Michael G. Strawser, New Media and Digital Pedagogy: Enhancing the Twenty-first-century Classroom, 2017, Lanham, Boulder, New York, London: Lexington Books, 185 pp., US$90, ISBN-13: 978-1-4985-4851-9.

“Philosophy has been criticized during the 25 centuries of its existence, - Yurgen Habermas has noticed, - but the fact that it is still alive means that it is as usual necessary. How long?” In different historical periods claims to philosophy concerned to the fact, that it couldn’t manage to accomplish its task – to help mankind to find the way to the fair society, to the world without wars and (according to Marx) from “mankind prehistory” to its “true history”. (...) During the XIXth century, and especially during the XXth century, it had become obvious impossibility of idea, “been acceptable for everyone”, and the danger of totalitarian indoctrination of any “truth”. However statement of truth pluralism has resulted in post-modernistic disavowal from the notion of truth. In the modern pragmatic world, where “that is true, what is useful”, anxiety and warning of philosophers annoy, rather than make fall to thinking. But the great danger is represented not because of philistine indifference to philosophy, but because of the fact, that philosophers often surrender, speaking about “death of philosophy”. The novaday’s philosopher shouldbe concerned not about the fate of philosophy in the world of the XXIst century, but by the world fate without philosophy. (shrink)

Despite Stewart admitting his own “socialist” sympathies, The Daily Show often critiques not only right‐leaning but left‐leaning language. Interestingly, despite the show's ironic satire, it aims at greater accuracy as a means to the larger end of truth in general, a stream of thinking termed “modernism.” But in “postmodernism,” truth is seen more as a continuum and a process. The show and its writers “teach that deliberation is not a means to an end but an end in itself. Discussion, dialogue, (...) provocation, and questioning are valued for their own sake—not because they lead to truth but because they foster a community able to discern untruth.” Better, the author believes the show does lead to truer understanding. But more than information, the show promotes transformation—from knee‐jerk habits of mind to mindful self‐awareness. One way it does so is by catching how people try to manipulate opinion using the red herring tactic. (shrink)

Embedding ethics modules within computer science courses has become a popular response to the growing recognition that CS programs need to better equip their students to navigate the ethical dimensions of computing technologies like AI, machine learning, and big data analytics. However, the popularity of this approach has outpaced the evidence of its positive outcomes. To help close that gap, this empirical study reports positive results from Northeastern’s program that embeds values analysis modules into CS courses. The resulting data suggest (...) that such modules have a positive effect on students’ moral attitudes and that students leave the modules believing they are more prepared to navigate the ethical dimensions they’ll likely face in their eventual careers. Importantly, these gains were accomplished at an institution without a philosophy doctoral program, suggesting this strategy can be effectively employed by a wider range of institutions than many have thought. (shrink)