March 21, 2015
March 20, 2015
Dewey & Heidegger: qualtrics.com
Dewey
Solutions evolve as individuals try it out and modify
As mentioned in previous reviews, qualtrics.com could benefit from an open forum where Qualtrics users discuss how they are using the platform and challenges they are dealing with. This forum could be organized by certain topics and the users would build relationships with each other as they seek to solve problems with each other. This platform would be limited to those that have a Qualtrics account and would probably be mostly successful with academic users. However, as those users enter the workforce, it would probably grow among corporations as well.
These forums will also provide areas for users to critique their Qualtrics experience and the firm can gather these insights and incorporate them into updates and new product launches.
Humans are problem solvers, not information gatherers
Another application of Dewey's ideas would be to provide helpful tips within the product highlighting trends, statistics, or best habits. This would place the burden on the user to apply and think critically but not to memorize certain facts or information.
Heidegger
Concern for certain things leads to authentic action
Heidegger emphasized the importance of caring about things. This ties in to a previous recommendation for qualtrics.com to build rich user profiles. As Qualtrics collects more information on their customers, it is better able to tailor content and the experience to them. After their profiles are complete, the landing page can change from the standard landing page to a specific page to what this user is engaged in. It is important to not add complexity to their experience but for it to be simple and natural.
On their new landing page, they can view recent, relevant articles, dashboards for their surveys, and upcoming events that they may be interested in.
Solutions evolve as individuals try it out and modify
As mentioned in previous reviews, qualtrics.com could benefit from an open forum where Qualtrics users discuss how they are using the platform and challenges they are dealing with. This forum could be organized by certain topics and the users would build relationships with each other as they seek to solve problems with each other. This platform would be limited to those that have a Qualtrics account and would probably be mostly successful with academic users. However, as those users enter the workforce, it would probably grow among corporations as well.
These forums will also provide areas for users to critique their Qualtrics experience and the firm can gather these insights and incorporate them into updates and new product launches.
Humans are problem solvers, not information gatherers
Another application of Dewey's ideas would be to provide helpful tips within the product highlighting trends, statistics, or best habits. This would place the burden on the user to apply and think critically but not to memorize certain facts or information.
Heidegger
Concern for certain things leads to authentic action
Heidegger emphasized the importance of caring about things. This ties in to a previous recommendation for qualtrics.com to build rich user profiles. As Qualtrics collects more information on their customers, it is better able to tailor content and the experience to them. After their profiles are complete, the landing page can change from the standard landing page to a specific page to what this user is engaged in. It is important to not add complexity to their experience but for it to be simple and natural.
On their new landing page, they can view recent, relevant articles, dashboards for their surveys, and upcoming events that they may be interested in.
March 17, 2015
Updated Standards for Critiques
The best social websites are unified, accessible, and ongoing.
Plato (what is inspired by ideals of social interaction)
- Unified -- we can tell quickly what the social interactions are about (theme) and how everything fosters that interaction.
- Accessible -- we participate by entering the conversation and sharing the most relevant interactions with others.
- Ongoing -- we find that the social interaction on the site leads to further social interaction.
Aristotle (what moves toward fully actualized ideals of social interaction)
- Unified action -- we can tell quickly how we can socially interact, and we find that everything fosters that type of interaction.
- Developmentally accessible -- we participate by consuming, sharing, and creating the content of the site with prototypes.
- Persuasively ongoing -- the content relates to us (ethos), it teaches us how to share and create content (logos), and encourages us to do so (pathos).
Hume (what people with taste like)
- Unified by being liked -- we can quickly see that the masses like the content; professionals (those who like what has traditionally been liked over time) like the content; and peers (those who like what we have liked) like the content.
- Accessible by sensibility -- we participate by consuming and liking the content because of how it affects us or how other similar things that have stood the test of time have affected us.
- Ongoing by tradition -- we hope to like what will endure into the future.
Kant (what people like because of their authentic, reflective judgement)
- Unified by being being articulately reviewed -- we can see that articulate, authentic reviewers all like praising it.
- Accessible by sense -- we can all participate by formulating fitting concepts to describe the best content.
- Ongoing reviews -- we can continue to articulately review the best content.
Hegel (what moves toward group embodied ideals)
- Dialectically unified -- we can see how the social interaction repeatedly moves from thesis to antithesis to synthesis.
- Actual accessibility -- we can all participate in arriving together at implementing the latest cultural standards for media and content.
- Ongoing evolution -- we can see how the site has built into it ways of developing itself beyond what it has been.
Marx (what moves toward group production modes that enlarge our individual embodied selves)
- Unified collaboration -- we see how it fosters individual development and flourishing of individuals; simultaneously fosters specialization and collaboration; the end goals are not fixed but moving along.
- Accessible by apprenticeship -- as users, we have a sense of the whole but work just on a part becoming masters (specialists) over time.
- Productively ongoing -- we can see how the social interaction for creating content develops from a thesis mode, to an antithesis mode, to a synthesis mode that more fully allows individuals to authentically express themselves and flourish on the site; we are rewarded for meaningful work (gamification).
Kierkegaard (what invites individual improvement by mentoring)
- Unified by progression -- as users, we lift each other, ultimately all of us arriving at the religious sphere.
- Accessible by mentoring -- we participate by consuming content at the level we are at or sharing and creating content condescending to where others are at; content is tailored to users at different levels: users seeking pleasure and gratification (aesthetic), guidance from rules (ethical), guidance by spirit (religious).
- Ongoing mentoring -- we are motivated by love to create non-pandering content that helps others advance from aesthetic to ethical and ethical to religious.
Nietzsche (what inspires individual improvement by examples)
- Unified by “will to power” -- we come together on the site to improve ourselves in some sense.
- Accessible by example - we participate by observing examples of self-improvement.
- Ongoing by examples -- as users, we share and create authentic content, showing examples of self-improvement.
Dewey (what groups of individuals continue to like after they try it out)
- Unified problem solving -- we can see how groups are working toward solving a problem or answering a question.
- Accessible by application -- we participate by testing out the presented standards.
- Ongoing revision -- we are invited to consider articulated standards for site content, to test those standards by applying them, to review the results of applying them, and to help revise those standards.
Heidegger (what draws individuals concerned about others to authentic action)
- Unified by possibilities -- as users on the site, we increasingly draw from similar worlds of possibilities.
- Accessible by disclosing -- we participate by exploring new possibilities opened up by content.
- Ongoing by authentic choices -- we are encouraged to actualize definite possibilities that may require giving up others; to make hard choices in the moment, because we are caring for many; and to actualize the best possibilities sensed.
March 16, 2015
Questions to Guide Discussion
What are the latest things that people are talking about with websites?
What are they trying to do with websites?
What problems are they facing?
What struggles are the BYU websites facing?
What are they trying to do with websites?
What problems are they facing?
What struggles are the BYU websites facing?
Dewey & Heidegger: WebPhil
Dewey
The pragmatists emphasized the idea that we, as humans, are problem solvers, not information gatherers. We see this trend with the growth of the internet and technology as there is less emphasis on people to memorize things because of the ease of accessibility to information. People now have more of a burden to actually think critically and apply the information that is out there. This is referred to as the instrumentalism of knowledge. Pragmatism finds itself somewhere between the ideas presented by empiricism and rationalism; empiricism emphasis the way that the world around us makes us think about things and rationalism emphasizes the way that comes from inside of us.
Dewey's ideas can be implemented into WebPhil by making the information needed to assess easily available, thereby placing more of a burden on the visitor to think critically. Whenever they are assessing a website, there could be a pop-up bar on the side that allows them to choose a philosopher and then choose a principle and get a brief explanation of the idea the philosopher taught. They could quickly access this information while critiquing and then make their own assessment and application based on it.
This pop-up can be organized based on common problems (i.e. user fatigue, not clear what purpose is, doesn't drive action, etc...). There can then be a list of possible solutions or ideas that are supported by philosophical content.
Heidegger
Heidegger taught the importance of caring about things in order to make an appropriate assessment. This is clear in schoolwork: the more we care about it, the better we do; the less we care about it, the harder it is to do. The importance of caring about things relates to his idea of authenticity, which he used interchangeably with appropriateness.
The viewers of WebPhil should care about what they are doing. There is already some hurdle necessary for them to leap and that is actually visiting the website and looking through it. They must have some desire, at least, to get this far. However, when they get to critiquing or being critiqued, it must be in a way that they care about. For example, those who critique should be able to choose the type of website they would like to critique and through which lens they would like to critique. Those who seek feedback from the critique should be required to do a quick write-up of why they came to WebPhil and what they would like to get out of the critique.
These visitors (critics and those who get critiqued) should have profiles they build that allows them to select certain details and explain why they use WebPhil. This can help WebPhil segment and personalize content to them so that what they see and do is always relevant to their interests.
When users create their profile, they specify their interests (even those that may not be obviously relevant to web design). When other users critique their website, they can easily see the website designer's profile and their interests. The more they tie in these other interests, the better feedback they will get on their review. They can also focus their efforts on applying the philosophical content to the interests of the designer.
The pragmatists emphasized the idea that we, as humans, are problem solvers, not information gatherers. We see this trend with the growth of the internet and technology as there is less emphasis on people to memorize things because of the ease of accessibility to information. People now have more of a burden to actually think critically and apply the information that is out there. This is referred to as the instrumentalism of knowledge. Pragmatism finds itself somewhere between the ideas presented by empiricism and rationalism; empiricism emphasis the way that the world around us makes us think about things and rationalism emphasizes the way that comes from inside of us.
Dewey's ideas can be implemented into WebPhil by making the information needed to assess easily available, thereby placing more of a burden on the visitor to think critically. Whenever they are assessing a website, there could be a pop-up bar on the side that allows them to choose a philosopher and then choose a principle and get a brief explanation of the idea the philosopher taught. They could quickly access this information while critiquing and then make their own assessment and application based on it.
This pop-up can be organized based on common problems (i.e. user fatigue, not clear what purpose is, doesn't drive action, etc...). There can then be a list of possible solutions or ideas that are supported by philosophical content.
Heidegger
Heidegger taught the importance of caring about things in order to make an appropriate assessment. This is clear in schoolwork: the more we care about it, the better we do; the less we care about it, the harder it is to do. The importance of caring about things relates to his idea of authenticity, which he used interchangeably with appropriateness.
The viewers of WebPhil should care about what they are doing. There is already some hurdle necessary for them to leap and that is actually visiting the website and looking through it. They must have some desire, at least, to get this far. However, when they get to critiquing or being critiqued, it must be in a way that they care about. For example, those who critique should be able to choose the type of website they would like to critique and through which lens they would like to critique. Those who seek feedback from the critique should be required to do a quick write-up of why they came to WebPhil and what they would like to get out of the critique.
These visitors (critics and those who get critiqued) should have profiles they build that allows them to select certain details and explain why they use WebPhil. This can help WebPhil segment and personalize content to them so that what they see and do is always relevant to their interests.
When users create their profile, they specify their interests (even those that may not be obviously relevant to web design). When other users critique their website, they can easily see the website designer's profile and their interests. The more they tie in these other interests, the better feedback they will get on their review. They can also focus their efforts on applying the philosophical content to the interests of the designer.
Dewey & Heidegger
Dewey
The pragmatists emphasized the idea that we, as humans, are problem solvers, not information gatherers. We see this trend with the growth of the internet and technology as there is less emphasis on people to memorize things because of the ease of accessibility to information. People now have more of a burden to actually think critically and apply the information that is out there. This is referred to as the instrumentalism of knowledge. Pragmatism finds itself somewhere between the ideas presented by empiricism and rationalism; empiricism emphasis the way that the world around us makes us think about things and rationalism emphasizes the way that comes from inside of us.
Heidegger
Heidegger taught the importance of caring about things in order to make an appropriate assessment. This is clear in schoolwork: the more we care about it, the better we do; the less we care about it, the harder it is to do. The importance of caring about things relates to his idea of authenticity, which he used interchangeably with appropriateness.
The pragmatists emphasized the idea that we, as humans, are problem solvers, not information gatherers. We see this trend with the growth of the internet and technology as there is less emphasis on people to memorize things because of the ease of accessibility to information. People now have more of a burden to actually think critically and apply the information that is out there. This is referred to as the instrumentalism of knowledge. Pragmatism finds itself somewhere between the ideas presented by empiricism and rationalism; empiricism emphasis the way that the world around us makes us think about things and rationalism emphasizes the way that comes from inside of us.
Heidegger
Heidegger taught the importance of caring about things in order to make an appropriate assessment. This is clear in schoolwork: the more we care about it, the better we do; the less we care about it, the harder it is to do. The importance of caring about things relates to his idea of authenticity, which he used interchangeably with appropriateness.
Late Post-modern Period
The influence of the early and middle post-moderns can easily be seen in Dewey and Heidegger's philosophies. The early post-moderns, namely, Hegel and Marx, were concerned with a unified system, with all of society as a context for the individual to pattern his life by. Kierkegaard and Nietzsche, the middle post-moderns, turned to the individual, with Kierkegaard discussing what it means for the individual to be authentic, to not just blindly submit to the will of the many, and Nietzsche advancing the idea of certain individuals, known as overmen, who could be inspired and in turn inspire those who would follow them. Although Dewey and Heidegger came from different perspectives and different schools of thought, these basic influences can still be seen in their philosophies, which were concerned with the individual in the context of society. This marriage of early and middle postmodernism is concerned with applying practical empiricism to problems such as the meaning of Being and the different worlds that influence us at any given time. To say that this limited space doesn't do these philosophers justice is a massive understatement, but hopefully it will inspire you, dear reader, to find out more about them, because it truly is pretty fascinating stuff.
Education: University of Vermont, Johns Hopkins, University of Chicago
Influential in social and educational reform
Pragmatist and champion of democracy
Dewey was an American philosopher, who developed, along with Charles Peirce and William James, what is known as pragmatism. Pragmatism is what you might call classical American philosophy, not just because its founders were American, but because it has something of the pathos of America built into it. The name, pragmatism, loosely relates to practical results: experimentation and observation. Dewey sought to reform the educational system between the extremes of rationalism and empiricism. Empiricists thought that experience starts with what is given to our senses. Rationalism, on the other hand, is based on thought and gives little to no credit to experience. Traditionally, then, experience and thought are antithetical to each other. But real experience, according to Dewey, is an interaction between a thinking being and the world.
Teachings
Education: University of Freiburg
Incredibly influential in topics such as ontology, phenomenology, and existentialism
Notoriously difficult to understand
The easiest way to think of Heidegger is as a modern reincarnation of Aristotle. Heidegger was particularly influenced by book six of Aristotle’s Nichomachean Ethics, in which he saw Aristotle at his most nuanced as he discussed the limits of reason in attaining the moral life. In this book, Aristotle distinguishes between practical understanding and theoretical understanding. In theoretical understanding, we understand what is fully actualized and therefore won't change. But in practical understanding, we actualize potentialities of things that do change.
For Aristotle, potentialities are in substances and things develop accordingly unless the surrounding situation deters it. For Heidegger, on the other hand, potentialities emerge in the occasion or experience of development, drawing on past worlds; not substances with potentialities but events forming and actualizing potentialities. Heidegger takes the practical understanding as fundamental. We develop our theoretical understanding in a practical world, learning to abstract away from a natural object, like a chair to sit on, and instead see it as an object in space so we can predict its movements. From this idea, it should be easy to see how Dewey and Heidegger are somewhat related.
Teachings
The influence of the early and middle post-moderns can easily be seen in Dewey and Heidegger's philosophies. The early post-moderns, namely, Hegel and Marx, were concerned with a unified system, with all of society as a context for the individual to pattern his life by. Kierkegaard and Nietzsche, the middle post-moderns, turned to the individual, with Kierkegaard discussing what it means for the individual to be authentic, to not just blindly submit to the will of the many, and Nietzsche advancing the idea of certain individuals, known as overmen, who could be inspired and in turn inspire those who would follow them. Although Dewey and Heidegger came from different perspectives and different schools of thought, these basic influences can still be seen in their philosophies, which were concerned with the individual in the context of society. This marriage of early and middle postmodernism is concerned with applying practical empiricism to problems such as the meaning of Being and the different worlds that influence us at any given time. To say that this limited space doesn't do these philosophers justice is a massive understatement, but hopefully it will inspire you, dear reader, to find out more about them, because it truly is pretty fascinating stuff.
John Dewey
1859-1952Education: University of Vermont, Johns Hopkins, University of Chicago
Influential in social and educational reform
Pragmatist and champion of democracy
Dewey was an American philosopher, who developed, along with Charles Peirce and William James, what is known as pragmatism. Pragmatism is what you might call classical American philosophy, not just because its founders were American, but because it has something of the pathos of America built into it. The name, pragmatism, loosely relates to practical results: experimentation and observation. Dewey sought to reform the educational system between the extremes of rationalism and empiricism. Empiricists thought that experience starts with what is given to our senses. Rationalism, on the other hand, is based on thought and gives little to no credit to experience. Traditionally, then, experience and thought are antithetical to each other. But real experience, according to Dewey, is an interaction between a thinking being and the world.
Teachings
- Change is valued. Movement is prioritized over the fixed, and transitions are given emphasis over origins.
- Intelligence should be practical. Knowledge is an interaction between the knower and the known.
- Intelligence is not simply the gleaning of information, but the process of solving a problem. A satisfactory state is reached after interplay between discovered facts and suggested solutions.
- The measure of a thing is whether one likes the results it brings after continued experimentation, rather than emphasizing the values of something abstract, such as God, or reason.
- Unified problem solving -- it should seek to solve a problem that its visitors may have.
- Accessible by application -- we participate by testing out the presented standards.
- Ongoing revision -- we are invited to consider articulated standards for site content, to test and review those standards by applying them, and to help revise those standards as necessary.
Martin Heidegger
1889-1976Education: University of Freiburg
Incredibly influential in topics such as ontology, phenomenology, and existentialism
Notoriously difficult to understand
The easiest way to think of Heidegger is as a modern reincarnation of Aristotle. Heidegger was particularly influenced by book six of Aristotle’s Nichomachean Ethics, in which he saw Aristotle at his most nuanced as he discussed the limits of reason in attaining the moral life. In this book, Aristotle distinguishes between practical understanding and theoretical understanding. In theoretical understanding, we understand what is fully actualized and therefore won't change. But in practical understanding, we actualize potentialities of things that do change.
For Aristotle, potentialities are in substances and things develop accordingly unless the surrounding situation deters it. For Heidegger, on the other hand, potentialities emerge in the occasion or experience of development, drawing on past worlds; not substances with potentialities but events forming and actualizing potentialities. Heidegger takes the practical understanding as fundamental. We develop our theoretical understanding in a practical world, learning to abstract away from a natural object, like a chair to sit on, and instead see it as an object in space so we can predict its movements. From this idea, it should be easy to see how Dewey and Heidegger are somewhat related.
Teachings
- Asked, "what does it mean to be?" Answer: (in very small part): humans are the being for whom things matter; therefore, to be is to care.
- Care is brought out in art. And art is truth's "setting-itself-to-work." Art sets up a world which allows for the truth of something to be disclosed.
- We are responsible for the state of things in our world. We are always here in the world, and nothing can be said about any other world, such as Kant’s noumena, for instance. For a question to make sense it has to fit into our world and our concerns. So it doesn't make sense to ask what the world is like separate from us and our concerns.
- When we act, we change things around us, and thus we also change the potentialities of those things. For example, once we use a hammer a new way, say, to pry something open, the potentialities of the hammer change. So we are continually, over time, having to actualize new potentialities, and by doing so we close off some possibilities and open up others.
- Discusses "conscience;" an echo of Kierkegaard's authenticity, as well as being conscious of the multiple "worlds" that affect us at any given time, drawing from those worlds authentically in the moment of performance.
- Unified by possibilities -- as users on the site, we increasingly draw from similar worlds of possibilities.
- Accessible by disclosing -- we participate by exploring new possibilities opened up by content.
- Ongoing by authentic choices -- we are encouraged to actualize definite possibilities that may require giving up others; to make hard choices in the moment, because we are caring for many; and to actualize the best possibilities sensed.
March 15, 2015
Dewey and Heidegger
Dewey:
Principle: Dewey didn't think there were set universal standards for things. He believed that the standards were what we liked and things were "good" if things seemed right in the specific context someone was engaged in. In other words, he believed that standards couldn't be decided on for a specific situation until they were tested out.
Application: Social websites should be tested before users begin to explore. And as users explore, there should be change and adaptation as the current standard fails to meet their needs.
Heidegger:
Principle: Heidegger viewed technology as an extension to man.
Application: We don't have to believe Heidegger completely to understand that he was onto something with this concept. Every day we walk around with our cell phones, drive in our cars, work on our computers, etc., etc. Our every day experience is intertwined with technology. Because of this there is a high bar for those creating social websites. Your users may not be experts on web design, but they are expert users. Almost everyone that will view their site has seen thousands of sites in their lifetime, and most can tell when a site is easy to navigate or not. Design your site with the expert status of your users in mind. Remember that technology is almost literally an extension to man these days.
Principle: Dewey didn't think there were set universal standards for things. He believed that the standards were what we liked and things were "good" if things seemed right in the specific context someone was engaged in. In other words, he believed that standards couldn't be decided on for a specific situation until they were tested out.
Application: Social websites should be tested before users begin to explore. And as users explore, there should be change and adaptation as the current standard fails to meet their needs.
Heidegger:
Principle: Heidegger viewed technology as an extension to man.
Application: We don't have to believe Heidegger completely to understand that he was onto something with this concept. Every day we walk around with our cell phones, drive in our cars, work on our computers, etc., etc. Our every day experience is intertwined with technology. Because of this there is a high bar for those creating social websites. Your users may not be experts on web design, but they are expert users. Almost everyone that will view their site has seen thousands of sites in their lifetime, and most can tell when a site is easy to navigate or not. Design your site with the expert status of your users in mind. Remember that technology is almost literally an extension to man these days.
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