Week 1

Hello! My name is Kelly Reeves. I am a senior at UCLA and played on the Women’s volleyball team 2010-2013. After my senior season, I took a year off of school to train with the USA National Team and played overseas in Switzerland on a professional team. Now that I am home and have a break, I have enrolled back in school to finish up my undergrad. I couldn’t be more excited to be back on campus and back in the Bruin community! 

In this weeks readings and lectures, the focus seemed to drawn to Charles Percy Snow's article of Two Cultures and the Scientific Revolution. In this article, Snow discusses the intellectual life of western society and how it has been split into two polar groups, literary and natural intellectuals. Literary intellectuals refer to themselves as “intellectuals as though there were no others” (Snow, 4). They have a “curious distorted image” and their attitudes are so different that they struggle to find much common ground with others. The natural intellectuals, or non-scientists, have a more “down to earth interests” and that even though they are not scientists, “they would share a good deal of the scientific feeling” (Snow 9). Snow goes into further depth about the two cultural poles and their arguments, but from the general consensus of what Snow is trying to emulate is this disparity between the rich and poor class and what caused for this separation. This idea of separation lead to a great deal of misunderstandings and ambiguity. However, John Brockman introduces this ideal of the Third Culture, “that consists of scientists and other thinkers in the empirical world who, throughout their work and expository writing, are taking the place of the traditional intellectual in rendering visible deeper meanings of our lives redefining who and what we are” (lecture pt.1). Brockman explains that this third culture would “close the communication gap between literary intellectuals and the scientists” (Bockman article). Scientists have started to communicate directly to the public that has rendered the deeper meaning of who and what we are as people.  

In addition to this concept of the two and third culture, stereotypes has become a perpetuated discipline that has contributed to this separation between art and science. We all stereotype in some shape or form, it is a bias that has deeply engraved in us, it is part of our human behavior. For intense, the stereotype of a Mad Scientist: white lab coat, glasses, chemicals, disheveled hair, the evil eye. The context and the history of stereotypes changes over time, because now, a Mad Scientist takes on a more secretive role that might involve working in government, CIA type stuff. The way that stereotypes emerge over time has created this separation of how we perceive our knowledge. 

To sum up why there is a separation between cultures is because of our education system. Countries around the world are trying to figure out ways on how to educate children to “take their place in the economies of the 21st century, and to create a cultural identity” (RSA Animate Video). The problem is, we are trying to implement what we did in our past and kids don’t believe the story that hard work will guarantee you a job. The current education system was designed and conceived for a different age, the intellectual culture of the Enlightenment. This system has struggled today because there is this epidemic of ADHD. Well not epidemic, but "children are living in the most intensely stimulated period where they are receiving information from all platforms (tablets, iPhones televisions ads)" (RSA Animate Video). They learn more on the internet than they do in school. It’s a phenomenon that is unlike any other. To a certain extent, this is true. Students have become so glued to their iPhones and the internet that they tune out the subject material in school. I don't know about you, but I find out about news or current events from all my social media apps. Twitter, Instagram, Facebook. It makes me curious if the things that we read online are more important or educational than the stuff we are suppose to learn in school. I understand the importance of education and getting a degree, it sets you up for your career path. But my question is, are teaching children the right stuff for their future?? 

Citations: 

Image 1:  Third Culture Model:

< https://spinstrangenesscharm.wordpress.com/2010/11/27/third-culture-kids/>

Image 2: Mad Scientist 

<http://img4.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20140830013538/villains/images/9/9e/Tumblr_static_f17iy7xk1cocwkwg84gs0woog.jpg>

Image 3: Changing Education Paradigm 

<http://vividlife.me/ultimate/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/changing-education-paradigms.jpg