>Peace, Love, and Friendship,
>
>Edouard
Edouard and all:
Near as I can tell, in a sense Piaget and Vygotsky did "straighten out
their differences." The point is that they "straightened out" that they
differed fundamentally.
We must ask ourselves, is there, can there be, and should there be only one
theory to describe the aspects of human behavior that interest us?
If we are modern then one might imagine that we would answer essentially,
"yes," to all three parts of this question. If we are not modern, then ...
I'm not advocating that we quit discussing the issue because we can never
get to "the theory." If I were I'd still be modern. On the other hand,
the purpose or goal and how we conduct the process of the discussion of
these theories can be quite different if we do not start from the premise
that there is "one theory" if we can only get to it.
I'm not arguing that we stick only to the theories as they "exist in the
literature" (do they "really exist" in the literature or do they exist in
our minds?), but it is the case I believe (as Mike seems to be urging) that
there is a value in trying to become as clear as possible about the
theories of others we are talking about (activity theory, social practice
theory, etc.). Otherwise we can end up spending a lot of time arguing
when we don't even have the same meaning for the terms we are using. So, I
am arguing over trying to be as "faithful" to whatever might be the core
meaning of a theory such as we can get it from the literature whenever we
use the name of that theory. This does not preclude us from making
syntheses and new inventions, but it behoves us to be as clear about these
new theories, too.
Dewey
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Dewey I. Dykstra, Jr. Phone: (208)385-3105
Professor of Physics Dept: (208)385-3775
Department of Physics/SN318 Fax: (208)385-4330
Boise State University dykstrad who-is-at varney.idbsu.edu
1910 University Drive Boise Highlanders
Boise, ID 83725-1570 novice piper
"Physical concepts are the free creations of the human mind and
are not, however it may seem, uniquely determined by the external
world."--A. Einstein in The Evolution of Physics with L. Infeld,
1938
"Don't mistake your watermelon for the universe." --K. Amdahl in
There Are No Electrons, 1991.
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