Re: [xmca] Re: Re[2]: Aufforderungscharakter/Valence/Affordance/Lewin/Gibson

Andy--
   
  I think Mike's note and the corresponding thread contains a better response to your response than I know how to write. All I'm trying to do is specify the level of analysis, tie constructs to data, and above all be relational rather than categorical about both the constructs and the data.
   
  Our level of analysis is quite different. You are a philosopher; you are interested in historical-cultural phylogenesis and socio-cultural ontogenesis. So you see the schoolchild in relation to social change rather than in relation to learning and growth.
   
  It is right, given this interest,that you should think that economic relations are the "real" material basis of historical cultural phylogenesis, guns are the real material basis of political institutions, and a preoccupation with language represents an idealist trap.It is even correct, given this interest, that you should think that the child in the schoolroom has a greater radius of subjectivity, because you extend that radius so very far into the child's future.
   
  But I'm a teacher of elementary school teachers. I am interested in microgenetic changes (what Halliday calls "logogenesis", or the creation of new word meanings), and individual ontogenetic development. I see the schoolchild in relation to learning in the here and now rather than in relation to social change, which for me is an interesting but for the moment subordinated issue.
   
  So for me economic relations represent only the cultural-historical endowment, and guns are a socio-cultural patrimony of very dubious immediate value in my work. A preoccupation with language, very far from representing an idealist trap, is a way of making the true object of investigation, thought processes, as material as possible. The child in the schoolroom has a radius of subjectivity that does not extend far into the future, a state of which he has no experience and in which s/he has little faith. The child's radius of subjectivity, in the here and now, is quantifiable and tied to empirical data; it consists of how many people will listen to what he/she says and do what he/she wants.

  I think you are interested in climate change, and I am just talking about the weather. As you know, the data on climate change can be VERY hard to interpret, particularly when you try to extend it into the future. My job's a little easier.
   
  David Kellogg
  Seoul National University of Education
  
Mike Cole <lchcmike@gmail.com> wrote:
  Specifying the level of analysis (and its empirical manifestations) is never
a bad idea, Paolo.
I share your interest in the science/geisteswissenshaften divide and in
fact, LSV argued he was
doing natural science even as he included history.... seems important to the
idea of resolving the
crisis, etc.

and lets by all means keep it relational!!
mike

On Sun, May 25, 2008 at 3:55 PM, Paolo Petta
wrote:

> Hello again! :)
>
> I fully agree to the different levels (I think I mentioned something along
> these lines myself --> this is mentioned not to "insist" on my point, but
> rather to explain how I really think it is the case! :-).
>
> I think the key point is exactly to make sure we all understand and share
> which level it is we are discussing (and I do hope I did not sound to
> nitty-gritty, if anything it is an indication of how much I have to learn!),
> and I am most grateful (again!) for the clarification of a possible source
> of misunderstanding (overloaded/reused terminology that could lead to long
> disputes/distract from addressing the actual phenomena of interest.)
>
> A particular interest of mine in fact lies in understanding better the
> nature of the "natural-scientific" divide, what the "natural-scientific"
> contribution can and cannot identify (not sure it serves the cause if I
> point at Dilthey, Dewey, Husserl...Blumenberg, Clancey, Feltovich, etc.:
> this is just meant to help "place" me.)
>
> Apologies for the too many words, too --
> and a very good start into the working week!
>
> Paolo
>
> On Sun, 25 May 2008, Michalis Kontopodis wrote:
>
>> Subject: Re: [xmca] Re: Re[2]:
>> Aufforderungscharakter/Valence/Affordance/Lewin/Gibson
>>
>> That is very interesting, Mike and Paolo et al
>>
>> However I would hesitate to bring the natural-scientific approach of
>> Gibson so close to that of Vygotsky.
>>
>> Let's think of an example:
>>
>> A carpet is soft. It has the affordance to step on it without producing
>> any noise.
>>
>> Because of this affordance it INVITES libraries to use it
>> (Aufforderungscharakter), so that students can work with concentration even
>> if other students are walking here and there.
>>
>> I see here two different levels of analysis.
>>
>> ?
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> Michalis Kontopodis
>>
>> research associate
>> humboldt university berlin
>> tel.: +49 (0) 30 2093 3716
>> fax.: +49 (0) 30 2093 3739
>> http://www.csal.de
>> http://www.iscar.org/de/culthistanthpsy/
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> On May 25, 2008, at 10:36 PM, Mike Cole wrote:
>>
>> 2008/5/25 Boris Meshcheryakov :
>>>
>>> Another note from Boris. In a small introduction to D.B. Elkonin's book
>>>> on the *Psychology of Play (1978)* Vygotsky some notes on preschool play
>>>> in which is contained the following fragment:
>>>>
>>>> "Here the action arises from the meaning of things, and not the things
>>> (in
>>> themselves) -- Aufforderungscharacter.
>>>
>>> This is all REALLY interesting. I knew of no prior connection of the idea
>>> of
>>> affordance to Gibson's work, I knew that Gibson and Zaporozhets were
>>> close
>>> colleagues, and I think the emphasis on
>>> the relational nature of affordances ("the meaning of objects, not the
>>> objects") is important..... although Boris' examples, and Neisser's, may
>>> make affordances closer to the SENSE of objects
>>> than their meanings. not sure, perhaps both/and.
>>> mike
>>>
>>>
>>>> .. " " (1978) : .. - ..
>>>> (. 289-294).
>>>>
>>>> , : ?, Aufforderungscharacter?(. 292).
>>>>
>>>> : ?
>>>> ?(.).
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> --
>>>>
>>>> ,
>>>>
>>>> .. mailto:borlogic@orexovo.net
>>>>
>>>> _______________________________________________
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>>
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>
> --
> Paolo Petta +43-1-5336112-12(Tel)
> Austrian Research Inst. for Artificial Intelligence +43-1-5336112-77(Fax)
> Freyung 6/6, A 1010 Vienna, Austria, Europe Paolo.Petta <@> ofai.at
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>
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Received on Sun May 25 18:01 PDT 2008