Re: [Slightly OT] Philosophy (was Re: Replacement for Abiword: LyX? Openoffice?)

On Tue, 2003-10-21 at 17:01, Thomas Thurman wrote:
> On Tue, Oct 21, 2003 at 04:13:49PM -0500, Ron Johnson wrote:
> > Why expose children to computers at such a young age?  Shouldn't
> > they be running and jumping, playing with toys, coloring, cutting,
> > riding bike/scooter, etc, instead?
> 
> (Gosh, I never thought of that. Guess we should close down Debian Jr.)

Gross over-reaction.  When my kids are older, they still will
need simple Linux-based tools.  A threadlet of "Replacement for
Abiword" discussed this.

> > Yes, I have 2 young children: boy aged 5.67, girl aged 4.25, and
> > yes, I am a database administrator (after being a programmer for
> > many years), and I've been very successful at it, while not having
> > been exposed to computers until 12th grade.  (Although I could have
> > used WordStar to type book reports & term papers.)
> 
> That doesn't mean anything one way or the other: you can't tell
> what your life would have been like had you started using computers
> earlier. Nor can I tell what mine would have been like had I not
> been exposed to computers as a child. Until one or the other of us
> can find a proper study, it's not really worth quoting such things
> as evidence.

If you are curious and drawn to technology, you would have arrived
sooner or later.  Maybe not as a programmer; maybe as an engineer,
or an artist.  So what?  After all, having more professional engineers
is a good thing.

-- 
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Ron Johnson, Jr. [email protected]
Jefferson, LA USA

"(Women are) like compilers. They take simple statements and
make them into big productions."
Pitr Dubovitch