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Tokyodreamer
SFN Regular
USA
1447 Posts |
 Posted - 01/15/2002 : 12:14:53
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I kind of embarrassed myself, but I couldn't let it go. I started my English 101 class (I'm going back to school, and I need the core basics...) and we were discussing a short essay. The author used the terms "There is evidence to suggest..." without actually citing any sources. The teacher was explaining why this was not a good technique, as one can find evidence supporting just about any position, when she said something like this:
quote:
It's like in science, in which you come up with an hypothesis, then go out and look for evidence that supports it, while throwing away the evidence that doesn't.
My jaw dropped, and before I knew it, I had slightly raised my hand just as the teacher looked at me. "Yes?", she asked. After a few seconds of embarrassed silence (what the hell did I raise my hand for?!) I said, "That example you gave, about science? That was an example of bad science, not science! But I'm off topic, sorry."
And she said something about yes, it was a generalization, but it does happen sometimes, right? I just wanted to disappear so I just nodded and let her move on.
This just makes me so angry. A person of authority, in a class filled with skulls full of mush, spreading such misinformation and mischaracterization. What's a guy to do?
(She also mentioned that myth about us only using a small percentage of our brains, but I didn't want to sound like a smartass...  )
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Sum Ergo Cogito
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Slater
SFN Regular
USA
1668 Posts |
 Posted - 01/15/2002 : 13:54:51 [Permalink]
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quote:
(She also mentioned that myth about us only using a small percentage of our brains, but I didn't want to sound like a smartass... )
It sounds like, in her case, that it isn't really a myth.
Just keep in mind that since she is a "word person" she probably gets most of her information anecdotely-where it is more important that it be a "good" (entertaining) story and facts are of little import. That would explain why she wasn't interested enough in science to find out how it works. But she knows a juicey piece of gosip will make people listen to her.
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The brain that was stolen from my laboratory was a criminal brain. Only evil will come from it. |
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Dog_Ed
Skeptic Friend
USA
126 Posts |
Posted - 01/15/2002 : 21:00:29 [Permalink]
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Sheesh. One would wish that even those whose field might include rhetoric would have a broad enough knowledge base to understand scientific methodology. It sounds like she was thinking of techniques for winning arguments (debating, rhetoric) and not research.
"Even Einstein put his foot in it sometimes"
Edited by - Dog_Ed on 01/15/2002 21:03:45 |
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Garrette
SFN Regular
USA
562 Posts |
Posted - 01/16/2002 : 05:58:27 [Permalink]
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This has been a frustration of mine in regard to literary types (in which category I include myself). Some professors of literature that I had were quite good, but most were of the ivory tower variety with what I believed to be artificial appreciation of literature.
I also had a philosophy professor of the same ilk who prattled on and on about the wonderful insights of Kant and Schopenhauer and Ren and Stimpy (not really, but he might as well have). We clashed frequently until one heated argument when I asked him to demonstrate one instance in which the philosophies he was teaching had caused him to change his behavior or his thinking outside the classroom. He could provide nothing. I accused him of reducing philosophy to an academic exercise without application and suggested he was unfit to teach it. I did not do so well in that class but--to his credit--not as poorly as I might have expected.
In regard to your teacher, Tokyo, I'd take heart at least that she doesn't want you to practice that bad technique. Take careful notes, though, to show her when she grades you poorly for not interpreting some work as she believes it should be.
My kids still love me. |
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