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EDTC 6101 Module 3: Attention (Weil: Attention in Studies & Love of…

- - - - "covetousness" = chief sin in that it is a will to appropriating/creating reality for ourselves
        
        secular version of original sin
  - - - prohibits use/acceptance of language as propaganda, distortion, sophistry, moving the masses
        
        interest group labels usually prevent full representation of people and reduce to an aspect of reality (15)
        
        "falsehood" is re. truth whereas "inaccuracy" is re. reality
        
        theological truthfulness vs. "false witness about realities" : theology's task of "keeping realities open to truth"
      - "such reductive uses of language thus fuel closed systems in the realm of reality" (211)
  - - - "The only Truth worthy of trust and obedience is YHWH, who created the world.... became incarnate in Jesus Chrsti, too upon God's self the worlds's ins in Christ's crucifixion, and will lead the world to its final consummation. This God gives human beings freedom in history, brings judgment upon human works which do not conform to God's will, destroys powers opposed to God's will in the last judgment, and will have communion with each human being in the New Jerusalem" (207-8)
      - how a law can become the antidote to the law of necessity
      - if law detached from person of God, we have legalism (focus on reality, not truth)
      - We reverently fear a God who gives us his attention
      - commands are promises; lusts rare not freedom
      - emphasis on God who breaks into history and provides redemption
        
        Yet in his sociological work, Ellul does not show God's intervening: God "is silent," and history is vicious cycles. (208) (Ellul refuses a secular version of redemption/Truth)
        
        Yet provides secular means for positive social philosophy, sustainable social life
        
        contemplation
        
        personality formation; reson, self-control, respect
        
        preservative/life cycle effect of tension
        
        common denominator to all is openness to dialogue, openness to truth
  - - - therefore absolutization of private or statute property is distortion of purpose of property
        
        b/c it fails to keep reality open to truth
        
        b/c it reduces people to "the poor" or to their economic dimension/reality
        
        b/c state policy makes us lazy about recognizing our own complicity
    - - JE resists Marxist or capitalist ideologies of work
        
        because (elsewhere) they are substitute truths/realities other than the gospel of the kingdom
        
        because (here) there is no reason to give human work ultimate status
        
        because (here) they take attention away from discernment of truth
  - - - manipulate
      - "ends up with the human being enslaved by the reality which he or she supposedly possesses, yet is completely dependent upon" (206)
      - fallen humans have innate desire to possess/ have power over "reality" (206)
    - - listen/attend/attention
      - "allows for love and freedom in relationships" (206)
      - "invites a posture of waiting and listening toward the other" (206)
    - - "rationality" of technique imposes social and mechanical organization, changing reality and education. --> death of humanities
        
        "useless to distinguish between technique and its use" vs. Rheingold, who sees intention as free to take instrumental approach to technology
      - 7 characteristics
    - - God's character and freedom; necessity; man's freedom; law
        
        David Wells' unconfirmed/Adamic and confirmed/Christ's/imputed/dispositional free will
        
        Philip Edgcumbe Hughes' image of man
        
        Jonathan Edwards' freedom of will
        
        Luther's bondage of will
    - - cf. Edward's solution to problem of evil: things only exist at all because God upholds them so
      - various forms: physical, moral, civil
      - related to "necessity"--way for creation to hold together after fall (206)
      - these forms of law/ethics "artificial," not dispositional and spontaneous like God's character and unfallen/restored image, not love
        
        "creatures experience them as external constraints or fates " (206)
      - yet there is also a law of biological "necessity" similar to Enlightenment "state of nature"/"natural law"
    - - only "work" in relationship with God
      - in this sense, "law" is personality, character, spirit #
      - therefore 10 commandments are promises
  - - - expansive view,
      - objectification occurs when promise to care for one another despite changing "realities" is absent
    - - Honor = listen, open to truth
      - "connection between dialogue and social and personal resilience in Ellul's thought" (213)
  - - - Thus "technical autonomy" is like mathematics in that it prescribes technique and answer?
      - This technical autonomy removes us from openness to truth
        
        like an expression of original sin
        
        we try to master the system but become its slave
  - - - What about "third way" of artistic creation
      - See JE's idiosyncratic view of providence and God's action
    - - JE's ethics cause us to remain vigilant lest we settle for a reduced view of obedience that substitutes reality for truth
        
        Great caution for Christians and denominations
    - - application of the theological to the sociological allows one to identify problems and to identify hope in the face of then and to resist domination of truth by reality
- - - - Hyperlinks
      - Web Searches
        
        The problem is not the search technology but how we use it. Great ideas on pp52-53 for teaching research practices, inquiry process, and "digital rhetoric" coincide with current scholarship in rhetoric and composition pedagogy such as TFT (Yancey), writing contracts (White & Peckham), discourse communities (Swales), genre studies
      - Rheingold's counterargument/ solution that we merely harness plasticity and impose internal discipline rather than ascetic withdrawal seems a less circumspect one than Ellul would be satisfied with; doesn't seem to be aware of realities or willing to expose them to truth
    - - quality sacrificed to quantity: CRAP/ democratization of media
      - volume control
    - - teach meditation
      - teach digital literacies: p64:
        
        digital participation and collaboration
        
        crap detection
        
        awareness/ mindfulness
        
        network smarts
      - teach attention in school
      - teach metacognition #
  - - - Davidson: optimistic view
      - mindful use of media
    - - breaks
      - serendipity, play
        
        cf. what Turkle likes about classroom
    - - fatal
      - addictive
        
        dopamine
        
        oxytocin
        
        positive random reinforcement
      - unhealthy
        
        email apnea
        
        sympathetic NS
      - bad parenting
        
        importance of early attachment in neural development and in development of a society!
        
        attention = love
      - socially alienating
      - loss of solitude
      - unproductive
      - Ask: What are my media practices doing to my brain?
  - - - heightened, relaxed, flexible, "nonmuscular" awareness,
      - default narrative network vs direct experience network
      - teach metacognition (66); "intelligence is largely at the mercy of self-control" (68)
  - - - central executive: working memory modulator
        
        allows metacognition
        
        "attentional blink"
        
        2 modes always used
        
        wide (aa million bits info per sec; subconscious
        
        narrow: 40/ conscious
        
        7 +/- 2
        
        mirror neurons
        
        same neurons fire when watching as doing
        
        hardwired attention to others (cf. interest in "story")
        
        "This faculty is at the basis of human culture" (40)
        
        trainability of attention: Dehaene
        
        HS only primate with sense of pedagogy
        
        actively transmit culture, through vision
    - - difference between oral and written language (60)
      - change in nature of education away from liberal arts for communication to more expedient and instrumental #
      - Underscores how I teach reading/writing cognition and metacognition through pattern and practice (60-66)
      - Wolf/Dehaene (59): biologically equipped to recognize visual patterns though reading too new to have evolutionary impact on brain: brain pulls from many areas/ individual idiosyncrasies
- - - - even though hyper attention "feels good"
      - train the brain to deep attention (follow a lecture) not hyper tasking
        
        value of practice
      - pedagogy: tell students to seize boredom as opportunity for new thinking; don't short circuit opportunity by going to web
      - Maryanne Wolfe: plasticity makes recovering deep attention possible. must be actively chosen
  - - - online courses "silence" students rather than giving all students equal chance to participate
        
        cf. Weil: what is lost is "paying attention" to instructor and listening
      - "flipped" classroom doesn't free up deer interaction; rather, "discussion" eliminates relationship with instructor
      - admin: "student lack of attendance: doesn't translate to students wanting more online classes: they feel isolated not engaged, miss the "structure"
    - - oldest form of instruction
      - allow for live and unexpected
      - allow for "alchemy" and modeling of true outcome: ability to think and elicit real responses: process not product
      - students now trained to avoid lecture and office hours, real interaction
      - yet employers want real skills of listening, speaking, thinking
      - joy