Archive for the 'perturbation' Category

You are currently browsing the archives for the perturbation category.

On Lateral Passes

or, How A Meme With A Reference To A Jew For Jesus Hip Hop Artist Reminded Me Of Dangerous Ideas
I don’t really remember how I got there, but I ended up at memepool, the brainchild of del.icio.us founder Joshua Schachter and Jeff Smith. Posted on January 5th, 2006, was an entry which read:
The popularity [...]

Sticks and Stones and Snap Judgements

There was a disconcerting (at least for me) response to Stephen Downes’ summary of my post on Wikipedia. While someone else might let it slide, I think I’d like to address it because as I turned it over and over in my head (is it because I’m from, dare I say it, Massachusetts?), I [...]

Wikispin

Here are some worthwhile and interesting responses to and critiques of my last post, The Emergence of Meaning: Wikipedia As Object-Centered Sociality:

Artichoke posted a response positing, “‘What does it do?’ takes precedence… over what it might mean.”
Stephan Downes writes, “…I read the value of Wikipedia differently…. Wikipedia’s article selection also varies - while editors [...]

On the Nature of Criticism

From the novel I am currently reading, Angry Black White Boy; Or, The Miscegenation of Macon Detornay:
How much respect can you have for something you refuse to criticize?
Often in the blogosphere it seems that new ideas and practices are touted, celebrated, embraced, and sometimes even followed with a very short — or even non-existent — [...]

Object-Centered Sociality, or the Act of Being Kicked

Members of a community usually have something in common. Thanks to Francine of Knowledging across life’s curriculum for pointing me (and others) in the direction of objected-centered sociality, based on the work of anthropologist/sociologist Karin D. Knorr Cetina. Jyri Engeström writes,
The fallacy is to think that social networks are just made up of [...]

Multitasking Realities

With a toddler, a half-time job with full-time responsibilities, a dad-ship, a husband-ship, a strong sense of civic duty and right-and-wrong, and a desire to keep up with this blog thing, I often feel myself being pulled in multiple directions at once. The end result is that basically nothing gets done or done all [...]

Deep Thoughts

There is no question in my mind that our tools of the information age — computers, the Internet, cell phones, all the associated accoutrements — are changing the way we, as participants, do things and even think. That certainly doesn’t mean that these changes are necessarily and always changes for the good.
George Siemens of the [...]

Designers vs. Attractors in Learning Ecologies

Once again I will be commenting on an extremely thought-provoking post by George Siemens on the Connectivism Blog, Designing ecosystems versus designing learning. He writes,

Instead of designing instruction (which we assume will lead to learning), we should be focusing on designing ecologies in which learners can forage for knowledge, information, and derive meaning. [...]

Smelly Knowledge?

If it’s to last, then the getting of knowledge should be, uh, tangible, it should be… smelly.- Rupert Giles, “I Robot… You Jane,” Buffy the Vampire Slayer
I’ve always had a soft spot for Buffy the Vampire Slayer. As I recently mentioned to someone, if Buffy’s not about human nature, I don’t know what is. I [...]