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We "The British" didn't build Stonehenge, the Bronze Age wasn't something Stone Aged Britons ascended into, it was immigrants with better skills (or more specifically weapons).
So it's not so much that they refused to adopt this new technology, they just got bludgeoned over the head with it
Turns out there was a Stone Age tribe just like that:
😆
"you'd often find a Fiesta in a hedge".
My mate Tony Fisher did reverse his mum's 1.2L Fiesta into a hedge in 1982.
"you'd often find a Fiesta in a hedge".
My mate Tony Fisher did reverse his mum's 1.2L Fiesta into a hedge in 1982.
One for the readers drives section.
I dont know if this is for real , or a made up internet fact but.- Apparently kids cant tell the time on an analogue ( dial ) face clock or wris****ch. They have become used to carrying a phone with the clock on the front screen in numbers that wearing a watch is unnecessary. Which is really sad if true. Theres probably loads of things that children / Teens cant do that was commonplace 30 years ago.
Changing a car tyre
Sharpening a a knife with a steel
Taking apart a bike and cleaning each componant and putting it back together
Coaxing a lawnmower into life ( whats easy start ? )
Knots and their specific uses
Lighting fires , unless it involves petrol , a mob and the police
Understanding depth of field and basic photography techniques.
Get ready for the replies that flood in from at least one person saying my 3 year old can do all those...
That's because birds are lactose intolerant and homogenised milk made them stop. They only wanted the cream!
Really
Yes, when did you last seen a bird with boobs!
Herding cattle down the road - on a bike carrying a stick. And having the skillz to avoid cattle that decides to cough and Sh*t at the same time.
I dont know if this is for real , or a made up internet fact but.- Apparently kids cant tell the time on an analogue ( dial ) face clock or wris****ch. They have become used to carrying a phone with the clock on the front screen in numbers that wearing a watch is unnecessary. Which is really sad if true.
I'm 46 and my watch is sat in its box on a shelf because I find it completely redundant when I have a phone with me.
I guess horses as a mode of everyday transport is one of the largest changes in what is still just about a lifetime. Go back to just pre-WW2 and this would've been routine still. Deliveries, mining, farming, even the railways just about everything. in the 1930's probably every adult would've been able to ride a horse, certainly nearly every man. Now it's probs less than one in a thousand? Perhaps even more
I dont know if this is for real , or a made up internet fact but.- Apparently kids cant tell the time on an analogue ( dial ) face clock or wris****ch. They have become used to carrying a phone with the clock on the front screen in numbers that wearing a watch is unnecessary. Which is really sad if true.
Why does it matter? I love an analogue watch, but they are heading the way of the dodo. People used to tell the time with sundials, if they bothered at all, or navigated with sextants etc. Is it sad that most people can't use those things anymore? I'm 61 and can easily do all the stuff on your list (apart from the photo stuff) but if I was 16 now, I wouldn't bother with any of them. They are just not relevant to modern life - unless someone has a specific, geeky interest. Why learn to change a tyre for example when most cars don't come with spares?
This is proper old man shouts at clouds territory! Kids now learn to do stuff which is relevant to their lives, not their parents or grandparents lives. That's always been the case and when you start to lament the irrelevancy of stuff you learned, it's just you getting old!
I dont know if this is for real , or a made up internet fact but.- Apparently kids cant tell the time on an analogue ( dial ) face clock or wris****ch. They have become used to carrying a phone with the clock on the front screen in numbers that wearing a watch is unnecessary. Which is really sad if true.
Why does it matter? I love an analogue watch, but they are heading the way of the dodo. People used to tell the time with sundials, if they bothered at all, or navigated with sextants etc. Is it sad that most people can't use those things anymore? I'm 61 and can easily do all the stuff on your list (apart from the photo stuff) but if I was 16 now, I wouldn't bother with any of them. They are just not relevant to modern life - unless someone has a specific, geeky interest. Why learn to change a tyre for example when most cars don't come with spares?
This is proper old man shouts at clouds territory! Kids now learn to do stuff which is relevant to their lives, not their parents or grandparents lives. That's always been the case and when you start to lament the irrelevancy of stuff you learned, it's just you getting old!
Pffft. I taught myself how to use a slide rule the other day.
I guess horses as a mode of everyday transport is one of the largest changes in what is still just about a lifetime. Go back to just pre-WW2 and this would've been routine still. Deliveries, mining, farming, even the railways just about everything. in the 1930's probably every adult would've been able to ride a horse, certainly nearly every man. Now it's probs less than one in a thousand? Perhaps even more
I seriously dlubt that. By 1930 the majority of people were living in urban areas with good public transport, way better than now atleast in terms of connections. Draught horses, for sure bit the notion of everybody cutting about on chargers in the 1930s is... Lol
Why does it matter?
It doesn't. My then MIL got upset with one of my kids when he told the time (accurately) as "six forty five" and not "Quarter to seven" which she insisted was somehow better? More right? Correct English? I dunno what she was thinking really...I had to not so gently steer the conversation away from the whole subject.
I seriously dlubt that.
I said most adults could ride one. Given that adults in the 1930 would've been born at the turn of the century and would've learned as children/adolescents in the preceding three decades.
The thing I find weird is not that young people can’t do things that they no longer encounter, like milk bottles, it’s that they aren’t very good with modern tech’ either.
I work in a college and feels like the building is full of old codgers like me in their 50s who are happily in and out of Office 365 all day including Excel and 17 year olds who are quite hazy about cloud storage and how to add 2 numbers in a spreadsheet. I have to say this is in part is the fault of the British education system
Being reliant on a mobile phone as an essential lifestyle companion is great. Until they accidently get left on the bus , run out of electricity , confiscated at school , dropped , stolen on the way home etc.
I missed my train as I didnt have my phone on me and couldnt tell the time so legging it the 400mtrs to the station to catch the train didnt happen and I sat there having phone seperation anxiety waiting the 45mins till the next one.
My neighbours have two kids and they're both in demanding jobs with commutes, sometimes away from home and sometimes working late. But they're really organised and there's always one of them there for the kids. No screens with the eldest at 9 and lots of healthy and happily noisy games. Footy, bows and arrows, basketball net and I often see a parent in the garden sitting on a blanket with the kids doing activities. Holidays they all go off cycle camping. It can be done.
I rarely have a phone with me. I was out on a gee gee a long way from home with a couple of Madame's mates. One of the lady's horse injured a foot so we phoned for transport. The transport was only two horses so rather than wait I trotted off on my own. Madame got phone call from one of her mates concerned for my safety "he hasn't even got a phone!" Madame: "he'll be fine".
One day I'll learn what silly thing I'm doing that results in double posts
And there are two threads about kids which is getting confusing
I dont know if this is for real , or a made up internet fact but.- Apparently kids cant tell the time on an analogue ( dial ) face clock or wris****ch. They have become used to carrying a phone with the clock on the front screen in numbers that wearing a watch is unnecessary. Which is really sad if true. Theres probably loads of things that children / Teens cant do that was commonplace 30 years ago.
2004 trying to teach photosynthesis to y8 (age 12/13) one of them got a 30 min detention for dicking about.
She had no idea how to read the analogue clock or add 30 min to the time
She got a 30 min lesson on how to tell the time and said thank you on her way out.
So kids not being able to tell the time is far from a new thing. I suspect she was not the only one in the class or year who was in the same boat.
I seriously dlubt that. By 1930 the majority of people were living in urban areas with good public transport, way better than now atleast in terms of connections. Draught horses, for sure bit the notion of everybody cutting about on chargers in the 1930s is... Lol
Yep, my forebears are from the valleys. My grandfathers and great aunts were from Mountain Ash born at the turn of the C19/20. One grandfather was down the pit, and the pit ponies were the closest he got to riding a horse. The other side were in the post office and school mistresses, and no chance they ever rode, or knew how to ride an 'orse
I do have a digital watch (HRM) (and a clockwork one that lives in a drawer) but i have it set to show an analogue watch face. JnrEpicJnr doesn't have a watch, and most of his mates don't, but he can read an analogue clock face
I work in a college and feels like the building is full of old codgers like me in their 50s who are happily in and out of Office 365 all day including Excel and 17 year olds who are quite hazy about cloud storage and how to add 2 numbers in a spreadsheet. I have to say this is in part is the fault of the British education system
Related to that, my Dad (a total technophobe if ever there was one) learnt rapid adding up when he had a temp job in an office - it was just summing the takings, subtracting the wages kind of stuff but no-one back then had a calculator so he learnt to do it all in his head. Still can.
Being a technophobe, he usually pays by cash so he'll wander round a shop, adding up the price in his head as he goes, he'll know it's (say) £8.35 so he'll hand over a £10 note and 35p in change.
This will invariably cause total confusion to the poor cashier. It simply doesn't register with them that it's been done to simplify the change, they cannot understand why someone would hand them some loose coins as well as the note. My Dad thinks he's being helpful. Only the local secondhand bookstore, staffed by someone even older than him, actually understands what he's attempting; in every other shop there's complete bewilderment.
I dont know if this is for real , or a made up internet fact but.- Apparently kids cant tell the time on an analogue ( dial ) face clock or wris****ch.
I bought a smart watch* recently. It has a choice of watch faces. About 7 of the 20 different faces are (primarily) "analogue".
Which suggests to me that there is still a need/desire to display "analogue" time so I'm not convinced that "fact" is actually factual....
(* It was a cheap Amazfit so not an expensive Rolex or similar targetted at rich old men like the typical STWer 😉)
Carefully fishing an audio tape out of a car stereo and using a pen to wind it back in. While lurching around in a car driven by a teenage idiot who has fantasies of being Nigel Mansell.
We sell a birthday card which went along the lines of...you are so old you did this. Then it had an image of winding a tape with a pencil. We all know a pencil is too thin to engage.
"We "The British" didn't build Stonehenge, the Bronze Age wasn't something Stone Aged Britons ascended into, it was immigrants with better skills (or more specifically weapons)."
For some reason I always feel that "we" got beaten in 1066 whereas it's just as likely that I'm descended from the winning side.
Then it had an image of winding a tape with a pencil. We all know a pencil is too thin to engage.
Image thing isn't working.. picture of bic biro
You can wind a cassette with a pen or a pencil. If the implement is too thin you can either tip it at an angle or twirl it.
I dont know if this is for real , or a made up internet fact but.- Apparently kids cant tell the time on an analogue ( dial ) face clock or wris****ch. They have become used to carrying a phone with the clock on the front screen in numbers that wearing a watch is unnecessary. Which is really sad if true.
It's absolutely real. Am I losing marbles, I could've sworn I'd written this at least once earlier? "Outside knowledge" is a hot topic in the escape room industry, being able to read a clock is no longer an ability you can assume people have. It seems mad to me because it's not exactly a difficult skill but I guess if it's one you never use... 🤷♂️
the ability to go onto a building site and build a jump out of random bits of wood and bricks
Am I losing marbles, I could've sworn I'd written this at least once earlier?
You had, here https://singletrackworld.com/forum/postid/13628572/
I don't think anyone has mentioned making bows from thick bamboo, arrows from thinner bamboo with the weighted, pointy bits of darts and walking through the local fields.
This was the north east in the 70s, and we were a bit feral.
I started with regular garden bamboo canes, but they always broke so my dad got a thicker length of willow (not the tearful type) for the bow, and the thin pieces for arrows. Worked pretty well, and there was loads of it around so saved me pinching his garden canes.
when would a teenager ever need to do that? Right between calculating using a slide rule and wiring a plug?
This scenario faced my son a few years ago when he went for a year out interview. Included brand new wire that needed stripping and everything. Apparently he came closest to getting it right, an even knew which wires went where, but left too much exposed core, and missed the cable holder bit entirely. He said some of the candidates seemed to struggle to even open up the plug to get started!
A while a go I was training a fresh grad to use some software.
I said "click the floppy disc to save the method"
I was met with a blank stare, followed by "what's a floppy disk?"
I then pointed to the icon on the screen, and they said "oh, the save button?"
Realised I had crossed the Rubicon and had become old...
This scenario faced my son a few years ago when he went for a year out interview.
I'd give the role to the candidate who went "well, that's bloody stupid, I'd order a replacement cable."
Realised I had crossed the Rubicon and had become old...
Both still hanging onto the notion that "save" is a thing?
I dont know if this is for real , or a made up internet fact but.- Apparently kids cant tell the time on an analogue ( dial ) face clock or wris****ch. They have become used to carrying a phone with the clock on the front screen in numbers that wearing a watch is unnecessary. Which is really sad if true
They are certainly taught this in schools. My kids were taught it 8-10 years ago and my wife taught it to other kids last year. Questions for me are a) is it worth taking the time from learning something else and b) why is it sad?
Answer to b) is quite interesting to consider and will require some philosophy and some introspection.
I think it's more a comprehension thing...
The if the little hand is about half way between the number one, and the number two, it's about half past one.
Now, one could be confused as to whether that's half past one in the afternoon or half past one in the morning, but you can make a fair assumption based on whether it's daylight or night time by looking at the sky lol.
That sounds totally ridiculous typing that out, lol!
They are certainly taught this in schools. My kids were taught it 8-10 years ago and my wife taught it to other kids last year. Questions for me are a) is it worth taking the time from learning something else and b) why is it sad?
It's certainly taught. It's simply not retained. Why would it be?
Should we be considering today that kids can't rewire a plug? My old Maths teacher said "you won't always have a calculator in your pocket," that aged badly.
Is the issue here simply that we've turned into old farts? KIDS OF TODAY DON'T KNOW HOW TO... well so what? Do we suppose there's going to be a sudden upsurge in the requirement to read a sundial? Should we be lamenting the loss of ability to use a Walkman?
(I blame the parents, again)
would a teenager ever need to do that? Right between calculating using a slide rule and wiring a plug
Luckily for us, despite never having to do it Gove''s 'reform' of GCSE bought wiring a plug back
Maybe if you are 90 but not many people are 9 are they. A 75 year old who doesn't have the internet, email address etc,. or know how to use it was only 55 when it was very widely used so what were they doing at 55, getting their excuses ready?
My 90 yr old parents use Ipads, email, messaging apps, etc etc
Apparently kids cant tell the time on an analogue ( dial ) face clock or wris****ch.
It's 100% taught in schools.
My 12 year old and all his mates learnt it. Most of them have analogue displays on their various smart watches.
It's not just about telling the time, it's about estimating a point on a scale which is then used throughout school.
Theres a good reason that most cars have analogue speedos - the human eye/brain is much faster at estimating a speed from a quick glance at an analogue dial than reading numbers.
Ignore 🙂
No need to take the top off in the early 60s Winters, it was standing on spout of frozen milk. I haven't bought milk in years.
Had a Saturday job on a milk round in the 80s. Winter was still a bitch
My father was a milkman when I was a young un (many decades ago). I used to get up around 5AM when I wasn't in school to help him. Many a winter morning, I nearly cried with the cold in my fingers. Some really cold mornings he wouldn't wake me but I used to wake up early back then and I'd cycle to catch-up with him either in the depot or the actual milk route. If he could stand the pain to put food on the table, then so could I.
Theres a good reason that most cars have analogue speedos - the human eye/brain is much faster at estimating a speed from a quick glance at an analogue dial than reading numbers.
Is that true?
Our car has both analogue and digital. Reading "35" doesn't require estimation, it's absolute. Dials are surely there today to look pretty or because they are expected by buyers, whoever needs a rev counter?
Is that true?
Sounds like rubbish to me. I also have digital and dial speed reading in my car and it is a lot easier to glance at the number that says 36mph that look at a speedo dial with the pointer somewhere between 20 and 40 and work out it is at 36mph.
I dislike driving my wife's car that only has a dial because of that.
Sweeping generalisation and recollection of facts from a good few years ago alert, but the way I remember it is:
For accuracy, digital is beneficial for most people.
However, for a 'somewhere in this zone', analogue dials are faster to read due to a combination of the fact that you don't have to focus centrally on the dial, and that the scale of the gauge is a continuous presence.
So, if you're going 88mph, with a digital speedo, you need to focus on the readout, your brain needs to read the numbers, interpret them, and only then can you exclaim 'great Scott'
With an analogue gauge, for a quick read, your eye only has to feedback the position of the needle, and your brain combines this with previous knowledge of the scale of the Speedo, and these two things are combined for a rough reading.
There's also loads of stuff to do with the eyes acuity zones, rods/cones, changing focal length from staring at the windscreen etc that my brain is too old and fuzzy to remember.
If you wanted to check that you were going 87.7mph, it would take longer, but for broad readings to the level of accuracy you need in a car, it's faster.
Like I say, my recollection, may be a bit off but that was the general gist.
Finding citations to back up any of what I recall seems bloody impossible though, due to all the search readings just containing opinions on forums and anecdotes!