OLDaily

Welcome to Online Learning Daily, your best source for news and commentary about learning technology, new media, and related topics.

Philosophy of Education After the Golden Years
Liz Jackson, Philosophical Inquiry in Education, 2025/01/31

---

I had completely forgotten that there's such a thing as the 'philosophy of education'. It seems like a big thing to forget, but honestly, I don't blame myself. This link is to the Philosophy of Education Society of Great Britain blog, which I ran into after seeing a society conference being advertised. Every page tries to verify that you're not a robot (in what I fear is a typical but losing response to AI).  The blog seems almost solely focused on book reviews. Here are archived book reviews (at least, up to 2020). There's also the Journal of Philosophy of Education, the most recent issue of which seems to be from 2022. There's also a Candian Philosophy of Education society. No blog, but at least the journal is current. And in it there's this highly relevant article, Philosophy of Education After the Golden Years, by Liz Jackson.

Web: [Direct Link] [This Post][Share]

Fake papers are contaminating the world’s scientific literature, fueling a corrupt industry and slowing legitimate lifesaving medical research
Cyril Labbé, The Conversation, 2025/01/31

---

"Around 55,000 scholarly papers have been retracted to date, for a variety of reasons... Even when the bogus papers are spotted – usually by amateur sleuths on their own time – academic journals are often slow to retract the papers." While I agree with the idea that research and findings should be subject to empirical testing, including review by the authors' 'peers', I have never felt that the existing system of academic publishing is a reliable means of doing this. Its weaknesses are becoming ever clearer in the age of AI-authored papers. Via Apostolos K.

Web: [Direct Link] [This Post][Share]

"Can you really build a life when you don’t know what is real and what is fake?"
Jason Gulya, The AI Edventure, 2025/01/31

---

"What happens when mistrust becomes our default?" It's a good question, and it's not answered in the article, at least not directly. But I can sort of answer it because mistrust has been my default for as long as I have been thinking about such things. I have never trusted authority (because, when you're a student especially, authority figures lie constantly and badly). I read and experienced enough when I was young to learn to not trust news and entertainment media (from Donald Duck to statistics to Irving media and everything in between). It's not an impossible way to live, it's just a way that's different from what older generations experienced. "Images and videos aren't just pieces of online content, that we need to fact-check and verify. They are forms of communication. They are forms of building human connections." Connection is what matters, not content. 

Web: [Direct Link] [This Post][Share]

Tools, means, and vicariousness
Matthias Melcher, x28's New Blog, 2025/01/31

---

Good article mapping the distinction between 'tool' and assistant with Doing Engelbart's distinction between 'direct' and 'indirect' tools. "I think the important criterion is some vicariousness: The tool helps in some indirect way, as an instrument or as means. The term 'mean' connotes a "way of attaining an end", i.e. something in-between, something half-way between ourselves and our goal. If an entity does all the work alone, it is not a tool."

Web: [Direct Link] [This Post][Share]

We publish six to eight or so short posts every weekday linking to the best, most interesting and most important pieces of content in the field. Read more about what we cover. We also list papers and articles by Stephen Downes and his presentations from around the world.

There are many ways to read OLDaily; pick whatever works best for you:

• Read in your web browser on this web page, updated weekdays
• Receive a daily or weekly email newsletter by subscribing here
• Subscribe to the RSS feed using your favourite feed reader
• Follow @OLDaily@mastodon.social on Mastodon or elsewhere in the fediverse
• Follow @OLDaily on Twitter
• Integrate the open API using the JSON feed