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Very nice! You've convinced me on the *University* point. I sloppily glossed over your qualifier that you were talking about the *educational system*. Sorry for that. Yes, I think we could do a much better job of teaching about higher order thinking ... thinking about thinking. 

But I think we do have a crisp disagreement that you well-state with:

On 3/9/21 2:40 PM, Prof David West wrote:
> But, is it not the case that there is a spectrum of individual difference in both aptitude and ability in this taking apart and putting together? And if we could move individual from one end of that spectrum towards the other, would that not be a good thing?

I confess I don't *know* if there is a spectrum, or not. I doubt it. I think we are all equally capable of lower and higher order thought like analysis, synthesis, and their interwoven use. I'd argue even my cat is just as capable of that as I am or you are. (Plato's dead. So he can't think at all.) Where the spectra lie is not in that higher order, or facility with it, but in the application domains within which it's used. E.g. when I heard my uncle talk of his experience as an underwater welder for the Navy, he exhibited what seemed like a similar facility to mine. It's just that I can't weld ... much less under water ... and he can't program, do any higher math, doesn't read philosophy or any religious texts but the Bible.

Given my doubt and alternative spectra, I can reformulate what you're asking to be "If we could move individuals from one domain to another, expose them to as many domains as possible, wouldn't that be a good thing?" And my answer to that is yes, absolutely. If my uncle had had a liberal arts education, he would not merely be a fantastic welder, he might've ended up a street philosopher, tossing out wisdom with the same ability he tossed out boiled crawfish.

Re: the ineffable:

> Missed (I think) Point: Is there any value in being able to comprehend/understand an ineffable thing, like Cantor's Absolute? Is that value, if any, exclusively enjoyed by the individual? Or, is there some possible group/social value? if the latter, would it be desirable if more people in the group could achieve that understanding/comprehension?

I think we disagree, here, fundamentally but not practically. I don't believe you *can* comprehend/understand something that's ineffable. What we can understand is the stuff lying around on the ground. The purported comprehension of something that can't be expressed is an illusion. We can only understand what is expressible. No expression, no understanding.

However, this kicks the can down the road a bit. Perhaps, in the *limit*, through parallax, many expressions approach a limit point (which may or may not "exist"). Then it takes just a bit of a Leap of Faith to jump from the many approximating expressions onto the (fake) limit. Here, you can get arbitrarily close to understanding that limit. But you never actually will understand it. This is what my uncle did with his welding. And it's what anyone does who SWEATS working on some task, in some domain. No sweat, no understanding.

So, to answer your question re this pragmatic reformulation, yes, *groups* can sweat with tasks, ask any long-lived bandmates. And would it be valuable if people would get off the couch and sweat more? Yes, absolutely. 8^D


On 3/9/21 2:40 PM, Prof David West wrote:
> Thanks for your comments. I understand and agree with part, but not all.
> 
> Agreememt: the division of analysis/decomposition and synthesis/composition. One of my favorite sci-fi books was Rite of Passage by Alexi Panshin. The two protagonists aspired to defined roles in their context: one was "ordinologist" the other "synthesist." The first was the person with the skills to organize and structure knowledge - like books and artifacts within a room. The latter was the person who could wander from room to room and know that "X" would make a huge contribution if moved to this other room, or these things from separate rooms should be clustered in this new room (and the ordinologist drop by to organize them of course).
> 
> Divergence: I believe we have an educational system, especially at the University level, that does an adequate job of producing ordinologists (scholars) but is woefully inadequate when it comes to producing synthesists. And, of course, I believe there would be value in producing some.
> 
> Orthogonal: status accretion. The first thing I thought of when reading your post was a favorite Plato quote:
> 
> /"[First,] perceiving and bringing together under one Idea the scattered particulars, so that one makes clear the thing which he wishes to do... [Second,] the separation of the Idea into classes, by dividing it where the natural joints are, and not trying to break any part, after the manner of as a bad carver... I love these processes of division and bringing together, and if I think any other man is able to see things that can naturally be collected into one and divided into many, him I will follow as if he were as a god."/
> 
> This seems to have some flavor of your status concern. But, is it not the case that there is a spectrum of individual difference in both aptitude and ability in this taking apart and putting together? And if we could move individual from one end of that spectrum towards the other, would that not be a good thing?
> 
> Of course the artificial status you speak of is very real and undeserved: there is no evidence that Jobs or Musk are farther along the spectrum than anyone else so why are they treated as if that was so? [There is clear evidence that the Kardashians are farther along the steatopygic spectrum than most and if that is a claim to fame/status, then it is deserved.]
> 
> Missed (I think) Point: Is there any value in being able to comprehend/understand an ineffable thing, like Cantor's Absolute? Is that value, if any, exclusively enjoyed by the individual? Or, is there some possible group/social value? if the latter, would it be desirable if more people in the group could achieve that understanding/comprehension?
> 
> BTW, with regard Plato. I know I am better than he was, so I do not mind at all that he would deem me a god.
> 
> davew

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