Kakuta Haruo---Decoding Japan---

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Location: Sakai, Osaka, Japan

Tuesday, August 29, 2006

Management of Educational Technology

We ought to learn from MOT (Management of Technology). Teachers are professionals of teaching. Teaching needs some technology. Then teachaers can be called technicians. Professionals would like to be treated differently than other workers or laborers, whether you like the idea of such discriminative treatment or not.

Monday, August 28, 2006

Is the World Flattening?

I wonder whether the gaps among social classes are widening or narrowing in today's world? If you into a certain country, the gaps there must look widening. If you look around the whole world, The rich in every country are getting richer, as rich as those in advanced countries: the poor in every country are becoming poorer, as poor as those in underdeveloped countries. The rich, however, are getting richer in absolute manner, and the poor are becoming poorer in absolute sense. Yet, the hierarchy in every and each country has not only become a part of the world hierarchy, but also they are forming a single global hierarchy. The rich are rich in the universal hierarchy, and the poor are poor, no matter where they live. Being a white or a Japanese does not guarantee that they are well-off. The world is, at last, overcoming racism.

Saturday, August 26, 2006

Neo Neo Neo

Neo-liberalism is ceding its momentum to the next ism. Communalism? Religious sectism? Secularism or/and socialism seem not to be in fashion. Pluralism is a reality but lacks in charismatic charm. Neo-neo-liberalism is what is needed.

Tuesday, August 22, 2006

The end of a season: the end of a reason.

A day is left before the beginning of the second term. Am I ready? ... That I doubt. After getting into my 40's or so, a summer goes by without satisfying achievement. Although this summer gave my family exciting and unusual experiences in China, that left me a little satisfaction. Neo-liberalism is ceding its momentum to the next ism. Communalism? Religious sectism? Secularism or/and socialism seem not to be in fashion. Pluralism is a reality but lacks in charismatic charm. Neo-neo-liberalism is what is needed.

Sunday, August 20, 2006

"Beethoven's Anvil" (2)

「It is important that the individual's sense of self, represented by the ego node, be consistent with other people's sense of him or her, and that these various other senses be mutually coherent. Much of social interaction is about achieving coherence among the neurally distributed components of a single identity.」(p.62)「A social status is simply one's position in the social system. ... A role, by contrast, is the social "script" you use to enact your status in a praticular situation.」(p.62)→A socialized or generalized persona is a status.「We could in fact think of one's kinship status as a specialized aspect of one's persona, an aspect one shares with all other individuals of the same status.」(p.62)「We might think of a status as a constraint on the persona, but better perhaps to consider it the core of the persona, which determines the basic features of one's interactions with others. One's unique features and capacities are then "attached" to that core. As such, the status exists in the brains of everyone in the culture.」(p.63)→In fact, "a constraint" makes a role easy to enact. It's a stimulus.「In fact, the set of possible statuses exists in the brain of every adult member of the culture. This set of statuses is affirmed and elaborated in the culture's stories and rituals; it forms the core of social life.」(p.63)→In one sense, "the set of possible statuses" is a culture.「the fluctuating patterns of interpersonal conjunction that sustain our cultural life.」(p.66)→The culture has certain patterns of interpersonal conjunction to sustain itself. Or cultures differ from one another as what kinds of patterns it has, and how it has them.「a low level of activity is still a means of participating in the evolving mental state.」(p.72)「The overall state (of the brain: Kakuta)is not explicitly controlled, at least not at a high degree of precision. Rather, that overall atate reflects activities at various levels within the whole system. ... Yet no component of the brain regulates all of this activity in detail. The overall activity just happens. That overall activity is what I am calling the mindl.」(p.73)「self-organizing dynamical systems」(p.74)「self-organizing dynamics」(p.75)「Somewhere in the brain a small fluctuation takes hold and becomes amplified to the point where it takes over global brain dynamics. This is not something you can will to happen --- at least not directly --- but if you put yourself in the right frame of mind and do the right things, then the magic may happen.」(p.75)「The pleasure of sport ---at any rate, the pleasure that derives from the activity itself, rather than from beating aomeone else in competition --- is simply the subjective feeling of smooth fluid physical motion in which one's motive force exactly matches and counters any resistance.」(p.85)「our commonsense view of the self easily accommodates the notion of multiple inner agents, often at odds with one another, acting on our behalf」(p.96)→"the notion of multiple inner agents": The notion needs its name. To have a name or not to matters. Having, or commanding, its name gives you a power to control it.→"multiple inner agents, often at odds with one another"「To be sure, we can choose to supress emotional expression through firm self-control --- but htat is quite different from not generating the expression at all. The latter is not physically possible. When the appropriate subcortical mechanisms organize some emotional state, they will modulate the skeletal muscles with the appropriate essentic form. Whether one's body freely expresses that form depends on the neocortical motor systems: they may allow the expression or try in varying degrees to suppress it.」(p.100)

Wednesday, August 16, 2006

Trip to Beijin

19 years have passed since I last visited Beijing. The two decades have witnessed much change both of the world and of myself. What have they seen in Beijing? Ms Liu, our guide, was busy talking to the other members of the trip, with her sign down. Our flight had left Osaka at 10:00 in the morning and arrived Beijing just after the noon. The time difference might make it sound short, but Eastword wind over the Northeast Asia had made the flight longer and rougher, and we had felt already tired when we arrived at the airport. We went out of the arrival area and looked for the sign of our tourist. Beijing airport was so busy that the outside of the arrival was jamed with people. We went through the people with their company's banners and signs in their hands. We couldn't find one for us. I went through them again in reverse in vain. I came out through them again, checking the banners and signs one by one. At the end of the crowds, there was a bank, and a young lady and a middle aged couple was talking about exchanging. I examined a sign in the lady's hands, and found who she was. The drive from the airport to the mid town was a tough one. Chinese streets used to be packed with bicycles, and now are packed with cars which people drive ust as they used to compete with their bicylces. They must have cirtain "FORCE" in them as JEDIS do, or otherwise they could not avoide getting crushed each other. The drive reminded me a pot race in Episode I. The drive, anyway, brought us to Tian-tan (namely, Heaven-platform) Park, where emperors used to pray to the heaven. There are other platforms like Nong-tan (Farm-platform), and Di-tan (Land-platform). Daoism in China is somewhat similar to Shintoism in Japan. Every and each thing has its god in it. Tian-tan used to be a closed temple only for emperors, but now open to ordinaly citizens with small entrance fee. They enjoy greens which lack in city life. Long corridors where nobles used to walk now give the people shades in hot summer days. Some play pokers, some Chinese chesses, some Chinese songs, but other majorities just sit, looking into passengers. Tian-tan building itself was already repaired, and looked brandnew. Unluckily, some other buildings in the park, along with many other sightseeing spots in Beijing, were under repairment. They are preparing for 2008 Olimpics. Tian-tan is in the south of the city. We drove north to visit Qing-shan (namely, scenery-mountain) Park. The park adjoins the Royal Palace, and used to be a closed personal gurdain for emperors. The mountain's northskart has a tea house, Yu-cha-yuan (Royal-tea-house), which, of course, used to be used only by emperors and their families. We enjoyed Chinese-style tea ceremony there. We call our tea ceremony Sa-do (Tea-way), while they call theirs Cha-ying (Tea-art), which concenrate more on how to make tea delicious. Our dinner time was yet to come, so the couple suggested to have Hu-dong tour. Having no particular idea, we said yes, which led us to an action-movie-like experience. Each pair of us mounted a bicycle-type rickshaw. Against our expectation for an elegant tour through Hu-dong area, the rickshaws rushed through narrow streets, sometimes car-chasing each other, sometimes bumping into each other, sometimes narrowly passing other rickshaws which rush against ours. Our hearts were just pounding so hard as to get out of our mouth. Hu-dong is not a proper noun in a gramatical sence. Beijing's traditional residential areas have been called Hu-dong. Those areas have small private houses along narrow streets. The houses usually belong to a type which is called Si-he-yuan (Four-combined-house). A courtyard is surrounded with 4 buildings in Si-he-yuan. Parents live in the north one, which faces south like emperors'; brothers in the east one; sisters in west one. The south building is used for other purposes, like a study. The Hu-dong tour had its own guide. The guide said the number of cross post on the gate used to indicate the class of the owner. As far as I see, all the gates of the area had two cross posts. As the number must be a even one,there used to live the lowest officials. Stone posts under the gate indicate the owner is either a civilian or a military officer. The former post has a picture of sheep, as a civilian officers used brushes as a stationary; the latter shapes a drum, as military officers used to be organized with the sound of drums in the battle fields. Beside officers there used to live some merchants with a picture of a purse on their stone posts. A middle aged man in his 50s welcomed us to his Si-he-yuan. He had made an earlier retirement because of his illness, and receives 1,800 RMB every month as a pension. His early retirement might have led him to show his own house. He served us a paper-cup of tea under a grape trellis. His pronunciation was clear, and his explanation had a well experienced tone. That enabled me to understand
Ms Liu sighs it rains rather a lot in Beijing this summer. Chang-cheng, or the Great Wall, is hazed in the light rain and misty fog. The longness or the greatness of the wall never reveals itself; the steepness of the cliffs in both sides can be hardly sensed. Steep hills and flights of steps tell us we are ascending anyway. How far and high have we come? You can never see in the mist-like clouds, but your legs tell you. As we climb the wall, the wall shows itself peak by peak. Each peak has a fort with some space to hold soldiers. "The wall" itself is wide enough to let two horses pass in parallel. Our right side barriers are taller than the left ones, which tells we are walking westward. Chang-cheng is a bulwark against the North, nomads such as Mongolians. The wall, however, never worked under any great pressure from the North. Someone, some Chinese officers, opened gates to them then. A Japanese warlord once wisely put it; people are stone walls, and people are strongholds. We kept walking westward. Dunhuang, the west end of the Great Wall, is some 2,000 km away. I wonder if we have walked 1/2000 of the way. Over the steepest hill and flight of stairs, the fourth fort or fourth peak comes into our sight out of the mist. Here we are in the fourth, highest, and largest fort. Come into the fort, and you will find a souvenior shop, which offers arrival certificates. Another side of the peak has another souvenir store, which sells a full range of gifts along with refreshments. Ah, are we welcomed, or made fool of?