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Good dog?
The greatest challenge in understanding the role of randomness in life is that although the basic principles of randomness arise from everyday logic, many of the consequences that follow from those principles prove counterintuitive.... In the mid 1960s, [Daniel] Kahneman, then a junior psychology professor at Hebrew University, agreed to perform a rather unexciting chore: lecturing to a group of Israeli air force flight instructors on the conventional wisdom of behavior modification and its application to the psychology of flight training. Kahneman drove home the point that rewarding positive behavior works but punishing mistakes does not. One of his students interrupted, voicing an opinion that would lead Kahneman to an epiphany and guide his research for decades.
"I've often praised people warmly for beautifully executed maneuvers, and the next time they always do worse," the flight instructor said. "And I've screamed at people for badly executed maneuvers, and by and large the next time they improve. Don't tell me that reward works and punishment doesn't work. My experience contradicts it." The other flight instructors agreed. To Kahneman the flight instructors' experience rang true. On the other hand, Kahneman believed in the animal experiments that demonstrated that reward works better than punishment. He ruminated on this apparent paradox. And then it struck him: the screaming preceded the improvement, but contrary to appearances it did not cause it.
How can that be? The answer lies in a phenomenon called regression toward the mean. That is, in any series of random events an extraordinary event is most likely to be followed, due purely to chance, by a more ordinary one.
--Leonard Mlodinow, The Drunkard's Walk
The issue of regression to the mean is interesting in itself, and it's the motive for Mlodinow's anecdote, but I'd like to focus on the claim of behavioral psychology, that rewarding good behavior works but punishing bad behavior doesn't. Is this true? If so, what do I do with this principle? How do I apply it? On my mind today is that, as I've often saidin a punitive tone of voice, music critics don't know how to sustain an intellectual conversation. And my assumption is that I'm not really going to have many sustained intellectual conversations unless I and people like me teach others how to do it. More immediately, I'm wondering if there's a way to have an impact on the gross dysfunctional behavior that sinks a lot of music discourse - a current example is the stupid commentary at Jezebel and Autostraddle about Taylor Swift, which Alex O. and Erika do a good job of taking apart. Basically, Autostraddle and Jezebel project a virgin-whore dichotomy onto Taylor that Taylor's actual words and behavior don't support at all, then excoriate Taylor for perpetuating the virgin-whore dichotomy. But the real dysfunction in criticism isn't the making of a false inference on the basis of too-little evidence and being too thoughtless to look for further evidence or to notice what contradicts the inference - who doesn't do that at some point (and to be honest I only skimmed the Autostraddle piece myself)? - but rather what comes after, the inability of the overall conversation to take care of this, the many voices being unable to make up for the limitations of the single voice.
I have a bunch of contradictory thoughts:
--In commenting on Taylor, or Jezebel, or Autostraddle, our responsibility is to the reader and to ourselves, to ask questions and communicate visions and to foment thought, not to help improve Taylor or Jezebel or Autostraddle, who haven't asked for our help.
--I think it's important to go out and counter a lot of the bullshit, but my real impulse is to want to ignore the Jezebel shit. But then, my instinct is also that if I create an enclave where I and a few people like me shut out the shit, I end up narrow and ignorant, and my convo not worth all that much.
--Sometimes irl or in our own comment threads we will run into Jezebel types, who may not be intitially hostile to us but will still be spouting this irritating baloney. Can I approach someone like that with the attitude, "Here's a potentially interesting person from whom I might learn something, if we can set aside her dysfunction (or even if we can't)"? I won't say that this is second nature to me.
--Few of us are in position to instruct anyone else in the musicwrite world anyway, or to dole out rewards and punishments. That said, I'm wondering what I can do differently, since what I am doing isn't working anymore. I'm not attracting many readers, and people much smarter than the two women who made those Taylor posts also aren't willing to run with me, or don't know how, and at a higher intellectual level there's still often the same basic species of dysfunction: an inability to notice counter-evidence or to consider alternative explanations.
--Some people (and I'm sometimes one of these, unfortunately) take correction as criticism and they don't hear criticism, instead their mind takes a walk, they feel hurt and fight back but attack straw men. But people really do need correction. I certainly benefit from being told when I've gotten something wrong, even told meanly. And not all misperceptions can be changed by one's own trial-and-error, by experience. The Kahneman example is good because it shows a mistake that day-in-and-day-out experience is going to seem to reinforce, not correct. And prejudices and fears perpetuate themselves by choking off inquiry. If I'm afraid of something, I'm not going to explore it, and if I don't explore it I'll never meet the counter-evidence that challenges my fear.
--On comment threads, my immediate impulse is to correct someone's errors and to challenge ideas where I think I have better ideas of my own. This makes some sense, since agreeing with what was said doesn't keep the conversation going and doesn't seem to add anything to it. Dave had a long, terrific post about the funhouse distorting mirror that the anti-Taylorites create for themselves, but the bulk of my comments were about a brief parenthetical aside of his where he says Taylor doesn't mention God once on Fearless,* my response being to point out the times where Taylor does mention God, on Fearless or elsewhere. So there was nothing in my comments to honor Dave for making a terrific post. I assume that in general Dave does feel recognized by me and that this isn't an issue, but my point is that the basic impulse is to contradict and correct, not praise. Of course, the best response would be to take his idea and elaborate on it.
--Isn't it condescending to withhold correction where you think you might hurt someone else's progress? What makes you think you have the power to hurt or help someone? Imagining yourself into such a role can be a power game you play with yourself - like in "Microwaving A Tragedy," where Rihanna is telling herself that Chris needs her to come and rescue him. (A way to feel strong is to believe that the bullies are really in a lot of pain, and that you could help them out of this pain if only they'd let you. Not to say that this can't be true, but it's still a power play.) The fact is, you do have to hold back at times, and calculate, and pull the strings, but is there a way to do so that doesn't feel like bad faith?
--When someone takes something as punishment rather than correction it's because he doesn't feel you're on his side. Whereas if he does feel you're on his side, you don't have to micromanage your own tone of voice. But how do you get someone to feel that wayespecially if it isn't true especially when you're fundamentally trying to lure that person away from dysfunctional, destructive behavior and into starting over?
--People aren't dogs. Dogs can't comprehend other points of view or ponder alternative explanations or wonder what the world might be if things were somewhat different. Maybe, therefore, reward and punishment works differently for them. Do any or you know anything about behavior mod of the last 50 years, since that Kahneman anecdote?
--The point isn't to evade counterattack or to get someone to like me but rather to help someone feel confident enough to risk giving up cherished ideas and familiar modes of behavior. If I'm to reward someone (reward? how?) it shouldn't particularly be for saying something I agree with but for re-evaluating evidence and for giving a second look and for putting forth interesting ideas one never has heard before.
*I think he may have gotten this not completely correct idea from me, actually.
"I've often praised people warmly for beautifully executed maneuvers, and the next time they always do worse," the flight instructor said. "And I've screamed at people for badly executed maneuvers, and by and large the next time they improve. Don't tell me that reward works and punishment doesn't work. My experience contradicts it." The other flight instructors agreed. To Kahneman the flight instructors' experience rang true. On the other hand, Kahneman believed in the animal experiments that demonstrated that reward works better than punishment. He ruminated on this apparent paradox. And then it struck him: the screaming preceded the improvement, but contrary to appearances it did not cause it.
How can that be? The answer lies in a phenomenon called regression toward the mean. That is, in any series of random events an extraordinary event is most likely to be followed, due purely to chance, by a more ordinary one.
--Leonard Mlodinow, The Drunkard's Walk
The issue of regression to the mean is interesting in itself, and it's the motive for Mlodinow's anecdote, but I'd like to focus on the claim of behavioral psychology, that rewarding good behavior works but punishing bad behavior doesn't. Is this true? If so, what do I do with this principle? How do I apply it? On my mind today is that, as I've often said
I have a bunch of contradictory thoughts:
--In commenting on Taylor, or Jezebel, or Autostraddle, our responsibility is to the reader and to ourselves, to ask questions and communicate visions and to foment thought, not to help improve Taylor or Jezebel or Autostraddle, who haven't asked for our help.
--I think it's important to go out and counter a lot of the bullshit, but my real impulse is to want to ignore the Jezebel shit. But then, my instinct is also that if I create an enclave where I and a few people like me shut out the shit, I end up narrow and ignorant, and my convo not worth all that much.
--Sometimes irl or in our own comment threads we will run into Jezebel types, who may not be intitially hostile to us but will still be spouting this irritating baloney. Can I approach someone like that with the attitude, "Here's a potentially interesting person from whom I might learn something, if we can set aside her dysfunction (or even if we can't)"? I won't say that this is second nature to me.
--Few of us are in position to instruct anyone else in the musicwrite world anyway, or to dole out rewards and punishments. That said, I'm wondering what I can do differently, since what I am doing isn't working anymore. I'm not attracting many readers, and people much smarter than the two women who made those Taylor posts also aren't willing to run with me, or don't know how, and at a higher intellectual level there's still often the same basic species of dysfunction: an inability to notice counter-evidence or to consider alternative explanations.
--Some people (and I'm sometimes one of these, unfortunately) take correction as criticism and they don't hear criticism, instead their mind takes a walk, they feel hurt and fight back but attack straw men. But people really do need correction. I certainly benefit from being told when I've gotten something wrong, even told meanly. And not all misperceptions can be changed by one's own trial-and-error, by experience. The Kahneman example is good because it shows a mistake that day-in-and-day-out experience is going to seem to reinforce, not correct. And prejudices and fears perpetuate themselves by choking off inquiry. If I'm afraid of something, I'm not going to explore it, and if I don't explore it I'll never meet the counter-evidence that challenges my fear.
--On comment threads, my immediate impulse is to correct someone's errors and to challenge ideas where I think I have better ideas of my own. This makes some sense, since agreeing with what was said doesn't keep the conversation going and doesn't seem to add anything to it. Dave had a long, terrific post about the funhouse distorting mirror that the anti-Taylorites create for themselves, but the bulk of my comments were about a brief parenthetical aside of his where he says Taylor doesn't mention God once on Fearless,* my response being to point out the times where Taylor does mention God, on Fearless or elsewhere. So there was nothing in my comments to honor Dave for making a terrific post. I assume that in general Dave does feel recognized by me and that this isn't an issue, but my point is that the basic impulse is to contradict and correct, not praise. Of course, the best response would be to take his idea and elaborate on it.
--Isn't it condescending to withhold correction where you think you might hurt someone else's progress? What makes you think you have the power to hurt or help someone? Imagining yourself into such a role can be a power game you play with yourself - like in "Microwaving A Tragedy," where Rihanna is telling herself that Chris needs her to come and rescue him. (A way to feel strong is to believe that the bullies are really in a lot of pain, and that you could help them out of this pain if only they'd let you. Not to say that this can't be true, but it's still a power play.) The fact is, you do have to hold back at times, and calculate, and pull the strings, but is there a way to do so that doesn't feel like bad faith?
--When someone takes something as punishment rather than correction it's because he doesn't feel you're on his side. Whereas if he does feel you're on his side, you don't have to micromanage your own tone of voice. But how do you get someone to feel that way
--People aren't dogs. Dogs can't comprehend other points of view or ponder alternative explanations or wonder what the world might be if things were somewhat different. Maybe, therefore, reward and punishment works differently for them. Do any or you know anything about behavior mod of the last 50 years, since that Kahneman anecdote?
--The point isn't to evade counterattack or to get someone to like me but rather to help someone feel confident enough to risk giving up cherished ideas and familiar modes of behavior. If I'm to reward someone (reward? how?) it shouldn't particularly be for saying something I agree with but for re-evaluating evidence and for giving a second look and for putting forth interesting ideas one never has heard before.
*I think he may have gotten this not completely correct idea from me, actually.
no subject
My experiences teaching tell me that you can (and constantly have to) correct without punishing, but when egos are fragile (and 12-year-olds have some fragile-ass egos, at least as fragile as your average internet music nerd or any other member of the species) you'll inevitably end up "punishing" unintentionally. Probably daily (I still somewhat obsess over times I shut down conversation accidentally with a harsher tone than intended).
The key is not to try to "reward" or "punish," but to provide a context for positive reinforcement, in which the success of the conversation and new learning is a reward or accomplishment. A simple "good point" is fine, but the bigger-picture reward is feeling like you're part of something worth being a part of. Added to that overarching sense of accomplishment, though, and missing almost completely from online discourse, is the occasional completion of projects along the way -- these can act like external rewards, and I think there's a loose analogue here in friendly competition and games in the Pop World Cup and perhaps Top Whatever Lists vein. (One problem with conversations is that they don't have to end -- but there can be benchmarks along the way after which you can say to yourself, "good, I accomplished something, what's next?")
The literal classroom space is of great importance to achieving learning goals, too, as it's within this controlled space that you can define meaningful roles. Without some sense of boundaries (online or in the classroom), everything begins to fall apart -- roles instill a sense of unity and order (and there's no sense trying to avoid these things, merely to shape them to be good unity and order), and though even in a classroom setting these roles need to be fluid (teacher can be student, student can be teacher, etc.) they still need to exist.
One issue I have with Tumblr, e.g., as a "community" is that I feel incredibly isolated due to a lack of a centralized space. I have access to a feed of ideas, some frivolous, some serious, some good, some bad, most half-formed, and I respond to them quickly and intuitively. And on the other end of the spectrum, one problem with LiveJournal is that it's quite insulating, and strangers don't easily dive in without already feeling comfortable in the space.
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This is basically sound media literacy practice in one sentence, with varying levels of "one never has heard before" depending on literal childhood development (it was hugely significant for my students to demonstrate understanding that ad revenue often pays for media production, but by the undergraduate level this tends to become a platitude thrown around to dismiss any number of more important issues). Good teaching designs outcomes for growth in critical thinking, but doesn't prescribe what that the end result of that critical thinking looks like.
Which leads to all of the process-heavy pitfalls the classroom has to offer -- the biggest one, perhaps, being how do you assess good process? Again smaller projects, ones that can actually be finished, are helpful. Also including everyone in the critiquing process (whether this means "look at this paragraph in this blog post" or "look at this book report") can be helpful -- one thing that I notice re: your position in the wider rockcrit world is that people seem intimidated by (or uninterested in) challenging you. One the one hand (intimidation) there's "OTM" syndrome -- OTM says that there's nothing in a statement that can't be expanded, challenged, or developed. I hate the "CLICK IF YOU LIKE THIS" feature of Tumblr, because it allows someone to respond with OTM without elaborating.
On the other hand (disengagement) there's a sense of impenetrability -- when ideas are dense, there can seem to be little room to enter into them, even though realistically the denser or richer the ideas, the MORE places for entry there are. One solution might simply be asking more questions.
Something like an "Ask Me" blog might help with this, wherein no content can be created without someone else initiating the process; or, similarly, you can ask more questions of others, even if you already have your response in mind, before contributing your own perspective -- yes, you're withholding what you feel to be a correction, but not indefinitely; you'd be asking a question to encourage people to work out the kinks for themselves (and you'd be offering your criticism without just saying it -- "how does what you're saying square with how Taylor uses God in 'Our Song' and 'The Best Day'?" forces me to listen to reevaluate without feeling attacked).
In the classroom, I know that I eventually want students to get to _______, but the trick is getting them to figure out how to get to _______ before I have to tell them how to (since once I tell them, they're just going to memorize parrot what I said, and it will be about as useful as knowing a date in history class). For the people who engage with you most frequently and at length (your LJ regulars, e.g.), this is exactly the process that ends up happening, but as I said LJ doesn't really let the world in, or even a particularly large subsection of a smaller "world" you're interested in.
no subject
Well, two things to consider here.
(1) What do you mean by "the overall conversation" and by "making up for the limitations of the single voice"? Because, at least as far as The Great Jezebel/Autostraddle Taylor Swift War of Twenty Ten goes, I think the many voices of the Internet successfully challenged and added to the single voice of the Jezebel post. People responded to and argued about the Jezebel post not just in the Jezebel comments section, but across multiple blogging platforms, and the discussion still hasn't quite died down.
So if by "the overall conversation" you mean the Internet as a whole, and by "making up for the limitations of the single voice" you mean making sure that the single voice isn't allowed to dominate the overall conversation, then I think the overall conversation was successful. But if by "making up for the limitations of the single voice" you mean getting the single voice to acknowledge and adopt arguments presented by the overall conversation, then the problem is that (2) there's more to the conversation than the conversation.
It isn't a wild population of voices, fighting and mating and evolving, carrying forward the best traits and leaving behind the worst. Some voices hold other voices captive, select which of them will breed and which will not, control which traits will be carried forward, without considering whether those traits are healthy. There's some drama over on Jezebel right now because some commenters who argued against the "feminist's nightmare" post and questioned Jezebel's continued criticism of Taylor Swift saw their comments deleted and their commenting privileges lost. It has nothing to do with the conversation, it's beyond the conversation's control. The many voices are unable to make up for the limitations of the single voice because the single voice is able to do exactly what you want to do to it -- namely, ignore you if it disagrees with you.
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I'd like to believe that not only within The Internet As A Whole, but within the category Feminists Who Feel Some Social Distance From Taylor Swift, we would find that most people who paid attention to the argument were appalled by Autostraddle's mode of arguing, but I don't trust that that's what we would find.
[For those lurkers who haven't been following Taylor Swift or the argument, Taylor Swift has a stanza in the song "Fifteen" that goes, "Back then I swore I was going to marry him someday/But I realized some bigger dreams of mine/And Abigail gave everything she had/To a boy who changed his mind/And we both cried," Abigail being Taylor's best friend. And Autostraddle's critique goes:
I mean, she's pretty clear in "Fifteen" — really the only song where Taylor has an actual female friend — that "Abigail gave everything she had to a boy, who changed his mind, and we both cried."
I'll spare you the time of listening to the song and give it to you straight: Abigail had sex with a boy, and later they broke up. That's right. No marriage. She gave him all she had.
That's right. All Abigail had was her hymen.
(Off the top of my head I can think of three other songs where Taylor has a female friend: "Tied Together With A Smile," "Mary's Song" (those two seem to be about female friends), and "The Best Day," if she's allowed to count her mom as a friend. Not to mention the video for "White Horse.")]
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(*: It linked nicely because I've thought the same thing in reverse about Cat Power, where the tension that she's more conventional than her circle)
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In "Fifteen" she seems a bit patronizing of her own earlier, fifteen-year-old self, too, the strange thing being that she wrote her "That's a lie" line when she was fifteen.* But then, it's very teenage to be patronizing towards your earlier selves, to both overestimate and underestimate at the same time. I think when she's being "meta" about her earlier self she may not be doing justice to her own complexities. (I simply don't believe that when she was fifteen she didn't know there were greater things in life than dating the boy on the football team, even if that's how she remembers it.)
(Am I being patronizing myself when I say "It's very teenage"? Really, there is such a thing as age-appropriate behavior, and I'm hoping it's not patronizing to point that out.)
*Or sixteen at the latest (her first draft was when she was fifteen, or even fourteen, scribbled down when she was supposed to be paying attention in class) - though perhaps it was contributed by cowriter Liz Rose, who's almost my age and has written a mammoth number of songs, very few of which I know. The ones she cowrote with Taylor include some very good ones: "Tim McGraw," "Cold As You," "Tied Together With A Smile," "Teardrops On My Guitar," "Come In With The Rain," "White Horse," "You Belong With Me," among others.
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*Well, in the controversy I was referring to, you could say that the overall conversation in the form of Paul Nelson did get Silber to engage, even if Silber then wasn't able to get Nelson to adequately engage back. By the way, Nelson was substantially correct in that controversy, which deserves a post of its own. And I can't say I followed through or remember whether, with or without Silber's help, he ever addressed the death-wishing part of Dylan's work that Silber was highlighting. I wish I hadn't, when I got the second edition of The Rolling Stone Illustrated History Of Rock & Roll, given away the first edition, since the second didn't carry over Nelson's Dylan essay from the first (all I remember is that Nelson chose as his narrator a hard-boiled detective). Anyone got a copy?