三勘蝴蝶梦》楔子 | c**i
发帖数: 6973 | 2 The following was published on Sunday, a day after the WSJ book review on
Saturday. Authors and editors of the two were unlikely to know existence of
the other. I modified just now the origfinal posting to add the following to
that posting.
Motoko Rich, Nature? Nurture? Not So Fast ... Paradoxically, the kind of
parents who follow debates about parenting may be those with the least to
worry about. New York Times, Apr 17, 2011 (title in print).
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/17
/weekinreview/17nurture.html?scp=3&sq=caplan&st=cse
Quote:
"But does a wealthier parent who forces a child to practice piano 20 hours a
week make a huge difference to her overall well-being? 'We don’t really
know,' said Jeanne Brooks-Gunn, a professor of child development at Columbia
.
"'We don’t know what part of parenting is critical,' he [Bruce Sacerdote,
the Dartmouth College economist] said.
My comment:
(a) The article appeared in page 3 of the section of Week in Review of the
Sunday paper. The front page of the section contained a teaser for the
article: Who Really Cares How Yuppies Raise Their Kids?
(b) The report cites
Bruce Sacerdote, What Happens When We Randomly Assign Children to Families?
National Bureau of Ecopnomic Research (NBER), November 2004 (Working Paper
10894).
http://www.nber.org/papers/w10894.pdf
Please read Abstract. "Very similar results obtain when I use the father's [
compared to mother's, in Table 3 and Abstract] outcome instead of the mother
's (not shown)." web page 15.
(c) Unlike an experiment in physics and chemistry--and in bi9ology, to a
certain extent--which allows control group and experimental group whose
difference is just an variable, an experiment can rarely be done on humans.
And an experiment on humans can hardly control variables between the two
groups (the most a scientist can do is to make the two groups similar).
(d) In US, federal government does not put its nose in family matters.
States keeps a respecful distance, for it is generally accepted there is no
right or wrong way of raising children, as long as there is no abuse. Thus
no state in the union has criminalized spanking in the HOME. Look at the
maps in
Corporal punishment in the home
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporal_punishment_in_the_home |
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