Verbatim » the evolution of ideas

standing on the shoulders of giants

Shanta Rohse — Wed, 15 Mar 2006 03:52:39 +0000

If I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.

Sir Isaac Newton

If I have not seen as far as others, it is because there were giants standing on my shoulders.

Hal Abelson, although according to Wikipedia, he attributes it to his Princeton roommate, Jeff Goll

the essential citizen

Shanta Rohse — Sun, 22 Jan 2006 15:17:05 +0000

Tomorrow is election day in Canada. If the last Federal election a scant 18 months ago is any indication, some 40 percent of us will not exercise our fundamental right and civic responsibility to vote. It’s a perfect time to reflect on the nature of citizenship and the possible role that learning designers play in such a state of affairs. University of Toronto philosopher Mark Kingwell writes that, “Citizenship, if it means anything, means making our desire for justice active. It is not something we can do alone” (The World We Want, 2000, p.19). Yet, my memories of my high school civics class are more of dwelling on the arcane workings of government, less of galvanizing the social desires for justice. In this weekend’s (appropriately named!) Ottawa Citizen, Tony Atherton quotes John Myers, a curriculum instructor at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, who concurs: “Students are really interested in programs in whch they feel they can make a difference. They’re not really interested in the role of the governor general or the powers of the Senate.”

The quotations for this theme will be collected as the essential citizen, and what better place than to start with Mark Kingwell.

Update Jan 25, 2006. In fact, more people cast ballots in this election than the previous two, with about 65% of registered voters showing up at the polls. I guess that’s a good thing. But does voter turnout=good citizen?

the name of the vine

Shanta Rohse — Mon, 19 Dec 2005 21:25:46 +0000

Any taxonomic scheme has problems. We tend to label and dismiss anything once we assign it a category. Our classifications blind us to the wildness of natrual organization by supplying coneptual boxes to fit our preconceived ideas. They should reflect our study of nature. The two-tiered five-kingdom system will always need revision. Whatever its difficulties, it does not perpetuate the age-old errors of the “animal versus vegetable” dicholomy. We can group life into three or five or a million categories, but life itself will elude us.

Lynn Margulis, Symbiotic Planet: A New Look at Evolution, 1998, p. 68.

the map is not the territory

Shanta Rohse — Mon, 19 Dec 2005 21:17:49 +0000

These antiquated terms – “blue-green algae,” “protozoa,” “higher animals,” “lower plants,” and many others – remain in use despite their penchant to propagate biological malaise and ignorance. The use of these insults to the living benefits those people whose budgets, class notes, and social organization depend on their continuity. I suggest that one reason Wallin’s good ideas [Juan Wallin, who originally proposed in the 1920s that various cell components originate as symbiotic bacteria] were opposed or ignored was that he was thoroughly misunderstood by the many biologists and teachers who reinforce the misconception of fixed classification. Bacteria, seen only as causes of disease, were then and are now nearly alway branded as “enemy agents.” Note how they are “waiting to be conquered” by the “weapons” of modern medicine. It is ridiculous, of course, to describe them primarily in military, adversarial terms: most bacteria are no more harmful than air, nor can they, like air, ever be removed from our bodies and our environment. But many still erroneously believe that any bacteria, if present, should be eradicated. Bacteria now and even more in Wallin’s day must be vanquished. How could they “inhabit” healthy tissue? Wallin’s colleagues confused the map with the territory.

Lynn Margulis, Symbiotic Planet: A New Look at Evolution, 1998, pp. 55.

the curse of new media

Shanta Rohse — Mon, 14 Nov 2005 04:12:37 +0000

The art form of comics is many centuries old, but it’s perceived as a recent invention and suffers the curse of all new media. The curse of being judged by the standards of the old. Ever since the invention of the written word, new media have been misunderstood.

Careful, Jacob! If you keep doing this [writing on tablets], you’ll stop using your memory!

Each new medium begins its life by imitating its predecessors. Many early movies were like filmed stage plays, much early television was like radio with pictures or reduced movies.

Far too many comics creators have no higher goal than to match the achievements of other media, and view any chance to work in other media as a step up. And again, as long as we view comics as a genre of writing or a style of graphic art this attitude may never disappear.

Scott McCloud, Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art, 1993, p. 151, describing the influence of new media in the comics realm…quotation without the benefit of graphics.

selling the idea

Shanta Rohse — Sun, 13 Nov 2005 03:42:32 +0000

I realize that most authors would talk about how to make the idea before they teach you how to sell it. That’s backward. Knowing how to sell your idea – make it happen – is the step you must take before you bother inventing it. If you can’t figure out how to implment your idea, there’s no point in inventing it, is there? If you insists on reading section 3 [Creating the Free Prize] first, it won’t kill you, but I really wanted to hammer home the idea that you need to learn how to sell something before you focus on what to make.

Seth Godin, Free Prize Inside: The Next Big Marketing Idea, 2004, p. 57, emphasizing again that marketing is all that matters.

interpreting the universe

Shanta Rohse — Mon, 10 Oct 2005 13:45:23 +0000

Each age interprets its universe in terms of what is currently important to it. Ancient animistic people wanting to make sense of the starry sky saw it as a zoo of people and animals—the Hunter, the Swan, the Lion, the Dog. The mechanical age of the eighteenth century bred a mechanistic philosophy; in the clockwork universe, God was the watchmaker who set the wheels spinning and then stood back to watch his creation turn; the newly discovered constellations of the southern hemisphere included the Octant, the Triangle, and the Microscope. Our present Computer Age sees the universe as an ever-changing flow of information, and if we were to discover the stars today our first instinct would be to try to decode their message.

Jack Cohen and Ian Stewart, Collapse of chaos: Discovering simplicity in a complex world, 1995, p. 288