26 Friday Jul 2013
Posted in Work
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My paid work at BU involves supporting many educational technologies, but especially ePortfolios: websites that showcase personal learning and make it visible. As a demonstration for others to see, I’ve created an extensive portfolio about myself, displaying my scholarly and professional history. If you’re interested in my background, feel free to have a look. You’ll probably be able to learn more about me than you ever wanted to know.
21 Sunday Jul 2013
Posted in Epistemology, German Tradition, Metaphysics, Philosophy of Language, Vedānta
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Advaita Vedānta, Baruch Spinoza, Eckart Förster, G.W.F. Hegel, Immanuel Kant, pedagogy, Stonehill College, Upaniṣads
Not long ago I attended a conference on a particular genre of educational technology. The conference presenters were endlessly positive, uplifting – they sought to inspire the attenders with the potential that their subject could offer for student learning. But some discontent rumbled among the attenders, rightly I think: these presenters are not really saying anything. Their theories are abstractions, perhaps even platitudes, that are difficult to disagree with but mean very little in application. Emotionally they can inspire us; rationally they give us no value.
In the conference’s smaller- group discussions (of which there were fortunately many), there was more of a chance to speak of problems, to complain, to be negative – and paradoxically, by being negative they were able to be more constructive. Why? It is far easier to understand what to do when you understand what not to do; you learn what’s true in part by learning what’s false. Endless affirmation of how good something is won’t tell you anything about what makes it good, let alone about how to put it into practice successfully.
As it happens, on the way to this conference I had been reading a book about Kant. Continue reading
14 Sunday Jul 2013
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autobiography, Four Noble Truths, G.W.F. Hegel, James Doull, Karl Marx, McGill University, Nicholas Thorne, Pali suttas, Thailand, utilitarianism
A few years ago I told what I thought of at the time as the story of my philosophy: how I left a utilitarian worldview and came to discover Buddhism in Thailand at age 21. I realize now that there’s something important missing from that story, and you can see it in the final paragraph of the second piece:
And yet, all the Western philosophy that I’d learned before didn’t just go away. I’d learned important, powerful, beautiful things that seemed true – and often seemed opposite to the Buddhism I’d found myself in. Is there a way to reconcile the two? One way or another, that question has been central to my life ever since.
That was the right ending: since then I have indeed been preoccupied with reconciling Buddhism and the Western philosophy I’d already learned. But if you only read those two pieces, you would come away with the impression that the Western philosophy I had learned, and would try to reconcile, consisted primarily of utilitarianism. And that would be completely wrong. Continue reading
07 Sunday Jul 2013
Posted in Early and Theravāda, East Asia, Jainism, Mahāyāna, Metaphysics, Self, South Asia
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Chan/Zen 禪, conventional/ultimate, intimacy/integrity, Ken Wilber, Milindapañhā, Thomas P. Kasulis
I have frequently discussed how early Indian Buddhism, like Jainism, takes an integrity perspective in an ethical or practical sense. I’ve said less about the theoretical side of its integrity approach. But I think that side is very much there. And it’s that link between theoretical and practical philosophy that makes the concepts of intimacy and integrity so appealing: they go “all the way down”.
I find it particularly important to discuss the theoretical integrity of early Buddhism because I think this is a place where Thomas P. Kasulis – from whom I take the very concepts of intimacy and integrity – has misapplied his own theory. Continue reading
30 Sunday Jun 2013
This April, during an ELI online conference on massive open online courses, I had an interesting exchange on Twitter with fellow educational technologist Edward O’Neill. (It was through my professional Twitter account rather than my philosophical one.) The exchange began when one of the conference presenters claimed that “the core purpose of the university, what it gets paid for,” is to provide certification for credit.
That equation – that “the core purpose” and “what it gets paid for” were assumed to be the same thing – raised my hackles. I responded in two tweets: “Since when is ‘the core purpose’ of something the same as ‘what it gets paid for’? Core mission of a university is to educate people. BUSINESS MODEL of a university is to certify for pay. Don’t confuse the two.”
The conversation that ensued was provocative and edifying, and probably best cited here in the form of the dialogue it was:
EO: Industries change.
AL: Often for the worse. Especially when something that was not previously regarded as an “industry” becomes so. Continue reading
23 Sunday Jun 2013
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For those of us who think at length about universities and the changes they may undergo, it’s a commonplace to refer to the medieval origins of the modern university system. These origins are typically taken to be a bad thing. For example, lecture-based pedagogy is said to date to a time before printing, when that was the only way students would have access to a text. So, the argument goes, it’s an obsolete atavism; there is no reason to keep it around.
I have become increasingly nervous around this line of argument. For it seems to me that a fully modernized university will be one that has no place for the humanities. Continue reading
16 Sunday Jun 2013
Posted in Friends, Metaphilosophy, Social Science
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academia, Aristotle, Elisa Freschi, lokatakki (commenter), Maharashtra, Matt Wilkens, Mencius, Randall Collins, skholiast (blogger), technology
The term digital humanities has quickly become trendy over the past couple years. The term has often excited me, since digital technology in the humanities is both a part of what I do for a living, and what makes my humanistic scholarship on this blog possible. So I’ve followed discussions of digital humanities, such as the HUMANIST mailing list, with interest.
I remain deeply interested in the field, but I’ve also begun to acquire some skepticism toward it. Continue reading
09 Sunday Jun 2013
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Last week I critiqued Chris Fraser‘s readiness to discard the “implausible, unappealing radical” view that he found in the Zhuangzi. My reflections there were general and methodological. Here I want to plunge into the details and see what might happen if we read the Zhuangzi in the way that I recommended there, rather than the way that Fraser takes in his article.
Let me be clear that what follows is the work of a rank beginner in the study of Daoism. Indeed, most of what I know of the Zhuangzi comes from Fraser himself. So I acknowledge that my attempted interpretation here may be totally wrong. But just based on the passages Fraser himself translates, I find it a more satisfying interpretation than the one that Fraser takes. Continue reading
02 Sunday Jun 2013
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As I noted last week, I owe a real intellectual debt to Chris Fraser‘s work for helping me figure out Zhuangzi – or the Zhuangzi, as Fraser would say. His interpretations have been of incredible value to me in understanding this very difficult thinker (or text, if you prefer). I have my difficulties with him, though, when it comes to methods of constructive application – of trying to apply Zhuangist philosophy to our contemporary context. Continue reading
26 Sunday May 2013
On Stephen Walker’s recommendation, I’ve been turning to the articles of Chris Fraser in order to understand the difficult Daoist thinker Zhuangzi. (Happily, Fraser makes most of his articles available free online.) The Zhuangzi is an intimidating text to attempt to understand for a number of reasons, and it’s helpful to have the guidance of someone like Fraser who has spent a lot more time with it than I have. Continue reading