Tuesday February 7, 2006 5:00 am Ballina NSW

A. Morning Musings

5:00 am It is dark outside at this hour. But there is a noticeable breeze through the unit which is cool and refreshing.

I am beginning to show a little more flexibility with these web pages. I just noticed that I failed to complete a day-end reflection last night. No worries, as they say here. It is a good saying.

My collage of web sites reminds me of my undergraduate days where I was always taking 5 courses at a time. I had lecture notes for each course as well as a set of notes and underlined text books (yellow highlighters had yet to be invented) with annotations in the margins (post-its were also in the future). Noting this, both highlighters and post-its are part of the paper generation. This web site is a venture into the electronic age.

Another venture into the electronic age is that of blogging. I gave that a serious try last September ( http://cloudchamber.blogspot.com/ ). I enjoyed making the early entries but soon felt limited in what the blogs allowed (technically) and moved to creating web sites such as this that give me more control over the screen and allow me to integrate material created with other software. But, as I keep reminding myself, the real issue is not the web site but my neuronal activity. Creating a web site is primarily of value to the author whose neurons are firing differently as a result of creating the product. I suspect this latter statement resonates well with artists. This is my canvas. It represents a dynamic image of Learning over time. Not too neat, but more accurate than a revised manuscript.

Real Learning fascinates me. There is a clear difference between really understanding something and simply understanding something. I began reading "Something and More" yesterday. It is an intriguing book. Unique in my experience. Ostensibly it is about mathematics, but it is closer to Proust in terms of its stream of consciousness style. It makes me think. What is the author saying? A well-organized and structured book may help me understand more easily, but at the same time it prevents me from thinking. I wonder if we have gone to far with our educational and publishing industries in terms of trying to help the learner see the important points? There is clear value in much of this but we may inadvertently be depriving the individual of opportunities for personal synthesis and extension.

Sunday's creation of a new web site for Philosophy in only an hour helped me realize that I now have a pseudo-template for any topic or subject. And it is a fairly simple template. But the structure is more obvious to me than the viewer as I am usually seeing these screens within a Dreamweaver authoring setting and thus also see the file structure on the right of the screen.

Here is a screen capture showing this structure for the daily Journal entries:

There are four basic pages (the bottom four) and then a folder for each month which contains all the images for that month plus one summary page (the chronology page) and a separate page for each day. Not too complicated.

Now let's look at the files for the History web site:

This is a fairly similar structure. There are four basic pages plus a series of entries for each session (which in this case was only 3 times in January). I also have a separate file folder for the creation of files using other software (Mind Genius - a mind mapping package) which I have organized in a folder devoted to a particular book (Ideas by Peter Watson). It would also be possible to have this in a folder called MindGenius but that seems to emphasize the tool when I think the emphasis should be on the topic.

Neither of these file structures are rocket science yet it has taken me a couple of years to evolve this system to its present form. Not too efficient. The real issue is not, in this case, the idea, but the implementation. One must develop a personal approach to Learning and to Time that involves both a level of commitment and a personal life style that is likely new to almost anyone giving this a try. I have found that early morning is best. It is quiet, I am (usually) alert and refreshed, and I have a few hours before regular daily activites begin.

One of the features of my Home page, and the corresponding chronology pages is the number of different topics. But although the number of topics is high (15) some of these rarely are attended to. At the moment they are there to remind me that I would like to get more involved in some topics than I seem to be able to find time for. It is a way of potentially altering my priorities. However the devil may be in the details. Thus what started out about 3 weeks ago as an innocuous idea - namely let's try adding a few photos to add an element of detail to the narrative, looks like it may expand to a whole new venture: serious digital photography. This raises the delimma for each of us - when do we decline an opportunity or refuse to engage in an activity because we are too busy and too committed to existing projects and when do we drop an existing project in order to begin a new one. This is more than just about "work" projects, it is also about how one leads a life. We all find our balance, at least most of the time.

Another aspect of any activity is the level of skill one has with the tools. Two examples from these pages come immediately to mind. One is the insertion of photos and the other is the insertion of part of a previous screen display. In both cases I have a routine that is genuinely fast and automatic. In both cases this involves Learning how to use another software package. In the case of the photos I have software (ZoomBrowser) that came with my Canon digital camera that allows me to download images from the camera, select one, change its size and store it on my web site with only a few mouse clicks. The process for one photo takes about 20 seconds. For a screen capture (I have a Windows system) I use a small utility called SnagIt that allows me to select a portion of the screen and save it on the web site. This also takes only a few keystrokes and is very easy to do without thinking. However when it comes to Drawing, my use of a tool such as a pencil is still embarrassingly primitive.

Looking at my Plan for today, I realize that my exercise routine is beginning to slip. Fortunately the beach walks are stamped in sand. Exercise must also be done early or it is in danger of also getting lost. Done. I only have one item in my plan - to continue reading the maths book "Everything and More". I will leave it at that for the moment and see how the day unfolds. 6:15 am

B. Plan

Chores: Visit to Thursday's Plantation near here.

Exercise: Exercise & Beach walk.

Mathematics: Continue reading "Everything and More".

Philosophy:

C. Actual

6:20 am Check email, update this website. 7:00 am

11:00 am I have skim-read the magazine "Philosophy Now" and am delighted. I am sufficiently motivated that I now want to reread it with a yellow highlighter and then make a set of bulleted notes about the entire issue. It has turned into a drizzly day, cool and dark - actually very pleasant. I am feeling a bit lazy, a nice feeling, but also feel that I want to do something. I am vacillating between reading "Wordplay" and re-creating some mind maps for my History web site. This is primarily one of copying a few (4) charts that I made with colored pencils last April. The copying is easy, but the coloring may be a Learning experience. 11:15 am

11:20 am Now to try the mind mapping. I have one map complete but am having a lot of difficulty getting the colors working for each of the branches. 12:30

7:30 PM I am now the excited owner of a Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ30 digital camera. Now to see if I can get on top of the formatting for the Mind Genius software.

Here is the chart for Learning (originally created April 21/05)

Here is the chart for History ( originally created April 21/05 ):

That is enough for tonight. 8:10 PM

D. Reflection

8:30 PM The weather today was very windy and overcast but there was almost no rain and although it was the coolest day this summer, it was still shorts and t-shirt weather.

Creating the mind maps turned out to be more tricky that I anticipated, but I now have it under control. The remaining two charts shouldn't take too long. The real advantage of the electronic form is their potential for easy modification in the future. They also provide a very good way to see at a glance the important points underlying each chart.

I have read and highlighted most of the magazine "Philosophy Now" and have thoroughly enjoyed it. I am looking forward to making a few notes on this, hopefully tomorrow.

Purchasing the digital camera was the highlight! 8:40 PM