Jump to content

The Last Word


Bazza

Recommended Posts

What's funny is that education is context from where I got this from.

 

The Need for Thick Schools: Classical Education Against Cynicism

http://www.thepublicdiscourse.com/2017/08/19796/

 

 

I like that article. It seems to me that as our world has become ever more technologically advanced, we humans have started to lose connection with each other. Education is (nominally) preparing students for a competitive job market, but is not really preparing them to be functional human beings. One of the big foci at this conference was all students--not just the high achievers or the ones we happen to like personally--need to feel like they have the opportunity and the support to be successful.

I'm more ambivalent. I think he has an ideological agenda to advance, and I am profoundly suspicious of people with ideological agendas.

 

I recall that it was in 9th grade that I bought into a cynical view of the world (and the continual burning anger that it had to be that way). It first manifested in an essay assigned in English class, and it seemed so different from my previous writing that the teacher didn't think I wrote it (and marked it down hard for that). Part of that package was adopting the resolution that no, I wasn't going to tell people what I wanted any more. Especially for those who already had power over me, it was an added lever, a means by which they could extract more out of me by raising false hope and running a bait-and-switch. People still ask you what you really want, and sometimes they ask this innocently, so you have to develop untrue answers that have enough plausibility to them to divert the questioners on a long-enough basis. ("Long-enough" meant three years; at that point I had lived that long in one place only once, and I knew I wouldn't until I was in college, at least.)

 

I point this out because the writer may not realize that some of his students may already have reached my state, where they silently refused to give honest answers to that sort of question. It is precisely at the "thick" schools at which he is employed that instructors ask such questions, and (I submit) they do so with ulterior motives. Students who don't show the traits demanded by the instructors' fundamentally reactionary mindset have ... things happen to them. (Or not happen for them, if you see what I mean.)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

You can't trust atoms (and chemistry) they make up everything.

Not quite everything, maybe not even a majority of everything ... much of the dark matter seems to be nonbaryonic, but....

 

  

Including you (and me), of course.

Yeah, true dat.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Unfortunately, your content contains terms that we do not allow. Please edit your content to remove the highlighted words below.
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...