Re: death of the mind.

From: dan michaels (feedbackdroids_at_yahoo.com)
Date: 07/16/04 

Date: 16 Jul 2004 12:55:10 -0700

"John Hasenkam" <johnh@faraway.> wrote in message news:<40f7e6fb@dnews.tpgi.com.au>...

> >
> > Best that you had not used the word indoctrination here in the first
> > place. That shows a somewhat callous perspective towards education.
> > Like you, life has dealt me a few blows - eg, auto transmission went
> > out this past week, on and on - but like Socrates, I choose not to be
> > entrapped by raw materialism.
> >
> > And of course, to the enlightened teacher, as opposed to the
> > egotistical self-same teacher, transcension is the entire point of
> > education. Only a very poor teacher would say ... "... now students,
> > I'm going to tell you the truth, and you must never waver from the
> > path, or else you will become as idiots ...". Now, that IS
> > indoctrination.
>
> "A new scientific truth does not triumph by convincing its
> opponents and making them see the light, but rather because
> its opponents eventually die, and a new generation grows
> up that is familiar with the idea from the beginning."
>
> Max Planck
>
> Read some history of science. It took decades for people to accept Darwin's
> views and he provided ample evidence.

Well, you are definitely trying to mix things up here.

We were talking about the difference between a teacher who
indoctrinates versus one who educates his[her] students .... not
whether a group of peer scientists are willing to accept changes to
their pet and/or the extant theories.

Regards education, I was very lucky - in having been trained as an
engineer - rather than in the soft sciences. Engineering largely deals
with principles which are able to be repeated time and again by
essentially all other engineers - so we didn't have to listen to too
many egotistical teachers developing their own pet theories about the
metaphysical.
===============

> People still believe in free will. I place a cruel twist on this: we cannot
> have free will, but just perhaps our brains do. Brains are running the
> world, not us.

If it makes you feel happy, it can't be all that bad - Sheryl Crow.
=================

> If education does not involve indoctrination please explain:
>
> Why it can take a generation for new ideas to be readily accepted by the
> majority.

Peer scientists as a group are relatively conservative. Abd as
mentioned above, they are not students in the classroom.
==============

> Why old ideas, even when repeatedly demonstrated to be false, persist.

Pure and simple ---> ego. 2 examples that come to mind are Francis
Crick and "his" discovery of how life works, and my old advisor, who
wouldn't even deign to look at data that didn't support his own ideas.

And Kuhn might have something to add to this, too.
===============

> Why even well educated people persist in beliefs that are bunkum.
>

Bunkum, like beauty, is *ALL* in the mind of the holder. You should
know that. It's opinion. Your bunkum is another man's truth, and your
truth is bunkum to another man.

Your statement makes sense ONLY if you believe you have the absolute
truth - and I can tell you right now ... neither you nor anyone has
the absolute truth about anything. If someone stands up, and tries to
tell you he has the truth and what everyone else believes is bunkum,
you had best tell him to go join a seminary - or maybe write a book.

*IF* it sells, then at least he came claim a small following of
believers.
=================

> > Always better to talk about education in terms of opening students'
> > minds, in order that they may learn to think for themselves, rather
> > than closing them, by passing the gas of "absolute anything".
> > =================
>
> Ideally, education is about opening up our minds. Practically, the older we
> get, the harder that becomes. Aint evolution a bitch. Only a few transcend
> their education.

Only a few thranscend their education, but they are the few that are
responsible for just about all of the forward progress too. An
educator plays to that, knowing that most of the students only want a
job and a car and they'll be satisfied to graduate, but there are the
few who will not be so easily satisfied. So ....

.... do you bring them all down to the lowest level, or try to bring
at least some of them up to a higher level?

Maybe you've just been away from school for too long, or are a
graduate of a somewhat restrictive educational process.
=================

> > Well, IF you're in the army, then you MUST accept the army way - else
> > you and your comrades will face quick extinction. But, out here, we
> > don't have to accept those terms. Hardly. How do we play the
> > prisoner's dilemma?
>
> Yes we do, there are countless examples of people who refused to tow the
> party line (scientific or otherwise), who were ostracised for their views.

I think what history shows is that it is very rarely the "joiners" who
are responsible for forward progress - rather the independent thinkers
who are not so willing to settle for just a little peer approval.
That's where the real equity is.

Name all the great men. In general, they were all self-made men and
independent thinkers. How many worked by committee?
===============

> Where is freedom? We don't need overt co-ercion to be persuaded, social
> pressures, seeking acceptance from others, is usually far more important
> than the quest for truth because such acceptance provides immediate and
> tangible rewards whereas bucking the trend entails a huge risk.

As just mentioned .... to wit, the army privates and the "joiners"
rarely are on the fork in the road leading to progress.
===============

 
> >
> > If you spend 24 hours a day worrying about philosophy, then you have 0
> > hours left to live a life. It's your choice. I'd say the proper blend
> > is 2% devoted to philosophy, 98% to living.
>
> Karl Popper: The reason why many philosophers are depressed is because they
> know they have nothing useful to contribute.
>

Karl was a very smart man, I presume this must mean.
================

> Camus, The Myth of Sisyphus:
>
> "But it is bad to stop, hard to be satisfied with a single way of seeing, to
> go without contradiction, perhaps the most subtle of all spiritual forces.
> The preceding merely defines a way of thinking. But the point is to live."
>

Even a toad gets weary of living in a shoebox in the back of a closet.
=================

> In a tangental way Camus touches on something important here. Brains don't
> like contradiction, will perform all sorts of somersaults to avoid the same.
> Yet as the physicist John Wheeler once advised, "In any discipline find the
> strangest thing and then explore it." The sad truth is that most of the time
> we avoid the strange things, we hate being strangers in a strange land.
>

Hmmm, Wheeler plagiarizing Heinlein. Bad, bad, bad.

And as mentioned several times above, the 98% or so of the masses are
one thing, the other 2% are something else.

We must endeavor not to suppress the minds of the 2nd group while
dealing with mundane issues regards the 1st group. Must'nt we, now.
================

> And will people stop calling me a behaviorist. That is insulting to
> behaviorists!
>
>
> Regards,
>
>
> John.

Um ... you must be mixing messages. I didn't note use of that word
pertaining to YOU in my preceding posts. However, as one who .... by
his own admission .... is involved in an AI project which is on the
verge of commercialization, why not talk more about some AI in general
- and then other people around here won't be getting so confused.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: Imagine a world with more sexually open, sensual, happily libidinous politicians. Wait, can you?
    ... dumbing drugs was channeled into education the potential would be hard to ... i think it is only part of the truth. ... constitute walking tours of London, late 1500's where an ambitious boy ... Everyone, it seems, loved to talk about, even teach their trade orart. ...
    (alt.gathering.rainbow)
  • Re: Cello CD made in heaven
    ... if you value education over an artistically attuned soul. ... should apprehend art if it's true art. ... and the artist has not achieved much in the way of truth. ... "serious" theatre plays mostly to keep up with the culture-snotty ...
    (rec.audio.opinion)
  • Re: Readers respond to Sajid Mahmoods "abolish science education"
    ... certain segment of society. ... trying to expose all students to their corrupted version of science, ... The way I remember it, at least at the higher levels of education, ... Teaching the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth - to ...
    (talk.origins)
  • Re: OT - Michelle Obama & Pride In America
    ... education you had to endure. ... Sad, that... ... There is no truth to the statement that I am a socialist, ... You, like so many of your ilk, have traded in lies, ...
    (rec.outdoors.rv-travel)
  • Re: Cello CD made in heaven
    ... if you value education over an artistically attuned soul. ... should apprehend art if it's true art. ... and the artist has not achieved much in the way of truth. ... We have organs of perceptions, ...
    (rec.audio.opinion)