Genuinely think that knowledge/education had pretty much been totally democratized at this point. You can chat with AI or YouTube or online classes and get all the education you could ask for.
What you won’t get it access to networks. I spend a lot of my time thinking about how networks work, strong and weak ties, and how access to networks makes a world of difference.
I wish I had a trade
If you have a trade and you have good business/ sales sense, the world is your oyster
Specifically Granovetter’s Society and Economy
Homeschooling is interesting
How to balance social interactions/ socialization
Most homeschoolers I knew growing up were in the church. They tended to be odd but they at least were heavily socialized through the church. I guess?
And if you’re not in a church, how do you socialize?
I guess sports are accessible and other athletic actives
Having similar shared experiences I would imagine bonds people and curates trust which is necessary for cooperation
Which I think is a major aim of education, implicitly
I strongly believe that knowledge is a social construct
And a byproduct of networks of human activity
It’s like cost vs value
Knowledge is an abstraction
Cost is an abstraction of value
The map is an abstraction of the territory
I question an Education devoid of the social activities and networks that create and substantiate knowledge
I think the utility of education is, though perhaps not always explicit, the socialization, the ability to arrive at or create understandings, to collaborate toward ends, etc
I’m cautioning against the value of an education that doesn’t appreciate the value of socialization
Why to homeschool or avoid college or just educate purely online
What is the value of college, or any schooling?
If they all teach the same curriculum, and all that differs is the peer group/ network of peers and their networks
I think acquiring language is critical
But a book won’t teach you the value of knowledge. Wisdom. Practicality etc etc of what you know
You can go quite far technically speaking. Like, understanding the language of mathematics/physics/logic/technical disciplines can take you very far, but there is still a social element
I’m not sure I entirely agree with myself but it’s an intuition I have
It’s a question of value.
Education is valuable because it teaches us valuable things. What is the value of those things. What are the things of value it teaches us.
Vocabulary. Behaviors. How to work with others. Disciplines. Mental frameworks. It even instills values or informs our value system. That is, we what should be we aiming at, or why the aim or focus is worth it and deserves our attention in a particular way.
Education is not just going through the motions to regurgitate information
It should be a means to an end.
A key to a door
Or provide an ability to fashion keys and doors of your own
But how can education provide the full scope of value without meaningful relationships, ie networks, etc
I dunno
You are the company you keep
I think that extends beyond friends to other week ties and associations
All depends on what you are trying to achieve
I’m sure you can be a hermit and be entirely self sufficient and be happy and possess incredible local knowledge for things relevant to your personal survival
But as you seek to contribute to society and the larger structures governing it the role of education to socialize becomes evermore important. As you integrate into systems that support other systems etc
I think we take for granted the networks were born into
Which is why social mobility is challenging throughout history
We don’t understand their value or pull or how they even impact our lives
We are like fish in a pond who don’t know the ocean exists
But talk about water as if we are experts
I like the idea of higher education evolving into an incubator like model
Not even with the idea of a business but more people aspiring towards a common end and joining a community with peers and mentors to assist in the development and growth toward that end
Perhaps that’s how higher ed was originally conceived
I like the idea of highly committed, intimate, personal, scrappy, sacrificial, etc
Intensely focused
Like the liberal arts model
But broader and more practical
When I think of networks, it’s 1) relationships, these strong and weak ties to other individuals and their access to networks (networks are physical/proximate or psychological or economic, 2) the verbal landscape or the language inherent in a network that binds it and 3) the cultural landscape that encompasses the rituals and symbols and etiquette and behaviors etc
All three are integral to a network. A the broad network is society, but there are countless networks comprising that society, networks within networks, like a neural net. Think of how many “functions” there are in a corporation, think of how many “markets” there are for their buyers, etc. each is a network in itself supporting the broader socio-economics.
When we think of education, and ask ourselves what we are explicitly learning, and what is the value of education in that regard.
Within a network there are various forms of value: economic, status, authority, power, etc … maybe truth, maybe justice, etc.
What else?
And then, how well do do education institutions actually preparing/teaching an individual to not only thrive in a network, but gain access to it
We are fish born into bodies of water
Some mere puddles
Others born into streams or rivers or seas or oceans
I think it’s important to understand how to access other bodies of water
That opens up the utility of knowledge
Even an awareness that there other other bodies of water allows us to leverage knowledge more intelligently
But accessing is still a challenge as an outsider
No idea of any of this makes sense
But goes back to education. We learn a thing. We think the thing we learn stands alone, but it does not. It’s embedded in networks of humans
Athletics is a good analogy
Or sports
If you are born into a soccer family, you can participate in soccer games.
You may not ever be exposed to other sports. And never know the games you are missing, and the payouts they provide
You may read books about football, but if you don’t know anyone who plays football, what does it matter? You won’t know how to use it. You can’t play the game by yourself.
And there may be barriers preventing gaining access to playing football games. Maybe the barrier is basic knowledge, maybe it’s location, maybe it’s startup costs etc
Networks are games
How to add value
I actually think this is why modern education fails so many people
Not even broader, just less academic. Less rigid. I think liberal arts education is amazing. But would be great if it was a little less formal.
I have friends that have joined an incubator and I’ve read about Ycombinator and other incubators and their culture and access to networks and likeminded peers and mentors etc
Intensely focused on work
Value is the key
How to extract value
By providing value
The net is the gain
Need to position yourself as close to the centers of a network as possible
Or intersections of networks
William Dare 