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What do LessWrongers think of terror management theory? It has it's roots in Freudian psychoanalysis, but it seems to be getting more and more evidence supporting it (here's a 2010 literature review)
Yup!
I will copy this into an edit of the main post:
I decided to go to public school, because I was tired of all the little annoying stuff at my current school--especially the entitled kids and the entitled attitude in general. Everybody acts like they deserve something. It's very irritating.
The other reason I came to that decision was "exploration value". By moving to a new situation I learn whether I really am better off in the kind of environment offered by the public high school; even if it ends up being worse for me, at least I know what to avoid. If it's good, I know it's good; and if it makes no difference, I know that, too.
I would do that, but they don't let you take the GED unless you've officially dropped out of high school. Which isn't happening...
I've considered graduating a year early, but at that point I'd rather just finish it out. I'll have enough free room in my schedule to take fun art classes and stuff.
Finally, commuting is a life-killer. Adults very commonly underrate the loss of quality of life for commuting (I commute 10 >minutes each way; I have had jobs with one-hour commutes.) I'd suggest it's even more valuable time lost for a teenager.
You have no idea how gratifying this is to hear. The commute is only a half-hour drive, but it does kind of suck. It's nice to know I'm not crazy to think that.
Believe me, I would do exactly that if I could, but my parents won't let me. It's not even that think I won't get into college--they don't seem to have a rational reason beyond "you just have to follow through with things" and "trust me, I'm much older than you, this is not a time in your life to waste opportunity" and "everybody needs a high school diploma, even if they go through college" none of which are strictly true, as far as I can tell.
That's part of my motivation for going back to public school--because there are less requirements and the workload is less strenuous I can build my schedule in a way that is conducive to me learning things outside of class.
I actually wouldn't mind being on track, but the very large time commitment (meets are usually at least an hour away) and the competitive aspect are deal-breakers for me, as they are for the other sports.
I have one or two friends, but the fact that we all live so far away and that most kids at the school are already in cliques and/or really fake and pretentious makes it hard.
As someone who uses facebook a lot and has many far-away friends from sleep away camp, it seems like it only forces you to keep in touch if you want to be.
The academics, in terms of signalling, are fantastic, but in terms of actual learning they are only okay. Theoretically they are fantastic in terms of actual learning too, but there are many bad teachers, and because the classes are heavily discussion based the learning is largely a function of the intelligence of your classmates, and my school is not selective enough for that to be taken care of. (They even have the gall to ban honors-level English and History classes for underclassmen, so I learn just about nothing in those...)
I'm still friends with several kids at the public school. They are very, very nice, and there are enough wealthy kids in my town that no one really cares about that. Also, they know I could only afford it because my mom works there, so they don't chalk me off as "snobby rich kid" (many of them are richer than me!)
My parents don't care at all. The only authority exerted in them in this area is that they won't let me unschool (which is something I really wanted to do for a while but probably don't have the self-discipline for
I don't expect to keep my high school friends, but if I'm happier from their friendship it will be easier for me to study and get good grades (I know this from experience).
I went to the public middle school, which is the exact same group of kids, so I know a lot of students there and have talked to them about it. It genuinely is the exception to the rule that a public school can be almost as good as a private school (and better, when you throw in the commute and the snobbery involved with the private school). I went to school in a different district when I was younger and it was terrible, even though the school was considered really good, so I know exactly what you're talking about.
I don't know what you mean by "base rate", but people seem to do pretty well at both schools.
That seems like really useful advice. One of things I actually don't like about the private school is that on the one hand it's rather high status, but on the other hand a lot of the people there are not very smart and most of them are quite superficial in a weird, ironic way (our school has an obsession with racism that borders on hysterical considering that the vast majority of students are white, a substantial minority are boarders from China, and as far as I know there has been only one isolated case of actual discrimination against anyone.)
I'm going to read through the goal factoring page tonight; hopefully I can get a grip on it and try to apply it to this situation in addition to the other techniques explained by ScottL (thanks again, ScottL!). And read the starting university advice page. I'll report back soon.
This is so thorough! Thank you so much! I think my desire to transfer does spike when I feel lonely... a useful piece of information. :)
The public school is really unusually good for a public school. Also, I'm a (straight) girl, and I've tried dancing and am REALLY bad at it. I took ballet when I was a little girl for years... I appreciate the suggestion, though.
I should have clarified that I'm on financial aid because my mother works at the school, not because they particularly want me. My mother did tell me that I might have gotten a scholarship anyway, because I'm a good student, but I don't know if I'd buy that.
My PSAT was very good (1490 out of 1520) and I have a solid A- GPA, so I probably don't have to worry too much about going to college. I am not hugely concerned with getting into Harvard or anything like that.
Furthermore, though the private school academics are definitely better, all of the classes are "discussion-based" which means that you spend most of the time listening to your peers try to bullshit their way into class participation points. Granted that some teachers ignore this and teach more traditionally, and some students are smart enough to say interesting things--but they're still high school students.
You're certainly right about letting things go. Even if society didn't really exist I'd still have to spend several hours every day hunting for food. I should be more grateful.
Thank you for the advice.
The major falsifiable prediction is that reminding people of their own mortality will cause them to increase the strength of their psychological terror defense mechanisms, which may include culture, religion, or social ties. Here is a literature review of the subject from 2010. According to the review, the theory hasn't been falsified:
"MS [mortality salience, i.e. death reminders] yielded moderate effects (r=0.35) on a range of worldview- and self-esteem-related dependent variables"
Ah, yeah, that could be an issue--I suppose I never noticed... I think there are similar apps which might not need so much information. You could google "sleep tracking apps". Last I checked there were at least five or six similar ones.
Ah, yes, if that's the case, definitely your best bed (although generally species names are italicized, if you want it to look at least kind of realistic)
"Fern" is a very broad category, but for the species name (the 'imagined' part) I would go with either fictus or conceptus. The fern that you think of when you think "fern" is probably of the Athyrium genus. So I would say Athyrium fictum or Athyrium conceptum (you have to change the ending of the adjective to match the (probably) neuter gender of athyrium). One of the Latin words for fern is filix, which is feminine, so yo could also do Filix ficta or Filix concepta.
EDIT: The genus you'd want is actually Polypodium, so you want Polypodium fictum or Polypodium conceptum. (source: my Latin teacher, who's also into botany).
Source: William Whitaker's Words and two years of Latin.
No, but I've had some decent results with Sleepbot, which is much cheaper (free) if you have a smartphone already. Probably doesn't have nearly as good measurements as the mattress, and obviously doesn't make it adjustable, but it does seem to wake you up at a good time if you turn the accelerometer and microphone sensors on. (My smartphone broke, so as yet I haven't collected real empirical data on how well it works)
What do you guys think of the theories of Ernest Becker, and of the more modern terror management theory?
The basic argument as that many, if not all, human behaviors are the result of our knowledge of our own mortality and our instinct to deny and forget about it in order to seek some kind of literal or symbolic immortality (by living forever, or writing a famous book, etc.) Religion exists to tell us that it's okay to die, culture to make us forget about religion, so we don't examine it too closely or think about death in general (it can still be scary because the evolutionary instinct to survive is still there). This definition of "culture" applies to nearly every domain of human achievement, including this very website. Less wrong exists to raise users' self esteem or self-concept so that the feel some security in a symbolic kind of immortality (I'm rational, I'm a transhuminist--of course I'll survive!)
I suggest you read the links I gave above for further explanation. There have also been scientific studies on mortality salience (here's a review) which seem to support the theory.