Reply #72: It's called the boob tube

[Alcibiades]

because it turns you into a boob.

I really don't blame primary and secondary school teachers or administrators. The fault lies with the parents, and with the televisual lifestyle of Americans today.

A friend of mine has a theory about knowledge, which is that common knowledge isn't common, that most of it is known only to a few, and even the best-educated will occasionally be wrong. I once met a Ph.D. student, for example, who was unfamiliar with the heliocentric model of the solar system (she thought the sun rotated around the earth once a day, and I had to convince her that the earth rotating on its axis would also produce the same effect, from our point of view.) One person can be wrong about one particular fact, even something as important as the question of whether the sun rotates around the earth or vice versa, and it doesn't matter. The real danger inheres in the loss of our love of learning and the devaluation of the activity of education.

Far too many kids, and parents, see the attainment of a degree as a necessary credential for securing a certain lifestyle. That being the case, cheating becomes understandable, though no less repugnant. I agree with the comments on the prevalence of cheating; it has made me wish I had the authority to revoke the high school diplomas of certain students.