Will has always thought knowing was like floating in deep space, no permanent
reference points just lines of meaning, histories, and ideas that can occasionally
intersect to give the illusion of an anchor point. He is thinking this now because his
Quest requires an anchor or a reference point to gain advantage from, to look out on
the topography and report back with knowledge. So in order to attempt a
foundation he will try to connect some of the lines by following the history of his
intellectual journey.
As an undergraduate student Will wanted to be a scientist, a mathematician or
physicist. He loved the precision of science, the feeling of knowing, but even then he
had doubts that arose when his teachers would mention how 50 years ago we
though one thing was true but today we know differently. This bothered Will
because who is to say in 50 years what we know now might be considered wrong.
This was the first seed of doubt that would change Will’s direction and challenge the
foundations of his epistemology. Although feelings of doubt lingered as Will
continued his edification it would not be until he began his doctorate that these
doubts manifested in an irreconcilable shattering of his worldview.
As a first year doctorate student Will enjoyed the confidence and institutional
support that reinforced the mainstream idea of using statistical analysis of
standardized test scores to measure and predict outcomes. This was a happy and
content time, the methods were well known, the traditions well understood and
supported at all institutional levels. However, it was short lived due to exposure to a
simple but complex question: “What knowledge is of the most worth?”1 These seven
words tore asunder the foundation of Will’s way of knowing. The complexity of
answers to this question required a reconceptualization of his understanding of
education. Not just how it relates to teaching but also what it means to know. With
his worldview shattered Will has no other option but to seek new answers. This is
the beginning of his Quest.
Where to start is always difficult in deep space but if this story is about Will’s
journey then we should start with The Shattering. Will was very happy about the
opportunity to return to school. He had been a teacher for many years already but
was rather uninspired by the routine of it and was looking forward to studying
education as a way to make teaching more interesting. He did not expect to have his
foundations shattered. As when most things break apart there is a period of
remorse, of separation, possibly regret, even denial. Will felt all these and more.
This was such a significant time because Will was of the belief that statistical
analysis was the most elegant human construct to represent natural phenomena.
The recognition of a normal distribution in nature was a profound observation and
the history of its development into what we can generalize as statistics today
parallels modernism. This felt like a very solid and robust foundation, yet it did not
address the complexity of the question. Will began to realize he was so caught up
1
with the elegance of the technique that he could not see the question it was meant to
address.
Will had been noticing cracks in the foundation, like a Montreal overpass these
cracks were In themselves dangerous and foreboding but were only just indicators
of an entire system that was crumbling. When the shattering finally took place it was
not so much a surprise that it was happening but the scale, the enormity of it was a
shock. When a foundation is lost all that has been built upon it over time goes with
it. The result is devastation. Rebuilding would be a great task that would require a
whole new infrastructure. Where to start?
What remained after the shattering was an interesting collection of elements. Hope
and a sense that a new way of building an infrastructure could be based on the
fundamental value of wanting pass on knowledge to future generations that might
help prevent the kind of deconstruction he had experienced. Instead of a foundation
built on reductionist ideology and made from the shortsighted perspective of
efficient capitalism perhaps something could be built that included the profoundly
complex mystery of the human condition.
Will has had a proclivity toward complexity since he first saw a visualization of a
Mandelbrot set2. The organic resemblance was striking, a formula that represents
nature. However, Will found that the more one inquires into complexity the more
complex it gets. The mode of inquiry seems inadequate. The algorithm is only a part
of knowing the complexity. If this way of knowing challenges Will’s
Ramus (1515-1572)
Goethe (1749-1832)
Shakespeare (1564-1616)
Copernicus (1473-1543)
Ibn al-Haytham (965-1040)
Scientific Method
Papyrus 1600BC
Plato 400BC
Aristotle 320BC
Alexandria library 200BC
2
Ibn al-Haytham (965-1040)
Roger Bacon 1214-1292
Ockham 1287-1347
Copernicus (1473-1543)
Francis Bacon 1561-1626
Galileo (1564-1642)
Descartes 1596-1650
Newon 1642-1726
Statistics
Risk
Complexity