[ExI] virtual education, was: RE: virtual travel

Wed Apr 1 14:57:59 UTC 2020

From: extropy-chat <extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org> On Behalf Of Dave Sill via extropy-chat
Subject: Re: [ExI] virtual travel

On Wed, Apr 1, 2020 at 9:58 AM spike jones via extropy-chat <extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org <mailto:extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> > wrote:

 OK so now we can see that it isn’t a good idea to join a tourist stampede and won’t be again in the easily foreseeable.  So how can we compensate for that?  I can imagine a form of virtual tourism which not only mimics the experience, in some ways it exceeds it…  A virtual tour could answer that.  Being there would merely give you practice mooing.

 https://duckduckgo.com/?q=virtual+museum+tours

-Dave

OK cool thanks for that Dave.

This suggests the next question.  As we temporarily suspend our civilization, of course the economy takes a lightning-bolt hit, even as we discover far more efficient new ways to take care of our necessities.

How much of our economy is completely dependent on inefficiencies?  I am already seeing the answer to that in our education system: most of it.  

Do let us focus on education as a sub-economy.  We can already see that most of the time spent in physical school is mostly a waste, if we consider education as the primary desired end-state.  Is it?  If so, virtual education is available, has been for a long time and is vastly superior to anything the students can get in school, along with being far cheaper and safer.  Socialization is more difficult if done virtually of course.

The teachers union is not liking this one bit, for perfectly understandable reasons.

I am doing a project for our local superintendent: collecting parent-eye view feedback on virtual learning.  The one overwhelming message coming thru loud and clear: the academically rich are getting dramatically richer, the academically otherwise are getting little or nothing.  

Sal Kahn started his online Academy as a humanitarian effort to close the global academic achievement gap.  The gap he hoped to narrow and bridge with the virtual classroom opens to a yawning chasm.

spike

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