How the Internet Changed Truth

A couple of weeks ago I did a blog post on education based off of an article my science teacher had given us. A little while after that post he gave us yet another editorial. I just got around to reading it a few days ago, and found it very interesting. I unfortunately cannot link to it, as New Scientist requires a subscription, but the editorial was titled "Why Untidiness Is Good for Us." David Weinberger, the author, is not speaking of the state of your bedroom, but the state of knowledge.

He contends that the internet has fundamentally changed the nature of knowledge, at least in the world of science. Paper has limits on how much can be printed, so some topics are not published. Additionally, within articles that are published, they generally cannot release all the data that led them to their conclusions. We have discussed the first in class a lot, and the second has also been touched on. But I think that in the realm of science it has perhaps even more ramifications that in historical papers. While history is more than full of facts, scientific experiments and data take up a lot of room to just present, much less explain. This would severely limit authors ability to talk about everything that led to their conclusion - and it can be a lot. As the author noted, Charles Darwin wrote "a two-volume work to establish a single fact: they [barnacles] are crustaceans."

But a new concept that he introduced was that "printed matter does not link." Which means that the author "has to cram everything the reader needs into one volume" and must paraphrase and quote with great brevity. As we know, a quote is nothing without its context, and linking to the original really allows the reader to fully access that original context.

Weinberger then goes on to say that the internet has further changed understanding of knowledge from "a set of coordinated definitions based on essential differences and similarities." Why? Because the internet has shown us that "we don't agree, and we can't let that stop us." So now, multiple understandings of the classifications of barnacles can exist with in one database, and scientists with vastly different opinions can contribute. And yes, the author was referring to the understanding of knowledge in science, the supposed world of objective facts and simple truths. Obviously, this is not the case - and perhaps the internet is what will bring many of us to realize this.

Tokenism

source

This is a still from the second episode of Sherlock. The show is about Sherlock Holmes, and preserves the characterization of original. The plots are modernized and  loosely based on the original books. The show aired its first season on the BBC in 2010 and its second in 2012.
On the episode in question, very little of the show was based on the original book, and nothing about the characters' ethnicity was pulled from this. The still shows Soo Lin Yao, a one time character on the show. She was involved in a gang, which is actually an ancient Chinese crime syndicate, and was a drug mule. However, once she comes to England she somehow magically knows how to perform complex tea ceremonies and appraise antiques and gets a job in a museum. She is now obsessed with the teapots and acts like they are alive. She also quotes ancient scholars. After being shown for a little in the beginning, she disappears. When she returns again she helps Sherlock solve his mystery, and then gets shot in the head and dies.

Multilingualism at Home and Abroad

From the NY Times

When reading today's New York Times, I came across an article on Latvian voters rejecting a proposal to add Russian as a second official language. This reminded me of the issue of language in the U.S., which has been centered mainly around Spanish speakers. In Latvia, more than a quarter of people speak Russian as their first language. According to U.S. census data, about 35 million, or 12%, of the U.S. population speaks Spanish at home. The percentage of Spanish speakers in the U.S. is less than half of the percentage of Russian speakers in Latvia, and Spanish has become a huge force in the United States politically, economically and socially - especially in the realm of education - I can only imagine the importance of Russian in Latvia.

The article framed the issue as being on one side a push for recognition and rights for Russian speakers in Latvia, and on the other a question of national identity. The Latvian president commended those who voted against the referendum for not "yielding before provocations and attempts to foment hatred." The emotional charge of his statement shows the importance of the official language to many in Latvia, and another Latvian framed the issue as one of "the nation's identity" and not one of rights for minority groups. In a country where they actually have an official language, unlike in the U.S., the debate around national identity seems to have a little more strength than in the United States. But it seems to me like when 25% of the country speaks a language other than the official one, perhaps the national identity needs re-framing. In the United States, the whole national identity argument has never held much weight for me, when the country's history is made up of immigrants who often did not speak English.  What do you think? Do people in countries with some sort of history of an official language have more justification for the "national identity" argument than do those in countries like the United States?

...And the Pursuit of All Who Threaten It

The other day I was watching the Colbert Report online, and one of the ads running was for the Navy. I zoned it out as always, but I did catch one phrase: "Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of All Who Threaten It." This seemed like a really weird phrase to me. I was unable to find the advertisement, but upon googling the phrase I found this article, written in 2004 by military.com, a military and veteran membership organization.

The article states that the slogan first came about in 2002 and "was intended to convey a sense of the Navy's mission." A couple things about this slogan seemed strange to me. First, the idea that the Navy pursues any who "threaten" "life" or "liberty" is simply untrue. The Navy, for the most part, pursues those who are seen as threatening the U.S. Of course there are other functions of the Navy, and of course it is sometimes involved in situations where the main goal is humanitarian, not U.S.-specific, but, in general, the armed forces go after people who are perceived as a threat to the United States. But of course the phrase "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness" from the Declaration of Independence is basis for this slogan, so perhaps that implies the association with America.

But the origin of this phrase in the Declaration of Independence seems rather odd to me. "Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" has become a motto that is seen as encapsulating much of American ideals. The slogan's modification of "happiness" to "All Who Threaten It" marks a strange turn in how the U.S. identifies itself. Although the slogan refers specifically to "the Navy's mission," it is being used in an advertising campaign that attempts to appeal to the general population through their sense of patriotism. What does it mean about the United States when attacking those who threaten us is a part of our national identity? This slogan is hardly the only example of this. Patriotism has increasingly become defined by support for troops, hatred for terrorists, and willingness to attack all possible threats.

The Problem with Rigor

Before finals in American Studies class, we were presented with an editorial on a Florida law that required history to be taught as a collection of facts, not as something constructed. We discussed the detrimental effect that this law could have on schools and classes such as ours and then moved on. I was prompted to return to the subject when I in science class our teacher gave us an editorial called "Trivializing Science Education" by Bruce Alberts, which discussed a 1998 California law regulating science education.

The law is quite different than the Florida law, and has some different problems, but also some similar ones. For example, "an overly strict attention to rules, procedure and rote memorization." Rote memorization has little place in a science curriculum. Laws of physics and such are to be understood, not memorized. If you don't understand Newton's first law there is no point in being able to recite it.  Biology classes are the most vulnerable to this, and I found my biology class last year to be primarily memorization based, but the memorization was set in a background of understanding broader themes and concepts, and seemed purposeful. What the article points out is especially dangerous is requiring children to memorize facts "that the vast majority of them cannot yet grasp," such as requiring fifth graders to memorize the periodic table of elements (which the law did).

Despite some of their differences, I think the California and Florida laws were probably driven by the same motivation. Alberts suggests that "the preference for 'rigor' in science education" is the motivation, because it leads to "the unfortunate result...that difficult concepts are taught too early" and "an overly strict attention to rules, procedure and rote memorization." It is not hard to believe that a similar desire for rigor in history education could lead to the over-emphasis on tests and facts found in the Florida law.

Of course, I must tack on a disclaimer to the above statement - elements of the Florida law such as downplaying the Constitution and highlighting the Declaration of Independence do not have any clear link to rigor and are probably the result of other motivations. I am just speaking of the emphasis on testing and facts.

But why does the search for rigorous education lead to an over-emphasis on memorization? Why can't a conceptually based curriculum be rigorous?