OLDaily

Human History Gets a Rewrite
William Deresiewicz, The Atlantic, 2021/10/22

If nothing else, this article should make it clear that we should be open to embracing alternative explanations, and even alternative descriptions, about things where we don't have certainty. The rise of nation-states and the emergence of civilization is certainly one such subject. And I will admit that my own discomfort with official story is similar to that of David Graeber, at least as he is depicted here. To b clear, I knew nothing about him before reading this article, though I am certainly aware of his work through its outcomes: things like Occupy Wall Street and the protests against the World Economic Forum (WEF). This article is essentially a review of The Dawn of Everything in which Graeber and David Wengrow ask, "How did we get stuck... in a world of war, greed, exploitation [and] systematic indifference to others’ suffering?" That is a good question, and really ought to be on the curriculum somewhere.

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How Big Tech Runs Tech Projects and the Curious Absence of Scrum
Gergely Orosz, The Pragmatic Engineer, 2021/10/22

Big tech projects (including most learning technology) means tech development teams, and there has been over the years a never-ending discussion on how these teams should be organized. Over the last decade or so the method of choice has been Agile with its scrum-focused methodology. This survey, however, makes it clear that there is a wide variety of methods employed, with the most common being that work teams organize themselves however they want. This is a long and detailed article and excellent background, especially if you find yourself in the unfortunate position of having to organize a team of developers.

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Let’s talk about PLE in TEEM 2021
Linda Castañeda, 2021/10/22

Readers no doubt know that I have a continuing interest in the topic of the personal learning environment (PLE) and have never stopped working toward one. So I'm encouraged to read that "some PLE-people (and friends)  have decided to try to reedit that amazing spirit and incredible conversation about PLE that are, at least from our point of view, more relevant than ever before." There's a PLE track at the TEEM conference at the end of October, and even better, "we have asked our authorship teams to record a video with the most critical points of their papers, and THIS is going to be their actual presentations of their papers." Awesome. The videos are embedded in the web page.

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Libraries and publishers must make e-books accessible for all
Libby Homer, WonkHe, 2021/10/22

From my perspective, there's two ways to read a book: consumption, and reference. For the most part, consumption is a single-use reading of a book, while reference is multiple-use. In consumption, you read it, and you're done. In reference, you return to it time and again. If I intend to consume a book, I just want to borrow it from a library. If I intend to use it as reference, I'm willing to buy it. This worked well in the era of paper books, and I developed a good collection of books that stood me well over time (and still does, though it's dated), and meanwhile read far more books from the library. There was no way I would (or even could) purchase all those books. But now, in the world of ebooks, the system is broken. Publishers expect me to buy every book I read. But I can't. I need a proper way to access ebooks from a library. So does everyone else in the world. And publishers be warned: if we don't get it, we're likely to stop paying for books altogether, even the ones we use for reference. So i support this call to action from Libby Homer "to ensure we have sustainable models for providing students (and other readers) with access to e-books and e-textbooks.

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On Pluralism and Conceptual Engineering: Introduction and Overview
Delia Belleri, PhilPapers, 2021/10/22

The concept of 'conceptual engineering' may be understood as "a philosophical methodology that focuses on the assessment and revision of conceptual representations" (see also David Chalmers, What is Conceptual Engineering and What Should it Be?) In some senses, this might be thought of as the creation of categories and taxonomies, though there is more involved. We can also think of it as the creation of modules. In education research and some social sciences, the construction of theories is largely a form of conceptual engineering. This paper offers a fascinating look at some of the mechanics underlying conceptual engineering and in particular the ways different approaches can result in multiple models for the same domain. We can, for example, think of concepts as performing "specific causal or explanatory functions in higher cognitive processes, such as abstraction, categorization, induction, and so on." or we can think of them as a device for "changing the rules that speakers use to evaluate the truth of certain propositions." The paper surveys a variety of different types of pluralism in conceptual engineering (pluralism about function, pluralism about goals, etc.). Image: Christophe, Coatanea & Bernard.

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