Login to Change.org
Create an Account
Michael Doyle
Bloomfield, NJ
I followed Clay Burell here....
Recent Activity
-
Michael commented on the article |
Dear Clay,
I would love to see this post split into several different pieces--the video is interesting, but its mistakes lessen its impact, and we need real discourse here. Still, I think how we present information to students (and how this video both works and fails) would be a powerful thread.
Capitalism deserves its own post, starting with some definition of what we're all talking about. The model using "immortal" corporations that externalize and hide their costs and require continued growth cannot be sustained.
Finally, how teachers (agents of the government) can encourage students to question assumed truths in a culture could be another fine thread deserving its own post. -
Michael commented on the article |I fear Mr. Obama made his intentions clear when he selected Mr. Duncan. No one should be surprised by what followed.
Magical thinking occurs on both side of the aisle--just harder to recognize when it occurs in the same pew. -
Michael commented on the article |"For we know that economic progress and educational achievement have always gone hand in hand in America....It's time to prepare every child, everywhere in America, to out-compete any worker, anywhere in the world.... It's time to give all Americans a complete and competitive education from the cradle up through a career."
Mr. Obama, March 10, education speech
Well, the Business Roundtable folks should be cheering.
"When I hear the constant vilification of corporate America, I personally don’t understand it. I would ask a lot of our folks in government to stop doing it because I think it’s hurting our country."
Jamie Dimon, CEO JP Morgan etc.
When the CEO of JPMorgan Chase & Co complains that politicians are vilifying corporations on the same day the President vilifies public education and gives props to the Business Roundtable agenda, well, color me paranoid.
The children of America did not disrupt the economy.
Duncam outrageously manipulates data to his advantage.
Mr. Obama is not interested in your expert view of the Korean model. If he were, he would have gotten it right the first time.
I'm going back to my garden before blood starts oozing out of my ears. -
Michael commented on the article |Works fine now and I quite enjoyed it.
Thank you. -
Michael commented on the article |
Ah, the blessed age of high tech--I cannot get past the buffer.
The problem is likely at my end--I do not own an iPod, and I am still learning linux/ubuntu--but the lack of comments thought maybe something else is going on.
Feel free to chuck this message if all is well. -
Michael commented on the article |Oh, dear, my evil twin is barging in--Caly, would you be so kind as to vanquish him?
Thank you. -
Michael commented on the article |
Dear Mr. Ortiz,
Your story is touching, your subtlety ingenuous. Still, you misunderstand science. To be fair, there is a huge article of faith in science--uniformitarianism. Things continue today as they did in the past.
You do not need to directly observe something for it to provide evidence in science. Science recognizes inferential reasoning.
I agree that fossils are beautiful. That I agree with that does not provide any evidence for or against your thesis.
The past can indeeed be observed through inference. I trust you paid your water bill last month. Using your logic, you'd be hard-pressed to prove it.
Uniformitarianism is a bit of a leap, but one accepted by science--it cannot proceed otherwise. Creationism is an exponentially new level of faith, and God bless you for that.
But it's not science. -
Michael commented on the article |
Watching words fly past each other can be exasperating, and the continuous (and I suspect deliberate) misunderstanding of the word "theory" in science precludes true discussion. Still, I never met a fray I could resist, so in I jump.
Mr. Bosin, school board member or not, Christian or not (and for the record I'm the latter, not the former), the idea that science attacks Christian principle(s) "while no others are being questioned" reveals a huge misunderstanding about science. Science questions everything, and bases its models on direct and indirect observations of the natural world.
Science does not close the door on religious thought, but it has no answer for things based on the supernatural or myth or magical thinking or pure faith. This is one of its limits, and that much is worth teaching.You can, however, teach that science has procribed limits without introducing Creationism, which, of course, is not science.
(You did manage to get all kinds of buzz words into the discussion--had you thrown in "American Way" and "apple pie" you would have swayed me.) -
Michael commented on the article |Dear Clay,
I think you know my opinions on Duncan--he's sitting at the head of the Business Roundtable, he glaringly manipulated his data when he testified to Congress in August, 2006, and I think a lot of folks are smitten by his obvious charm.
It may well be true that Bush didn't throw tons of money at NCLB; I think that if Arne turns out to be who I think he is (and ladies and gentlemen, take a look at the evidence that's available), then his access to scads of money to push his agenda will be even more destructive than Bush's 8 years, at least as far as education goes.
That's saying a lot.
I'm not sure what I fear more, neoconservatives or neoliberals. I thought "neo" meant "new". Now I suspect it's code for "New Education Order."
I'd much rather deal with the honesty and earnestness and openness of an old-style conservative than with the pablum that passes for thought in the neo crowd.
I trust Arne about as far as I can throw him. And yeah, part of it is a blue collar bias against anyone who spells "Arnie" as "Arne"--I'm a lot of things, but slick's not one of them. -
Michael commented on the article |
I've been using John Kyrk in class for a couple of years now--he does phenomenal work with photosynthesis.
