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A quick journey through enslavement - sometimes called our educational system

category international | rights, freedoms and repression | opinion/analysis author Monday January 30, 2006 20:48author by Seán Ryan Report this post to the editors

A further submission following the recent theme of this contributer on the idea that it is not just an aspect of our society that has failed, but that the whole model of our society has failed and cannot be fixed. It must be replaced.

This piece makes some very strong accusations and then backs them up, some ideas are offered and the piece ends introducing the next piece to be added which will be on employment.

It seems that the vast majority of children in this country are headed for lives of drudgery. I think that since it is the obvious policy of our government to herd the majority of our children into being menial servants for our American betters and others, that it would make better economic sense if these children were not educated at all and just put to work when and where they are capable.

Or is that taking it bit too far?

I can't see it going down too well come election time. Better to keep it the way it is. Sub educate them, destroy their ambition and make it seem their fault, yes Goddamnit if we are going to use some of our hard earned resources, then we had better make them investments.

Some would demand, how dare I suggest that the education our children get is substandard?

Education is supposed to help you with your life right?

Everyone who has all that they need, step to the right, the rest of you stay where you are, yah huddle together for comfort, fight amongst yourselves, so much the better.

Education helps you live, learn about and co-operate with society right?

Everyone who feels safe, content and equal take another step to the right and the rest of you shut up moaning.

What is the first article of our Constitution about? (The Constitution being that, which defines, defends and guarantees Irish nationality and citizenship and it is that which supercedes all subsequent law). What are your rights and duties as a citizen? Surely this knowledge should form part of the core of your education?

When birth certificates are handed out, a copy of the Constitution should also be given. This is the contract that doesn't require your signature to consider you legally bound to it. The very least your government could do is give you a copy of it. Try to get a copy in your local bookstore. This book that supercedes all law is very difficult to get your hands on. It is a national disgrace that our Constitution is forever out of print.

It has gone midnight and your neighbours are at it again; screaming at each other and the paper-thin walls only block the view. What are your rights, and how do you see them recognised without losing an unfair amount of already wasted valuable time?

Education shows us where we came from in order to help us see where we are going right?

How come all the rich kids grow up and get the good jobs and easy lives?

Intelligence is bestowed randomly throughout the population and is not dictated by wealth right?

Wrong, apparently. Otherwise wealth and status would be randomly bestowed upon each generation, unless of course, there is at the very least, a double standard in our educational system and in society itself.

Am I being fair?

Yes. Having received part of my supposed education in a school for rich kids, I experienced the depth of the differences in standards of education, between "rich" and "poor" schools. I learned it's not so much as what you know, as who you are amongst other things. I also learned that even those, who were of less intelligence than the average kid in the peer group, did quite well in secondary school, due to social background, prior superior primary education and by the peer group bootstrapping, to achieve higher goals for both individuals and the group itself. Rich schools as well as providing an education, provide a training ground for teaching the skills of leadership, control and motivation. Poor schools, it's everyone for themselves, teachers included.

This however, should not be taken that I feel "rich" schools provide a decent standard of education; I just feel that they provide a vastly superior standard in teaching life skills, than those offered by "poor" schools. I may also add that these life skills are just as important, as the more general concept that is supposedly education.

I am not speaking of teachers here. The job that they perform with the resources they have, and the difficulties they face is nothing short of miraculous. Couple this with the inadequate training and the non-existent support they receive, they truly show why we were once known as the land of saints and scholars. And they do it in an atmosphere where current and unrelenting propaganda, slurs and slanders them constantly. Dedication is too small a word to describe the sacrifice these people make, albeit uselessly. We need to wake the fuck up and treat and train our teachers better. They are without a doubt, the most essential ingredient in a viable society.

Have you every truly been inspired by a teacher? In the sense that, there you are, plodding along in a roughly forwards direction and then, wallop! You are now going forwards and upwards as well. Think of any politician you want, have you ever been inspired by any of them? Do you think they might inspire your children? Are any of them currently in government? Are any in government capable of inspiration?

Education should be tailored to the individual needs, wants and potentiality of every child, instead of trying to hammer square pegs into round holes. I mean do we tailor the clothes to the man, or the man to the clothes? Or rather, shouldn't we tailor the clothes to fit the man?

Lets look at the three R's

Reading and wRiting:

For secondary schools, using a very, very rough generalisation, one can see that approximately 120 hours are spent per year learning English. Say one hourly lesson per day for the approximate six months per year at school. 5 hours a week, 4 weeks in a month, by 6 months, which gives us 120. This is of course an underestimation, as it does not take into account, 31 day months, homework, punishment or the fact that all other subjects are taught through English.

So it is 120 hours per year, for six years of secondary school, learning to read and appreciate a language, that most of them have been using effectively since before their second birthdays and ever since, well nearly ever since. They obviously couldn't be using it effectively for at least 120 hours a year, otherwise this would make these 120 hours totally irrelevant. This is to say, that most kids take a little over a year, to learn to speak and understand the language, with the added difficulty that they do this with no references. Yet our educational system believes it will take a further fifteen or sixteen years before they can read and write?

Yes we shall have them read Shakespeare, Tenyson and Yeates too. Then we will give them their opinions on each work. We shall tell them exactly what the author had in mind, for each and every sentence; saving them the need to think for themselves. Yes, then we shall give them exams to make sure that they remember their new opinions. The pattern begins to emerge. Deprivation of thought; and it creates a hatred for the written word too, just in case they might be tempted to educate themselves later on in life. It's sticker time! Or if you prefer, fries with your burger. I'm beginning to get an insight into Attention Deficit Disorder. It's what happens when no worthwhile stimulus is present.

Not forgetting homework we shall make them write in flawless English and beautiful handwriting and lovely straight margins, yes we shall make them draw conclusions that are not their own. Brainwashing is easy isn't it? It is not so much learning English as learning to conform.

Easy it may be, but its results are long term and in the long term, they are unpredictable. I generously say unpredictable, because if our government and prior governments deliberately brought Irish society to its current state, then they are guilty of ethnically cleansing us systematically over generations.

Aside from programming children, does it teach any useful skills?

Without a doubt yes, if the question were individualized a bit however, does it teach all kids useful skills? Then the answer becomes no. The truth is it helps some kids and doesn't help others. The way that is taught however is very unhelpful and very harmful.

Children are apprentice adults, they learn to be adults in three ways, mixing them and referencing and improving on them, and they are, observation, intuition and by transgression of boundaries. Observation is easy in that they learn from what they observe. Intuition is a processing of what is known and believed, into new behaviour or thinking. Transgression of boundaries is more complex. Simply put, they break rules and reap the consequences. Or sometimes they approach breaking the rules to see exactly where the boundary is placed. Either way they gain new experience and intelligence.

So we've got kids, who've learnt the English language by two. They will have experienced every type of emotion that they will ever experience, usually around three, but definitely before five. They will base and refine all other emotions on these early experiences. I mean if you threw music into the picture you'd have a little "Mozart" on your hands. Isn't it kind of absurd then, to believe that until they are in their mid to late teens, that they wont understand the concepts behind onomatopoeia or end of line rhyme (I myself don't understand them still in that I see them as stimulating techniques but they impart fuck all else) or that they would ever talk of these subjects again, unless of course they later have kids who later going through the same thing, bring the subject up. For instance is memory not a feature of intelligence? We see guys remember the order of a deck of cards and are very impressed that he or she can remember a sequence of 52 cards. Yet we get annoyed at our kids for remembering and repeating the current no.1 hit in the charts after hearing it but a few times. In fact most would be able to hum all the number 1's for the previous year one after the other and each of them a sequence of thousands of notes and an abstraction of numbers and sets and relativity.

It saddens me to think anyone could believe kids, most of whom can wrap their parents and other adults round their fingers, would not understand the subtleties of Shakespeare's characters and their needs and drives. Shakespeare wrote about people and made them seem human. This is a massive clue. Human behaviour is natural and therefore we all have insights into why people do what people do, as we are human too. This does not need to be taught and if it is not present by the time the system rams this stuff down our kids' throats, it will never be present.

The Third R:

aRithmetic, God where do I start?

How about the shortest distance between two points is not a straight line, it is zero. (See quantum tunnelling.) Couple this with the fact that even if we negate the zero option, what has been defined is then a line segment and not a line, whose definition which also appears on the curriculum states that a line is of infinite length.

How about the three internal angles of a triangle do not always add up to 180 degrees and in fact I defy anyone to point out an example of a triangle in the known universe, who's internal angles sum to 180 degrees absolutely.

Parallel lines sometimes meet (hint; think of lines of longitude on a globe)

From the parallel lines example we can also see that a straight line can also be curved. Again I defy anyone to point out a single straight line in the universe without resorting to the use of one's imagination.

From just the examples I've quoted above, it can be seen that just about every theorem taught at second level education is based on misinformation. It is based on Euclidian geometry, which was conceived before Christ and is based on the geometry of a plane. This again is another flat object that hasn't been seen to exist in our universe. In fact I would go as far to say; that most of the mathematics curriculum is not only not relevant to the children it is inflicted upon, but is not relevant to our universe. In fact the whole curriculum is but a prelude to the mathematics of our universe and others, but how many children get the opportunity to see the big picture? Why only open the door a little so they may only look inside?

Let's move on to science.

I've got no problem with biology, other than it could be much more in depth, it could cover a lot more topics and I believe it should incorporate extensive first aid training, or some other training that encourages people to look out for each other. There is no point in generating power that will not or cannot be utilised, nor is there point in it, if it is not utilised whilst being generated.

Physics and chemistry I am going to keep lumped together, because chemistry is really a part of physics anyway (Sorry to all the outraged chemists). Again like the idea of Euclidian geometry it's hard to know where to start.

I am going to start with Newton. Isaac Newton the guy who discovered gravity when an apple fell on his head. I wonder what happened to apples before he discovered gravity. Anyhow I digress. Isaac Newton lived some centuries back and has contributed more to science and mathematics than probably anyone ever has or ever will. The only problem being the vast majority of it is wrong. Relativity has been and gone. It showed that the universe is a lot more complex and unpredictable than Newton believed and that the physical laws he wrote, were only rough approximations.

Not only that, remember back to those moments in school when you forced your attention on the teacher shining a light through the prism and the pretty rainbow it produced. At least I hope you thought it was pretty, because if you didn't then you got little value from that lesson. Anyway the seven colours, red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet plus the mysterious group beneath red referred to as infrared and the equally mysterious range above violet called ultraviolet, are what make up white light, Newton tells us. He then simplifies this by telling us that there are three primary colours, red, green and blue (the seven colours may be formed by mixing combinations of these). He tells us that when these three colours of light are mixed, white light is produced and therefore white light is composed of these primary colours (I wonder what combination of primary colours produces ultraviolet exclusively?).

Here is an experiment I want you to perform. Go into a dark room; make sure there is no light. Shine a red light on your hand and observe the shadow it makes. Does this cause a problem with Newton's explanation of white light being composed of three primary colours? You are in a room with only one light source, this light source is a primary colour, but so is the shadow it produces, in fact it's a separate primary colour, there is no white light or any other combination of primary colours present, from which this primary colour can be extracted. How can this have happened if Newton is to be believed?

Here's an even better example that kills Newton's reasoning about light. Go to your television and turn it off. Observe the screen (darkish grey). Now turn it on again and watch it until something coloured black comes on. How is black formed when the darkest the screen can get is dark grey?

Think of this, you are showing your holiday slides to your friends by projecting them onto a white screen. How is it that the colour black has no problem showing up? How is black projected onto the white screen? This gets even more interesting if the slides are in black and white. Again when the projector shines light at the screen, some of it turns black, yet if the projector is switched off the whole screen is white, or at least grey.

So Newton's ideas as to what composes light may be pretty and even funny when you look at my examples, but are far from the whole picture. Yet we teach that his explanation of light is absolute and complete. I think it raises far more questions than it answers.

I only make fun of Newton to highlight the inadequacies of the physics curriculum. He is I believe, one of the greatest humans and one of the greatest minds, ever to have walked the face of the earth. It is one thing to point out the flaws of his ideas with hindsight and modern contraptions, and ideas that show us that not only is colour a product of primary colours and white light, but that it is also a product of shade and relativity, but to have envisioned them in the time that he did, and to have thought them through to the point that he did, was the mark of a genius that but seldom graces us.

How many forms of matter exist?

Three. Right? Solid, liquid and gas, right?

Is plasma a solid, a liquid or a gas?

Is energy a solid, a liquid or a gas?

So how many forms of matter exist?

Where does anti-matter fit into the above picture not to mention virtual matter?

Does the atom look as it is illustrated in science books?

Nope.

The curriculum teaches of a point particle universe. It doesn't tell you however, that the universe and matter only behave as if they were point particles whilst they are being observed. The rest of the time and I may add the most of the time, they behave as wave functions, that permeate the whole of our universe everywhere. The reason we observe matter is because the mind of man is like a singularity and where different parts of the universe pass into the conscious event horizons (the point of no return, e.g. when light enters your eye the amount not reflected is absorbed and trapped), they become point particles or events. The mind of man can then be boiled off similar to and by similar processes to Hawking radiation and entropy, and that this allows us to express ourselves, to the universe itself at large and each other.

The law of conservation of matter and energy, matter cannot be created or destroyed. An interesting law, but wrong if taken at face value. If this law is correct then the universe does not exist or at least was not created. Matter may be created from Hawking radiation. Virtual matter (which may be converted into normal matter via Hawking radiation) is totally and utterly destroyed in the cataclysmic annihilation of virtual pairs.

A body in motion tends to stay in motion. There are no examples of bodies in the known of universe that aren't in motion. And to imagine a body at rest is to imagine the universe as having an absolute reference point, and to have found an exception to the law of entropy, which states that over time entropy increases. This has some very important and profound implications for us. For instance it is why heat always flows from hot to cold and never from cold to hot. It is probably why time is perceived to go forwards and not backwards. It is why the universe is forever in a state of change. It is why bad things happen to good people. It is essentially, why the state of the universe and of man, is in an increasing state of chaos. It is why we cannot have a perpetual motion machine. (Look at a light bulb. If it is on you wouldn't want to touch it, yet you only bought it to give out light, the heat is a waste product. In converting the electrical energy into the light energy we also generated heat that is of no use to us. Every time we manipulate energy we lose some of it in the manipulation, all energy will eventually dissipate in this fashion, until there is not enough left to cause any event, this is called heat death and at this point the universe ceases to exist.) So whilst the law of bodies in motion is interesting and does have its uses, it is kind of irrelevant in as far as laws go. It is funny that this law is studied, and yet the law that all but makes it irrelevant, not to mention being one of the most basic of all the scientific laws we have discovered, is by and large ignored.

We have important terms like Absolute zero, when Einstein has proven conclusively that there are no absolutes. And once and for all to the mentally jaded, who ask am I absolutely sure that there are no absolutes? I say "no absolutes" is a negative absolute (there are NO absolutes). It is the lack of an absolute not an actual absolute in itself and isn't self-contradictory. Adding an extra absolute to the sentence, "There are no absolutes." Has no effect of disproving it. It just expects me to develop a capacity to be able to comprehend an absolute, and is therefore, not to have got the point in the first place. There are no absolutes and I cannot be absolutely sure about anything, never mind being absolutely sure about everything. And even though I don't believe Einstein saw it at the time, this introduces uncertainty into every universal law, all except of course for entropy, who's potency it only increases, as entropy is at its core about uncertainty.

Relativity is barely touched upon yet its discovery and implications are everywhere. The excuse for this is that Relativity is a subject so complex, that it is better left for third level education. It is said that when Einstein first introduced his theory, that there were less than a handful of people on the planet who would understand it. This however didn't stop the nuclear age.

Now I'd like to switch to a subject that has plagued and stunted the Irish since we were invaded and enslaved by the British. I speak of denial of education. The deliberate crime of this is as bad as the crime of genocide. It robs children of their future, their potentiality, it robs parents of their right to see their children make better lives than they have had and it robs this country of its most precious resources. I speak mainly of exclusion or as it was known earlier, expulsion.

As I said earlier, one of the ways a kid learns is by overstepping boundaries. If the child repeatedly steps over the same boundary is it the fault of the child that he or she did not learn from the earlier lesson? Indeed it is also most often pointed out by the educational system itself that these kids are not learning from the educational system anyway.

Talk about getting your arse about face.

If a factory produces shoddy goods, is the product to blame?

If some bored and disillusioned adult spits in your burger, is it the burger that's to blame?

This is some guilt to be placing on such young shoulders, considering they don't even get a trial.

The parents are to blame.

Then why punish the kids?

The schools are to blame.

Why punish the victim?

The state is to blame.

Why not make herd animals out of those who give us power?

We are to blame.

And we inflict it on our children so that they may do the same to theirs.

One of my most inspiring memories is of something a truly gifted teacher said to my class, when I was in primary school. He said that education is what remains, when what has been learnt is forgotten. Again I say with this definition in mind, that we are sub educating and subjugating the children of this country.

I would suggest; that in order to deny a child an education, it should take a judge and twelve jurors, composed of politicians who serve locally, to convict the child of being evil.

It seems to me that we need to reopen hedge schools. Or at the very least make private schools illegal, this would force the rich to contribute to the whole of society rather than victimising it and would at least integrate the little elitist training camps. It is unfair to ration education and knowledge of any type. Particularly when cash decides who gets fed. Cash does not decide what can be learnt; we decide and we fail miserably.

For example, when outside the area of a school, the child is supposedly under the same social law, that we all supposedly adhere to. And the Gardaí supposedly ensure this. When they become of age and well before they are of age enough to vote, they may become subject to incarceration.

However once inside school, the only discipline the state will allow the child is lines, detention, suspension or expulsion. And teachers and the system itself have to police the kids. Their own peer group and highly evolved society have no say and no function in this, and they learn to rebel from society, with the it's us against them, or it's us against us, mentality, and I may add that to miss this vital point is to have not even the beginnings of a question, not to mention an answer as to what education should be mostly about.

Cut the size of a classroom in half, and you halve the time required to educate a child, for example, the amount of different modalities of teaching can be practiced on those they were designed for, rather than using them all, in hit and miss fashion, in large classrooms (diversity should be the tool of education not its yoke). You also make the process more efficient and the cost stays roughly the same, but because the whole system becomes more efficient, it becomes money better spent; this has the same effect, financially that is, of reducing the overall cost of education and is to truly invest in one's country.

Even funnier, I doubt the numbers of teachers required to do this would significantly be changed. Also, think of the long overdue concept of job satisfaction that these patient necessities, so richly deserve. In other words, if one feels that children do not get the education they need and deserve, bitch last at who, she or he, puts most care, effort and time into educating children.

Now imagine quartering the size of a classroom. It is entirely possible in my opinion to have children educated to a level well beyond what would be considered a very good third level education, by the time they were old enough to assume the responsibility to vote. It must be remembered here, that a child can usually understand and practice the concept of communication before seeing a second birthday. (If you do not consider this a remarkable achievement, imagine trying to teach it to someone, who had no grasp of it. You see the true beauty here, is they teach themselves, using us as mere examples.) It is with this in mind, when I say, that I see the stemming of this potential as a manifestation of one of mankind's most evil sins.

Look at what this would mean to the future of Ireland. Just imagine the possibilities and the progress that could be made, from just the first generation that we educate in this fashion.

Imagine when the mechanisms finally click and lock together, in the second generation, when each child has a home environment that has the ability to interact with these children, in an educational sense that is, and further the potential grows, and exponentially so.

Bootstrapping.

E=mc2. Education = potential X efficiency2. Like I said earlier, relativity has many current and simple examples.

Barr my new version of the equation of relativity, which may be a little unpalatable some, it should be readily apparent that reducing the size of pupil to teacher ratios is the way to go. I would also suggest that anyone who has looked at the concept of education in a thoughtful manner and who does not admit to the truth that is simplistically obvious, is a liar and a thief, plain and simple. (For the fuckwits, in the department of education and the rest of the government, yes, I'm specifically referring to you!) This obviousness brings my premise of subjugation way beyond the realms of a conspiracy theory, it is happening, and we are facilitating it.

There should be a strict sense of what is current in, morality, civility, co-habitation and cooperation. They should be a mini society modelled on our more mature society, but allowed to experiment within parameters specified and guided by teachers.

They should have to govern and police themselves, control budgets, finances and wages which would be paid for work done, such as learning about different subjects, we should pay them as they are essential ingredients in our most important investment, and should be allowed to function, utilising their already existing hierarchy and structure, and of course be subject to the overall authority of teachers. As to what forms of punishment should a teacher administer? I am open to suggestions. I will say however that this small society must be taught to function, for how in God's name can they be expected to live within society, if they are not shown? How can they know what they want from life if we do not show them what is on offer? They should not be just dumped into mainstream society, but absorbed into it.

We could learn from them, and they from us. At the end of the day, society itself is an experiment until we perfect it. We are therefore all in a process of learning, and presuming to be educated is to be ignorant indeed.

As it is, we isolate kids from the world, to teach them of it, and we never even begin to tap into their already existing society, other than to deprive, belittle and mutate it and to set it towards self-destruct.

It is an inconsolable pity and may it be to our everlasting shame, and it will be to our continuing detriment that the science of teaching and implementation of same, has not even tried to keep pace with the rest of society's rocketing technological advancements.

The land of saints and scholars.

Yah right.

Continually we hear of assessments, tests and exams.

In a system that forces children, to a very narrow and condescending notion of education, these tests and things only serve the state and foreign feeders, and are not to see the particular child receives a better standard of education.

It is an outrage that some tests could not be administered at the start of a child's education that would design an education that would fit the particular child's needs, wants and abilities. Then with all the other tests and exams the state administers, results could be used to enhance and update tailor made educations. Not just to consign fates to them. We need to educate children enough that they decide their own fates and better ours. This is the level of education that we ourselves and society have yet to reach, despite the abundance of knowledge that is available and the potential it unlocks.

I mean, for employers to demand a Leaving Certificate from a prospective employee, for a job that only requires rudimentary skills in basic comprehension is indicative of the employer's contempt, and not the young applicant's ability, irregardless of Leaving Certificate.

Whilst I'm at it, why are interviews treated in very much the way as a serf asking a lord for a favour, in a country with no peerage?

Why do schools, Fás and society in general condone and perpetuate this practice? The employee is as important to the employer as is the employer is to the employee. This is a symbiotic relationship, why is one treated as a parasite?

Surely the want to work, coupled with the intelligence, ability and personality suited to the job, are all that are required and I may add, the employer, should he not at least reciprocate these values?

The business world whose founding principle is bottom line profit, feel they should have a say in how the whole of society is run. They form massive associations like IBEC, and are actually consulted by government on how to run the economy and country.

Red light!

Stop and go no further.

Their only care is profit, and they are advising us how to spend money. Us! We are the people who they treat as inferior from the very first handshake, and we're asking them how to spend and invest some of their expenses. We are a hindrance to bottom line profit. Why pay us at all? Just hang onto it and save me the smell.

Sláinte
Seán Ryan

author by .:.publication date Mon Jan 30, 2006 22:02author address author phone Report this post to the editors

If you shine a "red light" through a prism the full spectrum will appear in your darkened room unless the "red light" is only "red" in which case you would have ended up in CERN if you'd had more money behind you, stayed in the one place most of your life, (except of course for working at CERN) (and the holiday gaff) (on which you pay no tax) (a lot of CERN work at home) (but they still get on the original www not this shite stuff they feed us : http://public.web.cern.ch/Public/Welcome.html)

but then you'd be too inaccesible for us, and speak another language.... one we wouldn't understand. @ all @ all @ all

on to unemployment. lets go!

author by Terrypublication date Mon Jan 30, 2006 23:45author address author phone Report this post to the editors

Sean,

You raised some very good points with regard to our so-called education system and you have hit the nail on the head about it's true purpose. However it is not unique to Ireland.

I don't know if you are familiar with John Taylor Gatto, but he was a teacher for 30+ years in the USA and he got so frustrated with the education system, he started to research the origins of it and what he discovered astounded him. He went on to write many articles and wrote the famous book (available online) called: The Underground History of American Education.

In one of this essays: Against School -How public education cripples our kids, and why (found at
http://www.spinninglobe.net/againstschool.htm ) he discusses many of the issues that you have discussed, but as he says himself:

What exactly is the purpose of our public schools?.......1) To make good people. 2) To make good citizens. 3) To make each person his or her personal best. These goals are still trotted out today on a regular basis, and most of us accept them in one form or another as a decent definition of public education's mission, however short schools actually fall in achieving them. But we are dead wrong. ..........the great H. L. Mencken, who wrote in The American Mercury for April 1924 that the aim of public education is not

to fill the young of the species with knowledge and awaken their intelligence. ... Nothing could be further from the truth. The aim ... is simply to reduce as many individuals as possible to the same safe level, to breed and train a standardized citizenry, to put down dissent and originality. That is its aim in the United States... and that is its aim everywhere else.

In this essay he also outlines how many of the great industrialists/capitalists of the day got involved in education and helped fund it. Carnegie being one of the big ones.

And it is clear his influence affected this country too, because if you visit practically any public library in this country, most of which were built around 1920s, you will see the name "Carnegie" over the doorway. It's very likely when trouble was brewing in Ireland at the turn of the century what with James Connolly and the General Strike, Easter Rising, the revolution in Russia (1917) and so forth, that De Valera who of course was a US citizen along with the Catholic Church who were already running the schools must have struck some kind of deal with the American capitalists to back De Valera to ensure the socialists and communists never got hold here, and to take control of our education system and like in the USA, use it to shape the minds of the next generation, dumbing them down and creating a subservient and obedient populace that was less able to think and unlikely to rebel.

And hey whether that's the way it happened, the result is certainly the same.

More at the related link, including what an ideal school might look like, see:

School For a Post-Industrial Society, Sudbury Valley School, by Dan Greenberg

Related Link: http://www.spinninglobe.net/gattopage.htm
author by Seán Ryanpublication date Mon Jan 30, 2006 23:58author address author phone Report this post to the editors

I see that CERN are trying to add the aether back into Einstein's beautiful pattern, good luck to them.

This collider thingie on the other hand concerns me. It's a step closer to possibly vindicating M theory and String theory and will be a massive step forwards in the search for the secrets of generating power from the seething vaccuum.

Look at where we are considering we can only liberate energy from itself.

Then again, I'm curious to know.

Seán

author by Seán Ryanpublication date Tue Jan 31, 2006 00:44author address author phone Report this post to the editors

Thanks for the comments Terry. As soon as I finish this comment I'm off to download everything I can find on John Taylor Gatto.

I'd not heard of this man before, but I'm familar with what you described, especially the capitalist input into the process.

Democracy and capitalism are incompatible. Democracy is a process of equalisation, through representation whereas capitalism promotes a pecking order through repression.

Here's an interesting challenge to our government, although I'm sure they'll bolt at the thoughts of it. Methinks that somebody of the ilk of Indy may sometime take up the challenge. This challenge would dramatically cut the cost of education and at the same time offer it to the masses.

Simply video record each and every lecture given in every university for the period for a year. (Educators would need to be compensated for this big time.) Then put it all in an open forum, like Indy. Do a similar exercise with primary and seconday schools.

If the government will not do its duty, it's quite possible to arrange to do it for them.

Thanks again,
Seán

author by wikipedian - XXI century hedge schoolspublication date Tue Jan 31, 2006 11:37author address bcnauthor phone Report this post to the editors

was completely central to the encyclopedia idea. The idea that every garage band in the USA would have its records listed really didn't wet anyone's knicks at all, but the idea that someday not only would we send cheap computer equipement to Africa but that there they could access "all our data" and use it to teach seemed and still seems - "inspirational".

And as much we continue to work towards that, we also work to ending intellectual property which will hinder people in those states using in the data we may give or share with them on open source software platforms and donated hardware to make the drugs they need.

That is why the open source movement may be termed accurately but not solely "anarcho-syndicalist".

Anyway in Europe and the 1st world - It is very important to recognise academia for what it is,
a mostly market led and corporate guided self replenishing pseudo-elite.

author by seanBpublication date Wed Feb 01, 2006 16:11author address author phone Report this post to the editors

Can I suggest that the true responsibility for education lies with the family as outlined in the constitution. This is a very interesting and stimulating treatise but perhaps relinquishes our rights and suggests we might change the state's methods rather than our own. When my first born child reached school age I stepped away from a 'career' path that was not going to offer the best for my children. I have never believed that an expensive education is better for a child than a cheap education - my father neglected my personal development in my teenage years so he could work his way upwards to pay for my expensive education!!! - I would rather have gone fishing with him. Education is not what happens in school - it is what happens in one's mind. I had an expensive education but failed my leaving cert, and failed it even more comprehensively when I repeated - in my late twenties I realised I had reached the top of my profession as a graphics software designer and programmer - had private meetings with bill gates, steve jobs and every other major player in america and england - and all of it was self taught. When my second born was starting school she was bullied as a 'blow-in' and a 'hippie' so my wife and I taught the two of them at home for a few years. It was bliss... they learned more in the two hours a day we gave to schooling than their peers learned in a full school day. We had a lot more help around the house. Our kids were (and still are) gregarious, comfortable in the company of both adults and children, bright, interested, autodidactic, etc, etc. They elected to go back to school after a few years as they felt they weren't getting enough time with peers (we live in the west of ireland), so we encouraged this but insisted that any day they chose to stay at home they were welcome to. As a result of this policy they have both integrated well but maintained a healthy direspect for institutional thinking. The oldest is off at university in brighton now (is this good or bad? I don't know - but think it important that she make the decision not me) and her sister is in 5th year. I am not saying that our way is THE way only that it as A way. I hated school when I was younger but eventually realised through my children that the failing was my parents' not the schools'. We have a constitution that helps us to do what we as parents need to do by giving us the first crack at our child's education. The failures then should be seen as failures of the parent not the state. The greatest future failure will be when the politicians and media persuade the ignorant masses to abolish this fundamental right. And the greatest failure now is when a parent puts their ambition for either themselves or their childrens' education before the simple expedient of spending time with the family.

p.s. We now have a three year old as well who is already eloquent beyond her years - I have no fears for her education - we have already done the most important part of it - we listened to her from the day she was born.

author by sambopublication date Wed Feb 01, 2006 16:31author address author phone Report this post to the editors

"Democracy and capitalism are incompatible. Democracy is a process of equalisation..."

I'm not sure that you understand democracy in the same way that I understand democracy. Democracy is based on the flawed assumption that a majority will have the best interests of the individual at heart.

As I see it, democracy and capitalism are two names for the same force - and throwing in the 'one man one vote' nonsense holds no water. Over 28 years of voting I have never once managed to vote for someone who got elected - for 28 years my vote equals zero so I suppose it is a form of equalisation. Perhaps democracy works when kept down to groups smaller than a thousand or so - but i would still be sceptical.

author by Seán Ryanpublication date Wed Feb 01, 2006 17:34author address author phone Report this post to the editors

I should have put it that it was the theory behind democracy that I was on about. It's practice is obviously an abomination with or without the controlling mess that is capitalism, in which I have but voted once (referendum) in the whole of my life.

Sorry about not being clear

Sláinte,
Seán

author by Seán Ryanpublication date Wed Feb 01, 2006 20:55author address author phone Report this post to the editors

Hi SeanB,

Your comment was a breath of fresh air. You see the primacy of the child in education rather than seeing a product. I suppose the thrust of my main argument in the piece was the government's program of making designer citizens to suit thier needs, rather than a designer system to suit the needs of children and that suits our needs. This being the case the child did not take primacy in my argument as such. But I hope the overall argument itself, does take the primacy of the child's and society's needs into account.

Mr. B, the only thing you said that I take offense to is what you said about meeting Mr. Gates.

Shame on you!

How come the fucker's still walking around?

Anyway it sounds to me as if a lucky 3 year old has a very bright future. There are many more like you. A confident and attentive parent is the best 'schoolbook' a child can read.

My regards and respect,
Seán

author by Seán Ryanpublication date Wed Feb 01, 2006 22:10author address author phone Report this post to the editors

Please forgive my ignorance in not recognising wikipedia in what I had to say. Most of what I've written, was done quite a few years back, when wickipedia, the gutenberg project, and loads of others were more a brilliant idea than a fact.

Truth is, I'm still getting to grips with how far the open source movement has come and indeed the evolution of its arguments. I went the other route, rather than try to build what you have constructed, I went about trying to convert people to the idea of it, my success has been marginal, but I've educated myself in the process and am now ready to make up for lost time.

I realise that a lot of what I have to say will parallel a lot of what you guys have already done, this is more down to ignorance on my part than anything else.

To recognise that knowledge is discovered and not created is a noble thought.

Inspired and inspirational you are.

Intellectual property only exists whilst it remains in the imagination, beyond that, it is an abomination.

author by wikipedian - (iosaf)publication date Thu Feb 02, 2006 11:43author address author phone Report this post to the editors

the open source movement really has come a long way.

.:. "being ignorant is not so much a shame, as being unwilling to learn" .:.
Benjamin Franklin. born Feb 2 1706

2 million "e-books" are downloaded free a month from
http://www.gutenberg.org/
there are 950,000 entries in the english language wikipedia alone after 4 years.
But what is good is that there are over 7000 entries in the "simple english" (reduced learner or second language english) after less than a year.
http://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page
and you know one site which never gets "spam", "trolls" or even "misguided jokes"
provides kids and adults with sheet music *free*
http://www.pianopublicdomain.com/

I always feel I have to remind people of the progress we have made since the 19th century when "anarchism" began. They shot men on May Day who only wanted to work less than 10 hours a day, perhaps to spend more time with their kids. But their kids worked as well. And no woman voted, and the issue of the day was slavery and emancipation. And then only 100 years ago with Montessori and Ferrer i Guardia we got the idea of "free and open schools".

a short time. not much progress. but progress nonetheless.

author by David Cpublication date Thu Feb 02, 2006 13:25author address author phone Report this post to the editors

I agree with Ivan Illich when he wrote that:
"for most men the right to learn is curtailed by the obligation to attend school."
( Ivan Illich, 'Deschooling Society' (1971) - Intro; book is available online here => http://www.preservenet.com/theory/Illich/Deschooling/in....html )

Some links to resources for unschooling/self-directed learning:
http://www.learninfreedom.org/
http://www.alternative-learning.org/
http://www.unschooling.com/
http://www.johntaylorgatto.com/ - website for the guy that Terry mentioned already

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