Ichthyic
Posts: 3325
Joined: May 2006
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There were at least 3 separate topics being discussed simultaneously in that thread, so it's taken me some time to pull out my commentary specific to Allen's course, but without further excuse, here 'tis.
I'm not even going to cover much of what Pim said in that thread, as he must have been on drugs or something; he was all over the board, claiming that ID is a "theoretically valid hypothesis", equating all PT posters to creationists, and wondering why we even maintain PT to begin with. so... uh, I'm just going to strike that up to a bad day for Pim and move on, as many have seen the regular posts from him previously about the vacuity of ID in all aspects anyone can think of.
much of my responses were based on Allen's first full post discussing the issues, which can be seen here, and I would recommend for context for the rest of the discussion on this thread:
http://www.pandasthumb.org/archive....-121417
Here are some of my comments, based on that and later comments, interspersed with comments from Allen and others.
[quote]
...indeed, while both sides apparently “learned something”, according to Allen, both sides just as equally did not change “her/his mind over the course of the summer”.
What this shows, as most here already could have guessed, is that no matter how much we attempt to “break our intellectual backs”, people given to the ID worldview (the vast majority of that differing little from an essentially creationist mindset), will not be swayed by any argument of reason or evidence.
Heck, if Allen couldn’t do it by carefully walking through all the relevant literature, step by step, I tend to think it simply can’t be done.
In the same way, I can also guess that those who think Francis collins will have better luck with his “approach” will end up being disappointed as well.
I’m tempted to say:
“Can we just get on with the inevitable game of whack-a-mole now, and put aside all attempts at reconciliation?”
but, I suppose there might yet be some way of putting this idiocy to rest that involves some sort of intellectual argument. Anything is possible.
bottom line though, the evidence to me, and others here, seems to point to a potential underlying psychological malady that creates this kind of worldview. This is also suggested by the cites posted in this thread, previous research on heritability of ultra-religious behavior that was posted here last year, and just about every long-term discussion any of us have had with those who purport to be YEC’s or IDers (the denial and projection are obvious and rampant in just about every post they make).
[/quote]
Allen later clarified by informing us that the 2 (yes only 2) ID supporters in the class were actually invited, and not Cornell students, and as to what he meant by "nobody changed their minds", he was really referring to the evolution supporters not being influenced by the ID texts covered in the course.
However, he also pointed out (when asked) that there is no public record of either of the two ID participants recognizing the vacuousness of Behe or Dembski's literature, and seemed to not only have no problems with those students knocking the Dawkin's text covered in the course, but evidently agreed with much of their criticism:
Allen:
[quote]This is why we dismissed Phillip Johnson’s book, The Wedge of Truth and why we spent relatively little time discussing Dawkins’s The Blind Watchmaker, as both were essentially “position statements,” rather than scientific analyses.
[/quote]
After a back and forth with Wheels, I clarified a bit of my thinking on whether there is value in evidentiary argument in addressing the issue of creationism, and whether that a class designed as Allen's was could possibly acheive the goal of rational debate influencing the belief structures of creationists (interspersed comments are from Wheels post):
[quote]
Wheels:
| Quote | | Creating a more informed public that can see through ID bullshit for themselves is the first and probably the most difficult step |
actually, this “step” has already been tried, and apparently has failed.
regardless of whether it has to do with inadequate funding for educational institutions, or poor teachers, or poor administrations, the end result is that the proportion of those profession essentially what amounts to creationism has changed little in the last 20 years or so, according to the gallup polls.
without a SERIOUS overhaul of the entire educational system, I can’t see how this will change in the near future.
and even if the money were there to make significant changes, you simply can’t force somebody to learn something their parents don’t want them to learn - they’ll simply put their kids into a “private” school.
| Quote | | A more achievable short-term goal would probably be to defuse much of the tension between religious groups and secular science, because provocation isn’t going to make people suddenly more reasonable, rational, and agreeable. |
the problem is, that regardless of what folks within the blogosphere seem to think, it’s the creationists THEMSELVES that are generating just about ALL of the tension; the scientists are simply reacting, and relatively few even are.
The right wing see the issue as a “hotbutton” issue, just like homosexuality, that can easily be exploited for political gain, and they are doing their utmost to rile up the “faithful” to create the very tension we see now.
The only way to “defuse” the situation is to get idiots like robertson, Kennedy, Dobson, and Chimpy McGrin to stop trying to play politics with their basic grassroots powerbase.
that’s like asking a junkie to stop shooting up.
not terribly realistic.
| Quote | | Dr. Pennock’s books on Creationism which don’t ever give the impression of any personal religious beliefs at all but present the cases free of bias, informatively and academically, while still revealing the anti-evolutionist movers to be clownishly inept and hopelessly thickskulled besides being factually wrong. |
this is an intellectual argument that will fly over the heads, or be deliberately ignored, by the vast majority of creobots and those placating to them, like Coulter.
again, like the attempt by Allen, it simply will not fly with those “already convinced of the evils of materialism”.
and again, let me stress that the evangelical movement in america has far less to do with religion than it does with politics.
blaming religion for the idiocy these folks exhibit is a totally seperate issue from religion as a whole.
otherwise, we would see creobots more commonly in other countries, which we don’t.
| Quote | | I see it as a problem of personality and psychology rather than religion or areligious beliefs, it’s a fundamental problem with the way some people think (or don’t think) of things, especially in regards to the possibility of themselves being ignorant and wrong, rather than whether or not they choose to believe in a Flying Spaghetti Monster. |
yes, and this underlying pychology predisposes certain individuals to glom onto the kind of creationism we discuss here.
again, the very reason i refer to it as a “malady”; it shares little in common with much other “religion”.
Note that this is also exactly the reason why i said that Collins will have similarly dismal results in trying to reach those afflicted. We can leave the specifics of whether collins himself is suffering from some of the same issues for another day.
| Quote | | Consider the almost unfailing tendency of Creation proponents to recycle and reguritate decades-old bull despite being irrefutably and demonstrably wrong . |
can be quite nicely bottled under “denial”….and the ever oft heard claims of evolutionary theory as “religion” can similarly be put under the category of “projection”.
I can point to a classic case of these very things: our own little AFDave who posts over in ATBC.
He’s just one of the hundreds of creobots that have posted here that exhibit rampant denial and projection, without even realizing it of course.
it’s like I flashback to my psych 101 classes every time i read their posts. hence the reason I prefer the term “creobot”.
| Quote | | But I always argue to the bitter end for the sake of the spectators, the fence-sitters, those who don’t know about this whole “evolution” thing but might be willing to give it a shot if only somebody would teach them about it. |
more power to ya. lurkers have popped in from time to time on the thread created by AFDave to thank those refuting him over and over again, and to note how wrong Dave is.
It doesn’t change Dave’s mind though.
[/quote]
In response to Allen accusing those critical of the course of being "uncivil"...
| Quote |
Allen said: | Quote | | the majority of people on both sides of this issue are not interested in rational discussion nor logical arguments supported by evidence. |
(Note: does anyone find it odd that this directly contradicts the supposed purpose of the course? - If true, why start a course whose design was supposed to bring "clarity" via rational discussion?)
Allen:
one, I did attempt to address some serious flaws i saw in the analysis used in this paper, and in the published one you cited.
two, you are completely naive to think that rational discourse will solve this issue.
You really need to take a reality check and spend some time speaking with some REAL YECers like Dave over in ATBC.
150 plus pages of attempts to rationally present biology, genetics, and geology to him and he thinks we are all just deluded. The only real value has been to some of the lurkers, all of whome de-lurked and flat out pointed out how we had it right and Dave was being irrational. Which affected Dave not in the slightest.
THAT’S the reality here. your course was a nice bit of exploration, but on the national stage, it means very little, to tell the truth.
Your analysis of the reaction here ignores the fact that many of the people commenting have been dealing directly with creationists for years, and as your own post mentioned, have seen very little in the way of evidentiary argument having any impact.
Both yourself and Pim are overestimating the value of rational debate.
As i said, ever try to rationally talk a junkie out of being a junkie?
It rarely ever works. You have to attack the psychological barriers that these people put up to maintain their delusions.
The quotes from the papers you have posted so far, along with the quotes of how you apparently “graded” mistakes like the crypsis one, suggest that you are more interested in coddling the belief structures that generated the mistakes, than breaking them down to correct it.
Moreover this:
It’s people like you folks that make me wonder if I’m really on the right side, here.
is an especially troubling thing to hear from tenure track professor from Cornell.
Perhaps you are at that.
Perhaps we can discuss the issue of search imagery vs. “innate” imagery at some other time and place more appropriate.
ITMT, i see a tremendous amount of hedging on your part, combined with a tendency to promote factual errors and a very bizarre analysis of how posters here view this whole issue.
I really think you should take a step back from this issue, take a breath, and rethink.
We aren’t the ones who set this up to be a game of “whack a mole”, but try as we would, that does seem to be where it always ends up.
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which basically was the last post I made on that specific issue.
now a lot of that is out of context to some of the important posts others made in between, and the posts that Pim and Allen were making about the course and interpretations, so I will double back and simply copy the more relevant of their posts so you can see for yourselves:
Comment #121339 (Allen):
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Actually, very early in the summer when things started heating up at the Evolution and Design website, Hannah and I stumbled upon a very equitable system of moderation. She (a self-avowed IDer) was in charge of moderating people clearly identifiable as ID supporters, whereas I (a vehement pro-evolutionist) was in charge of moderating people clearly identifiable as EB (“evolutionary biology”) supporters. After a few difficult cases, it seemed to work out pretty well. Both of us were suitably abashed by the intemperate remarks put forth by people we viewed as being on “our side,” and both of us took care to let nearly all comments through, unless they clearly (indeed, egregiously) violated the clearly stated “rules of engagement.” Within a day or two it became apparent to me that almost everyone had stopped hurling epithets and started providing reasoned support for their arguments (or not, in which case it was blindingly obvious to everyone reading the comments who was playing fast and loose with the truth).
As I pointed out in the latest post at our website, I don’t think anyone changed their mind as a result of the seminar, but I do believe that most of us came away with a much clearer and more comprehensive grasp of the issues and how each side viewed them, and what kinds of evidence each side used to defend their views (or not, as the case may be). Furthermore, there was strong concensus at the end of the course that almost all of what most people think of as evolutionary biology (and quite literally all of what Darwin presented in the Origin of Species) is virtually untouched by ID, which focusses almost exclusively on issues surrounding the origin of life and the genetic code, plus a few selected biochemical pathways (and, of course, the bacterial flagellum). We spent a week deconstructing Michael Behe and William Dembski’s arguments (and their books) and found that the much-vaunted Darwin’s Black Box says virtually nothing about nearly all of evolutionary theory (and that even Behe himself concedes that there is “strong evidence” for common descent), and that Dembski’s “explanatory filter” and “complex specified information,” while mildly interesting from the standpoint of probability theory, has almost no demonstrable application to real-world biological systems.
Therefore, far from undermining evolutionary biology, the works of these two authors (taken at face value) have almost no relevence to the great bulk of evolutionary biology. Furthermore, all of the participants (including the ID supporters) rejected Phillip Johnson’s The Wedge of Truth as pure political polemic, not worthy of our time and attention; indeed, one of the most ardent ID supporters stated “That isn’t ID.” If not, then at least for the participants on the notorious Cornell evolution and design seminar, ID is an entirely theoretical hypothesis restricted to the origin of life, the origin of the genetic code, and the origin of a few selected biochemical pathways (and the bacterial flagellum), currently lacking empirical verification and without clearly defined methodologies for verification or falsification.
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Comment #121417 (Allen):
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Three questions were posed. The following are my answers to these questions, as they did not explicitly come up in this format this summer:
(1) What is the current status of ID research?
As far as I know, there is no empirical research that either validates or falsifies any of the principle claims of the primary authors of ID texts (i.e. Michael Behe and William Dembski, but also including David Berlinski, Guillermo Gonzalez, Stephen Meyer, and Jonathan Wells). Only Behe and Dembski have presented even quasi-empirical applications of ID theory. The remainder fall into the same category that Phillip Johnson did this summer - that is, they write what amount to polemics based on opinion and speculation, nearly all of it negative (that is, they do not present positive hypotheses, they merely attack various aspects of evolutionary theory). As noted earlier, Behe and Dembski’s works were the primary focus of our seminar this summer, and the conclusions most of us arrived at have already been noted.
I believe that the primary reason that there is essentially no empirical research being done to either validate or falsify ID theory is that ID theory in general does not consist of positive hypotheses that can be empirically tested. As many have pointed out, Behe’s concept of “irreducible complexity” is based almost entirely on ignorance and lack of information, rather than on “first principles” (i.e. on theoretical formulations that lead to the conclusion that the evolution of “irreducibly complex” objects or processes are impossible).
Dembski’s mathematical speculations remain precisely that: speculations without the slightest shred of empirical support. After spending many hours working through Dembski’s mathematics, we concluded that it is currently impossible to use his “explanatory filter” (as expressed in mathematical terms) to determine if a given biological entity quallifies as “complex specified information” (CSI). Although Dembski’s mathematics are mildly interesting from a purely intellectual standpoint, they do not lend themselves to making actual calculations, again because there are so many unknown variables that must be quantified before his equation(s) for CSI can acually yield confirmatory or disconfirmitory judgements.
Therefore, unless someone undertakes a program of research tha proposes a series of testable positive hypotheses based on ID theory that can be empirically validated, it appears likely that ID theory will eventually come to the same fate as Bergson and Deleuze’s concept of élan vital; a footnote to the progress of empirical science, of interest only to those interested in failed pseudoscientific “theories.”
(2) With Behe and Dembski essentially marginalized, who are the scientists working on the theory of ID?
As far as I know, there are none. With the possible exception of Guillermo Gonzalez, all of the other authors listed above do not perform empirical research. Rather, they pursue an essentially negative program of attacking evolutionary biology and proposing philosophical speculations (based almost entirely on fundamentalist Christian theology) as a substitute.
(3) What is the role of the Discovery Institute and why are they so keen on influencing Boards of Education?
The Discovery Institute is a purely political entity, not currently engaged in any form of empirical research (nor supporting such research in either monetary or other ways), whose entire function appears to be to promote a political program intended to force a basically fundamentalist Christian viewpoint into the public schools and, eventually into local, state, and national governments and laws. These goals are explicitly stated by the directors of the Discovery Institute in the “wedge document” and have been its primary raison d’etre since its inception.
We did not directly discuss the Discovery Institute, the “wedge document,” the Kitzmiller v. Dover trial and decision, nor the writings of any of the polemicists listed above. This was a deliberate decision on the part of the participants in the seminar, as we all wanted to restrict our analysis and discussion to the scientific claims of the principle ID theorists. This is why we dismissed Phillip Johnson’s book, The Wedge of Truth and why we spent relatively little time discussing Dawkins’s The Blind Watchmaker, as both were essentially “position statements,” rather than scientific analyses. I my opinion, the same can essentially be said for Behe’s Darwin’s Black Box, leaving only Dembski’s The Design Inference as the only non-polemical work in all of ID “theory.” And, as noted above, we concluded that Dembski’s mathematical work only suggests a possible way of distinguishing between “natural” and “designed” objects and processes, without presenting an empirically testable way of so distinguishing.
So, was the whole exercise “worth it?” It was indeed, as it helped all of us come to clarity on many of the foregoing points. As I have stated elsewhere, I don’t think anyone changed her/his mind over the course of the summer, but I believe (based on our discussions, especially during the last class) that we did come to some clarity on the issues, on the kinds of arguments made by both sides, and the kinds of evidence that would qualify as confirmative or disconfirmative on either side of the issue. Currently, there is abundant confirmative evidence for most of evolutionary theory (with the exception of the origin of life, the genetic code, and selected biochemical pathways) and virtually no empirical confirmative evidence for ID theory. Unless ID “theorists” take steps to become ID “scientists,” this situation is unlikely to change.
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Comment #121422(flint):
| Quote |
Kind of exhausing trying to wade through the meticulously careful political correctness here, which has served only to muddy the semantics almost beyond recognition.
There is no “ID theory.” There is only the irremediable religious position statement. Goddidit. With that as a given, of course nobody is going to change their mind. Blather about the “kinds of evidence” that might undermine ID is fatuous: ID is not based on any evidence, and exists in flat-out defiance of any and all relevant evidence. Furthermore, it cannot possibly be otherwise. Allow evidence’s foot in the door, and ID evaporates like it never existed. Contrast with the politically correct “virtually no emprical comfirmative evidence for ID theory.” When, as is obvious, there is no such thing as ID theory, and evidence is irrelevant to the Believers. Sheesh. Let us not break our intellectual backs bending over to give the benefit of nonexistent doubt.
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Comment #121452)Registered User
(Note, RU spent quite a bit of time persuing the discussion forum set up for the class)
| Quote | Don’t worry, Flint. Allen is extremely flexible in this regard. Civility trumps truth in the land of infinitesimally pointy heads.
Reading Allen’s description of the course “results” here, one might imagine that you could go to the Evolution and Design blog and find all sorts of statements where Allen’s ID peddlin’ buddy Hannah Maxson is criticizing the statements of Behe and Dembski and their inspirational guru, Phil Johnson.
You’ll not find that. And you’ll also discover that as the course blog goes on, you’ll find less questions answered by the “honest” and “passionate” Ms. Maxson. That is because asking certain obvious questions of Allen or Hannah violated their strange creationist-favoring “ground rules” and resulted in the banning of those who dared ask those questions.
All that is left, then, is endless blithering about where the greatest source of Salvador Cordova’s confusion lies. Been there, done that.
As for what actually happened in Allen’s class, it remains something of a mystery since almost all the reporting on the class came from Allen or Hannah, both of whom seem deeply committed to ensuring the appearance of the “success” of the class, according to their own terms. The blog was certainly a success in terms of creationist marketing as it contains commentary by both Allen and Hannah which is sharply critical of at least one prominent evolutionary biologist (Dawkins) and — as far as I can tell — precisely zero statements by Hannah criticizing the well-known lies of her ID heroes.
What’s up with that, Allen? Any thoughts? Does Hannah lack the gene for admitting baloney? Any adaptive advantages in that mutation?
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Comment #121702(Allen):
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I find it interesting that, rather than discuss the content of E. Broaddus’s paper, most of the commentators at this website feel fully justified in attacking both the motives of the students taking my seminar course and my motives in offering it, and in my enforcing some minimum standards of civility at the course website. That virtually none of the commentators has demonstrated any familiarity with the content of the students papers posted at the website (all but one of which vigorously support the “evolution side”) indicates to me that they have already made up their minds about what happened in the course and don’t want to be confused by the facts. This despite the fact that there is a detailed commentary online available to all at http://evolutionanddesign.blogsome.com/, currently comprising 24 posts (several by the students in the course) and over 1,500 comments from both sides of the issue, plus downloadable copies of most of the final research papers written by the students in the course. What can one conclude from this except:
• the commentators at Panda’s Thumb don’t give a #### about students or their ideas, regardless of whether they agree with them or not
• the commentators at Panda’s Thumb also don’t give a #### about arguments based on evidence (even when those arguments support their own position), but prefer to make definitive statements about courses in which they have not participated and research papers that they have not read
Almost anyone viewing the comments here would be justified in concluding that commentators at the Panda’s Thumb (i hesitate to refer to them as “evolutionary biologists”) are utterly uninterested in what a bright, hard-working, conscientious student is thinking vis-a-vis a topic of much discussion among evolutonary psychologists, and are instead only interested in getting back to playing “whack-a-mole.” This conclusion simply amplifies one that I came to reluctantly after a couple of weeks of moderating the Evolution and Design website: the majority of people on both sides of this issue are not interested in rational discussion nor logical arguments supported by evidence. They are only interested in polemics and character assasination for political reasons that are fundamentally unrelated to questions of scientific investigation or philosophical discussion.
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Comment #121708(Allen):
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“We’ll just have to take MacNeill’s word for it, while ignoring the censorship Maxson is quite clearly exerting on the blog itself. We must also be careful not to CONCLUDE anything from said censorship…”
Clearly, the poster who wrote this paid no attention to my own description of how the course website was moderated, nor displayed any understanding of why a COURSE website should not be conducted in the same kind of drunk mudwrestling format that goes on here.
It’s people like you folks that make me wonder if I’m really on the right side, here. When Sal Cordova treats me and my students with civility and you folks heap nothing but scorn on them, what am I (and they) supposed to conclude?
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Comment #121798(Pim):
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If I overestimate the power of scientific discourse on those studying to become a scientist then let that be so. I fully recognize that this is but one of the many prongs necessary.
Your flaw seems to be that you presume that I am considering rationale debate to be the only way to resolve the ID issue. On the contrary. But with the rise of IDEA clubs on campuses, it helps to evaluate the arguments in a rationale manner and in an environment free of detractors.
How many IDers are impressed by arguments that ID is nothing but Christianity in drags? It may make one feel good to make such statements, certainly I have been guilty of such remarks as well. But it is also very ineffective and only serves to strengthen the resolve of IDers.
If rationale arguments or debate are overrated then perhaps it’s time to close PT? Or does PT serve a purpose after all? Even if it is a relatively minor one?…
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Comment #121922(Allen):
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In Comment #121890 Popper’s ghost wrote:
“It might have been useful if MacNeill had responded to my question in my initial post..: “Since these statements are direct contradictions to fundamental ID dogma, how can it be that there was “strong consensus” and yet no one changed their mind?”
Because all but two of the registered students in the seminar came into it with pretty strong opinions already in favor of evolution and opposed to intelligent design (this is Cornell, after all). None of these students changed their minds and came to accept ID, despite spending six weeks reading Behe, Dembski, Johnson, etc. and listening to Hannah’s impassioned defenses of Dembski’s mathematical speculations. Most of them were non-scientists, however, and they did come to understand and appreciate the value of reasoned argument and support via evidence for their positions, not to mention becoming much better informed about ID (and therefore better able to argue against it).
The remaining two students came into the class as committed IDers (Hannah and Rabia were not registered students, BTW; they were “invited guests” - invited by me). These two students were considerably less convinced of the ID position at the end of the course than they were when they came in, shifting from a blanket rejection of all of evolutionary theory to accepting most of evolutionary theory while maintaining a “wait and see” attitude about the origin of life/genetic code/selected biochemical pathways. One of these two also came to accept common descent (primarily because it became clear that Behe does so as well, and therefore a “good IDer” can accept common descent without giving up ID). The other (a self-described YEC) shifted very significantly over the summer, coming to accept natural selection as the primary “engine” of microevolution, and “having an open mind” about macroevolution. Both of these two IDers came into the course pretty strongly opposed to evolution and supportive of ID, but by the end (and as a result of the process by which we analyzed the various readings assigned for the course) they came to appreciate and apply the technique of critical analysis and argumentation with supportive evidence.
To me, that makes the course very much worthwhile. So much so, in fact, that I’m repeating it as a special section in my good friend and colleague Will Provine’s evolution course this fall (Will is wildly in favor of the idea, BTW). Should make life even more interesting between now and the winter solstice.
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Comment #121930(Allen):
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“…has either of your pro-ID students made statements, equivalent to those you’ve now made on their behalves, on the blog or elsewhere, that you are in a position to share?”
Nope. The only students in the course who posted or commented on the blog were already staunch evolution supporters (i.e. members of the overwhelming majority in the seminar).
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Comment #121938(Pim):
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I think the significance of this ‘experiment’ or seminar was that IDers were exposed to viewpoints which showed how teleology in nature is expected (Ayala, Ruse etc) and how analogy is a very weak argument. In other words, how science already deals with concepts of ‘design’ and ‘teleology’ and how ID refuses to address these topics.
The discussion of Dembski’s CSI showed that Dembski’s definition of design as the set theoretic complement of chance and regularity is based on the assumption that the set is non-empty and on the assumption that we can successfully eliminate any and all chance and regularity scenarios. Furthermore, the students reached the conclusion that even if Dembski’s arguments were right, it lacks empirical relevance as any application to a non trivial problem seems impossible.
And finally, I believe that various students came to appreciate the conflations of terminology such as information, design, complexity by ID. They do not really mean what one expect them to mean.
I cannot speak for Allen or the participants of this class as I only participated in the blog discussions. I have found Allen’s approach quite effective when he shows how ID concepts are hardly new to science. Design, analogy, teleology… In other words, Allen managed to undermine much of the foundational relevance of ID by not only showing that ID is vacuous but also how science does deal with these issues all the time, without the need to let our ignorance resort to conclusion not warranted by the evidence.
Perhaps I am naive in my thinking here but I have found Allen’s approach to be quite ingenious (sp).
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*whew*
Ok, i think those were the main quotes that were the basis for much of the debate.
bottom line, I was a bit concerned about the following things:
1.) There appeared to be no objective measure of either the goals, or the results, of the course, and the design of it seemed to me to be less than the "ingenious" nature that Pim ascribed to it.
Invited ID participants? there was an IDEA club on campus - none of them wished to participate, or could suggest any other ID supporting students to participate?
More work needed to be done here to get a better sample of participants.
Moreover, an objective framework needed to presented as to what the actual goals of the course were aside from some ambiguous definition of "clarity". As an addendum to that, the results were NOT presented with any clarity from either the instructor, or any of the witnesses or participants. It was horribly confusing trying to piece together from what Allen was saying (see the quotes above!) what the actual results of the course were.
2.) I am concerned that accuracy in the course was given over to some vague feeling of "civility" that allowed much misinformation to not only go unchallenged, but even rewarded in the class. my concerns are typified in my response to a comment of Pim's:
Comment #121856(Sir_Toejam)
| Quote |
Pim: | Quote | | What if Allen believes that allowing students to discover their own errors on their own terms is far more efficient than telling them that they are wrong, wrong wrong… |
and when they don’t “discover their own errors”?
we simply let them slide, right?
seems an odd way to teach.
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again, this leads to the question as to what the goals of this course actually were, and whether there should have been any responsibility of those acting as instructors to in the end, attempt to correct the actual factual errors, or even misinterpretations of evidence, that the students presented in the course.
If i teach an algebra course, and reward my students for any random answer to a problem, so long as they "show their work", I'm really leaving the job half done, am I not?
this must be a huge post by now, so I'll leave it here and let whoever catch up.
cheers
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"And the sea will grant each man new hope..."
-CC
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