By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Evidence Rebuts Chomsky's Theory of Language Learning
Paul Ibbotson, Michael Tomasello, Scientific American, 2016/09/12
I've never supported Chomsky's theory of language learning. So to me, this is old and unsurprising news: "cognitive scientists and linguists have abandoned Chomsky’s 'universal grammar' theory in droves because of new research examining many different languages." The real mechanisms for language learning are network mechanisms. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. The jobs of the future – and two skills you need to get them
Simon Torkington, World Economic Forum, 2016/09/12
"The World Economic Forum’s Future of Jobs study predicts that 5 million jobs will be lost before 2020 as artificial intelligence, robotics, nanotechnology and other socio-economic factors replace the need for human workers."  Keep in mind that the World Economic Forum have been champions of austerity over the years. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Why Science Should Stay Clear of Metaphysics
Peter Byrne, Nautilus, 2016/09/12
I read Bas C. van Fraassen's The Scientific Image (248 page PDF) not too long after it came out. I had been studying the positivists in depth and while the rejection of positivism (and consequent embrace of continentalism and existentialism) was all the rage, I found in van Fraassen the essence of what I considered the right response to the positivists. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Learning Knowledge and Skills for Agriculture and Rural Livelihood
Anna Robinson-Pant, UNESCO, 2016/09/16

Food for thought. "Young people arrange their learning, livelihoods and social practices according to their needs, lifestyles, traditions and evolving environments. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Institutions And Openness
noreply@blogger.com (Stephen Downes), Half an Hour, 2016/09/16

People do not value education not because we have educational institutions. Rather, we have educational institutions because people value education. And educational institutions are only one of many ways people support their own education, because what people value is the education, not the institution. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. The MOOC Identity: Designing Learning Environments
Stephen Downes, [Sept] 09, 2016, International MOOC Colloquium, Anacapri, Italy

In this presentation I place the development of the MOOC in the context of innovative and transformational change. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Trends in Canadian University Finance
Alex Usher, Higher Education Strategy Associates, 2016/09/09
The funny thing about Alex Usher's report in HESA is that while he keys in on the rising costs on colleges and universities in Canada, he doesn't talk about the students served by those institutions. In the reports he cites but doesn't link to (966 page PDF) the word 'students' appears for the first time on page 952. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Putting Student-Produced OER at the Heart of the Institution
Michael Caulfield, Hapgood, 2016/09/08

There have been numerous open education resources (OER) projects over the years, but they tend to disappear. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. 2016 Lecture Capture Survey
Duke University, 2016/09/07

The typical college classroom is not the most exciting place in the world, but with lecture capture becoming more common this may change for the better. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. What's the Future of Jobs?
John Hagel, Edge Perspectives, 2016/09/06

The interesting thing about the meeting I was at in Capri was that there were people from Udacity, EdX, Coursera, and other MOOC initiatives, and how much of the discussion focused around preparing people for jobs. More...