Week 16

Pankaj Mishra: "[Fareed] Zakaria is all smooth reassurance: the American economy remains dynamic, and the US is as competitive and technologically innovative as any European country. The politicians in Washington may be know-nothings, but the country’s major research universities are still the best, attracting talent from all over the world. Besides, ‘the rise of the rest is a consequence of American ideas and actions.’ [..]

Zakaria first came to prominence with a 7000-word article called ‘The Politics of Rage: Why Do They Hate Us?’, published in Newsweek a few weeks after 9/11. Something of the glamour of Kennan’s Long Telegram now attaches to this article: New York magazine described it as ‘a defining piece on the meaning of the terror attacks’ in a profile studded with praise from Henry Kissinger which also proposed Zakaria as America’s first Muslim secretary of state. Tina Brown called him ‘New York’s hot brainiac of choice’. Zakaria’s article appeared during the moment of primitive fury that overcame even ‘liberal’ commentators. Amid the clamour for retribution, Zakaria sounded calm and judicious. Read now, however, his article seems notable mostly for its evasions: he was careful not to say anything that might get him stigmatised as a radical. Blaming the Arabs for their failure to modernise, he didn’t mention the American obsession with energy security, which has shaped the politics of the Middle East for more than half a century. He found space in his paragraph on Iran to mock ‘fashionable’ supporters of the Islamist upsurge in London and Paris, but didn’t bring up the Anglo-American coup against Mossadegh in 1953 or the American mollycoddling of the shah. He wrote about the collaboration between the Pakistani dictator Zia-ul-Haq and the Saudi Islamists, but left out the middleman in the affair, the CIA."

"The thing I hate the most about advertising is that it attracts all the bright, creative and ambitious young people, leaving us mainly with the slow and self-obsessed to become our artists.. Modern art is a disaster area. Never in the field of human history has so much been used by so many to say so little"

Nature: "The system of PhD education in the United States and many other countries is broken and unsustainable, and needs to be reconceived.[..] The academic job market collapsed in the 1970s, yet universities have not adjusted their admissions policies, because they need graduate students to work in laboratories and as teaching assistants. But once those students finish their education, there are no academic jobs for them [..].

The necessary changes are both curricular and institutional. One reason that many doctoral programmes do not adequately serve students is that they are overly specialized, with curricula fragmented and increasingly irrelevant to the world beyond academia. Expertise, of course, is essential to the advancement of knowledge and to society. But in far too many cases, specialization has led to areas of research so narrow that they are of interest only to other people working in the same fields, subfields or sub-subfields. Many researchers struggle to talk to colleagues in the same department, and communication across departments and disciplines can be impossible [..].

If doctoral education is to remain viable in the twenty-first century, universities must tear down the walls that separate fields, and establish programmes that nourish cross-disciplinary investigation and communication. They must design curricula that focus on solving practical problems, such as providing clean water to a growing population [..].

Higher education in the United States has long been the envy of the world, but that is changing. The technologies that have transformed financial markets and the publishing, news and entertainment industries are now disrupting the education system. In the coming years, growing global competition for the multibillion-dollar education market will increase the pressure on US universities, just when public and private funding is decreasing. Although significant change is necessary at every level of higher education, it must start at the top, with total reform of PhD programmes in almost every field. The future of our children, our country and, indeed, the world depends on how well we meet this challenge"

"I described what happens to young scientists when they get their postdocs, which are usually limited to two years. In that two-year period, they are expected to start what is often a new line of research, and to have produced and got published a paper in a major journal, by say, at the latest, 18 months, so that they can apply for another grant. Who can do that? [..]

But the intellectual heart of research is sick because its main purpose is discovery. Illuminating our understanding of nature, that’s what it’s about. It’s not about producing a paper that nobody wants to read or understand. If we lose sight of that, then we won’t find out things so easily. We may stumble across things occasionally, as we’ve always done. But many young people just don’t see what science is for. Most of them are trying to get a paper. We have to be ambitious. We have to find something that is worth telling other people about"

It is interesting that research into personality resurfaced during 60s; we believe it did because the zeitgeist of the times required it. 1956 is the year when # of white collar workers exceeded blue collar workers for the first time (in US, later gradually in the world), and what followed is, as they say, history. Demands for more freedom, individuals asserting themselves in greater frequency, women, student, minority movements are only few examples, all starting with the new production method started to tilt the balance in favor of the individuals.

Clotaire Rapaille's culture code method is a Jungian approach. Rapaille does talk about "the reptilian", base desires similar to Freud, but he has levels where the base is distinctly seperate from codes of the culture, and the intellect. In a way, Rapaille talks about "personalities for big groups".

Due to the maddening speed of change of our times, we routinely forget good works of knowledge. Myers-Briggs psychology method which was later expanded by David Keirsey is one of those. This method has its roots in Jungian psychology; most people interested in this topic probably know about the rift between Freud and Jung, even if they might not remember the reason. Here it is: Freud thought individuality, personality did not matter, Jung thought that it did. Behavioral psychology has its roots in Freudian view, personality research has its roots in Jungian view [1]. Pay attention to how behavioral economists keep talking about "herd mentality" originating from their tendency is to see people only driven by their most basic desires, feelings.

Anyway, let us continue: After Jung died, his work remained almost forgetten until 50s. During 50s/60s Isabel Myers-Briggs dusted off the method, refined it, and made it applicable using clear-cut categories [2]. David Kearsey took where MB left off, and later published his book Please Understand Me II. We will talk about Kearsey simply because he is the last in line of these researchers.

Kearsey talks about 16 specific characters, and 4 broad categories these characters belong. Artisans, Guardians, Rationals, Idealists. If these broad types sound familiar, that's normal because they are. Such categorization of human character go all the way back to Aristotle and Plato. What MB method also did in addition was creating 16 subgroups, and most importantly, creating a personality test that worked. Here is one such test:

Take It

http://similarminds.com/jung_word.html

We probably will talk more about this method in the future, it integrates nicely in our current profiling approach. But for now know this: This is one more nail in the coffin for "massification" of society, one-size-fits-all approaches especially in the subject of education. Once you understand how for example SJs are different from NTs (this will make sense when you read Kearsey), then teaching everyone using the same method will look even more barbaric -- which is unfortunately an appropiate label for our education system.

Beyond policy issues, methods such as Kearsey's are / should be indispensible to provide help to people to cope with their day-to-day lives. New tech made the world more individualized, but at the same time faster, more turbulent and chaotic as well. This maddening world constantly highlights differences between all of us, just by the sheer amount of different circumstances it throws at us constantly.

There is no way of stopping technology and the changes it causes in the society, so we need to learn to cope with them.

"In his new book What Tehnology Wants Kelly argues technology is a near living, breathing organism and has a certain direction, and wants. I am a firm believer that techology is the main driver of societal change, and "we shape our tools and then be shaped by them", so forth. But Kelly's argument seems to be just somewhat more extreme than my position.

I do understand and emphatize fully with what he is saying, and in fact, have entertained such thoughts myself at certain periods. As someone who is involved in programming, mathematics, I do intuitively "feel" sometimes there is a way a piece of code "should be", would be "better" when it reaches that stage, and bothered when my small creation is not there yet.

But that uneasy feeling has nothing to do with technology itself, it has everything to do with me, and human pedagogy in general. It is hard to describe, but if I had to quantify it somehow, I would say good solutions have certain economy to them, they do as much as possible with as little as possible. In that sense, coding, modeling is no different from anything else in nature; and nature loves conserving energy (that's why we see lots of round shapes in the universe such as water drops, planets, etc). Since human beings are part of nature, and we have survived millions of years of evolution, we are aware of such "natural" optimizations ourselves, in fact they must be deeply ingrained in us.

Hence the "direction" of technology. The winners are determined not only by the creators themselves, but also by the consumers, maintainers, improvers of our creations. Everyone votes on a product's pedagogical excellence, if it's too hard to remember, too hard to maintain, too hard to understand, it is simply forgotten, so it "dies". If that creation was alive, near-living, I am sure it would not want to die. But it does"

I read somewhere new Superman movie will have General Zod as its villain. Good choice -- the movie will have better change to be on code. Western world cultural tug-of-war is between Rome and Jesus, militarism and piece; in this lens General Zod will represent the militarism side of the equation and that frees up Sman to be Jesus.

Also some suggestions.. In movies they always make S look like a damn brick flying around. Give the man little flexibility. Have him use some intellect, some ingenuity. In the comics I've read that big-ass cape can stretch, have him use it to cover something. An explosion? A planet? We (the people) also want a big action sequence where S is kicking ass, in multiple directions, with everything available. Have him build something on the fly, and again, bust a cap. Be creative. Let's not forget the character is (now) a metaphor for the postmodern human, hearing stuff at long distances (telephone), strength (mechanical tools), speed (trains), flight (planes). If we humans can combine these tools in creative ways, than the equivalent uber-person should be able to do the same.

Someone apparently profiled the character using MBTI, and S comes out to be an SJ, a Guardian. Protector, provider, etc. This type's primary focus is logistics, rather than strategy or tactics. A real-life persona, George Washingon was an SJ, during US war of independence, he tried to conserve his resources, not take many risks, naturally-- but he was also creative enough to turn the war to be in his own terms, and effectively fight a guerilla campaign against the British forces. So logistical mind doesn't automatically imply someone is a dumb-ass.

Good luck.

Dr. Who being a Time Lord is on code for British people -- the culture code Brits give themselves is CLASS. Therefore, the hero being "a Lord" which indicates "class" is suitable for them. I hear some British people saying "class does not matter anymore in our society" -- don't believe it. It is still a factor.

Einstein and Eddington: Nice movie. When I saw this movie on TV, I spotted David Tennant and my first reaction was "ah, another Dr. Who episode (one of my favorite scifi shows). It seemed in this episode Dr. Who is in 40s, it's normal, this sort of thing happens a lot in Dr. Who (he is a Time Lord after all [1]), then I notice "the Doctor" does not seem to remember who he is, but fine, 'he lost his memory (happens all the time in scifi shows, as much as doppelgangers, alternate universes, turning into aliens)". But after some time I realize the movie is neither Dr. Who, nor scifi, but a great movie nevertheless. E&E's two central characters were Einstein and Eddington, the former working on General Theory of Relativity, and the latter running the first experiment on its findings, proving them right.

It was a great science movie -- I hope to see more movies of this kind, displaying the joy of discovery, invention, mathematics, intervowen with social, cultural, historical issues in its backdrop.

[1] The irony of 24 actually was the superhumanness of Jack Bauer. He succeeded in his missions, but his almost superhuman abilities were signalled something else: It took that much more personal effort to cover the shortcomings of the system, and since that kind of ability being a near impossibility in the real world, we conclude that things are not fine. Examples of dysfunction is shown at all levels: in one scene, senator X tells Jack Bauer "son, let the system work / help you". The man is promptly killed in the next scene, by a terorist.

The message is clear. TARFU, and FUBAR.

Another show that chronicles the collapse of bureucracy, like 24: Chaos. The show takes place in the CIA: a new recruit joins a tightly-knit team, and we see bureucratic office politics, risk averseness of the old order. 24 showed the collapse of the system using serious acting, action and irony [1], Chaos does it with all of the above, plus comedy.

This exchange between new recruit and his office buddy displays the spirit of the show:

OB: Here is your PC. It comes with Windows 97 installed.

NR: You are kidding me right?

OB: You are familiar with the IRS, US Postal Service, FEMA. What do they all have in common?

NR: They're government-run agencies?

OB: As is the CIA. And when was the last time you walked in the Post Office and shouted "my God I stepped into the future!".