“Presumably you didn’t mean to insult these folks, who represent a core museum constituency. Every art museum serves two publics — an art public and a general public. After the affront, your interview puts a thumb on the scale for the latter.” – Los Angeles Times
Author: Douglas McLennan
Skills Versus Knowledge: Are We Teaching Kids The Wrong Way?
What if the best way to boost reading comprehension is not to drill kids on discrete skills but to teach them, as early as possible, the very things we’ve marginalized—including history, science, and other content that could build the knowledge and vocabulary they need to understand both written texts and the world around them? – The Atlantic
Egypt Asks Interpol To Track Tut Artifact It Believes Was Stolen And Sold At Christie’s Auction
Egypt said on Tuesday it had asked Interpol to track the statue and other artefacts over alleged missing paperwork, and it criticised British authorities for not supporting its claim. – The Guardian
Want To Tear Down Authority, Then Attack The Authority (Not Its Argument)
“Contrary to the popular view, I think that we sometimes have good reasons to argue against the person. In other words, ad hominem arguments can be good arguments, especially when they are construed as rebuttals to appeals to authority.” – Aeon
Warner Announces New Streaming Service Built Around HBO – A Really Dumb Idea?
Some 35 million households now subscribe to HBO either via their cable service or the HBO Now streaming service. They’re used to paying for premium content. HBO is betting that they’ll pay roughly the same amount for a lot more of this other stuff. HBO Max subscribers will get everything a current HBO subscription delivers plus a lot more from TBS, TNT, Cartoon Network and CNN. – Washington Post
Hollywood Is Betting Big On Remakes. But New Study Suggests Audiences Aren’t Thrilled
The study found that fully 91 percent of remakes drew a less positive audience score than the original. Among critics, the remakes received a lower Metacritic score just slightly less frequently -— 87 percent of the time. – Washington Post
Bournemouth Symphony Calls On Orchestras To Employ Disabled Musicians, Touting Its Own Successes
It received funding from Arts Council England’s Change Makers initiative to become more accessible and inclusive. Alongside organisational changes like disability awareness training, BSO created a disabled-led ensemble, BSO Resound, and supported a training placement for its Director, conductor James Rose. – Arts Professional
Some Science Has Become So Theoretical It Lacks Evidence. Are We Fooling Ourselves?
In the past, experiments played a vital role in developing theory and vice versa. For some time now that back-and-forth has not existed in certain fields where experiments are barely managing to test theories developed over decades. Wherever experimental data can be coaxed out of nature, it suffices to corroborate or refute a theory and serves as the sole arbiter of validity. But where evidence is spare or absent – as it is for a growing number of questions in physics – other criteria, including aesthetic ones, have been allowed to come into play both in formulating a theory and evaluating it. – The Guardian
What Happens When We Lose The Capacity To Be Bored?
In the past, work was recognized for its colonizing power, expanding to fill and dominate time itself such that there might exist no clear line between work hours and nonwork hours. Our current condition is worse. The Interface, leveraging boredom, makes us all into unpaid workers for the advertisers who support those apparently cost-free platforms. We ought to recall that there is no such thing as a free transaction. In this species of transaction, you pay with your individuality, freedom, and happiness. – The Walrus
Is Failure A New Literary Genre?
Karl Ove Knausgård devoted several autobiographical volumes to everyday failures in My Struggle, and since then there has been a deluge of ‘fail-lit’, both in fiction and non-fiction. Could failure be the new literary success? And if so, doesn’t that mean it’s not really failure at all? – BBC