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September 20, 2017 at 7:43 am #1094Allison MaierParticipant
Wells’ main problems with education are that it is not widespread enough, it is segmented, it is too influenced by political action/ideas, and it has not evolved at the same pace as the rest of society.
The first two points speak to how Wells views education as limited, which heavily concerns him. Wells wants a universal, synthesized education, the backbone of which would be his World Encyclopedia. I think the rise of the Internet has improved at least potential universality, since this technology can connect almost anyone to tons and tons of information. The Internet’s global aspect also improves the synthesis of information, since many subjects can interact to put forth a project (for instance, a digital humanities project).
Wells also criticized the idea of inherent politicization in education. Wells argues that the experts in fields do not necessarily have to be politically active. I would argue that this aspect, a link between education and political action, is still strong, at least in traditional education (universities, etc.).
Wells’ other main critique of the education system is that it has not kept up with the rest of modern society. I would argue that this gap not only still exists, but usually exists. While globalization and the rise of the Internet have furthered some sort of universality, a gap between the knowledge of experts and the knowledge of an average person definitely persists. Wells, I think, acknowledges that this is often the case. Due to this gap, it is difficult for knowledge from experts—which has specific jargon, lenses, and methods—to be immediately understandable by a general population. While I believe that this gap has closed somewhat since Wells’ time, I do not think it has completely gone away. On a practical level, as well, it can be an immense process to change what is taught in schools.
- This reply was modified 6 years, 7 months ago by Allison Maier.
September 15, 2017 at 10:09 am #1077Allison MaierParticipant- Like Zach, I had always thought of a computer as something that existed outside the physical world. The “language” a computer used was so foreign that trying to understand how any of it worked was overwhelming. For example, all of commands we have been using in class, like “cd” or “chmod,” were confusing because they did not make sense to me as words. However, after reading this article it makes a bit (haha) more sense to me because I can see how a computer uses a specific code to operate, with patterns and a key. Shannon’s model for communication, in particular, made the process seem more straightforward.
- This chapter definitely presented a new way to look at information, and in particular how a language can communicate that information, for me. I think before reading this chapter, information had never seemed so mathematical. The probability of certain patterns in a language, for example, are something I had obviously been internalizing but never really consciously thought about. It struck me how prevalent this concept is, even if we don’t realize it. For example, the test Shannon did on his wife is pretty much the same premise as Wheel of Fortune. While Shannon’s concepts of information, uncertainty, and probability are heavy, it also becomes clearer as the chapter goes on that we already deal with these concepts frequently in our everyday lives, we usually just don’t recognize them.
September 13, 2017 at 1:03 pm #1066Allison MaierParticipantThe fact that most surprised me was when Gleick said that the word lyrics did not exist until the nineteenth century. I can understand if that specific word did not exist, but it seems to me that there must have been a word which came before it that had at least a similar meaning. As Gleick discussed, songs are as old as civilization so it seems that there must have been some word which meant “the words used in songs” before the appearance of lyrics in the 1800’s.
One of the most fundamental connections that this chapter can make to Metadata surrounds the discussion about the map not being the territory. Gleick discusses this concept in the section where he quotes Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz. Gleick also uses a quote from John Locke—“Definition being nothing but making another understand by Words, what Idea the Term defin’d stands for”—which basically rewords the concept.
The question I am interested in learning the answer to popped up was Gleick was discussing how a new word becomes part of the OED. I find the self-imposed regulations fascinating because they are so arbitrary. One page 68, for example, Gleick says “As a rule a neologism needs five years of solid evidence for admission to the canon.” Why five years? What about that length of time means that a word is part of a universal language?
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