Episode 5 Beyond Binary Interviews. Women In Tech: Jess Houlgrave

We hear more and more about the need to get more women in tech. More female founders, female funders, and more female panelists at events.

Is it a man's world?

Jess Houlgrave, founder of Codex Protocol and shEOS recently said in an interview with the Spectator that blockchain is  "an industry based on merit. It’s very diverse, very varied politically and geographically — so no one cares whether you’re male or female, it’s about how good you are".

Does that mean there isn't a problem?

We discuss with Jess herself, her thoughts, experiences and theories, on the role of software, society, finance, the media, quotas, regulation and education in correcting the balance.

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Episode 4 Why Does Everyone Hate Vegans?

If you’ve ever met a vegan, you’ve probably heard the arguments about the problems with eating meat.
You’re also probably familiar the stereotype of vegans being anything but persuasive in their approach.
Are you sure it’s them that you hate?
Maybe it’s the consequences of some of your actions?
Have a think about it. Maybe go beyond binary thinking.
Try a vegan meal. The animals will thank you for it. I’ll thank you for it, and I’m pretty sure you’ll enjoy it.

Why are vegans annoying?

We explore cognitive dissonance, the social psychology behind minorities more effectively persuading the majority to their point of view.

Do you hate vegans? Why? When they talk about cruelty, does it make you feel uncomfortable?

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Episode 3 Universal Basic Income. Will Robots Free or Enslave us?

Will the AI revolution change the world as much as the industrial revolution? Who will benefit, which jobs will be made, and which will automation make extinct?

 

Is Universal Basic Income or Negative Income Tax the solution? Can technology help put the community back in society?

 

From time banks, to social credit, from Big Brother to Robot Overloads, we discuss how AI, automation, the rising power of corporations, and changes in taxation will change society.

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Episode 2 Education - To Standardise, Specialise, Privatise or Subsidize

Education, Privatise, Standadize, Subsidise, or Specialised

Having an overly scripted and prescriptive syllabus on any course means that there is less room for teachers to adapt to the students, to add their own personal style to classes
Examples of teachers who have left the profession due to over-standardisation)

Can force a “one size fits all” approach, which limits opportunities
The danger is falling into “transfer-content pedagogy” which emphasises one correct way.

Enabling intrinsic need for self-development, is fairly Idealised, is it a bit wishy-washy?

You want a standardised doctor for pure truths, but that’s false. I don’t see an objective truth, doctors don’t know everything, they make mediocre decisions?

And a cure for cancer, might come from a more Asian thinking?

Perhaps the next Nobel prize comes from the Swedish system? Or you might get a really good American student that is really good, despite their ridiculous system of over testing.

The Waldorf style school of education doesn’t prevent people from becoming doctors.
I think the key is the public school system because at the end of the day, our taxes are paying for it.
What are the pros of standardised assessment?

• Ensures a consistent approach and measurement of students across a target group (class/school/district/nation/globally) - especially important for any global qualifications such as universally recognised language certificates
• Way of getting feedback on how a syllabus and curriculum can be adjusted/improved
• Can be used to address issues of inequality (geographical/socio-economic/ethnic/etc) where any systematic disparities exist

Cons of standardisation of assessment are:

• It can overemphasise the importance of test results over authentic learning (short vs long-term)
• Can lead politicians believing that analysing test results are the main way of improving education
• High-quality assessment is expensive and time-consuming, so cheaper and easier methods may be applied (e.g. multiple choice) that aren’t as accurate

It’s interesting, with technology, you can now have the best lecture, on any subject, beamed into the classroom, but that’s just wheeling the tv in, and it's a poor substitute for someone that’s in the room, interacting with the kids, seeing their reaction, understanding their needs, and know what they’ve understood, and adjusting accordingly.
The Khan Academy is a good example of a flipped classroom. An individualised and contextualised approach is required, because there’s no such thing as one standardised humanoid, each with different ways of processing information. I’ve learned a bit from watching YouTube videos, with concise 5 minute videos.
Parents get oversight, and managers can see how teachers are doing, but it could be used globally to compare.
I think technology is extraordinary, and I think it’ll change things in more than just that way. As remote working is getting more possible parents have more time with their kids, and can impart more knowledge.  So kids won’t have to bounce off of corporate offices to see how work happens and gain a better understanding.
and Parents being at home is a very important part of the equation, if you look at NGOs and the UN now focusing on educating mothers, and they reason they do that is because mothers are more likely to be at home, so that investment is multiplied compared to a father that’s rarely home.

Things like flipping the classroom, teaching social skills, discussing entrepreneurial possibilities, thinking holistically, and even the traditional family business, will all be much more common and doable once the family united is reunited.
Computerized, centralised systems, makes for a freer system, but there will be checks and balances.

Homeschooling is a really interesting alternative if the public school doesn’t meet your requirements.

How businesses view learning compared to governments.

• Teaching has become increasingly more difficulty (parents/taxpayers/content)
• State/Local school board voted in by taxpayers (inc. those without kids)
• Disadvantage of system is religious/political intervention and dictation of syllabus/marking rather than professional educators/best practice
• “helicopter” vs “snowplough” vs “homeschool” parents (who communicate vs removing all obstacles vs overcoming difficulties)
• Main issue seems to be “uninformed” parents wielding democratic power (criticism of direct democracy / Brexit etc)
• How much unionisation of teachers is there in the US? To fight back again parental tyranny
• “parents want control over their children's education but don't want to educate themselves to do it in the best possible way” totally correct – covering up their own flaws with egoic legal threat, what about Trump as a role model? This is his modus operandi

 Typically we spend most of our childhood and adolescent lives in some form of education system. Education also holds the key to the future evolution and adaptation of our species, and our very survival in the rapidly changing modern world. It gives us knowledge of the world and skills that we can apply throughout our working lives. It inspires us to become autodidacts - lifelong learners with boundless curiosity about the world around us.. Or at least, these should be the ideals of a good education…

The difficulty in ensuring education is as good as it can be, often comes down to pragmatic differences. Should taxpayers fund public schools, or should there be a range of private options, with different prices on offer to those who can afford to pay more? Should what is learned be standardised or should students be able to decide for themselves what they want to pursue so that they are as engaged as possible in their studies? This is a classic example of ‘binary thinking’, which is so common in public and private discourse nowadays. Our aim is to go beyond binary thinking and delve into other possibilities that provide alternative answers.

One key issue is that of private vs state education. It is good to have variety, but hard to get investment in education if high rate taxpayers don’t use the service. Nevertheless, investment in education benefits all, from crime reduction to boosting the economy. This makes a strong case for a public/ state education system. Investment in education pays off in terms of savings at a ratio of 8 to 1, and is therefore one of the key areas to invest in. Who wants to live in a world where there isn’t a basic level of dignity for the poorest and most marginalised in society? If we want a better world, we should want it for everyone, not just those closest to us. Wanting the best and giving equal opportunity to everyone (even those we may fear or despise) will ensure a better overall standard of living for those we love.

Private schools are seen by some as elite and by others as a personal choice concerning what is best for their children. Why shouldn’t someone who works hard, be able to make this investment in the future of their children? There is certainly a strong case for private and alternative schooling, especially in terms of syllabus and flexibility as will be mentioned later, yet there are also drawbacks. Private schools tend to take children from richer families, who have usually invested more into their children in terms of private tutoring and extra-curricular activities (music, sports, clubs, etc) and this means that there is a ‘brain drain’ for local state schools, who tend to end up with students from poorer backgrounds. They can be less engaged and more prone to discipline issues for a variety of reasons.

It would therefore make sense to create community dialogues, exchanges and co-operation between private and neighbouring state schools in the future. In some countries, such as the UK, private schools receive tax relief meaning they have higher amounts available to spend. Some of this could be invested in in communal projects that would bring together students from richer and poorer backgrounds alike. This would make meaningful connections and break down perceived class barriers, bringing an exchange of ideas and viewpoints that students might not usually encounter. This could be done via practical projects such as building and construction challenges, musical collaboration, communal gardens (as a way for them to learn about vegetables and home-grown produce) or sports competitions and events (without segregation between schools, as this could lead to the opposite of the desired effect). This is just one idea to address an imbalance in the current UK school system. State schools must follow the National Curriculum, whereas private schools are not obliged to and have more freedom to teach any kind of religious education, and teach a range of viewpoints.

Should there be a National Curriculum for all schools, whether private or state funded? There’s a danger in not standardising education. For example, some secondary science teachers struggle helping homeschooled and liberal arts school students with basic science, which is no longer compulsory at a primary level. It would seem that basic maths and science subjects are two essential candidates for inclusion in a standardised system, for any type of schooling. They are verifiable, testable and fundamental to understanding the world around us. They are some of the most essential tools for life in the modern world. Moreover there are no contradicting points, not at least until the very highest levels at the frontiers of modern theoretical science, yet this is covered at postgraduate levels and goes beyond the scope of this blog post.

Which other subjects should be standardised? There are a range of opinions on this but one clear essential is a kind of ‘social studies’ that includes basic sexual education, money and law. It seems that these issues are not often taught in schools (some argue it is a parental responsibility) yet how can a child become a responsible adult if they are unaware of the laws of the society they live in? Indeed, in the UK the law applies to all equally and ignorance is no defence, which makes this a state responsibility. Sex education has also been consistently proven to lower rates of teenage pregnancy (e.g. recent studies in the Netherlands, where there is a comprehensive national sex education system have shown this to be the case). It seems that some conservatives are against this idea as they feel it would lead to increased sexual promiscuity, but such systems have been shown to have no such effect on promiscuity, nor on the rise of sexually transmitted diseases.

Other subjects that could be included are basic geography, languages and music (native and an additional language), along with playing a musical instrument, have been shown to have many long term benefits on brain/mental health). Cooking, diet and physical exercise are also fundamental topics that children must be educated in if they are to be healthy. This is another example of investment paying off in the long term and seems to have been neglected in the USA and the UK, given the extent of the obesity and mental health problems in both these countries.

The key advantage of a standardised syllabus is ensuring that the very basics are taught, consistently, to all students in the world, to ensure that they have the best opportunity to live a healthy, happy and well-rounded life. It should provide them with the tools they need not only to survive, but also to thrive. The advantage also extends to teachers, who shouldn’t need to continually reinvent the wheel. Time-saving is also a huge benefit, reducing administration time which is the bane of many teachers, and means they can spend more time with students. This needs to be implemented in a flexible way, however, because a strict syllabus and curriculum can be oppressive and prescriptive. This could mean that teachers wouldn’t be able to adapt the material to their students and help fill gaps in their knowledge. In our opinion, a skeleton framework of topics, including some content and key points, yet with scope for this to be adapted by teachers, would be the most efficient and flexible approach.

One big criticism of schools in non-secular countries (or those that claim to be), is that their ‘religious education’ is essentially the religion of that country (e.g. Catholicism in Spain, or Islam in Indonesia) and teaches only that religion. This means that many students leave the school system with little to no knowledge of the different religions in the world and may not have been exposed to alternatives, such as atheism, pantheism and Taoism. In some cases, students choose to change their religion or opt not to follow it and this then means that most of their class time spent learning about that religion would have been wasted. Time is spent studying texts of the national religion at the expense of other topics that would prove far more pragmatically useful for students. This is not to say there is no place for religion, but in our opinion it should be an impartial, fact-based subject, which aims to promote cultural global understanding, something which is becoming more and more important in a globalised world. Religion is also an issue in schools when it comes face-to-face with science and evolutionary theory. In the USA there are creationists who strongly believe that evolution is not true and teach their children a literal interpretation of biblical events. How are science teachers able to mark essays on whether a child understands evolutionary theory, if they reject the theory and state the world was created in 7 days? Episode 2 of the Beyond Binary Thinking Podcast features an interview with an anonymous USA teacher who goes into more detail on the issue.

What of the future of education when combined with technology? The Khan Academy is an approach that favours the 'flipped classroom' approach, turning the traditional model of education on its head. The idea is that students learn the material at home, watching videos on platforms such as YouTube on for example the topic of single digit addition. In the classroom they do further practice and the teacher is able to help those students who did not learn the matter fully or struggled with understanding. High performing students are also able to help those who are struggling, further enhancing their own knowledge. The system runs alongside an online model which features a 'knowledge tree' meaning that once students answer 10 questions correctly they can move on to the next branch of the tree (e.g. single digit subtraction or double digit addition).

The key advantage of this is that there are no students that have gaps in their knowledge at lower levels, making it hard to study more advanced topics (e.g. algebra or calculus). There is also an element of gamification, giving students awards and trophies for breaking certain personal best records or achievements, which has been shown to be more motivating than traditional marking systems,.

Could this be the future of education? It would give teachers the ability to apply themselves more directly with each students and adapt to their needs. Moreover it would allow teachers and parents to have a fully transparent oversight of their children's education, also enabling them to help their children with more difficult topics.

Let's flip the system!


Check out this episode!

Episode 1: Religious Atheist Agnostics. Their Sacred Cows and Creation Myths

A psychologist, a philosopher, and an anthropologist walk into a Podcast. We hope to offend anyone that holds entrenched views, pop some bubbles, air out some echo chambers, see if we can tackle familiar controversies, and try and find a third way.

The principle of this podcast is simple. We maintain that any time someone has trapped their thinking in a false dichotomy (Left vs. Right, Us Vs. Them, Good vs. evil..) then they’re oversimplifying and preventing dialogue by limiting what could be a rich conversation to the equivalent of a wrestling match.
Have you ever heard the story of Christians being fed to the lions for the entertainment of the vomitorium loving Romans?

Or heard about American pilgrims, fleeing to the new world to escape religious persecution?

These tales have entered our collective understanding of the world, despite being widely refuted by historians as a complete fabrication.
I’m contending that most of what you've been taught about the history of Christianity and Atheism is wrong.

The idea that Christians were either persecuted Martyrs, or that they held back scientific advancement, burnt libraries, and started crusades is nonsense and I’m hoping to take us beyond this example of binary thinking.

It’s easy to pick apart a creationist with a literal reading of the King James version of the Bible. Atheists claim to be enlightened and rational, in comparison to the gullible believers. I find it fascinating that they’ve fallen into the same self-serving biases and made a revisionist history .
I hear divergent creation myths from both Atheists, Christians and Muslims, and I’d like to share the view from modern historians that neither the dark ages, nor the renaissance actually existed, and that the narratives we’ve learned about them are wrong.

The stories of Christians being fed to the lions come largely from the morality plays of the Middle ages. Though there are examples of Christians (along with every other minority outgroup) being persecuted, few historians have found reliable sources depicting such barbarism. Indeed the Roman Empire (originally Polytheistic) was more tolerant than many empires with regards to religious freedom.

The United States also has many creation myths that those who've passed through their school system can probably remember. One is that pilgrims, fled religious persecution in Europe, to be free in the New World.

A more precise description would be that the Puritans fell out of power, and were unable to persecute everyone else. At their zenith, they tried to ban Shakespeare’s plays, and smash stained glass windows in churches. They fled to America to be free to persecute each other, and would go on to make their own society miserable (see prohibition and the Westboro Baptist Church).

r/badhistory is filled with atheist creation myths. Although religious people have well documented and dubious parables, it’s fascinating to observe that the same thing has happened in self-proclaimed “rational” atheist groups. The mechanisms warrant further study, but it’s fairly straightforward to understand how group identity, retelling of stories, and self serving biases lead to people remembering and repeating the versions that paint their ingroup in a positive light.

The intention of our discussion was never to score a point for the religious, but merely to highlight that many of those that claim rational superiority, have adopted the same tribalistic biases as many of their religious brothers and sisters (who oft claim the moral high ground).

Once we understand that Christians were neither persecuted martyrs, nor destroyers of scientific advancement, the history of religion can be understood with much more nuance.

A creationist with a literal reading of the King James version of the Bible is an easy straw man to ridicule. That’s why it’s so fascinating to find atheists claiming to be enlightened and rational, falling into the same self serving biases and believing (without fact checking) their own revisionist history.

A most fascinating history of Christianity, occurs when the declining Roman Empire, rebrands itself as the Holy Roman Empire. With its promise of economic growth (and threat of military power) strangled by a corrupt and bureaucratic empire, it pivoted to claim dominion of the gates to the afterlife.

The Atheist creation myth, popularised by Carl Sagan (and more recently Neil de Grasse Tyson in the series Cosmos) just doesn’t fit into how modern historians discuss the period.

During the Crusades (In the 12th Century) the Muslims were blamed for burning the Great Library of Alexandria (500 years prior). During the Protestant Reformation, it was popular to blame the Catholic church for it.

The resulting myth is that Christianity intentionally burned heretical and scientific knowledge, plunging the world into the dark ages, and setting back the progress of society by thousands of years with inquisitions and crusades.

Were we all rescued by the enlightening age of the reformation, where we were freed from the shackles of organised religion to live in a world run by reason and scientists?

How inaccurate. Monks were the only printing presses Europe had at the time. The so called dark ages saw the invention of the novel, wind and watermills, modern universities, clocks, and logarithms. They combined mathematics and physics for the first time, during a period where many lived longer in less repressive empires.

Thomas Aquinas finally freed philosophy from an obsession with Aristotle. Italian historians and Classics teachers probably mourn the loss of the Roman Empire more than the conquered peasants (forcibly subjugated under massive empires) ever did. Europe entered a period of relative peace and prosperity, fragmented, but more recognisable to today.

There have been multiples renaissances, depending on your cultural perspective. In the 12th century, Christian clerics reached out to their Muslim and Jewish counterparts in Spain to translate texts. The merging of Greek, Christian, and Muslim ideas has happened many times. Our high school history education celebrates when it happened amongst the rich merchants classes in Venice, and that has stuck with us. Probably because those people feel closer to modern society than the monks that were doing the same thing 500 years before.

It's somewhat inaccurate to portray the Crusades as entirely religious, or in the light of modern colonialism. The fourth Crusade saw the crusaders excommunicated after attacking the Christian city of Zara on behalf of the Venetians and then sacking Christian Constantinople because they ran out of money. I’m not claiming religions are blameless, but the motives seem more to do with power and finance than those who oppose religion would like to suggest.

SMLXL

Likewise the claim that Galileo was arrested by a science disabling church for claiming the sun was at the centre of the solar system is an over-simplistic misrepresentation.

I’m not about to defend the excesses of the Inquisition, but let’s be fair here. Galileo was busy refuting Kepler’s claim that the moon caused the tides, that orbits were elliptical, and that comets could be further away than the moon.

At the same time, he dedicated his writings to the pope, and while getting involved in religious squabbles such as writing snide derisions of Christian subgroups such as the Jesuits.

Yes, Galileo was a victim of house arrest, but this was the height of the inquisition, and so tensions were understandably high in the power struggle with Protestantism. To portray Galileo's story as science versus religion is somewhat disingenuous.

For decades, he was invited by subsequent popes to discuss the differing models of the solar system. Galileo wrote a book called ‘The Simpleton’, where he quoted the geocentric pope as a titular character.

The fact that Galileo's sentence was house arrest, is not the narrative of a persecuted martyr, but more that of a scientist lacking any diplomacy and social nuance. He criticised the pope from within the inner circle, during extreme political tensions, and yet was allowed to continue to write and share scientific theories.

Indeed, Einstein referred Galileo’s later works as the foundation of modern physics. Considering how outspoken he was of the Pope and senior religio-political factions at the time, his light sentence says more about the leniency of the inquisition than the suppressive nature of the church.

There’s a more interesting discussion to have than:
Are Christians or Atheists smarter, which group is more moral?

To understand people's religious beliefs, requires thinking on more than one dimension.

Are you spiritual?

Are you opposed to organised religion?

Do you think organised religions should have any power, and if so, should that be separated from the state?

How about your feelings towards members of religious organisations?

What’s your take on the history of the Catholic Church?

Are you more sympathetic to the Protestant churches, or do you think all religions have the same key flaw?

Do you consider religions fundamentally the same, or quite different?

Are some religions superior to others?

How tolerant are you to other people's differing beliefs?

Each of these questions provides a more detailed and nuanced understanding of the different dimensions that are necessary to consider people’s beliefs when discussing atheists, agnostics, and believers.

I’d love to hear your thoughts. Please, let’s take the topic of Religion Beyond Binary Thinking.

Check out this episode!