Mother invents a device to prevent her child from chatting online. How nice - and not at all sinister or control freaky.

- posted by Alan @ 7:12 AM

 
Fallibility

I've been revisiting The Underground Grammarian and just came across the article The Ordeal by Fire.

It struck me that he was talking about something like TCS fallibility. I can't do justice by summarizing it, but can only encourage you to read it. Here's a taste:

It does not take a scientist to suppose that he may be wrong. It does not take a learned jurist to consider what sort of "right" any one person might have to order and govern not only the ordinary social behavior but even the inner life of belief and conviction in another person, and whether the having of that right implies some corresponding responsibility, and what that responsibility might be. It does not take a philosopher to ask by whose authority it is that he now deems himself an authority legitimately constituted to raise up others by his rule. It takes no more than a single human person to say, I could be wrong.

- posted by Gil @ 2:11 PM

 
Dean Esmay Isn't Fond of School

Undergraduate college, in particular.

Save this link for times when homeschoolers express terror that their kids might not get admitted into college.

And, here's a followup.

- posted by Gil @ 3:25 PM

 
And, here's a post from my blog:

Too Smart To Teach?

Ok, we all know that public high schools suck (private ones do too, but differently), but this is ridiculous!

A bright, young, prospective teacher was turned down by an Atlanta high school with this note from the principal:

Though your qualifications are quite impressive, I regret to inform you that we have selected another candidate. It was felt that your demeanor and therefore presence in the classroom would serve as an unrealistic expectation as to what high school students could strive to achieve or become. However, it is highly recommended that you seek employment at the collegiate level; there your intellectual comportment would be greatly appreciated. Good luck.

I'm not sure whether to laugh or cry.

- posted by Gil @ 3:05 PM

 
This was also posted at my blog. It was pointed out to me by a friend that it should fit right in here. A follow-up is not far off.

Priorites

I have noticed a rather perplexing trend in the TCS blogging community (TCSBC from now on). However, before I elaborate, I should make something clear. The TCSBC holds a variety of views, both in the political and social spectrums (note that I'm aware social issues are in a very important sense political as well. 'Political' here refers to economic issues and foreign policy, mostly). The rather unique thing about the TCSBC, however, is that it's social views and political views are not normally found together. This means that, in many situations, a given member of the TCSBC will disagree on either political or social issues, but not both. This is fine; coherent disagreement generally helps theories improve.

Now, with that explained, I will go on to show you what has been confusing me.

You see, it seems like the priorities of the TCSBC lie much more with the political issues than with the social. This astounds me. For one thing, TCS itself, which every member identifies strongly with and supports, is entirely a social philosophy. (Yes, I am aware of the people who consider "TCS" to refer to the entire worldview associated thereof, and in such a case it goes beyond social issues. However, in this post I'm sticking with the more obvious, technical definition.)

In essence, I see every day TCSBC members happily promoting and lauding political pundits with terrible views on social issues. Here, I should remind you of what I said above: Social issues are political in the sense that they are a part of overall politics. Indeed, the pundits being touted speak out on economic issues, foreign policy, and social issues. And whenever they speak on social issues, they spew forth a stream of vile untruths. Yet only rarely does a member of the TCSBC actually call them on it. (Note: I know Gil did it once as well, in regards to Lileks, but I couldn't find the post. My apologies Gil.)

So what have I established so far? TCSBC members don't like arguing (futilely, in most cases, due to ridiculously deep entrenchment) about social issues with people who have good ideas on politics. They usually don't even condemn them. Alright, that's understandable, in a sense, since at least these people get some things right, so condemning them overmuch could be counterproductive.

Pay attention now, because this is where it gets interesting.

There exists another group. A group that agrees with the TCSBC on social issues, but disagrees on economics and foreign policy. And this group is almost always condemned by the TCSBC, or, at best, looked on with a sort of mild disdain.

Attachment Parenting is excellent and quite TCS with regards to infants. And when Alice or Camille support it, they are very quick to mention the aspects of it which they disagree with. When providing links to Instapundit or IMAO, however, they rarely add qualifiers like "Just try to ignore the fact that he's horribly abusive to children and wants to control women."

In effect, it seems the TCSBC has a specific set of priorities; namely, political ones. This seems utterly perverse to me, and now I have to go to class. I will post more on this later.

- posted by Dan @ 4:37 AM

 

Petty, Petty, Petty

Read this and contemplate the sheer depth of the pettiness of the little tinpot dictators running schools. Head teachers want parents fined for taking their children out of schools under anything other exceptional circumstances and only with permission granded by a head teacher. The idea is to stop parents from taking children out of school for holidays during term time when it's cheaper with the excuse that this is good for their "education".

What is it that happens in a head teacher's life to make him into a sad, boring control freak?

- posted by Alan @ 5:45 PM

 
well if no one else is gonna post stuff i guess i'll link myself more. just wrote this rant

- posted by Elliot @ 12:16 AM

 
here's a post on tcs

- posted by Elliot @ 3:10 PM