Linear vs. Global Thinking

I took this interesting assessment: http://www.onionmountaintech.com/files/Global-Linear%20Activity.pdf. I scored a +10, which puts me squarely in the "global" category. I fit pretty well into this category, although I really cannot work on more than one thing at once. I do like to work on one thing for about five minutes, then switch to something else. I tend to have five or six tasks I am working on, but I can only concentrate on one at a time. For example, I can't talk and type at the same time. It is also hard for me to talk and to monitor miscreants in the class at the same time.

I think that one of the challenges I have had as a teacher is trying to adapt to teach linear thinkers. I try to use outlines, although this becomes less useful as the classes advance and we depend more on seminar. Seminar is, in fact, my favored way of discussing ideas. What I am working on is summarizing what we said in seminar to make it more accessible to linear thinkers.

I think it might be informative for you to take this assessment, although I cannot ask for your results, as that would violate your privacy. After you are done, read the descriptions of the two types of thinking. Let me know if this was useful to you.

That is so unprofessional

There is something else that disturbs me, but it is beyond being a “pet peeve.” The more I think about this phenomenon, the more I think it is a symptom of a dying civilization. This is the recent custom of using the term “unprofessional” as a catchall adjective to describe all sorts of behavior that we do not like. Maybe this is not something that junior high students hear very often, but it is ubiquitous among adults. I rarely hear somebody’s behavior, particularly behavior that occurs while at work, criticized with any other adjective.

A “profession” is a person’s job. If something is “unprofessional,” then it breaks some rule of the marketplace. Have we really become so diminished as a culture that the only concept of good or right that we have is based on suitably for a commercial undertaking? What happened to things being “wrong”? Or “demeaning”? “Mean-spirited”? “Cruel”? Even milder terms – such as “careless” or “unconventional” – are disappearing from our vocabulary.

Some of the behaviors that people term “unprofessional” are simply wrong. For example, I once worked at the same company as a man whom everyone described as behaving unprofessionally. He would rarely criticize a person in private, but he would save up whatever he wanted to say and humiliate the person in front of the whole department. He also would make demeaning jokes about people who worked for him. I did not work in the same department as this guy, but I did talk to people in his department. They complained about him a lot. They never described him as “cruel” or “demeaning,” but always as “unprofessional.”

The fact is that this man’s behavior WAS all these things. Why wouldn’t somebody call it by the correct term? The badness of his behavior is minimized by using a term that indicates that the only thing he is guilty of is breaking some rule of business etiquette. It seems in cases like this, you should reserve “unprofessional” for behaviors like showing up to work with your shirt untucked or forgetting your tie.

The other sense in which the word “unprofessional” is used is more pernicious. This is when the word is used to describe actions that are not wrong in any real sense, but which seem strange to you or make you uncomfortable. This can become a way to squelch innovation. Was it professional for Galileo to question the established notion of the nature of the world, which was believed by most scientists and based on generations of thought? Probably not – it got him into a world of trouble and upset a lot of people. Was John Woolman unprofessional when he jeopardized his livelihood by confronting his friends and neighbors about owning slaves? What about Albert Einstein questioning the linear concept of time? (Have you ever seen a picture of Einstein where he looked professional?)

It seems that the function of creative and innovative people is to ask questions and make observations that make other people uncomfortable. If this is “unprofessional”, then maybe that word should be seen as an appellation of honor. That is why I am creating the “Unprofessional of the Year” prize, to be awarded right here. Nominate people by responding to this post. I haven’t come up with a prize yet, but I am sure the honor of being mentioned in this blog will be the most exciting part of it. The prize probably will, in fact, be totally comprised of seeing your name here.

To qualify, all the nominee needs to do is to do something or say something that is called “unprofessional,” but that is not wrong in any other way than it calls into questions established views or methods. Take the time to type up the story and post it as a reply to this blog essay.

Ants

This summer we had a giant community of ants move into a planter we had in our front yard. I know that most ants out here are pretty vicious, but I always respected my grandfather's dictum, "If you don't bother it, it will leave you alone." I took the attitude that the little fellows were in their habitat, so I should leave them alone. However, these turned out to be really aggressive beasts. They sometimes bit my daughter while she was sleeping, and they attacked my dog. I was worried that my dog would get killed by them one day, because they moved around the place almost in a swarm. The final straw was when my wife put her arm on top of the patio wall. The ants jumped on her, wrestled her to the ground and stole her glasses. Well, not really, but they did attack her.

I hate to use poisons, so I tried to dig out their queen. If I could just get rid of her, the nest would die a slow, peaceful death. At least that was the way it was with the red ants back home - I think the local ants may have a way to replace a queen. Anyway, I couldn't find her. I still didn't want to apply poison to the ground - I didn't want to poison bugs that were not bothering me, nor the predators that eat ants and other bugs. I tried a trap with mayonnaise and boric acid. They loved the mayo, but the boric acid didn't seem to bug them, either.

Finally I decided to poison the guys. I kept on thinking that maybe they would take the road of peace and quit biting us. I hate to kill things that are just trying to get on with their lives. But the foul little demons decided ambush the dog again, and my daughter still woke up with ant bites on her legs. So I bought a bottle of liquid death. I sprayed their heinous nest of wickedness. They seemed to appreciate the additional moisture, and I did not really see them thinning out. I knew it wasn't instantaneous poison - they wanted the ants to share some with the queen before they died. But it didn't seem to bother them for a couple of weeks. So I got some nest treatment and poured that on them. I gave them a really, really big dose of the stuff. I didn't want them to go on living with just an annoying stomachache. I figured smiting them at once was the best option. I don't like to think of them suffering needlessly because I didn't have the courage to do them in, so I doused the nest.

Finally, they disappeared. I still feel guilty about having to use poison, which I hate to do. I also worry about the residual effects of the poison I did use. But at least we haven't been attacked for a couple of weeks.

Pet Peeves

I know I covered these in class, but I think they might need reinforcement. My first pet peeve is the use of the word "troop" instead of "soldier." I don't know why this has become so common, but even NPR uses it now: "14 troops and 7 civilians were killed in a car bomb explosion." A troop is a group of soldiers, not a single soldier. I have seen speculation that the reason they started using this word incorrectly is that "soldier" sounds more personal than "troop," although I don't think this is really true. It could also be because "soldier" sounds like somebody whose primary objective is combat, while "troop" may seem less hostile. You sometimes hear of troops deployed to distribute medical equipment or to help out in some other way.

My other pet peeve is the use of "prior to" when you mean "before." People say this to sound more educated. I used to use this phrase myself, and part of the reason I find it disturbing may be that I was embarrassed that nobody pointed out how ridiculous it sounds. I didn't figure it out until I read The Oxford Dictionary of American Usage and Style. The funny thing is that I rarely hear students use it, but frequently hear teachers using it. Remember that you can get extra credit if you correct your teacher for using this overworked phrase. Just write down the incident and let me know about it.