Fuel and Engines

Posted to Dave Warlick's Flat Classroom Fuel:

Fuel and engines. Wrong analogies. Suggest static configuration, consumption, instead of what actually happens in a complex ecosystem.

This is why you would say kids have less of an experience of the world than you do. You consumed a great deal, but did not interact with it, mold it and fashion it, make it your own. You passively became the recipient of The Taming of the Shrew, like the engine passively consumes fuel.

Maybe The Taming of the Shrew is part of a child’s landscape today, maybe not; they are drawing from a much larger selection (ecosystems thrive on diversity, but engines choke on it). The input of The Taming of the Shrew, wherever it occurs, is transformed, reshaped, and becomes part of the organic culture that is dynamic, evolving, growing.

I’m really surprised you would post this, really surprised your wouldn’t get where your metaphor is leading you astray here. But the influence of a monoculture is pervasive, and we don’t always recognize the impacts in our thinking.

p.s. (not part of the post)

It's funny, isn't it, how I can post here in almost total obscurity. I like that. I think I need that.