End of Semester

Hello all! Yet another semester has come and gone by much too fast and there is, happily, something to show for it. For me, this semester was a mind-altering one. I think about the world differently now than I did before. A fairly arresting notion for me, slightly disconcerting at times, but a change which I more or less welcome. The primary change, I believe, is that I now demand a better understanding of the subject matter with which I am engaged. To quote physicist Richard Feynman,
“ You can know the name of a bird in all the languages of the world, but when you’re finished, you’ll know absolutely nothing whatever about the bird... So let’s look at the bird and see what it’s doing — that’s what counts. I learned very early the difference between knowing the name of something and knowing something.”
Before this in my educational career, I mostly, sadly, went along for the ride. Sure I had questions but they never got to the heart of the issue. To continue Feynman’s illustrious example, I would ask how to say the birds name in German. A valid question but one which doesn’t see the full picture.
Sticking with physics for the moment, I had an important realization about my education the other day. I studied with a friend of mine who is going to be a very good doctor some day. He is very driven. However, I don’t much get his studying habits. He goes through the book, writes down every possible equation, most of which are manipulations of the same equation for specific circumstances, and proceeds to memorize all of them. Now, for a test over three chapters, this is somewhere around twenty to thirty various equations, many with the same variables. This is not how I learn, but I don’t think it’s how my friend learns either. I’m going to ask him next semester to write down as many equations as he can remember and see how many he gets, even if only to satisfy personal curiosity. However, if I had to make a bet, I would put money on him not getting too many down. So the obvious conclusion is that he’s learning it for the test. But then, what’s the point?
For me, my education is at its best when it’s real. When, for example, I’m driving back to school along a curve going 60 miles per hour and am able to calculate the coefficient of kinetic friction which my soda would slide across the dash board. (µ = .281 by the way). Moreover, my education is for me. It’s personal, which is why I liked this semester in Paideia where we each basically shared how our education was personal to all of us. What do we actually think about when we get out of class? What do we come away with? What matters?
I switched majors from biology to philosophy. Even now I’m not sure which had more influence on the other (whether switching majors made me think differently, or whether I was thinking differently, and so I naturally switched majors). I think it more the latter, but it was undoubtedly a combination of the two. Switching majors is not an everyday occurrence certainly, and particularly not after having already spent half my time here. It will have its effects. Thanks to my folks’ intense understanding, graciousness, and dough, I’ll probably be able to take an extra semester for the philosophy capstone. Now, I want to talk specifically about switching majors for a make-up blog, so I won’t go into such great detail on the matter now, but the issue goes hand in hand with the value of Paideia and why I enjoy the program so much. Put briefly, I wouldn’t be a philosophy major if I wasn’t getting a liberal-arts education, perhaps if I wasn’t in Paideia either but that seems to difficult to tell for sure. Now, what is it specifically about Paideia this semester that aided in this transformation? (Because I do indeed think that motivation was behind the very content of what we spoke about).
We certainly spoke a great deal about science and art and their relation to knowledge in general. I really enjoyed how Michelle’s reading on Proust contributed to this idea. I think it should be required reading for all science majors. As we spoke about in the meeting, I think science is misperceived by most and given a tremendous amount of blind faith. I think this is at its clearest in the FJS building. What happened to curiosity? Where’s more of the Bryson-ian questioning of the fundamentals? Science is, of course, based on such questioning, and yet very rarely was it found amongst my peers. It is not about memorizing equations. Memorization is blasphemous to science. It is contrary to its every goal and purpose. It just doesn’t make sense.
And yet such faith in science is widespread, and with it comes the distrust of the humanities. There isn’t room, apparently, for both. Since they seem in contradiction, it is the logical choice to choose one over the other. Bullshit. I understand there are differences in the methods of determining what is and how to best acquire knowledge within each field, but to argue that science is the “objective field,” while the humanities are the “subjective field,” does nothing more than illustrate a severe misunderstanding of the issue as a whole and of science in particular.
Discussions we had in Paideia on the nature of science helped me in two ways. First, simply in that it was an outlet for my own thought, as the discussion on Bryson should indicate. But it’s a two way street, and hearing what others said on Bryson, along with Katie and Michelle’s readings in particular, sparked much thought on the issue of education in general, and more specifically science.
Apart from the very content though, I enjoyed Paideia most this semester because I realized its value specifically in making connections between ideas. These ranged from almost trivially obvious ones that have even so not been made, like biology and life, to frequent ones that are often misperceived such as science and religion. Raw discussion is perfect for this goal and that’s why Paideia is so valuable, even if it isn’t entitled as an honors program.
That said, some small things can be done to improve Paideia. Everybody needs to read. Everybody also needs to get readings in on time. I didn’t get mine in on time, so I don’t have room to talk there, but I did read. I also realized, after reading Katie’s blog that I should have tried to advocate a more provocative view on Bryson. This should be at the foreground for everyone as well. All in all, I think Paideia went well considering Caitlin and Brady are both abroad. Good job all.