On reading James Flynn

Read a short book by James Flynn this evening while watching the Midnight Mass in the Vatican. Very uplifting - both of course. A main point he makes - the book by the way is Does Your Family Make You smarter? (He has lots of books of course). But the uplifting point I found and indicated in my Amazon review is that your family circumstances are not necessarily going to dictate the level of intelligence - your IQ - for life. The scope of this inquiry in the book is less than the overall success of individuals but aimed at a narrower focus limited to measurable IQ scores - which can of course affect success but except for pointing out intelligence isn't everything, does not attempt to explore everything else. The target of the book is the message of the twin literature which may be misleading and can result in a pessimistic outlook on the part of those who would like to advance beyond the limits of their given family life and circumstances. To this the good news is you can go beyond that and at least reach the level your genes "intended" provided you use your own autonomy to do the things that will increase your IQ. These include things like not only joining a library club but more especially loving to read. The significance of family influence whether positive or negative can be detrimental in your SAT scores, for example, which can limit what kind of university you enter and what profession you achieve. What families influence most is vocabulary. After 17 the influence of the family drops off and you can level off at the range permitted by your genes. So the answer is that your family can make you smarter but only up to a certain point at which time you are free for good or bad to better yourself or not. So don't use the twin effect to counter the Flynn effect. How this is exciting to me is how it dovetails with my aims in course work. In logic of course I aim to help students improve their logic skills and in all my courses I aim at helping increase vocabulary. Both of these are items he lists as keys to IQ. So it is nice to find a book that supports what I think I am doing in my work. Nice.

Past Deadline

Since it is now past the deadline I am going to complete filling in the grades for my remaining classes based on what I have received as of now. After this the grades will be permanent. I already completed the grades for the Logic class last week. I hope everyone has a wonderful holiday break. See you next year!

Thursday night class final session

This evening we watched the movie Ex Machina and considered the question of what it means to be a person. Specifically, might someday Artificial Intelligence be able to fool us into thinking it is human. And if so, will they treat us nicely? If you are interested there is a new book titled Superintelligence that discusses the topic. This ends the semester for me except turning in grades. Please make sure you have everything in to me ASAP but no later than Saturday or it won't be included in your grade. Have a great holiday break and stay safe.

Tuesday classes final session afternoon

We voted on and then watched Monty Python The Meaning of Life (because I did not bring the Quest for the Holy Grail) but judging from the laughs it was a success until everyone left half way though because they had to catch the bus. Sorry for not thinking about that! Hope everyone has a wonderful holiday. And please remember to send me everything before the weekend!

Tuesday classes - final sessions

For Introduction to Philosophy this morning for our final session we watched The End of the Tour and afterwards watched a few minutes from the Charlie Rose interview. Please remember to send everything in ASAP if you haven't yet. The End of the Tour was the end of the course. Have a great holiday break and hope to see everyone back again next semester on campus. I am not sure as I write this what movie the class will select for the final session of Anient and Medieval Philosophy this afternoon....

Monday Logic - Last session

For the last class the vote was for the Monty Python movie The Life of Brian. Afterwards we watched some of the debate between John Cleese, Michael Palin, Malcolm Muggeridge and the Bishop of Southwark.

Thursday classes

For our last regular session before finals week the quiz question for both my morning Introduction to Philosophy course and my afternoon Ancient and Medieval Philosophy course was do you think you got your money's worth from this course? You may also want to suggest how to make it more worth while if you like. For my evening double session of Introduction to Philosophy the first half quiz question was what movie do you want to see for the final session next week if you are coming? (Remember attendance on the last session is not mandatory except for me. If you are coming vote on which movie you would like to watch and discuss. The second half quiz question is do you think you got your money's worth from this course?

Wednesday Logic

Today is the last class day of the semester for this course except for the final session next Monday from 10 to 12:45. Attendance at the final session is not required. All work should already be turned in via email by then. For those who want to participate we will watch a movie and discuss the logic of the film. The quiz question today is what movie would you like to watch? As long as I have it we can watch whichever movie those students who intend to attend vote for. If you do not intend to attend please let me know that rather than vote on a movie. Notice I do not post grades on Blackboard because it is too complicated. Grades will be posted on UAOnline after Wednesday midnight.

Tuesday classes

The quiz question for both my classes today is what movie would you like to see on the final session?

Monday Logic

Today we watched a lecture by Jared Diamond on his book Collapse in order to analyse an extended argument. This topic is chapter 16 in the old book but is deleted from the new book. The quiz question assumes that the sort of lecture and book! are examples of an ongoing conversation. I also mentioned Thomas Friedman in this respect. So the quiz question is how much time each day do you spend being part of this conversation? Do you follow the news? Do you have a blog yourself?

Thursday Classes

For Introduction to Philosophy this morning I do not remember what the question was! Did I forget to ask one? If I forgot here is a good one: what sort of language games are you a fluent speaker in? For Ancient and Medieval Philosophy today the quiz questions was: If you were to find a relic of the church to be false would you still promote it as true to continue acquiring funds for the church? For this evening's Introduction to Philosophy the first half quiz question is do you think there ought to be a National (or better International!) authority that licenses individuals (and organizations?) to profess religious doctrine. (What I am thinking about here is something along the lines of Miroslav Volf in his book Flourishing.) For the second half the quiz question is what sort of language games are you a fluent speaker in?