Maggie's Farm

I think formal education ought to proceed at the individual student's pace, not lockstep by age and class grade as in the German model.

Achieve proficiency with something, then move onward like merit badges.  That would certainly appeal to most kids, I think.

At Mead, Stuff Learned Trumps Time Served

Why Do Most College Students Think the Same Thoughts?

Youth, naivete, timidity, and inexperience.

From the article:

Bloom’s work is no mere exercise in horripilation. He provides a wonderful and hopeful corrective to the bottomless mendacity of the Left. Bloom explained that Marcuse was mistaken, dreadfully mistaken, because he had not understood another important German thinker, Max Weber. For Weber, like Nietzsche, had identified values to be key to any society. There must be a notion of right and wrong. Weber saw the rise of Capitalism, which filled Marx with such loathing, as the triumph of what he called the ‘protestant ethic.’ A particular group of Christians applying the four cardinal virtues of prudence, justice, temperance, and fortitude (each of which has a significant emotional component) had changed the face of the earth. Marcuse simply thought Weber was condemning religion, in the same (wrong) way Marxists thought Nietzsche had. But Weber was making a very profound point. Weber was referring to the ascendancy of spirit over matter. Man creates his culture. In every important respect, men and women are free. This is nothing less than a huge, devastating rebuttal of Marxism. More complete than the collapse of the Berlin Wall, which we now see had been merely the fall of bricks and mortar.

Ethics are the key to the de-marxification and de-toxification of our society.

When an anthropologist makes politically-incorrect discoveries, he gets into trouble but learns a lot about the anthropology of modern academia.

Napoleon Chagnon’s study of human nature in the Amazon—and the academy

"Conrad Martens, an official artist on the second voyage, did this drawing of the Beagle laid ashore at the mouth of the river Santa Cruz in Southern Argentina. When repairs to the hull were necessary after the ship had struck a rock, the ship was beached and the work was performed between high tides."  Image courtesy of the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University

The story of HMS Beagle (1820-1870) - an ordinary ship. Not about Darwin, about the life of a 19th C. ship.

“She belongs to that much-abused class, the ‘10-gun brigs’ ...
notwithstanding which; she has proved herself, ... in all kinds of
weather, an excellent sea boat.” —John Lort Stokes

The EPA Is Going to Regulate Wood-Burning Fireplaces Out of Existence

That is not from The Onion. Wood stoves and furnaces, and charcoal grills too. These bureaucrats are crazy and drunk with power.

"Everything that is not banned should be mandatory."  Your moral and intellectual superiors say so. It's all for the best, for the greater good. Trust them.

Dr. Bliss queried about challenging and difficult things which can be intrinsically rewarding despite their effort, complexity, difficulty.

Making music has to be the highest of all hobbies, and understanding music perhaps comes second, but fly-fishing is one of the more humble but still somewhat complex things as are most absorbing hobbies, like woodworking to photography to baseball. Anybody is blessed to have one or two hobbies.

For those to whom fly-fishing is a mystery, here's one example of complexity: Fly Fishing Knot Tying Basics.

B.S., Mechanical Engineering, Georgia Tech
M.A., Literature, Harvard
Law degree, Emory University

Who?

More Decline in the U. of Chicago Core.

I have come to think that it's not so much about ideology and abandoning the canon of mankind's works over the past 10,000 years, but it's more about marketing to the kids. It's disgusting, and it saddens me.

If the U of C were in Big Ten football, they could and probably would keep their core and their soul. They are selling their soul for a bowl of lentils. It's greed.

Today is Holy Saturday for the Catholics, but we Protestant Yankee New Englanders just call it "yard chore Saturday" or Trout Fishing Saturday.

I was thinking about how the term "pious" has become an almost derogatory, if not derogatory, term, which took me to Euthyphro.  Never get in a debate with Socrates expecting to win, but always get in one if you want to be forced to re-think what you think.

From Justification, Sanctification, and Grace, from Dr. Bob:

I recall a conversation I had some years ago with a young man in Britain, in the old Compuserve forum days. He, an atheist/agnostic, said something to the effect of, "All religions are the same, there's basically a set of rules to follow, and if you obey them, you get rewarded by going to heaven."

And I agreed with him (to his surprise) with one caveat: that Christianity is the one exception to his otherwise astute observation. In Christianity, it's not about doing something different, it's about being something different.

So how does that work? And aren't Christians all about being good, following the Bible, going to church, and condemning and judging those who don't?

Yeah, all too often we are. Sad but true. But that's not really how it's supposed to work, you know.

Read the whole thing. Then, if you want to, read his follow-up post, The Sword of Grace. One quote:

Christianity is not merely another framework of moral codes by which to live. It is not comprised solely of the teachings of a charismatic leader, urging compliance to please or placate God or promulgating some hidden wisdom. It asserts at its very heart an outrageous claim: that those who relinquish their right to self-centered autonomy by submitting to God through the specific and exclusive portal of Christ will become judicially guiltless before their Creator. It further claims, perhaps even more outrageously, by this act to re-create the person so submitting, in a manner so thorough and profound that the individual can no longer be thought of as the same person who existed prior to that moment of choice and submission.

An interesting economic website.

Like Kudlow, he and his contributors understand the interactions between government, central banks, crony capitalists, hedge funds, and private enterprise. One sample link: When The Top Goes Over-The-Top: What The Soaring Price Of Ferraris, Wine And Art Tell Us

The competition for full-tuition foreign students.

Higher Ed follows the money. Greedy non-profits, are they not?

We recently linked this: Should the U.S. Adopt the German Model of Apprenticeships?

The otherwise-useful article concludes with the notion that "government could do more." 

I have no idea what government has to do with it. After the basics, most lines of work are learned by apprenticeships and "practice" of various sorts. Just consider auto mechanics, cooking, gunsmithing, machine-tooling, law, medicine, bond sales, garden design, preaching, playing music, carpentry,  jewelry design, flower arranging, cattle-raising, horse-grooming, dog training, leather-working, road-paving, politics and sales in general, fashion, etc., etc., etc. The list is endless.

I am very much in favor of the term and concept "apprentice," but I don't know what the heck government has to do with it. Why do so many people have this reflex that "government ought to do something"? As if it could.

People can figure these things out on their own.

Why don't they simply raise lamb in fields of mint, saving us the trouble?

Well, the answer is probably because making your own mint sauce is fun, easy, and quick. That artificially-colored sweet mint jelly from the supermarket is to real mint sauce as canned cranberry jelly from the supermarket is to fresh homemade cranberry sauce.

Since everyone's garden mint is probably growing like crazy right now (but not up here, yet - is mint an herb or a weed?), here's the right way to make mint sauce for lamb. Make it when the mint is new, and it will last at least all summer.

Then you pick up that excellent butterflied lamb at Costco, marinate it overnight in a garbage bag (the best marination tool ever made) with olive oil, crushed garlic cloves, white wine, lemon juice, pepper, thyme and rosemary - then throw it on the charcoal, cook it on hot coals - blood-rare in  the middle but almost burned on the surface, sliced thin, and have a feast fit for kings.

Got any leftovers? Not likely, but good for the best sandwiches in the world. White bread, salt, pepper, and mayo.

I like grilled lamb best with oven-roasted potatoes, and I will eat regular mashed potatoes or garlic mashed potatoes with anything. Salad first maybe, but no nasty vegetables to detract from the lamb. Perhaps olive-oil-and-garlic marinated grilled vegetables with the lamb if you are one of those people who think eating vegetables enhances life.

By the way, serving white wine with lamb is a crime. Why do people in America ever do it? Lamb is neither an oyster nor a lobster, and it demands a high-octane, heavy bodied beverage.

Photo: Sheep grazing on summer mountain pastures in 1912 near Casper, Wyoming.

Four families of equations expose the hidden aesthetic of bicycle wheels, falling bodies, rhythmic planets, and mathematics itself.

The spira mirabilis is a lovely thing, and the equation describing it is simple. He discusses the geometry of four interesting shapes.

I would never claim, however, that math can "expose" an aesthetic. "Expose" is the wrong word, because the aesthetic is immediately apparent, but it's the math that is not.

Coase’s Tortoise - Federal bureaucracy gets in the way of complex ongoing relationships that serve civil society. Most people have heard of Coase's famous theorem, but don't really know it. A quote:

Normal human beings with adult temperaments understand that life is a complex, messy, imperfect business, and that sometimes we have to make accommodation for one another. It is for this reason that modern American English contains the phrase “Don’t make a federal case out of it.” I do not know Mr. Bundy, but, assuming that he is a decent sort, I think it is very likely the case that this story would have gone very differently if one of his neighbors had approached him one afternoon and said, “Say, Cliven, I’m worried that your cattle might step on my tortoises, which are very dear to me. What could we do about that?” Practically every suburbanite with a yard and neighbors with dogs has experienced a comparable situation, as has every urbanite with boisterous neighbors or neighbors who seem to become hard of hearing when their favorite television shows are on. (Ahem.) Our first instinct is not, as a rule, to make a federal case out of it.

If the Desert Tortoise (a fine critter, for sure, and one the Indians liked to cook for supper) survived the buffalo, why not the cattle?

Just one quote from an excellent piece from Walter Russell Mead: The Coming Reformation of Higher Ed:

One important shift we need to make, in K12 as well as in higher ed, is from the time-served model of education to a stuff-learned model. The time-served model asks how many credits, how many years? As a method of qualification it is characteristic of guilds where you have to serve so many years as an apprentice, so many years as a journeyman--you have to walk through all the steps.  And it also is a revenue enhancer for colleges because the bright kid is going to have to take just as many courses as the dumb kid. Here's another aspect of the stuff-learned model.

Suppose we actually had an exam, a national baccalaureate exam of some kind, and if you passed that exam then you would be deemed to have graduated from college with an equivalent of a BA. Not only would this make it possible for a lot of people to get that degree with less time in class and less money spent, it would also allow the kid that went to the University of Illinois and learned a lot to be able to compete with the kid who went to Harvard and stayed drunk. It gives the kid from the no-name or lesser-name school an honest-to-God credential. To me, this is a matter of elementary social justice. It would help to reduce the immense prestige premium that a handful of schools have--a form of privilege that those of us who care about a more open and democratic society should oppose.  And I think it would be healthy to put less pressure on middle-class kids to get into name schools and put more pressure on them to learn stuff that would be interesting and useful. And offering certificates equivalent to a BA to students passing an exam would address a lot of the needs that are now fulfilled through very cumbersome and expensive programs often leading to a lot of student debt.

And if a family's kids are able to graduate from high school two or three years early, the taxpayers save money.  Why shouldn't some of those savings go to the family that managed the savings, so they could use the money for the next stage in their childrens' education?   

But who would design that exam, Prof. Mead? I'd be willing to do it, but then higher ed would "teach to the test."

My BA test would include things like (for examples) Calculus, Physics and Physical Chemistry, Plato, Econ, the Ming Dynasty, John Locke, molecular Bio, Michelangelo, one or two languages, basic Law and Civics, basics of Engineering, Geography and Geology, Roman history, Sophocles, Bach's music, the Bible, and Augustine. Plus an essay on a random topic during the exam.

The degree would mean something, if done my way, and separate the slackers from the scholars. Could kids pass it? Well, how about just a score on it, then? But who would care? It doesn't take a fancy degree to sell software or bonds, to write code, or to make Chai Latte.

From Eye candy - The pleasure we take in beauty must have been shaped by evolution  - but what adaptive advantage did it give us?

It is not yet clear why adults should find perceptual play fun. Aren’t we done learning how to perceive? Everyone achieves a certain basic level of skill in characteristically human activities: walking, talking, looking, listening, and singing. We do this by pleasurable play when young, and we maintain these skills with practice well into adulthood. But with each of these activities, the human body affords us the capacity to improve – to become extraordinarily skilled. Spontaneously developed language and motor skills are adequate for most purposes, but they are far below those of the most accomplished performers. An accomplished poet or playwright has a command of language that comes from repetition, practice, and instruction. She comes to this level of expertise with great difficulty. The same goes for somebody who appreciates poetry with hard-won knowledge of context and allusion.

I'll give the essay an A- for Effort, but trying to discuss such topics as Truth and Beauty in reductionistic terms is certain to be disappointing in the end. I would argue that the human soul has no adaptive value at all. It's a gift and a curse.

What is the best-adapted and largest class of animals on earth in terms of population, biomass, range, and overall success? Class Insecta. Bugs. Or maybe it's bacteria, but I think I recall that it's bugs. Might have that wrong. It's definitely not the higher apes despite our love of music and our pleasant clothing.

Many bugs make music too.

It will come as no surprise to observers of graduate education that the
report documents the fact that foreign students make up the majority of
enrollments in U.S. graduate programs in many STEM fields...:

 At the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the proportion of international students in graduate electrical engineering programs is 52.5 percent and, in computer science, 35.3 percent. At Stanford, 56 percent of graduate electrical engineering students and 43.7 percent of graduate computer science students are international.

Dartblog: Members of the faculty are wondering if (Pres.) Phil Hanlon has a spine.

Slide show here.

Non-stop rain in New England for a few days, converting the entire countryside to a wetland swamp. It brings drains to mind. French Drains aren't French. They are named after Mr. Henry Flagg French of Massachusetts, a judge and a drainage expert. Good concept.

This fellow build a good one. I like the fact that the word "tile" is still used for PVC pipe.

Glad I do not need any of them, though. In 1824, farmers did not build their houses where they would get flooded, where there was an underground spring, where there was poor drainage, or where they would have wet cellars. They checked first.

They did not consider every piece of land to be a building site. Nobody builds on a flood plain, a beach, or on a hilltop. It's just stupid.

Photo on right is a shallow French drain. Holes down, of course. (Dummies are known to install them with the perforations facing up.) You can rent one of those mini-backhoes, have a load of gravel delivered, and make one yourself. A plain old-fashioned ditch or swale works too.

Photo below is a constructed swale. Man-made or natural, a swale is just a pleasant drainage ditch or depression. A small vale, you might say.

In all likelihood, making these today probably violates some federal laws. After all, the EPA now claims to regulate ditches. At the farm, we have plenty of man-made ditches and swales, but none made recently.

A conversation with Charles Murray

Why should they be treated any differently? It boggles the mind. As Taranto notes:

That resolves the conundrum we noted atop this column. Fringe political speech like flag burning, funeral protests and Nazi parades is so broadly unappealing as to have no effect on "the will of the people." The same is true of nonpolitical forms of expression such as pornography, violent video games and depictions of animal cruelty. (Breyer's willingness to countenance restrictions of the first two has to do with the protection of children, not of the body politic.)

Only mainstream political expression has the potential to thwart the "collective" will, and thus, in the view of Breyer and his fellow dissenters, it alone is deserving of restriction on such a rationale. That stands the First Amendment on its head. Its purpose may be to "make government responsive," as Wilson argued, but the means by which it does so is the limitation of government power and protection of individual freedom.

So only political speech requires adult restrictions? Not commercial speech, not speech of the press and the MSM, not porn, not commercial advertising, just political speech of individuals?

Why not limit those Viagra ad budgets, for the children of course.

Even if this is all un-American and strange, it seems hardly partisan since the very wealthy tend to support the Leftist control freaks. What's up with all of this? And what the heck is "the collective will"? There is no collective will except nominally and only in totalitarian states.

Let's face it: When politics and government are too important, freedom is in trouble.

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