Sunday, April 08, 2007
RECOMMENDED READING
A variety of subjects on this holiday weekend.
Top Billing!: Marc Schulman - "Orwell, the Left, and 9/11"
A substantial and well researched essay by Marc and, for me, a timely one as I had my students begin reading Orwell late last week. Marc has also, incidently, given American Future a facelift. Looks sharp !
Dr. Thomas P. M. Barnett - "Q&A"
Tom gives a reader insight into his strategic thinking process; and in another post, gives further indication of the direction of Book III.
Dr. Thomas C. Reeves - "Teaching the Many Instead of the Few" and PHK - "Missing in Action: Geography, World History and Foreign Languages"
The state of American education is fodder for no shortage of good posts.
Newshog - "Analytical Assumptions for Iraq Part I., Part II. and Part III."
While I would quibble with the Newshogs at many points, overall a thought-provoking foreign policy series. Hat tip to Dave at The Glittering Eye.
SEED - " The Trans-Science Railway"
"A Chinese initiative sets out to train 1.3 billion scientists--one farmer at a time". China is junking hoary Communist ideology in public education in favor of science. The Chinese only really need to succeed in inculcating scientific literacy with a tiny fraction of their rural population to ultimately increase the number of scientists on a global scale by several orders of magnitude. In 2030 there will be PhD's running around born in the hinterland villages of Shaanxi.
A variety of subjects on this holiday weekend.
Top Billing!: Marc Schulman - "Orwell, the Left, and 9/11"
A substantial and well researched essay by Marc and, for me, a timely one as I had my students begin reading Orwell late last week. Marc has also, incidently, given American Future a facelift. Looks sharp !
Dr. Thomas P. M. Barnett - "Q&A"
Tom gives a reader insight into his strategic thinking process; and in another post, gives further indication of the direction of Book III.
Dr. Thomas C. Reeves - "Teaching the Many Instead of the Few" and PHK - "Missing in Action: Geography, World History and Foreign Languages"
The state of American education is fodder for no shortage of good posts.
Newshog - "Analytical Assumptions for Iraq Part I., Part II. and Part III."
While I would quibble with the Newshogs at many points, overall a thought-provoking foreign policy series. Hat tip to Dave at The Glittering Eye.
SEED - " The Trans-Science Railway"
"A Chinese initiative sets out to train 1.3 billion scientists--one farmer at a time". China is junking hoary Communist ideology in public education in favor of science. The Chinese only really need to succeed in inculcating scientific literacy with a tiny fraction of their rural population to ultimately increase the number of scientists on a global scale by several orders of magnitude. In 2030 there will be PhD's running around born in the hinterland villages of Shaanxi.
Labels: recommended reading
¶ 7:54 AM
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Mark, there's an interesting connection between China's science literacy project and Dr. Barnett's and PHK'a posts: an important part of China's science literacy project is the teaching of English. Mark my words: this will have unexpected secondary effects.
Mark --- Thanks for the link as I am the author of that NewsHog series... I am curious as to what your quibbles are as I want to strengthen my appreciation of reality and analytical framework, and I greatly respect your work and through process
Hi Dave,
You are right. English is a gateway language and not merely for science.
Hi Fester,
I enjoyed the series - quibbles are not a serious dispute but as you asked, here is an example or two:
In general I think the respective " teams" are undergoing a high degree of granularity right now. Case in point the Sunni Tribals and the nationalists/lite Islamists (Revolution of 1920/HAMAS) are swinging harder against al Qaida than you indicate.
OTOH, while I'm very supportive of the Kurds aspirations, I think we should be cautious about overestimating their enthusiasm for us.
The common ppl may be, Barzani and Talabani have longer memories, particularly Barzani who recalls the royal screwing his father received at the hands of the Nixon administration and the Shah. These men are less representative leaders than tribal Lords and if need be they can make their followers turn on a dime.
As I said, quibbling about details and degrees, not differences of kind.
You are right. English is a gateway language and not merely for science.
Hi Fester,
I enjoyed the series - quibbles are not a serious dispute but as you asked, here is an example or two:
In general I think the respective " teams" are undergoing a high degree of granularity right now. Case in point the Sunni Tribals and the nationalists/lite Islamists (Revolution of 1920/HAMAS) are swinging harder against al Qaida than you indicate.
OTOH, while I'm very supportive of the Kurds aspirations, I think we should be cautious about overestimating their enthusiasm for us.
The common ppl may be, Barzani and Talabani have longer memories, particularly Barzani who recalls the royal screwing his father received at the hands of the Nixon administration and the Shah. These men are less representative leaders than tribal Lords and if need be they can make their followers turn on a dime.
As I said, quibbling about details and degrees, not differences of kind.
Mark --- thanks for the feedback, and I agree, I did gloss over differences at too high of a level. That was an editorial decision on my part as I figure that most of my audience is paying a reasonable but not intense level of attention, and I was trying to overview.
On a second note, Dave Schuler brought up an interesting point of the possiblity of an urban-rural divide as having as much if not more explanatory power than the more common sectarian split... what are your thoughts on that?
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On a second note, Dave Schuler brought up an interesting point of the possiblity of an urban-rural divide as having as much if not more explanatory power than the more common sectarian split... what are your thoughts on that?
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