Why do humans always exaggerate?

For the millionth time, can you stop posting stupid questions?

Maybe I’m going for the ten millionth! Surely extremely erudite and hyper intelligent forum members... ponder profound peculiarities in people??  

Consciousmess posted:

Maybe I’m going for the ten millionth! Surely extremely erudite and hyper intelligent forum members... ponder profound peculiarities in people??  

Reminds me of ‘The Good Old Days’!

G

We subconsciously 'minimise' others' experiences perhaps?

I have never ever exaggerated!

Dolphins are too lazy?

Surveys said 60+ hrs a week, which I know is a big exaggeration

how do you know it is a big exaggeration?

typical uninformed comment

suggest you read the Government 2016 teacher workload survey

https://www.gov.uk/government/...workload-survey-2016

key findings were for classroom teachers around 55 hours and for school leaders 60 hours. So- not an exaggeration-

Steve 

Humans !  I once had a cat that would exaggerate every time we looked at each other. And had a pet cockerel that liked to aggerate the hens eggs.

Perhaps being closer to something makes it look bigger, they’re not exaggerating just have a different perspective. On the other hand they might be an agenda to push or are just seeking attention. Newspapers, particularly the gutter press are very guilty of these last two.

We exaggerate, or minimise, to make a point.  That’s all their is to it.  But because one person exaggerated, the next has to exaggerate a little more - so 9 hours a day for some, became 10 hours a day for the next, then you see you’re working more than that person so tha becomes 11 hours...

As for teachers working hours... what evidence do you have they are exaggerating?  12 hours a day is quite attainable if you include working at home too.  8am till 5-6pm with grabbing lunch on the run is easily done “at school”, then a couple of hours at home in the evening.  Not that other professions don’t work similar.

A related article.

OK, so it's SKY news, but I think he makes a reasonable and believable point.

https://news.sky.com/story/oxf...logist-says-11143449

Isn't "always" a bit of an exaggeration?

I think it’s called irony. 

Oh, so it's a colour, like coppery. 

As I have a tendency to use understatement rather than exaggeration, especially when it comes to feelings, while with measurements I tend to aim for reasonable accuracy - so I have to challenge the 'always'. But where exaggeration is used, it is usually a means of reinforcing what one is saying.

I don't find humans always exaggerate and I try not to, but I guess if you lack an extended vocabulary then exaggeration might be a means to compensate.

Social media seems a notable factor in growing exaggerations where everyone is looking for the next biggest superlative to describe their 'unbelievable', 'monumental' or 'epic' experience with something they simply enjoyed.

Consciousmess posted:

It was spurred by reading a newspaper article about why teachers leave the profession. Surveys said 60+ hrs a week, which I know is a big exaggeration, even though my fingers on the pulse fully aware of the pressures teachers are under, having been one for 15 years in three institutions.)

I married a secondary school teacher. She gets in to school in the mornings for about 8 and routinely finishes between 5 & 6 pm most days. They have a lunch break, not all of which is spent like I do with feet up reading the internet & furtling about, but let's err on the cautious side and say they have 30 minutes off. Let's go too for the earlier finish of 5pm, as we don't want to exaggerate. So that's a working day of 8.5 hours. Plus travel, but we don't count that. 42.5 hours then, per week. Plus the 2, 3, 4 & occasionally more hours in the evenings, marking planning & updating student grades on their system. Usually at least 3 nights a week, sometimes more. We'll go for 3 as we still don't want to exaggerate, so anything from 6-12 additional hours, which puts us on a nominal 50 hours. Add on a couple of stints over a typical weekend and it's pretty easy to get to 60 hours.

If we use the bigger numbers above, 5 x 9½ hour days = 47.5, plus a further 16 in the evenings and easily another 12 over the weekend, gets us to what, 70+ hours in a week? In my experience the norm is somewhere between the two, and sometimes the poor little mites get their books back on a Monday unmarked as she's had a bit of time off. And let's not forget Parents' Evenings, which seem to happen a lot more frequently these days than I remember as a youth. We're lucky to see her much before 10 on a parents' evening, or on the current thing, 6th Form Open Evenings.

This btw is the norm for my OH, and most of her colleagues. I'm sure there are schools that really do have teachers that roll up at 9:00, leave at 3:00 and have no marking, planning or other stuff to do out of school and live an idyllic life of joy and stress-free downtime. It must be great.

Humans may exaggerate and usually do, but teacher hours don't seem to be part of it.

joerand posted:

Social media seems a notable factor in growing exaggerations where everyone is looking for the next biggest superlative to describe their 'unbelievable', 'monumental' or 'epic' experience with something they simply enjoyed.

You missed "a night and day difference" out of your list of superlatives.

ChrisR_EPL posted:

Consciousmess posted:

It was spurred by reading a newspaper article about why teachers leave the profession. Surveys said 60+ hrs a week, which I know is a big exaggeration, even though my fingers on the pulse fully aware of the pressures teachers are under, having been one for 15 years in three institutions.)

I married a secondary school teacher. She gets in to school in the mornings for about 8 and routinely finishes between 5 & 6 pm most days. They have a lunch break, not all of which is spent like I do with feet up reading the internet & furtling about, but let's err on the cautious side and say they have 30 minutes off. Let's go too for the earlier finish of 5pm, as we don't want to exaggerate. So that's a working day of 8.5 hours. Plus travel, but we don't count that. 42.5 hours then, per week. Plus the 2, 3, 4 & occasionally more hours in the evenings, marking planning & updating student grades on their system. Usually at least 3 nights a week, sometimes more. We'll go for 3 as we still don't want to exaggerate, so anything from 6-12 additional hours, which puts us on a nominal 50 hours. Add on a couple of stints over a typical weekend and it's pretty easy to get to 60 hours.

If we use the bigger numbers above, 5 x 9½ hour days = 47.5, plus a further 16 in the evenings and easily another 12 over the weekend, gets us to what, 70+ hours in a week? In my experience the norm is somewhere between the two, and sometimes the poor little mites get their books back on a Monday unmarked as she's had a bit of time off. And let's not forget Parents' Evenings, which seem to happen a lot more frequently these days than I remember as a youth. We're lucky to see her much before 10 on a parents' evening, or on the current thing, 6th Form Open Evenings.

This btw is the norm for my OH, and most of her colleagues. I'm sure there are schools that really do have teachers that roll up at 9:00, leave at 3:00 and have no marking, planning or other stuff to do out of school and live an idyllic life of joy and stress-free downtime. It must be great.

Humans may exaggerate and usually do, but teacher hours don't seem to be part of it.

Spot on, from my observation of my sister-in-law who is a dedicated teacher. Except that did not include additional tutoring and exam prep sessoins in holidays, especialle Easter (N.B. voluntary, unpaid), days going into school at the time of exam results in summer hols - which with GCSE and A Level results different weeks preclude those weeks for family holidays away, and several days before the start of the autumn term preparing lessons for the beginning of he school year.

It was very different when I was at school in the 1960s, when some staff very visibly simply regurgitated the same lessons each year, and with no flexing for different students' capabilities or ways of responding, marking homework during lessons while we were working on set things, and staff car park virtually empty within 15 min of end of school day (then 4pm).

When I was still young the 'English' were known for their understatement to given situations.  This was an attractive quality to have espescially where other nationalities were given to overstatement to the same situation.  I think this type of view on life served well in extreme situations in places like being in the London underground during the blitz in the Second World war.  Imagine being there, with bombs falling down above and exploding probably shaking the the walls of the underground and bits falling off the wall.  The person next to you shakes down the dust from his of her attire and then asks you in a calm voice " would you like me to make you a cup of tea?" - Classic stuff..!

Romi posted:

The person next to you shakes down the dust from his of her attire and then asks you in a calm voice " would you like me to make you a cup of tea?" - Classic stuff..!

Now I have the urge to watch Carry on Up The Kyber...

Huge posted:

Isn't "always" a bit of an exaggeration?

Never.

Eloise posted:

Now I have the urge to watch Carry on Up The Kyber...

Genius film: Bungit Din and his Burpas, the Third Foot & Mouth Regiment ("Devils in Skirts"), Sir Sidney Ruff-Diamond, Private Widdle, Brother Belcher, Princess Jelhi, Major Shorthouse, Pte Ginger Hale, Randy Lal the Khasi of Kalabar and the superb dinner scene. Talbot Rothwell's best-ever script.

Nobody exeggerates on the Hi Fi Corner.