[Xmca-l] Re: Bill's query

[Andy Blunden]

You can't use colour on the xmca server.
You can _underline_ or *bold* or /italicise/ but even these
are not reliable.

best to write in full prose, like: "You asked me whether I
thought that XXX but I think that YYY"

Andy

------------------------------------------------------------
Andy Blunden
ttp://www.ethicalpolitics.org/ablunden/index.htm
On 17/04/2018 12:49 AM, Wolff-Michael Roth wrote:
> Huw, in the original, I am using the color red to add. I don't see the
> color in the quoted text that comes after your message. Michael
>
> On Mon, Apr 16, 2018 at 7:45 AM, Huw Lloyd <huw.softdesigns@gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>> It's not immediately clear to me who is saying what, in this email,
>> Michael, and whether you both have agreed upon a distinction of some
>> kind...
>>
>> Best,
>> Huw
>>
>>
>> On 16 April 2018 at 15:05, Wolff-Michael Roth <wolffmichael.roth@gmail.com
>> wrote:
>>
>>> Bill asked me to respond to some questions, but I could not find in my
>>> trash can the earlier strand. Here the issues he had raised:
>>>
>>>
>>> -------------------
>>> Since I have bothered to read your book and quote directly from it I
>> think
>>> my comments deserve a public response. I'll repeat it again here:
>>>
>>> Specifically you say that constructivists argue that: (I've *bolded* the
>>> bits where your understanding of Piaget is different to mine)
>>> "the individual mind is ... *informationally closed* to the surrounding
>>> world" (51) (von Glasersfeld said this iin the text where he also
>> discusses
>>> Piaget, if I remember well)
>>> "In a constructivist account, she (Melissa) might be said to *incorrectly
>>> 'interpret'* the object ..." (51) (this is what you typically find in
>>> constructivist research, for only something in your mind exists for the
>>> person)
>>> "As Piaget, modern day constructivists often characterize children's
>>> knowing
>>>  *negatively: as lack, deficit ... or deviance* ..." (52) (I have pointed
>>> in the past to many places where Piaget writes what a child cannot yet
>> do,
>>> he always uses adult reasoning as (generally implicit) reference for
>>> characterizing the child. There was  a nice chapter in the 1980s:
>>> Meyer-Drawe,
>>> K. (1986). Zähmung eines wilden Denkens? [Taming of undomesticated
>>> thought?] In A. Métraux & B. Waldenfels (Eds.), Leibhaftige Vernunft:
>>> Spuren von Merleau-Pontys Denken (pp. 258–275). Munich, Germany: Wilhelm
>>> Fink. And in Merleau-Ponty's writing you can see the critique of a
>> Piaget,
>>> from whom children are lesser (adults)
>>> "In the constructivist literature , we can frequently read that
>>> *misconceptions
>>> ... have to be eradicated* (53) (Yes, this you can find in the literature
>>> on misconceptions, with the very verb "eradicate")
>>>
>>> Piaget's best known observation were about conservation, the tall and
>> wide
>>> glasses, and I've never heard children's responses described as
>> incorrect,
>>> deficit or misconception but always as a stage that children have to pass
>>> through. It always seemed me that Piaget respected and understood the
>>> child's different view of the world. (Well, I just did a quick check, and
>>> in *The Growth of Logical Thinking, *the verb/noun fail/failure appears
>> at
>>> least 50+ times, though one would have to check the sense; the verb
>>> *cannot* appears
>>> over 60 times, and so on...)
>>>
>>> I gather you haven't read Papert or Minsky. I feel their version,
>>> constructionism, contains many useful insights. (I have, in my
>>> constructivist days, and I have read many of the books coming from his
>> lab
>>> [Papert], and I know many of his students personally. And I referenced
>>> their work amply, until I saw no more benefit in that work.)
>>> ------------------
>>>
>>> Michael
>>>