I think you're really underestimating construction workers and people in general. Einstein was a patent clerk while doing amazing physics. Jimi Hendrix worked odd jobs and was a paratrooper. People are capable of amazing (and terrible) things and it is folly to think that you can understand people's problems and potential without getting to know them individually.
Shrugs - you're cherry-picking exceptions when I clearly used the word average.
If I say dancing around a fire and chanting, on average, doesn't help people with kidney disease and you retort with 'it helped my grandmother' - where do we go from here?
Should I get to individually know every person with kidney disease to see if dancing around the fire will cure them?
That seems to be what you're suggesting, unless I'm misunderstanding you.
If I'm reading your comment correctly, then I think I'm disagreeing with you on two points:
1) I find that the outliers make a big difference in any distribution. For example: the vast majority of start ups fail, but the ones that succeed can make a large impact. To your example, the vast majority of compounds tried as drugs fail but the rare ones like peniclilin change medicine as we know it.
2) Personally I've found that people's current status in life can be a predictor of future success but it far from perfect. I would suggest that rather than trying to predict who is going to succeed beforehand we come up with a system that gives them some opportunities to be successful.
> If I say dancing around a fire and chanting, on average, doesn't help people [...]
What if we really did give people the option of periodic sabbaticals where they could do whatever they want (including "dancing around fires and changing")? It could massively reduce stress levels, and given stress' negative impact on health, this really could help (on average).
We could perhaps achieve something to this effect via "basic income", such that people would be able to take leave of employment without fear of destitution, thus laboring on such a schedule as they would more genuinely voluntarily agree to.
I think they are objecting to your generalisation of construction workers as lacking in imagination or dreams beyond "living to work". Which I object to, as well, as when I worked in construction that range of people I met and the dreams and goals and ideas they had were immense. People are fascinating, regardless of what job you do, and I think you would be amazed at what people can do when given the opportunity.
