# Are wealthy people more musical?



## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

From the Guardian: "Wealthier people are more musical, report suggests."

Yes folks, it's true. There's a musicality gap. "Interestingly, it was the categories that seemed more objective such as 'melodic memory' and 'beat perception' that showed the strongest statistical correlation with wealth."

http://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2014/mar/05/wealthier-people-more-musical-report


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## UserMrD (Mar 7, 2014)

Interesting, as well as inevitable ?


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## starthrower (Dec 11, 2010)

It's a load of bunk.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

starthrower said:


> It's a load of bunk.


Leaving it at just that, it suggests only that you'd prefer not to believe the results of the study.


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## starthrower (Dec 11, 2010)

All I know is that that much of the world's great music was created by very poor folks. All of the great folk music, jazz, blues, country, blue grass, etc...


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## Guest (Mar 7, 2014)

So this is why I like Mendelssohn more than bluegrass


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

starthrower said:


> All I know is that that much of the world's great music was created by very poor folks. All of the great folk music, jazz, blues, country, blue grass, etc...


Of course the study was about listeners, not composers. But FWIW I did a survey of the great classical composers a few months ago and most came from middle-class or better backgrounds. Which is not surprising for some obvious reasons.


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## Serge (Mar 25, 2010)

KenOC said:


> Of course the study was about listeners, not composers.


The difference is that the poor people will sacrifice almost everything to listen to music while to the rich it costs almost nothing.


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## aleazk (Sep 30, 2011)

Oh, please... what a load of crap... Ken, make us all a favor and go listen to some Beethoven instead of making us read this ****.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

aleazk said:


> Oh, please... what a load of crap... Ken, make us all a favor and go listen to some Beethoven instead of making us read this ****.


Did I make you read it? No, it was your own insatiable appetite for worthless studies! Innocent I am, innocent!


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## Couchie (Dec 9, 2010)

Wealthy people have more money than poor people.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Couchie said:


> Wealthy people have more money than poor people.


Uh...that's probably correct. :lol:


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## Il_Penseroso (Nov 20, 2010)

The puzzle of creativity - not only in music but any other form of art or science - has not been solved yet... and i think never will be. If there's still a question like "What makes a man a genius?" well, i don't know the answer, but as far as i know it doesn't have anything to do with wealth whether it's (as for example) Mendelssohn or Dvořák...


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Again, the study was about listeners, not musically creative people.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Of course the Guardian is a pseudo left wing paper beloved by the PC. What it wouldn't say is that (as a general rule) people who are meritocratically wealthier tend to be more intelligent and care more for things like education for their kids. Now in the UK it used to be possible for the working class kid to rise above their background through the grammar school. Now such places have been abandoned in favour of the largely failed comprehensive schools - which give all kids the same, mediocre (and often poor) education - it is far more difficult. In fact, comprehensives have had the effect of increasing the gap between rich and poor kids' education by encouraging the rich to send their kids to fee paying schools in search of decent educational standards.


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## Guest (Mar 7, 2014)

KenOC said:


> From the Guardian: "Wealthier people are more musical, report suggests."
> 
> Yes folks, it's true. There's a musicality gap. "Interestingly, it was the categories that seemed more objective such as 'melodic memory' and 'beat perception' that showed the strongest statistical correlation with wealth."
> 
> http://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2014/mar/05/wealthier-people-more-musical-report


Except that the musicality map clearly shows some parts of the country where those on lower median incomes scored higher levels of musicality. Look at the the Border counties (for non-UK members, that's between Scotland and England). Dumfries and Galloway, Allerdale, Carlisle, Eden (though not Northumberland) all go from 2nd lowest income quintile to the highest musicality quintile.

The conclusion reported by The Guardian is too simplistic. But thanks for sharing Ken!


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

KenOC said:


> From the Guardian: "Wealthier people are more musical, report suggests."
> 
> Yes folks, it's true. There's a musicality gap. "Interestingly, it was the categories that seemed more objective such as 'melodic memory' and 'beat perception' that showed the strongest statistical correlation with wealth."
> 
> http://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2014/mar/05/wealthier-people-more-musical-report


Not surprising, I bet wealthy people are better at reading, writing, science and maths too. The reasons are obvious: more support at home, better schools, higher expectations.

Note that this was a British survey. The British state school system is not very good at music.


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## Il_Penseroso (Nov 20, 2010)

KenOC said:


> Again, the study was about listeners, not musically creative people.


Oops sorry! :lol:


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## Morimur (Jan 23, 2014)

Wealthy folks are not only more musical than the poor, they're also prettier, smarter, smell better and have ridiculously expensive teeth!   

_*That last one is probably true._


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Lope de Aguirre said:


> Wealthy folks are not only more musical than the poor, they're also prettier, smarter, smell better and have expensive teeth!


Just wait in a (very) few years for those expensive designer babies. Things to come...Eloi and Morlocks?


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## Morimur (Jan 23, 2014)

KenOC said:


> Just wait in a (very) few years for those expensive designer babies. Things to come...


Meh. By the time the factories (hospitals/labs) are in full production mode, I'll probably be gone... Hopefully.


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

Given that the human brain is plastic and that there is little or no pure "nature" unaffected by "nurture" or environment, probably nearly all skills or talents of any sort at all are correlated more or less strongly with wealth. (Pause for us all to remind ourselves what "correlated" actually means, and to reflect on all the complications of causality, the law of large numbers, black swans, etc., so that there is no need to bother ourselves further with such intelligence-insulting diversions.) That's actually a very left-friendly thought, because it argues that there is no actual "equality of opportunity" when there is a persistent underlying nonrandom material inequality, exploding the right-wing myths that our societies actually do have equality of opportunity, and that the "resulting" inequalities are little more than merit (even with any dose of purely arbitrary luck thrown into the calculations). But it's not that bad for the right, nothing like time to abandon all hope; you just have to avoid the conversation, spread disinformation, and most of all to create/find/emphasize different justifications for persistent inequality.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Thank you science. Everything is exactly the same as everything else, differing only due to the malevolent forces of wealth. In other words A always = B if the underlying truth were known. A comforting thought, though somewhat contrary to much apparently disinterested scientific research.


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## Morimur (Jan 23, 2014)

science said:


> Given that the human brain is plastic and that there is little or no pure "nature" unaffected by "nurture" or environment, probably nearly all skills or talents of any sort at all are correlated more or less strongly with wealth. (Pause for us all to remind ourselves what "correlated" actually means, and to reflect on all the complications of causality, the law of large numbers, black swans, etc., so that there is no need to bother ourselves further with such intelligence-insulting diversions.) That's actually a very left-friendly thought, because it argues that there is no actual "equality of opportunity" when there is a persistent underlying nonrandom material inequality, exploding the right-wing myths that our societies actually do have equality of opportunity, and that the "resulting" inequalities are little more than merit (even with any dose of purely arbitrary luck thrown into the calculations). But it's not that bad for the right, nothing like time to abandon all hope; you just have to avoid the conversation, spread disinformation, and most of all to create/find/emphasize different justifications for persistent inequality.


The reason for that persistent inequality is human nature. There's not much to admire in our psychotic species.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

science said:


> Given that the human brain is plastic and that there is little or no pure "nature" unaffected by "nurture" or environment, probably nearly all skills or talents of any sort at all are correlated more or less strongly with wealth.


In that case Beethoven would never have composed a note. The problem comes with correlating wealth with opportunity. Obviously wealth brings it's own opportunities. But the task should be getting those opportunities to more people. That is something the education system in the UK once offered, albeit imperfectly. Now it appears to be mediocrity for all except, of course, for the rich.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

The truth remains: Those with gold make the rules. Only Marx had a reply for that.


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

DavidA said:


> In that case Beethoven would never have composed a note. The problem comes with correlating wealth with opportunity. Obviously wealth brings it's own opportunities. But the task should be getting those opportunities to more people. That is something the education system in the UK once offered, albeit imperfectly. Now it appears to be mediocrity for all except, of course, for the rich.





science said:


> (Pause for us all to remind ourselves what "correlated" actually means, and to reflect on all the complications of causality, the law of large numbers, black swans, etc., so that there is no need to bother ourselves further with such intelligence-insulting diversions.)


I worry that confirmation bias might reinforce my cynicism.


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## Morimur (Jan 23, 2014)

KenOC said:


> The truth remains: Those with gold make the rules. Only Marx had a reply for that.


Very true, but there's no remedying the situation unless man is changed from the inside.


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

KenOC said:


> Thank you science. Everything is exactly the same as everything else, differing only due to the malevolent forces of wealth. In other words A always = B if the underlying truth were known. A comforting thought, though somewhat contrary to much apparently disinterested scientific research.


The illusion of disinterested observation is comparable with the reintegration of unsituated knowledge. The socialization of semantic drift can be subsumed under the rhetoric of the master-slave dialectic, closely allied with the unanalyzed arbitrariness of materiality - narrowly avoiding withdrawal into conscious unreadability.


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## Crudblud (Dec 29, 2011)

In other words: The rich have more money and time and opportunities than the poor, who are too busy worrying about the cost of living, which rises ever higher above their income, to have much time left over for trivialities. Couldn't have worked that out by myself, good job we have the media to remind us all of our respective places.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

KenOC said:


> The truth remains: Those with gold make the rules. Only Marx had a reply for that.


Those who adopted Marx's policies have tended to ensure everyone has the same - nothing! Except the few at the top, of course!


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

Lope de Aguirre said:


> The reason for that persistent inequality is human nature. There's not much to admire in our psychotic species.


I guess it depends on what you look for. For beasts, we make some pretty good music, and there is the occasional altruism.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Crudblud said:


> In other words: The rich have more money and time and opportunities than the poor, who are too busy worrying about the cost of living, which rises ever higher above their income, to have much time left over for trivialities. Couldn't have worked that out by myself, good job we have the media to remind us all of our respective places.


This might have been true in Jane Austin's day but probably not now, where wealth is acquired far more by meritocracy. The fact is that people who are ambitious for themselves tend also to be ambitious for their children and their prospects. Even the good old left wingers. We used to live opposite the fee paying high school for girls. Amazing the number of left wingers (university types, etc) we saw dropping their kids off there. They, of course, believed in comprehensive education - other people's kids!


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

science said:


> The illusion of disinterested observation is comparable with the reintegration of unsituated knowledge. The socialization of semantic drift can be subsumed under the rhetoric of the master-slave dialectic, closely allied with the unanalyzed arbitrariness of materiality...


Oh dear. Do you have a way of measuring this against the Gunning fog index?


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

KenOC said:


> Oh dear. Do you have a way of measuring this against the Gunning fog index?


A always equals B, I guess, no matter what the disinterested scientists say. If you want to translate your post into English... but then, I enjoy satire, so suit your own sweet self.


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## Morimur (Jan 23, 2014)

science said:


> I guess it depends on what you look for. For beasts, we make some pretty good music, and there is the occasional altruism.


'Occasional' - That's the problem. Art can make life bearable (at least for awhile) but it won't stop our eventual suicide as a species. I suppose it's quite easy to adopt apathy so long as calamity remains at bay, but suffering doesn't discriminate. We will all die one day but before we do, our lives will have undoubtedly been touched by acute pain and sorrow.


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

DavidA said:


> This might have been true in Jane Austin's day but probably not now, where wealth is acquired far more by meritocracy. The fact is that people who are ambitious for themselves tend also to be ambitious for their children and their prospects. Even the good old left wingers. We used to live opposite the fee paying high school for girls. Amazing the number of left wingers (university types, etc) we saw dropping their kids off there. They, of course, believed in comprehensive education - other people's kids!


I have to love you, buddy. It's nice to see the claim that we live in a meritocracy, even nicer to see the idea someone wanting a better education for other people's kids ought to mean that they wouldn't want the best for their own kids, but in fact there is nothing better on the internet than spokesmen for the elite writing things like "Jane Austin."

Let's talk about correlation, black swans, and Beethoven.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

science said:


> A always equals B, I guess, no matter what the disinterested scientists say. If you want to translate your post into English... but then, I enjoy satire, so suit your own sweet self.


Quite simple really.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gunning_fog_index


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

Lope de Aguirre said:


> 'Occasional' - That's the problem. Art can make life bearable (at least for awhile) but it won't stop our eventual suicide as a species. I suppose it's quite easy to adopt apathy so long as calamity remains at bay, but suffering doesn't discriminate. We will all die one day but before we do, our lives will have undoubtedly been touched by acute pain and sorrow.


No matter how much the sorrow or how acute the pain, for most of us there's some occasional joy as well. Maybe the end is bad, but the middle counts too.


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## SiegendesLicht (Mar 4, 2012)

science said:


> I have to love you, buddy. It's nice to see the claim that we live in a meritocracy, even nicer to see the idea someone wanting a better education for other people's kids ought to mean that they wouldn't want the best for their own kids, but in fact there is nothing better on the internet than spokesmen for the elite writing things like "Jane Austin."


I think the idea was that some people, those that particularly like to preach "equality", want the best education available for their _own _kids, but "equal" (= equally poor) education for the kids of everybody else.


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

KenOC said:


> Quite simple really.
> 
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gunning_fog_index


I understood _that_ post of course, and responded to it almost without sarcasm. How about that A equals B stuff? Too profound for prosaic explication? Or just over my pathetic head?


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## Guest (Mar 7, 2014)

DavidA said:


> Even the good old left wingers. We used to live opposite the fee paying high school for girls. Amazing the number of left wingers (university types, etc) we saw dropping their kids off there. They, of course, believed in comprehensive education - other people's kids!


Can we keep politics out of this?


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

SiegendesLicht said:


> I think the idea was that some people, those that particularly like to preach "equality", want the best education available for their _own _kids, but "equal" (= equally poor) education for the kids of everybody else.


There would indeed have been some considerable irony if they'd actually tried to force someone else's kids to have a poor education rather than trying to help yet someone else's kids to have a better one. But in case the last is an abomination, we can pretend the latter two goals are the same.


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

MacLeod said:


> Can we keep politics out of this?


That's a good idea. To be fair SiegendesLicht and DavidA should get a response to my... whatever I did... but I'll let them have the last word. We won't settle anything here of course and anyway we'd better stick to topics explicitly musical.


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## Crudblud (Dec 29, 2011)

DavidA said:


> This might have been true in Jane Austin's day but probably not now, where wealth is acquired far more by meritocracy. The fact is that people who are ambitious for themselves tend also to be ambitious for their children and their prospects. Even the good old left wingers. We used to live opposite the fee paying high school for girls. Amazing the number of left wingers (university types, etc) we saw dropping their kids off there. They, of course, believed in comprehensive education - other people's kids!


We live in a plutocracy, not a meritocracy. From that, combined with what I'm sure was, from your perspective, a witty quip about Marxism, I am getting the sense that you have very little understanding of political science and should probably stop talking about it. The rest of your post relies on conjecture and anecdotal evidence, and I see no reason to continue this discussion.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

45 posts in less than 3 hours, in response to a pretty dumb article in the Guardian. Seems a sensitive nerve was poked.


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## Guest (Mar 7, 2014)

KenOC said:


> 45 posts in less than 3 hours, in response to a pretty dumb article in the Guardian. Seems a sensitive nerve was poked.


Do I get the prize for rejecting the article's headline conclusion?


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

KenOC said:


> 45 posts in less than 3 hours, in response to a pretty dumb article in the Guardian. Seems a sensitive nerve was poked.


I'm pleased whenever I see an aspiration to "poke sensitive nerves" on the internet. We have to do something with all this bandwidth.


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## Morimur (Jan 23, 2014)

This is a perfect microcosm of our world; a millennia of human history played out in one tiny corner of the internet. It's a good thing none of us have nukes.


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

Lope de Aguirre said:


> It's a good thing none of us have nukes.


But are you so sure of that?

Just a fun off-topic thing: one of my friends was an officer in the military: she was at a nuclear missile site on 9/11, and, not knowing what was going on in the world, they took several of the preparatory steps towards launching the missile - while watching CNN of course, because that's _our_ world. That was more responsibility than she wanted to have, but if she tells me that we live in a meritocracy or that we drown in a torrent of unadulterated tears, I will politely agree.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

science said:


> I have to love you, buddy. It's nice to see the claim that we live in a meritocracy, even nicer to see the idea someone wanting a better education for other people's kids ought to mean that they wouldn't want the best for their own kids, but in fact there is nothing better on the internet than spokesmen for the elite writing things like "Jane Austin."
> 
> Let's talk about correlation, black swans, and Beethoven.


It makes me smile the justification those on the left wing put up for their own practice of inequalities. I had a colleague who was a rabid left winger and a great advocate of comprehensives action. However, when the time came for his own kids to go to secondary school, he decided the comprehensive school he had been advocating was not good enough for his own kids (although past ardently fine for everyone else's!) So he paid to send his kids to the high school! What's more, he didn't see the total inconsistency of his position!


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## dgee (Sep 26, 2013)

KenOC said:


> 45 posts in less than 3 hours, in response to a pretty dumb article in the Guardian. Seems a sensitive nerve was poked.


Oh dear! I can only imagine your dismay :-(


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## Guest (Mar 7, 2014)

DavidA said:


> It makes me smile the justification those on the left wing put up for their own practice of inequalities. I had a colleague who was a rabid left winger and a great advocate of comprehensives action. However, when the time came for his own kids to go to secondary school, he decided the comprehensive school he had been advocating was not good enough for his own kids (although past ardently fine for everyone else's!) So he paid to send his kids to the high school! What's more, he didn't see the total inconsistency of his position!


I see you've decided to persist in posting explicitly political diatribes (albeit quite mild). This puts posters holding different political views in a difficult position: to reply in kind, thereby perpetuating the breaking of TC rules; or to refrain from replying and allowing your views to go unchallenged.

Suffice to say that your step from the alleged hypocrisy of an individual to a generalisation about those of a particular political persuasion is a misstep.


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## Piwikiwi (Apr 1, 2011)

DavidA said:


> It makes me smile the justification those on the left wing put up for their own practice of inequalities. I had a colleague who was a rabid left winger and a great advocate of comprehensives action. However, when the time came for his own kids to go to secondary school, he decided the comprehensive school he had been advocating was not good enough for his own kids (although past ardently fine for everyone else's!) So he paid to send his kids to the high school! What's more, he didn't see the total inconsistency of his position!


Unless it works. I live in the Netherlands and I don't think I know anyone or even know a private school. Everyone who send their kids to high school pays the same (1200 euros a year or something) from the super rich to the super poor.

It's the same when it comes to universities. You pay around 1500 euros a year and people there are people from all backgrounds. I can barely think of one private university and that one was in financial trouble.


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## Morimur (Jan 23, 2014)

Piwikiwi said:


> Unless it works. I live in the Netherlands and I don't think I know anyone or even know a private school. Everyone who send their kids to high school pays the same (1200 euros a year or something) from the super rich to the super poor.
> 
> It's the same when it comes to universities. You pay around 1500 euros a year and people there are people from all backgrounds. I can barely think of one private university and that one was in financial trouble.


Consider yourself blessed to live in such a great country.


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## Nereffid (Feb 6, 2013)

MacLeod said:


> Do I get the prize for rejecting the article's headline conclusion?


Do *I* get a prize for going to the effort of reading the research paper itself instead of the inevitably inaccurate newspaper version? 

http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0089642



> Because the correlations with income were obtained across geographical regions, it is possible to plot maps of the distributions of dimensions of musical sophistication and compare them to the distribution of regional income. Figure 7 shows that there is a clear concentration of high-income local authorities in and around London and the so-called 'Home Counties' (e.g. Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire, Essex, Kent, Surrey, Sussex). The medium-sized correlations with musical sophistication and musical training are visible especially in urban areas in Scotland and Northwest England (Manchester and Liverpool). This seems to support the notion that certain types of musical engagement, especially musical training, are associated with greater wealth. However, the maps also show some clear differences between income levels and aspects of musical sophistication. For example, in the West Country and in parts of Wales, participants reported relatively high levels of general musical sophistication despite generally lower income levels. This might be due to regional musical traditions, such as choirs and amateur music ensembles, which are particularly strong in these regions ([141] p. 597).





> Finally, we compared self-reported musical sophistication and performance on the two listening tests to socio-economic data from a sub-sample of British participants from the large-scale and online implementation. Overall, and despite the fact that we used a powerful data-mining technique, socio-economic variables were able to 'explain' only small proportions of the variance in the musical data. However, the variables with the strongest associations were related to occupation, occupational status, education, and age, while gender and ethnic group had far less predictive power. A possible interpretation of the influence of these variables on the self-report data is that musically sophisticated behaviour is strongly linked to an early stage in life when people are able to organise their time in a flexible way (e.g. when they are at school or university or when they are self-employed). This interpretation does not hold true for retired people, however, supporting the fact that age is an important factor, with younger ages reporting higher levels of musically sophisticated behaviour. In addition, certain professions that have a natural link with music (music, media, and educational professions) seem to extend the period of musically sophisticated behaviour beyond the early and flexible stage in life.


But hey, this isn't quite as exciting as "Wealthier people are more musical", is it?


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## Piwikiwi (Apr 1, 2011)

Lope de Aguirre said:


> Consider yourself blessed to live in such a great country.


Well we have other problems with our education system:')


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## Guest (Mar 7, 2014)

Nereffid said:


> Do *I* get a prize for going to the effort of reading the research paper itself instead of the inevitably inaccurate newspaper version?
> 
> http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0089642


Well I'll give you one!


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## clara s (Jan 6, 2014)

As it seems from all above, Europe has got political and social sensitivity.


But sorry gentlemen, if I tell you that I have a strong musical culture,

who can say how wealthy or penniless I am?


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## Ingélou (Feb 10, 2013)

In the UK, generally if you want to learn an instrument, you have to pay a private music teacher. In some areas of the country, like the Borders, there may be a reservoir of traditional musicians who pass on skills between families. As has been observed, almost any cultured skill will be found at a higher level among people who have resources and a supportive background. But just to throw a spice into the pot:


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## starry (Jun 2, 2009)

dgee said:


> Oh dear! I can only imagine your dismay :-(


But it's exactly what he wanted?


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## Andreas (Apr 27, 2012)

Classical music has, until some decades ago perhaps, been a bourgeois art. Like most arts, where costly material or professional training is needed to realize it. The cheapest art, in this regard, is literature. Maybe acting is even cheaper, provided one can do without classes.

I imagine it's theoretically possible to become a composer by borrowing scores and books on music theory from the library for free and figuring it all out by oneself. But it will hardly be the case. It's a curious thought: when one goes to a concert, most probably everyone on stage comes from a pretty privileged background. So do most of the audience, or course. But it's easier to be born poor and become a classical music lover than to be born poor and become a concert musician.

Again, in theory most public school systems should provide every kid with everything they need to make it. With a good education and scholarships and the like, everything should be possible. But even if it is, it has only been so for 30 years or so.

Classical music still is, predominantly, of, by and for the upper classes of society, probably more than any other art form. That does give it a bit of a funny taste.


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## starry (Jun 2, 2009)

The packaging may seek to have a less populist look, but it's still basically music and received the same way as any other.


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## SiegendesLicht (Mar 4, 2012)

Andreas said:


> Classical music still is, predominantly, of, by and for the upper classes of society, probably more than any other art form. That does give it a bit of a funny taste.


Why would it give music a funny taste? Why would someone who loves music for its sake even care who else, apart from him, loves it, whether rich people or poor people (as long as they are not part of some criminal subculture), unless he only looks for the approval of the "correct" social group?


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## Freischutz (Mar 6, 2014)

A point that seems to have passed by some people on this thread is that these results - to whatever extent they are believable (go and read prize-winning post #56) - are to do with probabilities and distributions, _not_ absolute determinations. So yes, there are poor people who can make it as musicians of any type, and if you tell me you're a composer, I can't say with _certainty_ what your economic background is, but the point is that the _distributions_ of musical ability for different socioeconomic groups has a different shape so that, if you tell me you're a composer, you're _more likely_ to be from a wealthy background, and those who are from underprivileged* backgrounds are less likely to achieve the same.

The fact that there exists a handful of counter-examples does not undermine the broad trend which very forcefully demonstrates that we do not live in a meritocracy (and though meritocracies are often held up as democratic utopias, they have many flaws too - I personally would not want to live in a meritocracy because I do not believe it is my job or the job of my peers to decide, assess and reward the value of other people's contributions to society. Just because you are good at something does not mean you deserve a better quality of life than people who aren't).

* I say "underprivileged" because it's a common word, but we're not really dealing with _privileges_ here. Poor people are not people without privilege, they are people disenfranchised from the political process.


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## Morimur (Jan 23, 2014)

Piwikiwi said:


> Well we have other problems with our education system:')


Really? Come to the good ol' US of A and get back to me on that.


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## Polyphemus (Nov 2, 2011)

While I normally despise cliche's there is one that has always held true. It usually applies to politicians, surely one of the more loathsome sub-species among us. 
"Figures can lie and liars can figure" is the cliche to which I refer. 
The essence of it is that any set of facts or figures can be manipulated to produce a required result. So most polls etc promote the result that the sponsor of said poll wants. So no matter what eminent organisation commissions and conducts a poll the result inevitably reflects their editorial or political policy.
Cynical? damn right I am.


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## Nereffid (Feb 6, 2013)

Polyphemus said:


> While I normally despise cliche's there is one that has always held true. It usually applies to politicians, surely one of the more loathsome sub-species among us.
> "Figures can lie and liars can figure" is the cliche to which I refer.
> The essence of it is that any set of facts or figures can be manipulated to produce a required result. So most polls etc promote the result that the sponsor of said poll wants. So no matter what eminent organisation commissions and conducts a poll the result inevitably reflects their editorial or political policy.
> Cynical? damn right I am.


Cynical indeed! Are you saying Müllensiefen et al. faked their data, or that their methodology was deliberately unsound?


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## Polyphemus (Nov 2, 2011)

Müllensiefen by his own admission "I supervise projects in the area of musicality and individual differences, musical similarity perception, music in advertising, and statistical modelling of music perception."
The above quote is taken from Müllensiefen's page at the Goldsmiths University site.
It hardly reflects pure thought indeed accedes to musical differences admits to personal perception.
Putting it simply there are none of us who are not controlled to some extent by outside influences be they monetary, political, religious or whatever.
Personally I reserve the right to be as cynical as I am having watched generations of people being sold the pup that the new messiah was on the way when in fact its all the same old bs.
So just get hold of your favourite music sit back and enjoy.


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

Polyphemus said:


> Müllensiefen by his own admission "I supervise projects in the area of musicality and individual differences, musical similarity perception, music in advertising, and statistical modelling of music perception."
> The above quote is taken from Müllensiefen's page at the Goldsmiths University site.
> It hardly reflects pure thought indeed accedes to musical differences admits to personal perception.
> Putting it simply there are none of us who are not controlled to some extent by outside influences be they monetary, political, religious or whatever.
> ...


That's all fine with me in the abstract, but in the concrete: if you have kids, get them vaccinated.


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## Polyphemus (Nov 2, 2011)

P.S. 
All my kids were vaccinated as were their kids and they all run when dad put on his music. I wonder if there is a correlation.


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

Polyphemus said:


> P.S.
> All my kids were vaccinated as were their kids and they all run when dad put on his music. I wonder if there is a correlation.


There definitely is but afaik the sample size is too small. How many grandkids we talkin' here?


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

Wealthy folks are simply more likely to be exposed to classical music since it is considered to be "upper class" music.

Otherwise there is no provable correlation among wealth, class and musical ability.


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## Freischutz (Mar 6, 2014)

hpowders said:


> Wealthy folks are simply more likely to be exposed to classical music since it is considered to be "upper class" music.
> 
> Otherwise there is no provable correlation among wealth, class and musical ability.


How do you know?


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

Freischutz said:


> How do you know?


Common sense. Find the study that proves the correlation. Then, tell it to the 4 boys from Liverpool or JS Bach; or LV Beethoven; or WA Mozart; or F Schubert.

Quelle folie!


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## Polyphemus (Nov 2, 2011)

5 grandkids 3-18.


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## Ukko (Jun 4, 2010)

KenOC said:


> From the Guardian: "Wealthier people are more musical, report suggests."
> 
> Yes folks, it's true. There's a musicality gap. "Interestingly, it was the categories that seemed more objective such as 'melodic memory' and 'beat perception' that showed the strongest statistical correlation with wealth."
> 
> http://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2014/mar/05/wealthier-people-more-musical-report


"Wealthy" people have more beat perception?



Ravel's Bolero trumps jungle drums? I suppose that depends on whether one is in the audience or in the pot.


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

I guess I should make this clear. The point is that if some researchers find a correlation between wealth and height, and someone says they don't believe it because they're familiar with five individuals from history who were poor but tall, that someone might even be right about all five individual exceptions ("outliers") without actually having a valid challenge to the researchers' finding. 

I'm sorry for some comments that I made earlier in the thread. I assumed this was almost universally known and wrote some careless things.


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## Nereffid (Feb 6, 2013)

science said:


> I guess I should make this clear. The point is that if some researchers find a correlation between wealth and height, and someone says they don't believe it because they're familiar with five individuals from history who were poor but tall, that someone might even be right about all five individual exceptions ("outliers") without actually having a valid challenge to the researchers' finding.
> 
> I'm sorry for some comments that I made earlier in the thread. I assumed this was almost universally known and wrote some careless things.


Hey, just because you're called "science" doesn't mean you can use ACTUAL SCIENCE here! :devil:


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

KenOC said:


> Of course the study was about listeners, not composers.


According to your OP, the term was 'more musical,' which implies a musicality which could be defined either way, as listener or creator. Besides, how can one compose without perception of music? It would seem that 'composing' is a sub-category of 'musicality.'


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

KenOC said:


> 45 posts in less than 3 hours, in response to a pretty dumb article in the Guardian. Seems a sensitive nerve was poked.


You underestimate yourself. We all know our answers; we just like to play semantics with you.


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

Nereffid said:


> Hey, just because you're called "science" doesn't mean you can use ACTUAL SCIENCE here! :devil:


I wonder if I can change my screen name to "irony."


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

KenOC said:


> From the Guardian: "Wealthier people are more musical, report suggests."
> 
> Yes folks, it's true. There's a musicality gap. "Interestingly, it was the categories that seemed more objective such as 'melodic memory' and 'beat perception' that showed the strongest statistical correlation with wealth."


Don't say that in Baltimore.


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## apricissimus (May 15, 2013)

KenOC said:


> 45 posts in less than 3 hours, in response to a pretty dumb article in the Guardian. Seems a sensitive nerve was poked.


Congrats. Job well done.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

MacLeod said:


> I see you've decided to persist in posting explicitly political diatribes (albeit quite mild). This puts posters holding different political views in a difficult position: to reply in kind, thereby perpetuating the breaking of TC rules; or to refrain from replying and allowing your views to go unchallenged.
> 
> Suffice to say that your step from the alleged hypocrisy of an individual to a generalisation about those of a particular political persuasion is a misstep.


Sorry, but I've seen this sort of thing too often! The problem is that these are observed facts not my views.


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## arpeggio (Oct 4, 2012)

NO.....................................


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## Orfeo (Nov 14, 2013)

Are wealthy people more musical?

Not necessarily. There are plenty of examples of non-wealthy people who were very musical (Classical and World Music), depending on your definition of the level of musicality. For instances, look at Russia (then the Soviet Union) or Great Britain and Ireland. Look at Central & East Europe and even Scandinavian countries, where many highly gifted musicians came from poor or middle-class backgrounds (and in many instances, stuck in either of those economic strata). Look at Jamaica and the Americas, with people like Marley, Coltrane, Alton Ellis, La Lupe, Tupac singing/performing various genres such as Reggae, Jazz, Calypso, Hip Hop, Latin American (like boleros, guarachas, Latin soul, and so forth). In poor countries, music, for so many aspiring artists, has been a ticket to get out of poverty (or out of the ghetto if you will). That has been the case for a long time and remains as such today.


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## jim prideaux (May 30, 2013)

DavidA said:


> Of course the Guardian is a pseudo left wing paper beloved by the PC. What it wouldn't say is that (as a general rule) people who are meritocratically wealthier tend to be more intelligent and care more for things like education for their kids. Now in the UK it used to be possible for the working class kid to rise above their background through the grammar school. Now such places have been abandoned in favour of the largely failed comprehensive schools - which give all kids the same, mediocre (and often poor) education - it is far more difficult. In fact, comprehensives have had the effect of increasing the gap between rich and poor kids' education by encouraging the rich to send their kids to fee paying schools in search of decent educational standards.


well! thanks for that judgement about my entire working life-spent in a comprehensive school-where did you acquire such perceptive insights?-oh and another thing, this was a thread about an article in the Guardian regarding musical creativity-so how come you just high jacked it for your own purposes?


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## Guest (Mar 7, 2014)

DavidA said:


> Sorry, but I've seen this sort of thing too often! The problem is that these are observed facts not my views.


So you can cite "observed facts" about people you have known (and judged). So can we all. I can make observations about you and your behaviour here, but I'm not about to make sweeping generalisations about, say, people called David, or people who don't hold left wing views.


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## Blake (Nov 6, 2013)

Of course, we all know money buys everything… amirite?


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

Many of our greatest composers came from humble, even poor roots. It's all genetic.


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## Bulldog (Nov 21, 2013)

The only assumption I make about wealthy people is that they have lots of money and net worth.


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

The only things I know about wealthy people is what I read in the tabloids.


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## Sudonim (Feb 28, 2013)

DavidA said:


> Sorry, but I've seen this sort of thing too often! The problem is that these are observed facts not my views.


The conclusions you draw from these "observed facts" are your views. There's an old Internet saying: _The plural of 'anecdote' is not 'data.'_ Science has already pointed out this error to you, above.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Sudonim said:


> _The plural of 'anecdote' is not 'data.'_


I had never seen or heard that before. It's one to remember! :tiphat:


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## aleazk (Sep 30, 2011)

Newspapers love these kind of statistical surveys... basically because they can add the label "science" to whatever sensationalist title they make with them.

In this case, the subject of study is a very volatile concept, "musicality"... that's enough for me for not consuming it... :tiphat:


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## Guest (Mar 7, 2014)

I would be interested to hear from anyone who has bothered to take a look at the link to the original study as given in post #56, and if so how far they managed to get in wading through the various pages of statistical analysis. 

If there is anyone, could they kindly comment on whether the various measures of musical knowledge which were constructed are sensible and well constructed? What about the suitability of the various econometric models that were constructed? Are they suitably designed to explain the regional differences in musical knowledge in terms of variations in income, education and other types of socio-economic phenomena? Do they think that the testing procedures were robust and that the best possible results were obtained? Are the overall results sufficiently reliable to be able to assert confidently that musical knowledge is positively related to income and wealth?

I'm sure there must be someone who is dying to spill the beans on all this.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Sudonim said:


> The conclusions you draw from these "observed facts" are your views. There's an old Internet saying: _The plural of 'anecdote' is not 'data.'_ Science has already pointed out this error to you, above.


Sorry, they are facts I have observed. History! Left wingers who preached comprehensivisation for everyone else sending their kids to fee paying schools! We observed it! Not imagined. Observed!
Whether they were justified in doing so or a bunch of hypocrites is up to the observer to decide.
You can point out my perceived 'errors' all you like but it does not alter my observations.

As to 'sweeping generalisations' I don't believe I made any. I just gave you my observations.


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

One's observed facts are anecdotal; far from being a comprehensive trend. The sample is not large enough to draw a significant statistical conclusion.

In my community, all the women are driving convertibles; no men. Can I assume then that all purchasers of convertibles in the USA are women?


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Partita said:


> If there is anyone, could they kindly comment on whether the various measures of musical knowledge which were constructed are sensible and well constructed? What about the suitability of the various econometric models that were constructed? (etc.)


I have not and will not spend the time to read the actual study. I have done so in the past a couple of times (the Guardian seems to report on a lot of these), and the research designs in both cases were, to a greater or lesser degree, garbage. Purely anecdotal evidence and a tiny sample size, but I will happily infer a generality from it! :lol:


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## Guest (Mar 7, 2014)

hpowders said:


> Common sense. Find the study that proves the correlation.


I won't respond to everything here, because I know people crave equality and thus get all sensitive about it.

But come how, P. Howders, are we really doing the "I'm right until you prove me wrong." Argument? Let's switch gears to a solid Atheism/Theism discussion if that's the way you want to go. :lol:


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## mmsbls (Mar 6, 2011)

As others have said, I too expect that very few people here read the actual paper. Admittedly the paper includes fairly detailed statistical analysis that most here would find immensely boring.

First, the paper title is _The Musicality of Non-Musicians: An Index for Assessing Musical Sophistication in the General Population_. The authors research is _not_ focused on professional musicians. So the conclusions of this paper are not relevant to great composers, performing musicians, or other famous musicians.



hpowders said:


> Common sense. Find the study that proves the correlation. Then, tell it to the 4 boys from Liverpool or JS Bach; or LV Beethoven; or WA Mozart; or F Schubert.


KenOC did that on the first post (sort of, see below). Of course, I assume you mean demonstrates rather than proves. Anyway the paper very explicitly showed a correlation between wealth and _certain measures_ of musicality. Also my point above shows why this paper has little to do with composers.

One real issue here is the definition of musicality. The paper defined 3 parameters that are related to musicality - beat perception, melody memory, and a complex, self-reported construct called musical sophistication. I doubt anyone here really thinks that the first two have much to do with high levels of musicality. Even if they did, the paper determined that wealth has a much smaller correlation with them than musical training does. Musical sophistication may have more to do with what we think is high levels of musicality.

Another issue is the use of postcodes (neighborhoods) to determine the wealth of individuals. As the authors point out, the postcodes are the present addresses and tell us nothing about where the participants lived throughout their lives. They may have grown up in a poor neighborhood, lived in a middle class neighborhood, and recently moved to a rich neighborhood.

There are other considerations that make the simple correlation between the 3 musical parameters and wealth difficult to clearly explain, but correlation says nothing about causation.

There is one set of results that I find quite interesting from the paper:

Increased beat perception is positively correlated with lower age while increased melody perception is positively correlated with higher age. The authors have little idea why that might be true.


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

Not focusing on great composers, many of whom came from humble backgrounds. Sounds like statistical manipulation to me.


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## mmsbls (Mar 6, 2011)

hpowders said:


> Not focusing on great composers, many of whom came from humble backgrounds. Sounds like statistical manipulation to me.


How many of the 147,633 participants in the study do you think are composers much less great composers? There simply are not enough composers to effect the results no matter what the authors did with them.

The point is that the authors are _explicitly not_ interested in the musicality of professional musicians so they used participants who come from the general population.


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## Guest (Mar 7, 2014)

When a statistic implies "more often" or "more likely", a few exceptions can exist without making the statistic wrong, hpowders.


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## Freischutz (Mar 6, 2014)

mmsbls said:


> Increased beat perception is positively correlated with lower age while increased melody perception is positively correlated with higher age. The authors have little idea why that might be true.


I'm not certain, but it's quite possible that this is a linguistic phenomenon in the sense that beat perception is absolutely vital during developmental years for children to acquire language in a way that pitch (and therefore melody) perception is not (pitch is still important, most particularly in tonal languages, but beat perception establishes itself earlier and is more fundamental to all languages, not just tonal ones). But then, like many cognitive functions, our acuity with beat perception diminishes quite rapidly, leaving melody perception to take precedence as a longer term mental ability.


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## aleazk (Sep 30, 2011)

mmsbls: :tiphat:


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## Guest (Mar 7, 2014)

KenOC said:


> I have not and will not spend the time to read the actual study. I have done so in the past a couple of times (the Guardian seems to report on a lot of these), and the research designs in both cases were, to a greater or lesser degree, garbage. Purely anecdotal evidence and a tiny sample size, but I will happily infer a generality from it! :lol:


I know that. I was only pulling a few legs, and didn't expect anyone to come forward saying they have read it in detail.

I tried to wade though it but I didn't have the time to do it justice. The study is a nightmare of complexity, far more so than I was expecting. I'm used to wading through material like this, but I got quickly bogged down in a good deal of sophisticated hypothesis testing procedures.

The fact is that the number of "observations" in respect of regions is very low at 7. This is the key step where they line up each of the measures of musical knowledge against the regional data for income etc, and carry out a maximum likelihood estimation of the linkages based on the 7 sets of matching data. A total of only 7 matchings leaves a lot to be desired, and makes the estimates so much less reliable than if it were possible to have a much higher number of regional matchings based on smaller geographical areas.

Some of the data on the location of individuals could be wrong because it's picking up students away from home and some overseas students. For some of the musical knowledge statistics there was a poor fit against the postulated determinants, and this is probably due to factors like a greater traditional musical interest in some regions independent of income and education, e.g. in Wales regarding the long existence of Chapel choirs etc. These factors were not allowed for in the basic model, and to this extent it was mis-specified.

Despite this, the broad shape of the results doesn't surprise me. I can well accept, a priori, that musical knowledge is likely to be positively related to income levels. When I get time, I might have another attempt to read through it more thoroughly.


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## Ukko (Jun 4, 2010)

(DavidA and response)
Off Topic! Off Topic! [siren sounds]


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## Haydn man (Jan 25, 2014)

Couchie said:


> Wealthy people have more money than poor people.


I have noticed that's one of the main differences


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## Sudonim (Feb 28, 2013)

DavidA said:


> Sorry, they are facts I have observed. History! Left wingers who preached comprehensivisation for everyone else sending their kids to fee paying schools! We observed it! Not imagined. Observed!
> Whether they were justified in doing so or a bunch of hypocrites is up to the observer to decide.
> You can point out my perceived 'errors' all you like but it does not alter my observations.
> 
> As to 'sweeping generalisations' I don't believe I made any. I just gave you my observations.


Here's one sweeping generalization I'll make: British right-wingers are depressingly similar to their American counterparts.


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## mmsbls (Mar 6, 2011)

Partita said:


> I tried to wade though it but I didn't have the time to do it justice. The study is a nightmare of complexity, far more so than I was expecting. I'm used to wading through material like this, but I got quickly bogged down in a good deal of sophisticated hypothesis testing procedures.


I will simply say, "Amen."


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## mmsbls (Mar 6, 2011)

Ukko said:


> (DavidA and response)
> Off Topic! Off Topic! [siren sounds]


I will also say "Amen" to this bit of wisdom.

Please remain on the topic of the Guardian article and away from political topics not relevant to the thread.


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## aleazk (Sep 30, 2011)

Partita said:


> I tried to wade though it but I didn't have the time to do it justice. The study is a nightmare of complexity, far more so than I was expecting. I'm used to wading through material like this, but I got quickly bogged down in a good deal of sophisticated hypothesis testing procedures.


I too read these kind of things quite often. I have very little interest in statistical methods, if you ask me, I'm not in the experimental crowd. But it took me just a minute to jump to the definitions sections, which are really the important part for the interpretations. And after reading the aforementioned definitions, it took me only another minute to lose any interest in this thing...


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

Sudonim said:


> Here's one sweeping generalization I'll make: British right-wingers are depressingly similar to their American counterparts.


Good! I would like to meet them! We can watch Fox News together.
We really are not so bad, you know.


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

mmsbls said:


> How many of the 147,633 participants in the study do you think are composers much less great composers? There simply are not enough composers to effect the results no matter what the authors did with them.
> 
> The point is that the authors are _explicitly not_ interested in the musicality of professional musicians so they used participants who come from the general population.


My point is many great composers came from impoverished backgrounds where just being born was a big deal back in the 18th and 19th centuries. Musical talent is all in the genes. Money and class have little or nothing to do with it. Some of Beethoven's rich pupils couldn't play the pianoforte for crap; yet look at his background. The family had to use the "van" to get respect. He wasn't fooling anybody into thinking he was an aristocrat by blood. Came from a family of musicians. All in the genes.

I can't take such a study seriously when the authors leave out an important segment of keenly musical folks who came from humble backgrounds.

Whoever has come from a wealthy background and has found that rare, amazing teacher who could teach their lil' darlings musical talent, please let me know.


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## mmsbls (Mar 6, 2011)

hpowders said:


> My point is many great composers came from impoverished backgrounds where just being born was a big deal back in the 18th and 19th centuries. Musical talent is all in the genes. Some of Beethoven's rich pupils couldn't play the pianoforte for crap; yet look at his background. Had to use the "VON" to get respect. He wasn't fooling anybody into thinking he was an aristocrat by blood, but man, did he have the talent!


I understand what you are saying, but the paper says nothing whatsoever about the likelihood of composers coming from rich or poor backgrounds. It makes statements about wealth and certain particular musical traits measured in the population at large. Present wealth seems slightly positively correlated with certain specific musical traits. Presumably good composers require much more than those specific traits. Remember musical training affects those traits much more than wealth does. And good composers probably have other more important traits that allow them to excel in music.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

hpowders said:


> My point is many great composers came from impoverished backgrounds where just being born was a big deal back in the 18th and 19th centuries. Musical talent is all in the genes. Money and class have little or nothing to do with it. Some of Beethoven's rich pupils couldn't play the pianoforte for crap; yet look at his background. Had to use the "VON" to get respect. He wasn't fooling anybody into thinking he was an aristocrat by blood, but man, did he have the talent!


Actually Beethoven's family was pretty solidly middle-class. Too bad his father was a fish, which reduced their circumstances. Yes, he had plenty of talent, but he got a nice royal subsidy to live and study with the best in Vienna, which cost plenty (and his progress was critically overseen by the Elector of Bonn as a result).

In those days, talent wasn't enough; composing was recognized as a deep and difficult craft. It wasn't for nothing that the best and most serious music was spoken of as "learned." When Beethoven spoke of his own status as a composer, he always spoke as a master craftsman, not some wild-haired uber-talented genius.

BTW the family name had been "van" as far back as anybody knows, certainly through Ludwig's grandfather, Lodewijk van Beethoven, himself a respected musician from Belgium who became Kapellmeister to the Elector of Cologne. Nothing to do with getting respect, just part of the name.


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

Yeah. He got subsidized after his talent was recognized. He left school at what, 11? Not exactly the aristocratic pathway. He could have just as easily died during childbirth.


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

mmsbls said:


> I understand what you are saying, but the paper says nothing whatsoever about the likelihood of composers coming from rich or poor backgrounds. It makes statements about wealth and certain particular musical traits measured in the population at large. Present wealth seems slightly positively correlated with certain specific musical traits. Presumably good composers require much more than those specific traits. Remember musical training affects those traits much more than wealth does. And good composers probably have other more important traits that allow them to excel in music.


I guess I don't see the point of such a study. To me, it's simply a waste of time.

"Slightly positively correlated" reminds me of those worthless and disgracefully dishonest antidepressant studies conceived by the drug companies in an attempt to skew the data to demonstrate that their pills are better at curing depression than placebo, when they are not.


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## BurningDesire (Jul 15, 2012)

KenOC said:


> Again, the study was about listeners, not musically creative people.


Well being a listener doesn't make you musical XD


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## BurningDesire (Jul 15, 2012)

SiegendesLicht said:


> Why would it give music a funny taste? Why would someone who loves music for its sake even care who else, apart from him, loves it, whether rich people or poor people (as long as they are not part of some criminal subculture), unless he only looks for the approval of the "correct" social group?


Why would you care if criminals like the same music as you? (and plenty like classical) XD


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## Freischutz (Mar 6, 2014)

hpowders said:


> Musical talent is all in the genes.


It's one thing to say that this study was rubbish, but this statement is a bold and extraordinary claim in its own right that requires substantial evidence. It can't be deduced from anecdotal observations about composers like it's an obvious bit of logic. Biology is complicated and, most often, when someone says something is "all in the genes", that usually means they're under-qualified to talk about genetics (and I say "usually" very pointedly because I want to presume as little as possible about your education). Very few aspects of human behaviour are totally pre-determined by genes and musical ability is so amazingly complex as to make that connection practically impossible. Of course there's a genetic component, but it isn't everything or even nearly everything.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

BurningDesire said:


> Why would you care if criminals like the same music as you? (and plenty like classical) XD


Quite so. If memory serves, Ernst Stavro Blofeld, possibly the greatest criminal since Moriarty, is an insatiable Mozart fanboy. Moriarty, of course, preferred Brahms, but only the chamber music.


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## Morimur (Jan 23, 2014)

BurningDesire said:


> Why would you care if criminals like the same music as you? (and plenty like classical) XD


I walked into a Starbucks today, snached up a thick wad of napkins and didn't buy a thing! I know I am bad but I do love them classics! :devil:


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## mmsbls (Mar 6, 2011)

hpowders said:


> I guess I don't see the point of such a study. To me, it's simply a waste of time.


There have been 125 posts on this thread, and no one has discussed the main purpose of the study. Pretty much everyone has responded to the wealth correlation part which is a very minor aspect and not the main focus. Even though I read the paper, I don't consider myself remotely knowledgeable enough in this area to understand the value of this research and whether it is a waste of time.

Did you read the paper itself? If so, do you feel you understood it?


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

mmsbls said:


> There have been 125 posts on this thread, and no one has discussed the main purpose of the study. Pretty much everyone has responded to the wealth correlation part which is a very minor aspect and not the main focus. Even though I read the paper, I don't consider myself remotely knowledgeable enough in this area to understand the value of this research and whether it is a waste of time.
> 
> Did you read the paper itself? If so, do you feel you understood it?


No I haven't. I'm wary of these kinds of studies.


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

Vesuvius said:


> Of course, we all know money buys everything… amirite?


Oh, no, absolutely not. Rich people get a lot of things for free.


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

hpowders said:


> No I haven't. I'm wary of these kinds of studies.


AFAICT, you're just rejecting it because you don't like its conclusions.

That's fine in a way; that sort of dislike is a legitimate part of the scientific process because it inspires other researchers to do their own studies, sometimes designed more carefully, and often things turn out to be a bit different than the original study showed. It can take a long time for people to sort it all out, especially with something complex like human behavior.

So hang out, wait a year or two and see if any studies come out that offer you some solace.

But don't reject the entire idea of studying stuff just for a romantic idea about Beethoven overcoming poverty. And also, stop acting like a few outliers means that no correlation exists. Just say something like, "I want to see more studies because the findings surprise me and I'm skeptical." That's perfectly legitimate and you may turn out to be right.


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

I've seen enough corrupt studies in my time manipulated to produce the desired outcome. I'm skeptical.
I may be wrong, but I'm still wary.

I do realize your heart is in the right place, but after seeing first hand how studies can be constructed to produce any desired outcome one wishes, I would say I'm the wrong guy to present with a study on anything. Just the word "study" has me reaching for the Prilosec.

I'll simply leave it to the rest of you to debate the study's findings.


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

hpowders said:


> Thanks by the way for telling me word for word what I should have said.


Hey, my pleasure. PM me any time you're not sure. To the best of my knowledge, I'm usually right, and I promise not to mislead you intentionally, so if you repeat what I tell you, you'll usually be right to the best of my knowledge too.


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

science said:


> Hey, my pleasure. PM me any time you're not sure. To the best of my knowledge, I'm usually right, and I promise not to mislead you intentionally, so if you repeat what I tell you, you'll usually be right to the best of my knowledge too.


I hate looking down at a piece of paper when I'm talking to someone though, and memorizing it would sound stiff. I'm no Richard Burton. 

Wish I had access to a teleprompter, but I'm not that famous to deserve one.


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## Blancrocher (Jul 6, 2013)

I'm encouraged by the study--I infer from it that all of us here on TC are millionaires or will be soon, given our impressive musicality.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Blancrocher said:


> I'm encouraged by the study--I infer from it that all of us here on TC are millionaires or will be soon, given our impressive musicality.


Yes, certainly better to be a musical listener than a classical music composer.

Q: What's the difference between a composer and an extra-large pizza?
A: The pizza can feed a family of four.


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## Blancrocher (Jul 6, 2013)

KenOC said:


> Yes, certainly better to be a musical listener than a classical music composer.
> 
> Q: What's the difference between a composer and an extra-large pizza?
> A: The pizza can feed a family of four.


True--though that's only because musical listeners all use Youtube these days.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

mmsbls said:


> As others have said, I too expect that very few people here read the actual paper.


As the paper is the Guardian, that at least proves people here have good sense!


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## Guest (Mar 8, 2014)

DavidA said:


> As the paper is the Guardian, that at least proves people here have good sense!


That'll be a joke, eh? How is your sniping any more acceptable than someone posting that those who don't listen to Wagner/Mozart/Merzbow have good sense?

[Edit: Of course, for anyone not quite following, the "paper" referred to was actually the research paper, not The Guardian].


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## dgee (Sep 26, 2013)

DavidA said:


> As the paper is the Guardian, that at least proves people here have good sense!


I expect David is an avid commenter at the Mail online


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## Haydn man (Jan 25, 2014)

Freischutz said:


> It's one thing to say that this study was rubbish, but this statement is a bold and extraordinary claim in its own right that requires substantial evidence. It can't be deduced from anecdotal observations about composers like it's an obvious bit of logic. Biology is complicated and, most often, when someone says something is "all in the genes", that usually means they're under-qualified to talk about genetics (and I say "usually" very pointedly because I want to presume as little as possible about your education). Very few aspects of human behaviour are totally pre-determined by genes and musical ability is so amazingly complex as to make that connection practically impossible. Of course there's a genetic component, but it isn't everything or even nearly everything.


That's interesting and of course goes back to the old Nature versus Nurture argument
In some cases the genes play a big part where child prodigies are concerned e.g Mozart or Tiger Woods
I do know from sport studies (which I think has many similarities with music) that what often separates the gifted from the very good is the ability to see a bigger picture/ more options in any given situation. This had not been coached into them and seems to be an inbuilt ability. 
Sure hard work and dedication help but the right genes may play a very large part in what separates genius from the rest. And probably helps to explain why there are so few truly great composers or sportsmen and hence their fame and longevity in history.


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## TurnaboutVox (Sep 22, 2013)

DavidA said:


> Now in the UK it used to be possible for the working class kid to rise above their background through the grammar school. Now such places have been abandoned in favour of the largely failed comprehensive schools - which give all kids the same, mediocre (and often poor) education - it is far more difficult. In fact, comprehensives have had the effect of increasing the gap between rich and poor kids' education by encouraging the rich to send their kids to fee paying schools in search of decent educational standards.


You have never had a comprehensive education system in England, I don't think, unlike some parts of Scotland. Your middle class children have always been creamed off by selective schools. I was utterly shocked by how class riven the education system in England was on moving here. Almost all my (professional, middle class) colleagues had their children at fee-paying schools. I wouldn't say this was unknown in the part of Scotland in which I grew up, but it was rather more unusual.

In my own country, my profession had a sprinkling of working-class entrants and professionals - not something one sees much of in England. Maybe this is a consequence (in part) of education policy and practice?



DavidA said:


> Of course the Guardian is a pseudo left wing paper beloved by the PC.


Your evidence for this is...?



DavidA said:


> What it wouldn't say is that (as a general rule) people who are meritocratically wealthier tend to be more intelligent and care more for things like education for their kids.


Things like that do get said in The Guardian, but that doesn't make such views any less questionable. People who are wealthy tend to see themselves as 'meriting' it.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

dgee said:


> I expect David is an avid commenter at the Mail online


Now the Mail is an absolute right wing rag. But at least it makes no pretensions to be anything but!


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

TurnaboutVox said:


> You have never had a comprehensive education system in England, I don't think, unlike some parts of Scotland. Your middle class children have always been creamed off by selective schools. I was utterly shocked by how class riven the education system in England was on moving here. Almost all my (professional, middle class) colleagues had their children at fee-paying schools. I wouldn't say this was unknown in the part of Scotland in which I grew up, but it was rather more unusual.
> 
> Your evidence for this is...?
> 
> Things like that do get said in The Guardian, but that doesn't make such views any less questionable. People who are wealthy tend to see themselves as 'meriting' it.


Your first point is wrong. The better off middle class children are creamed off by fee paying schools. My own children went to the local comprehensive. It's their experience which makes me cynical about the system.

Just read the Guardian and you will see - it is quite obvious. Unless you're one of the middle class PC types who read it!

People who are wealthy these days often too merit it as they have made it. I haven't but I don't envy those who have.


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## TurnaboutVox (Sep 22, 2013)

DavidA said:


> Your first point is wrong. The better off middle class children are creamed off by fee paying schools. My own children went to the local comprehensive. It's their experience which makes me cynical about the system.


In the area in which I reside, Faith schools cream off the middle class children of parents who can't or don't care to pay. Trust me - I grew up in a nearly comprehensive system; almost every child in the community went to a non-selective state school. I have seen nothing remotely like it in England.



DavidA said:


> Just read the Guardian and you will see - it is quite obvious.


I have been reading it for 40 years! One of the things I like about it is its breadth and diversity of opinion.



DavidA said:


> Unless you're one of the middle class PC types who read it!


  Your prejudice, I think...



DavidA said:


> People who are wealthy these days often too merit it as they have made it. I haven't but I don't envy those who have.


 People who are successful often have many advantages in life, not least relatively stable and successful parents or families. The comprehensive system was an attempt to provide some redress for children (we were all children once) who did not have those advantages.


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## MagneticGhost (Apr 7, 2013)

Has anyone mentioned Maslow's hierarchy of need in relation to this yet?

The British education system was brilliant in the 80's in Bedfordshire. Free music tuition for everyone. Extensive peripatetic network, Saturday music schools. four youth orchestras, wind bands, choirs etc

The free part disappeared through the 80's, early 90's. Presumably to fund tax cuts and bonuses.


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## Guest (Mar 8, 2014)

TurnaboutVox said:


> You have never had a comprehensive education system in England, I don't think, unlike some parts of Scotland.


I'm not quite sure what you mean...although there are a few local authorities that operate a selective system, they are in the minority. Most operate a comprehensive system, although inevitably, how well this works depends on the local distribution of independent schools.

I moved away from a selective system and put my sons in a comp.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

TurnaboutVox said:


> In the area in which I reside, Faith schools cream off the middle class children of parents who can't or don't care to pay. Trust me - I grew up in a nearly comprehensive system; almost every child in the community went to a non-selective state school. I have seen nothing remotely like it in England.
> 
> I have been reading it for 40 years! One of the things I like about it is its breadth and diversity of opinion.
> 
> ...


And why do parents - even those who have no personal faith of their own - want to send their kids to the faith schools rather than comprehensives? That is the question the failing system should be asking.

Guardian readers believe it has breath and diversity of opinion. Others of us beg to differ.

Oh yes! It's that other people are prejudiced, of course!

But the comprehensive system has failed to deliver its objectives. Now all kids share the disadvantages of poor education. Unless, of course, the parents can go outside the state system.


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## TurnaboutVox (Sep 22, 2013)

> _Originally Posted by TurnaboutVox
> You have never had a comprehensive education system in England, I don't think, unlike some parts of Scotland._





MacLeod said:


> I'm not quite sure what you mean...although there are a few local authorities that operate a selective system, they are in the minority.


Sorry, I meant to write 'fully comprehensive'. and yes, I meant, because of the relative importance of independent and faith schools, not to say selective state schools in some local authorities.


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## TurnaboutVox (Sep 22, 2013)

DavidA said:


> Oh yes! It's that other people are prejudiced, of course!


You might recognise the mote in your own eye on this occasion!



DavidA said:


> But the comprehensive system has failed to deliver its objectives. Now all kids share the disadvantages of poor education. Unless, of course, the parents can go outside the state system.


It didn't fail in my community.

My view is that it has been undermined by the seduction away from it of aspiring parents. And, as you are aware, I am also arguing that no such 'comprehensive' system was ever in place in much of the UK - exactly because it was never comprehensive in the sense that all pupils regardless of wealth and ability used it.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

TurnaboutVox said:


> You might recognise the mote in your own eye on this occasion!
> 
> It didn't fail in my community.
> 
> My view is that it has been sabotaged by the seduction away from it of aspiring parents. And, as you are aware, I am also arguing that no such 'comprehensive' system was ever in place in much of the UK - exactly because it was never comprehensive in the sense that all pupils regardless of wealth and ability used it.


Sorry but this is not good reasoning. Your view is that when something is a failure it has been sabotaged. The other view is that people have rejected it because because it is no good. In any case the worth of a school system should not depend on whether a minority wealthy parents and their children to it. The fact is that the vast majority of people in the UK send their kids to comprehensive schools as there is no choice. With such a huge majority of people sending their kids to this the schools they should be a wild success. But they are, on the whole, a failure. If they were such a wild success then people would forego feepaying schools for the comprehensives.


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## Andreas (Apr 27, 2012)

Lope de Aguirre said:


> I walked into a Starbucks today, snached up a thick wad of napkins and didn't buy a thing! I know I am bad but I do love them classics! :devil:


I think Starbucks, somehow, probably even made a profit out of that.


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## Freischutz (Mar 6, 2014)

DavidA said:


> Sorry but this is not good reasoning. Your view is that when something is a failure it has been sabotaged. The other view is that people have rejected it because because it is no good. In any case the worth of a school system should not depend on whether a minority wealthy parents and their children to it. The fact is that the vast majority of people in the UK send their kids to comprehensive schools as there is no choice. With such a huge majority of people sending their kids to this the schools they should be a wild success. But they are, on the whole, a failure. If they were such a wild success then people would forego feepaying schools for the comprehensives.


How do you measure success? Let's remember first of all that compulsory education is less than 150 years old, and we're talking about an incredibly complex social system that was never destined to be _perfect_ in a short space of time. I would say that, despite all its failings - of which I agree there are some - the standard of education achieved in comprehensives today is _far_ better than it was a century ago, and therefore far better than at any time in our history. That is a success. It is also a tremendous success that the UK's literacy rate, like many countries, is at 99% for the first time in history, it having previously been much, much lower, but these are the kinds of facts that over-privileged people take for granted. But don't you forget that there was once a time not too long ago when barely anyone on this forum would have been taught to read and it is thanks to the education system that we can.

What this really comes down to is not that the comprehensive system is intrinsically bad, but that it is not as good as private or selective schooling. That really should not be surprising given that you're comparing comprehensives to 1) schools that have more funding (an obvious imbalance) and 2) schools that are constructed to skew their results towards the higher end of the curve. This is the very antithesis of a level playing field, so comparing comprehensives to these alternatives and declaring it the loser is totally disingenuous.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Freischutz said:


> How do you measure success? Let's remember first of all that compulsory education is less than 150 years old, and we're talking about an incredibly complex social system that was never destined to be _perfect_ in a short space of time. I would say that, despite all its failings - of which I agree there are some - the standard of education achieved in comprehensives today is _far_ better than it was a century ago, and therefore far better than at any time in our history. That is a success. It is also a tremendous success that the UK's literacy rate, like many countries, is at 99% for the first time in history, it having previously been much, much lower, but these are the kinds of facts that over-privileged people take for granted. But don't you forget that there was once a time not too long ago when barely anyone on this forum would have been taught to read and it is thanks to the education system that we can.
> 
> What this really comes down to is not that the comprehensive system is intrinsically bad, but that it is not as good as private or selective schooling. That really should not be surprising given that you're comparing comprehensives to 1) schools that have more funding (an obvious imbalance) and 2) schools that are constructed to skew their results towards the higher end of the curve. This is the very antithesis of a level playing field, so comparing comprehensives to these alternatives and declaring it the loser is totally disingenuous.


Actually I was not comparing comprehensives to feepaying schools. I was nearly replying to the charge that the private sector has somehow sabotaged the comprehensive schools. I rather feel that it is the comprehensive system that has failed kids and as an excuse it's advocates blame the private sector rather than the system they have created.


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## TurnaboutVox (Sep 22, 2013)

DavidA said:


> Sorry but this is not good reasoning. Your view is that when something is a failure it has been sabotaged. The other view is that people have rejected it because because it is no good. In any case the worth of a school system should not depend on whether a minority wealthy parents and their children to it. The fact is that the vast majority of people in the UK send their kids to comprehensive schools as there is no choice. With such a huge majority of people sending their kids to this the schools they should be a wild success. But they are, on the whole, a failure. If they were such a wild success then people would forego feepaying schools for the comprehensives.


I don't think that where a comprehensive system has seriously been attempted, it has been a failure. You'd have to remember what came before for the majority of pupils (secondary moderns, or, a little further back, no secondary education at all - a fate suffered by my grandparents). All systems have disadvantages and advantages which are different for different users.

My view is that the comprehensive idea has been undermined (seriously) in the last 30 years - not that this is the reason for its 'failure' or otherwise.

I take your point entirely about how important it is to address the failures of a system - any system - and I'm sorry not to have addressed that aspect of your earlier posts before; but this does not necessarily imply that the system itself _cannot_ provide good outcomes.


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## TurnaboutVox (Sep 22, 2013)

DavidA said:


> Actually I was not comparing comprehensives to feepaying schools. I was nearly replying to the charge that the private sector has somehow sabotaged the comprehensive schools. I rather feel that it is the comprehensive system that has failed kids and as an excuse *it's advocates blame the private sector rather than the system they have created.*


I hope you realise that this is absolutely not what I am arguing, David.


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## Guest (Mar 9, 2014)

DavidA said:


> But the comprehensive system has failed to deliver its objectives. Now all kids share the disadvantages of poor education. Unless, of course, the parents can go outside the state system.





DavidA said:


> With such a huge majority of people sending their kids to this the schools they should be a wild success. But they are, on the whole, a failure. If they were such a wild success then people would forego feepaying schools for the comprehensives.


As Freischutz asks, how are you defining 'success'? At the very least, to support your claim that they are "on the whole, a failure" you would need to track those who attended such schools from age 11 to, say, age 40, to find out whether they have become "successful" citizens, or, in your terms, failures. For this is what you are saying: that the (majority of ?) children who've been attending comprehensives since they were established have become failures.

That's an awful lot of children to make wild and potentially insulting claims about.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Just as a side note: The LA Times a few years ago did an in-depth analysis of the Los Angeles Unified School District, the nation's largest. They rather rigorously analyzed how children improved their standardized test scores in a variety of areas under various teachers, over several school years, teacher by teacher. This had nothing to do with the *levels* of the scores, only their improvement.

Not surprisingly, some teachers showed consistent improvements in their students' scores. Others, just as consistently, did not. The paper published their results in a multi-part series, with teachers' names. There was a tremendous hue and outcry. The District stated clearly that classroom outcomes were not and would never be part of their teacher evaluation process. Nevertheless, one teacher committed suicide.

The exercise has not been repeated.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

TurnaboutVox said:


> I don't think that where a comprehensive system has seriously been attempted, it has been a failure. You'd have to remember what came before for the majority of pupils (secondary moderns, or, a little further back, no secondary education at all - a fate suffered by my grandparents). All systems have disadvantages and advantages which are different for different users.
> 
> My view is that the comprehensive idea has been undermined (seriously) in the last 30 years - not that this is the reason for its 'failure' or otherwise.
> 
> I take your point entirely about how important it is to address the failures of a system - any system - and I'm sorry not to have addressed that aspect of your earlier posts before; but this does not necessarily imply that the system itself _cannot_ provide good outcomes.


I tell you comprehensivisation has been seriously attempted here. And it is a failure.


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## Guest (Mar 9, 2014)

DavidA said:


> Actually I was not comparing comprehensives to feepaying schools. I was nearly replying to the charge that the private sector has somehow sabotaged the comprehensive schools. I rather feel that it is the comprehensive system that has failed kids and as an excuse it's advocates blame the private sector rather than the system they have created.


Do you have have any statistical evidence to back up your assertion that the pre-comprehensive school system in the UK produced better results than the system that followed it? In broad terms we are talking about the pre and post 1965 situation. I'm referring to proper, well-organised research carried out by a reputable organisation across the UK as a whole, or at least a large part of it. If you have anything in mind, I would like to see it.


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## Guest (Mar 9, 2014)

DavidA said:


> I tell you comprehensivisation has been seriously attempted here. And it is a failure.


I'm beginning to think that your baseless and repeated assertions about readers of The Guardian, left-wingers and comprehensive education are a form of trolling that should be reported. Are you going to continue in this vein, or do have something of value to say about the OP?


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## lupinix (Jan 9, 2014)

I guess I should stop composing then.


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

Heh! Heh! Typical starving artist!!


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## Svelte Silhouette (Nov 7, 2013)

TurnaboutVox said:


> You have never had a comprehensive education system in England, I don't think, unlike some parts of Scotland. Your middle class children have always been creamed off by selective schools. I was utterly shocked by how class riven the education system in England was on moving here. Almost all my (professional, middle class) colleagues had their children at fee-paying schools. I wouldn't say this was unknown in the part of Scotland in which I grew up, but it was rather more unusual. People who are wealthy tend to see themselves as 'meriting' it.


I am part of 'the Grammar School mob' so theoretically should be in support of that BUT the 'Comprehensive' system definitely 'bettered' far more ('educationally') than had been able to 'better themselves' in previous years. 'Council house' children (no offence intended) could suddenly make it to Oxbridge or a decent 'Red Brick' 'on the back of the Comprehensive system' albeit though they then had a tougher time there than the rest of us and found it difficult 'networking'. The previous 'Secondary Modern' system was where the '11+' and/or '13+' failures (in areas where this 'second bite of the cherry' examination process was practised) would have found themselves and been viewed as 'intellectual failures' at such a ridiculously early age. A few such as AMS of AMS Trading (AMSTRAD) managed to rise to success outside of education BUT that required tenacity, 'being in the right place at the right time', a lot of luck and some very hard graft. Similarly, I was a fan of Polytechnics 'running in tandem' with old and new Universities before everything from Teacher Training colleges upwards was tagged with the same label. I am not a fan of Academies BUT only time will tell on that score ...

*However, there seems to be a lot of 'politicising' going on here around education rather than a discussion about whether the wealthy are more musical or not. Obviously the wealthy have more advantages and parents from such a background will oft buy their children instruments when even the vaguest interest in one is expressed and many I know have a variety of 'redundant' keyboard, stringed and wind instruments in their homes to prove that point. Was Mozart musical ... well, a bit. Was he from a wealthy background ... well, not really. Were The Beatles musical ... well, some would say a bit. Were they from a wealthy background ... um, not even remotely. Am I musical ... no (sadly, not at all, even within a home were both parents were musical [on the keyboard and wind fronts]) but I have a few musical instruments in my closet including a couple of stringed ones. Did I come from a wealthy background ... well, some might say that BUT I couldn't possibly comment.*

I think it's a case of talent 'being in the right place at the right time' so that they get noticed OR talent 'coupled with tenacity and sheer hard graft' ... wealth helps get folk in the right place at the right time meaning that luck isn't required on that score BUT they still need talent and true talent 'will eventually find a way'.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

KenOC said:


> From the Guardian: "Wealthier people are more musical, report suggests."
> 
> Yes folks, it's true. There's a musicality gap. "Interestingly, it was the categories that seemed more objective such as 'melodic memory' and 'beat perception' that showed the strongest statistical correlation with wealth."
> 
> http://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2014/mar/05/wealthier-people-more-musical-report


As Disreali said, "There are lies, d**n lies and statistics."

This is a load of bogus research which is, to me, perfectly pointless. Innate musicality has nothing to do with income. What is important is the encouragement of musicality. My father was from a poor, working class East End background. That didn't stop him and his elder brother becoming highly talented pianists who made a living from tingling the ivories. What was important was that the home encouraged them in their music. 
As an extreme case, Cziffra was brought up in the most grinding poverty imaginable! His melodic memory and beat perception were pretty good, weren't they?
So was that of guys like Scott Joplin and Ray Charles who didn't come from backgrounds that exuded wealth. And I don't believe a certain ZGeorge Gershwin's folks were rolling in loot either!


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## Ingélou (Feb 10, 2013)

Max Jaffa in his autobiography, 'My Life on the Fiddle', describes how he grew up in a poor Jewish household in the East End of London. He began the violin at the age of six, because his father entered him for an enterprise started by his drinking cronies. The child of theirs that had the most aptitude would be given lessons paid for by clubbing up together. Max won, and for for three years was pushed by his father until he said he couldn't do it any more. His father made a tactical retreat and after a year or so, Max missed it and went back to the violin. His father used to make sure that when he came home from school, he did his homework, and then spent two hours, the rest of the evening, practising. Eventually Max went to music school, became a virtuoso, but opted to play in a hotel orchestra because he didn't like the competitive orchestral life. 
His father had no interest in music per se but saw the whole thing as an economic enterprise and after Max was grown up, expected 'pay-back'. 

I agree with those posters who say that it's not that the wealthy have special musical gifts - it's all about support & the general culture and educational opportunity.


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## Taggart (Feb 14, 2013)

DavidA said:


> And I don't believe a certain George Gershwin's folks were rolling in loot either!


True, but they did buy Ira a piano. Although the piano was bought for Ira, it was George who took it up and persevered. George was earning around $800 a year at age 15 which was similar to the salary of a county preacher. The family obviously had talent - Ira wrote lyrics, Frances danced, even Arthur composed.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

DavidA said:


> This is a load of bogus research which is, to me, perfectly pointless.


Might be interesting to hear why you believe it's bogus. Simply disliking the study's conclusions doesn't seem to justify such a statement.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Taggart said:


> True, but they did buy Ira a piano. Although the piano was bought for Ira, it was George who took it up and persevered. George was earning around $800 a year at age 15 which was similar to the salary of a county preacher. The family obviously had talent - Ira wrote lyrics, Frances danced, even Arthur composed.


Yes, it's encouragement not wealth that's important.


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

Talent helps a wee bit though.


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## Guest (Mar 9, 2014)

DavidA said:


> Innate musicality has nothing to do with income.


Except that as the Guardian article makes clear, the research does not show a causation, only a statistical correlation. The research _may _be pointless, but I fail to see how it is bogus.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

MacLeod said:


> Except that as the Guardian article makes clear, the research does not show a causation, only a statistical correlation.


Just so. It found (or claimed to have found) a relationship between wealth and the ability to appreciate certain technical aspects of music. It did not address the "why" question, nature versus nurture, or anything like that.


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