Well, in this way, school was at least preparing you for the real world... of journalism at least...
One night, probably in 1880, John Swinton, then the preeminent New York journalist, was the guest of honour at a banquet given him by the leaders of his craft. Someone who knew neither the press nor Swinton offered a toast to the independent press. Swinton outraged his colleagues by replying:
"There is no such thing, at this date of the world's history, in America, as an independent press. You know it and I know it. There is not one of you who dares to write your honest opinions, and if you did, you know beforehand that it would never appear in print. I am paid weekly for keeping my honest opinion out of the paper I am connected with. Others of you are paid similar salaries for similar things, and any of you who would be so foolish as to write honest opinions would be out on the streets looking for another job. If I allowed my honest opinions to appear in one issue of my paper, before twenty-four hours my occupation would be gone.
"The business of the journalists is to destroy the truth, to lie outright, to pervert, to vilify, to fawn at the feet of mammon, and to sell his country and his race for his daily bread. You know it and I know it, and what folly is this toasting an independent press? We are the tools and vassals of rich men behind the scenes. We are the jumping jacks, they pull the strings and we dance. Our talents, our possibilities and our lives are all the property of other men. We are intellectual prostitutes."
Source: Labor's Untold Story, by Richard O. Boyer and Herbert M. Morais, published by United Electrical, Radio & Machine Workers of America, NY, 1955/1979.
If you read his post again, I believe he was saying that schools teach obedience and conformity and NEGLECT creativity and critical thought. Thus children do not learn how to think for themselves with any skill or understanding.
Good discipline is essential to free thought. But when some say 'discipline', they don't mean internally motivated self discipline, they mean obedience and/or conformity. (Why aren't you conforming to my wishes? You must lack discipline...)
Nominal "free-thinking radicals" can be just as conformist...
Not true. From all *appearances* they can be considered just as conformist, but that would only be taking outside circumstances into account. Internally, the reasoning process itself is non conformist. It's a different approach, not necessarily a different appearance.
"Think, dammit. Don't lash out because it's the easy thing to do.
I think this statement applies more accurately to your post...
What kind of society would we have if kids were taught that they didn't have to do anything on a schedule, that they didn't have to be on time and organized...
Schools don't teach kids how to create and implement schedules to help them achieve their goals. Instead, kids are taught to conform to an arbitrary and micromanaging schedule imposed by an 'authority' figure. In this light, traditional school schedules are devoid of content, since they lack any purpose except obedience and conformity training.
...that they didn't have a place in a power structure, that they didn't have to respect authority?
They have their place as voting citizens. In essence, they ARE the authority, and as such should be taught how to make responsible decisions. That takes practice. Children who learn to blindly obey authority figures get another kind of practice. I think this develops and encourages BAD HABITS. Schools today model an authoritarian system, not a democratic one. This is bad for democracy itself!
What the hell is wrong with teaching kids to NOT be little shits? Or would you rather raise a generation of criminals because it's not cool to follow the rules? Juvenile crime is bad enough already, why promote it? The fact is that rules make a society livable, and you have to teach people the rules at an early age. If you don't, you get a lot of punks who use violence to solve their problems.
This stems from the base assumption that we are all inherintly evil, and the evil side of us must be suppressed from an early age by means of punishments, rewards, and indoctrination into a top down authoritarian heirarchy. Otherwise we'd run wild! We'd all be criminals...
Personally, I think that if a kid is taught only how to conform to rules, they are more likely to become criminals because they've only gained a shallow understanding of the law in school. They never learn that the law is a tool that they, as a future voter, will help shape, depending on what they want to accomplish in society. Thus they never gain any respect, since rules always appear as something preventing them from doing what they want, not as something that helps them accomplish their goals. Combine this with the arbitrary nature of many rules in classrooms, and you are teaching a child to obey indiscriminately. Again, good for authoritarian, bad for democratic.
If the poster has a kid, I encourage him to adopt a hands-off method of raising him and see what happens.
Why is it you instantly assume that the alternative is a hands off apporach? Is it possible to be more hands ON, without using punishments, rewards, and authority sturctures? To me, people who have been trained NOT to think for themselves have trouble imagining more than one alternative to any particular problem.
Oh, and by the way, what can be more hands off than blindly sending your child to a government institution for a standardizing 'education'?
I suggest to you that the research I've done for the last 5 years backs up what I'm saying. Maybe you should stop apologizing for a system that clearly doesn't work, and start looking into alternative methods of education, methods that actually take the learning process into account.
"Together we will bring order to the universe!" D. Vader.
And how is it possible that the 'education' system, after having twelve generous years to work its magic, spits out apathetic citizens?
I mean, who would benefit from that?
Isn't the education system supposed to make people smarter and more interested in life? When you look around, can you tell if it's working?
Some might say "you can lead a horse to water..."
Well, if you drag a horse to water with all your might, then force his head in the trough for hours at a time... after twelve odd years you could turn the poor thing off of water all together.
What government should do is create an atmosphere where you or I or anyone else with the desire can go make money for him- or herself.
It's because of this narrow view embraced and perpetuated by money chasers that most can't imagine a world where you don't have to work your life away simply to survive.
Those not desiring to make money should live with the consequences of their decision.
You got it. You either waste your life away chasing money, or else... My point is that if you can't conform to the economic environment, or if you don't want to conform to it, you're in trouble. That's not fair! So the poor get welfare in leau of an alternative way of life.
This doubly protects the rich, removing the potential for alternative competing systems (protecting assets and/or growth potential of established system) and pacifies the poor at the same time (no angry riots inspired by hunger). It also serves to pit hard working taxpayers like yourself against the poor.
Want to do away with welfare? I do. But I figure we ought to fix the underlying structural problems first. If you're not interested in doing that, then I suggest we are at an impasse.
What I liked about it was that the developers hadn't crippled the strain's ability to reproduce.
We are now polluting the genetics of certain species of plants. This is a type of pollution that is difficult for us to control. Perhaps impossible. What will rice be like in a hundred years? We have introduced a new element of uncertainty.
Rice might never be the same. This genetic change might suit us fine, in the short term. But will it suit the rice itself? Is there a chance that this change will weaken the rice plants ability to survive in some way?
When a single species in an environment changes, all other species around it adapt to that change. What kind of changes in other species are we encouraging? Maybe certain species of bacteria or fungus will find this geneticly modified strain of rice to be a terrific food source. It might take a few years to find out. By then, how many other strains of rice will be 'infected' with this man made trait?
Its got *sources* linked so you can verify it for yourself.
Now, have you ever seen a pro-bush site link their sources? No. Then we would have known that Gore never said he invented the internet. Bush doesn't trust you enough to give you accurate information. Bush doesn't trust you to make an informed decision for yourself: he doesn't disclose the full truth. He wants you to make an *uninformed* decision.
What do you think the XBox is for? Games? This device is going to sneak into millions of homes under the radar, as a gaming platform. But in a couple years, the MSN gaming network is going to offer... other services. How convenient. Maybe start slowly, gently, with some basic utils. After all, you don't want to confuse people... you must take care not to spook the herd.
Taking this strategy into consideration is why I think the Indrema will eventually fly. They won't 'beat' Microsoft, but they're not really playing the same game. The Indremas greater flexibility will insure a small but stable niche that will only get bigger with time.
People can structure organizations and licencing agreements in many different ways. Different structures encourage different sets of behaviours. With that in mind, can anyone think of a structure that could (as an example) attract enough resources to sustain a long-term full-time collaborative effort, while still maintaining what is attractive about open source?
Oversimplified Example: Many structures are designed to be competitive. Competition encourages secrecy, bottlenecking the flow of ideas, stifling creativity and innovation. Open source seeks to overcome this. But how many people can make a living writing open source software? I suspect that for some, writing open source is a hobby financed by a 'day job'. This seems to me, as an ignorant observer, like fertile ground for an innovative approach.
Answer from Bush
You're going to be safe. Safe from things that harm you. It's about principles. Don't listen to them journalists. I'm gonna make you safe from evil and dark hearts. I have a good heart. It's good, not bad. Take the military for instance... **censored due to lack of content**
2) Minority Religions...
by Electric Angst
I'm a uniter, not a divider. We ought to welcome people into our hearts and spirits, regardless of their past sins. It's never too late to open your heart to Jesus. That's called forgiveness. I forgive. Every time I put someone to death in Texas, I forgive them for their sins first. I always make sure I do that. If they were innocent, then they're in heaven anyway. I let God sort 'em out. But the death penalty is their to keep order. Order is important. Rules ought to mean something.
3) Why give a tax cut?
by funkman
Because it's not the governments money. The government is an entity wholly separate from the people. The governments money should never be confused with the peoples money. How can the government hope to lead people if it's using their own money? I lead differently. I get things done. I plan to finance government like I financed my campagn: corporate donation. That's what leaders do, they lead. *chuckle* The government to trust people. I trust. I have a record. I trusted the people in Texas. Now we're number one in pollution! That's called leadership. Leadership. I lead. I'm a leader.
4) electoral reform
by carleton
Whatever gets me into office. I've got some debts to repay. *chuckle* That's called honesty. I'm honest, with a good heart. It's important to pay back debts. A matter of principle. I support my friends. I trust them. They like me. They give me money. If what they want in return is my autograph, I'll give it to them. That's called trust.
5)How Do You Feel About Intellectual Property?
by Phil Gregory
I'm for it. You heard what I was for. I'm for it. If what I said I was for is this, then I'm for it, if it isn't, then I'm not. You heard it.
6) Encryption....
by SquadBoy
I think we should do everything in our power to prevent encryption. The military needs to be strong. If our country were encrypted today by a rogue nation, we wouldn't be ready. The military supports me. I know how to get things done. I know how to motivate the military: by offering them a cushy job with a defense subcontractor when they retire. I'll do everything in my power to make that possible. So the military has to be strong to prevent encryption.
7) Rising Political Protests
by sterno
I think the protests are an important expression. We have to ask: what's causing these protests? I'll tell you: an education recession. Under my plan, students will be punished frequently for their mistakes when reading. It's called accountability. If you make a mistake while learning to read, you ought to be punished. That's called compassion. After a while of this teaching, they will learn: don't read unless you have to. That should fix things.
8) Asteroid Defenses
by Ethelred Unraed
Asteroid Defense is turning hearts dark. These video games ought to be regulated. I trust people to allow me to regulate these things. Trust. We ought to hold these digital butchers accountable. Accountability. In Texas, when we hold people accountable, we put 'em to death. *wide turned-on grin*.
9) The Future of the Country, and of Humanity
by 11223
Our mission ought to be that we keep things in perspective. The proper perspective, I might add. My perspective. I tell you, when I turned forty, and my wife threatened to leave me if I didn't stop drinking and smoking crack, I had a "spiritual awakening". I realized that if I just did what I was told, I could accomplish anything. Now I'm about to become President! They told me this would happen when I became governor, but I didn't believe 'em! So our goal should be to enforce existing laws. People should follow rules. That's what a leader does, enforces laws. I enforce laws to get things done. Rules ought to mean something. They mean: don't do that, or else you'll get into trouble. Accountability. That's what America is all about.
first this link:
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20001024/pl/bush _education_dc_1.html
Funny that this contradicts the original RAND report, ohh I mean THE OFFICIAL Report, that said in his state he was tied first only to North Carolina in education improvement...
Not quite. What Rand says: http://www.rand.org/hot/Press/texas.scores.html
Regarding the next link:
Ok first after reading the article it seemed like a very strong paper, ohhh wait it is written in the journals of eductaion...
A scholarly, peer-reviewed journal of education. Where would you expect to read such a paper? Do you think it would be better if it were written by people who were not experts on education? Would you have a lawyer examine a medical procedure because the medical establishment is too biased???
Second lets just look at some of the evidence or arguments made in the article, "SAT-Math scores have deteriorated relative to students nationally." Now let me ask you if more students take a test, particularly students of lower economic ranges do you believe that test scores on average would increase or decrease? The answer is obvious and shows part of the failed logic in the article
You take a single quote from the introduction, misunderstand it, then present it as evidence that the whole article is worthless??? Let me point you to the relevant portion in the report so you at least know what that portion of the intro was referring to...
It is clear that a substantial portion of the increased pass rates on the TAAS exit test between 1991 and 1998 is, as mentioned previously, an illusion based on exclusion. Specifically, much of the apparent increase in grade 10 TAAS pass rates is due to increased numbers of students taking the grade 10 exit level version of TAAS being classified as special education students, and increased rates of students dropping out of high school in Texas, at least until 1997....
Nonetheless, as best I can estimate, about half of the apparent increase in TAAS exit level pass rates cannot be attributed to such exclusions. So it is relevant to address the question of whether gains on TAAS are a real indication of increased academic learning among students in Texas or whether they represent scores inflated due to extensive preparation for this particular test.
To help answer this question, it is necessary to look at other evidence of student learning in Texas, to see whether the apparent gains on TAAS since its introduction in 1991 are reflected in any other indicators of student learning in Texas. I now summarize evidence from the SAT college admissions test...
Regarding the Harvard link, check it again.
Regarding vouchers, I'm all for vouchers as long as the Feds don't hamstring the voucher schools by making them 'accountable', as GWB puts it. Do you know what that means? Micro-management of schools from washington.
I am looking for good unbiased evidence here...
All three of the education links qualify. Plus, there's lots of raw data in these other articles, data that can be checked. That's why I posted them. Don't you think they raise some serious questions?
I really don't care if Dick Cheney got his money from the Gov't big deal...
You asked for evidence that Bush/Cheney were pro corporate welfare. I give it to you and now I'm "wasting" your time?
I know you weren't trying to argue that George Bush is going to try and micromanage peoples lives more than Al Gore. If you really are for less micromanagement then that argument is shot.
Not more or less, just more insidious. He wants to tinker with the education system in ways that are just plain stupid and irresponsible:
Bush is for corporate welfare. Ok give me some proof I fail to see any evidence that supports your argument, maybe a website and don't send me one that is obviously against him.
While in Texas he signed a corporate welfare bill...
The "system" that you refer to is the economic body of the country...
Wrong. I was refering to the larger democratic system of which economics is a part, but NOT the whole.
Taxes merely reduce freedom of choice (doing what you want with your resources) and increase costs all around.
What an amazingly narrow argument: you say that taxation reduces freedom because you have less money to spend! Cry me a river.
Because of taxes, I can walk around safely at night. I can drive a safe car on a paved highway. I can fly safely. I can drink safe water. I don't have to worry about being invaded. I could go on...
So what you are saying is that people need to take care of other people so they can be exploited for extended time periods.. I like that...
Well, I like having police around. But they don't take care of me. In fact the police are an expression of me taking care of myself. How? By collaborating with my fellow citizens to elect a government that hires policemen. Didn't know that you could take care of yourself by collaborating with others? Man, the isolation... It must be lonely.
Does this exploit the rich? Or were you saying that the poor are being exploited... I'm not sure, it doesn't make sense in either case.
I have a better idea... How about, when someone uses the system that is in place to supporting my efforts to make money, they realize that it is also supporting their efforts to spend money... And the responsibility for said purchase is still their own. They can't demand later that I use the value transfered for their betterment..
They can! It's happening right now! It's called taxation!
And the idea that the system is in place to support the poors ability to spend money is...
I find this 'let's-tax-the-rich-so-that-we-can-give-more-to-th e-poor' trend a bit disturbing.
Good. That trend IS disturbing. But it has LITTLE to do with progressive taxation.
Don't distort the issues.
Sorry, but having some asshole with political ambitions suggest that I should get taxed more than what I already am to support some unwashed welfare-leeching gang of hoodlums is not my idea of fairness.
How about using your taxes to maintain and improve schools so that other immigrants can go to college. Why focus on welfare alone when we could focus on military, roads, police, national parks... Why should you pay more? Because you are obliged: the system worked for you so you are in a position to keep the system healthy and fertile. You ought to make sure it can work for others in the future. Yes, it's about fairness.
And no, you don't earn money all by yourself. You don't live in a vacuum. We're not talking about individuals. We're talking about a huge economic system and society that needs to be improved and maintained.
Now that you're earning money for yourself, you want out. But when you need a FREE PUBLIC EDUCATION, did you think of yourself as an "unwashed welfare-leeching" hoodlum? I bet not.
Your reasoning is simplistic. Your arguments favour your postion economically, but they fail you logically.
It's fair because the rich have an obligation to feed money back into the system to keep it healthy, so that others can get rich after them. Why the rich? They can afford it. And they benefited the most from the system in the first place! They should take care of it.
The poor can't afford to do this because most of their money goes towards eating and shelter. They don't have much to spare. Putting more of the burden on them would be like punishing them for others success! (The poor help the rich get rich... we all participate in the economic system. The rich don't get rich in a vacuum...)
It's about feeding money back into the system to keep the system healthy and fertile.
I wish people would start thinking about their simplistic and naive parroting. After all, if the system falls apart, who has the most to lose?
I love how Nader wants to punish those of us who have succeeded, and reward those who have not. It all makes sense to me. I work hard and have to basically give money to one who doesn't. Thanks a lot.
As if you earn money all by yourself! Hah! Do you make your money in a vacuum? Nobody else had anything to do with it? There is no system in place that supported your efforts? Maybe you should think about it differently. Maybe you should consider it like this:
Those at the bottom, those who bought your wares and helped make you 'rich' are insisting that you feed some of your money back into the system so the system stays healthy and so that others have the same kind of chances that you had.
The people who succeed have an obligation to keep the system healthy so that others may succeed in the future.
Your simplistic reasoning is excusable since it is obviously brought on by an acute case of selfishness. That's why we have to mandate your participation in the tax system. We know how attracted you are to arguments that favour you economically.
Gore's position is to give "targeted tax cuts" to things he likes.
I guess you like to keep things simple...
Gore is 'targeting' his tax cuts because he doesn't feel the country can afford across-the-board tax cuts. Not because he likes some people more than others. Sheesh. In addition, tax cuts run the risk of increasing inflation. Gore is preventing this by using his tax cuts to help encourage personal savings.
So he is targeting the people who actually NEED tax cuts while preventing inflation at the same time. He is being frugal, but fair.
It's funny how Bush manages to paint Gore like an elitest when Bush has a record of favouring the wealthy at the expense of the poor!
It turns out that Bush only brings his 'principles' into play when they are convenient. For example, Bush wants to micromanage every school room, from teacher paychecks to student report cards, using a criteria that doesn't make any sense, and is not backed up by educational research. Nor is it backed up by his Texas record. Quite the opposite. If you think this is minor, imagine the masses of stupid people voting in a couple decades. This is a real threat to liberty!
And he IS for micromanaging the economy. He talks about 'shaping the economic environment' much the same way Bill Clinton does. What do you think that means???
He's also for corporate welfare. This amounts to using businesses as a funnel, diverting public funds into the pockets of the RIGHT PEOPLE. I would call it corruption, EXCEPT THAT IT'S LEGAL!
Bush doesn't need to react to reality; his principals tell him what to do.
No, I didn't. I wasn't even responding to your point. I was using your phrasing to make an entirely different point. I thought I clarified that when I said I "wasn't trying to quibble or jump on you for minor inaccuracies". I've understood what you meant from the beginning and I don't disagree with you. Instead, I was using the "ambiguity in what [you] wrote" to make subtle distinctions between the many nuances of certain words, distincitons that I find revealing and interesting. In other words, I was on a tangent. I thought that was obvious.
I don't think Slashdot should have a jurisdiction. I figure if it's interesting, we might as well discuss it. If it's not interesting, don't participate.
I also think that discussing how police officers are sent into classrooms to manipulate children 'matters'.
And yes, it is about technology. In fact, it's the most powerful technology of all! "Social Technology".
It has, by far, the greatest influence on our lives. Yet most are oblivious to its machinations. Now that's power!
DARE uses authority figures in an attempt to intimidate children into blind compliance. As such, it is not education. It is manipulation and conditioning. Manipulating and conditioning children into blind compliance is wrong! It hinders their ability to make intelligent decisions, it creates unnecessary fear, it discourages rational thought. It hinders education!
DARE can tear families apart. Children have been conditioned from an early age to be loyal to 'authority figures'. If DARE presents them with sufficient evidence of their parents evils (smoking pot), they sometimes betray their families and rat them out. At the very least they will learn about conflicting loyalties, regardless of their parents habits.
Perhaps some children rat their families out becausd they are worried that they might 'die' from smoking pot. So DARE uses innaccurate data to manipulate children.
I wonder why DARE is even needed. I mean, if our education system teaches children to think for themselves, to make rational intelligent decisions, isn't DARE redundant? Unfortunately, our education doesn't teach these things. Just the opposite. So DARE exposes weakness in our education system.
DARE exposes what our education system does teach: ignorance. By emphasizing rote memorization of innaccurate and/or incomplete 'facts', by using authority to intimidate, by emphasizing punishments and rewards, by encouraging blind obedience and discouraging active exploration, DARE builds on previous lessons.
DARE is ineffective at doing what it claims to be doing. But it is effective in other ways. It reinforces the lessons taught to children throughout their lives at school: obey, don't question and don't explore. These lessons are the very antithesis of a real education.
I used to like e-mail. It was new and tech related. You could tell: it had acronym-like properties, emphasizing just how NEW this thing was... kinda like R.A.D.A.R. Tech words sometimes use hyphens and periods in their construction, often a mishmash of jargon from the tech they relate to, to show how they were constructed.
But once people start using the word in conversation, you quickly forget what it looks like. And the tech itself loses its novelty, so eye catching hyphens seem quaint. Gradually, you write it the way you hear it; the aural representation takes over from the visual. Its a real word now. Like 'radar'.
Sorry about your friend. Could you give some details? I've never heard of anyone dying from E. I've heard of people dying from dehydration, herion they thought was E, or any death near a rave (ecstacy related death...) etc. The problem is that the press misrepresents what actually happens in order to 'spread the word' that E is dangerous. I think E IS dangerous, which is why people ought to have accurate and detailed information, not propaganda.
It is not that science makes no, or few assumptions. We assume a lot of things, many of them we don't even acknowledge. Still, science tries to minimize what we assume, and keep it limited to things that seem "self-evident". Then when we find exceptions, we change the assumptions to keep it consistent, and integrated.
I agree with you on this. And I think there are some interesting implications.
Does science simply rest on another kind of faith, a different set of 'self-evident truths' or base assuptions?
How do we deal with the probability of the unknown and the unkowable? Do we live in a state of non-belief, able to recognize information as useful but never creating a belief out of it? Or do we create beliefs based on incomplete science, then change them when there is a critical mass of contradictory evidence, a process akin to plate tectonics? Do we recognize ideas as useful tools, to be 'picked-up' when applicable then put down again, or do we cling to our ideas about things in a vain struggle for certainty and stability? Have we accepted science as useful in some contexts, or are we using science in a vain attempt to satisfy a need for certainty and control?
Which of the above is the more flexable approach? Which is more susceptible to the allure of unquestioning belief?
Ideas about the Universe may have changed, but I suspect that many ancient habits are still alive and well, even in the world of science.
I think you just described why things like love are utterly pointless and futile.
That depends on whether 'love' is something that you experience, or if it's an idea/concept/thing in itself. Experiencing love is not futile. Trying NOT to experience love can be futile!
But clinging to some idea or belief about love IS futile, since your focus is drawn away from the raw experience of love itself, and towards your imaginary ideas about those feelings. Many people habitually confuse and clutter their experiences with ideas and thinking. If you don't need to think, then you should stop thinking. Just 'be' for a while; no thought, no ideas, just raw experience: undistorted, unfiltered and in your living room...
Anyways, is this similar to Nihilism? This approach I learned from books on Zen. I heard there were similarities.
Slashdot Mirror
Well, in this way, school was at least preparing you for the real world... of journalism at least...
One night, probably in 1880, John Swinton, then the preeminent New York journalist, was the guest of honour at a banquet given him by the leaders of his craft. Someone who knew neither the press nor Swinton offered a toast to the independent press. Swinton outraged his colleagues by replying:
"There is no such thing, at this date of the world's history, in America, as an independent press. You know it and I know it. There is not one of you who dares to write your honest opinions, and if you did, you know beforehand that it would never appear in print. I am paid weekly for keeping my honest opinion out of the paper I am connected with. Others of you are paid similar salaries for similar things, and any of you who would be so foolish as to write honest opinions would be out on the streets looking for another job. If I allowed my honest opinions to appear in one issue of my paper, before twenty-four hours my occupation would be gone.
"The business of the journalists is to destroy the truth, to lie outright, to pervert, to vilify, to fawn at the feet of mammon, and to sell his country and his race for his daily bread. You know it and I know it, and what folly is this toasting an independent press? We are the tools and vassals of rich men behind the scenes. We are the jumping jacks, they pull the strings and we dance. Our talents, our possibilities and our lives are all the property of other men. We are intellectual prostitutes."
Source: Labor's Untold Story, by Richard O. Boyer and Herbert M. Morais, published by United Electrical, Radio & Machine Workers of America, NY, 1955/1979.
If you read his post again, I believe he was saying that schools teach obedience and conformity and NEGLECT creativity and critical thought. Thus children do not learn how to think for themselves with any skill or understanding.
Good discipline is essential to free thought. But when some say 'discipline', they don't mean internally motivated self discipline, they mean obedience and/or conformity. (Why aren't you conforming to my wishes? You must lack discipline...)
Nominal "free-thinking radicals" can be just as conformist...
Not true. From all *appearances* they can be considered just as conformist, but that would only be taking outside circumstances into account. Internally, the reasoning process itself is non conformist. It's a different approach, not necessarily a different appearance.
"Think, dammit. Don't lash out because it's the easy thing to do.
...that they didn't have a place in a power structure, that they didn't have to respect authority?
I think this statement applies more accurately to your post...
What kind of society would we have if kids were taught that they didn't have to do anything on a schedule, that they didn't have to be on time and organized...
Schools don't teach kids how to create and implement schedules to help them achieve their goals. Instead, kids are taught to conform to an arbitrary and micromanaging schedule imposed by an 'authority' figure. In this light, traditional school schedules are devoid of content, since they lack any purpose except obedience and conformity training.
They have their place as voting citizens. In essence, they ARE the authority, and as such should be taught how to make responsible decisions. That takes practice. Children who learn to blindly obey authority figures get another kind of practice. I think this develops and encourages BAD HABITS. Schools today model an authoritarian system, not a democratic one. This is bad for democracy itself!
What the hell is wrong with teaching kids to NOT be little shits? Or would you rather raise a generation of criminals because it's not cool to follow the rules? Juvenile crime is bad enough already, why promote it? The fact is that rules make a society livable, and you have to teach people the rules at an early age. If you don't, you get a lot of punks who use violence to solve their problems.
This stems from the base assumption that we are all inherintly evil, and the evil side of us must be suppressed from an early age by means of punishments, rewards, and indoctrination into a top down authoritarian heirarchy. Otherwise we'd run wild! We'd all be criminals...
Personally, I think that if a kid is taught only how to conform to rules, they are more likely to become criminals because they've only gained a shallow understanding of the law in school. They never learn that the law is a tool that they, as a future voter, will help shape, depending on what they want to accomplish in society. Thus they never gain any respect, since rules always appear as something preventing them from doing what they want, not as something that helps them accomplish their goals. Combine this with the arbitrary nature of many rules in classrooms, and you are teaching a child to obey indiscriminately. Again, good for authoritarian, bad for democratic.
If the poster has a kid, I encourage him to adopt a hands-off method of raising him and see what happens.
Why is it you instantly assume that the alternative is a hands off apporach? Is it possible to be more hands ON, without using punishments, rewards, and authority sturctures? To me, people who have been trained NOT to think for themselves have trouble imagining more than one alternative to any particular problem.
Oh, and by the way, what can be more hands off than blindly sending your child to a government institution for a standardizing 'education'?
I suggest to you that the research I've done for the last 5 years backs up what I'm saying. Maybe you should stop apologizing for a system that clearly doesn't work, and start looking into alternative methods of education, methods that actually take the learning process into account.
"Together we will bring order to the universe!" D. Vader.
"The problem is voter apathy."
Yes. But what to do?
And how is it possible that the 'education' system, after having twelve generous years to work its magic, spits out apathetic citizens?
I mean, who would benefit from that?
Isn't the education system supposed to make people smarter and more interested in life? When you look around, can you tell if it's working?
Some might say "you can lead a horse to water..."
Well, if you drag a horse to water with all your might, then force his head in the trough for hours at a time... after twelve odd years you could turn the poor thing off of water all together.
And what would that accomplish?
James.
What government should do is create an atmosphere where you or I or anyone else with the desire can go make money for him- or herself.
It's because of this narrow view embraced and perpetuated by money chasers that most can't imagine a world where you don't have to work your life away simply to survive.
Those not desiring to make money should live with the consequences of their decision.
You got it. You either waste your life away chasing money, or else... My point is that if you can't conform to the economic environment, or if you don't want to conform to it, you're in trouble. That's not fair! So the poor get welfare in leau of an alternative way of life.
This doubly protects the rich, removing the potential for alternative competing systems (protecting assets and/or growth potential of established system) and pacifies the poor at the same time (no angry riots inspired by hunger). It also serves to pit hard working taxpayers like yourself against the poor.
Want to do away with welfare? I do. But I figure we ought to fix the underlying structural problems first. If you're not interested in doing that, then I suggest we are at an impasse.
Status Quo
James.
What I liked about it was that the developers hadn't crippled the strain's ability to reproduce.
We are now polluting the genetics of certain species of plants. This is a type of pollution that is difficult for us to control. Perhaps impossible. What will rice be like in a hundred years? We have introduced a new element of uncertainty.
Rice might never be the same. This genetic change might suit us fine, in the short term. But will it suit the rice itself? Is there a chance that this change will weaken the rice plants ability to survive in some way?
When a single species in an environment changes, all other species around it adapt to that change. What kind of changes in other species are we encouraging? Maybe certain species of bacteria or fungus will find this geneticly modified strain of rice to be a terrific food source. It might take a few years to find out. By then, how many other strains of rice will be 'infected' with this man made trait?
OK, check this link out.
http://www.realchange.org/bushjr.htm
Its got *sources* linked so you can verify it for yourself.
Now, have you ever seen a pro-bush site link their sources? No. Then we would have known that Gore never said he invented the internet. Bush doesn't trust you enough to give you accurate information. Bush doesn't trust you to make an informed decision for yourself: he doesn't disclose the full truth. He wants you to make an *uninformed* decision.
Doesn't this worry you?
What do you think the XBox is for? Games? This device is going to sneak into millions of homes under the radar, as a gaming platform. But in a couple years, the MSN gaming network is going to offer... other services. How convenient. Maybe start slowly, gently, with some basic utils. After all, you don't want to confuse people... you must take care not to spook the herd.
Taking this strategy into consideration is why I think the Indrema will eventually fly. They won't 'beat' Microsoft, but they're not really playing the same game. The Indremas greater flexibility will insure a small but stable niche that will only get bigger with time.
People can structure organizations and licencing agreements in many different ways. Different structures encourage different sets of behaviours. With that in mind, can anyone think of a structure that could (as an example) attract enough resources to sustain a long-term full-time collaborative effort, while still maintaining what is attractive about open source?
Oversimplified Example: Many structures are designed to be competitive. Competition encourages secrecy, bottlenecking the flow of ideas, stifling creativity and innovation. Open source seeks to overcome this. But how many people can make a living writing open source software? I suspect that for some, writing open source is a hobby financed by a 'day job'. This seems to me, as an ignorant observer, like fertile ground for an innovative approach.
1) War on Drugs
by Tim Doran
Answer from Bush
You're going to be safe. Safe from things that harm you. It's about principles. Don't listen to them journalists. I'm gonna make you safe from evil and dark hearts. I have a good heart. It's good, not bad. Take the military for instance... **censored due to lack of content**
2) Minority Religions...
by Electric Angst
I'm a uniter, not a divider. We ought to welcome people into our hearts and spirits, regardless of their past sins. It's never too late to open your heart to Jesus. That's called forgiveness. I forgive. Every time I put someone to death in Texas, I forgive them for their sins first. I always make sure I do that. If they were innocent, then they're in heaven anyway. I let God sort 'em out. But the death penalty is their to keep order. Order is important. Rules ought to mean something.
3) Why give a tax cut?
by funkman
Because it's not the governments money. The government is an entity wholly separate from the people. The governments money should never be confused with the peoples money. How can the government hope to lead people if it's using their own money? I lead differently. I get things done. I plan to finance government like I financed my campagn: corporate donation. That's what leaders do, they lead. *chuckle* The government to trust people. I trust. I have a record. I trusted the people in Texas. Now we're number one in pollution! That's called leadership. Leadership. I lead. I'm a leader.
4) electoral reform
by carleton
Whatever gets me into office. I've got some debts to repay. *chuckle* That's called honesty. I'm honest, with a good heart. It's important to pay back debts. A matter of principle. I support my friends. I trust them. They like me. They give me money. If what they want in return is my autograph, I'll give it to them. That's called trust.
5)How Do You Feel About Intellectual Property?
by Phil Gregory
I'm for it. You heard what I was for. I'm for it. If what I said I was for is this, then I'm for it, if it isn't, then I'm not. You heard it.
6) Encryption....
by SquadBoy
I think we should do everything in our power to prevent encryption. The military needs to be strong. If our country were encrypted today by a rogue nation, we wouldn't be ready. The military supports me. I know how to get things done. I know how to motivate the military: by offering them a cushy job with a defense subcontractor when they retire. I'll do everything in my power to make that possible. So the military has to be strong to prevent encryption.
7) Rising Political Protests
by sterno
I think the protests are an important expression. We have to ask: what's causing these protests? I'll tell you: an education recession. Under my plan, students will be punished frequently for their mistakes when reading. It's called accountability. If you make a mistake while learning to read, you ought to be punished. That's called compassion. After a while of this teaching, they will learn: don't read unless you have to. That should fix things.
8) Asteroid Defenses
by Ethelred Unraed
Asteroid Defense is turning hearts dark. These video games ought to be regulated. I trust people to allow me to regulate these things. Trust. We ought to hold these digital butchers accountable. Accountability. In Texas, when we hold people accountable, we put 'em to death. *wide turned-on grin*.
9) The Future of the Country, and of Humanity
by 11223
Our mission ought to be that we keep things in perspective. The proper perspective, I might add. My perspective. I tell you, when I turned forty, and my wife threatened to leave me if I didn't stop drinking and smoking crack, I had a "spiritual awakening". I realized that if I just did what I was told, I could accomplish anything. Now I'm about to become President! They told me this would happen when I became governor, but I didn't believe 'em! So our goal should be to enforce existing laws. People should follow rules. That's what a leader does, enforces laws. I enforce laws to get things done. Rules ought to mean something. They mean: don't do that, or else you'll get into trouble. Accountability. That's what America is all about.
first this link:
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20001024/pl/bus
Funny that this contradicts the original RAND report, ohh I mean THE OFFICIAL Report, that said in his state he was tied first only to North Carolina in education improvement...
Not quite. What Rand says: http://www.rand.org/hot/Press/texas.scores.html
Regarding the next link:
Ok first after reading the article it seemed like a very strong paper, ohhh wait it is written in the journals of eductaion...
A scholarly, peer-reviewed journal of education. Where would you expect to read such a paper? Do you think it would be better if it were written by people who were not experts on education? Would you have a lawyer examine a medical procedure because the medical establishment is too biased???
Second lets just look at some of the evidence or arguments made in the article, "SAT-Math scores have deteriorated relative to students nationally." Now let me ask you if more students take a test, particularly students of lower economic ranges do you believe that test scores on average would increase or decrease? The answer is obvious and shows part of the failed logic in the article
You take a single quote from the introduction, misunderstand it, then present it as evidence that the whole article is worthless??? Let me point you to the relevant portion in the report so you at least know what that portion of the intro was referring to...
Regarding the Harvard link, check it again.
Regarding vouchers, I'm all for vouchers as long as the Feds don't hamstring the voucher schools by making them 'accountable', as GWB puts it. Do you know what that means? Micro-management of schools from washington.
I am looking for good unbiased evidence here...
All three of the education links qualify. Plus, there's lots of raw data in these other articles, data that can be checked. That's why I posted them. Don't you think they raise some serious questions?
I really don't care if Dick Cheney got his money from the Gov't big deal...
You asked for evidence that Bush/Cheney were pro corporate welfare. I give it to you and now I'm "wasting" your time?
I know you weren't trying to argue that George Bush is going to try and micromanage peoples lives more than Al Gore. If you really are for less micromanagement then that argument is shot.
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Not more or less, just more insidious. He wants to tinker with the education system in ways that are just plain stupid and irresponsible:
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20001024/pl/bus
http://epaa.asu.edu/epaa/v8n41/
http://www.law.harvard.edu/groups/civilrights/c
Bush is for corporate welfare. Ok give me some proof I fail to see any evidence that supports your argument, maybe a website and don't send me one that is obviously against him.
While in Texas he signed a corporate welfare bill...
http://www.libertyhaven.com/noneoftheabove/spor
http://www.essential.org/monitor/mm2000/00march
Plus, check out what Dick Cheney did when he left government:
http://www.salon.com/news/col/cona/2000/10/10/c
http://www.salon.com/politics/feature/2000/07/2
Sure, these articles might be considered 'anti' Bush/Cheney, but the facts are still there. Feel free to check them out for yourself.
The "system" that you refer to is the economic body of the country...
Wrong. I was refering to the larger democratic system of which economics is a part, but NOT the whole.
Taxes merely reduce freedom of choice (doing what you want with your resources) and increase costs all around.
What an amazingly narrow argument: you say that taxation reduces freedom because you have less money to spend! Cry me a river.
Because of taxes, I can walk around safely at night. I can drive a safe car on a paved highway. I can fly safely. I can drink safe water. I don't have to worry about being invaded. I could go on...
Lots of CHOICE.
Preservation of FREEDOMS.
James.
So what you are saying is that people need to take care of other people so they can be exploited for extended time periods.. I like that...
Well, I like having police around. But they don't take care of me. In fact the police are an expression of me taking care of myself. How? By collaborating with my fellow citizens to elect a government that hires policemen. Didn't know that you could take care of yourself by collaborating with others? Man, the isolation... It must be lonely.
Does this exploit the rich? Or were you saying that the poor are being exploited... I'm not sure, it doesn't make sense in either case.
I have a better idea... How about, when someone uses the system that is in place to supporting my efforts to make money, they realize that it is also supporting their efforts to spend money... And the responsibility for said purchase is still their own. They can't demand later that I use the value transfered for their betterment..
They can! It's happening right now! It's called taxation!
And the idea that the system is in place to support the poors ability to spend money is...
HEE HEE HEE HEE!!!
I'm giddy.
I find this 'let's-tax-the-rich-so-that-we-can-give-more-to-th e-poor' trend a bit disturbing.
Good. That trend IS disturbing. But it has LITTLE to do with progressive taxation.
Don't distort the issues.
Sorry, but having some asshole with political ambitions suggest that I should get taxed more than what I already am to support some unwashed welfare-leeching gang of hoodlums is not my idea of fairness.
How about using your taxes to maintain and improve schools so that other immigrants can go to college. Why focus on welfare alone when we could focus on military, roads, police, national parks... Why should you pay more? Because you are obliged: the system worked for you so you are in a position to keep the system healthy and fertile. You ought to make sure it can work for others in the future. Yes, it's about fairness.
And no, you don't earn money all by yourself. You don't live in a vacuum. We're not talking about individuals. We're talking about a huge economic system and society that needs to be improved and maintained.
Now that you're earning money for yourself, you want out. But when you need a FREE PUBLIC EDUCATION, did you think of yourself as an "unwashed welfare-leeching" hoodlum? I bet not.
Your reasoning is simplistic. Your arguments favour your postion economically, but they fail you logically.
It's fair because the rich have an obligation to feed money back into the system to keep it healthy, so that others can get rich after them. Why the rich? They can afford it. And they benefited the most from the system in the first place! They should take care of it.
The poor can't afford to do this because most of their money goes towards eating and shelter. They don't have much to spare. Putting more of the burden on them would be like punishing them for others success! (The poor help the rich get rich... we all participate in the economic system. The rich don't get rich in a vacuum...)
It's about feeding money back into the system to keep the system healthy and fertile.
I wish people would start thinking about their simplistic and naive parroting. After all, if the system falls apart, who has the most to lose?
I love how Nader wants to punish those of us who have succeeded, and reward those who have not. It all makes sense to me. I work hard and have to basically give money to one who doesn't. Thanks a lot.
As if you earn money all by yourself! Hah! Do you make your money in a vacuum? Nobody else had anything to do with it? There is no system in place that supported your efforts? Maybe you should think about it differently. Maybe you should consider it like this:
Those at the bottom, those who bought your wares and helped make you 'rich' are insisting that you feed some of your money back into the system so the system stays healthy and so that others have the same kind of chances that you had.
The people who succeed have an obligation to keep the system healthy so that others may succeed in the future.
Your simplistic reasoning is excusable since it is obviously brought on by an acute case of selfishness. That's why we have to mandate your participation in the tax system. We know how attracted you are to arguments that favour you economically.
Gore's position is to give "targeted tax cuts" to things he likes.
I guess you like to keep things simple...
Gore is 'targeting' his tax cuts because he doesn't feel the country can afford across-the-board tax cuts. Not because he likes some people more than others. Sheesh. In addition, tax cuts run the risk of increasing inflation. Gore is preventing this by using his tax cuts to help encourage personal savings.
So he is targeting the people who actually NEED tax cuts while preventing inflation at the same time. He is being frugal, but fair.
It's funny how Bush manages to paint Gore like an elitest when Bush has a record of favouring the wealthy at the expense of the poor!
It turns out that Bush only brings his 'principles' into play when they are convenient. For example, Bush wants to micromanage every school room, from teacher paychecks to student report cards, using a criteria that doesn't make any sense, and is not backed up by educational research. Nor is it backed up by his Texas record. Quite the opposite. If you think this is minor, imagine the masses of stupid people voting in a couple decades. This is a real threat to liberty!
And he IS for micromanaging the economy. He talks about 'shaping the economic environment' much the same way Bill Clinton does. What do you think that means???
He's also for corporate welfare. This amounts to using businesses as a funnel, diverting public funds into the pockets of the RIGHT PEOPLE. I would call it corruption, EXCEPT THAT IT'S LEGAL!
Bush doesn't need to react to reality; his principals tell him what to do.
you missed my point, somewhat.
No, I didn't. I wasn't even responding to your point. I was using your phrasing to make an entirely different point. I thought I clarified that when I said I "wasn't trying to quibble or jump on you for minor inaccuracies". I've understood what you meant from the beginning and I don't disagree with you. Instead, I was using the "ambiguity in what [you] wrote" to make subtle distinctions between the many nuances of certain words, distincitons that I find revealing and interesting. In other words, I was on a tangent. I thought that was obvious.
I don't think Slashdot should have a jurisdiction. I figure if it's interesting, we might as well discuss it. If it's not interesting, don't participate.
I also think that discussing how police officers are sent into classrooms to manipulate children 'matters'.
And yes, it is about technology. In fact, it's the most powerful technology of all! "Social Technology".
It has, by far, the greatest influence on our lives. Yet most are oblivious to its machinations. Now that's power!
DARE uses authority figures in an attempt to intimidate children into blind compliance. As such, it is not education. It is manipulation and conditioning. Manipulating and conditioning children into blind compliance is wrong! It hinders their ability to make intelligent decisions, it creates unnecessary fear, it discourages rational thought. It hinders education!
DARE can tear families apart. Children have been conditioned from an early age to be loyal to 'authority figures'. If DARE presents them with sufficient evidence of their parents evils (smoking pot), they sometimes betray their families and rat them out. At the very least they will learn about conflicting loyalties, regardless of their parents habits.
Perhaps some children rat their families out becausd they are worried that they might 'die' from smoking pot. So DARE uses innaccurate data to manipulate children.
I wonder why DARE is even needed. I mean, if our education system teaches children to think for themselves, to make rational intelligent decisions, isn't DARE redundant? Unfortunately, our education doesn't teach these things. Just the opposite. So DARE exposes weakness in our education system.
DARE exposes what our education system does teach: ignorance. By emphasizing rote memorization of innaccurate and/or incomplete 'facts', by using authority to intimidate, by emphasizing punishments and rewards, by encouraging blind obedience and discouraging active exploration, DARE builds on previous lessons.
DARE is ineffective at doing what it claims to be doing. But it is effective in other ways. It reinforces the lessons taught to children throughout their lives at school: obey, don't question and don't explore. These lessons are the very antithesis of a real education.
I used to like e-mail. It was new and tech related. You could tell: it had acronym-like properties, emphasizing just how NEW this thing was... kinda like R.A.D.A.R. Tech words sometimes use hyphens and periods in their construction, often a mishmash of jargon from the tech they relate to, to show how they were constructed.
But once people start using the word in conversation, you quickly forget what it looks like. And the tech itself loses its novelty, so eye catching hyphens seem quaint. Gradually, you write it the way you hear it; the aural representation takes over from the visual. Its a real word now. Like 'radar'.
Sorry about your friend. Could you give some details? I've never heard of anyone dying from E. I've heard of people dying from dehydration, herion they thought was E, or any death near a rave (ecstacy related death...) etc. The problem is that the press misrepresents what actually happens in order to 'spread the word' that E is dangerous. I think E IS dangerous, which is why people ought to have accurate and detailed information, not propaganda.
So I urge you to share some details with us.
It is not that science makes no, or few assumptions. We assume a lot of things, many of them we don't even acknowledge. Still, science tries to minimize what we assume, and keep it limited to things that seem "self-evident". Then when we find exceptions, we change the assumptions to keep it consistent, and integrated.
I agree with you on this. And I think there are some interesting implications.
Does science simply rest on another kind of faith, a different set of 'self-evident truths' or base assuptions?
How do we deal with the probability of the unknown and the unkowable? Do we live in a state of non-belief, able to recognize information as useful but never creating a belief out of it? Or do we create beliefs based on incomplete science, then change them when there is a critical mass of contradictory evidence, a process akin to plate tectonics? Do we recognize ideas as useful tools, to be 'picked-up' when applicable then put down again, or do we cling to our ideas about things in a vain struggle for certainty and stability? Have we accepted science as useful in some contexts, or are we using science in a vain attempt to satisfy a need for certainty and control?
Which of the above is the more flexable approach? Which is more susceptible to the allure of unquestioning belief?
Ideas about the Universe may have changed, but I suspect that many ancient habits are still alive and well, even in the world of science.
I think you just described why things like love are utterly pointless and futile.
That depends on whether 'love' is something that you experience, or if it's an idea/concept/thing in itself. Experiencing love is not futile. Trying NOT to experience love can be futile!
But clinging to some idea or belief about love IS futile, since your focus is drawn away from the raw experience of love itself, and towards your imaginary ideas about those feelings. Many people habitually confuse and clutter their experiences with ideas and thinking. If you don't need to think, then you should stop thinking. Just 'be' for a while; no thought, no ideas, just raw experience: undistorted, unfiltered and in your living room...
Anyways, is this similar to Nihilism? This approach I learned from books on Zen. I heard there were similarities.
James.