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In this podcast, we will discuss all things education. The ReasonRx Podcast benefits not only the student, teacher, and parent, but also all adults and business professionals. After all, education...
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In this podcast, we will discuss all things education. The ReasonRx Podcast benefits not only the student, teacher, and parent, but also all adults and business professionals. After all, education is for everyone: we all have to teach, and learn, and think.
Education is the systematic training of the mind. More technically and in more depth, education is “the systematic training of the conceptual faculty by means of supplying in essentials both its content and its method.” (Dr. Leonard Peikoff)
Of course, in the primary sense, it is the systematic training of the young to prepare them for adult life. Its purpose is to prepare a child for the total depth and range of surviving and thriving as an adult human in the broad world -- social and material, physical and biological/ecological.
So your host and co-hosts will interview guests and offer in-depth discussion of topics like study skills, biology, philosophy of education, epistemology, math pedagogy, music pedagogy, art, the role of art in education and human life, nutrition, exercise, sleep, the nature of science, and more -- everything involved in education and needed for an optimally functioning human.
The show will strive to help us think deep so we can live large and live well:
"A little learning is a dang'rous thing;
Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring:
There shallow draughts intoxicate the brain,
And drinking largely sobers us again."
--Alexander Pope (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierian_Spring)
To support the show and help us grow our audience -- so we have more of an impact on education and the culture -- please help us with a donation:
1. https://www.patreon.com/reasonrxpodcast
2. https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=SP6QPQKJU4XSS&source=url
Also, please consider liking us on your podcast app, and leaving a rational review.
Email us at ReasonRxPodcast@aol.com, michael@goldams.com, or goldmj@aol.com.
Host.
Michael: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-gold-2883921/
Gold Academy: https://goldams.com
Total Human Fitness: https://total-human-fitness.com
Gold Academy Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/EpistemeRx/
YouTube Gold Academy: https://www.youtube.com/@goldacademy
YouTube Total Human Fitness: https://www.youtube.com/@totalhumanfitness
Co-host.
Melanie: https://www.linkedin.com/in/melanie-katragadda-nctm-9b14522a
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Education is the systematic training of the mind. More technically and in more depth, education is “the systematic training of the conceptual faculty by means of supplying in essentials both its content and its method.” (Dr. Leonard Peikoff)
Of course, in the primary sense, it is the systematic training of the young to prepare them for adult life. Its purpose is to prepare a child for the total depth and range of surviving and thriving as an adult human in the broad world -- social and material, physical and biological/ecological.
So your host and co-hosts will interview guests and offer in-depth discussion of topics like study skills, biology, philosophy of education, epistemology, math pedagogy, music pedagogy, art, the role of art in education and human life, nutrition, exercise, sleep, the nature of science, and more -- everything involved in education and needed for an optimally functioning human.
The show will strive to help us think deep so we can live large and live well:
"A little learning is a dang'rous thing;
Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring:
There shallow draughts intoxicate the brain,
And drinking largely sobers us again."
--Alexander Pope (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierian_Spring)
To support the show and help us grow our audience -- so we have more of an impact on education and the culture -- please help us with a donation:
1. https://www.patreon.com/reasonrxpodcast
2. https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=SP6QPQKJU4XSS&source=url
Also, please consider liking us on your podcast app, and leaving a rational review.
Email us at ReasonRxPodcast@aol.com, michael@goldams.com, or goldmj@aol.com.
Host.
Michael: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-gold-2883921/
Gold Academy: https://goldams.com
Total Human Fitness: https://total-human-fitness.com
Gold Academy Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/EpistemeRx/
YouTube Gold Academy: https://www.youtube.com/@goldacademy
YouTube Total Human Fitness: https://www.youtube.com/@totalhumanfitness
Co-host.
Melanie: https://www.linkedin.com/in/melanie-katragadda-nctm-9b14522a
The ReasonRx Podcast: A Rational Perspective on Education
The ReasonRx Podcast: A Rational Perspective on Education
Michael GoldEpisodes & Posts
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Transcribed
5 MAY 2026 · Science should be taught by following how it developed historically. There are all sorts of reasons why -- most importantly because that method fits with the nature and aims of education.
The historical and inductive essence needs to be there, but how that is achieved could vary -- and should, by age, intellectual level, power of patience, etc. You could go into more or less depth and breadth, depending on the student(s). You could use some topic to capture interest, then start asking "how do you/we know???" You could start with an absraction and "reverse engineer" some inductions and theories. As long as the root in perceptual experience and the steps of abstraction are respected, and as long as principles of logic and reasoing are learned (in their practice).
Notes.
1. Introductory physics: An Historical Approach by Hebert Priestley https://archive.org/details/introductoryphys0000prie/page/6/mode/2up
2. "For their part, Casadevall and Bosch write that science education reform should resultin scientists who are: (1) broadly interested, creative and self-directed, as were somescientists in the era of Louis Pasteur, Marie Curie, Albert Einstein, and Linus Pauling; (2)versed in epistemology, sound research conduct and error analysis, according to the‘3R’ norms of good scientific practice—rigor, responsibility and reproducibility; (3)skilled in reasoning using mathematical, statistical and programming methods and ableto tackle logical fallacies.”
—From "Biomedical science education needs a newphilosophy, Johns Hopkins researchers say"
https://hub.jhu.edu/2018/01/03/biomedical-science-education-reform-casadevall-bosch/
3. “Teaching Heat: the Rise and Fall of the Caloric Theory” by Dr. Michael Fowler (Professor of Physics, University ofVirginia, retired)
http://galileoandeinstein.physics.virginia.edu/more_stuff/TeachingHeat.htm
More of his work here: https://galileo.phys.virginia.edu/~mf1i/
4. Physics for the Inquiring Mind by Dr. Eric Rogers (Professor ofPhysics, Princeton University, 1942-1971). Quotes from p. 205 and from the book descriptoin on the back jacket.
https://archive.org/details/PhysicsForTheInquiringMind-Rogers/page/n217/mode/2up
Available for purchase on Amazon, but free pdfs can be found on the Internet.
5. “The Purpose of Education,” by Martin Luther King, Jr., published in 1947 in the the Morehouse College campus newspaper The Maroon Tiger.
https://kinginstitute.stanford.edu/king-papers/documents/purpose-education
6. "I fully agree with you about the significance and educational value of methodology as well as history and philosophy of science. So many people today—and evenprofessional scientists—seem to me like someone who has seen thousands of treesbut has never seen a forest. A knowledge of the historic and philosophical backgroundgives that kind of independence from prejudices of his generation from which mostscientists are suffering. This independence created by philosophical insight is—in myopinion—the mark of distinction between a mere artisan or specialist and a real seekerafter truth."
—Albert Einstein (Letter to Robert A. Thorton, Physics Professor atUniversity of Puerto Rico (7 December 1944) [EA-674, Einstein Archive, HebrewUniversity, Jerusalem]. Thorton had written to Einstein on persuading colleagues of theimportance of philosophy of science to scientists (empiricists) and science.
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Albert_Einstein
7. The very well-done physics lectures by Dr. Walter Lewin.
https://www.youtube.com/@lecturesbywalterlewin.they9259
8. "A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.”
--Robert Heinlien (quote from the 1973 sci-fi novel Time Enough For Love)
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Time_Enough_for_Love
9. Range: Why Generalist Triump In a Specialized World by David Epstien
https://www.amazon.com/Range-Generalists-Triumph-Specialized-World/dp/0735214484
10. “Few [scientists] are philosophers. Most are intellectual journeyman, exploring locally, hoping for a strike, living for the present."
--E.O. Wilson, Consilience: The Unity of Knowledge
https://www.amazon.com/Consilience-Unity-Knowledge-Wilson-ebook/dp/B00P5557DK/
11. “The seeker after truth is not one who studies the writings of the ancients and,following his natural disposition, puts his trust in them, but rather the one who suspectshis faith in them and questions what he gathers from them, the one who submits toarguments and demonstration and not the sayings of human beings whose nature isfraught with all kinds of imperfection and deficiency. Thus the duty of the man whoinvestigates the writings of scientists, if learning the truth is his goal, is to make himselfan enemy of all that he reads, and, applying his mind to the core and margins of itscontent, attack it from every side. He should also suspect himself as he performs hiscritical examination of it, so that he may avoid falling into either prejudice or leniency.”
—Ibn al-Haytham (Abū ʿAlī al-Ḥasan ibn al-Haytham, c. 965 – c. 1040.) Source: quote at the beginning of Chapter 11, “The Physicist,” in the book The House of Wisdom by JimAl-Khalili.
https://www.amazon.com/House-Wisdom-Science-Knowledge-Renaissance/dp/0143120565/
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Pierre_and_Marie_Curie.jpg from Wikipedia. Please consider liking us on your podcast app, and leaving a rational review.
Email us at ReasonRxPodcast@aol.com, michael@goldams.com, or goldmj@aol.com.
Host.
Michael: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-gold-2883921/
Gold Academy: https://goldams.com
Total Human Fitness: https://total-human-fitness.com
Transcribed
29 APR 2026 · Thanks for the good administrators out there! But the less-than-good need to be "controlled" and "managed" by checks and balances of critical thinking, logic, root-cause analysis, and "Extreme Ownership." And sone outside oversight.
“Education must also train one for quick, resolute and effective thinking. To think incisively and to think for one’s self is very difficult. We are prone to let our mental life become invaded by legions of half truths, prejudices, and propaganda. At this point, I often wonder whether or not education is fulfilling its purpose. A great majority of the so-called educated people do not think logically and scientifically. Even the press, the classroom, the platform, and the pulpit in many instances do not give us objective and unbiased truths. To save man from the morass of propaganda, in my opinion, is one of the chief aims of education. Education must enable one to sift and weigh evidence, to discern the true from the false, the real from the unreal, and the facts from the fiction.
"The function of education, therefore, is to teach one to think intensively and to think critically. But education which stops with efficiency may prove the greatest menace to society. The most dangerous criminal may be the man gifted with reason, but with no morals...."We must remember that intelligence is not enough. Intelligence plus character—that is the goal of true education. The complete education gives one not only power of concentration, but worthy objectives upon which to concentrate. The broad education will, therefore, transmit to one not only the accumulated knowledge of the race but also the accumulated experience of social living.
"If we are not careful, our colleges will produce a group of close-minded, unscientific, illogical propagandists, consumed with immoral acts. Be careful, 'brethren!' Be careful, teachers!" [And, I'd add, "Be careful, Administratorts!")
--Martin Luther King, Jr. (From MLK’s 1947 article “The Purpose of Education,” published in the Morehouse College campus newspaper The Maroon Tiger. See: https://kinginstitute.stanford.edu/king-papers/documents/purpose-education )
Some solutoins.
1. Extreme Ownwership by Jocko Willinck and Leif Babin
https://www.amazon.com/Extreme-Ownership-audiobook/dp/B015TM0RM4/
2. Companies and organizations that teach critical thinkig.
3. Companies and organizations that teach root-cause analysis.
I can help with the critical thinking and root-cause analsys. Just get in touch. I'd be glad to helip.
And here, as promised:
1. "Awful School Admins" (13 min 6 sec)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jwxQ0xD80PM
2. "Teacher Story Time: How I Was Fired in Front of My Class" (4 min 13 sec)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ke4kJMkV1dY
3. "Bad Principals Make Teachers Quit: Dealing w/Administration, Instructional Coaches & School Boards" (17 min 52 sec)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kc1wsE5kNak
4. "Norwich school board places superintendent on administrative leave following personnel complaints" (2 min 37 sec)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K20xB5Eugu4
5. "About 1 in 8 senior leaders have psychopathic traits. Here’s how to spot an abusive boss" by Lindsey Leake. (Fortune, 26Apr2025)
https://fortune.com/well/2025/04/26/psychopath-senior-leaders-abusive-boss/
6. "The Truth About Corporate PsychopathsWhat research does—and does not say about psychopathy in the office." by Emilia Bunea (Psychology Today, 12May2023).
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/to-manage-is-human/202305/the-truth-about-corporate-psychopaths
7. "How To Survive A Toxic Manager In Any Workplace" by Caroline Castrillo (Forbes, 5Mar2025)
https://www.forbes.com/sites/carolinecastrillon/2025/03/05/how-to-recognize-and-survive-a-toxic-manager-in-any-workplace/
8. "7 signs that your boss could be a toxic manager — and what you can do about it" by Julia Sullivan (USA Today, 24Jun2025)
https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2025/06/24/signs-of-a-toxic-boss/84323544007/
9. " 'I was fired because my principal did not like me.' SCS Teacher Challenges School System" (9 min 13 sec)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xjq_ukpJ_bY
10. "When Teachers Are Bullied (Why More Don't Speak Up)" (4 min 3 sec)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WJDLION3_0s
11. "4 Powerful Strategies for Teachers with Unsupportive Admin" (7 min 55 sec)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xh3NWkPDnL8
12. "I Quit Teaching After 18 Years - Some Advice for Teachers" (9 min 27 sec)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=31qp-9_nTWE
Etc., Etc., Etc.
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Balance_à_tabac_1850.JPG from Wikipedia.
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Inmates_Orleans_Parish_Prison.jpgy." Please consider liking us on your podcast app, and leaving a rational review.
Email us at ReasonRxPodcast@aol.com, michael@goldams.com, or goldmj@aol.com.
Host.
Michael: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-gold-2883921/
Gold Academy: https://goldams.com
Total Human Fitness: https://total-human-fitness.com
Transcribed
21 APR 2026 · Induction is valid. Hume was wrong: there is no “problem of induction."
Inductions validly and logically formed are contextual absolutes. We can and should confidently and certainly form inductions, use them, and rely on them.
Necessity is in experience. It is in reality. It has epistemic and metaphysical priority over anyone’s imaginings and ramblings.
1. “Practical scientists [and adults] who rashly allow themselves to listen to [most modern] philosophers are likely to go away in a discouraged frame of mind, convinced that there is no logical foundation for the things they do, that all their alleged scientific laws are without justification, and that they are living in a world of naïve illusion. Of course, once they get out into the sunlight again, they know that this is not so, that scientific principles do work, bridges stay up, eclipses occur on schedule, and atomic bombs go off.
“Nevertheless, it is very unsatisfactory that no generally acceptable theory of scientific inference has yet been put forward. … Mistakes are often made which would presumably not have been made if a consistent and satisfactory basic philosophy had been followed.”
—An Introduction to Scientific Research by E. Bright Wilson, Professor Chemistry at Harvard. (About Edgar Bright Wilson: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edgar_Bright_Wilson)
2, "I fully agree with you about the significance and educational value of methodology as well as history and philosophy of science. So many people today — and even professional scientists — seem to me like someone who has seen thousands of trees but has never seen a forest. A knowledge of the historic and philosophical background gives that kind of independence from prejudices of his generation from which most scientists are suffering. This independence created by philosophical insight is — in my opinion — the mark of distinction between a mere artisan or specialist and a real seeker after truth."
—Albert Einstein (Letter to Robert A. Thorton, Physics Professor at University of Puerto Rico (7 December 1944) [EA-674, Einstein Archive, Hebrew University, Jerusalem]. See: https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Albert_Einstein)
3. "I should even think that in making the celestial material alterable, I contradict the doctrine of Aristotle much less than do those people who still want to keep the sky inalterable; for I am sure that he never took its inalterability to be as certain as the fact that all human reasoning must be placed second to direct experience."
—From the Second Letter of Galileo Galilei to Mark Welser on Sunspots, p. 118 of Discoveries and Opinions of Galileo, translated by Stillman Drake, (c) 1957 by Stillman Drake, published by Doubleday Anchor Books, Doubleday & Co., Garden City, New York
4.“Rule 1 We are to admit no more causes of natural things than such as are both true and sufficient to explain their appearances.
“Rule 2 Therefore to the same natural effects we must, as far as possible, assign the same causes.
“Rule 3. The qualities of bodies, which admit neither intensification nor remission of degrees, and which are found to belong to all bodies within the reach of our experiments, are to be esteemed the universal qualities of all bodies whatsoever.
“Rule 4. In experimental philosophy we are to look upon propositions inferred by general induction from phenomena as accurately or very nearly true, not withstanding any contrary hypothesis that may be imagined, till such time as other phenomena occur, by which they may either be made more accurate, or liable to exceptions.”
—Newton’s Rules of Reasoning in Science. See: http://apex.ua.edu/uploads/2/8/7/3/28731065/four_rules_of_reasoning_apex_website.pdf
5. "This is the case when both the cause and effect are present to the senses. Let us now see upon what our inference is founded, when we conclude from the one that the other has existed or will exist. Suppose I see a ball moving in a streight line towards another, I immediately conclude, that they will shock, and that the second will be in motion. This is the inference from cause to effect; and of this nature are all our reasonings in the conduct of life: on this is founded all our belief in history: and from hence is derived all philosophy, excepting only geometry and arithmetic. If we can explain the inference from the shock of two balls, we shall be able to account for this operation of the mind in all instances.
"Were a man, such as Adam, created in the full vigour of understanding, without experience, he would never be able to infer motion in the second ball from the motion and impulse of the first. It is not any thing that reason sees in the cause, which makes us infer the effect. Such an inference, were it possible, would amount to a demonstration, as being founded merely on the comparison of ideas. But no inference from cause to effect amounts to a demonstration. Of which there is this evident proof. The mind can always conceive any effect to follow from any cause, and indeed any event to follow upon another: whatever we conceive is possible, at least in a metaphysical sense: but wherever a demonstration takes place, the contrary is impossible, and implies a contradiction. There is no demonstration, therefore, for any conjunction of cause and effect. And this is a principle, which is generally allowed by philosophers.
"It would have been necessary, therefore, for Adam (if he was not inspired) to have had experience of the effect, which followed upon the impulse of these two balls. He must have seen, in several instances, that when the one ball struck upon the other, the second always acquired motion. If he had seen a sufficient number of instances of this kind, whenever he saw the one ball moving towards the other, he would always conclude without hesitation, that the second would acquire motion. His understanding would anticipate his sight, and form a conclusion suitable to his past experience.
"It follows, then, that all reasonings concerning cause and effect, are founded on experience, and that all reasonings from experience are founded on the supposition, that the course of nature will continue uniformly the same. We conclude, that like causes, in like circumstances, will always produce like effects. It may now be worth while to consider, what determines us to form a conclusion of such infinite consequence.
“ 'Tis evident, that Adam with all his science, would never have been able to demonstrate, that the course of nature must continue uniformly the same, and that the future must be conformable to the past. What is possible can never be demonstrated to be false; and 'tis possible the course of nature may change, since we can conceive such a change. Nay, I will go farther, and assert, that he could not so much as prove by any probable arguments, that the future must be conformable to the past. All probable arguments are built on the supposition, that there is this conformity betwixt the future and the past, and therefore can never prove it. This conformity is a matter of fact, and if it must be proved, will admit of no proof but from experience. But our experience in the past can be a proof of nothing for the future, but upon a supposition, that there is a resemblance betwixt them. This therefore is a point, which can admit of no proof at all, and which we take for granted without any proof.”
—From Hume’s (or maybe Adam Smith’s) “AN ABSTRACT OF A BOOK lately Published; entituled, A TREATISE OF Human Nature, &c. wherein The CHIEF ARGUMENT of that BOOK is farther illustrated and explained." See: https://davidhume.org/texts/a/
6. "This Platonic heritage, with its emphasis in clear distinctions and separated immutable entities, leads us to view statistical measures of central tendency wrongly, indeed opposite to the appropriate interpretation in our actual world of variation, shadings, and continua. In short, we view means and medians as the hard 'realities,' and the variation that permits their calculation as a set of transient and imperfect measurements of this hidden essence. ... But all evolutionary biologists know that variation itself is nature’s only irreducible essence. Variation is the hard reality, not a set of imperfect measures for a central tendency. Means and medians are the abstractions."
—"The Median Isn’t the Message" by Stephen Jay Gould (See: https://www.edwardtufte.com/notebook/classic-articles-on-statistical-thinking/)
7. “I can imagine." Uniformity. Future vs past.
Self-contradiction. Applies also to deduction, reasoning, language, etc. And we are part of nature: we are not immune from what he says.
8. And why is causality custom or habit? What causes it? Why only custom or habit? Why not anything else? Why is this suddenly a stopping point, and Hume does not “imagine things to be different again?” Are habit and custom necessary, or not? Are they uniform? How do you know about tomorrow or other instances?
And I disagree: there are no “analytic” statements that are “true” in the mind only.
9. Works of David Hume: https://davidhume.org/
"The Problem of Induction": https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/induction-problem/
"Notes on Hume’s Argument(s) concerning Induction” by Peter Millican, Hertford College, Oxford https://davidhume.org/teaching/documents/Hume_Notes_Induction.pdf
10. Galilean Spiral:
i. https://mathcurve.com/courbes2d.gb/galilee/galilee.shtml
ii https://mathworld.wolfram.com/GalileanSpiral.html
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Dispersive_Prism_Illustration.jpg from Wikipedia. Please consider liking us on your podcast app, and leaving a rational review.
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Gold Academy: https://goldams.com
Total Human Fitness: https://total-human-fitness.com
Transcribed
20 APR 2026 · Math is a way of understanidng of the world. It is a tool of thought that is governed by both metaphysics and epistrmoology. It is not a "free creation of the mind."
In this episode, I discuss some thoughts on the nature and philosophy of mathematics and how it really works, contra to what many today and through the ages have said. (Their practice of math, thank goodnes, has not been entirely consistent with their philosophy of it.) I owe all or most of this to Pat Corvini, who has done great work on the foundations of mathematics. Of course, any mistakes or misunderstandings here are my fault, not hers. I take responsibility for them.
Notes.
Math is important. It helps you live, survive, and thrive. It helps solve problems of survival: shelter, food, fun, etc.
Salary. Budget it, i.e., measure it out to your values. How much is something worth to you. Savings. Interest income. Salary increases.
How much gas cost how much and can get you how far in context of what budget and what values.
How much paint to buy to cover which walls or ceilings, why and when and how.
Or the equivalent for gardening, and lawn care, or driveway care, or roofing, etc.
How to understand ideas and science about exercise, fitness, health, diet, drugs.
Hobbies and work. Engineering. Nursing. Fighting. Photography.
It is integral to how we as humans interact with the world.
It is an important tool of thought used in most every field of thought: physics, photography, fitness, philosophy, chemistry, medicine, accounting, finance, economics, art, painting, sculpture.
It is not merely in our heads. Set theory wrong. Kant wrong. Math is not “pure reasoning.” It is not deductive. It is not “purely in the mind.”
It is a method of knowing and understanding the world. It has content and method. It arises from facts of reality, nature, and experience: repetition, multiplicity, etc.
Entities: first concepts of number
Add, subtract, multiply, divide
Later, get 0 and 1
Fractions: counting parts
Attributes: more abstract concepts of number
Possibility of continual division (sequence/series)
The science of number: even, odd, primes, etc.
Attributes: the science of measurement
Counting numbers —> real numbers
Need concepts of method, such as roots
Concept of “negative” — reality comes first, knowledge second; we give and take things and move things around, then start to figure out how to conceptualize that and make it scientific; no one ever had some idea in their head first, then “deduced” that things could be moved around, ergo reality snapped into place. That’s absurd.
More abstract: complex numbers
Ratio
Proportion
Functions
Area and volume as function
Coordinate system
---->Calculus
Image from "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/39/Children%27s_number_blocks_being_used_for_learning_to_count_-_51069936953.jpg" on Wikipedia. Please consider liking us on your podcast app, and leaving a rational review.
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Host.
Michael: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-gold-2883921/
Gold Academy: https://goldams.com
Total Human Fitness: https://total-human-fitness.com
Transcribed
17 APR 2026 · Teaching, learning, and understanding -- examples are critical, not just in school, but in life and at work.
After all, we all have to sometimes teach and sometines learn -- it's part of being a social animal. And we frequently have to think. So we should know how to do them well.
No matter what -- Acid. Base. Titration. Redox. Quantum mechanics. Maxwell’s equations. Navier-Stokes equations. Turbulence. Government. Psychopath. Discipline. Friend. Money. Honesty. Integrity. Reason. Logic. Induction. Deduction. Wisdom. -- in forming concepts of these things and understanding them, we should have examples, preferably a wide, varying range of examples.
Here are two cases where I've used examples to teach concepts and understanding of them.
I. Adjectives
noun
cat, human, wisdom, reason, emotion, victory, oak, butterfly, friend, physics, grammar, philosophy, logic, steak, hamburger, home, school
--> a noun is a word that names a person, place, or thing
verb
think, understand, feel, run, throw, lift, jump, cook, eat, digest, rest, sleep, move, is, was, smells
--> a verb is a word that names an action or state
adjective
red, blue, big, small, fast, slow, strong, weak, wise, unwise, capitalistic, communistic
his, her, their
three, five, most, all, some, none
this, that, a, the
--> an adjective is a word that modifies a nout
adverb
slowly, quickly, wisely, intelligently, unsmartly, very, so
yesterday, yesterday, tomorrow, on my birthday,
here, there, on the corner, under the roof
for the team, because I said so,
--> an adverb is a word that modifires a verb
preposition
through, to, out, upon, because of, in, over, across, in spite of, up, down
--> a preposition is a word that connects a noun to the rest of the sentence
The Adjectives Questions
Which one(s)?
What kind?
How many?
Whose?
The Adverb Questions
How?
When?
Where?
Why?
Notice some logical features in what we did. We identified these things:
What are they?
How are they similar?
How are they different from related things? What’s the contrast?
What’s the context?
We should do that in forming concepts of other things, and in understanding those things.
II. Projectiles.
horizontal: ball pushed on ground, etc.
vertical: ball dropped, etc.
projectile: rock thrown, coin flicked off a table, cannobal fired, bulllet fired
self-propelled: bird, jet airplane, helicopter
affected by air resistance: feather dropped or thrown, piece of paper (not crumpled) dropped
Galileo: just as ramp/incline slowed down free fall so he could study it, so also a ramp slowed down projectile motion so he could study it.
Notice some logical features in what we did. We identified these things:
What are examples?
In contrast to what?
What is definitive? How do we characterize it?
Why do they do what they do?
How can we understand it?
We should do that in forming concepts of other things, and in understanding those things.
Galilean Spiral:
i. https://mathcurve.com/courbes2d.gb/galilee/galilee.shtml
ii https://mathworld.wolfram.com/GalileanSpiral.html
Kepler's Laws
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kepler%27s_laws_of_planetary_motion
Examples are key in forming concepts and in studying the things for understanding. And it is in the real things where we find their rich variety and all sorts of actions and causation. And it is in focusing on the examples that we stay tied to reality.
Contact Michael at goldmj@aol.com or michael@goldams.com. Please consider liking us on your podcast app, and leaving a rational review.
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Host.
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Gold Academy: https://goldams.com
Total Human Fitness: https://total-human-fitness.com
Transcribed
13 APR 2026 · Just a few thoughts on how to fix educaiton and on what won't work.
We need to get to the funcamentals if we want improvement for our students and our children, and we want a better world -- we need to do to educaiton what Galileo and Newton did to physics: set education on a rational, inductive basis, one that is true to human nature.
Notes.
I. Here is more of the MLK quote.
”Education must also train one for quick, resolute and effective thinking. To think incisively and to think for one’s self is very difficult. We are prone to let our mental life become invaded by legions of half truths, prejudices, and propaganda. At this point, I often wonder whether or not education is fulfilling its purpose. A great majority of the so-called educated people do not think logically and scientifically. Even the press, the classroom, the platform, and the pulpit in many instances do not give us objective and unbiased truths. To save man from the morass of propaganda, in my opinion, is one of the chief aims of education. Education must enable one to sift and weigh evidence, to discern the true from the false, the real from the unreal, and the facts from the fiction.
"The function of education, therefore, is to teach one to think intensively and to think critically. But education which stops with efficiency may prove the greatest menace to society. The most dangerous criminal may be the man gifted with reason, but with no morals.
...
"We must remember that intelligence is not enough. Intelligence plus character—that is the goal of true education. The complete education gives one not only power of concentration, but worthy objectives upon which to concentrate. The broad education will, therefore, transmit to one not only the accumulated knowledge of the race but also the accumulated experience of social living.
"If we are not careful, our colleges will produce a group of close-minded, unscientific, illogical propagandists, consumed with immoral acts. Be careful, 'brethren!' Be careful, teachers!"
--Martin Luther King, Jr. (From MLK’s 1947 article “The Purpose of Education,” published in the Morehouse College campus newspaper The Maroon Tiger. See: https://kinginstitute.stanford.edu/king-papers/documents/purpose-education )
II. Alliteration
The example I was tryign to recall is in this movie clip: "[MF] V for Vendetta - The V monologue - HD" (1 min 39 sec) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wKn1R6fekk4
III. Some recommended logic texts.
1. Logic: An Introduction by Lionel Ruby
https://archive.org/details/logicintroductio00ruby
2. An Introduction to Logic by HWB Jospeh
https://archive.org/details/cu31924032298949/page/n1/mode/2up
IV. Feynman on understanding.
1. "How to Build a MIND that CAN'T FAIL | Richard Feynman" (17 min 31 sec)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tkze-jrBnws
2. "How Education DESTROYED Your Brain (Richard Feynman's Warning)" (28 min 52 sec)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bfWBBIYB39g
3. "The Feynman Technique — Stop Memorizing, Start Understanding" (14 min 345 sec)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NYSe2Ln0Tf4
Contact Michael at goldmj@aol.com or michael@goldams.com. Please consider liking us on your podcast app, and leaving a rational review.
Email us at ReasonRxPodcast@aol.com, michael@goldams.com, or goldmj@aol.com.
Host.
Michael: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-gold-2883921/
Gold Academy: https://goldams.com
Total Human Fitness: https://total-human-fitness.com
Transcribed
7 JAN 2023 · In this episode, Scott Harris joins us to discuss:
-what philosophy is
-why you need it
-why students need it
-why it should be taught
-his background in all that
-how he teaches it
-his scope and sequence
-what students get out of it
-some of his teacing experiences
-how philosophy has helped his students
-and more
About Scott:
Scott K. Harris (https://www.linkedin.com/in/scott-k-harris-b037966) has a Bachelor of Arts in History/Psychology from Texas State University and a Master’s in Education from Lamar University. He received the Mirabeau B. Lamar Award for Teaching Excellence, and was the first teacher in Texas to receive the Quality School Teacher Award.
In his 29th year of teaching, Harris has taught U.S. History, World History, Psychology, A.P. Psychology, A.P. Macroeconomics, Philosophy, and International Baccalaureate’s capstone course Theory of Knowledge. He also coached swimming and water polo for 17 years.
Harris has guest-lectured at Texas State in Philosophy, and at the University of Texas San Antonio’s graduate school in Education. For nearly two decades he was a member of the Mind Science Foundation and the National Association of Scholars.
Harris piloted curriculum for what is now John Stossel-in-the-Classroom, serves as a consultant to Free- to-Choose Media, and is an associate producer for Izzit.org, all of which produce videos advocating liberty and economic education.
Contact Scott: https://www.linkedin.com/in/scott-k-harris-b037966
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Notes.
1. "What is Philosophy?" (22 min 55 sec)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dXKHJLxM7lM
2. "Certainty" (10 min 37 sec)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ph9ttUjI-y0
3. "What is Science?" (6 min 14 sec)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DBYArLiumEc
4. "Logic: Basics of Induction vs Deduction" (10 min 2 sec)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DBYArLiumEc
5. "Deep Thinking: Finding the Empirical and Causal in the Traditional" (27 min 23 sec)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zeBxMkfhSnc
6. "Bruce Lee incorporated philosophical ideas into his martial arts fighting style, jeet kune do.
"Chinese martial arts styles are grounded in traditional philosophy, and Hong Kong martial arts superstar Bruce Lee worked hard to endow jeet kune do, a fighting style he created, with philosophical underpinnings.
https://www.scmp.com/topics/bruce-lee?module=inline&pgtype=article owned a library of around 2,000 books on martial arts, and he would often refer to these for inspiration. While a student at the University of Washington in the United States, Lee studied two courses in philosophy – Introduction to Philosophy and Chinese Philosophy – and he applied what he had learned there to martial arts."
Excerpt from "Bruce Lee as philosopher: 10 of the ideas animating his martial art style ‘jeet kune do’, such as letting nature take its course" ( South China Morning Post, 8 Dec 2019)
See: https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/entertainment/article/3040994/bruce-lee-philosopher-10-ideas-actor-imbued-his-martial-art
7. "He enrolled at Edison Technical School where he fulfilled the requirements for the equivalent of high school graduation and then enrolled at the University of Washington. At the university, Bruce majored in philosophy. His passion for gung fu inspired a desire to delve into the philosophical underpinnings and many of his written essays during those years would relate philosophical principles to certain martial arts techniques."
Excerpt from "Long Bio"
See: https://brucelee.com/bruce-lee
8. "I fully agree with you about the significance and educational value of methodology as well as history and philosophy of science. So many people today — and even professional scientists — seem to me like someone who has seen thousands of trees but has never seen a forest. A knowledge of the historic and philosophical background gives that kind of independence from prejudices of his generation from which most scientists are suffering. This independence created by philosophical insight is — in my opinion — the mark of distinction between a mere artisan or specialist and a real seeker after truth."
--Albert Einstein (Letter to Robert A. Thorton, Physics Professor at University of Puerto Rico (7 December 1944) [EA-674, Einstein Archive, Hebrew University, Jerusalem]. Thorton had written to Einstein on persuading colleagues of the importance of philosophy of science to scientists (empiricists) and science.
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Albert_Einstein)
9. Monty Python sketch "Argument"
i. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xpAvcGcEc0k
ii. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ohDB5gbtaEQ
10. “Sir, you are drunk.”
“And you, Bessie, are ugly. But I shall be sober in the morning, and you will still be ugly.”
Rumored to have been said by Wiston Churchill.
See: https://winstonchurchill.org/publications/churchill-bulletin/bulletin-031-jan-2011/drunk-and-ugly-the-rumor-mill/
See also: https://quoteinvestigator.com/2011/08/17/sober-tomorrow/
11. "Man's Search for Meaning" by https://www.amazon.com/Viktor-E-Frankl/e/B000APVZJU/ref=dp_byline_cont_book_1
https://www.amazon.com/Mans-Search-Meaning-Viktor-Frankl/dp/0807014273/
12. "Harrison Bergeron," aka "2081"
i. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_GVHgpCnBmk
ii. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sU3myZ3H6u0
13. "Harrison Bergeron Full Movie - 1995 Starring Sean Astin, Christopher Plummer - Award Winning"
i. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xxLhqVIhIWQ
ii. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XBcpuBRUdNs
14. In "How to Argue With Kindness and Care: 4 Rules from Philosopher Daniel Dennett," they write:
"The subject of sound rhetoric—with its subsets of ethical and emotional sensitivity—has been taken up by philosophers over hundreds of years, from medieval theologians to the staunchly atheist philosopher of consciousness Daniel Dennett. In his book Intuition Pumps and Other Tools for Thinking, Dennett summarizes the central rhetorical principle of charity, calling it 'Rapoport’s Rules' after an elaboration by social psychologist and game theorist Anatol Rapoport.
"Like their classical predecessors, these rules directly tie careful, generous listening to sound argumentation. We cannot say we have understood an argument unless we’ve actually heard its nuances, can summarize it for others, and can grant its merits and concede its strengths. Only then, writes Dennett, are we equipped to compose a ‘successful critical commentary’ of another’s position. Dennett outlines the process in four steps:
1) Attempt to re-express your target's position so clearly, vividly and fairly that your target says: ‘Thanks, I wish I'd thought of putting it that way.’
2) List any points of agreement (especially if they are not matters of general or widespread agreement).
3) Mention anything you have learned from your target.
4) Only then are you permitted to say so much as a word of rebuttal or criticism."
They also write: "These are remedies for better social cohesion and less shouty polarization, for deploying 'the artillery of our righteousness from behind the comfortable shield of the keyboard,' as Maria Popova writes at Brain Pickings, 'which is really a menace of reacting rather than responding.'
"Yelling, or typing, into the void, rather than engaging in substantive, respectful discussion is also a terrible waste of our time—a distraction from much worthier pursuits. We can and should, argues Dennett, Rapoport, and philosophers over the centuries, seek out positions we disagree with. In seeking out and trying to understand their best possible versions, we stand to gain new knowledge and widen our appreciation."
Image and bio courtesy Scott Harris. Please consider liking us on your podcast app, and leaving a rational review.
Email us at ReasonRxPodcast@aol.com, michael@goldams.com, or goldmj@aol.com.
Host.
Michael: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-gold-2883921/
Gold Academy: https://goldams.com
Total Human Fitness: https://total-human-fitness.com
Transcribed
23 OCT 2022 · In this episode I read Dr. Michael Fowler's "Teaching Heat: the Rise and Fall of the Caloric Theory" and discuss its significance. It recommends teaching physics historically, which also helps students learn science, logic, and reasoning, which they need for using thought in the world and they need for adult life.
Note: sorry for some of the reading in the episode. I was tired, so my contacts were blurry, so I could not read too well sometimes. I should have put my glasses on before I started!
It's a great article with lots of lessons.
How does science develop? Do scientists always accept truth and reject falsity?
What does history say? Scientists are nothing more and nothing less than human — and what do humans do? How do groups, cliques, bullies, cults, etc., work?
Galileo was put under house arrest and was harassed for his scientific views. Someone at his time, Bruno, was burned at the stake for saying the earth went around the sun.
Ignaz Semmelweiss was ridiculed for advocating doctors wash their hands before surgery, even though he had inductive evidence and proof.
James Joule was ridiculed for claiming that heat was a form of motion, because ‘all he had was hundredths of a degree to prove his point.’
Scientists of his day were committed to the “caloric” theory of heat. They rejected the idea that heat was a form of motion.
We see failures on the part of some "scientists" throughout human history:
-rejecting Aristarchus, Copernicus, Kepler, Bruno, Galileo on heliocentrism
-rejecting Kolreuter that bees pollinate plants
-rejecting Berger that the EEG was a useful tool
-rejecting Mayer on energy conservation
-rejecting some scientists who discovered that Killer Whales live in pods
-rejecting some scientists who discovered that Wolves are social pack animals, not "lone killers"
-Etc. Ad Infinitum.
And the social group of scientists sometimes have errant, unfounded beliefs. Jane Goodall was the one who went and actually studied Chimpanzees to find out about them, instead of merely assuming things about them. She discovered that Chimpanzees eat meat, and are not merely fruit-eaters — a discovery anyone could have made if they’d have had the independence of thought to go look. Thank goodness for Jane Goodall!
This kind of thing happens some all through human history. It is with us today.
Why?
Humans are social animals. We are not committed only to truth, but also to the group. Of course, the group needs to be committed to reality, else it suffers, fails, and dies, to the extent it departs from truth. But we need some group commitment to survive and thrive.
There is a difference between science (a method of thought), the products of science, and the scientific community. An important difference students should learn deeply.
Contact Michael:
1. Email: reasonrx@aol.com
2. Gold Academy: https://www.goldams.com
3. Total Human Fitness: https://total-human-fitness.com
4. Cypress Creek Ecological Restoration Project: https://ccerp.org
5. LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-gold-2883921/
6. Twitter/Instagram: EpistemeRx
Notes.
1. "Teaching Heat: the Rise and Fall of the Caloric Theory" by Michael Fowler, University of Virginia
http://galileoandeinstein.physics.virginia.edu/more_stuff/TeachingHeat.htm
2. More good lecture, courses, and articles by Dr. Fowler: https://galileo.phys.virginia.edu/~mf1i/home.html
3. In "Scurvy: An Example of Science vs. the Scientific Community" I give an example of a failure of the scientific community to get things right.
https://goldams.com/scurvy-and-science-vs-the-scientific-community/
4. Introductory physics; an historical approach by Herbert Priestley
https://archive.org/details/introductoryphys0000prie
5. Physics For The Inquiring Mind by Eric Rogers
https://archive.org/details/PhysicsForTheInquiringMind-Rogers/mode/2up
Image from: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Joule%27s_Apparatus_(Harper%27s_Scan).png Please consider liking us on your podcast app, and leaving a rational review.
Email us at ReasonRxPodcast@aol.com, michael@goldams.com, or goldmj@aol.com.
Host.
Michael: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-gold-2883921/
Gold Academy: https://goldams.com
Total Human Fitness: https://total-human-fitness.com
Transcribed
14 OCT 2022 · In this episode I discuss the great, classic article "The Median Isn't the Message" by Stephen Jay Gould. We delve into the article, its meaning, and lots of the depth and breadth we can get out of it. It should be read and studied by every statistics teacher and statistics student -- and everyone else, it is so full of lessons.
Contact Michael:
1. Email: reasonrx@aol.com
2. Gold Academy: https://www.goldams.com
3. Total Human Fitness: https://total-human-fitness.com
4. Cypress Creek Ecological Restoration Project: https://ccerp.org
5. LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-gold-2883921/
6. Twitter/Instagram: EpistemeRx
Notes.
1. "The Median Isn't the Message" by Stephen Jay Gould
https://www.edwardtufte.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg?msg_id=0003ms
2. Left skewed vs. right skewed
i. https://www.statology.org/left-skewed-vs-right-skewed/
ii. https://www.cuemath.com/data/right-skewed-histogram/
3. An article on Aristotle and science (high school- or college-level reading): https://galileoandeinstein.phys.virginia.edu/lectures/aristot2.html
“To summarize: Aristotle’s philosophy laid out an approach to the investigation of all natural phenomena, to determine form by detailed, systematic work, and thus arrive at final causes. His logical method of argument gave a framework for putting knowledge together, and deducing new results. He created what amounted to a fully-fledged professional scientific enterprise, on a scale comparable to a modern university science department. It must be admitted that some of his work - unfortunately, some of the physics - was not up to his usual high standards. He evidently found falling stones a lot less interesting than living creatures. Yet the sheer scale of his enterprise, unmatched in antiquity and for centuries to come, gave an authority to all his writings.
“It is perhaps worth reiterating the difference between Plato and Aristotle, who agreed with each other that the world is the product of rational design, that the philosopher investigates the form and the universal, and that the only true knowledge is that which is irrefutable. The essential difference between them was that Plato felt mathematical reasoning could arrive at the truth with little outside help, but Aristotle believed detailed empirical investigations of nature were essential if progress was to be made in understanding the natural world.”
4. The BBC provides a great, honest tribute to Aristotle for his work in science and biology: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JN8ortM4M3o
The BBC program is also here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e12pbSHrzAs&list=PL2VcIjTwDHoLScpo2c26t-x3EdTP6WepL&index=1
5. From: https://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/oct/02/the-lagoon-armand-marie-leroi-aristotle-review
Excerpt 1. "The Greeks are famous, perhaps notorious, for casting their science whole, from first principles, without troubling to examine the natural world it sought to explain. But Aristotle changed everything, providing lengthy accounts of fish and fowl, their lives, courtships, kinds, anatomies, functions, distribution and habits. They were often erroneous, but what sets Aristotle apart is his workmanlike attitude. One gets the impression of a practical man, given to neither the remote and crystalline idealism of his predecessors, nor the flights of fancy of later natural historians such as Pliny the Elder."
Excerpt 2. "Darwin knew almost nothing of Aristotle until 1882, when William Ogle, physician and classicist, sent him a copy of The Parts of Animals he'd just translated. In his note of thanks, Darwin wrote: 'From quotations which I had seen I had a high notion of Aristotle's merits, but I had not the most remote notion of what a wonderful man he was. Linnaeus and Cuvier have been my two gods, though in very different ways, but they were mere schoolboys to old Aristotle.' “
6. See also this article by Dr. James Lennox: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/aristotle-biology/
7. A quote about Galileo that discusses the importance of Aristotle, reasoning, and a correct view of logic.
In the book Galileo Galilei – When the World Stood Still, Atle Naess wrote:
“Galileo’s radical renewal sprang, nevertheless, from the Aristotelian mind set, as it was taught at the Jesuits’ Collegio Romano: human reason has a basic ability to recognize and understand the objects registered by the senses. The objects are real. They have properties that can be perceived, and then ‘further processed’ according to logical rules. These logical concepts are also real (if not in exactly the same way as the physical objects).”
8. A quote of Galileo himself that shows the importance of Aristotle to science and all human reasoning, and that identifies a basic principle of reason and logic: they are based on the evidence of the senses.
"I should even think that in making the celestial material alterable, I contradict the doctrine of Aristotle much less than do those people who still want to keep the sky inalterable; for I am sure that he never took its inalterability to be as certain as the fact that all human reasoning must be placed second to direct experience."
From the Second Letter of Galileo Galilei to Mark Welser on Sunspots, p. 118 of Discoveries and Opinions of Galileo, translated by Stillman Drake, (c) 1957 by Stillman Drake, published by Doubleday Anchor Books, Doubleday & Co., Garden City, New York.
9. Newton's Four Rules of Reasoning (showing he was Aristotelian, not Platonic, and showing you some fundamentals of how to reason and do science): http://apex.ua.edu/uploads/2/8/7/3/28731065/four_rules_of_reasoning_apex_website.pdf
Newton explicitly rejects Platonic thinking and the practice of some at the time of making stuff up in their heads when he says, in Rule 4, “not withstanding any contrary hypothesis that may be imagined.”
So he is with Galileo in method and philosophy of science.
He says himself that we stick to facts, we find causes, and that we use induction:
“Rule 1 We are to admit no more causes of natural things than such as are both true and sufficient to explain their appearances.
“Rule 2 Therefore to the same natural effects we must, as far as possible, assign the same causes.
“Rule 3. The qualities of bodies, which admit neither intensification nor remission of degrees, and which are found to belong to all bodies within the reach of our experiments, are to be esteemed the universal qualities of all bodies whatsoever.
“Rule 4. In experimental philosophy we are to look upon propositions inferred by general induction from phenomena as accurately or very nearly true, not withstanding any contrary hypothesis that may be imagined, till such time as other phenomena occur, by which they may either be made more accurate, or liable to exceptions.”
10. In "Plato And Saving The Appearances," The Bedford Astronomy Club writes:
"Plato lays down the principle that the heavenly bodies' motion is circular, uniform, and constantly regular. Thereupon he sets the mathematicians the following problem: what circular motions, uniform and perfectly regular, are to be admitted as hypotheses so that it might be possible to save the appearances presented by the planets? (Duhem, To Save the Phenomena, 5)
"Continuing, Simplicius explained:
"The curious problem of astronomers is the following: First, they provide themselves with certain hypotheses: . . . Starting from such hypotheses, astronomers then try to show that all the heavenly bodies have a circular and uniform motion, that the irregularities which become manifest when we observe these bodies—their now faster, now slower motion; their moving now forward, now backward; their latitude now southern, now northern; their various stops in one region of the sky; their at one time seemingly greater, and at another time seemingly smaller diameter—that all these things and all things analogous are but appearances and not realities. (Duhem, To Save the Phenomena, 23)"
See: https://www.astronomyclub.xyz/uniform-circular/plato-and-saving-the-appearances.html
11. The "Saving the appearances" quote I mentioned.
https://goldams.com/galileo-rejecting-plato/
12. Here is a good example of the failure of Platonic and “lost in math” “science.”
Excerpt: ”Galileo claimed to have seen moons around the planet Jupiter. Another scholar, Francesco Sizi, attempted to refute Galileo, not with observations, but with the following argument:
“ 'There are seven windows in the head, two nostrils, two ears, two eyes and a mouth; so in the heavens there are two favorable stars, two unpropitious, two luminaries, and Mercury alone undecided and indifferent. From which and many other similar phenomena of nature such as the seven metals, etc., which it were tedious to enumerate, we gather that the number of planets is necessarily seven...ancient nations, as well as modern Europeans, have adopted the division of the week into seven days, and have named them from the seven planets; now if we increase the number of planets, this whole system falls to the ground...moreover, the satellites are invisible to the naked eye and therefore can have no influence on the earth and therefore would be useless and therefore do not exist.' (Holton & Roller, 1958, p. 160)"
From: https://www.nichd.nih.gov/publications/pubs/using_research_stanovich Please consider liking us on your podcast app, and leaving a rational review.
Email us at ReasonRxPodcast@aol.com, michael@goldams.com, or goldmj@aol.com.
Host.
Michael: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-gold-2883921/
Gold Academy: https://goldams.com
Total Human Fitness: https://total-human-fitness.com
Transcribed
7 OCT 2022 · In this episode I discuss what grammar is and why we need it. It ain't about blindly following rules or being rude to each other. Rather, grammar is how we put thoughts together so we can think better, so we can be better understood, so we can better understand others, so we can write and speak better at work, so we can teach and learn better, etc.
Contact Michael:
1. Email: reasonrx@aol.com
2. Gold Academy: https://www.goldams.com
3. Total Human Fitness: https://total-human-fitness.com
4. Cypress Creek Ecological Restoration Project: https://ccerp.org
5. LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-gold-2883921/
6. Twitter/Instagram: EpistemeRx
Notes.
I. A definition of grammar: https://www.dictionary.com/browse/grammar
II. Haptic: https://www.etymonline.com/word/haptic?ref=etymonline_crossreference
" 'pertaining to the sense of touch,' 1890 from Greek haptikos 'able to come into contact with,' from haptein 'to fasten' (see apse)."
III. Readings from Writing and thinking. A Handbook of Composition and Revision by Norman Foerster and J.M. Steadman.
1. Thought and Expression: https://archive.org/details/writingthinkingh0000norm/page/2/mode/2up
2. Grammar: https://archive.org/details/writingthinkingh0000norm/page/126/mode/2up
3. Economy: https://archive.org/details/writingthinkingh0000norm/page/48/mode/2up
4. Parallelism: https://archive.org/details/writingthinkingh0000norm/page/22/mode/2up
5. General Obscurity — Loose Thinking: https://archive.org/details/writingthinkingh0000norm/page/414/mode/2up
IV. Ayn Rand on grammar and logic: https://goldams.com/the-importance-of-grammar/
V. Walden drafts
1. The Walden Woods Project
https://www.walden.org/what-we-do/library/thoreau/the-writings-of-henry-david-thoreau-the-digital-collection/
2. The Walden Manuscript Project
https://digitalthoreau.org/the-walden-manuscript-project/
VI. Parallelism
i. What parallelism is and some examples in literature: https://literarydevices.net/parallelism/
ii. Some benefits of parallelism and more examples: http://sixminutes.dlugan.com/parallelism/
VII. Sentence Diagramming
To learn grammar, you can study sentence diagramming. I recommend it. Good stuff. Here are some resources.
1. Free online sentence diagramming books.
i. GLENCOE LANGUAGE ARTS, Sentence Diagramming (answers at end)
https://d3jc3ahdjad7x7.cloudfront.net/Uw3BMx78pj032cWUNrOWrznKoOtEzR2iCVP5krMeqziiIxpi.pdf
ii. Basics First Sentence Diagramming (answers at end):
http://jwoodsdistrict205.yolasite.com/resources/BASICS%20FIRST%20DIAGRAMING%20SENTENCES%20A.pdf
2. Sentence diagramming books you could purchase.
i. Rex Barks: Diagramming Sentences Made Easy by Phyllis Davenport: https://www.amazon.com/Phyllis-Davenport/dp/1889439355/
ii. Diagramming Step by Step: One Hundred and Fifty-Five Steps to Excellence in Sentence Diagramming by Eugene Moutoux: https://www.amazon.com/Diagramming-Step-Fifty-Five-Excellence-Sentence/dp/1935497650/
3. Courses I teach.
A. Can be done on a variety of media or in person
i. https://goldams.com/services/language-and-literature/sentence-diagramming-grammar-course-session-1/
ii. https://goldams.com/services/language-and-literature/sentence-diagramming-grammar-course-session-2/
B. On Outschool.
i. https://outschool.com/classes/sentence-diagramming-grammar-class-session-1-AbFeysbi#abl8xusnkv
ii. https://outschool.com/classes/sentence-diagramming-grammar-class-session-2-VHt7Knnt
iii. https://outschool.com/classes/sentence-diagramming-grammar-camp-session-1-4Rk6AvMW
iv. https://outschool.com/classes/sentence-diagramming-grammar-camp-session-2-uG9DZ7hA
Image from Please consider liking us on your podcast app, and leaving a rational review.
Email us at ReasonRxPodcast@aol.com, michael@goldams.com, or goldmj@aol.com.
Host.
Michael: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-gold-2883921/
Gold Academy: https://goldams.com
Total Human Fitness: https://total-human-fitness.com
In this podcast, we will discuss all things education. The ReasonRx Podcast benefits not only the student, teacher, and parent, but also all adults and business professionals. After all, education...
show more
In this podcast, we will discuss all things education. The ReasonRx Podcast benefits not only the student, teacher, and parent, but also all adults and business professionals. After all, education is for everyone: we all have to teach, and learn, and think.
Education is the systematic training of the mind. More technically and in more depth, education is “the systematic training of the conceptual faculty by means of supplying in essentials both its content and its method.” (Dr. Leonard Peikoff)
Of course, in the primary sense, it is the systematic training of the young to prepare them for adult life. Its purpose is to prepare a child for the total depth and range of surviving and thriving as an adult human in the broad world -- social and material, physical and biological/ecological.
So your host and co-hosts will interview guests and offer in-depth discussion of topics like study skills, biology, philosophy of education, epistemology, math pedagogy, music pedagogy, art, the role of art in education and human life, nutrition, exercise, sleep, the nature of science, and more -- everything involved in education and needed for an optimally functioning human.
The show will strive to help us think deep so we can live large and live well:
"A little learning is a dang'rous thing;
Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring:
There shallow draughts intoxicate the brain,
And drinking largely sobers us again."
--Alexander Pope (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierian_Spring)
To support the show and help us grow our audience -- so we have more of an impact on education and the culture -- please help us with a donation:
1. https://www.patreon.com/reasonrxpodcast
2. https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=SP6QPQKJU4XSS&source=url
Also, please consider liking us on your podcast app, and leaving a rational review.
Email us at ReasonRxPodcast@aol.com, michael@goldams.com, or goldmj@aol.com.
Host.
Michael: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-gold-2883921/
Gold Academy: https://goldams.com
Total Human Fitness: https://total-human-fitness.com
Gold Academy Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/EpistemeRx/
YouTube Gold Academy: https://www.youtube.com/@goldacademy
YouTube Total Human Fitness: https://www.youtube.com/@totalhumanfitness
Co-host.
Melanie: https://www.linkedin.com/in/melanie-katragadda-nctm-9b14522a
show less
Education is the systematic training of the mind. More technically and in more depth, education is “the systematic training of the conceptual faculty by means of supplying in essentials both its content and its method.” (Dr. Leonard Peikoff)
Of course, in the primary sense, it is the systematic training of the young to prepare them for adult life. Its purpose is to prepare a child for the total depth and range of surviving and thriving as an adult human in the broad world -- social and material, physical and biological/ecological.
So your host and co-hosts will interview guests and offer in-depth discussion of topics like study skills, biology, philosophy of education, epistemology, math pedagogy, music pedagogy, art, the role of art in education and human life, nutrition, exercise, sleep, the nature of science, and more -- everything involved in education and needed for an optimally functioning human.
The show will strive to help us think deep so we can live large and live well:
"A little learning is a dang'rous thing;
Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring:
There shallow draughts intoxicate the brain,
And drinking largely sobers us again."
--Alexander Pope (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierian_Spring)
To support the show and help us grow our audience -- so we have more of an impact on education and the culture -- please help us with a donation:
1. https://www.patreon.com/reasonrxpodcast
2. https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=SP6QPQKJU4XSS&source=url
Also, please consider liking us on your podcast app, and leaving a rational review.
Email us at ReasonRxPodcast@aol.com, michael@goldams.com, or goldmj@aol.com.
Host.
Michael: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-gold-2883921/
Gold Academy: https://goldams.com
Total Human Fitness: https://total-human-fitness.com
Gold Academy Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/EpistemeRx/
YouTube Gold Academy: https://www.youtube.com/@goldacademy
YouTube Total Human Fitness: https://www.youtube.com/@totalhumanfitness
Co-host.
Melanie: https://www.linkedin.com/in/melanie-katragadda-nctm-9b14522a
Information
| Author | Michael Gold |
| Organization | Michael Gold |
| Categories | Education , Philosophy , Self-Improvement |
| Website | www.goldams.com |
| reasonrxpodcast@aol.com |
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