# JeopardyFail



## Chi_townPhilly (Apr 21, 2007)

Today, in the opening round of the "general knowledge" game show "Jeopardy," the category *Composers- Country of Birth* appeared. Here's how it went down:

$200 question- Chopin. After one of the three contestants gave a wrong answer, a competitor rung in with the correct response.

$400 question- Elgar. All three contestants sat mutely without hazarding an attempt at an answer.

$600 question- Schubert. Someone buzzed in with the right answer the first time- the only time that happened the entire category.

$800 question- Berlioz. Two "buzz-ins," two incorrect answers-- and the third contestant didn't risk a response. Like "Elgar," this stumped everyone.

$1000 question- Villa-Lobos- One "buzz-in," one wrong answer... and this, too, went unanswered.

Brutal.


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## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

If it was filmed in USA, I'm not surprised. My impression is that (in general) Americans are great at their own history, culture, famous people, etc. but not very knowledgeable about the rest of the world.

If it was another country (eg. UK) then I'm surprised - esp. them missing Elgar. He's a national icon for the Brits, isn't he?


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## tdc (Jan 17, 2011)

I want to 'like' the OP, but I don't actually 'like' what is described, I kind of want to laugh, I kind of want to cry, ahhhh I don't know what to do or say other than - pfffft that is ridiculous!


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## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

I think part of the reason is that there are no 'real' intellectuals anymore. Not 'real' in the sense that they have interests outside their specialised area of expertise.

This post of mine on another thread explains this. The rest of my argument on that thread was largely quite dodgy. I was in rant mode there.

But I think that compared to 100 or even 50 years ago, people are more kind of myopic.


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## kv466 (May 18, 2011)

Sad. I've actually been watching a little of the show lately and it's reminded me of how I really should have gone on already and use of the 'useless' information I have stored up here. I'll make sure and let ya'll know if I do.


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## Couchie (Dec 9, 2010)

These are relatively weak composers... Brazil, Poland, Britain... who gives a ****.

Ask where Beethoven or Wagner comes from and they all would have gotten it.


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## Guest (Sep 26, 2012)

Wagner? Robert or Lindsay?


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## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

BPS said:


> Wagner? Robert or Lindsay?


Or maybe the 'Roger Wagner Chorale' with music like this (balk Wagnerites, balk!) -










& Beethoven's just some dog in a movie. . .


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## Guest (Sep 26, 2012)

At least there can be no confusion about Beethoven...


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## Moira (Apr 1, 2012)

A friend of mine is a professor of geography. From time to time he would say something to his students about "General Knowledge". One day he was approached by a student asking where she could get a copy of this "General Knowledge" book.

I was educated at a high school where we had a long, formal general knowledge quiz each year with a trophy for each class year. I never won it, but coveted the trophy every year. I will never forget being asked what "Crepes Suzette" was, and answering "A French GoGo dancer".  My parents made me Crepes Suzette after that. To this day it is still one of my favourite desserts.


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## MaestroViolinist (May 22, 2012)

Huh, that's terrible, I agree with tdc (mainly the laughing part).


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## crmoorhead (Apr 6, 2011)

Sid James said:


> But I think that compared to 100 or even 50 years ago, people are more kind of myopic.


Incredibly wishful thinking, I think. 50-100 years ago, most people left school at the age of 14 and all kinds of nonsensical ideas were readily accepted as true. Do a google image search for cigarette advertising and there are some interestign endorsements. If you are saying that those well educated had a more rounded education, I would suggest that it only seems that way because of what we percieve as a 'classical education' i.e. classical music, latin, literature, poetry but that ignores the vast swathes of ignorance elsewhere. We still percieve someone who is knowledgeable in latin, the classics of literature and classical composers as being well-educated even if all those are dead or dying and less and less irrelevant to modern day. I think that the proportion of people that are genuinely interested in all kinds of fields has stayed roughly the same (or even increased) since the broad time period specified (mainly due to there being an information age since then), but it would be hard to prove it.


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

:lol::lol::lol:

But then again, when it comes to famous athletes I would find it extremely difficult unless it was blatantly obvious in their last name.


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## Andreas (Apr 27, 2012)

Sid James said:


> If it was filmed in USA, I'm not surprised. My impression is that (in general) Americans are great at their own history, culture, famous people, etc. but not very knowledgeable about the rest of the world.


Yes. But sometimes I think, let's not be too rough: the US is a huge and highly diverse country, almost a continent in itself. If you're an American who's knowledgable about all of the US, that's almost like being a European who's knowledgable about all of Europe.

Besides, those composers had sort of tricky names: Chopin sounds French, Schubert sounds German, Berlioz sound Spanish, and Elgar sounds scandinavian.


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## hocket (Feb 21, 2010)

That's still pretty mild compared to these:











It's not just the US, they're just ahead of the curve on modern society. You can expect people of similar calibre on any British reality TV show you care to mention. There's no point in being smug about this when you see Americans being stupid, because we're just seeing our own future. Cheer up!


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## Mephistopheles (Sep 3, 2012)

Sid James said:


> I think part of the reason is that there are no 'real' intellectuals anymore. Not 'real' in the sense that they have interests outside their specialised area of expertise.
> 
> This post of mine on another thread explains this. The rest of my argument on that thread was largely quite dodgy. I was in rant mode there.
> 
> But I think that compared to 100 or even 50 years ago, people are more kind of myopic.


I share your sadness, but I think crmoorhead is on the money to say that, actually, things probably haven't changed all that much - the problem is that the explosion of media in the past few decades has given stupidity and ignorance a visual prominence it never had before; so much so that people are even proud of it now.


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## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

crmoorhead said:


> ...If you are saying that those well educated had a more rounded education, I would suggest that it only seems that way because of what we percieve as a 'classical education' i.e. classical music, latin, literature, poetry ....


Yep that's what I was saying. Intellectuals of the past where more well rounded, and they had a decent level of enquiry into not only the past but also their present. I mean Elliott Carter, who was suggesting this in the interview I mentioned, in his time people read not only the classics but also new or newer things like James Joyce. He's a composer, but he's always been interested in literature (his bachelor degree majored in literature (at Harvard), but he also did music there and he went on to do studies with Boulanger in Paris, as we know).

But maybe its swinging the other way now. With more flexible degree programs and double degrees. Also incorporating general studies subjects in degrees. This is outside the scope of this thread, and its based on my general reading and just talking to people here (anecdotal).

I mean, let's be serious, what do you think of the 'quality' of leaders from the USA recently compared to those of the past. I think that presidents like George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, F.D. Roosevelt, Eisenhower (basically many of before the mid 20th century), they come across as being men who had 'the goods' in not only things like public relations waffle and bean counting but in terms of real substance. That's what I'm saying, I don't see many leaders like that now, and in terms of intellectuals, my opinion is much the same.


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## Mephistopheles (Sep 3, 2012)

Sid James said:


> Yep that's what I was saying. Intellectuals of the past where more well rounded, and they had a decent level of enquiry into not only the past but also their present. I mean Elliott Carter, who was suggesting this in the interview I mentioned, in his time people read not only the classics but also new or newer things like James Joyce. He's a composer, but he's always been interested in literature (his bachelor degree majored in literature (at Harvard), but he also did music there and he went on to do studies with Boulanger in Paris, as we know).
> 
> But maybe its swinging the other way now. With more flexible degree programs and double degrees. Also incorporating general studies subjects in degrees. This is outside the scope of this thread, and its based on my general reading and just talking to people here (anecdotal).
> 
> I mean, let's be serious, what do you think of the 'quality' of leaders from the USA recently compared to those of the past. I think that presidents like George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, F.D. Roosevelt, Eisenhower (basically many of before the mid 20th century), they come across as being men who had 'the goods' in not only things like public relations waffle and bean counting but in terms of real substance. That's what I'm saying, I don't see many leaders like that now, and in terms of intellectuals, my opinion is much the same.


Intellectuals may not be holding positions of public office any more, but I think you'll find if you compare like with like that the Elliot Carters of today are as well-read and well-cultured as the intellectuals of the past. Maybe the light just doesn't shine on them so much at the moment, but if you know where to look..


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## crmoorhead (Apr 6, 2011)

Sid James said:


> Yep that's what I was saying. Intellectuals of the past where more well rounded, and they had a decent level of enquiry into not only the past but also their present. I mean Elliott Carter, who was suggesting this in the interview I mentioned, in his time people read not only the classics but also new or newer things like James Joyce. He's a composer, but he's always been interested in literature (his bachelor degree majored in literature (at Harvard), but he also did music there and he went on to do studies with Boulanger in Paris, as we know).
> 
> But maybe its swinging the other way now. With more flexible degree programs and double degrees. Also incorporating general studies subjects in degrees. This is outside the scope of this thread, and its based on my general reading and just talking to people here (anecdotal).
> 
> I mean, let's be serious, what do you think of the 'quality' of leaders from the USA recently compared to those of the past. I think that presidents like George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, F.D. Roosevelt, Eisenhower (basically many of before the mid 20th century), they come across as being men who had 'the goods' in not only things like public relations waffle and bean counting but in terms of real substance. That's what I'm saying, I don't see many leaders like that now, and in terms of intellectuals, my opinion is much the same.


With regards to Eliott Carter, he _is _still alive and James Joyce has been dead for seventy years. I don't know if that counts as evidence that Carter is well versed in "new or newer" literature.  I will agree that it is likely that he is, but isn't it also the case that there are many people who enjoy multiple fields of expertise in the present day? And, as far as narrow focus goes, how do you suppose his grasp of science and mathematics is? A focus of literature and music doesn't seem indicative of a wide range of subjects or proof that people have dumbed down since then. The issue is placing value on certain types of knowledge versus others. If we examine people's knowledge of science, the arts and popular culture from thirty years before their birth until the present time or the time of their death, I don't think that there can be that much difference.

Vis a vis modern American leaders, its very tempting to see leaders long dead through rose tinted spectacles, as characters in a book rather than real people. Washington etc are revered for their legacies as well as their character, but we rely on historical facts and memoirs to paint a picture of them. Living figures and those that are within living memory have much more messy biographies. And with regards to American leaders, Obama is still pretty popular as a world figure, though not nearly as revolutionary as past figures. Nonetheless, how about people like Gorbachev, Nelson Mandela and the Dalai Lama. Inspiring world figures are still alive. These guys are hardly young, but who is to say that current political figures won't be as highly regarded 40 years from now? I think that it is all too tempting to create golden ages as being in the past. The present age is, I think, as exciting as any.

But I suppose that this is waaay of the topic of music even though I do find the discussion fascinating.


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## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

Mephistopheles said:


> Intellectuals may not be holding positions of public office any more, but I think you'll find if you compare like with like that the Elliot Carters of today are as well-read and well-cultured as the intellectuals of the past. Maybe the light just doesn't shine on them so much at the moment, but if you know where to look..


Yes, now they have to compete with 'A listers' and people like that. You have a point there. & that does feed into this thread a bit.



crmoorhead said:


> With regards to Eliott Carter, he _is _still alive and James Joyce has been dead for seventy years. I don't know if that counts as evidence that Carter is well versed in "new or newer" literature.  I will agree that it is likely that he is, ....


Carter was speaking of his younger days (re reading JOyce and others, he said him and other intellectuals he knew collected first editions of books coming out in those days). So that would have been in the 1920's and after. But his works of recent times (eg. last decade or more), many have got literary roots, esp. of 20th century modernism.



> ...but isn't it also the case that there are many people who enjoy multiple fields of expertise in the present day?
> 
> ...


Yes, but I've met more of those types of people of my parents generation or older than in my own generation.



> ...
> Vis a vis modern American leaders, its very tempting to see leaders long dead through rose tinted spectacles, as characters in a book rather than real people. Washington etc are revered for their legacies as well as their character, but we rely on historical facts and memoirs to paint a picture of them. Living figures and those that are within living memory have much more messy biographies. And with regards to American leaders, Obama is still pretty popular as a world figure, though not nearly as revolutionary as past figures. Nonetheless, how about people like Gorbachev, Nelson Mandela and the Dalai Lama. Inspiring world figures are still alive. These guys are hardly young, but who is to say that current political figures won't be as highly regarded 40 years from now? I think that it is all too tempting to create golden ages as being in the past. The present age is, I think, as exciting as any.


Yes, I don't see any use of romanticising the past, but as you say they had real legacies, not just on paper or a computer screen. A lot of 'progress' today is public relations jargon. I mean you had FDR with the 'new deal,' you had Eisenhower being in the liberation of occupied Europe, and the other two I mentioned are more obvious to Americans. What I'm saying is those guys had to be broad minded to do what they did. No use just knowing about a narrow thing if they have to do 'big things.' Mandela and the others you say are similar.



> ...
> But I suppose that this is waaay of the topic of music even though I do find the discussion fascinating.


Well another thread can be done on it, if you want to do it, but we can probably continue here.


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## crmoorhead (Apr 6, 2011)

Sid James said:


> Carter was speaking of his younger days (re reading JOyce and others, he said him and other intellectuals he knew collected first editions of books coming out in those days). So that would have been in the 1920's and after. But his works of recent times (eg. last decade or more), many have got literary roots, esp. of 20th century modernism.


I will defer to your knowledge on Carter, since I know very little about him.  I don't know about the point about collecting first editions, however, since most people read books that are being released for the first time ('literature' or not). Perhaps you are talking about collecting first editions of old books, though I don't see the point in that, personally .



> Yes, but I've met more of those types of people of my parents generation or older than in my own generation.


I'm still (quite) young, so I have yet to meet many of those types of people of _any_ generation. I rely on the internet for that kind of thing.



> Yes, I don't see any use of romanticising the past, but as you say they had real legacies, not just on paper or a computer screen. A lot of 'progress' today is public relations jargon. I mean you had FDR with the 'new deal,' you had Eisenhower being in the liberation of occupied Europe, and the other two I mentioned are more obvious to Americans. What I'm saying is those guys had to be broad minded to do what they did. No use just knowing about a narrow thing if they have to do 'big things.' Mandela and the others you say are similar.


I am not American, so I can only view these things as an outsider. With regards to 'progress', how about the Arab Spring and the changes in financial regulations happening worldwide? There are a great deal of changes happening for the better, IMO, though maybe I am naive in believing this. You did say 'a lot', however, and not 'all', so this is not really a point of contention. 



> Well another thread can be done on it, if you want to do it, but we can probably continue here.


Here is good.


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## superhorn (Mar 23, 2010)

Talk about lack of general knowledge, too many kids in school today think that Joan of Arc was Noah's wife !


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## crmoorhead (Apr 6, 2011)

superhorn said:


> Talk about lack of general knowledge, too many kids in school today think that Joan of Arc was Noah's wife !


Only if they've been watching Bill and Ted!  As a serious point, however, it irks me that a mad french girl from 600 years ago is seen an important piece of knowledge for kids (or adults) today. Some might see Biblical knowledge as even more fruitless. General knowledge is an interesting concept that implies that _everything_ is important without the acknowledgement that most people have limited recall. Most people may lack knowledge of history, but make up for it for extensive knowledge elsewhere. Ever heard a conversation with sports fans who seem to know ever detail of the history of their team or sport? Knowing the name of almost every player in the premiership isn't unusual. Some people balk at this type of knowledge, even though the winners of various cups and medals it is still classified as 'general knowledge' and, at the end of the day, just about as useful of knowing what year Beethoven died or when the Battle of Hastings was fought. Its all stats. Of course, maybe there is some generally accepted notion of what qualifies as 'good' general knowledge and what doesn't, but I don't get the logic. People gather information about what they enjoy or what might be useful from day to day, not to meet some imaginary standard of learning things by rote unless it is to impress others.


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

Bill and Ted is the stupidest thing I have seen in my life.


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## crmoorhead (Apr 6, 2011)

ComposerOfAvantGarde said:


> Bill and Ted is the stupidest thing I have seen in my life.


Albert Einstein said: "Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I'm not sure about the the universe."

There are always new levels of stupid, escpecially if you have ever worked in customer service. *shudders*


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## Cnote11 (Jul 17, 2010)

HA, I laugh at the thought that Eisenhower was some great President. Get your rose-tinted history glasses off and hit the books and discover a lot of the miserable things many of those people did. If you don't care to, you can have fun thinking well of good ol' monopoly-saving Eisenhower and those other men. How one can sing the praises a man who, no different than today, was out to protect corporate and special interests is beyond me. The same thing you would give flack to today's Presidents for is no different than what they were doing back then. As if people really know any meat and bone of American history. They only know the fanatical, and often made up, version of our history.


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## cwarchc (Apr 28, 2012)

Cnote11 said:


> HA, I laugh at the thought that Eisenhower was some great President. Get your rose-tinted history glasses off and hit the books and discover a lot of the miserable things many of those people did. If you don't care to, you can have fun thinking well of good ol' monopoly-saving Eisenhower and those other men. How one can sing the praises a man who, no different than today, was out to protect corporate and special interests is beyond me. The same thing you would give flack to today's Presidents for is no different than what they were doing back then. As if people really know any meat and bone of American history. They only know the fanatical, and often made up, version of our history.


Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past.


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## Mephistopheles (Sep 3, 2012)

cwarchc said:


> Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past.


You missed a few. Who controls the future controls the past. Who controls the present controls the future. Who controls the past controls the present. Who controls the future controls the present. Insightful stuff!


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## kv466 (May 18, 2011)




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## Chi_townPhilly (Apr 21, 2007)

*JeopardyFail, OPERA edition*

Late last week-

Category- *Opera titles in English* [we give you the original title, you provide the English title used]:

$200 question- Guillaume Tell- a contestant buzzes in with "William Tell." So far, so good.

$400 question- Le nozze di Figaro- another buzz-in, another correct answer- The Marriage of Figaro.

$600 question- Les contes d'Hoffman- participant buzzes in with 'The Tales from Hoffman.' Not quite... minus $600 for you. [Most of the French I know involves osculation... but I know the difference between "d'" and "dès"]. No further guesses hazarded... and the correct answer (The Tales *of* Hoffman) is untendered.

$800 question- Götterdämmerung- blank stares, no responses for what we know to be 'Twilight of the Gods.'

$1000 question- La fanciulla del West- a steeplechase-sized hurdle in this race, as "the English title used" is NOT a direct translation of the Italian title. Probably wisely, no-one takes on the challenge of 'The Girl of the Golden West.'

To restate, 'Jeopardy' contestants tend to be freakishly smart in a number of disciplines. Competition to even get *on* the show is intense. However, culture and performing arts continues to be a real blind spot for them...


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## Guest (Jan 10, 2013)

I see these types of threads, which kind of point out the glaring cultural shortcomings of the United States, and end up drawing out some long discussion about the dearth of intellectuality in the U.S. and just how uncultured we are anymore - and then I remember that David Hasselhoff and ALF were famous in Europe and the rest of the world long after we had shunned them. Then I don't feel so bad about where we are. 

For the record, I have a Ph.D. and, without bragging, don't consider myself a slouch in cultural or artistic matters, and I couldn't tell you the English translation of Les contes d'Hoffman (I have next to no knowledge of French) or of La fanciulla del West (same for Italian) and only knew Goetterdaemmerung because I know German. I couldn't tell you the English translation for most Italian-named operas that contain anything other than proper names. Oh, and incidentally, I know much more about classical music than the 1 Italian and 3 Spaniards that work in the same lab as myself.


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## starthrower (Dec 11, 2010)

It's a bit of a stretch to point to a game show as the arbiter of national health, isn't it? I wonder what the results would look like if a European version of this show chose subjects that are uniquely American? Probably a lot of blank stares, eh?



Sid James said:


> If it was filmed in USA, I'm not surprised. My impression is that (in general) Americans are great at their own history, culture, famous people, etc. but not very knowledgeable about the rest of the world.


Famous people. yes! Americans worship celebrity. As for knowing their own history/culture? Forget it!


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## Guest (Jan 10, 2013)

starthrower said:


> Famous people. yes! Americans worship celebrity. As for knowing their own history/culture? Forget it!


Oh, it isn't just Americans that worship celebrity. Like they don't have as ridiculous a fascination in other parts of the world. Paparazzi is huge over in Europe, unless I am mistaken. Celebrity worship is not a condition to which only Americans are susceptible.

@Sid - I think every country you visit, you will find that most people are more knowledgeable of their own history and culture than that of the rest of the world. Online here, in the company of people who are very interested in classical music, you are not going to get a representative sampling of any given country. And everybody tends to have their own biases towards their own country, seeing theirs as the superior one. I can remember my time in Switzerland back in the mid 1990's, where the Swiss seemed to be ignorant (willingly or otherwise) of the issue of the disposition of Jewish Swiss bank accounts during WWII.

The U.S. has its education problems, to be sure. But I think judging a country based on the responses of 3 individuals regarding their knowledge of the country of origin of various classical composers, or their ability to translate from French, Italian, and German into English is a bit of a stretch.


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## SiegendesLicht (Mar 4, 2012)

It seems, Americans have a tendency to look down on Europe a bit, because that's where most of their ancestors had escaped from in search of a better life than Europe could offer them. Besides, Americans had to build their own country, culture etc. from scratch in the 1700-1800s, so, as a kind of tradition most of them are still more preoccupied with their own, rather than with the fine art of other countries. Am I right? 

But then not many people are into fine arts in any country. If the same show was filmed in my own country or in Russia, for example, the results would probably be about the same.


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## Guest (Jan 10, 2013)

SiegendesLicht said:


> It seems, Americans have a tendency to look down on Europe a bit, because that's where most of their ancestors had escaped from in search of a better life than Europe could offer them. Besides, Americans had to build their own country, culture etc. from scratch in the 1700-1800s, so, as a kind of tradition most of them are still more preoccupied with their own, rather than with the fine art of other countries. Am I right?
> 
> But then not many people are into fine arts in any country. If the same show was filmed in my own country or in Russia, for example, the results would probably be about the same.


I think you will find that in most affluent countries. I think that the more affluent the country, the more things begin to slide. You will always have those who are ahead of the curve, but your average citizen is not going to be as knowledgeable as you would like.

I think Americans definitely do look down on Europeans - in general they feel we have it better here than over there. At the same time, having worked with Europeans, and having lived in Europe for 2 years (Germany, Switzerland, Austria), I can say that Europeans also look down on Americans.


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## SiegendesLicht (Mar 4, 2012)

DrMike said:


> I think you will find that in most affluent countries. I think that the more affluent the country, the more things begin to slide. You will always have those who are ahead of the curve, but your average citizen is not going to be as knowledgeable as you would like.


Isn't it the other way around: the more affluent the country, the more knowledgeable its citizens? In the affluent countries people have much more access to education, internet etc. and more free time to educate themselves. Somehow I am sure there are not so many classical fans or fans of other fine arts in the poorer countries.


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## Guest (Jan 10, 2013)

SiegendesLicht said:


> Isn't it the other way around: the more affluent the country, the more knowledgeable its citizens? In the affluent countries people have much more access to education, internet etc. and more free time to educate themselves. Somehow I am sure there are not so many classical fans or fans of other fine arts in the poorer countries.


I think that happens in both affluent and poor. The problem is that more free time tends to lead to more worthless pursuits. I think once you have hit a certain critical mass of wealth and availability of education, those who have a desire to seek out education will do so. But I don't think that number will continue to rise as you gain even more wealth and education availability. Consider this - why is it, with more Americans going to college than at any time in the past are we seeing college graduates coming away ignorant of much of this information we would expect from them?

I think you will see education levels rise until you reach that critical point at which those who have a desire to learn more have access to that education, and beyond that, there will be no significant increase in the number of knowledgeable people. In affluent countries, this is particularly glaring, given the relative wealth of the people and their access to this education. But as the old saying goes, you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink.

In poor countries, the lack of education is for other reasons entirely.


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## Guest (Jan 10, 2013)

SiegendesLicht said:


> Isn't it the other way around: the more affluent the country, the more knowledgeable its citizens? In the affluent countries people have much more access to education, internet etc. and more free time to educate themselves. Somehow I am sure there are not so many classical fans or fans of other fine arts in the poorer countries.


As for just how much people in affluent countries educate themselves, with you mentioning access to the internet, I think it is quite telling to look at Google's Zeitgeist 2012 report, where they report the overall top searches, as well as top searches in various categories for the year. http://www.google.com/zeitgeist/2012/#the-world

If Internet searches are any indicator, Europe doesn't seem to be much more cultured than the U.S. With the exception of the Euro 2012 drawing more searches in Europe than in the U.S., the top searches don't look that different. I noticed that Whitney Houston was even a top search in one of the European countries (I think it was Germany) - seems like Americans aren't the only ones who worship celebrities.


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## SiegendesLicht (Mar 4, 2012)

I think the people who use the internet for some educational purpose (I wish I used it more often for such purposes myself...) will always be a minority and lost in statistics like this. The question is, how large is this minority from country to country. 
At least Americans seem to have been very interested in the election and that is a good sign


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## superhorn (Mar 23, 2010)

How about the kid who when asked on a music test what his favorite classical work was said "The Taco Bell Canon " ?


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## starthrower (Dec 11, 2010)

DrMike said:


> Oh, it isn't just Americans that worship celebrity. Like they don't have as ridiculous a fascination in other parts of the world. Paparazzi is huge over in Europe, unless I am mistaken. Celebrity worship is not a condition to which only Americans are susceptible.


I didn't say it was just Americans that worshipped celebrity, did I?


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## Guest (Jan 11, 2013)

starthrower said:


> I didn't say it was just Americans that worshipped celebrity, did I?


I wasn't accusing you of doing so. I was merely making the point, building off of what you said, that this issue was not unique to Americans. I consider these discussions to be open ones and I am speaking to everyone who is reading, not just to you. Your comment prompted me wanted to make an additional comment based on what you said. There was no putting words in your mouth or attempt to criticize.


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## starthrower (Dec 11, 2010)

I don't know about other countries, but I assume it's a ubiquitous human behavior, at least in western societies where famous people are the new gods. Anyway, I've been reading a fascinating book about this crazy brain of ours called The Origin Of Consciousness (In the breakdown of the bicameral mind) by the late Julian Jaynes. I don't know what today's opinions are about this theory that was published back in 1976, but it's an interesting read.


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