[Xmca-l] Re: remote_online learning?

[Tom Richardson]

Hi Henry
Thank you for your thoughtful, fact full reply.

It would save me continuing to plough through Damasio's well-written but
fairly lengthy book 'Looking for Spinoza', if you were to send me a brief
personal summary of what he means intellectually for you - (or am I being
lazy?) - since it is always illuminating to understand what our thinkers
mean to/for our peers. I have not broached Baruch S's work for myself.

Best wishes
Tom

On Tue, 26 May 2020 at 17:09, HENRY SHONERD <hshonerd@gmail.com> wrote:

> Hi Tom,
> Thank you for your rich, well-thought-out response to my question. And
> thank you for recognizing that I wanted it to be generous. Perhaps a
> quibble is that you associate the first stage of Stalinist rule as
> capitalist, rather than industrial, as I understand it. I think that’s
> important. Stalin’s top-down planning had the same hall marks as Mao’s,
> Castro’s and the current North Korean leader. I appreciate your optimism
> that any system devised by humans can create human thriving that is not
> destructive of of humanity itself. We seem to have boxed ourselves into a
> corner by destroying our niche, the world. COVID-19 and climate change,
> IMHO, we are all, indvidually and collectively complicit. I hope that we
> can get beyond romanticism and cynicism in meeting our fate. I think that
> Vygotsky and Spinoza represent what can come of wrestling with open hearts
> and clear thinking with our condition.
> Henry
>
>
> On May 26, 2020, at 3:09 AM, Tom Richardson <
> tom.richardson3@googlemail.com> wrote:
>
> Good Morning (GMT+1) Henry
>
> I'm touched by your mail today. My life experience does not include such
> practical engagement as yours, with any of the major social disruptions /
> attempts at new organisation, of the C20.
>
> It seems dismissively facile to criticise amazing historic
> re-organisations of social life like the Cuban  Revolution, but it is
> necessary. Otherwise the same mistakes will happen again and again.
>
> The political strand which I accept as most accurately analysing
> historical and current reality characterises the liberation movements
> (particularities, differences, I'm ignoring for sake of quick explanation)
> post 1900, as nationalist, and mostly state socialist/capitalist. IE they
> are top-down, state directed anti-imperialist/colonialist movements. The
> self-organisation and free association of the producers that is the essence
> of communist organisation is absent. Often there is some commitment to a
> Kautskyan / Stalinist "two stage theory", requiring full
> capitalist development to prepare the ground for the next step of
> proletarian rule - eg in  the South African struggle. We can see where that
> has led so far.
>
> But the analysts I accept, posit that socialism in one country cannot be
> created nor sustained while the basis of total global social reproduction
> is the money based economy, taken forward by the capital-labour
> relationship of commodity production - the so-called 'free market' whose
> anarchy ensures an absence of any organised relationship to global human
> needs, since it is driven by the *value-based circulation of commodities* dominating
> all global production.
>
> The freedom is that of the individual / joint-stock company in the pursuit
> of surplus value. And, yes, Marx, does provide an analysis of "money" which
> indicates how a future system of production would/could not be based on the
> use of money and therefore wages.
>
> There is so much literature about this to be investigated, (much of it
> written by US authors, extraordinarily, given the Chicago School and the
> legacy of McCarthy). I started with Engels 'Socialism, Utopian and
> Scientific' which explained in a way that my pro-market, individualist
> history teacher could not, why the Anti-Corn Law League had 'won' and the
> Chartists had failed.
>
> Anyway, I am only recycling, from my own limited understanding, the sort
> of analysis that the original authors of the literature I value provide in
> overwhelming but convincing detail.
>
> While the way forward towards a future that communists see as essential if
> the planet is not to be destroyed, or at least human life on it, is not in
> prospect as far as any realist can foresee, at present, the reality of the
> Barbarism that Capital brings (together with the technology necessary for
> the possibility of real change), is clear every moment in our lives.
>
> Human resistance and creative answers to apparently insoluble problems,
> and the reality that the working class has nothing to gain that sustains
> *real* *fulfilling human* life from capital's continuation, sustain my
> knowledge that my commitment to moving beyond capitalism, is both essential
> and realistic.
>
> I trust that this attempted answer to your generous question makes
> sufficient sense .
>
> Best wishes
>
> Tom
>
>
>
> On Mon, 25 May 2020 at 22:26, HENRY SHONERD <hshonerd@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Hi Tom,
>> What is it about “free market economies” is the cause of wage slavery? Is
>> there at least some jiggering of the market that could end “destructive
>> anarchy”? Do we do away with money? And I am serious here. I take it that
>> capitalism is the problem, not the market, or money. I was in the doctoral
>> program in economics at UC Berkeley during the late 60s. My concentrations
>> were comparative economic systems and economic planning. I dropped out
>> after only getting a masters degree in economics there, and went to Cuba to
>> cut sugar cane with the Venceremos Brigade. I felt strongly Che’s call to
>> make the New Man (though women were there too, and check out the film
>> “Lucia”) of that era, but I think that central planning (Castro’) of the
>> Cuban economy had a destructive and anarchic side. Castro apologized for
>> his mistakes during the year of 10 million tons of sugar cane production,
>> but the damage was done. Cuba has been a shining light in some ways for me
>> and others, not least the health care workers, the original Doctors Without
>> Borders, that beautifully exemplify the new human.
>>
>> So, really, what do we replace markets and money with? Or is it the
>> “free” part that’s the rub.
>>
>> Henry
>>
>>
>> On May 25, 2020, at 2:21 PM, Tom Richardson <
>> tom.richardson3@googlemail.com> wrote:
>>
>> Hello Annalisa
>>
>> "All that I figure is possible from the worldview you frame is:"
>>
>> Since I have suggested neither of the alternatives you state as the only
>> way forward, it would surely invalidate your further argument.
>>
>> But I must admit that the idea of thirty thousand working class families
>> and then some,  organising to change the wage-slavery employment system
>> that they are exploited by, would be a great idea.
>> Here's to that day, as the freely associated producers of our social life
>> organise to end the destructive anarchy of our present free-market
>> economies.
>>
>> Regards
>>
>> Tom
>>
>>
>>
>> On Mon, 25 May 2020 at 19:58, Annalisa Aguilar <annalisa@unm.edu> wrote:
>>
>>> Hi Tom and others,
>>>
>>>
>>> I agree that Capitalism is bad, and that it causes wealth and poverty in
>>> extremes. Which then creates social injustices that would be much lessened
>>> with less economic inequality.
>>>
>>>
>>> I do not think that I ever said (did I?) to ignore the traditional power
>>> structures. I said that every day we negotiate the power structures. And
>>> when we decide it's not working we can create change. That possibility is
>>> always an option, but it demands diligence, discipline, and discovery.
>>>
>>>
>>> All that I figure is possible from the worldview you frame is:
>>>
>>> 1. it's futile. Give up. The structures will always be against us.
>>> Settle in to your given hand of bad fortune.
>>>
>>> 2. grab a gun and kill as many people sitting in seats of power (which
>>> means the chair of power remains to be replaced by someone else).
>>>
>>>
>>> Forgive me if I reject both those options.
>>>
>>>
>>> As I said, perhaps in another post, the liberal position of citing data
>>> and objecting to the existence of that data, isn't going to make power
>>> structures change.
>>>
>>>
>>> What would make change is for those 15K-30K families to organize and
>>> among themselves decide how and what they can do to make their lot better.
>>>
>>>
>>> It's called organizing.
>>>
>>>
>>> Civil disobedience works because it is civil.
>>>
>>>
>>> Kind regards,
>>>
>>>
>>> Annalisa
>>>
>>> ------------------------------
>>> *From:* xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu <xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu>
>>> on behalf of Tom Richardson <tom.richardson3@googlemail.com>
>>> *Sent:* Monday, May 25, 2020 3:25 AM
>>> *To:* eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity <xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>
>>> *Subject:* [Xmca-l] Re: remote_online learning?
>>>
>>>
>>> *  [EXTERNAL]*
>>> Hi Annalisa
>>> Good Morning - just a correction to figures about poverty in our town -
>>> I should have been more careful,; fortunately the figures from memory were
>>> an underestimate rather than an exaggeration:
>>>
>>> Almost 30,000 children are living in poverty across Teesside - and half
>>> are from working families.
>>>
>>> And stark new statistics reveal that the picture is worst in central
>>> Middlesbrough
>>> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.gazettelive.co.uk/all-about/central-middlesbrough__;!!Mih3wA!UzpqqoKO1pITTk2fSACEPEAKdX9lS-DB6KRcN_OsqP68UjnBttHBF_Z-qSWQ8KfjrXPuWg$> -
>>> as hyper-local, official Government data reveals three quarters of all kids
>>> in one neighbourhood are living below the breadline.
>>>
>>> Regards
>>>
>>> Tom
>>>         BoWen
>>>
>>>
>>> On Sat, 23 May 2020 at 22:17, Annalisa Aguilar <annalisa@unm.edu> wrote:
>>>
>>> Alas, hello again Tom (& VO's),
>>>
>>> While I accept your assessment of our differences in approaches and
>>> understandings, I do not see that it is obvious that there is no meeting
>>> point.
>>>
>>> For example, innovation exists in science and in art, in business it is
>>> entrepreneurship. I believe that there are good things that come from
>>> business entrepreneurship, and there are bad things too. We love that art
>>> and science are innovative, when they are, but there can be failings there
>>> too.
>>>
>>> The captains of industry who believe they are self-made men, and who
>>> believe that anyone who decides for oneself being on the assembly line of
>>> the manufacturing floor is only a dumb pawn in a larger game, would be in
>>> my estimation the worst that kind of human that entrepreneurship generates.
>>> Elon Musk is one example, perhaps.
>>>
>>> As much as I likely would not want Elon Musk over for dinner, I can
>>> admire that he has been able to steward the creation of an electric car in
>>> the midst of a sleepwalking auto industry that cannot envision automobiles
>>> without a gas-eating combustible engine.
>>>
>>> At the same time what he gives he takes away: I'm not sure that I can
>>> ever get on board a space rocket to inhabit Mars. I actually object to that
>>> project because as long as we haven't worked out how to feed everyone on
>>> this earthship, we should not be escaping it by polluting another planet,
>>> even if, as Carl Sagan told us, there are billions and billions of them out
>>> there.
>>>
>>> "They" in the form of (other they)'s do not have power unless we give
>>> them that power. That power is always up for debate every minute, every
>>> day, every year.
>>>
>>> Given that there are now 38 million unemployed in the US (I can't name
>>> the numbers elsewhere and I'm sorry about that), that's like the entire
>>> population of California being on the dole. It is a significant number, and
>>> it may be that many of those people start their own businesses, not because
>>> of education or desire, but of necessity.
>>>
>>> Many of the young and unemployed are educated. That could be a
>>> combustible cocktail, depending upon their self-awareness and outward
>>> worldview.
>>>
>>> One strange article in NYT described a scene designer who has been out
>>> of work since the health order shutdown, and hasn't received any
>>> unemployment yet because she filed in New Jersey, while her partner did
>>> because he filed in New York. Then she got an offer to work in a company
>>> who is making ... wait for it.... facemasks, so now she is toiling over a
>>> machine, sewing facemasks.
>>>
>>> I don't think I could live in that situation because of the stark irony,
>>> if that is a just word for that. I mourn the loss of her creativity, but I
>>> hope it is temporary.
>>>
>>> Now out of necessity, she's had to travel that path. So I can agree with
>>> you that because of the government order to shut down business, and because
>>> a company who hired her decided to make facemasks, because what other
>>> ingenious product would or could one manufacture right now? they have
>>> shaped her working life. Have they shaped her social life, though. I mean
>>> completely? She still has her contacts on her iPhone, she likely returns
>>> home to her partner to cook dinner and search for more work. Her desires
>>> and dreams are likely impacted, but has she completely given up? Should she?
>>>
>>> I am not pro-revolution, only because they create rivers of blood in
>>> streets, etc. I'm more of the mind that incremental choices can together
>>> create a tipping point of social change.
>>>
>>> For example, consider the tiny house movement. Or how young people will
>>> share resources, or reevaluate buying things, or what they eat.
>>>
>>> People make the best lemonade only with the best lemons.
>>>
>>> There is going to have to be a reckoning of having so many unemployed
>>> people. It can't be ignored. To just pretend that everyone will be happy
>>> with a lower wage job (lower than when the pandemic hit), is only going to
>>> drive people to desperate measures. The country will want to put people to
>>> work and this could be an opportunity for collective change, for creating
>>> meaningful jobs.
>>>
>>> Because who wants a civil war.
>>>
>>> So there will have to be some sort of appeasement for the social reality
>>> that people must have their basic needs met. The temporary stimulus is a
>>> lifeline, but the real economic difficulties will start when people start
>>> to return to work, and there are less jobs with the result being there is
>>> less money circulating in the economy overall. With interest rates so low,
>>> and pumping more money into the economy is only going to raise the prices
>>> of things, possibly wages, but not the buying power.
>>>
>>> People will cut bait from the lives they once had, and simplify. Moving
>>> to less crowded cities and towns, returning to live with parents. Perhaps
>>> creating cooperatives. One area for discovery with so much time on one's
>>> hands is handcrafting. I think there will be a blooming of new businesses
>>> that incorporate *real* labor. This may also usher in more vocational
>>> training programs.
>>>
>>> One article I read today discussed the eating of meat, and how it is a
>>> destructive social practice including its impact on climate change. Largely
>>> that industry depends upon of automation, and now with slaughterhouses
>>> being virus hotspots, do you want to trust that the meat you buy is not
>>> tainted with COVID? Or that you are forcing a worker into an unsafe work
>>> environment and catch the virus?
>>>
>>> If people were decide to stop eating meat, or reduce even its
>>> consumption because it's too expensive, and if the government stops giving
>>> subsidies to these agro-corporations, then these polluting companies will
>>> fail. That would be great news.
>>>
>>> Then the writer pointed out that if we returned to diets higher in
>>> plant-based food, that would increase demand for real farms, real
>>> entrepreneurship and generate jobs, as it takes more people to grow
>>> vegetables, than it does to raise pigs or chickens. We would also become
>>> healthier as a population. There is already a network of farmer's markets
>>> for local produce, so it may mean a growth in that area.
>>>
>>> I suppose what I'm trying to say is I do not think it is so cut and
>>> dried that we are subject to the worst forever. I think with so much time
>>> on our hands people are free to organize and decide to help one another in
>>> mutual aid. We do not have to rely on traditional power structures, and we
>>> do not have to resort to bloody revolutions.
>>>
>>> Depending upon what you are looking for in life, there is a third way
>>> arising.
>>>
>>> Kind regards,
>>>
>>> Annalisa
>>>
>>>
>>> ------------------------------
>>> *From:* xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu <xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu>
>>> on behalf of Tom Richardson <tom.richardson3@googlemail.com>
>>> *Sent:* Saturday, May 23, 2020 4:24 AM
>>> *To:* eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity <xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>
>>> *Subject:* [Xmca-l] Re: remote_online learning?
>>>
>>>
>>> *  [EXTERNAL]*
>>> Hello once more Annalisa
>>>
>>> Our difference of approach to and understanding of the modern state and
>>> the production of social life obviously admits of no meeting point as far
>>> as I read your astonishingly wide-ranging and impassioned response.
>>>
>>> Without the simplicity  of my reply intending to signal a facile
>>> sarcasm, I must bluntly state that I begin from the acceptance that
>>> nefarious or not, 'They', in the sense of government and corporations, do
>>> have the power to control and shape the organisation of social life. We
>>> can, if enough socio-political pressure can be brought to bear through
>>> social movements, rebellions, revolts, shift certain aspects of that
>>> fashioning of our lives.
>>>
>>> But at present, the relationship of wage slavery imposed by Capital ,and
>>> the society shaped by that relationship, are dominant throughout the life
>>> of our planet.
>>>
>>> Sad at such an impasse, since we both wish the best for humanity
>>>
>>> Tom
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On Fri, 22 May 2020 at 21:46, Annalisa Aguilar <annalisa@unm.edu> wrote:
>>>
>>> Hi Tom, and VO's of XMCA
>>>
>>> Concerning your questions about our new normal now that COVID19 is with
>>> us and here to stay, I think your guess is as good as anyone's. I am not
>>> sure if we as humans have ever been burdened with such an event as this,
>>> and at the same time are able to watch the unfolding events and respond (or
>>> not respond if you are a stable genius) quickly from the feedback of data,
>>> news, anecdotes, and other forms of perception of how the virus is
>>> impacting us.
>>>
>>> What is worth remembering as well, is that epidemiologists have been
>>> warning us for decades that a pandemic was a clear an present danger to the
>>> way we live and negotiate the modern world. We see in sensurround how right
>>> they were.
>>>
>>> As I consider your question, I have to think that people mow might be
>>> sorted into two classes, well at least two classes:
>>>
>>>
>>>    1. People who seem to think the virus is just another flu and once
>>>    we find a vaccine, all will return to Christmas 2019 (or whatever December
>>>    Holiday or pre-pandemic time you mark your calendar as before the pandemic
>>>    hit, which of course depends upon where on the earth you are located).
>>>    2. People who seem to think the virus has changed us and there will
>>>    never be going back to Christmas 2019 (or whatever December Holiday...)
>>>
>>> I suspect the Americans of the neo-conservative persuasion who have been
>>> motivated to protest health order social distancing believe that not only
>>> this is a conspiracy to control fredom-loving people, but that we should
>>> return to Christmas 2019 as soon as possible, they are of Cohort 1.
>>>
>>> I think Cohort 2 are going to be people who take in the facts and the
>>> data and are actively attempting to sort out where do we go from here. I
>>> feel confident you are in Cohort 2, as ar most people on this list.
>>>
>>> Now, as Carol M has pointed out, in a lot of ways our discussion about
>>> online learning is a first world concern, for those who have an internet
>>> connection that is ubiquitous not only at home, but at school, work, on the
>>> bus, on planes, in cafes, and other public gathering spaces, like city
>>> halls, or town squares. That's another reason why it's hard to take Klein
>>> seriously, in terms of *tone*.
>>>
>>> I recall reading something from George Lakoff when he indicates that
>>> there is a liberal stance that seems to believe that if one objects loudly
>>> enough with "sky is falling" rhetoric and then feed out various data, that
>>> using this strategy the audience will become motivated to protest in the
>>> streets, write letters to congress, run for office, or whatever civil
>>> action must be done, and with alacrity. It doesn't work. I do not think
>>> being against anything ever "works." I think only being for something
>>> works.
>>>
>>> Let's look at Klein's article as an example. If she were to be
>>> rhetorically successful she would outline the problem she identifies (Mr.
>>> Schmidt goes to Washington), but instead of all that is wrong, talk about
>>> what can be right. Not to say she should agree with Mr. Schmidt and his
>>> ways.
>>>
>>> I feel her article could be a lot heavier on what works with education
>>> and how to enhance that further. She does mention how money should b used
>>> more for school nurses, smaller classrooms, etc. This is where she could
>>> have expanded beautifully into a viable solution to spark everyone's
>>> imaginations. But she didn't do that. She is more motivated it seems to
>>> mark Mr. Schmidt and his technological minions to masterminding a New World
>>> Order that will steal our souls and tether us to the Matrix from now until
>>> the end of time.
>>>
>>> I also feel she would have been more conducive to discourse by writing
>>> an open letter to Cuomo and Schmidt, and to invite a response. This is also
>>> leading by example to cultivate democratic processes that are near and dear
>>> to all of us. Instead she "otherfies" them, and this is also not useful.
>>> And I am not saying that as a stance to defend Mr. Schmidt or Gov Cuomo, in
>>> any way.
>>>
>>> So back to your question, I do not think that there is any way we will
>>> be extricated from this reality of COVID 19. We will have to pick our
>>> stones across the river carefully so that none of us slips and is carried
>>> down the rapids. I feel it is more useful to say we are a family of one
>>> kind, and all of us have to stay together to make it across. And that all
>>> of us deserves a life jacket as a measure of survival because not all of us
>>> will get to the other side without getting wet, or falling in.
>>>
>>> The tension between CEOs and their contempt for the slow-food of
>>> democracy is well known. If only they could persuade all of us to eat fast
>>> food, then they could take over the world as the next McDonalds, in terms
>>> of technological vision, whatever a McDonalds would look like on a screen,
>>> as an app, whathaveyou.
>>>
>>> Unfortunately what seems to elude folks who have not worked in tech, or
>>> those who see tech as just another new Ford in the garage, is that
>>> technology is always in flux. There is always development of new hardware
>>> that needs new software written to use it, so there is a double-quicksand
>>> of events upon which technology is founded (and funded) upon. That's what
>>> Moore's Law is about.
>>>
>>> Technology in order to "be itself" must always move fleetingly, like the
>>> shark must to breathe. Technology will never be able to last the halls of
>>> government. For that reason, any rendition of technology in government (and
>>> school systems for that matter) will be like bad combovers that are meant
>>> to convince us that we are now more attractive and appealing (not meaning
>>> to offend those who live by their combovers...)
>>>
>>> Where I feel technology could best serve us is to help create grassroots
>>> democracy tools, to support what we know is possible and could even
>>> threaten the basis for representative democracy and bring it closer to a
>>> straight agora democracy.
>>>
>>> Some might call this anarchy, and I could argue along the lines of David
>>> Graeber that anarchy is a more pure form of democracy practiced in all
>>> "primitive" or "ancient" cultures, it's not a perfect fit, and I intend to
>>> make that reference loosely. My point is to say there should be what David
>>> K calls involution of what government is, to what government was, and to
>>> supplant that, or rather what causes those parts to be pushed to the
>>> margins is to imagine a government where there is mor connection to
>>> agora-like venues where one person speaking in a Zoom-like frame is of
>>> equal stature of any other person speaking in the frame. One can sort of
>>> imagine this with the Zoom-empowered senate hearings which I watched for a
>>> while on the NYT front page. It was really strange to me. I suppose the
>>> danger is that we get to hear Sally Mc? from Arizona use her time to blame
>>> the Chinese for the virus, etc, for more time that we would like. But
>>> that's democracy.
>>>
>>> So one fallout could be that grade-school kids and their resulting
>>> perezhivanie from Zoom-based classrooms, will adopt the tool for political
>>> discussions as adults. Might that be a good thing?
>>>
>>> Maybe.
>>>
>>> At the same time, do you remember a book that came out in the mid90s
>>> called "Silicon Snake Oil"? This is yet another phenomenon of technology,
>>> that people oozing charisma will claw their way to the microphone and pitch
>>> an idea about the next vaporware, who will then make unsubstantiated
>>> promises and claims directed to feed our fantasies and dreams, and who will
>>> then abscond with all the money, only to request not to look at the man
>>> behind the green curtain, or if pulled by the ear into a senate hearing
>>> will say "I thought it was a good idea at the time." etc.
>>>
>>> I think that is the view of Klein about all technology, and there are
>>> merits in that, but there are also other ways to think about it.
>>>
>>> This article about Marc Benioff in Wired recently discusses about the
>>> social entrepreneurship of his wealth:
>>> https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.wired.com/story/gospel-of-wealth-according-to-marc-benioff/__;!!Mih3wA!W28GBEL0aIq1NgmDiOlx-TmRsWu4eL5nX1ltx94nkWToxMToNF4HPASRw-GvuZbxXOlSMQ$ 
>>> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.wired.com/story/gospel-of-wealth-according-to-marc-benioff/__;!!Mih3wA!QlFQ9K0fpCeY8Ago6eD8wEZsCoPsUNbxY-9nGASn68fLoIl7bpzI7P4YyuMxRNSRIbnKqA$>
>>> Who by they way now owns the magazine Time, the way Jeff Bezos bought
>>> the WaPo, and Lauren Jobs bought The Altlantic, and Pierre Omidyar funded
>>> The Intercept.
>>>
>>> I do invite, as much as you can stomach, anyway, for any educators or
>>> other members of our vibrant list to make regular reading of Wired
>>> Magazine, which is a far more interesting read on technology than something
>>> like Fast Company. I encourage this reading, if only to know the enemy, as
>>> it were. Wired articles are far more nuanced and sophisticated than when
>>> the magazine first got off the ground in the early 90s. I find reading it
>>> helps to connect some dots for those who do not consume technology culture
>>> all the time. Just pick and choose what you are curious about.
>>>
>>> We must become familiar with the vernacular of technology if we want a
>>> hand in the game of how it plays in education, our stomping grounds. This
>>> will require effort on our part. That is not to say we must adopt all the
>>> shiny new toys. But we can be like a Consumer Report for education, and
>>> evaluate and measure the good the bad and the ugly of technology and its
>>> use in the edu sphere.
>>>
>>> We cannot sit on our laurels and wait for someone else to decide for us
>>> how technology will be deployed. That stance is what the mythology of
>>> inevitable technology rests and self-perpetuates.
>>>
>>> We must be more tech literate, and we must be the first to coin words
>>> and how they manifest in edu venues. What works what doesn't. I don't see
>>> any other way to fight back and to keep control of the educational
>>> narrative, where of course we want to hardwire zopeds, manifest and lead
>>> critical and nourishing perezhivanie, and model by example sterling
>>> mediated learning experiences for students and teachers.
>>>
>>> What other projects can there be?
>>>
>>> For me, this is "fighting back" because it makes the sort of shark-like
>>> entrepreneur recede for a time (as they will always be looking for a way
>>> into edu's tax coffers), because we are successful getting education right.
>>>
>>> I do not accept that entreprenuership is what took the sanctity from
>>> teaching and learning. But that's an argument to be made. I feel it is only
>>> one side of the argument.
>>>
>>> Once I had an male acquaintance tell me that one reason women are in
>>> inferior roles is because they let this happen to them. As you might
>>> imagine, I had a real hard time with that argument and I had to clench my
>>> jaw to now spew various vitriol upon him. But after I thought about it, in
>>> a narrow sense he is not wrong because not it is true that enough women in
>>> history identified the value to struggle for rights even if they would not
>>> see equality in their own lifetimes. There are many explanations for why
>>> that did not happen, that are not facile to depict. But then I also had to
>>> think of how much women's struggles have succeeded because they did decide
>>> to not let this happen to them anymore. But now women are learning in the
>>> US, anyway, that nothing fought for is a permanent fixture, and so we must
>>> become resigned to the perpetual struggle for equality, as all marginalized
>>> people must.
>>>
>>> So now I direct this to our context of education in the venue of online
>>> learning. This is not an easy question, and it is not intended to
>>> trivialize the work and efforts of many on this list, but it is instead a
>>> question of inner reflection, or a taking of inventory of one's own life:
>>>
>>> How much has each of you done to take measure and fight for meaningful
>>> education in the classroom?
>>>
>>> Could you have done more? Can you do more?
>>>
>>> Then the same for asking yourself how have you integrated technology
>>> appropriately into your learning methods and general perezhivanie.
>>>
>>> I hope this might provide some further food for thought concerning
>>> preservation on the sanctity of learning and instruction in the classroom.
>>>
>>> So all this is to reply to you Tom, that in short, the nefarious They
>>> can only take control if we let them.
>>>
>>> Kind regards,
>>>
>>> Annalisa
>>>
>>> ps please excuse all typos, which are all made on my own.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> ------------------------------
>>> *From:* xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu <xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu>
>>> on behalf of Tom Richardson <tom.richardson3@googlemail.com>
>>> *Sent:* Thursday, May 21, 2020 11:26 AM
>>> *To:* eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity <xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>
>>> *Subject:* [Xmca-l] Re: remote_online learning?
>>>
>>>
>>> *  [EXTERNAL]*
>>> Hi Annalisa
>>>
>>> Thank you for providing the details of your deep and committed
>>> background in distance / online learning. Mine is obviously shallow, which
>>> must have triggered you and 'Robsub' somewhat.
>>>
>>> But my questioning is in the newer context of the Covid19 threats to
>>> global society and the solutions being sought to extricate us from them.
>>>
>>> Governor Cuomo's conversation with Schmidt to examine solutions to the
>>> problems of present coping and future emergence from the pandemic is
>>> understandable. Two persons with power and a need to act, discuss what
>>> technology (in its widest hard- and software aspects) has to offer.
>>>
>>> In a democracy we can assess the solutions they propose and shape them
>>> to what we know to be as near to optimal for our society as possible. Your
>>> assertion of the efficacy of our agency which Klein seems to deny,
>>> with her politico-economic caveats.
>>>
>>> Schmidt has an evangelism for the potential of technology, but expressed
>>> with such restraint - he's no zealot. He also, in the video of the ECNY
>>> conversation with Marie-Josee Kravis, sees the lack of 'simplicity' in the
>>> three-tier democratic system of the US. He is a CEO with an organisation
>>> geared to problem-analysis, solution choices, and operational capability
>>> which can be put into action without delaying debate. He expressed no
>>> hostility to 'democracy' but as he said, it does not work simply.
>>>
>>> Klein reminds us to be wary if not alarmed, not because she is
>>> despairing (I believe), but because that direct entrepreneurial drive has
>>> profit making as its unavoidable aim. Whatever Schmidt's humanistic
>>> feelings, if profit doesn't result from his and his companies actions, they
>>> will not survive. That competitive drive is also present in his aspirations
>>> for international dominance (see his remarks on the rise of China's
>>> technology).
>>>
>>> So far, the sort of distance / online learning you have worked on, has
>>> been nested in the context of family and (normal) school life. That
>>> normality had implicit in it human values, customs and structures, whatever
>>> differences of class, race, gender and culture were present. The melding of
>>> state and enterprise in a newly-developing novel (5G?)high-tech 'solution'
>>> to mediating education presents a situation which need to be examined I
>>> believe. And my query, in that 'Kleinian' context was looking for answers
>>> from those, like yourself, with wide experience of previous technological
>>> 'answers' and their implications for the results within the learner.
>>>
>>> I affirm, along with you, the irrepressible resistance and sheer
>>> cantankerousness we humans bring to unjust situations. But such fighting
>>> back will often be unsuccessful in its aims, when the need to reduce labour
>>> time with new technology is driving events - Luddism and machine looms? Our
>>> human drive to change and adapt, our use of our agency to create or alter
>>> our lives must not be suppressed. But what Klein is reminding us of is just
>>> how tilted is the balance of power - the power of the state and behind it,
>>> the drive from the vast corporate world, for profit. Our agency is so often
>>> undone by the arbitrary intervention of those forces.
>>>
>>> Those are the forces which have destroyed what you name the 'sanctity'
>>> of teaching and learning. I would name it the basic need for those goals,
>>> but we share it. With the need to re-invigorate just such a precious
>>> resource, we will continue to fight like hell. Despite their mere
>>> humanness, corporations and states at present have greater knowledge and
>>> power than 'mere' citizens. My intervention in xmca discussion was really
>>> to say "They're looking to take even more control of daily life.
>>> Within academia, you can analyse how they are making such changes happen
>>> and continue to alert the rest of us, if you fear the consequences of
>>> their changes."
>>>
>>> Best  wishes
>>> Tom
>>>
>>> On Wed, 20 May 2020 at 22:29, Annalisa Aguilar <annalisa@unm.edu> wrote:
>>>
>>> Hi Tom,
>>>
>>> May I, in turn, thank you for your civil disagreement? 🙂
>>>
>>> Online learning is one area of study in my educational background. We
>>> looked at Second Life (SL) and tried to create a learning space there,
>>> once. I think that there is always room for innovation, but there is always
>>> a transaction of what one forfeits for what one gains. I was underwhelmed
>>> by SL's prospects.
>>>
>>> In the heyday of SL, which as a platform is barely in a coma right now,
>>> I'd once heard that a medical school created a giant kidney sculpture, that
>>> students' avatars could walk around to investigate and discuss with one
>>> another how various kidney processes worked.  It was a virtual biological
>>> fountain in the town square. I'm not sure that this learning context would
>>> ever beat out a human anatomy class, but I found the solution interesting.
>>>
>>> Blackboard was another platform we used, which I detested. It was like
>>> looking at the teacher's chalkboard through a slice of swiss cheese.
>>> Perhaps it is more "evolved" now.
>>>
>>> What was interesting about SL is that one could project a sense of
>>> place, which we know is helpful for memory and retention. There was a lot
>>> of open space for play involved in SL, enough to make it interesting, but
>>> it was perhaps far too much work to create viable learning environments.
>>>
>>> I think what we have to accept (which I feel all experienced educators
>>> already know and feel) is that flattening all education to an online
>>> learning space of a 2D screen, as may be experienced with grade-schoolers
>>> during the pandemic today, is destructive to learning, *because* of
>>> associations of place with learning.
>>>
>>> In a way, online learning venues that we may enjoy as adults, such as
>>> the AUP conference on Psychology in Global Crises, is a bit like driving,
>>> drinking, and smoking. What I mean is that one must pass a certain age in
>>> order to decide if it is good for me or not, or that I have the hand-eye
>>> coordination to negotiate (as with driving). Consider recent ZOOMbombing
>>> abuses, which would make any parent want to unplug the computer and
>>> constrain learning to books.
>>>
>>> We live in a time where the classroom holds no sanctity whatsoever. We
>>> must put the sanctity back into teaching and learning.
>>>
>>> I still maintain that we are not powerless to debate the ways in which
>>> the situations and environments we determine are viable to create contexts
>>> of learning.
>>>
>>> I find the lack of detail in the Klein article is not by accident, but
>>> out of convenience. There has been plenty of online learning happening for
>>> quite sometime now. But this has largely been in adult or in college-aged
>>> learning venues . Not with grade school.
>>>
>>> I do think that there has been some online tutoring venues for
>>> grade-school kids, but I'm not certain how much that has been formally
>>> studied. I also wonder what answers homeschooling might contribute as well,
>>> although that venue for learning has a decidedly conservative sheen upon
>>> it, for all the homesteading mythologies those folk abide in. I would guess
>>> that this is form of learning is one that they would welcome, because
>>> parents would get to pick and choose what their children learn.
>>>
>>> I don't think this could ever be construed as a liberal arts education,
>>> nor would it deliver new generations of critical thinkers.
>>>
>>> What I feel may be a part of the pushback against these propositions is
>>> childcare, and how parents will require this to provide for their own
>>> families. I found this NY opinion piece insightful:
>>> https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/22/opinion/coronavirus-parenting-burnout.html__;!!Mih3wA!W28GBEL0aIq1NgmDiOlx-TmRsWu4eL5nX1ltx94nkWToxMToNF4HPASRw-GvuZYbDdg7ZQ$ 
>>> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/22/opinion/coronavirus-parenting-burnout.html?action=click&module=RelatedLinks&pgtype=Article__;!!Mih3wA!SZSEYLggVkbsFhK2-SLWJT1oidlnry4UU07CU8yscHieuVTRIi4U3vkjwqo1GLIpcTD9PA$>
>>>
>>> It may be we witness in a shakeout for free childcare that it is a
>>> right, not a privilege. That would be a huge boon for many. But the
>>> pandemic may also show us a new aspect of the validity of classroom
>>> education and why we must fight to preserve it. We use it or we lose it.
>>>
>>> It may usher in more critical discourse about the meaning of the
>>> classroom to the child's learning. if only for the attentional affordances
>>> that the classroom provides to a cluster of young minds and their teacher.
>>>
>>> Last, in reply to your, "I cannot grasp what is intended/visualized by
>>> the AI/digital experts," may I remind you that Thomas Edison believed that
>>> he could turn the classroom upside-down with the invention of film, and
>>> that education would be significantly transformed by watching movies.
>>> People then worried if that meant there would be no need to learn to read,
>>> etc. We see that what Edison visualized was simply not realistic. But is it
>>> the case that watching films in a classroom doesn't provide some facet of
>>> learning? Yes. But has it supplanted traditional forms of learning? No.
>>>
>>> If teachers discover there are legitimate technological additions to
>>> already successful evidence-based learning environments, that support
>>> well-known learning theory, technology can be welcomed if it can be
>>> integrated with existing models.
>>>
>>> If teachers do not find such technology useful, then it's just another
>>> way to enrich the pockets of Mr. Schmidt and other technophiles, where
>>> money will be spent but the products unused. That would be tragic and
>>> wasteful.
>>>
>>> One of the aspects I do not like about the idea of grade-school online
>>> learning environments is how it inures children to surveillance, which may
>>> also turn off a great many kids who would prefer wandering backyards, or
>>> riding bikes in the park, to play with friends. I don't think learning and
>>> surveillance is a constructive combination.
>>>
>>> There is a lot to consider, and perhaps this is where the alarm is more
>>> appropriately felt, because these are new challenges, and there are not yet
>>> words to describe what we find wrong with these problems, and so we must
>>> better ourselves by searching for the arguments and stances we can unite
>>> behind. Perhaps we feel alarmed because we must grapple with an unknown
>>> interloper. We are fatigued because our senses are already shredded from
>>> what is already difficult about living in a pandemic.
>>>
>>> This is why I do not feel Klein's tone is helpful to us. It stands upon
>>> a mythology that technology is inevitable. After much study and
>>> introspection, I will never accept that reality.
>>>
>>> To listen to Klein is to believe that a town crier were to some and say
>>> "They are coming take all our tools and all they will leave us are hammers
>>> and pins."
>>>
>>> I just do not believe this narrative.
>>>
>>> We cannot give up.
>>>
>>> Is there a fight ahead? Yes.
>>>
>>> Should we rally together to protect what needs protecting? Most
>>> definitely, yes.
>>>
>>> Kind regards,
>>>
>>> Annalisa
>>> ------------------------------
>>> *From:* xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu <xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu>
>>> on behalf of Tom Richardson <tom.richardson3@googlemail.com>
>>> *Sent:* Wednesday, May 20, 2020 7:31 AM
>>> *To:* eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity <xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>
>>> *Subject:* [Xmca-l] Re: remote_online learning?
>>>
>>>
>>> *  [EXTERNAL]*
>>>
>>> Hello Annalisa
>>> Thank you for your reactions to the Klein article. I agree with almost
>>> none of your opinions about the content nor the form. About the capacity of
>>> human nature for both heroic altruism and lethal self-interested behaviour
>>> acted out by the same person, I have no doubts.
>>>
>>>    - What I really wanted an answer to was: 'What will the environment
>>>    created for this new online learning actually consist of, in the
>>>    widest sense of the situation for the learner and the context in which such
>>>    learning takes place?'.
>>>    - What can be confidently forecast about the nature of these changes
>>>    for the *perezhivanie  *of the learner, which shapes her social
>>>    being and that which she perceives as being 'normal/abnormal',
>>>    'acceptable/unacceptable' and 'changeable/unchangeable' in her society?
>>>
>>> Since little practical detail is given in Klein's piece and I haven't
>>> yet listened to the complete video from the ECNY meeting, I cannot grasp
>>> what is intended/visualised by the AI/digital experts.
>>> I would welcome some approach to answers to those questions if that is
>>> within your area of expertise; if not, I am content to let it rest.
>>>
>>> Kind regards
>>> Tom
>>>
>>>
>>> On Tue, 19 May 2020 at 22:07, Annalisa Aguilar <annalisa@unm.edu> wrote:
>>>
>>> Hello Tom,
>>>
>>> Thank you for posting the link.
>>>
>>> I did finally get around to reading the Klein article, and it is fairly
>>> dismal the manner that she outlines the intentions of Mr. Schmidt. That is
>>> not to say that she is far from the mark, but we are not just unthinking
>>> pods in the matrix, powerless to articulate the way technology is distended
>>> into our lives.
>>>
>>> I think what bothers me most about the Klein article is the tone. It
>>> reinforces through negation a fallacy that technology is inevitable (and
>>> resistance is futile). I say this because she presumes this narrative has
>>> become the hegemony upon which she reacts. It is far too doomsday.
>>>
>>> At the same time, a lot of her concerns are valid. The trawling for
>>> power in Washington by Silicon Valley is not unknown to us.
>>>
>>> Yet, I also had a real hard time with her juxatposing Schmidt with Bill
>>> Gates. Gates is working to do actual good in the world by projects such as
>>> the humble toilet in geographic locations without waste treatment
>>> facilities, or low water infrastructure (and we might as well include
>>> Warren Buffet in that equation, because the lionshare of the funding
>>> flowing into the Gates Foundation is from him. Buffet did not make his
>>> billions through technology, unless you want to include the telephone).
>>>
>>> I happen to know that the Gates Foundation is funding efforts to
>>> encourage agricultural developments in places like Columbia to grow coffee
>>> to replace illicit crops, in order to scale down the violence that
>>> coincides with the drug wars. These efforts are working.
>>>
>>> Why does she leave this out of the discussion? That's the general
>>> problem I find with Naomi Klein, is the chicken-little-sky-is-falling
>>> perspective.
>>>
>>> She seems to be similar to those trumpsters who blame the genesis of
>>> COVID (if not upon China) upon Gates, as some strange mastermind move to
>>> control the world.
>>>
>>> Tom, I think it is right and human that you responded to the bleakness
>>> of the tone, but that doesn't mean this worldview is correct or accurate.
>>> Technology will always be a tool for use. It is not monolithic. There is
>>> the off button. We do still have a democracy and processes in place to
>>> deliberate the way forward.
>>>
>>> As long as humans desire freedom there will always be resistance to
>>> control systems, generating a constant search for the chinks in the armor,
>>> or other loopholes to squeeze through. People will always use technology in
>>> ways that were not anticipated, but just as that can be assertion can be
>>> construed as dismal, it can also mean good news, that we always have agency
>>> to decide how to use our tools.
>>>
>>> Also, one stick in the spokes that was glaring for me is that Mr.
>>> Schmidt will never be able to address the laws for mandatory education for
>>> disabled children with his goals for flattening the classroom into
>>> two-dimensional online learning screens. He will never be able to walk
>>> around that law.
>>>
>>> So there are many ways this "technology is inevitable" narrative simply
>>> does not hold water for me.
>>>
>>> I hope this might be a little encouraging.
>>>
>>> Kind regards,
>>>
>>> Annalisa
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> ------------------------------
>>> *From:* xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu <xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu>
>>> on behalf of mike cole <mcole@ucsd.edu>
>>> *Sent:* Tuesday, May 19, 2020 10:46 AM
>>> *To:* eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity <xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>
>>> *Subject:* [Xmca-l] Re: remote_online learning?
>>>
>>>
>>> *  [EXTERNAL]*
>>> Hello Tom Richardson
>>>      This topic has been the front and center in the "Re-generating Chat
>>> Project" that has just finished its
>>> planned two year efforts that focused on the challenges to human
>>> development, and theories of "Development
>>> in the Anthropcene.  Two months ago, the word Anthropocene was replaced
>>> by the code word, covid-19, a pandemic.
>>> Both crises pose huge challenges to theories of development as well as
>>> to actual development of huge numbers of people around the  world.
>>>      The MCA-linked website, CulturalPraxis currently has a number of
>>> essays on the challenges of this historical moment, and the opportunities.
>>>       In the United States, the crisis has deschooled society in the
>>> most dramatic way one can imagine -- A way that literally forced
>>> a massive re-mediation of human life.  Education, the wheel house of
>>> most members of this discussion over the years,
>>> is now a family affair big time. Simulaneously, home-worksite relations
>>> have been disassembled,  both modes and relations of production are getting
>>> a shock that is crumbling institutions (home, school, work,).
>>>
>>> We can really get the feel of Roy D'andrade's comment that doing social
>>> science is like studying rocks in a rockslide.  This rockslide moves a warp
>>> speed and its invisible.
>>>
>>> Remediation of existing classroom structures is what we have been about
>>> for 100 years.
>>> Seems like there has never been a more appropriate time to start
>>> providing working models of effective practices that do NOT
>>> assume that things will return to Christmas, 2019.
>>>
>>> Thanks for asking.
>>> mike
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On Tue, May 19, 2020 at 9:07 AM Tom Richardson <
>>> tom.richardson3@googlemail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>> Greetings Xmca-ers
>>> I would   like to raise a question.
>>> In the article by Naomi Klein linked below, apart from all the major
>>> questions about  our futures  - personal freedom, health protection,
>>> democratic control and the power of Big Digital Tech_AI, international
>>> competition etc. that she raises, I wondered what from a Vygotskyan
>>> approach to child/human development/education can / should be a reply to
>>> these sentences on the 'home schooling' that has (or hasn't) been
>>> happening  recently:
>>>
>>>
>>> "Indeed, Schmidt has been relentless in pursuing this vision. Two weeks
>>> after that article appeared, he described
>>> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XtAyGVuRQME__;!!Mih3wA!VRgkzssOuSyNvpVQWR2QH7dShhiXD5eWtYs2HahNwv_pKUU7G9GOQZMrzIpGsa_-KDBGFw$> the
>>> ad-hoc home schooling programming that teachers and families across the
>>> country had been forced to cobble together during this public health
>>> emergency as “a massive experiment in remote learning”.
>>>
>>> The goal of this experiment, he said, was “trying to find out: how do
>>> kids learn remotely? And with that data we should be able to build better
>>> remote and distance learning tools which, when combined with the teacher …
>>> will help kids learn better.” "
>>>
>>> https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.theguardian.com/news/2020/may/13/naomi-klein-how-big-tech-plans-to-profit-from-coronavirus-pandemic__;!!Mih3wA!W28GBEL0aIq1NgmDiOlx-TmRsWu4eL5nX1ltx94nkWToxMToNF4HPASRw-GvuZZ29Ujyvg$ 
>>> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.theguardian.com/news/2020/may/13/naomi-klein-how-big-tech-plans-to-profit-from-coronavirus-pandemic__;!!Mih3wA!VRgkzssOuSyNvpVQWR2QH7dShhiXD5eWtYs2HahNwv_pKUU7G9GOQZMrzIpGsa-SnnFGDg$>
>>>
>>>
>>> Just asking
>>> Tom Richardson
>>> Middlesbrough UK
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>>
>>> "How does newness come into the world?  How is it born?  Of what
>>> fusions, translations, conjoinings is it made?" Salman Rushdie
>>> ---------------------------------------------------
>>> For archival resources relevant to the research of lchc.ucsd.edu.
>>> For narrative history of LCHC:  lchcautobio.ucsd.edu.
>>> For new MCA-related website see: culturalpraxis.net
>>> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__http://culturalpraxis.net__;!!Mih3wA!V4rtgUKjjshdiOxbIML_kuerunhUbHYomcCKiRVA5FkPs1WJIJwbuavyFoG613bJeWFP-g$>
>>> .
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>
>
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