Chapman Kids Blog

"In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world." –John 16:33

Tag: history

Linux and civilization

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On Wednesday, August 5, 2015

In culture, Software, Technology

Installing LinuxThe “scratch and dent” computer I bought from the Dell Outlet website with a discount coupon arrived today. I think I got a screamin’ deal. I bought it because I needed a Linux computer for some contract work I am doing in the evenings to get one of my old employers over the hump with a product they are trying to get out. So I spent most of yesterday evening loading all the tools I need to do the development onto the new computer. That included Xubuntu 14.04 LTS, Qt/Qt Creator, OpenCV (finally moving to version 3!), a subversion client, etc., etc. I needed to build OpenCV in a specific way required by the application so I did that, too.

The upshot to all this is that I needed to sit and wait for things to finish downloading, installing and building. During that time, I found a great article about three phases through which civilizations pass: Barbaric, Vigorous and Decadent. Here is the premise of the article titled A Tour of Our Decadent Civilization on the Sultan Knish blog:

It’s easy to find examples of barbaric and decadent civilizations. We can find all the barbaric civilizations to suit an entire faculty’s worth of anthropologists in the Middle East. And then back home we can see the decadent civilization that employs their kind to bemoan the West.

Vigorous is what America used to be when it was moving west, producing at record rates and becoming a world power. Decadent is what it is becoming.

Christian and I had an interesting talk about all this on the phone a couple of nights ago. The thing that amazes me is that the vast bulk of people in America do not get it. In our conversation we attributed it to the fact that most people under the age of 30 get their information from Reddit, Slashdot, Comedy Central and Huffington Post while people over 30 get their information from Facebook.

I think we are partially right. People buy into the pseudo-scholarship of Richard Dawkins, Bart Ehrman, Marcus Borg, Stephen Hawking, Lawrence Krauss, Sam Harris and the like who represent their false ideas based on personal agendas and/or ruminations way outside their fields of expertise. It makes its way into pop culture because it allows people license to live how they want in the moment rather than do the hard work and self denial based on morays driven by objective truth.

The conclusion of the matter is the same as it has always been. Our chunk of civilization in our time and place will wake up one way or the other. Unless there are changes, it will be a very rude awakening.

Betty Blonde #388 – 01/11/2010
Betty Blonde #388
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Did politically correctness kill the Liberal Arts with the help of the College Board?

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On Thursday, June 4, 2015

In Education, Homeschool

GW Thielman, in an article at The Federalist helpfully titled The Liberal Arts Are Dead, Long Live STEM, makes the point that what goes for a Liberal Arts education today has become incredibly illiberal. STEM, of course, being the acronym for fields in Science, Technology, Engineering and Math. He believes the focus of “liberal arts” education these days is more about the politically correct zeitgeist of the day than the preparation of students to think critically. He gives a great explanation of this point I have tried to make frequently on this blog.

STEM curricula have been critiqued for supposedly neglecting the humanities, but students who major in STEM obtain more credit hours in languages, arts, and human interaction than their humanities counterparts obtain in scientific fields. Rhodes College professor Loretta Jackson-Hayes has explained the benefit of liberal arts for STEM students, but liberal-arts students could likewise benefit from cross-training in the more exacting disciplines.

Students who pursue STEM majors are also better at the humanities than liberal-arts majors are at the sciences. Harvard law professor Harvey Mansfield in The New Atlantis observed, “Science students do well in non-science courses, but non-science students have difficulty in science courses. Slaves of exactness find it easier to adjust to the inexact, though they may be disdainful of it, than those who think in the realm of the inexact when confronted with the exact.” Perhaps envy subtly contributes to liberal arts defensiveness against STEM.

This is precisely why our children earned STEM undergraduate degrees. One went on to graduate work in STEM, but the other was accepted for a PhD at a great school in a non-STEM field specifically because she had an undergraduate degree in a STEM field. Theilman goes into this in detail with some excellent supporting links.

Right after I read his article, I ran into another article by Stanley Kurtz in National Review titled How the College Board Politicized U.S. History. I believe it is about precisely the same problem. The article discusses how the College Board, the company that makes standardized examinations like CLEP, the SAT and high school AP tests is degrading their AP materials by politicizing in a disturbingly politically correct, left-wing way. He is not the only one. You can read more about a group of highly credentialed historians made a statement denouncing this revisionism in this article at Real Clear Politics titled College Board’s Reckless Spin on U.S. History.

This is precisely why we are so grateful we homeschooled our children and sent them on to do STEM degrees and why I continue to push back on this kind of revisionism whenever I get the chance.

Betty Blonde #338 – 11/02/2009
Betty Blonde #338
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Luke at Sonlight experiences homeschool disconnect in his class

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On Wednesday, November 16, 2011

In Education, Homeschool

Landmark History of the American PeopleLuke Holzman over at the Sonlight Blog wrote a post about how he learned less about history in his traditional school than he did in homeschool.  That experience resonates with us.  See here, here, and here.  He talked about the Sonlight Core D & E Curricula that includes the Landmark History of the American People books. He is right and this is part of the reason we have been such big fans of Sonlight. They are awesome books and give a feel for history I have not seen anywhere else. Now if they could just kick that horrible Joy Hakim history curriculum to the curb and find a worthy replacement.  It was less than useless for us.

Rembrandt comes to the North Carolina Museum of Art

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On Wednesday, October 26, 2011

In General

Day 65 of 1000

We were amazed back in 2008 that a Dead Sea Scrolls exhibit came to the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences with tons of artifacts.  Duke University loaned some old, old bibles from their collection to add to the exhibit.  That was one of the highlights of our homeschool year.  Then, last spring Christian and Kelly were both required to go to the North Carolina Museum of Art as part of their Art Appreciation class at the community college.  Lorena and I took them one Saturday.  The collection their is amazing.  Now, the Art Museum has brought Rembrandt in America to Raleigh for a three month stay.  Grandpa Milo, Grandma Sarah, and our dear friend Gladys are coming for Thanksgiving this year,  Maybe we can all go see Rembrandt together.  Another hat tip to Andrew.  We do not know how he finds all this stuff, but we are glad he does.  Maybe we can get he and his bride to tag along with us.  Just sayin’.

We also love the North Carolina Museum of History.  Our favorite visit there was about North Carolina’s rich pirate history–Blackbeard and all that.  We need to start watching all of these museums a little more closely for these types of opportunities.

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