Bill Dembski is attempting to justify his pedagogical technique of sending students to “hostile” websites to drop comments. For example, in this syllabus we see:
At least 10 posts defending aspects of the Christian worldview totaling at least 3,000 words on “hostile” websites
For another course (AP 410), students have to
provide at least 10 posts defending ID that you’ve made on “hostile” websites, the posts totalling 2,000 words, along with the URLs (i.e., web links) to each post (worth 20% of your grade).
Now what’s problematic here isn’t that Dembski is encouraging students to post on “hostile” sites, it is that the assignment doesn’t force the students to engage with their critics in any way. Instead, all the student has to do is cut and paste some text, save the url, and pass it on to Dembski. Money in the bank.
Those of us who use discussion forums and webboards in our teaching know that if any value is to be gained from the exercise students must engage with each other and respond to claims while defending their own through a series of engagements. It is such long-term engagement that is profitable not “drive-by posting”.
In short, my objection is not that Dembski’s students are posting on “hostile” sites, it’s that he is not doing anything pedagogically useful by encouraging them to do so. Dembski appears to be as good a teacher as he is a mathematician or theologian.
Update (8/11): Joel Borofsky, Dembski’s former TA, tries to defend his master but completely ignores the sort of argument I’m making and instead wikers on about what he sees as argumentative fallacies. Come on Joel, defend Dembski’s pedagogy …
August 10, 2009 at 4:41 pm
I have always wanted to have a Phd to tack onto my name,but have been to lazy and not smart enough to earn one. Thank jebuss that I now have a chance. Thank you Bill.
Look for my ignorant ravings to be showing up soon.
August 10, 2009 at 4:48 pm
Yes indeed: post AND respond
August 10, 2009 at 8:12 pm
ID is science.
Okay, only 9 more posts and 1,997 words to go…
August 10, 2009 at 10:21 pm
Actually James, if you repeat that a further 666 times, you’ll have more or less reproduced the output of the DI, though you should perhaps throw in a “Darwin is Hitler” every now and then just to spice things up.
August 11, 2009 at 6:13 am
As far as I can tell, Dembski appears to be training his students to be trolls. But the trolling isn’t the worst part of his curriculum. The part that really makes my jaw drop is his “critical thinking” course:
At Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, “Critical Thinking” means exercises in how to conduct an effective PR campaign.
August 11, 2009 at 9:47 am
I think he’s not training them to be trolls as much as he’s training them to be “Soldiers for Jesus”. That’s why he doesn’t care if his students engage in any dialogue; their job is simply to get the good word out into the “hostile” blogosphere.
August 12, 2009 at 4:51 am
Back in the day, I had an instructor who insisted that each person join a specific newsgroup and post 1 reply per week to a topic. However, the idea here was to get the students answering questions on the newsgroup to broaden their problem-solving skills. The post had to be in response to one put out by another member and not simply copied and pasted out of a text or web page.
But Dembski does not require actual discussion, just drive-by posting.
August 15, 2009 at 11:32 am
How many times do you have to post for Dembski before you get one of them there cool sweaters?
August 17, 2009 at 12:12 pm
[...] 3,000 words, along with the URLs (i.e., web links) to each post (worth 20% of your grade).” As John Lynch notes, the problem “isn’t that Dembski is encouraging students to post on ‘hostile’ [...]
August 21, 2009 at 12:11 pm
[...] quibblings and thus shutting the comments off.” This is somewhat ironic for a professor who sends his students onto the internet to drive-by comment on sites that oppose ID. For Dembski, valid criticisms are [...]