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Posted at 11:25AM on 23 Oct 09. Permalink.

It's Friday - my contribution: XKCD animated

Posted at 11:26AM on 23 Oct 09. Permalink.

An incredible film, for everyone to enjoy on their Friday:

I promise you won't regret it, unless you suck :-P

Posted at 11:33AM on 23 Oct 09. Permalink.

Ah. Friday, time for some fun.
Hopefully no persons of interest were harmed in the making of this movie. ;-)

Posted at 11:34AM on 23 Oct 09. Permalink.

It's Friday - my contribution: XKCD animated

Lovely!

Posted at 11:36AM on 23 Oct 09. Permalink.

And given the title we just need a link to Dance Dance Immolation - two members of the audience in nomex suits and flame throwers for when you screw up ....

Posted at 11:43AM on 23 Oct 09. Permalink.

What I want to know is if Tolley thinks that there's a way to teach science and science concepts *without* addressing literacy and numeracy. If nothing else, if you're not introducing a whole lot of new words and logical ways of thinking, you're not teaching it right.

(This has weighed on my mind somewhat because on Saturday I have to sit the general GRE, an US requirement for graduate school entrance that tests literacy and numeracy. If your university system is organised in such a way that someone having an undergraduate degree is not enough evidence that they are, in fact, literate and numerate, *you're doing it wrong*.)

Posted at 11:47AM on 23 Oct 09. Permalink.

In the US entering University for an undergraduate course you're expected to pass a General Ed requirement - largely this is NZ 7th form math/english/science - so by the time you hit a post grad environment yes you should have passed this stuff - but really the GREs are intended to allow the best schools a way to pick the best students - so anything simple that weeds people out probably is to be expected

Posted at 11:54AM on 23 Oct 09. Permalink.

Thank you very much Graeme, delightful.

In a rather different vein, this little Russian jewel from the dying years of the cold war has surfaced on Youtube:

Posted at 11:56AM on 23 Oct 09. Permalink.

We are delivering three 16 year old girls, for cos-play, to Armageddon on Saturday morning. I hope there are not high winds as my daughter may well be whisked away, in her great pink outfit.

Another great Media 7 last night. Bryce is a smart guy, and probably one of the best newspaper editors in NZ. I agree with your comments re Dennis Dutton. I have clashed with him in the past and he turns everything into a personal attack. He is probably the reason why I have never joined the Skeptics.

Posted at 11:58AM on 23 Oct 09. Permalink.

Having worked for a few years in both the UK and NZ teaching systems I think heading down the UK route re literacy and numeracy hours is horrifying. Most teachers i the UK dream of our (NZ) integrated approach...whether it is the embedded literacy in an art class or what ever the subject.

Gawd, I'm already bemoaning the tiny amount of art/music/creativity happening in our local school and now I sense it only is going to decrease. Sure the pedagogy in the 70s/80s got some things 'slightly' wrong with the lack of teaching basic math/english rules like multiplication tables but ... really!

Posted at 12:01PM on 23 Oct 09. Permalink.

but really the GREs are intended to allow the best schools a way to pick the best students - so anything simple that weeds people out probably is to be expected

I feel somewhat skeptical that a multi-choice test of your arcane vocabulary knowledge and fifth-form maths is actually going to separate people in a meaningful way, especially when the difference between a high and a mediocre grade can be as little as five questions.

I agree with your comments re Dennis Dutton. I have clashed with him in the past and he turns everything into a personal attack. He is probably the reason why I have never joined the Skeptics.

I have heard he's also the kind of person who assigns his own books and essays as a very significant portion of the reading for courses he teaches, which is...somewhat telling.

Posted at 12:03PM on 23 Oct 09. Permalink.

This has weighed on my mind somewhat because on Saturday I have to sit the general GRE

My sympathies! As I recall the GRE, it was an absolute cow of an exam. I sat it in advance of my post-grad studies in the USA and as I recall, ended up in the top 5% percentile for comprehension and bottom 5% for logic/analysis! It was full of those sort of questions like.."If a train is travelling at .. and another train is travelling at..."; the kind of questions which turn my brain to mud.

Great about Southland winning last night, eh!

Posted at 12:03PM on 23 Oct 09. Permalink.

cos-play

I admit I still think first of a food fight rather than geeky dress-ups when I see this term.

Posted at 12:08PM on 23 Oct 09. Permalink.

That was the interview that Henry was born to do!

Posted at 12:15PM on 23 Oct 09. Permalink.

I feel somewhat skeptical that a multi-choice test of your arcane vocabulary knowledge and fifth-form maths is actually going to separate people in a meaningful way, especially when the difference between a high and a mediocre grade can be as little as five questions.

Bahaha. Unfortunately NZ's relative disdain for intelligence testing is not overly useful, although perhaps that should be the real criteria for logical thinking. Despite the ideal that it studying should not convey an advantage for such tests, it's not the case, which puts us at a disadvantage.

Posted at 12:17PM on 23 Oct 09. Permalink.

I have heard he's also the kind of person who assigns his own books and essays as a very significant portion of the reading for courses he teaches, which is...somewhat telling.

Denis Dutton's views on Aesthetics are somewhat quaint (with all the menace that word implies). At present, he is trying to kill off the subject by claiming that Art can be explained by Evolutionary Psychology, a discipline which has become the last refuge of a scoundrel.

Posted at 12:24PM on 23 Oct 09. Permalink.

In a week when significant changes to the ACC scheme have also been set in motion more on the basis of ideology than evidence

Actually, in the absence of evidence, as I/S discovered yesterday.

Posted at 12:38PM on 23 Oct 09. Permalink.

Dutton is essentially a conspiracy theorist on climate change.

And Jonathan Eisen is essentially... Aw, you know something Russell, you had him nailed a decade back. Dutton may give me a headache on occasion, but at least he's not running around saying that treating children with cancer is all about self-interested corporate whores lining their own pockets.

Posted at 12:40PM on 23 Oct 09. Permalink.

The ACC thing just gets scarier. Not only do we face every likelihood that the workers' account will be opened to competition, we now have this wonderful idea, attributed to John Key: He refused to rule out possible similar treatment of other ACC accounts, such as the motor vehicles one, into which car drivers pay levies when renewing their vehicle registration.

There are only two ways that unprofitable accounts (ie: everything except the workers' account) could possibly work in the private sector:
1) Premiums go up exponentially. If motorcyclists think they've got it bad with the proposed changes now, wait until they see what'll hit them when the people carrying their cover have to make a profit! Or,
2) Which is a much, much, much scarier option, is that the insurers are allowed to sue those who cause injury to their clients. If they can't charge premiums at a level that will sustain cover and also return a profit, they will have to seek cost recovery. There is no alternative. And that, of course, will put us into the wonderful realm of American-style tort fuckery. Hoo-fucking-ray.

So, I feel that a huge fuck-you-very-much needs to go out to Act voters right about now. Coz if National introduces legislation to make any or all of the other accounts competitive, Act will vote for it in a heartbeat.

Oh, and as an almost-side note, whatever happened to investing in NZ? We have no native accident insurers, they'll all be Australian and American. That means that the profits will be siphoned off overseas, on top of the destruction of ACC's investment portfolio. That's just "O for Oarsome" beyond words.

Edit: I hope that National would only be likely to try and make the other accounts competitive on the basis of pressure from Act. I don't think their ideological blinkers are quite that fixed, but I guess it's possible. Having Act in the equation, though, changes everything. And not for the better.

Posted at 12:42PM on 23 Oct 09. Permalink.

And Jonathan Eisen is essentially... Aw, you know something Russell, you had him nailed a decade back.

I did say I wasn't comparing them. But Dutton does annoy me.

Posted at 12:44PM on 23 Oct 09. Permalink.

It seemed strange at first that numeracy was considered important, but science not. Wouldn't those who support mathematics also support science?

But then of course it struck me: science helps you understand the world; arithmetic helps you become an accountant or currency trader. And we all know which is more important if you're ambitious for Nu Zild.

Posted at 12:51PM on 23 Oct 09. Permalink.

Well put. We should never let ill-educated politicians anywhere near education.

Posted at 12:55PM on 23 Oct 09. Permalink.

I had a little bit of a try at that conversation with Vicki when I was at the conference the Skeptics held in Wellington last month. It does seem odd that the Skeptics (and we're talking here about a movement rather than just specifically the New Zealand variety) are willing to suspend their method of inquiry when it comes to Climate Change, especially since they're all over Bill Maher at the moment for being inconsistent in his skepticism.

Posted at 12:55PM on 23 Oct 09. Permalink.

Bahaha. Unfortunately NZ's relative disdain for intelligence testing is not overly useful, although perhaps that should be the real criteria for logical thinking.

The ability to identify words like "torrid", "sere", and "limpid" is, quite frankly, far more a test of how much old-school Trek fanfic I've been reading this week than native intelligence.

Posted at 12:56PM on 23 Oct 09. Permalink.

It really does seem to me that there is an active hostility in this Government, among some Ministers at least, to expert opinion. There's a desire to see things as simply black and white, the solutions as a matter of common sense, and those who say that things are more complicated as hand-wringing and politically-correct people who would rather not face up to hard facts.

I hesitate to say this with boldness at the moment, because it is a strong claim, but the evidence of this demeanor seems to be accumulating. In education, it seems clear.

Posted at 12:59PM on 23 Oct 09. Permalink.

It does seem odd that the Skeptics (and we're talking here about a movement rather than just specifically the New Zealand variety) are willing to suspend their method of inquiry when it comes to Climate Change

Not to me. I'm no longer surprised by the ability of people to suspend a body of evidence if it would mean giving up a "fact" that has become dear to them. If it means giving up an entire worldview, or at least accepting contradictions in it, the stakes are even higher and acceptance even more difficult.

Posted at 1:08PM on 23 Oct 09. Permalink.

I run a small business (1 employee me), I pay enough ACC every year that it's roughly worth a day of my time (as I bill it out).

I figure it's probably going to take me at least another day of my time to find a private insurer - that means my rate will double that year hard to amortize any saving from that over anything less than a decade unless I end up paying 1/10th of the premium - I bet the paper work will be higher ongoing anyway

At the moment I get one bill a year from the ACC, I write a check along with the others at the end of the month and post it - 10 minutes work.

And Labour say they'll go back to the old scheme when they're reelected - why would I choose to change? I'll take my 10 minutes/year of overhead happily.

People also seem to forget WHY we changed to a no-fault scheme - it was to stop us spending all our time in court over personal injury law suits - before ACC people wouldn't give their friends rides in their cars, certainly not if you valued your friendship - after ACC the govt reduced funding to law schools and the courts

Posted at 1:11PM on 23 Oct 09. Permalink.

The ability to identify words like "torrid", "sere", and "limpid" is, quite frankly, far more a test of how much old-school Trek fanfic I've been reading this week than native intelligence.

Lucy, I dropped out of my US PhD programme after four years. All I have to comfort me is a useless postgrad diploma in my minor, Women's Studies, and my 'you are a 99th percentile badass' score in the verbal portion of the GRE. Don't take that small joy away from me, with all your logic and whatnot! Sob.

Posted at 1:19PM on 23 Oct 09. Permalink.

Re the education changes: There seems to be a 'one size fits all' approach being taken here. What I mean by that is that ALL the advisors for science, PE etc. are being dropped, which assumes that ALL schools need the advisors in the 3Rs. One would have thought that a number of schools would have their act together in the 3Rs and are now looking to extend into the other areas.

The Minister also talks about this pool of advisors that they can switch on and off for the different subjects one year to the next. It does beg the question as to what the science advisors will do for the next year. It's highly likely that they will change careers and so won't then be available when the Minister deems they are necessary at some arbitrary point in the future.

Posted at 1:41PM on 23 Oct 09. Permalink.

So, I feel that a huge fuck-you-very-much needs to go out to Act voters right about now.

I was in the Epsom electorate for last election, and I did everything I could to stop them. In this case that amounted to holding my nose and dropping my electorate vote on National.

Fuckers.