And for all those who like me, don’t read German, here is a useful link to an outline of John’s turtle (aka von Humboldt): https://scholarsbank.uoregon.edu/xmlui/bitstream/handle/1794/1456/humbrev-mcneely.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y

Bw

Corony

>>> He was the one who said you never step into the same river twice.

 

And apparently one of his smartass students then offered the rejoinder that you never step into the same river once. 

 

The systematic involvement of UK universities in research is a fairly recent phenomenon, historically speaking. Though of course there were always the occasional oddball gown-clad Newtons  and Copernicuses lurking around age-blackened European quadrangles, even as late as the 1950s and early 60s most academics in the UK (including Oxford and Cambridge) did not engage in research in the sense that it is understood now, though of course they remained up to date with scholarship in their field.  Big science and engineering research tended to take place in government laboratories, research institutes, Medical research centres or industry. Most research is still done in business and industry. The catalytic moment appears to have been the Soviet launch of Sputnik and the panic reaction by Western governments that we were being overtaken technologically.  This was a key factor in the 60s expansion of universities and turning the former CATs into uiniversities that would also undertake scientific research.  In the USA this was that time of massive investment in defence-related research in universities clustered around the North Carolina triangle. (Still more people with PhDs in the north of NC than any similar sized region in the world apparently).  

 

Cardinal Newman in his 'Idea of a University' was expressly against the idea of universities undertaking researrch as he felt this would undermine their teaching function (which, I suppose, it has, more or less, subsequently done). 

 

Ray

---

From: Online forum for SEDA, the Staff & Educational Development Association [[log in to unmask]] on behalf of Jason Davies [[log in to unmask]]
Sent: 17 November 2016 16:38
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: research-teaching interface term

On 17 Nov 2016, at 14:41, Fung, Dilly wrote:

(I'm now anticipating a flurry of emails on Plato et al. :-)

I think this one should be earlier -- the sixth century BC philosopher Heraclitus who, having completed his book, placed it in the local library so anyone could read it (books were astonishingly expensive then). He was the one who said you never step into the same river twice. Plato was mostly just very good at marketing other people's ideas and getting the credit.

The next honorary mention would be Aristotle, most of whose attributed written works are actually projects done by his students and/or lecture notes from his teaching.

Looking back at the ancient world as a reality check, the distinction between research and teaching is actually not to do with knowledge but the organisation (and funding) of institutions. Lone philosophers were usually independently wealthy (though not always) but many formed communities and institutions that relied on student fees and/or patronage of a rich person.

So I'd hazard that often the 'distinction' between research and teaching is actually underpinned and becomes a meaningful question for political and economic reasons, but is played out on an epistemological and pedagogical playground (which is why it is never resolved there: there is no means to resolve it there).

Cheers

J