Deaqr Squeers,

I was hoping you would join us on this thread.
I also would love to discuss homeschooling with you. I liked your example of Mary Shelley's excursions - I'm inclined to that way of doing things.

As far as the human condition is concerned, our situation is such that we can be aware of the nature of our organization and, therefore, we are able to tweak the arrangement here and there so that we don't always feel that we are led by the nose into conformity.
As you say, we don't have to be sheep (well, not all the time).

Just a tip - if you do seriously embark on educating your children outside of an institution, the overwhelming chorus from those around you is likely to be: "But, what about socialization?" - as if educational institutions are not artificially contrived worlds where children are segregated with age-peers away from the real world.
I could go on...and on....
Suffice to say - the "world" is your oyster as far as education goes - it just takes a little thinking outside the box.

Dear Foxy,

Interestingly, I came across that book by Tor Hundloe - and when I googled his name, up came an article he had written for OLO (I hadn't been aware of OLO's existence prior to that). So, he's the one that brought me here.

Dear Squeers,

I'd also like to know why Koestler didn't go with Buddha's example of self-transcendency.

Dear Poirot,

Years ago I read Koestler's book,
"The Lotus and the Robot."
You should be able to get hold
of a copy from your local library.
I believe it may provide you with the
answer to your question about Buddhism.
In any case, it's a good read, as Koestler's
observations are usually very astute.
"If East is East, and West is West,
Pray tell me where Japan is placed?"

The following website may also be of
interest to you:

http://lodown.net/?p=70
"Koestler, Wilber and Holarchical Reality."

Poirot: Hi! Interesting topic - thank you.

As I read your initial post, two ideas kept coming to mind.

One was the beginning of the movie Ants, where Z is undergoing therapy:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PM23eviKGX4

- and the other was Eisenberg's article on ontogenetics:

http://bjp.rcpsych.org/cgi/content/full/184/2/101

It's a terrific essay that explains the "ontogenetic niche" whereby nature and nurture interact, sometimes producing long term changes to an organism.

Dear Poirot,
I'm not at present in a position to home-school my kids (I've already heard the "socialisation" complaint, but of course you're right), but am considering a house-swap with a UK resident. What better than exposing them to a whole different culture! I could still use the Australian curricular).

Dear Foxy,
I enjoyed the Holarchical Reality link. It sounds a bit like Lacanian theory, wherein we're comprised of abstractions, derived from what he calls the "imaginary", the "Symbolic order" and the "Real", the latter being the equivalent of Kant's Noumena. The ego, according to Lacan, is indistinguishable from the imaginary captivations which constitute it from head to toe. Our bodily being, which we first recognise in the "mirror stage", is a "mirage of unity and solidarity", masking the fact that the subject is more non-being than being. Compounding this delusionary "interpellation" (Althusser's term, but he was a student of Lacan) we are also indoctrinated into the "symbolic order" (language, norms etc.), which structures our juvenile selfhood "spontaneously" according to its formative interaction with cultural meaning and taboos. The mature Self then spends the rest of its days dissatisfied with symbolic reality, haunted by the lost "Real"(dreams of reunification, "jouissance") that lies unattainable beneath the accumulated strata of signification. The idea is also held (by some) to account for sensations of the uncanny, aesthetics, religious experience etc. There is some debate among Lacan's acolytes as to whether the "Real" is Real, or just an imaginary pined-for phenomenal state that preceded acculturation. I tend to favour the Real's unreality (which critics argue suggests idealism) because thingness in-itself is nevertheless finite and only temporarily gross. I suspect the Buddha (only Theravada Buddhism for me) would agree with me, that our "sophisticated" being is an illusion to be transcended. Which still, paradoxically, leaves a temporary materialism to be negotiated.
Catherine Belsey's very accessible "Culture and the Real" gives an excellent account if anyone's interested.
Nietzche said that like Christianity, Buddhism offers no hope in "this" world, the goal being to overcome it, yet the Buddha was keen first and foremost to live ethically.

Dear Squeers,
The U.K. swap sounds like a great opportunity.

Dear Foxy and Pynchme,
Thanks for the links - more grist for the mill.