Poor Grades Tied To Class Times That Don't Match Our Biological Clocks (berkeley.edu) 294
An anonymous reader shares a report: It may be time to tailor students' class schedules to their natural biological rhythms, according to a new study from UC Berkeley and Northeastern Illinois University. Researchers tracked the personal daily online activity profiles of nearly 15,000 college students as they logged into campus servers. After sorting the students into "night owls," "daytime finches" and "morning larks" -- based on their activities on days they were not in class -- researchers compared their class times to their academic outcomes. Their findings, published today in the journal Scientific Reports, show that students whose circadian rhythms were out of sync with their class schedules -- say, night owls taking early morning courses -- received lower grades due to "social jet lag," a condition in which peak alertness times are at odds with work, school or other demands. "We found that the majority of students were being jet-lagged by their class times, which correlated very strongly with decreased academic performance," said study co-lead author Benjamin Smarr, a postdoctoral fellow who studies circadian rhythm disruptions in the lab of UC Berkeley psychology professor Lance Kriegsfeld.
Grow up (Score:3, Insightful)
Life isn't always about getting the schedule or job you want. Sometimes you have to suck it up and do what you need to do and stop whining about why you fail.
Re: Grow up (Score:5, Insightful)
Perhaps. Or perhaps - like me - one may only accept jobs without onerous requirements on hours worked. You want me to be in at 9am for a quarterly review meeting? Sure. You need me in by 9am every morning. Nope.
Re: Grow up (Score:5, Interesting)
At my last job, we had "core hours" from 9-3 that everyone was supposed to be in, but outside those hours was up to us. I got used to a 6:30-3:00 schedule that I still maintain even though I no longer have formal schedule requirements. As long as you're in for enough of the day to overlap sufficiently with the people you need to interact with, I see no reason to dictate mornings or afternoons.
Re: Grow up (Score:5, Informative)
Ok, I can see this maybe if working an odd job, maybe a restaurant job (I did these while in school and growing up)...but you certainly can't be serious about this for a real job?
You must be young, perhaps a millennial in order to thing that 9am is "onerous".....but that's they way the real world works my friend.
If you want to make a healthy living, you need to face up to that quick.
The days of sleeping till noon are for teens still living at home, as an adult, you need to go to bed earlier and get up for real world hours.
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Most people who love what they do tend to put more hours into their jobs than those who show up on time because they have to, then leave as soo
Re: Grow up (Score:5, Insightful)
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Most jobs out there have almost no creativity involved in them at all. Those that do it is very limited, say the first 10% and the last 5% when you are forced to problem solve in the beginning and troubleshoot why it isn't working right at the end. The other 85% is all about not being a lazy turd and just cranking out some work.
There is something to be s
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Yes, that is how the world works. Problem is, it's inefficient. Which means that whichever company stops working like that first will out-compete those who don't. I work to the real world's schedule, but it's the schedule set by nations with a failing economy that can't keep up with those who work differently. I don't demand that the real world accommodate me, unlike the grandparent post, but I do keep my eye on those who have adapted and evolved. If I can find a way to fit in with THEM, then I'll move. I o
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Hi stereotypical uniformed grandpa character.
It turns out, lots and lots of companies don't particularly care if you arrive at work at 6am or 10am, as long as you put in a 40-hour week. Sure, that doesn't fit all jobs because in some jobs you need someone to cover those hours. But not in all jobs.
For example, the "meh, get in by 10ish" policy is actually quite frequent for software development and similar IT-related fields....you know, the core audience for Slashdot.
In fact, every real job I have had in t
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Ok, I can see this maybe if working an odd job, maybe a restaurant job (I did these while in school and growing up)...but you certainly can't be serious about this for a real job?
You must be young, perhaps a millennial in order to thing that 9am is "onerous".....but that's they way the real world works my friend.
If you want to make a healthy living, you need to face up to that quick.
I'm a 40-year old senior engineer at a mid-sized firm. Core hours are 10:00-16:00, barring any customer engagements. And honestly, as long as your work is getting done and you aren't missing meetings, no one is going to raise an eyebrow no matter what your hours are.
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My advice for those that can't seem to get the message is don't join the military snowflakes. I had to be up by 5am and on the road to get to work by 0630. For a 0700 show time. Why a half hour early? Because I was in charge and had to get there before my troops did who were expected to show up early as well.
As the saying goes "If you aren't 15 minutes early then you are 10 minutes late"
So what did that mean for bedtime? I crawled into bed as close to 8pm as possible or just had t
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Life isn't always about getting the schedule or job you want. Sometimes you have to suck it up and do what you need to do and stop whining about why you fail.
You must be a "half-empty" kind of guy.
The message that this study gives is not to use it to make excuses for failing. The message is to try to plan your day to your appropriate peak attention, if you can.
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Re:Grow up (Score:5, Insightful)
Life isn't always about getting the schedule or job you want. Sometimes you have to suck it up and do what you need to do and stop whining about why you fail.
Look at it from the point of view of an (intelligent) employer. Unless I need you at specific times to cover a shift, why would I not want you to be working when you're most productive?
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
Knowing that this is a problem is an important step towards addressing it.
With the exception of bosses that think you're not a good employee unless you're miserable, most realize that having productive employees is important. This kind of research supports things like flex-time and telecommuting. Both of which can allow for employees to shift their work to better match their body's needs. The result is better quality, less illness, less on the job accidents and potentially better employee retention.
It can b
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Look at it from the point of view of an (intelligent) employer. Unless I need you at specific times to cover a shift, why would I not want you to be working when you're most productive?
Looking at it from the point of view of an (intelligent) employer, I would want to hire employees that were most productive during regular work hours.
Sure, it takes a few years to shake off the juvenile need to sleep in after years of staying up late partying, or gaming, or binge watching TV shows, but at some point you become an adult with a family and you want to be in sync with the rest of the world. I'm now at the age where I've been alive longer in sync with circadian rhythm than the amount of years
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Sure, it takes a few years to shake off the juvenile need to sleep in after years of staying up late partying, or gaming, or binge watching TV shows,
Being an early bird is not a moral virtue. Different people have different circadian rhythms. If yours is naturally less than or about 24 hours, you'll find it easy to get up early, and fatiguing to stay up late. If yours is naturally, say, 25 hours, you'll find the reverse.
Looking at it from the point of view of an (intelligent) employer, I would want to hire employees that were most productive during regular work hours.
Sure, if conformity matters to you more than ability. Makes perfect sense for a manufacturing line, or any number of related jobs that robots do better. But if you need your employees to be creative, you make every allowance
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"Life isn't always about getting the schedule or job you want. Sometimes you have to suck it up and do what you need to do and stop whining about why you fail."
But...but...they are SPECIAL!
Their mom told them.
Re: Grow up (Score:5, Insightful)
Hmm...I take it we grew up getting a trophy for showing up, and raised to think the world revolves around you didn't we?
I've got some bad news for you sunshine....unless you wanna live your live in a box under the freeway, you'd better learn quick that YOU had to adjust to how the rest of the world works and deal with it.
Unless you are independently wealthy already, that's just a fact of life.
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As noted in my previous post, that does depend. There are companies that offer flexitime and there are cultures that are highly successful outside the UK/US paradigm. Flexible hours and a good work culture improves competitiveness and some countries are cashing in on that.
Now, if you want to stay in the US, you have to live by US rules. Same with the UK. And most companies are rigid and, well, I wouldn't call it medieval as some Japanese and European corporations have operated successfully from 900 AD until
Re: Grow up (Score:4, Insightful)
Hmm...I take it we grew up getting a trophy for showing up, and raised to think the world revolves around you didn't we?
You know, the monumentally stupid thing about this particular insult is it was not the kids deciding to hand out participation trophies. After all, they were kids and weren't handing out anything.
The kids could handle losing just fine. Their parents could not. In other words, your generation handed out trophies because your precious snowflake didn't win.
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And your evidence that they are actually not able to work in the real world?
'Cause again, the kids were just fine then and are just fine now. The "whining" is comments like "We shouldn't be saddling kids with mountains of student loan debt in order for them to pass the basic entry requirements to a better life". You'll note that this statement isn't even about them. It's about the future and people other than them who should not be put in the same position.
You, on the other hand, are constructing and inc
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Wait, what? (Score:2)
I thought that most (not all) college classes had options for scheduling. I know there are night school classes so is this about educating kids that they can change their schedule for the better or simply to provide another excuse for those who are under-performing?
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Limitations (Score:2)
I thought that most (not all) college classes had options for scheduling.
To some degree but it's not infinitely flexible. Sometimes the classes you need to take are only offered at a time that isn't ideal for you.
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I thought that most (not all) college classes had options for scheduling. I know there are night school classes so is this about educating kids that they can change their schedule for the better or simply to provide another excuse for those who are under-performing?
You're more likely to find flexible schedules at big Universities than at smaller Colleges. If you're the kind of person who can't work well in the morning, a small private College probably isn't for you- go to Big Bland State University instead; you'll do better and learn more there.
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Depends on the school. Mine scheduled at least one big required class for the popular majors only at 8am MWF. The primary goal of that class was to drive people out of the program, so that the only people that remained really wanted to be in that program. So not only was it early, they specifically made the class difficult.
For example, a lot of people arrived at my college as "pre-med". Organic Chemistry at 8am for their entire sophomore year eliminated about 40% of them.
huh (Score:3)
Huh ... so maybe rounding kids up like cattle and packing them into big buildings and trying to educate them like cattle has other dangers then just making them big targets.
Or are these findings just applicable to college age?
Re:huh (Score:4, Insightful)
Academic performance is something that could have been tested for well before "University".
Once accepted into university a person should be able to study at normal times of the day all over a week.
How did they pass all the exams and tests to a good national standard to get accepted into university?
Could study for years and based on merit was found to be better than most in the nation.
Get to university and is found to have a study alertness condition?
Thats the very best the entire nation could test for and was able to educate for years?
Only to get to university after all the testing and not do well the study?
The one thing every test over years should have detected well before any "University"".
Make the tests difficult again. That will find out who can study and who is ready for years of more work at university.
Who will be able to work on a thesis and show their new work on their thesis was their own.
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Once accepted into university a person should be able to study at normal times of the day all over a week.
And why would that be?
Of course you can have a dictatorship where you declare only people who wake up at 6:00 and manage to attend the 8:00 class can go to university.
But you can not have a dictatorship where people who are unable to wake up before 9:00 attend an 8:00 class and expect them to perform in any reasonable way.
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And why would that be?
Because it's easy for people like me to fight with insurance companies who don't want to give me stims because I'm over 18, thus my capacity to outperform the shit out of everyone around me by being on enormous loads of Methylphenidate all through grade school can continue into college.
What? I'm a frigging powerhouse at 1 in the morning. If I stop working to control my insomnia, I end up sleeping until 11am and become sharply awake and mentally fit after around 9pm regardless of the level of sleep depr
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This is /. and communism talk like that is not tolerated.
It's actually a capitalist policy. People keep asking how the state can solve homelessness and end hunger. The answer? Make people less-poor.
1/8 of the income is essentially redistributed flat, which allows the welfare system to function properly and ensure that people aren't homeless or hungry. The impact on taxes is actually about nothing--pre-TCJA, you're looking at corporate profit tax rate falling from 35% to 33.5%, and the top tax bracket falling 3.6%. Leaves enough room to get universal healt
Teaching has a vastly greater impact (Score:2)
While a bit groggy in my first period classes, I was always wide awake by my second class. While I do think it's ridiculous to have students to school by 7:45 a.m., I get that it can help mom and dad get to work on time, but extending the starting time an hour wouldn't put most out that much.
Conversely, I'd have to say crappy teachers make the most difference between students who get good grades and those who don't. It was my experience that when presented with teachers who were concerned with mediocre or
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While a bit groggy in my first period classes, I was always wide awake by my second class.
[...]
My point in writing this is there are more important measures to address than morning class times if we want to improve a student's scholastic success rate.
That's like saying: "I would need to lose maybe 10 pounds, and this qualifies me to decide that morbidly obese people should just stop eating junk food and get in shape instead of bitching about hormones and requesting bypass surgery."
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Having a hormonal abnormalities is no excuse if you still jam copious amounts of chips and cupcakes down your gullet and pretend that a salad with croutons, cheese and 500 kcal worth of dressing is "healthy".
Is that a bona-fide strawman?
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I get that it can help mom and dad get to work on time, but extending the starting time an hour wouldn't put most out that much.
This article is about college. So mom and dad should be pretty much out of the picture. By 18, you should be getting up, dressing yourself, making breakfast and getting to school on your own. Most high school kids can manage this themselves. The primary reason that moving the start time back for high school is bad is that school districts have to provide bus transportation not only for high schoolers, but grade schoolers as well. And if they take you in later, they have to adjust the transportation schedule
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The problem already starts in the first classes of school.
Germany e.g. is loathed for having absurdly early school start hours for 6 year old kids.
The main conclusion is: only idiots who like to wake up at 6:00 and finish work at 12PM become first grade school teachers. And they lobby so much that school starting time for little kids is so early that half of them struggle to learn the most basic things.
I as an adult like to sleep till about 9:00 (winter longer) ... if I had a kid that has to be at school at
Juvenile Biological Rhythms (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Juvenile Biological Rhythms (Score:5, Funny)
Will they ever really grow up?
No we won't. And you can't make us. So there! Nyah, nyah, nyah!
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Science (Score:4, Interesting)
So we tailor their class times to their biological rhythms and they turn into adults with juvenile biological rhythms. Will they ever really grow up?
It doesn't matter. What matters is whether it is more effective to provide more off-shift jobs. We have TRILLIONS of dollars in capital that go unused at night, when people go home. If 10% of labor is also more effective at later hours, that's worth exploring.
Yes, they will grow up (Score:2)
tl;dr. Let the kids sleep in like their bodies are telling them to and they'll be more production and learn better, leading to better adults when it's time for them to be adults.
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Since the "patient" is just tired and not being psychologically damaged, it's not similar.
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Sleep deprivation in the extreme causes death. In the acute, it causes brain damage. One person stayed awake without drugs for 11 days and suffered measurable brain damage.
Chronic sleep deprivation increases the risk of depression and suicide. It lowers the capacity to feel pleasure and reduces the ability to thrive. Adults with chronic sleep loss report excess mental distress, depressive symptoms, anxiety, and alcohol use.
That's not what makes night owls (Score:5, Informative)
BTW, studies have shown people's average biological clock (when deprived of reference to day/night cycles) is 24.2 hours [scientificamerican.com] to 25 hours [nih.gov]. So it's actually the night owls who are normal, and the morning larks who are abnormal.
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they turn into adults with juvenile biological rhythms
I think I get what you're trying to say, but what you actually said is impossible. If you have a biological rhythm, it's inherent to you and not affected by social concerns or by whether you give in to it or not. If this were not true, then "night owls" could become "early birds" by simply changing their sleep habits. If you have the same biological rhythm as an adult that you had as a child, then that is (by definition) your ADULT biological rhythm and would be so regardless of whether class times had b
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If you have an education system with N parameters, with each parameter weighted according to its contribution to how well educated a child will become, then optimize according to those weights, you will produce a better output than if you deoptimize along those same N parameters. That would seem to be the definition of optimize. The question is, what are the parameters and what are the weights? You can't weight everything 100%, your total weight comes to 100%.
Answer that and you (a) answer your question, (b
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Why do you assume "biological rhythms" are forced on people? Those patterns change on their own as the person grows up.
Young kids tend to wake up early. Teenagers tend to wake up late. Elderly tend to wake up early.
Generally agree (Score:3)
Well, my first reaction (as many others I'm sure) was that sometimes work doesn't align with your sleep cycle either so suck it up.
But then much of the method in school (especially now) doesn't align with the real world, and school isn't supposed to be analogous to a work environment. I always felt like I was more with it in my afternoon classes going through school, and that has continued on in my work life. Luckily I now have a job with flex hours where I can roll in at 10pm and work till 7pm, covering what seems to be my hard wired peak window of useful brain time.
That said, what can you do. There's plenty of people who are at their best in the morning, and school logistics are complicated enough I'm sure. Switching to online learning sounds great in theory, but I genuinely believe a big part of school is the social aspect. Looking back I probably would have loved to not have to physically go to school, but the social experience probably did shape me for the better.
You don't say... (Score:2)
People can't perform when they're asleep on the job? Now that's a new discovery, who would have guessed that lacking sleep and rest would make people perform worse?
Where do you apply for grants for such discoveries, I have plenty more that I'd really love to present. Next week: Water is wet and it's cold up North.
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Well, this cold up north thing is changing rapidly.
At Christmass the north pole had +9C.
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Where do you apply for grants for such discoveries, I have plenty more that I'd really love to present. Next week: Water is wet and it's cold up North.
Seriously considering funding CDC research into sleep deprivation in our society, working hours, and job scheduling. Have to get elected first. Election is at the end of June; a few of us are starting fundraising in April. My opponent is not well-liked (it's Elijah Cummings), so this is pretty much all funding and I don't have to outspend him at all.
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He's been in his seat since 96
Yes, and nobody has actually run for his seat since 96. A bunch of people put their name on the ballot every year. Not one of them raises funds. No campaign committee (you legally must have one if you spend over $5,000), no Web site, no TV interviews, nothing.
He's been sitting there unchallenged for 20 years, with 10% of the vote going to people who did nothing more than put their name on the ballot.
Even the power brokers around here are excited that I'm actually running. I could beat this guy in $
Perhaps the better students know this (Score:2)
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Not always as easy as one might think. For engineering classes (as an example), they might only be offered once per year and required for graduation. I had architectural studios that were half-days three days per week (plus every other hour in your life to meet deadlines), making scheduling nearly impossible.
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And what would be the "advantage"?
Bedtime (Score:2)
It'd be interesting to see what affect going to bed at a decent time has on things too.
In college, everybody I knew who had a morning class that they really struggled in were also the bozos who were up until 3am every night, and so their poor academic performance was really due to them having to learn how to set boundaries without leaning on mom and dad so much.
Those who had already learned how to be responsible for themselves would simply go to bed early enough to be awake and ready for their class. Just l
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It'd be interesting to see what affect going to bed at a decent time has on things too.
Well, the first effect is: you have no social life as others stay up till 12:00AM
The second effect is: you lay awake in the bed until it is about 2:00AM, could as well have stayed with your friends up.
The third effect is: you wake up at 4:30AM and are still tired and try to fall asleep again.
The fourth effect is, you either:
a) manage to be out of bed at 7:00 and in school at 8:00 and then sleep the first two hours through
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The third effect is: you wake up at 4:30AM and are still tired and try to fall asleep again
My cats figured out that I do this and now come to pester me for attention.
I've adapted to this mostly, and have to keep strict use of melatonin and cognitive therapy to continue sleeping well. I have 3-4 good nights in a row and then a bad night, usually 2-3 bad nights a week. It was so much better when I worked 3pm-11pm and just went to sleep at 2am; and I've found now and then that just staying up until 1am causes me to sleep much better for the first half of the night, but I'm now trained to wake up
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Well, this is your lucky day, because I myself am a night owl. I am not naturally a morning person. At all.
But in high school I read some article about the benefits of getting up early and decided that I wanted those benefits. So I changed. It took time and a lot of hard work, but I wanted the reward so I worked for it.
I've been there too, just like you, not able to fall asleep for hours. It's frustrating, but it is something that can be overcome - for me in involved learning falling asleep techniques, esta
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I'm not sure it's the role of a 'responsible adult' to conform, or to force others to conform, to a system that only suits a proportion of the population.
If anything the role of a responsible adult would be to change the system, or at the very least allow changes to the system without having to be browbeaten into it, to ensure it suits everybody.
It has long been known that there's a biological basis between groups' waking and sleeping times. Back in the dawn of time this would have been a good thing, as it
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I appreciate your comment, but partially disagree. And as noted, I'm not one of the morning people, and please don't forget that my original comment was wondering aloud about the effect of bedtimes on these things - something I was wondering because a common thread in so many of the discussions on this topic is to completely ignore that aspect of it. So mostly I'm coming from the perspective of "hold on, before we conclude that we need to move the schedule [as this study basically concluded], doesn't it mak
Torture (Score:2)
My only D in college was my EE101 class at 7:30AM Tuesday and Thursday... and I R a Professional Electrical Engineer. Boy was that a miserable class. I had a few other 7:30AM classes over the years, but most were puff classes that I could do in my sleep. I remember a CAD teacher calling me to wake me up for the final exam because I was a half-hour late but had a perfect score up to that point...
Schools should operate 9-5 with no Homework (Score:2)
My biggest annoyance with schools are their insistence on operating at weird hours. Starting classes at the weird hour of 7:45am and running till 2:30.
Schools should start at 9 and end at 5pm. Sports can and should operate during the school day. Students should also have more than ample time to finish all of their work in school with the added amount of time. The same goes for studying.
I finish and leave all of my work at work when I'm done. Unless it's Sunday night prep for a big trip the next day homework
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Starting classes at the weird hour of 7:45am and running till 2:30.
Some years ago a study was done (and there have been many many studies) for kids need to sleep in a little so they are more restful and ready to go when arriving for school. There is ***no reason*** classes end early that afternoon (very few need to get back to the farm to milk the cows). So not surprising vandalism and other juvenile pranks occur between 3 and 5 pm (got nothing else to do between schools out and dinner time).
And having three months off during summer... hey very few need to work on the f
I don't really understand biological clocks (Score:2)
I'm a classic night owl, I stay up late and struggle to get enough sleep. A lot of my co-workers get into work at 8-8:30 while I show up 9-9:30.
During grad school when I had no courses and could go on my own schedule I didn't show up at 9-9:30, I showed up at 11-11:30, or even 1pm. It doesn't matter when the first course is, it was "early" for me.
I'm not a night owl because I'm somehow synced to my clock or even the sun, I'm a night owl because I feel really productive about 14 hours after I wake up, so it'
alternate conclusions... (Score:2)
So, now that we're actually looking at the data, it's clear that the main conclusion of the paper is only one of many that could be drawn. The biggest alternative conclusion is that students who adapt their sleep schedule to their class times do better than students who don't. The main argument of the authors is that it "may be difficult" for people to change their sleep schedule, and cit
Holy surprise, Batman! (Score:2)
Schools don't exist to make kids smarter (Score:2)
I wonder when someone (Score:2)
In a way, today's degrees only prepare one to be an employee for someone else.
The Internet has changed things, but not education. Back in the day I used to buy books all the time, now I can not recall the last book I bought. When I want to learn something
But Grade Inflation! (Score:2)
So, why the hell don't we give the little snowflakes all 4.0 GPA, and just let them declare themselves as whatever they identify as.
Given that grades aren't earned any more, why on esrth are we studying ways for people to learn things - that is not what it is about now. You go to college, attempt to destroy your liver and enjoy the college lifestyle, and get all A
Newsflash: (Score:2)
Newsflash: Kids who spend their weekends staying up till 4AM partying or binging on Netflix or gaming do a pretty shitty job on their Monday morning schoolwork.
What I dislike about these sorts of studies is the implication that we have no control over our internal clocks. Parents, if you care, enforce a reasonable bedtime and/or curfew for your kids. Teenagers, if you care, learn to wake up on time, which means going to bed earlier.
People act like it's rocket science, but people have pretty much always unde
The world's easiest solution (Score:2)
So if some students have lifestyles that aren't in sync with their study schedules, they should ask themselves whether their social lives are more important - or whether they went to university to study?
This issue seems to be bordering on blaming the colleges for the timetabling, rather than recognising
Re:Coddling. (Score:5, Insightful)
Our ancestors worked a few hours a day hunting game and then went back to doing nothing. Pretty much like most predators in the wild.
The main difference is that we today have a LOT more to spend our time and money on so we have to work more to get that shit paid. But if you consider what you really need, you'll notice that working just a few hours a day is plenty.
Re:Coddling. (Score:5, Interesting)
The main difference is that we today have a LOT more to spend our time and money on so we have to work more to get that shit paid.
False. While most things have rose at the rate of inflation, prices for entertainment have dropped substantially in the past 20 years. While a 55" tv would have cost $3,000+ just twenty years ago, they can now be bought for $300. Camcorders, cameras, tape/cd players have all been replaced by relatively inexpensive smartphones. Film and tapes for cameras and camcorders have been replaced by cheap memory cards and free unlimited online storage you can access anywhere from your phone. DVD and vcrs have been replaced by smart tvs with Netflix, Hulu and YouTube. 20 years ago you might spend thousands on a reasonable music and movie collection, that has been replaced by spending a few dollars a month on Netflix and Amazon streaming, Apple Music and Spotify.
Thanks to advances in vehicle reliability people are even keeping cars longer, an average of 11.5 years https://www.cnbc.com/2015/07/2... [cnbc.com]
So really this is the richest the average American has ever been.
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20 years ago we did not need netflix subscriptions and amazon prime and an apple Id just to watch movies
... no, we went to Jumbo Video here in Canada to pay $4.99 for a movie rental and maybe if we were lucky we could get three for $10. So basically one family movie night cost the same as a Netflix subscription cost today.
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Honestly, not many of us were alive during our ancestors' time, so I'm guessing we've got squat on what they were actually doing for as a daily routine (save some fantastical 'reconstructions').
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Honestly, not many of us were alive during our ancestors' time,
I was... at least for 2 generations of my ancestor's time. 1 of those generations is still around.
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Our ancestors (most of them) worked all day from before the sun rose to after it set just to survive, farming, gathering, hunting, whatever it took.
Our ancestors worked a few hours a day hunting game and then went back to doing nothing.
You're both right. It depends on which ancestors you are looking at. 300 years ago AC is correct. 3000 years ago Opportunist is correct. It depends which ancestors you're looking at. I imagine 3000 years ago, it probably depended on the season a lot too. In winter you probably had to work a lot harder to get you daily calories than you had to in late Spring.
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After the advent of cooking 1.8 million years ago, most hominids spent a lot of time not hunting or gathering. That is how culture, technology and language arose.
Re:Coddling. (Score:4, Interesting)
I don't think so. PBS did a things years back where they took a group of people and made them "settlers". They gave them a typical amount of money for the general store. Their job was to during the summer create what was necessary to make it thru the winter, by chopping wood, growing corn etc. The findings were not good. Every single family would have froze to death. Some would have made it a couple of months, which was not even close to the resources needed. One creative rich family who was disqualified even snuck out and bought stuff on the outside. They were indignant of course saying that they were just thinking outside the box. Life was significantly harder in the old days. Just look at lifespans.
Re:Coddling. (Score:4, Interesting)
We know that farming is highly inefficient on resources. An estimated 95% of people died from starvation or injury in the transition from the mesolithic to the neolithic, due to the fact that you have to work a lot harder with a much higher risk of getting nothing. That is why larger communities developed. Even though individuals and families had a low probability of surviving, a village had much better odds. It required a leader and distribution of what was produced, but it worked.
Re:Coddling. (Score:5, Interesting)
People today would not be able to cope with what they had to.
So what? I don't think my grandfather, who had the same job his entire adult life, expected dinner to be on the table when he got home, and frequently relied on violence as an educational tool would thrive in today's world either. The only thing that doesn't seem to change is people who repeat ad nauseam that things were better in the past.
Society is evolving. For the most part, men no longer drag women by their hair to fuck them next to piles of animal bones in cold, humid caves, and I don't think we lost of lot as a species as we moved past that. Today, with some exceptions, every person has a chance to make a meaningful contribution to society, and this is a good thing if we're at a point where people think about biological clocks to optimize productivity and happiness, instead of "toughing it out" and sticking with rigid systems.
Yes, there are idiotic aspects in today's life that may be mistakenly perceived as "evolution" (such as sexist and racist hiring policies at Google under the guise of "diversity"), but challenging the practice of having rigid schedules is not one of them. It's about time that we start considering better options than 9 to 5 for everyone, and next time you're stuck in traffic at rush hour you'll probably agree.
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Society is evolving. For the most part, men no longer drag women by their hair to fuck them next to piles of animal bones in cold, humid caves,
Right, the space heater and dehumidifier in the basement is a real boon!
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When your argument begins with a cartoon, expect your arguments to be treated as cartoonish.
These are the good old days (Score:2)
Our ancestors (most of them) worked all day from before the sun rose to after it set just to survive, farming, gathering, hunting, whatever it took.
And they had short(er) often brutal lives to show for it. They did that because they had no alternative. It wasn't a lifestyle choice.
People today would not be able to cope with what they had to.
Just because we don't have to doesn't mean we cannot if the need arises. Our ancestors would have happily traded their situation for the comfortable situation many of us enjoy today in a heartbeat. They didn't live that way because they had a choice.
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Yeah, just cut the power for say a month, and let's see who and how many will actually survive.....
If an attach took out the US power grid, we'd be in a world of shit over there....eveyone is so dependent upon it, and no one knows how to do basic things for survival off the earth anymore.
Even after the fighting, gangs, etc (I picture something very akin to Walking Dead type world, just without the zombies)....the few people left wou
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They were scheduled by the sun.
Or so those who live at low latitude like to think. It's far more complex than that, with seasons being far more extreme for many people who did quite well with midnight sun and winter nights.
Humans (and lifeforms in general) are good at adapting. It's a survival trait, and those who cannot adapt well are generally awarded with extinction, unless they find an unchanging niche.
That those who have a hard time adapting face more problems is to be expected. If they can't adapt, they need to relocate to where
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If you survived childhood, then the average lifespan in the Bronze Age was 72.
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FYI, snowflakes and fragile egos didn't appear magically. They are a product on their environment, and as a Slashdot 6-digiters you are old enough to share part of the blame as it happened on your watch. Stop bitching and start doing something about it, such as mentoring young people at work or boycotting Google and Facebook for their roles in accelerating this self-centered trend.
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because I was dyslexic at first period
Dyslexia doesn't wear off by 10:00 AM. You just got to bed late, didn't get enough sleep and were nodding off in class. You should have gone to a Christian private school.
Anecdote: There was a kid who was doing poorly in public school. particularly at math. So, on the advice of some neighbors, his parents enrolled him in a Catholic school. After the first semester, his grades had improved markedly, particularly in math. So his parents asked him what it was about the new surroundings that provided the newfo
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because I was dyslexic at first period
Dyslexia doesn't wear off by 10:00 AM. You just got to bed late, didn't get enough sleep and were nodding off in class. You should have gone to a Christian private school.
Who's to say he's Christian? My experience with kids from private Christian schools in University is that they weren't able to cope with the more rigorous classes in University. They were used to being coddled in High School where teachers had to give them high grades because the parents were paying them for their kids to have high grades instead of learning.
The Christian High School kids in my University as a general rule tended to crash and burn. They weren't used to having to do work.
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I found it was pretty easy to pass most classes just by showing up.
I had friends who went to different universities and had that exact same experience. Unfortunately for me, I went somewhere that they expected you to work... and work hard. There were no "basket-weaving" classes at my university.
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But oh, no, "let's go to thereapy". "We need Ritalin". "We need Adderall". "We need *understanding*."
then people wonder why this country got a bunch of druggies and nut jobs. I also see next article in the /. list is "Coffee Requires Cancer Warning, California Judge Rules."
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In the 8pm-10pm window, even when sleep-deprived for a year (1 hour per night average total sleep), I become awake and alert. I'm using melatonin (at 8pm!) and cognitive behavioral therapy, along with stimulants during the day. It's taken nearly a year, but I finally sleep pretty well; I still sometimes can't get more than 5 hours, and can almost never hit 7.5. If I can maintain 7.5 for 2-3 days, I start to notice symptoms of mania--one of which is that you simply can't sleep anymore. As with depressio