Academia

Thinking and Memorizing, continued

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Here’s a post by a pseudonymous teacher whose school is following the “21st century skills” model now being heavily promoted by various “experts.” Apparently one of the cornerstones of this approach, at least as implemented at this teacher’s school, is that content knowledge isn’t really all that important…”most content, after all, can be googled anyway.”

This post reminded me of something I wrote back in 2005, in response to other assertions by educationists to the effect that technology makes memorization unnecessary. I quoted some lines from a song by Jakob Dylan:

Cupid, don’t draw back your bow
Sam Cooke didn’t know what I know

…and observed that in order to understand these two simple lines, you’d have to know several things:

1)You need to know that, in mythology, Cupid symbolizes love
2)And that Cupid’s chosen instrument is the bow and arrow
3)Also that there was a singer/songwriter named Sam Cooke
4)And that he had a song called “Cupid, draw back your bow.”

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Goon Squad

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There have been numerous reports of thuggish behavior by teachers’ union supporters in Wisconsin and elsewhere. For example, here’s a Daily Caller story about a man–apparently a union operative or supporter–who attempted to disconnect the speaker system being used by the Tea Party group, and then shoved an individual who attempted to reconnect it. See also our political process has been stopped by a mob:

On Thursday, legislators were advised to return to their offices and lock their doors. Mobs roamed the halls, banging on the glass of the doors, pounding on the walls. No one could move in the halls or enter or leave the building. The glass of the Supreme Court’s entrance was broken. Legislators were genuinely afraid. Our elected representatives were afraid. In our Capitol.

A young female reporter trying to get into the Senate chamber struggled to get through the crowd. She arrived disheveled and upset because she had been roughed up as she tried to get through “Bitch-slapped” the mob told her. A senior senator was spat on. A senator and his female staffer struggled to get into the capitol. He was worried about his staffer because the crowd was grabbing at her and pushing her. University Police were two arms lengths away and did nothing. They, of course, are union.

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Ethical Truth and Ethical Practices for Inviduals, Businesses and Nations, Through the Lens of Benedict XVI’s Caritas in Veritate

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I gave a lecture last Fall at the Integritas Institute at UIC.

The lecture can be heard here.

I manage to mash-up the Pope with some economics and history, and some war stories, and C.S. Lewis and I even get Hayek in there at the end.

Perry – the $10,000 goal

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Rick Perry is someone I have long underestimated; his policies have kept us in relatively safe economic order despite the effect of national energy policies on a state that makes much from oil and despite the fact that some of the highest rates of illegal immigration and drug wars are on our borders. Instapundit links his policy on education. Reining in academic bureacracies, perqs and salaries is not anti-intellectual. It is egalitarian. Expecting state colleges to prove the value of the credentials they “sell” is the responsibility of government regulation.

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Recommended Reading

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I had intended to write an analytical post about the tumultuous events in Egypt and elsewhere in the Arab world and then I recalled that a) I do not speak or read Arabic b) am not versed in contemporary Egyptian politics c) am not an Arabist by academic training d) have never visited the Middle East and e) even those who are all of these things are often doing more news updating on twitter than deep analysis.

Egypt is the demographic and geographic center of the Arab Sunni world – but without the economic resources to make Egypt the power that Nasser once aspired that it would be in the heady era of postcolonial, nationalist, Pan-Arabism. So Nasser became a client of the Soviets, who could fund his ambitions and Egypt was a quasi- Soviet satellite until Sadat kicked the Soviets out for trying to undermine him in favor of a more pliant stooge, and accepted American patronage. Sadat’s assassination gave us Mubarak and his hated familial-military-party oligarchy (Ok, the military and party were largely there, but Mubarak’s rule has discredited them).

So, instead of my projecting what will happen next, I’ll devote this recommended reading to other bloggers and news sources who are freer with their conjecture:

Top Billing! Thomas P.M. Barnett Preliminary scenario voting results at Wikistrat’s Egyptian war room (updated 1630 EST Sun) and First ever Virtual Strategic War-Room Launched following Egyptian Chaos and the Wikistrat Virtual Strategic War Room site.

No Tom is not an Arabist either, but he does have experience with designing and participating in professional war games and futurism sessions inside the USG and out. The war room, to my casual observation, seems like an IT effort to synthesize expert analysis and crowdsourcing a primitive/structured prediction market. Interesting.

Abu Muqawama – An Open Letter to the Egyptian People, Egypt: A Humble Request.

Arabist.net The who’s who of the has-beens

Marc Lynch –Washington eyes a fateful day in Egypt and Obama’s handling Egypt pretty well

Col. Pat Lang-The Outlook for Egypt and the Middle East Is Grim By – Robert K. Lifton , More sensible attitudes on Egypt today, Omar Suleiman sworn in as VP

SWJ Blog – Days of Unrest (Update)

STRATFOR – The Egypt Crisis in a Global Context: A Special Report | STRATFOR

Fabius Maximus –Important information about the riots in Egypt and Why do we fear the rioters in Egypt?

HNN (Haider Khan) – Egypt, What Next?

Global Guerrillas – EGYPT: How to Lead and Open Source Protest , EGYPT: Mubarak’s Survival Strategy and EGYPT: Looting as Counter-Insurgency

Juan Cole –Egypt’s Class Conflict

Outside the Beltway –Egyptians Upset With U.S. Response To Crisis and Egypt and the Limits of US Power

That’s it.