What I learned from the Internet this week

Within academia, us/them distinctions are drawn based on precommitments to particular methodologies. Some of you in academia are smacking your foreheads and saying, "Well duh!" It takes some of us longer to catch on.

From a systems theory view, it would be better for people to organize around the problems to be solved. But given how complex and important some problems are, I guess that would require a group too large for most people to feel comfortable in psychologically.

Territorial behavior over metholodical approaches is very counterproductive to learning to say the least!

Comments

[martinned]

Maybe this is due to my job description, but I don't think I agree...

The method/approach used is the subject of the skill and knowledge an academic has to acquire in order to do their job. In order to improve their skill and knowledge, academics need to communicate with others who work from a similar approach.

Think of the aerodynamics specialist who works on designing cars: rather than communicate with others who work on the same "problem", such as the electrical engineers, metal work specialists, etc., such a person would normally form a group, an "us" with airplane designers and others who use mathematical modelling and wind tunnels to study air flow around objects.

Of course, one can argue about the correct definition of "the same problem", but as far as I can see the only way to salvage your point is to define a problem so narrowly as to inevitably incorporate elements of method/approach. (Do social psychologists, sociologists and economists work on different problems, or do they work on the same problems from different perspectives?)

[Michael F. Martin]

Okay I'll admit, I'm guilty of a gross oversimplification here. There is, of course, a benefit to specalization and subspecialization. My point is simply that specialization tends to be emphasized to the exclusion of generalization. As Freeman Dyson put it, we need both frogs and birds:

http://www.ams.org/notices/200902/rtx090200212p.pdf