The Death of Common Knowledge

[Moparnut72]

I was going to comment but it looked like one of those threads that was going to become something like an oil thread. 
kk

[Stretch]

I know there are 24 pints of Yuengling Premium in a case

Now THAT'S basic, important knowledge! 

                                        -Stretch

[bronzestar1]

I take the blame for this one.  My youngest daughter had a truck with a bunch of decals on the back window, and she started to take them off using her fingernail.  I told her let's go to the store and get a scraper, it'll make the job go much easier.  So we got a scraper at the local auto parts store, the kind that uses an exposed single edge razor.  I left her to it, then ran some other errands.  I came back, and she had all but one removed.  She said she was having some trouble with that one, so I asked her to give me the scraper.  Well, low and behold, she didn't remove the safety guide from the razor blade!  I peeled it off, and had that remaining sticker off in no time.  I was incredulous that she didn't know to remove the safety guide, and this is the daughter who graduated from nursing school at Duke!  When my other daughter graduated with her Master's Degree, she said "hey dad, I'm finally smarter than you!" (I only have a Bachelor's).  I was quick to correct her though, I said "no, you're more EDUCATED than I am, you're not SMARTER than me!".   

[DoubleGuzzi]

  Dundonian expression:
"All brains and nae common sense"
 
[She has 3 Bachelor's to my single Master's.]

[Yan]

The cell phone generation. At the shop one day i was doing division longhand on paper and someone asked me why I don't I use my phone. I replied " Then I won't remember how to do it this way"  If you have no calculator you are screwed & lost. Isn't ounces liquid not weight? most kids don't know both. It's common sense & bred out of next generation.

I believe it was Socrates who believed that books, and reading and writing weaken the mind by removing the need for the mental effort required for active memorization and critical thinking through dialogue. So, yeah, complaining about newfangled inventions is as old as civilization. 

[coast range rider]

While waiting for sandwiches in a RI deli, my wife orders 1 lb of corned beef from a young counter girl, a new employee.  The girl puts meat on the scale, and asks "how many ounces in a pound?"

She sounds hot!

[Dr. Enzo Toma]

In defense of the young lady, it sounds like she was simply new to the job and up until then had no need for memorizing such a unit conversion. Working at that counter, she'll learn what's relevant to her work, or not be very good at the job.

I'm sure I was taught ounces to pounds in grade school, but things I've been taught that I've never put into use, I tend to not remember. How I do remember that 16 oz = 1 lb is from the hobby of ultralight backpacking where I've weighed every item I take on trips and try to find ways to reduce weight for comfort and reducing risk of injury.

Consider that what's common knowledge to one line of work, hobby, generation, etc. may not be as commonly used by another.

[DoubleGuzzi]

Consider that what's common knowledge to one line of work, hobby, generation, etc. may not be as commonly used by another.

Very true. In the distant past, I could fairly accurately approximate the thickness of paper, in 100s of microns, by touch. Hardly a transferable skill though. 

[John Croucher]

I loaded 50 tons of common knowledge into roll back dumpsters over the last 4 months.  Stuff my mother and father in law hoarded believing that it all would be common and useful in the future.  Stuff was piled deep enough that trees found it useful for propagation.

Unfortunately They Both took a lot of knowledge with them in their deaths.  He was a machinist in a heavy equipment diesel engine rebuilding shop.  She was an artist working in porcelain and clay. They were old school Eastern Kentucky Mountain heritage.  They could farm, prepare and store food long term. Skills that were once common knowledge.  Times change.  I could never put a shoe on a horse or properly care for it. The horse would probably lead me to water.

[SIR REAL ED]

Great opportunity for us boomers to divert attention from how we have up the world, blame it on the young people.

The myth of group identity.  Generations, ethnicity, nationality, eye color, etc.

Good to know some things, like the concept of "us" & "them" are universal and eternal.

Remember the good ole days and the 1960's slogan of "Never trust anyone over 30!"

It works both ways!!

My preferred whine is the generalization of: "People!  They're all like that!"

[SIR REAL ED]

While most fasteners have gone metric, the ratchet connection dimensions remain SAE.

You know - 1/4, 3/8, 1/2, etc.

Why is that ?

 

Industry standards are tough to change.

High cost, wide ranging effects, little benefit.

Besides, a 15" Cresent Wrench is all you need.  It even replaces most hammers.....

I'm still steaming about the transition from square nuts and bolt heads to hexagon....

[SIR REAL ED]

Thank you very much.   She is a weapon and simply amazing.  One of my uncles said her only obvious shortcoming is her choice in a husband.  He’s right but I’m not complaining.

She lived & worked full time in camps, guides and similar outdoor arena stuff for many years. the “Its easy to start a fire.  You just need two sticks” boast is a favorite pet peeve of hers.

How about a video?

[guzzisteve]

It's getting worse seems no one can even wrench on their bike with out a video on how to do it.

I ride motorcycles, I don't watch video's of other people riding bikes.
I wrenched on Guzzi's for a living, I don't watch video's of other wrenches trying to do so
If you can't read and put words into actions, give it up & let someone else do your work

[SIR REAL ED]

I believe it was Socrates who believed that books, and reading and writing weaken the mind by removing the need for the mental effort required for active memorization and critical thinking through dialogue. So, yeah, complaining about newfangled inventions is as old as civilization. 

True enough.

Back in the day, the printing press was a threat to those who controlled the flow of information/knowledge and therefore power.

The other day I was thinking about helping a three year old learn math by making a multiplication table for them.  I suspect their teachers and parents have never seen one.

50-60+ years later, we can probably all remember the phone number and street address of the house we grew up in (EX2-2865, 252 Lawrence Road), but today we don't know the phone numbers of our spouses or our 6 closest friends....

Free range childhoods had many advantages...

[Gliderjohn]

Been at several Asian restaurants where the owner's grade school age kid is working as cashier, host or hostess and phone order taker. Now those kids can do change! In the early 80s I was working commission tire and and related stuff salesman for a large cahin. Foe awhile we had a a good team of four of us. You transacted with cash much more in those days. Our team of four got acknowledged by corporate after one quarter when our total error amount in cash balance was only .08 cents.
GliderJohn

[cliffrod]

How about a video?

lol.  Probably better politics to get me on video doing it than pester her.  I’m not as fluent as she is, but she taught me as well as she could.  There are various ways to do it but simply Rubbing two sticks together is a myth.

Doing it gets into all manner of purist vs cheating arguments, much like trailering your bike to a rally or who keeps it running.   is initial tinder 100% found natural fibers vs “civilization” fibers? char cloth is the best.  Details about wood drill- hand spun or bow driven? is drill natural state or kiln dried dowel?  then there’s what cordage is used on the bow- natural material, who & how it was made vs manmade & factory manufactured… even though you can get a tiny spark from 2 pieces of quartz, flint & steel actually produce enough spark to work while a magnesium striker rig is almost a waterproof match.

Some of the best cordage I’ve made in recent years was produced from some palmetto leaf filament while we were camping at the beach.  I made her a bracelet that she wore continuously for over a year.  It came out really well.  But running cordage like that on a fire drill means making a lot of extra cordage because durability is a problem.  So it’s better to use gut or rawhide.   Then it’s about sourcing the rawhide or gut….

Just asked her about it.  she laughed and said she knows where her flint & steel are.  Will have to see if we can find the other bits or start making them.  She is fair but somewhat transactional- what’s in it for her?


In the meantime, I’ll go beat on a big rock with air hammer & chisels to carve on a 4 ton stone into a life size angel using antiquated technology like compass and triangle to first enlarge a 2/3 scale full length model and then a pointing machine to accurately duplicate a 1:1 scale bust model that’s being indexed onto the same job.  My Masters taught me all of these methods verbally and by example while I worked next to them.   There’s lots of videos of this process on my YouTube @carolinasculpturestudio VSCA series that’s meant to capture and archive this unwritten knowledge before it’s too late.  Maybe it will suffice for a video contribution?

[Kiwi_Roy]

BTU the amount of heat required to raise the temperature of one pound of water one degree F

Here is a definition I found on line

Despite its name, the British thermal unit, or BTU, may be more widely used in North America than in Britain. Air conditioners, furnaces, and stoves are generally rated by BTUs. (Though "BTUs" is often short for "BTUs per hour;" in air-conditioner ratings, for instance, "BTUs" really means "BTUs of cooling capacity per hour".) Fuels such as natural gas and propane are also compared using BTUs. The BTU first appeared in 1865 and isn't part of the metric system—the metric unit of energy is the much smaller joule—so it isn't much used by scientists, but its practicality keeps it popular for consumer goods and fuels. A better-known heat unit is the calorie; a BTU is equal to about 252 calories. (Since the familiar food calorie is actually a kilocalorie, a BTU equals only about a quarter of a food calorie.)

[Perazzimx14]

How many fifths in a gallon?

Five (5) 750ml bottles of Jameson

[sign216]

Five (5) 750ml bottles of Jameson

Liquor "held the line" at staying with English units for a while, then folded.  I think only beer and milk are left on the Imperial scale. 

[Perazzimx14]

Liquor "held the line" at staying with English units for a while, then folded.  I think only beer and milk are left on the Imperial scale.

Liquor still does in some instances. Pints and 1/2 gallon jugs aka "handle"

The best of the "Imperial" scale is a Russian Imperial stouts...........

[SIR REAL ED]

lol.  Probably better politics to get me on video doing it than pester her.  I’m not as fluent as she is, but she taught me as well as she could.  There are various ways to do it but simply Rubbing two sticks together is a myth.

Doing it gets into all manner of purist vs cheating arguments, much like trailering your bike to a rally or who keeps it running.   is initial tinder 100% found natural fibers vs “civilization” fibers? char cloth is the best.  Details about wood drill- hand spun or bow driven? is drill natural state or kiln dried dowel?  then there’s what cordage is used on the bow- natural material, who & how it was made vs manmade & factory manufactured… even though you can get a tiny spark from 2 pieces of quartz, flint & steel actually produce enough spark to work while a magnesium striker rig is almost a waterproof match.

Some of the best cordage I’ve made in recent years was produced from some palmetto leaf filament while we were camping at the beach.  I made her a bracelet that she wore continuously for over a year.  It came out really well.  But running cordage like that on a fire drill means making a lot of extra cordage because durability is a problem.  So it’s better to use gut or rawhide.   Then it’s about sourcing the rawhide or gut….

Just asked her about it.  she laughed and said she knows where her flint & steel are.  Will have to see if we can find the other bits or start making them.  She is fair but somewhat transactional- what’s in it for her?


In the meantime, I’ll go beat on a big rock with air hammer & chisels to carve on a 4 ton stone into a life size angel using antiquated technology like compass and triangle to first enlarge a 2/3 scale full length model and then a pointing machine to accurately duplicate a 1:1 scale bust model that’s being indexed onto the same job.  My Masters taught me all of these methods verbally and by example while I worked next to them.   There’s lots of videos of this process on my YouTube @carolinasculpturestudio VSCA series that’s meant to capture and archive this unwritten knowledge before it’s too late.  Maybe it will suffice for a video contribution?

Beautiful work.  I can't imagine the patience required to learn how to do that and then actually do it.

[red stripeguz]

It's getting worse seems no one can even wrench on their bike with out a video on how to do it.

I ride motorcycles, I don't watch video's of other people riding bikes.
I wrenched on Guzzi's for a living, I don't watch video's of other wrenches trying to do so
If you can't read and put words into actions, give it up & let someone else do your work

Keyword "for a living". I fail to see what the issue with using a video as a learning aid in addition to manuals is. I consider myself an above average diy mechanic and have been working on my own stuff for over 40 years. I'll happily watch a quick video before tackling a new project because, why not?

[LowRyter]

I remember being a high school student, learning and performing simple jobs. 

We all gotta start somewhere. 

I'd guess the counter girl now knows how to measure and weigh with the scales, but she won't ever know how to "make change" since the cash register does that. 

[sign216]

Liquor still does in some instances. Pints and 1/2 gallon jugs aka "handle"

Perazzimx, for hard liquor, pints and half pint bottles are in ml now.  Everyone, incl. employees, refer to them as pints and half pints, but the bottles are actually ml.  Metric probably just makes it easier for the bottling plant to measure production.   

[Perazzimx14]

Perazzimx, for hard liquor, pints and half pint bottles are in ml now.  Everyone, incl. employees, refer to them as pints and half pints, but the bottles are actually ml.  Metric probably just makes it easier for the bottling plant to measure production.

Same with 750ml being called a 5th but its actually 7ml shy.

Metric makes things far easier. When curing meats I convert pounds and ounces to grams as easier and more exact for cure ratios.

[DoubleGuzzi]

^ As said:

.. Metric please = much simpler.

Thous of an inch or mm/microns - I know what I'd rather use, any day of the week!

[scra99tch]

Fluid ounces = Liquid
Ounces = Solids

Went to the shop the other day…cashier rang up the total to $14.59.  I gave her a $20 and said make it an even $15 bucks in total.  She couldn’t figure out the change without first putting in the twenty in the register, getting back all of the change and giving me the coins and a $5.  Had to leave the coins in their tip jar, she still didn’t get it.

Call it stage fright or being put on the spot but when I was delivering pizzas and even to this day I freeze up when having to count change.  When delivering pizzas in my later teens I swear it was a easy way to make out better as the customer would get frustrated and would often tell me to keep the change as I fumbled around with an unorganized jumble of bills.

[sign216]

Same with 750ml being called a 5th but its actually 7ml shy.

Metric makes things far easier. When curing meats I convert pounds and ounces to grams as easier and more exact for cure ratios.

For me, English units for large things, like a 6 ft 2x4.  Metric for small things, like a 20mm steel segment. 

Mail is still in ounces and pounds, which is good by me.

[SIR REAL ED]

Since Common Knowledge or Common Sense are part of culture, they are always very localized and time dependent.

Much like language.

[TN Mark]

‘common knowledge’ essentially changes with every generation because life in general changes.

What we’ve lost in my lifetime is ‘basic knowledge. What I mean by that are the basics in science, math, history, critical thinking, critical listening etc.