A Study in Luddites and Tech Optimism

I read Postman's article first. Postman's tone, arguments, and logic struck a familiar cord. Many of his more conservative notions were things espoused to me by academics that I was exposed to in my undergraduate years, and K-12 years as well. Reading Joseph's article second was, as suggested, a far more optimistic read, and also a broader minded one that I felt addressed the pieces of educational debate that I find most resonant with my actual lived experience and personal observations.

I think it's interesting that while both articles are essentially informed opinion pieces it is clear that Joseph holds himself to a higher standard of burden of proof than Postman does. Postman is busy setting up his own defense while also a number of alarmist statements and strawmen for him to handily pretend he has defeated.

Joseph builds a steady case based on persistent observations and criticisms that have existed in the public education sphere before the rise of tech, and will naturally need to be addressed after tech as well. He is looking at the problems from an educators perspective who is critical of the system, but also recognizes the value of it. When I was in school, and training to be a teacher, it was these types of educators who I felt taught me the most applicable information to life. They were able to cut through the alarmist or value judgments on things and show me the common threads that run through education, its follies, and its possibilities.

I think both authors look at technology as a tool and a cultural game-changer with very different conclusions. Postman claims the tool and the cultural shift that tech brings are worthless. Window dressing to what is already within us and pushed only on the pretense of progress that will ultimately harm society and the child. Joseph acknowledges that there are issues that have existed in education (specifically the education of children) that need addressing, and tech is a tool that has the capacity to address those issues in humanistic ways that can benefit society and the child.

I think both authors make points that I agree with, and both make points that I disagree with. That is to say, my life experience, my identity, and my own educational and professional journey have informed me in ways that align with and deviate from these author's points.

Postman says:

[Machines] divert the intelligence and energy of talented people from addressing the issues we need most to confront.

It seems he is addressing the issue of computers in the classroom here. Or perhaps televisions in the home. Doing some research on the man suggests these were ideas he regularly spoke out against for various reasons. I think there is a potential case to be made for the ways in which implementation of machines for the sake of having machines - or, these days, as a result of a complicated dance between teaching staff, community needs, perceived community needs, administrative posturing, government requirements, and a whole host of other factors - leads to detrimental outcomes in childhood education. When talking over issues with the school board in the district my children attend, it becomes clear that depending on who is on the board, and what their values and priorities and pressures are, that will be what gets passed down, but also, ever individual teacher develops a strong classroom culture within the limitations or allowances set at the district level. This can impact greatly when a personal device is the soul or single other available resource for learning besides the teacher in school (and/or the caretaker at home), the computer is taking the place and even displacing crucial elements of education - as Postman fears - but not because of what the tool is. Moreso because what it takes to achieve what Joseph cites: 

Takes much more to achieve. Postman fails to draw out as rich of a list of what defines the successful education of a child, but does somewhat give a nod to the role of peers in education when he says:

One of the principal functions of school is to teach children how to behave in groups.

However, unlike Joseph, uses this to then segue his thoughts into saying the loss of patriotic or nationalist-minded shared ideals dooms a well-functioning education system. While I can appreciate that a shared vision is a powerful motivator, and that schools were built with the intent to foster a particular shared vision in children, I would refer to the research brought up by Joseph that when schools were created, the list of goals the average person with school system law making power had in mind were the ones listed in the Industrial Age column of the table below:

This suggests to me that the vision Postman has is built on the very intent he claims to be criticizing. He says:

...contrary to conventional wisdom, new technologies do not, by and large, increase people's options but do just the opposite ... which is to say that there is an imperialistic thrust to technology, a strong tendency to get everyone to conform to the requirements of what is new.

This 'imperialistic thrust' is what drove and defined the ideals he holds up as unifying and what he asserts is better to be held onto. Imperialistic thrust, albeit of a different flavor than the royalty that it declared independence from, is what built the economy of this country, and its schooling ideals. A push towards conformity is built into the structure of schools at large, tech is merely a newer tool that can be used to manipulate how that is accomplished or not.

Joseph seems to have a better handle on this reality. He seems more keen to assert that we must view technology with the type of creative, inventive, and nuanced acceptance that is required of anyone who recognizes that a system is overall not structured for optimal education. However, what I find lacking is that he does not do this with a more overt and stronger hold to the consistent message that the structure itself needs changing, and how technology could contribute to that. In this it is interesting to me that where Postman feels empowered to bring politics into his piece, I imagine Joseph would risk not getting published if he did the same.

I also wish that Joseph had put a more critical eye on the potential pitfalls of a customization driven environment that is created by the ways tech makes it easy to achieve. I think this is where I feel the age of the article the most. Especially when he says,

...assembly-line jobs have largely disappeared, and employers, even in the manufacturing sector, are now looking for people who can solved problems, take initiative, and offer diverse perspectives as part of teams.

 I do not think assembly-line jobs have largely disappeared.  Or if they had in the early 2000's, they made a comeback. Thinking especially of Stryker and Amazon workers. I am also not convinced that what employers are looking for in their employees fits with his take. I have heard from friends and experienced in my own career that much of this is mostly intent without much of a shift in Industrial Age mindsets. I also do not think schools have found ways to implement tech that does not lean more into fitting it into poor practices rather than elevating their methods with the use of tech. Not in any sort of equitable way. I know this especially having observed and worked for an online curriculum platform during the Covid lock-down years. 

Article Links:

https://www.faculty.rsu.edu/users/f/felwell/www/Theorists/Postman/Articles/TECHNOS_NET.htm

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/267869194

Some other points of note from the readings I want to remember:

From Postman:

I have not yet heard a satisfactory answer to the question “What is the problem to which this $50 billion investment is the solution?” I suspect that an honest answer would be something like this: “There is no social or intellectual problem, but we can stimulate the economy by investing in new technologies.”

Where I find his assertion to be a strawman:
- democratization of information

- visibility and findability (for better or worse) enhancement (in places proclaiming freedom of information - freedom of speech? (same diff?)) of marginalized persons

- mass data processing 

- the 'potential'

- requires of humanity a new shelf of awareness and/or grappling with an environment they are not evolutionarily adapted to (for better or worse)

- artistic magnification

- human connection and collaboration (for better or worse)

- visibility/findability of movements, global happenings, context, opinion across more shared views than at any point or by any one person throughout history (for better or worse)

- mass disruption experiment

-widespread accessibility options?

Additional Strawmen

- Information has become a form of garbage. It comes indiscriminately, directed at no one in particular, disconnected from usefulness. We are swamped by information, have no control over it, and don't know what to do with it.

- The role of the school is to help students learn how to ignore and discard information so that they can achieve a sense of coherence in their lives; to help students cultivate a sense of social responsibility; to help students think critically, historically, and humanely; to help students understand the ways in which technology shapes their consciousness; to help students learn that their own needs sometimes are subordinate to the needs of the group.

- If a nuclear holocaust should occur some place in the world, it will not happen because of insufficient information; if children are starving in Somalia, it's not because of insufficient information; if crime terrorizes our cities, marriages are breaking up, mental disorders are increasing, and children are being abused, none of this happens because of a lack of information. These things happen because we lack something else. It is the “something else” that is now the business of schools.

For Future Reference