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Comment by newfoundglory | Hacker News Reader

The nonsensical overestimation of children shown in this thread leads directly to travesties like this judge arguing that toddlers are capable of representing themselves in immigration court. https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/can-a...

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> But the questions can easily trip up children with no lawyers, the attorneys said. A judge may ask, for example, if the child wants to leave the country voluntarily or would rather be ordered deported. If the child chooses either option, he or she cannot apply for other forms of immigration relief such as asylum in the United States.

I'm an adult and I would need a lawyer to be able to understand and answer questions like that.

I would tend to agree. Somewhere else in the thread someone recounted a conversation with a 24 month old far more advanced than any two year old I've met could manage. I think it would be pretty lucid even for my 3yo. That's not to say the conversation couldn't have happened, but the advice seems somewhat miscalibrated if that is taken to be typical.

My question: for all this talk of rationalism, where is the research to show this approach yields better outcomes than any other?

Unfortunately psychological interventional research on humans who cannot consent is quite forbidden.

(But we do that all the time actually.)

What do you do with failed experiments? How do you estimate outcomes and whether techniques were applied correctly?

That's not actually true, parents can consent on behalf of minors. Why would this present any more trouble in dealing with failed experiments than other psychological experiments?

There's a huge difference between parenting and an adversarial courtroom.

I think it's possible to agree with the article and also disagree with this judge.

Definitely - I was very much responding to the hn comments here, not the article.

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