illiteracy, yet again--a challenge

     A well-known piece of scientific research purports to prove that alcoholism is hereditary in males. The proof consists of brain scans of acknowledged alcoholics and their eleven-year-old sons. The scans differed from normal brain scans in the same way. The conclusion of the researchers was that alcoholism is hereditary--and that nothing can be done about it. I believe the experiment was very sloppily done, perhaps intentionally, to prove a hypothesis that won't stand up to real scientific scrutiny. I believe the researchers should have tested both fathers and sons for the actual physical presence of alcohol in their systems. I do not think that thy did this, but I'm not sure. Even if they did, they might have been merely looking at how alcohol consumption alters brain chemistry--as we know that many drugs do--and nothing more. The supposition that there was no alcohol in the children was both naive and unscientific.
      Researchers have used similar evidence to conclude that the brains of the illiterate are genetically different from the brains of those who can read. It's nonsense, and worse than nonsense. I have a suggestion--let's get some volunteers who are completely illiterate. We scan their brains. Then I teach them to read. Then we scan their brains again.  My prediction is that the brain scans will alter radically.  Learning matters.

illiteracy, again

     People spend years in jail, and when they get out, they are illiterate. This is outrageous. There isn't anyone who couldn't learn basic literacy skills in six months or less. What are they doing in there?

when I run the world

     When I run the world everyone will be able to read, write, and cipher. Everyone will also eat vegetables and sweep their front walks. What I would like to see happen, seriously, is an independent commission to find the illiterate in the United States. I believe that millions are profoundly illiterate. Meaning they can't read a printed two digit number, or read even the alphabet. Tens of millions may be what is usually called "functionally illiterate"--which means they read so poorly that anything in print is useless to them. We can begin with the prison and probation population, as crime is one of the major symptoms of illiteracy. People who have never been to school have learned to make a living--often through crime. Prisons seem to do a lot of "consciousness raising" and group therapy exercises, but they obviously are not effectively intervening in the problem of illiteracy. 
I suggest a trained army of literacy teachers--to beat this in one generation, before another generation is raised without any education at all.