Dear Susan
The Gardner stuff raises the general issue of Plato's Meno - how do we come to know what we didn't know before we knew. Socrate's answer : We were all "damaged" when we re-crossed from the land of spirits such that we have "forgotten" our knowledge.
The presumptions of kinds of intelligence is a little bit silly. Along with De Bono's lateral thinking, such presumptions conflate analysis with performance and/or reception with production.
For me, the variety of registers of intelligence/knowledge doesn't mean we need go look for underlying analytical structures - Gardner and De Bono simply multiply the problems while avoiding the issues.
I'm sure George Bush wishes that there was a variety of special intelligence called "terrorist" - but such a dream is no sillier, in itself, than the dream that there is a variety of special intelligence called "designer".
I'm sure there are many people who believe they have a special intelligence called "I'm a designer" - some of them like to talk about it, especially to people they feel don't have this special thinking cap in their cognitive cupboard.
enough thinking within the bumpy square
keith russell
OZ Newcastle
>>> Susan Margolis <[log in to unmask]> 09/19/04 20:54 PM >>>
Terry, Keith, & others:
I am going to assume you you familiar with the work of Howard Gardner- most
specifically his work in defining and documenting different kinds of
'understanding' and 'intelligence(s)' based upon studies of people who could be said
to be 'lacking' in those very qualities. One of his many premises: the dearth
of an 'ability', indicated that there truly was an 'ability' with which one
began.
Now, given Gardner's approach, how might the study of the 'damaged' brain
inform us about the capacities of the 'normal' brain?
Susan Margolis
www.coroflot.com/margolis
ref: old stuff- Howard Gardner, Project Zero, Harvard University
The Mind's New Science ISBN 0-465-04635-5 1985
Frames of Mind ISBN 0-465-02510-2 1983
Multiple Intelligences (Basic Books, 1990)
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