Monday, April 16, 2007

instrumental reasoning: enemy of progress

Early in his Etech 2003 presentation Alan Kay identifies instrumental reasoning as the enemy of progress


Instrumental reasoning - new tools and ideas are evaluated according to the current goal structures of the evaluator, the idea is accepted or rejected based on whether this new thing contributes to the current goals

Most people use instrumental reasoning. It is the most dominant form of human reasoning. Learn a system and then stick with it

The printing revolution happened 150 years after the invention of the printing press by Gutenberg. Those who understood the potential earlier were in a tiny minority.

The section of the population most likely to reject instrumental reasoning are children

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