User talk:Cormaggio/Visions of Wikiversity

Been new, and not wishing to be bogged down by monolithic research i pointed in one direction and said "this way" so i m here. My question is "What is the Vision or concept of Wikiversity? What differentiates it from the rest?" i.e. from Wikipedia. Like to say more, but let me see if this pebble reached the bottom first. :D - Red1 12:44, 13 May 2007 (UTC)

I must say the quote from Ray is most remarkable. I vote in support! - Red1 12:47, 13 May 2007 (UTC)

"chains on free speech" <-- Some speech runs counter to the educational mission of Wikiversity. Academic freedom does not mean Wikiversity is a platform for speech that fails to respect scholarly ethics. There are objective criteria that can be used to decide if someone is a liar. There are objective criteria that can be used to decide when something is pseudoscience. This is why it is possible for judges and juries to decide when someone is lying about what is or is not science. w:Intelligent design is in the category "pseudoscience" and not in category "science" for very good reasons. As one judge put it, "the religious nature of ID [intelligent design] would be readily apparent to an objective observer, adult or child" (see).
: "silence the creationist", "Arguments for creationism" <-- Biblical creationists are free to explore their interpretations of scripture at School:Theology. If there are any Wikiversity participants who want to discuss published evidence they feel is scientific and supports intelligent design, we can easily do that (see discussion). I think it would be best to put such a discussion project in Category:Protoscience. (see) --JWSchmidt 15:12, 13 May 2007 (UTC)

I think the main thing differentiating Wikiversity from other projects is that it is explicitly about learning, rather than involving some implicit element of learning. I would add to this the freedom Wikiversity gives people to explore what gives rise to knowledge, rather than to "simply" state how something is (not that I'm suggesting that Wikipedia's process, for example is simple!), and I think this is more or less the spirit of Ray's comment. To extend Jimbo's quote, it is to make people literate -ie being able to read and write (and that is a noble end in itself), but also to enable people to think critically about information. Information does not equate to education - learning must be prompted and framed by goals and contexts of learning - even informal or incidental learning. There may be some overlap between Wikibooks and Wikiversity - some of this is inevitable, but some could be better organised between the projects. And, to further muddy my answer, there will inevitably be learning involved in people's participation on other projects (I wrote my first M.Ed on "Wikipedia as a learning community"), but that Wikiversity can serve to organise and make explicit that process and context of learning - even if it involves the writing of articles on Wikipedia. Initial structure of these thoughts has been developed around Wikiversity:Service community (and perhaps feeds into Wikiversity:Wikiversity outreach, but this still needs a good deal of work. However, to avoid getting confused, I'd start with the welcome page and the approved project proposal. Cheers! Cormaggio ^talk 17:15, 13 May 2007 (UTC)

Well put. I hold that the first light of controversy shall arise over name calling. For example if i wish to dive into teaching economics, someone would ask which branch of economics, and if u would say, "Chinese Medieval laissez fair Bazaar Economics" i fear someone would ask, "Show where it came from the tree of economics, or go elsewhere". Anyway we won't know until somehow scratch back on the board. Thanks for intercoursing. My mind is getting warm - Red1 00:54, 14 May 2007 (UTC)