By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Blockchain’s Occam problem
Matt Higginson, Marie-Claude Nadeau, Kausik Rajgopal, McKinsey, 2019/01/10
The Occam problem is this: unless and until blockchain becomes the simplest and most effective technology to do a job (any job) it will not be widely adopted. Yet despite huge investments, blockchain has yet to meet this challenge. We shouldn't be surprised. "It is an infant technology that is relatively unstable, expensive, and complex. It is also unregulated and selectively distrusted". More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. The Social Epistemology of Consensus and Dissent
Boaz Miller, Zefat Academic College, 2019/01/09
This is a good paper that feels like it ends halfway through its topic. In the E-Learning 3.0 course (I'll have more on that Friday) we discussed the ideas that community is consensus - not the results of consensus, necessarily, but a shared process of consensus. This article looks at the relation between epistemology (the philosophy of knowledge) and consensus, looking at different models of consensus-formation, and then (briefly) the role of dissent, and (even more briefly) consensus-building algorithms. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Leo Damrosch[Edit][Delete]: Jean-Jacques Rousseau: Restless Genius, Washington Post [Edit][Delete] December 28, 2005

"It is manifestly against the Law of Nature... that a handful of men wallow in luxury, while the famished multitudes lack the necessities of life." If you are not familiar with Rousseau, this review of Michael Dirda's biography is a gentle introduction, one that I would encourage. Rousseau is important to me. He writes, "Nothing is more depressing than the general fate of men. And yet they feel in themselves a consuming desire to become happy, and it makes them feel at every moment that they were born to be happy. So why are they not?" This strikes a chord with me - Rousseau talks about the imprisonment society imposes on people - "Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Linda E. Patrik: Using Blogs to Teach Philosophy, Academic Commons December 19, 2005

A project that is close to my own roots. Interestingly, the author writes, "Unlike academic writing in most other disciplines, philosophical writing frequently and strongly states the 'I' because philosophers have to develop and defend their own positions". More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Listening and Epistemic Injustice
Maha Bali, Reflecting Allowed, 2019/01/04
Maha Bali discusses the related concepts of Legitimation Code Theory (LCT) and epistemic injustice. The former is created and promoted by sociology professor Karl Maton and is the idea of " exploring practices in terms of their organizing principles or ‘legitimation codes’." The latter originates in a book by philosophy professor Miranda Fricker. More...

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. The Philosopher Redefining Equality
Nathan Heller, The New Yorker, 2019/01/02
The premise of this engaging long-read about philosopher Elizabeth Anderson is that her bringing together of the ideas of freedom and equality is just the sort of left-right merger needed today. The left-right frame being imposed on Anderson doesn't sit well, and I've known many left-wingers over the years who have advocated for both freedom and equality as two sides of the same coin (the idea that the left opposes freedom is a right-wing trope, and entirely inaccurate). More...