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Comment by commandlinefan | Hacker News Reader

> minority students aren’t smart enough

Well, that's not quite what they're saying - essentially what they're saying is that they're a different kind of smart. Not that I agree with the logic, but essentially what they're saying is that the tests - along with the whole curriculum - were designed and written by white people, so they're unintentionally biased in a way that non-white people (except, I guess, asians) can't understand them. The implication being, of course, that if black people had designed the entire curriculum and the tests, they would be similarly impenetrable to white people. Of course, I don't think that makes much sense either, but that is the essence of what they're trying to assert.

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Mathematics is arguably (besides perhaps logic) one of the most pure, unbiased sciences one could imagine. Unless perhaps you take issue with the fact that notation borrows a lot of Greek symbols. It’s a difficult subject that requires struggle. Hand holding and dumbing it down is literally the worst thing you could do to make people better at mathematics. You must struggle or you will fail. Don’t think so? Let’s talk again when you hit real analysis.

> Mathematics is arguably (besides perhaps logic) one of the most pure, unbiased sciences one could imagine.

But teaching math absolutely is not. It is a very human process, helping students find handholds in what they know to make the next conceptual step. Absolutely breaking their minds with a new topic, then returning to it a month later and they find it obvious now. There are no platonic math lesson plans out there to tap into, and finding more effective ones has been one of humanity's jobs for at least as long as there has been written language.

(FWIW, real analysis is generally considered one of the easier courses in a typical math degree)

> (FWIW, real analysis is generally considered one of the easier courses in a typical math degree)

Quite a few colleges seem to use it as a filter class to determine who has the requisite aptitude and interest in pure math. At my college, the material wasn't particularly bad, but the evaluations were designed to be pretty challenging and grades weren't curved at all.

This is partly because the first course in real analysis (and usually the first upper division linear algebra course) is the first proof oriented course most students face. The material isn't necessarily the hardest, but the proof stuff is new to many people.

Chongli's experience is much more similar to mine, we covered basic real analysis topics in calculus classes, and the class titled real analysis was a third-year pure math course. It was designed for students who had taken multiple proof oriented classes already and were pursuing a pure math major. It's just one of those things that varies between colleges I guess.

Real analysis courses vary a lot between schools. On YouTube I’ve seen 3rd year real analysis exam questions that were covered in my first year calculus course. All math students at my school had to deal with them.

On the other hand, in my real analysis course we worked with metric spaces, topological spaces, Hilbert spaces, the Baire Category Theorem, etc. I doubt most students in “a typical math degree” would be studying these topics outside of a pure mathematics specific degree program.

> Well, that's not quite what they're saying - essentially what they're saying is that they're a different kind of smart

I'm pretty sure that is exactly what they are saying. The 2021 version of it anyway

you are correct, this is what they are saying. But i have yet to see anyone trying to give evidence that the test or curriculum contain thing that are inherently harder for black student to understand

I'm still waiting for the silence during which the insanity of this ideology finally clicks for those going along. We don't have to politely pretend that it isn't insane. We should pose direct questions to the lumpen commmissars trying to drag everyone into hell along with them.

What is a "white person"? A "black person"? Are these metaphysical categories? Biological categories? Cultural categories? Why would a person of one category be unable to understand curricula produced by people of another?

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