Book TV: Charles Murray "Real Education"

From FreedomFest 2008, held in Las Vegas, Charles Murray talks about his latest book which takes a critical look at the educational system in America and proposes ways to improve it.

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[uzijohn]

I agree with Murray's point,

All men are created equal, NOT identical

Intelligence is but one attribute!

Leadership, persistence, ingenuity, honesty, compassion, bravery, common sense, theyre all just as important.

A good, healthy and successful society needs all the above

[MrCropper]

"there is still a value for a society to educate it's populace"

Does Murray, in your view, NOT think "there is ... a value for a society to educate it's populace"?

[RichMatarese]

For most Americans and the lives they hope to live, a college degree is neither necessary nor beneficial. The learning skills required to speak and think and write and calculate and acquire needed knowledge throughout most people's lives can be inculcated before the end of adolescence. High school can and should do the job completely.

The only thing preventing this has been America's system of education, and the whole utterly damnable "educationalist" teaching establishment.

[eugenicsmovement]

@Moionfire the problem is not that kids with good grades who can pay for college are being turned away. The problem is that kids who have neither the money nor the brains for college are still going, because they're told it's "Yale or jail."

I don't think Murray is a eugenicist, but if he is, so what? Teddy Roosevelt, Marcus Garvey, Plato, Aristotle and Aldous Huxley all supported eugenics or eugenic practices. There are good arguments against eugenics, "They're losers" isn't one of them.

[cardo1111]

Dr. Murray summed it up very well.

[Moionfire]

Murray is a loser and a eugenicist - hence he hates many people going to college. If people are willing to pay the money to go to college and they have the proper grades, why shouldn't they go in.

In addition he ignores that only 30% of people have a BA--- so it is not like we are being saturated with BA degrees.

[tnguyen318]

America's writing is so Fake its not even funny.

[redblue18700]

College level material is really tuff and not for everyone. However, people are not so dumb they can't get a basic understanding and set of fundamentals. These fundamentals are not taught well in high school. I went to college just to learn basic knowledge that I should have learned years earlier but didn't.

[heartlessvietboy]

We need to come out a book of Facts about the Universe and our Solar System. No balogny that goes on and on and on.

[jrsub3]

@roll2996 Yes, I must admit, while I agree with his general point that we send too many kids to college, and that we're a status-whoring society who says a BA in some random major has real value for...I don't know why, apparently art history makes you better at sales than working?

But not for the same reason. We're a service sector economy, and we should be thinking about how we can get 1/3rd, even 40% of our kids to pursue meaningful study successfully. This starts way before college.

[roll2996]

What about all the other countries who are ahead of the USA in math and science?

Are they just smarter than us? I don't think

so. They have a longer school day , a longer

school year , different teaching metodologies

and populations who value education. His

entire argument - FAIL.

[gunittsolja1]

As far back as I could remember, I was always writing....short stories, poetry, etc. I was terrible at math and science in high school. However, my parents kept encouraging me to go to medical school. So I learned how to be good at the sciences, aced everything in college, and now I'm a first year med student. I still write though...all the time...and I love it. Medicine is interesting, but it's just okay to me. I wish everybody would have pushed me more towards what I love.