Category Archives: social issues

What’s Wrong With Usage-Based Billing?

OpenMedia.ca wants to Stop The Meter On Your Internet Use. But if all kinds of bandwidth were charged at the same rate (so that the carriers couldn’t favour one type of content, such as cable tv over another, such as … Continue reading

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The Myth of Separate Magisteria | Big Questions Online

The Myth of Separate Magisteria | Big Questions Online. The main problem (aside from its pretentious name) with Stephen Jay Gould’s concept of “Non-overlapping Magisteria” as a resolution of the “conflict” between science and religion is the fact that many … Continue reading

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Personal Knowledge Management

The #PLENK2010 topic for  discussion in Week 8 is PKM.

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What’s Wrong With Usage-Based Billing?

The folks at OpenMedia.ca are concerned about the recent CRTC ruling to allw Bell to apply usage-based-billing to independent ISPs. But I don’t se the problem. So long as everyone gets the same speed of sevice regardless of data type … Continue reading

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Killing Blasphemers on the Peace Train

This is apparently old news, but I was previously unaware of it. I recall being shocked when Cat Stevens was treated as potentially dangerous after his conversion to Islam. Now not so much!

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Missing the Point

Jason Rosenhouse has himself missed the point in his criticism of Josh Roseneau’s response to Jerry Coyne’s blog about Chris Mooney and others’ “accommodationist” heresy against the high priests of evangelical atheism.

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Fight Back Against Death Threats

The headline of this article by Hirsi Ali and Daniel Huff is unfortunate because it distinguishes one particular offensive group. But the authors do in fact acknowledge others and note that the case of anti-abortion Christian Extremists has been partly … Continue reading

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To CBC re banning of CC licensed material

Re : CBC Bans Use of Creative Commons Music on Podcasts.

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Cute Math Problem

This came up in a Math Ed discussion at LinkedIn. Here A, B, and C are three finite sets. If half of the As are Bs and half of the Bs are Cs and half of the Cs are As, … Continue reading

Posted in education, mathematics | 1 Comment

John Shook is Selling a Book

Wow! That’s a pretty blatant bit of self promotion. Start by asserting that everyone is arguing from ignorance but don’t do anything to dispel that ignorance in the article, and end with a promo for the book that you claim … Continue reading

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Learning Theories

. . . are something about which I have no expertise – but that’s never stopped me from sounding off about anything else, so here goes:

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Network Environments for Personal Learning

In week 2, the focus of #PLENK2010 shifted from the basic terminology, and emphasis on user “client-side” tools to the “server-side” area of support tools

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myPE(N)L ctd

So here is my current Personal Environment for Networked Learning (which I think of as the interface with physically remote people and information):

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My PE(N)L

is a mess (like this post) because my data streams are not well integrated.

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Spectral Atheism

Jean Kazez distinguishes between  Hard and Soft Atheism in a post on her blog whose title leads me to think of the range as a spectrum. In the opening paragraph she identifies atheism as a belief, saying  “It’s not enough … Continue reading

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Moore vs Lavallee on iPod “tax”

Howard Knopf reports on the exchange between James Moore  and Carolyn Lavalleeon about inclusion of iPods in the Canadian media tax. The idea of a tax on ipods is no more “toxic” or “dumb” than the one that presently exists … Continue reading

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Dawkins on Ratzinger on Godlesness

If the pope [1] can blame Hitler [2] on godlessness and atheist extremism, then it is not surprising that the truly godless might have something to say in response: the full text;       the video.

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PLENK Feeds

My Sept 13 post on PLEvsPLN does show up in the link from the #PLENK2010  Feeds List, but never seems to have been captured by the aggregator for the Daily.  So I’m giving it another go here just to see … Continue reading

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Spirituality, Metaphor, Myth, and the True Meaning of Truth

The discussion following this comment is actually more interesting than the post itself (in which Jerry Coyne mocks Chris Mooney’s recent discovery of 1970’s style “spirituality” as the bridge between science and religion).  The commenter, one Timothy F Simpson, is … Continue reading

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More Music Industry Copyright Madness

From Michael Geist – Cdn Music Industry Assoc Chair: Format Shifting, User Generated Content Keep Piracy Sites Going.  According to J.P. Ellson, the Chair of the Canadian Council of Music Industry Association and board member of the industry’s Balanced Copyright … Continue reading

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