TEC154 2010S, Class 03: Basic Background Overview: * Clarification questions. * Winner. * Marx. * Pool. * Linking these ideas. Admin: * Today, e'll try to arrange our classroom in a configuration more amenable to discussion. * Yeah, it's a little bit spread out. We'll deal. * In general, I will not respond to your reading questions directly. * If you see them posted on the corresponding reading page, you can assume that I gave you a check. * If I give you a higher or lower grade, I'll drop you a note. * If you have questions you want answered, rather than just things that are interesting conceptual questions that demonstrate you've thought about the reading, please mark them as such. * And it's nice if those questions have the form "When author writes "quotation" what does he/she mean by "phrase" (p. ## of edition)." * We will go over some of the factual questions I received. * I'm making my way through your assignment 1's. A first set of answers of general interest will go out later today. * Today is dead tree day (aka carbon sequestering day) in TEC 154. * Lots of readings for next week. * Read Whittaker for Monday and the other two for Wednesday. * We still don't have a volunteer for taking daily notes for the class. * Note that this is something the whole class will benefit from, since the notes can be available to everyone. * EC for tonight's concert. [Supporting classmate.] * Attendance. Whee! What "discussion technology" do you prefer? Clarification Questions (Recitation Format) Q: Is social construction the same train of thought that follows the "We do not know that green is green; we only know that we call it green," approach to what knowledge is? (Pool reading) * All knowledge is what people agree it is. Things are not objective; there is no true or false; only what is agreed upon. * More complex than that. * Part of the issue is that there are different forms of social constructionism. Some things are obviously socially constructed, such as gender. We come to an agreement to understand things as so. * Evolves over time * Some things can't be proven scientifically (by the experimental method) * Well ... there was the Stanford Prison Experiment * An important alternate issue: There are biases in the way that knowledge is created: What problems are studied, the questiosn that are asked, etc. Pool states that many scientists accept the general idea of paradigms without understanding the deeper implications of the social constructivist perspective. What are these deeper implications? * Scientists accept Kuhn's notion of paradigm shifts w/o accepting the deeper implications of Kuhn's work. * They don't get that there is no objective basis to these paradigms. * They don't get that someone made the choices as to what to study and what questions to ask. What makes the author think that people know that Santa Claus wears a red suit and rides in a sleigh pulled by eight reindeer? What makes the author think that people know that Santa Claus exists at all? * He doesn't really think that Santa Claus exists. * He is using a rhetorical flourish. * Speaks about the use of Santa Claus in the media. * Feels more relevant to many people than the knowledge of special or general relativity. * Something that is known that is not provable - a useful example of social constructionism * Empirical study can't be used for everything * If we step outside of our narrow, Western, objectivist perspective, maybe we'll know other things * Side note: Science is more about the ability to disprove than the ability to prove. What does "rhetoric of the technological sublime" means in chapter 1? * The implicit or explict claim taht technology is the best thing for society. * Refer's to Daniel Webster's speeches * "He invests the railroad with a quasi-religious inevitability that lends force to the characterization of his language as the rhetoric of the technologically sublime." * A way of reinforcing his claim that technology is the ends not the means. * To clarify, does Winner believe that technology is becoming INCREASINGLY influenced by the political environment in which it is conceived, or does he merely accept that technology and political goals coincide as much now as they did 1,500 years ago? 3,000 years ago? What was the Three Mile Island accident? * The most significant nuclear power plant accidents in America. * Gave a huge pause to a growing nuclear industry. What happened at the Haymarket Square bombing mentioned in Winner's essay? (It seemed to be just mentioned but I didn't get what it related to) * Part of the early American labor movement (late 1800's, Chicago) What is an ABM? * Anti-ballistic missle What is an SST? * Super-sonic transport What is mechanical philosophy? Are there still aficionados who drive steam-powered cars? Is there anyone who still drives steam-powered cars? I was very interested in Winner's examples of the political purposes of some technological designs. Has anyone studied more recent examples of some of these ideas? Where can I find them? Is Winner's argument that the atom bomb is political logical? I think the reasons that nuclear weapons "require" hierarchical command structures, is because of politics (destroying cities is definitely political) not something inherent in the bomb. On page 10 (in the tenth edition), what does Marx mean when he talks about technology being idolized? Or maybe he doesn't say that ... that's just what I got from it. On page 16 (in the tenth edition), is Pool trying to say that society controls technology? If so, I don't understand how that could be. If not, what is he saying there then?