Think Tank

[Mister Agenda]

Educate girls in Africa.

[Cato]

There have been several prototypes of self-sustaining electromagnetic motors capable of producing 40x the energy it consumes. If we mass-produced devices like this [...]

I'd like to see someone demonstrate the existence of said devices before we get too excited about mass-producing them.

Just sayin'.

Aisle 9, next to the perpetual motion machines.

...or...

In a hidden laboratory in a dilapated factory previously owned by The Twentieth Century Motory Company near Starnesville, Wisconsin.

[Violet]

Educate girls in Africa.

Unsurprisingly does nothing.

[Mister Agenda]

http://www.unicef.org/sowc04/files/Chapter4.pdf

http://www.cfr.org/education/girls-educa...inds/p6950

http://www.ifuw.org/fuwa/docs/Education_...Africa.pdf

http://www.unfpa.org/hiv/women/report/chapter5.html

[pocaracas]

Not just in Africa, but also middle east, India and neighbors, South America... Well, everywhere!

[Mister Agenda]

Absolutely. I'm frugal though, I think my charity dollar will have the most impact in Africa.

[downbeatplumb]

Equally distribute the wealth and have lower retirement ages.

[Violet]

http://www.unicef.org/sowc04/files/Chapter4.pdf

http://www.cfr.org/education/girls-educa...inds/p6950

http://www.ifuw.org/fuwa/docs/Education_...Africa.pdf

http://www.unfpa.org/hiv/women/report/chapter5.html

Did I ask for what these people think educating girls in africa would do? No. I observed that educating people to whom the education means nothing is utterly without point.

If a girl in africa has a chance at having a better life because of her education... then she is in the same position as a boy in africa who has a chance at having a better life because of his education. Unless that 'education' comes with 'hey, here's a way out of this shithole', or 'hey, your country has a huge use for scientists', or maybe 'hey, your parents don't rule over you until they die': if they weren't already in a position where they were being educated, educating them now will do nothing for them.

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Absolutely. I'm frugal though, I think my charity dollar will have the most impact in Africa.

It'd have a great deal more impact for the poverty-stricken in 'The West' or 'The East'... let Africa to itself: she can't hurt anything as such a splintered and individually weak region.

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Equally distribute the wealth and have lower retirement ages.

I agree!

If we're doing this age-line nonsense... let's make it 20 Just another 25 hours until I'll meet that: I'd gladly work all of them.

[NoraBrimstone]

Sorry, but I would definitely ban all organised religion. Society would benefit greatly from the loss of all that shit.

[Mister Agenda]

But it would suffer greatly from the police-state required to enforce a ban on religion.

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Did I ask for what these people think educating girls in africa would do?

It's what educating girls in Africa observably does.

No. I observed that educating people to whom the education means nothing is utterly without point.

You're confusing your opinion with an observation.

If a girl in africa has a chance at having a better life because of her education... then she is in the same position as a boy in africa who has a chance at having a better life because of his education.

A boy in Africa is more likely to get an education in the first place. A girl in Africa with an education is more likely to marry later and bear fewer children in her lifetime, less likely to become infected with AIDS, tends to have a greater increase in income than a boy, and her children are more likely to become educated themselves.

Unless that 'education' comes with 'hey, here's a way out of this shithole', or 'hey, your country has a huge use for scientists', or maybe 'hey, your parents don't rule over you until they die': if they weren't already in a position where they were being educated, educating them now will do nothing for them.

About half of the world's top 20 fastest growing economies are in Africa. While we've been wallowing in recession, the poorest African countries have seen their standard of living increase. Education is valuable and I've never seen people who appreciate access to it more than African girls.

There's a way to make it less of a shithole: economic development, the same force that raised hundreds of millions of Indians and Chinese out of extreme poverty in the last 20 years.

It'd have a great deal more impact for the poverty-stricken in 'The West' or 'The East'... let Africa to itself: she can't hurt anything as such a splintered and individually weak region.

How so? It's incredibly cheap to improve education in Africa. Tiny tuitions, used books, and teachers with an education equivalent to an American HS diploma. It's cheaper to help someone out of extreme poverty (you can get far more people out for the same amount of money)than it is to help them out of moderate poverty, and moderate poverty is a place from which it is much easier to get out of poverty entirely.

I don't see why I shouldn't care about or be pessimistic about helping people just because they live in Africa.