Starship Asterisk*

by **JohnD** » Thu Jan 31, 2013 9:28 am

It's a fascinating speculation as Martin Wright will admit, because the Mechanism isn't complete; there are lost parts.
John

by **bystander** » Thu Jan 31, 2013 2:42 am

JohnD wrote:See my post, Jan 21st, page one of this thread, Post No.11.
Same video, on the Guardian website, with an appreciation of the Michael Wright project
John

Beyond wrote:Before posting the video, i perused the threads to see if one had already been posted.
Apparently my perusal had holes in it. Oh-well.
At least with two videos, it's harder to miss

In fairness, John did not post the video. He posted a link to an article that contained the video, probably the source of the YouTube video.

by **Beyond** » Thu Jan 31, 2013 1:59 am

JohnD wrote:See my post, Jan 21st, page one of this thread, Post No.11.
Same video, on the Guardian website, with an appreciation of the Michael Wright project
John

Before posting the video, i perused the threads to see if one had already been posted.
Apparently my perusal had holes in it. Oh-well.
At least with two videos, it's harder to miss

by **JohnD** » Wed Jan 30, 2013 8:01 pm

See my post, Jan 21st, page one of this thread, Post No.11.
Same video, on the Guardian website, with an appreciation of the Michael Wright project
John

by **Beyond** » Wed Jan 30, 2013 6:18 am

Ann wrote:Thanks for the video, Beyond. The Antikythera Mechanism was quite amazing.

Ann

Yes, it is. It's a good thing i didn't hurt myself when i stumbled across it.

by **Ann** » Wed Jan 30, 2013 5:40 am

Thanks for the video, Beyond. The Antikythera Mechanism was quite amazing.

Ann

by **Beyond** » Wed Jan 30, 2013 2:08 am

I just ran across this virtual video of the Antikythera Mechanism and how it works. It's about 3-minutes long.

Click to play embedded YouTube video.

by **Anthony Barreiro** » Wed Jan 23, 2013 9:51 pm

owlice wrote:Plenty of kids still get a liberal arts education. My spawn took astronomy last year because he had to have a science ("Just one??," I asked. Apparently so.) to fulfill his degree requirements. This from a kid who looked for a book on low-temperature physics when he was about 10 and was disappointed that Borders didn't have any... a kid who wanted, and got, a book on the elements.... a kid who was "the" programmer for his high school robotics team and was going to major in computer science!

He expects to graduate in May with a B.A. in philosophy.

I don't see a monomania for STEM; I do see many many kids with poor science and math educations, and many adults who don't have a basic understanding of basic science and math, and without the ability to think critically.

Congratulations to your son!

You're right, students who do not major in sciences should nonetheless get a grounding in basic sciences, just as those who major in the physical sciences sciences should get a grounding in humanities and social sciences. My astronomy club, the San Francisco Amateur Astronomers, does an observing night for Dominican College's freshman survey course called "Big History." Every first year student get five weeks of cosmology, five weeks on the evolution of life, and five weeks of human history. That seems like a great starting point. The students are generally enthusiastic when they come out to look through our telescopes.

by **Beyond** » Wed Jan 23, 2013 4:38 pm

Chris Peterson wrote:
Beyond wrote:OK. Just what is "critical thinking"??
The term broadly covers a wide range of rational, logical, and analytical skills. It requires skepticism, evidence-based belief, lack of dogmatism, and many other things. The Wikipedia article on the subject seems to do a pretty good job of explaining it.

Ok, nothing new to me there, except calling what's 'normal' to me-->critical thinking. But they don't include the more critical-->non-thinking, that is required to let all that 'critical thinking' come together. Perhaps it is called another word.

by **Chris Peterson** » Wed Jan 23, 2013 4:07 pm

Beyond wrote:OK. Just what is "critical thinking"??

The term broadly covers a wide range of rational, logical, and analytical skills. It requires skepticism, evidence-based belief, lack of dogmatism, and many other things. The Wikipedia article on the subject seems to do a pretty good job of explaining it.

by **Beyond** » Wed Jan 23, 2013 3:52 pm

OK. Just what is "critical thinking"??

by **ta152h0** » Wed Jan 23, 2013 3:23 pm

I am so thankful to my professor who insisted I learn and practice critical thinking skills. Prof Kotenberg was my dad.

by **Chris Peterson** » Wed Jan 23, 2013 3:11 pm

Beyond wrote:
owlice wrote:...without the ability to think critically.
Think critically :?: :?: OUCH :!: That sounds like it would hurt :!:

Unfortunately, so many people apparently do find the process of critical thinking painful that they choose not to engage in it at all.

by **Beyond** » Wed Jan 23, 2013 1:05 am

owlice wrote:...without the ability to think critically.

Think critically

OUCH

That sounds like it would hurt

by **Ann** » Wed Jan 23, 2013 1:00 am

Owlice wrote:
I don't see a monomania for STEM; I do see many many kids with poor science and math educations, and many adults who don't have a basic understanding of basic science and math, and without the ability to think critically.

I have to agree.

To me the problem is not necessarily so much a too-great interest in sciences, but rather a - well, let's call it a fundamentalist approach to what should be humanities, and a fundamentalist approach to society and to people.

By "fundamentalist" I don't necessarily mean a religious conviction. I mean, rather, the cocksure-ness of whatever trend is "winning" at the moment and whatever trend dominates over the others because it has more money than the others. I talk about a situation where people in power can say that other people's problems aren't problems because they aren't the ones who have the right to define what is a problem and what is not.

Ann

by **owlice** » Wed Jan 23, 2013 12:15 am

Plenty of kids still get a liberal arts education. My spawn took astronomy last year because he had to have a science ("Just one??," I asked. Apparently so.) to fulfill his degree requirements. This from a kid who looked for a book on low-temperature physics when he was about 10 and was disappointed that Borders didn't have any... a kid who wanted, and got, a book on the elements.... a kid who was "the" programmer for his high school robotics team and was going to major in computer science!

He expects to graduate in May with a B.A. in philosophy.

I don't see a monomania for STEM; I do see many many kids with poor science and math educations, and many adults who don't have a basic understanding of basic science and math, and without the ability to think critically.

by **Anthony Barreiro** » Tue Jan 22, 2013 11:09 pm

JohnD wrote:No argument with that, Anthony!
And glad to hear that education is wider now - I presume you speak from your place in education?
I'm a physician, in a specialty with a stronger science content than most - anaesthesia.
Doctors have long sat between the two cultures, some say because we are not bright enough for either!

John

I don't work in education, I'm a clinical social worker. I did my undergraduate studies at the University of California Santa Cruz, a campus founded in 1965 to provide a first-rate undergraduate liberal arts education, balancing and integrating the humanities and the sciences. They recruited faculty who were passionate about teaching undergraduates. When I attended UCSC in the late 1970's they were still living up to that ideal. By now they have been mostly taken over by graduate studies in the sciences, because that's where the funding comes from. I'm not complaining about their science programs, some of them (including astrophysics) are pretty awesome, but I do believe that the balance has been lost, especially for undergraduates who are being prepared for specialized careers rather than lifelong intellectual curiosity, learning, and citizenship.

I work with medical doctors and have tremendous respect for medicine. You need to be up to speed on the current science, but you also need to be able to relate to patients as whole human beings. I haven't worked with anaesthesiologists, I imagine that would be more inclined toward science. You probably don't have too many discussions about Sophocles with your patients.

by **JohnD** » Tue Jan 22, 2013 10:12 pm

No argument with that, Anthony!
And glad to hear that education is wider now - I presume you speak from your place in education?
I'm a physician, in a specialty with a stronger science content than most - anaesthesia.
Doctors have long sat between the two cultures, some say because we are not bright enough for either!

John

by **Anthony Barreiro** » Tue Jan 22, 2013 9:36 pm

JohnD wrote:Or if Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics are missing.

The fact that you are here, Margarita, tells me that you are not one of the PPE (Philosophy, Politics and Economics) or Arts graduates, who think that they dirty their minds with an understanding of any science based subject. The Two Cultures was the subject of CP Snow's book "The Two Cultures" fifty years ago and we still have not resolved the problem he encapsulated.

JOhn

Snow made his "two cultures" speech in Cambridge in 1959, a time and place where the humanities had more intellectual prestige than the sciences. Look at the new buildings and newly endowed chairs on any university campus over the past 25 years, and it's clear that the pendulum has swung to the other extreme.

A broad liberal education includes enough math and science to allow a person to read and understand scientific reports, to place a specific finding in context, to understand research methods and statistical analysis well enough not to swallow every assertion credulously and uncritically, and to have well-reasoned opinions about matters of public interest.

Arguing about whether the humanities or sciences is more important is a bit like asking whether you should keep your left or right foot. You walk best with two feet.

by **MargaritaMc** » Tue Jan 22, 2013 8:31 pm

JohnD wrote:Or if Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics are missing.

The fact that you are here, Margarita, tells me that you are not one of the PPE (Philosophy, Politics and Economics) or Arts graduates, who think that they dirty their minds with an understanding of any science based subject. The Two Cultures was the subject of CP Snow's book "The Two Cultures" fifty years ago and we still have not resolved the problem he encapsulated.

JOhn

Oh absolutely, John! I am using my retirement to fill up the woeful lacunae in my education caused by an almost total absence of scientific subjects. (However, it must be said that as I missed so much of my education by being hospitalised as a child, I had a woeful lack of education, full stop.) For me, learning about, say, Physics and Biochemistry (my husband is research immunologist, so I am ahead of the game there) is gloriously stimulating and enthralling - the same level of delight and joy that, for example, is given by watching the Royal Shakespeare Theatre performing Hamlet, or the Opera North 1992 production of Carmen.

Astronomy is the best of both worlds for me: What painting by Cezanne or Turner can be more gasp- makingly beautiful than the Apod of the Fornax Cluster? Or statue more impressive a piece of work than the Antikythera Mechanism?

Margarita

by **MargaritaMc** » Tue Jan 22, 2013 8:15 pm

ta152h0 wrote:Margarita,
you are absolutely correct. Makes for a well rounded person with enough breadth to be invited to a lot of parties ( interesting people get to go to a lot of places )

This isn't at all relevant, but I keep thinking of Sir Toby Belch to Malvolio;

Dost thou think, because thou art virtuous, there shall be no more cakes and ale?

Margarita

by **JohnD** » Tue Jan 22, 2013 8:13 pm

Or if Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics are missing.

The fact that you are here, Margarita, tells me that you are not one of the PPE (Philosophy, Politics and Economics) or Arts graduates, who think that they dirty their minds with an understanding of any science based subject. The Two Cultures was the subject of CP Snow's book "The Two Cultures" fifty years ago and we still have not resolved the problem he encapsulated.

JOhn

by **ta152h0** » Tue Jan 22, 2013 8:06 pm

Margarita,
you are absolutely correct. Makes for a well rounded person with enough breadth to be invited to a lot of parties ( interesting people get to go to a lot of places )

by **MargaritaMc** » Tue Jan 22, 2013 7:57 pm

bystander wrote:
MargaritaMc wrote:What does STEM mean in this context?
Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics.

Many thanks. How very grim and limiting education must be if there is no music, poetry, art, history...

Margarita

by **bystander** » Tue Jan 22, 2013 7:47 pm

MargaritaMc wrote:What does STEM mean in this context?

Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics.

Starship Asterisk*

APOD: The Antikythera Mechanism (2013 Jan 20)

Post a reply

Expand view Topic review: APOD: The Antikythera Mechanism (2013 Jan 20)

Re: APOD: The Antikythera Mechanism (2013 Jan 20)

Re: APOD: The Antikythera Mechanism (2013 Jan 20)

Re: APOD: The Antikythera Mechanism (2013 Jan 20)

Re: APOD: The Antikythera Mechanism (2013 Jan 20)

Re: APOD: The Antikythera Mechanism (2013 Jan 20)

Re: APOD: The Antikythera Mechanism (2013 Jan 20)

Re: APOD: The Antikythera Mechanism (2013 Jan 20)

Re: APOD: The Antikythera Mechanism (2013 Jan 20)

Re: APOD: The Antikythera Mechanism (2013 Jan 20)

Re: APOD: The Antikythera Mechanism (2013 Jan 20)

Re: APOD: The Antikythera Mechanism (2013 Jan 20)

Re: APOD: The Antikythera Mechanism (2013 Jan 20)

Re: APOD: The Antikythera Mechanism (2013 Jan 20)

Re: APOD: The Antikythera Mechanism (2013 Jan 20)

Re: APOD: The Antikythera Mechanism (2013 Jan 20)

Re: APOD: The Antikythera Mechanism (2013 Jan 20)

Re: APOD: The Antikythera Mechanism (2013 Jan 20)

Re: APOD: The Antikythera Mechanism (2013 Jan 20)

Re: APOD: The Antikythera Mechanism (2013 Jan 20)

Re: APOD: The Antikythera Mechanism (2013 Jan 20)

Re: APOD: The Antikythera Mechanism (2013 Jan 20)

Re: APOD: The Antikythera Mechanism (2013 Jan 20)

Re: APOD: The Antikythera Mechanism (2013 Jan 20)

Re: APOD: The Antikythera Mechanism (2013 Jan 20)

Re: APOD: The Antikythera Mechanism (2013 Jan 20)