atw: Re: The New World Order, take 2
- From: John Snow <JSNOW@xxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "austechwriter@xxxxxxxxxxxxx" <austechwriter@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Thu, 19 Nov 2009 07:56:33 +1100
All this brings to mind something I have noticed with other professionals.
We can get so wrapped up in the thought processes and ways of expressing
ourselves in our area of expertise that we unconsciously carry it over into
other areas of life. I think it's okay to do this in a conscious way when the
situation demands, but beware of losing touch with reality.
As tech writers we often need to be very precise, even mathematically exact, in
what we produce.
But normal human communication is not like that. Most of the world would
understand exactly what Christine meant by "There is nothing you cannot learn
now on YouTube", and what Geoffrey means by "This is John Howard's demented
approach to ensuring balance on the ABC: give every nut their 15 minutes of
fame." To always speak with absolute literalism and mathematical precision is
totally unnatural.
(Now I am convicting myself. When I go home tonight I must apologize to my wife
for the way I have been criticizing her way of arguing.)
Regards,
John
From: austechwriter-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:austechwriter-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Michelle Hallett
Sent: Thursday, 19 November 2009 7:24 AM
To: austechwriter@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: atw: Re: The New World Order, take 2
I'm really quite surprised at how vicious this discussion has become. What is
wrong with giving every bit of soft-headed nonsense a forum? How else do you
challenge it? You don't have to waste a nanosecond of your time exploring it if
you don't want to. The forum is there so those who want or need to engage with
it to extend their understanding can do so. To me, that is how we have advanced
as a civilization, not by ignoring anything we consider unworthy. That is
elitism, not democratic thinking.
It's also possible to challenge people without denigrating them by making
statements such as: 'just imagine if we followed Christine's ethic....we'd
still be in the cave wondering whether to give more allegiance to the wind god
or the fire god or the sun god'. It's you, Geoff who looks ridiculous with
these kinds of statements.
I'm reminded why I don't waste my time on this forum. None of you know how to
challenge a person's point of view while respecting their right to have it.
Michelle
________________________________
From: austechwriter-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:austechwriter-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Geoffrey Marnell
Sent: Wednesday, 18 November 2009 8:00 PM
To: austechwriter@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: atw: Re: The New World Order, take 2
Sorry Ken, sorry Christine, but that is soft-headed hippie nonsense. Do you
seriously expect folk to stand by, mute, while other folk utter statements of
dubious epistemological value. Christine, you want people to "respectfully
share .. their personal understanding and perceptions, and together ... reach
a new understanding that each alone could not have reached [and not be
vigorously challenged in the process]". Pass me the bucket. You are effectively
saying that the epistemological value of an utterance is not a consideration.
Thus folk who say the earth is flat, Neil Armstrong didn't walk on the moon,
there were dinosaurs on the ark, carbon dioxide is not affecting the planet's
climate, Jews were not killed in gas chambers during the second world war,
scientology is a religion, and so on and so on should be invited to
"respectfully share .. their personal understanding and perceptions [so that]
together [we can] reach a new understanding that each alone could not have
reached". Soft-headed nonsense. Why should I waste a nanosecond of my time
sharing "personal understanding and perceptions" with a flat-earther? Or a
creationist? Or a market-worshipping economist who thinks everyone knows
everything about every market. Why should I give them an atom of oxygen to
spruik their nonsense. This is John Howard's demented approach to ensuring
balance on the ABC: give every nut their 15 minutes of fame.
One person's declarative utterance is not, ipso facto, equal to another's. In
amongst the truth there are the howlers, the idiocies and the spin. Just
imagine if we followed Christine's ethic and gave each person's view equal
respect and never verbally challenged what was clearly arrant nonsense. We'd
still be in the cave wondering whether to give more allegiance to the wind god
or the fire god or the sun god. We have progressed as a civilisation because
the superficial, the lazy and the vested interest has been challenged, and
challenged vigorously. Why waste hours of respectfully sharing someone's view
that there is a finite number of prime numbers when a two-minute knock-down
argument has been around since the time of Euclid.
I'm sorry Christine, but amongst the gems you do offer this list, occasionally
you put forward some claim or other that is arrant nonsense. Your claim that
everything that is to be learnt can be learnt from YouTube is your most recent
example (and your response to Howard Silcock's neutral, uncritical question is
an example of you refusing to follow the very ethic you want us to follow).
Those who challenged you have as much right to challenge your claims as the
claims of flat-earthers and scientologists. (You did, I notice, have the grace
to republish your posting with the claim that caused the fuss struck out, a
move that deserves respect.)
You say we are trashing your reputation, Christine, by vehemently arguing with
you. On the contrary, you are trashing your reputation yourself with claims
that are outrageous and fall at the first analysis (which thankfully, for you
and this list, is only occasionally).
Fellow subscribers, this is not a self-help list. The list doesn't exist to
make you feel good, appreciated and valued. (Go to your shrink for that.)
Statements made on the list deserve the same sort of scrutiny as statements
made in Economic Review, Physical Papers or the British Medical Journal. Don't
shy away from robust challenges on the basis that some on this list want to be
protected from criticism by wrapping themselves in some self-spun cocoon.
Robust argument is the way to knowledge, not post-modernist relativism of the
sort that gives every view an equal standing, to be shared in the hope of
reaching a new understanding through some Hegelian synthesis.
Sorry, but I've given up joints (along with self-contradictory epistemologies).
Geoffrey Marnell
Principal Consultant
Abelard Consulting Pty Ltd
T: +61 3 9596 3456
F: +61 3 9596 3625
W: www.abelard.com.au<http://www.abelard.com.au/>
________________________________
From: austechwriter-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:austechwriter-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Ken Fredric
Sent: Wednesday, November 18, 2009 9:53 AM
To: 'austechwriter@xxxxxxxxxxxxx'
Subject: atw: Re: The New World Order, take 2
Hear, hear!
Ken Fredric
Senior Technical Writer
________________________________
From: austechwriter-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:austechwriter-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Christine Kent
Sent: Wednesday, 18 November 2009 8:49 AM
To: austechwriter@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: atw: The New World Order, take 2
This is a re-send of my original post, with the offending words changed.
Curious how no-one addressed the perfectly obvious true intent of the mail.
Too challenging? Too philosophical? Too deep?
There is a process whereby everyone respectfully shares their personal
understanding and perceptions, and together they reach a new understanding that
each, alone could not have reached. It is essentially different from verbal
combat where each person tries to destroy the argument (and reputation) of the
other by any means available. Let's see if we can avoid combat and increase
understanding, shall we?
Christine (the NF in an SJ world)
From: Christine Kent [mailto:cmkentau@xxxxxxxxx]
Sent: Monday, 16 November 2009 7:29 PM
To: 'austechwriter@xxxxxxxxxxxxx'
Subject: RE: Re: Preferred font for corporate staff manuals
Guys
I know I am one of the few people on this group that has waded gung ho into the
new Web 2.0 world. I have a number of blogs, a facebook account, a you tube
channel, a twitter account that I rarely use, and dozens of other logins that I
set up but never used to all sorts of weird and wonderful things. I belong to
a number of social forums and conduct nearly all my business on or through the
web.
There is a reality "out there" that may be difficult to address because no-one
is researching it and in fact, no-one can research it. Whether we like it or
not, the non-business IT world has leapt a long way ahead of (or to the side
of) the business IT world, and it is all moving at such a speed that research
cannot possibly keep up.
I have conjectured that youngsters are being trained how to think, how to learn
and even how to read by the internet, which may even be exercising and training
totally different neural pathways to mainstream academic education. There are
no "experts" involved in designing this process. Web 2.0 junkies will get what
they choose to get through blogs, facebook, social forums and the like. If
someone sets the websites up in Arial (as per normal) they will learn to feel
comfortable reading Arial. As high level reading is not a terribly necessary
skill any more in their world (reading age 8 will probably about do it), and
writing even less so, they don't need to be all that proficient - just good
enough. My observation is that they read very little and what they do read,
they skim read, meaning they miss detail. They get most of their education
from one another and from YouTube. (There is nothing you cannot learn now on
YouTube.) There is little they want to learn that they cannot learn from
YouTube, high academic learning aside.
If I need any instruction on common computer programs, I go to YouTube where
some nice person will have videoed the process for me. If I want any news, I
get it from the web. I set up feeds on particular topics to my Google account,
so that it all comes to me. Even the news process and distribution has changed
its form courtesy of the web. Font is one really trivial aspect of this change.
I am well aware that this is all scattered and anecdotal, but how do we get it
from the anecdotal to the researched? Who even knows this needs research, let
alone has the dollars to research it. It is still mostly out of the gambit of
educational and even corporate organisations, who still have the internet
locked down to workers and students, and so are still are hugely unaware of
what is happening. It's like the "real world" has closed the shutters against
the tornado going on outside. There is a new world and new race of people
living outside, but those shuttered inside are oblivious to their existence.
All this means there CAN only be anecdotal evidence and observations from
intelligent people (of whom I am one, Peter) to watch what is happening in
stunned amazement and conjecture where it is taking us. Is there a point at
which the exponential rate of change implodes? I don't know. It still seems
to be accelerating at a seriously challenging rate. Dismiss it as nonsense at
your peril.
Christine
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