Jeremy Messersmith - A Girl A Boy and A Graveyard:
She says, “Life’s a game we’re meant to lose.
But stick by me, and I will stick by you.”
Your favorite places aren’t that way because of their things and stuff, but because of their people.
I find this little car to be a very interesting vehicle. Sharp looks, good gas mileage, fun.
A giant sunroof, too! Well, in proportion to the car.
“The mind is its own place, and in itself can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven.”
— John Milton
(Paradise Lost)
Here’s a good quote from jonknee in a discussion about the business of televising sports, network exclusivity, blackouts, etc.:
Football is infrequent enough that I can go to a bar, but if I went to a bar for every baseball game I’d be poor and drunk all the time.
Having got that previous post of life-threaten(ed) melodrama out of my system, it’s now time to confront the epidemic of cheating in schools.
Cheating, 2008
I left out an important detail when I told the story of my impossible first semester at dental school. It goes like this: shortly after receiving the news on the 12th of November, 2008 that I was mere points from failing two critical classes, I was in the library cramming for a histology quiz on which I could not afford to lose any points. A classmate of mine approached me.
“I’ve got the answers to the quiz, you know. They’re the same every year.”
“They are?”
“They are. I’ve got them right here. Would you like them?”
My classmate and I both knew the class was a farce, that 90% of the lecturers were spectacularly uninterested in educating us. We both knew the class was just the first of many hoops through which we were required to jump, for no real educational benefit. My classmate hedged their hours of studying with a sure thing: having the answers in hand. I couldn’t do it.
“No thanks.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes, I can’t accept those.”
At this point, I knew two things:
Cheating, 2010
Recently, Kottke brought the cheating topic back to the forefront of my mind. He posted a fascinating excerpt of a lecture from a University of Central Florida course director. In it, the professor describes his disbelief that one third of his 600 student class cheated on their October 2010 midterm:
To say I’m disappointed is beyond comprehension. Physically ill, absolutely disgusted, completely disillusioned, trying to figure out what the last 20 years were for. For those of you out there who acted ethically and acted honorably, and did it right, you have my undying gratitude and my utmost respect. For those of you who took the shortcut, don’t call me. Don’t ask me to do anything for you. Ever. Again.
It Get Worse
Modern cheating goes far beyond publisher’s test banks and crib sheets; the internet has extended the previous local connections between friends to a diverse network of full-time, well-paid paper ghostwriters. In a tremendously depressing article in The Chronicle Review called The Shadow Scholar, one of these paper generators describes writing for student customers:
Somebody in your classroom uses a service that you can’t detect, that you can’t defend against, that you may not even know exists.
I work at an online company that generates tens of thousands of dollars a month by creating original essays based on specific instructions provided by cheating students. I’ve worked there full time since 2004. On any day of the academic year, I am working on upward of 20 assignments.
In the midst of this great recession, business is booming. At busy times, during midterms and finals, my company’s staff of roughly 50 writers is not large enough to satisfy the demands of students who will pay for our work and claim it as their own.
People with money have always been able to buy their way through university. Now, when laziness and purchasing power combine, a façade of intellectual honesty can be maintained—the shadow writer doesn’t know their cheater’s identity—so the student isn’t singled out as a lazy cheater, even amongst their peers. Cheating is truly difficult to detect when one’s peers can’t even sniff it out.
Why?
When people try to understand the cheating problem and they are able to get past the incredible deceit students are willing to accept in exchange for good grades, criticism inevitably falls on “The System”. “This academic system is broken…”, they declare, “…a system that allows cheaters to succeed is not testing students correctly.”
This may be true. But, it jumps over the question of the individual to the question of their environment. Shouldn’t we first understand why students choose to cheat, and then try to fit these students into an academic setting?
Animals
After talking about the recent stampedes in Cambodia, Mykala and I came to rather general theory: when external pressures are sufficient, rational humans are quickly reduced to animals functioning entirely on instinct.
I believe this phenomenon explains some of cheating. Students are in hundreds of thousands of dollars of debt and their only way to repay is to get their degree and job. The specter of extreme financial pressure looms above the heads of these stressed out students. Losing their scruples, they claw and bite their way through a class using any means available. Cheating saved them from consequences, so they don’t see a problem.
Brains
What if debt doesn’t bother students? What if they’re rich? Perhaps they lack intellectual curiosity. A few comments from a discussion of “The Shadow Scholar” article:
There are some people who, irrespective of the work they put in, who will never be able to learn some things. I used to think that people were just lazy, but then I realized that many things are beyond most people. Don’t believe for a second that one day, everyone will be smart, uber-rational and we’ll all live in some Randian, Galt-led utopia.
Deep, critical thinking is not possible for most people. Through no fault of their own, they simply lack the mental hardware. I recognize that this view is very un-PC, but if mind is a function of matter as I believe, some people, regardless of what they do, will never be able to reason at a high level.
— oz
Uh oh. Now we’re in some truly dangerous depths. Sure, an inability to think would help explain cheating. But, if we believe some brains are physically inferior to others, the ideal of meritocracy is just the beginning of the collateral damage. Stratifying people and their brains by functional ability threatens to form the foundation of a rigid caste system. Suddenly, we’re at Gattaca’s doorstep.
Two possibilities explain a lack of intellectual curiosity: “I do not want to” and “I can’t”. Unfortunately, the outcome in both situations looks the same: the person is not curious. A more concrete example: am I unable to run an ultra-marathon because I lack “the hardware” or because I do not WANT to? How can we tell the difference?
I’m willing, however, to discontinue the debate about the processing power of different minds in favor of something else entirely more fascinating. What if there is social pressure to avoid intellectual curiosity? What faster way to ruin a good football conversation than subjecting folks around the water cooler with a dissertation about sports head injuries? Indeed, oz’s comment about people’s aptitude for thought sparked a reply addressing these social pressures:
I’ve known people who [are] capable of thinking deeply, but will do so only when cornered, and will resent whatever put them into that position. It’s not that they can’t; it’s that they have learned that there are social consequences when they do. They take away from the mindless fun of whatever group of people they are with when they start thinking about it.
Student’s social circles reward cheating:
People cheat because cheaters have more fun? Now I’m depressed.
In the past few weeks, I’ve had some very near misses with some very bad things.
(Almost) Bike Death
Seymour Avenue winds down a very steep hill as it approaches Franklin Avenue. At the intersection between the two, there’s a blind intersection controlled by a stoplight. In the winter, I come down this hill on my bike and turn left onto Franklin. 99% of the time, the light is red and I slow to a stop, but I’ve made it through on a couple of green lights in the past.
A few weeks ago, I came down the hill toward a red light. When I was about 20 feet from the blind intersection, the light changed to green. I stopped braking and started to pedal; from the blind spot to my right, a car raced through the intersection against the light. Had I come down the hill 2 seconds earlier, I would have seen the green light, kept my speed up, and been killed by that car running their red light.
(Almost) AIDS
I cleaned the teeth of a patient, and then accidentally poked my right tricep on the tip of a Cavitron, one of the instruments I had just finished using on them. I realized this after I had dismissed the patient; the ache in my arm was similar to what you feel after getting an immunization shot. From this feeling, I knew the tip had gone through to my muscle.
Read the patient history; lots of “No” answers for diseases. But then… “Stopped using cocaine in 2002.”
Oh. Shit.
I got myself to Boynton Health Services, and they drew my blood and put me on a multi-antiretroviral drug, Combivir. I was at risk for AIDS and Hep C. As I had JUST been informed the day before by an abrupt surgeon: AIDS can be managed; “Hep C will kill you in about 10-15 years.” The stats were not in my favor:
An estimated 60% to 80% of intravenous recreational drug users in the United States have been infected with Hepatitis C virus.
“So, did you have your source come in?” they asked at Boynton.
“I noticed my injury after the patient was checked-out.”
“You’ll have to call them and ask them to come in for tests.”
“I’ll tell them I strongly recommend they come in.”
“No; you beg them to come in.”
I raced back to the school and sat down at one of the phones. I dialed my patient’s home phone number wrong 3 times in a row. Finally, I heard phone ring.
Pick-up pick-up pick-up pick-up.
They picked up.
I explained the situation, how protocol dictated the patient come in and get tested.
“Let me go get a piece of paper,” my patient said.
It was then that I knew I had a chance of getting them to come in.
Three days later I got the phone call I had been hoping for: they had come in to get tested. They were negative. I could discontinue the drugs I’d been put on. I let out the longest sigh of relief of my life.
(Almost) Ice Crash
Mykala and I had an awesome time visiting Matt, Shayla, Kellie, and John in Woodbury. While we were enjoying our evening, an ice storm later described as “one for the ages” coated the streets in GLARE ice. You could’ve skated on the streets. The six of us teamed up to get the ice off two cars, then we departed.
“I have absolutely no traction,” Mykala said, as she backed out of John’s driveway. A few blocks later, and we saw a plow salting the roads. We continued to the interstate, and the road was fine.
Then, just past White Bear Avenue on westbound I94, we saw something strange: a man was piloting an SUV while simultaneously emptying what appeared to be a 50 pound bag of Morton salt onto the road. Now, why would he do that? Because there was absolutely no salt on the freeway.
Oh. Shit.
A Pioneer Press truck passed us, likely loaded down the morning papers. At least that’s what we guessed by the manner in which it slid sideways down the freeway in front of us, swerving from one guardrail to another. It took so long to come to a stop that I had time to get out my cell phone, ready to call 911 if the driver never regained control.
We pulled over.
“Alex, look at the other side of the freeway.”
It was almost four in the morning, but there was a traffic jam on the other side of I94: no one had enough traction to get up the hill. We saw cars stuck in one place on the hill, gently swaying back and forth, making precious little forward progress. Then, they started to slide backwards.
“What if we exited the freeway?” Mykala asked, looking to our right where a ramp curled down to Highway 61. We watched cars pass us by, hit their brakes, and slide out of view. We wouldn’t be exiting the freeway.
After talking it over for about 10 minutes, we started off again. Cars were abandoned in the ditches about every 50 feet. We became more and more frightened with each empty, ditched car we passed. The Pioneer Press truck was ahead of us, stuck trying to get off the freeway. We pulled over again, this time on the left side of the interstate. Mykala was ready to ditch the car and get out. I almost agreed, but I was scared we’d get run over by sliding cars as we made our way across lanes of traffic to the shoulder.
We were both shaking, but made good time (20-25 miles an hour) to our exit in Minneapolis. Franklin Avenue. Almost home. Uh oh. More glare ice! With no input from Mykala, our Jetta gently, silently, glided from the middle of the road to the curb, which provided enough friction to stop it. We were 20 feet from our street, and when Mykala hit the gas, the car slowly and uncontrollably rotated 180°. Hmm. It took another 10 minutes to go those 20 feet, rotate the car, and back it in neutral into the first spot we found.
Home safe.
Dear Everyone In The Library,
Terribly sorry for eating a giant, juicy, crispy Honeycrisp apple today. Noise pollution wasn’t a good enough reason to forgo such a delicious delight.
All the best in your continued academic pursuits,
Alex
This quote from Radiohead’s frontman Thom Yorke about Street Spirit (Fade Out) confuses me. I’ve never listened to it before, now I can’t decide if I want to hear it, or to never listen:
I can’t believe we have fans that can deal emotionally with that song. That’s why I’m convinced that they don’t know what it’s about. It’s why we play it towards the end of our sets. It drains me, and it shakes me, and hurts like hell every time I play it, looking out at thousands of people cheering and smiling, oblivious to the tragedy of its meaning, like when you’re going to have your dog put down and it’s wagging its tail on the way there. That’s what they all look like, and it breaks my heart. I wish that song hadn’t picked us as its catalysts, and so I don’t claim it. It asks too much. I didn’t write that song.
“All the money in the world can’t buy your health,” he said.
Then, he and his wife gave away the $11.2 milion they had just won playing the lottery.
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