X-Message-Number: 30572
References: <>
From: Kennita Watson <>
Subject: Fwd: Voluntary learning
Date: Tue, 4 Mar 2008 03:05:07 -0800

This was on Slashdot recently (2/28):

> Correcting Misperceptions About Evolution
>     from the lost-cause dept.
>     posted by samzenpus on Thursday February 28, @01:13 (Education)
>     http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/02/28/0424240

It was all interesting, but became germane to
cryonics at the end of page 3 (excerpted here).
Interesting that the evolutionists have some of
the same sorts of trouble as the cryonicists
vis a vis educating the public (though not to
the same degree).

<excerpt>
The state of the art meets the public

With the state of the art established, the final speaker, Martin  
Storksdieck of the Institute for Learning Innovation looked at how to  
get that information to a public has such a hard time accepting what  
science is discovering. He argued that, while most of the attention  
has focused on childhood education, we really should be going after  
the parents. Everyone is a lifelong learner, Storksdieck said, but  
once people leave school, that learning becomes a voluntary matter  
that's largely driven by individual taste.

Storksdieck discussed a number of key aspects of this voluntary  
learning. He argued that a surprising amount of it is faith-based;  
adults don't have the time or need to learn large frameworks like  
evolution, so they're often willing to accept or reject information  
based [on] reasons beyond its consistency with scientific  
understanding. As an example, he noted his own understanding of  
chemistry was weak, so he'd simply have to accept what Andy Ellington  
told him about the RNA world. The result is that what's accepted or  
not becomes largely a matter of social influences.

Here, Storksdieck offered two specific suggestions. The first is to  
get people in positions of leadership involved, as people pay  
attention to them, regardless of their grip on the facts. His example  
was Thabo Mbeki of South Africa, who set the country's battle against  
AIDS back significantly simply by expressing doubt in our scientific  
and medical understanding of the conditions. His other suggestion was  
that we should, as he put it, keep preaching to the choir. Enthused  
learners are the best communicators of information, and arming them  
with more of what we know is the best way to get that information  
before the public.

The series of talks was possibly the best overview of the state of  
knowledge in any field that I have ever seen, and the enthusiasm of  
the researchers and their excitement about the topics was palpable. I  
expect that, if the public saw more presentations like this, which  
revealed not only the full depth of our understanding, but also the  
enthusiasm, humor, and humanity of the people that have generated  
that understanding, then the teaching of evolution would generate  
only a small fraction of the resistance that it currently does.
</excerpt>

Hm.  Maybe Alcor/CI should present to
some councils of priests (there's probably
a word for those).  Ease into it; start
with Unitarians :-) .

Cheers,
Kennita
--
Relativity:  A grook with no reference whatever to the two-party system

To wear a shirt that's relatively clean,
   You needn't ever launder off the dirt
If you possess two shirts to choose between
   and always change into the cleaner shirt.
         -- Piet Hein

Live long and prosper,
Kennita

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