The European Tribune is a forum for thoughtful dialogue of European and international issues. You are invited to post comments and your own articles.
Please REGISTER to post.
School learning is a poor fit for a variable portion of the population. A lot of kids don't want to be in school, they don't want to listen in class, and they don't want to do homework. I didn't want to be in school, listen in class, or do homework when I was young, so I understand entirely. I think the proportion of kids who don't want to be in school and who resist the whole process has also been rising in recent generations, as it's become less of a route upwards and more of a meaningless series of hoops that guarantee nothing. Why work hard towards a pointless goal?
totally agree... with the internet one can pursue self-education like never before, once one is alphabetic and numerate it's a feast for the curious.
school -as is- is redundant, a form of lobotomy. it can take years to heal the psychic lesions from bad schooling and rediscover the joy of using one's intellect for the sheer deliciousness of it.
Zwackus:
Go dig ditches in the forest
better plant trees!
when it comes to american ed, it's a big problem that to be incurious is seen as cool.
asia will eat our lunch because the idea of family obedience and economic progress through education is more real to them than it is in the 'west'. it's cardinal, it's religion to them. a means to an end... money, social climbing.
we tend to have a more idealised form of educational philosophy, enlightenment through developing the 'higher faculties' bla bla. nice idea but it doesn't pay the bills in today's world for all but a few.
being able to work electrical circuits, basic plumbing, building skills (taught in HS in morocco), these are worth something in the real world.
in india i read they teach old grannies to become economically independent through maintaining solar arrays, yet there's no equivalent chez nous.
it wouldn't surprise me if in 50 years we are back to 90% working the land, as before the industrial revolution. just add high speed broadband, renewables and cheap public transport and parochialism is over.
learning the skills needed to farm, to preserve, to use natural modes of healing, these will be more useful than any number of MBA degrees.
and justly so... it's community that sustains and grounds people, and industrial capitalism shreds that social fabric as surely as it rapes and pollutes the commons that sustained those of the community who weren't whizzkids of some form.
of course if we paid teachers a lot more, and created more playful curricula, we might see big changes. 'The history of public debt is full of irony. It rarely follows our ideas of order and justice.' Thomas Piketty
with the internet one can pursue self-education like never before, once one is alphabetic and numerate it's a feast for the curious.
of course your value of basics will differ!
as zwackus says, if a student has no will to learn there's nothing to be done, but basic alfabetism and numeracy can be taught before the hormonal desire to differentiate and rebel kick in.
if they haven't learnt those basics by adolescence, something's badly wrong not even covered by this diary. 'The history of public debt is full of irony. It rarely follows our ideas of order and justice.' Thomas Piketty
japan is a special asian case compared to the other tiger economies as they embraced modernism with such scary gusto it has even taken their sex drive away.
... or channeled it into geisha blowup anime dollette worship 'The history of public debt is full of irony. It rarely follows our ideas of order and justice.' Thomas Piketty
japan is a special asian case compared to the other tiger economies
or canary? 'The history of public debt is full of irony. It rarely follows our ideas of order and justice.' Thomas Piketty
If you are not among the alpha circle, there is not much point in sex.
that worked out well for the Hapsburgs...
i guess Japan shows us where uber-modernism crashes into its gaudy limits. the once-rutting plebs self-geld with internet addiction while the power to light up tokyo so it's visible from mars plumes its untreatable waste into the biosphere non-stop.
but no fear that Cameron would be so imbecilic as to... oh wait. 'The history of public debt is full of irony. It rarely follows our ideas of order and justice.' Thomas Piketty
Peak growth shows a lot of entropy waste indeed. But is Japanese modernism still that relatively gaudy? Just remains of the legend, I tell. The market for technological awe is shrinking, the supply as well. Internet addiction is as special as their financial bubble, and even radioactive waste is repeatable anywhere.
There is just no gas for modernism anymore.
We are left with a fruitless dichotomy which must be transcended if we are to survive.
transcending it is so 60's, it worked as an escape valve, but ultimately just that...
turn on, tune in, drop out was an open invitation too political passivity, enabling the rummies and boltons and negropontes to make ground over the next three decades.
transcendence's only real function is to prepare for death, helping us to stay sane in a crazy era.
it doesn't get the legwork done.
i wish i knew what did... the closest i have seen is the 5*ers, who are writing a new book on participatory democracy.
as for the comments about japan and the rest of asia, japan was the first to take on western consumerism and then asianise it, taking it global so toyota and sony became the new coke and pepsi.
then followed malaysia, singapore, s. korea and china all racing to do to japan what japan had done to us!
so it goes... give man a brain, he'll figure out how to use it to poke himself in the eye. 'The history of public debt is full of irony. It rarely follows our ideas of order and justice.' Thomas Piketty
There's a vibrant working class culture, especially in the areas of greater Tokyo outside the metropolis, of people connected in one way or another to the industrial economy and its associated service professions. They are not broken and lame as are too many Tokyo strivers, they have active personal lives, get married at a variety of ages, and have a good number of kids. It is from this class that Japan's small-business owners and entrepreneurs often come as well, as they've not been broken by the system.
The same fools who cram their life away to get into Tokyo University are the same ones who end up as broken individuals in all kinds of ways, including in their sexual health and personal life. It's commonly said that people who get into Tokyo University are strange, and it's because they are broken by the process.
residual dna from too-recent emperor-worship, a certain national superiority complex rooted in suicidal fanaticism, medieval honour codes institutionalised, all leading to blinkered thinking.
fascinating... how much of that is true also of england, that other rainy little island that morphed to a surprisingly disproportionate degree of global influence.
not that it's exclusive to islands or anything... 'The history of public debt is full of irony. It rarely follows our ideas of order and justice.' Thomas Piketty
by Frank Schnittger - Jan 26 3 comments
by Frank Schnittger - Jan 22 3 comments
by Cat - Jan 25 25 comments
by Oui - Jan 9 21 comments
by Frank Schnittger - Jan 13 28 comments
by gmoke - Jan 20
by Oui - Jan 15 90 comments
by gmoke - Jan 7 13 comments
by gmoke - Jan 29
by Oui - Jan 2729 comments
by Frank Schnittger - Jan 263 comments
by Cat - Jan 2525 comments
by Frank Schnittger - Jan 223 comments
by Oui - Jan 2110 comments
by Oui - Jan 21
by Oui - Jan 20
by Oui - Jan 1839 comments
by Oui - Jan 1590 comments
by Oui - Jan 144 comments
by Frank Schnittger - Jan 1328 comments
by Oui - Jan 1219 comments
by Oui - Jan 1120 comments
by Oui - Jan 1031 comments
by Oui - Jan 921 comments
by NBBooks - Jan 810 comments
by Oui - Jan 717 comments
by gmoke - Jan 713 comments