Why I'm not (and won't be) a Professor

A cursory glance at the world's dictionaries (or indeed Wikipedia) confirms that the title Professor does not carry a unique definition. In France for instance, my daughter's pre-school teacher was Professeur Gendt. In other countries such as the USA, Japan and several others, it refers to someone who is a member of faculty of a college or university. There are also various other definitions around the world ranging from referring to a person who is on tenure to the head of an academic department.
I must confess that in all of these senses, I am a Professor and am often referred to as such by various communities that meet at International meetings and conferences for the past decade or so (I used to correct them at the beginning but realised its futility as most of them couldn't understand what I was making a fuss about!).

In most commonwealth countries however, the term has a more specific meaning. It is the highest position within the hierarchy of academics in a university or college. The Latin term itself refers to a person who professes to be an expert in some art or science, a teacher of highest rank. This highest of meanings is what characterises the definition in these countries, including Sri Lanka.

Unfortunately, much of what constitutes that high ideal is missing in academics who are conferred that title in our university system today. Of course many of them possibly do profess to be experts in some art or science and so would qualify under the Latin definition (though whether they are so, is often unclear since the term expert itself has no unique meaning!). I do not consider myself as someone who has dedicated his life to research and academia to an extent that fits this lofty definition. To be sure, like everyone else, till around 2002, I did march along that road to promotion, collecting points to earn my right to be called a Professor, as could be seen by my online CV (in a frozen state since then). I wrote academic papers, presented them at conferences, supervised research projects, did my bit of administration, spent sabbaticals in prestigious research centres and reformed my teaching. I even totted up my points to see if I had enough to be at least an Associate Professor!

The current Professor promotion scheme in Sri Lanka, is so minutely specified, that it can be targetted by any academic without any interest in research or teaching leave alone the lofty ideal of contributing to the global body of knowledge! Indeed anything in life that is so tightly specified often falls into the pitfall that renders the system quite useless. In case of doubt, consider whether we really are identifying all those who are really gifted learners in our Grade 5 scholarship exam – or is it only those who can retain the most from a particular year in school (Grade 5) that is turning out to be as good a definition of hell for them as we can device!

As someone has said, in most cases, we value what we can measure (read: reading, writing and arithmetic – or for that matter: quantitative, analytical and verbal; and call it IQ) rather than trying to measure what we should value (read: kinesthetic, spatial, musical, interpersonal, intrapersonal skills also; including measures such as EQ).

All this is not to refute the claim that Sri Lanka has indeed produced some men and women who have dedicated their lives in the pursuit of knowledge and its sharing. Indeed there are even a handful to be found in the universities these days! There are also several who were never bestowed the title since they were either not in university employment or their contributions were not recognized at the time.

This brings me to my top 10 reasons for not being (and not striving to be) a Professor.

10. Some of the best researchers in my field, and many other fields I am aware of, around the world are simply Mr. (and some Dr.)

9. Professor is nothing more (and arguably, nothing less) than a designation in a university – not a qualification to be flaunted in public for all purposes

8. If professors call themselves Prof. why not directors, Dir., managers, Man., executives, Exec. or indeed architects, Arch., philosophers, Phil. or composers, Comp.?

7. Whether one is a Distinguished Senior Professor at Harvard, MIT or Stanford, or an Associate Professor (or Assistant in some cases) at one of the many tens or hundreds of colleges of a little known university in some far flung country, your title would be the same, simply Prof.

6. The fraternity (of Professors) is not one particularly honouring to belong to anymore in Sri Lanka – check out any university Senate here these days!

5. The quest to give yourself in service, and that of collecting points to become a professor are not always aligned – often one is done at the expense of the other

4. The title Prof. is often used as a title of elitism rather than one signifying a dedication to a life spent in the creation and dissemination of knowledge

3. Professorship has made most who posses it become conceited and puffed up rather than making them humble and indebted to the society that nurtured them (as I personally believe it should)

2. The title Professor is aspired to more often than not by those who rely on it as their main source of identity (which I personally am not in need of)

And my top reason for not being (nor wanting to be) a Professor is:

1. I do not consider myself as having spent my life (or spending what's left of it) in the pursuit of knowledge creation and dissemination the way the masters of scientific research did in the past (nor I suspect are many of my colleagues who have joined that fraternity or are frantically striving to!)

The Falacy of the Virtue of Quick Decision Making

Perceptions of what constitutes efficient and effective decision making are probably the most confusing aspect of leading in administration. While textbook notions of quick decision making seem to be desired in a theoretical sense, even considered decisions, if not favourable to personal preferences, are often interpreted as ineffective and weak. Owing to the legacy inherited from the bus driver model of leadership in every sphere of life we encounter however, decision making by those in the ranks is never given any importance. As such, most employees live in the dichotomy of not being able to decide and not happy with the decision making of others.

Supervisors are not immune to this disease. Sporting a false sense of guilt each time a decision negatively affects even a single subordinate, supervisors typically distance themselves from the decision making process and instead walk on the thin line between commradarie and supervision. The result is either insubordination of those under them or being at the receiving end of their wrath over unpopular decisions.

Strategy has become of utmost importance in decision making in the organization. One important strategy which I have come to learn through reflection is the opposite virtue of what is given in the textbook: only respond after 24 hours wherever possible! This single strategy has already borne much fruit especially when confronted with seeming impasse and conflict situations.

Leading - as the Bus Driver or the Orchestra Conductor?

The model of leadership most commonly expected in Sri Lankan society in general appears to be the most extreme form of leading from the front – that embodied in the bus driver model. There could be many reasons for this ranging from it being the natural model in a maternalistic society to the general inertia in public sector organizations[1]. In general, a majority in such organizations expect to be led by the top in an almost dictatorial way so that individual thinking and responsibility is minimal. Using the bus driver analogy, most are happy to be passengers who can assume that the driver will take them to the desired destination.

This was one of the few issues I knew I needed to address from the very outset. Making use of my first address to the entire staff of just over 100 employees at the time, I emphasized the fact that I was a very bad bus driver. I did not have the skills required to take the organization where it should go. However, I was confident that the senior staff in the organization could grow into a very potent force in brining about radical change to the organization which would take it to its next level of operation.

As such, I reiterated that the model of leadership would change to the Orchestra model. The main requirement for this was for individuals to excel in different dimensions of the organization’s business with me simply playing the role of the conductor. I am grateful to several senior academics and administrators who appear to have excelled in this metamorphosis to a participatory leadership structure.

Overall however, especially in the lower ranks of the organization, there appears to be some confusion over the model change with a minority even verbalizing their belief that it signifies a weakening of the organization itself.

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[1] It is not uncommon to hear that one of the key reasons for individuals joining the university is its relative ‘laid backness’ and perceived ‘freetime’ to do other things apart from its job security.

To Lead or to Manage

One of the key realizations I had to face was the fact that between the dual roles of leader and manager that one is often called upon to play as a head of a department or an institution in the university system, is that my skill at the latter was at best, below average. While I love to initiate new things and see others initiating new things, continuing such initiatives through after they are proved to work in a systematic way does not come easily to me. For this reason, one of my chief requests in my application for the post of Director of the UCSC was that, if selected, I would need a hard working manager as Deputy Director. While it is unusual for a candidate to a post to make such conditions even before being selected, I am grateful to the Interview Panel and then the Board of Directors for acceding so precisely to this request.

Since being appointed Director of the School in May 2004, I have had to learn fast on the job, the many and diverse lessons of administrative maneuvering in order to get a job of work done. Some of these are quite different from what the typical paternalist Western textbooks posit about them, with most needing to be adapted and tempered to the complex uncertainties of a maternalist Sri Lankan society.

Needless to say, my learning curve ‘on the job’ has still been steeper than it probably ought to have. Administration and management are skills which have as much or more to do with the psychomotor and affective domains than the cognitive domain, so that there can be little substitute to learning ‘on the job’.

Some examples of the disjoint between the textbook and reality which have transpired in my short tenure of just under 2 years as Director of the School include perceptions of the model of leadership, the interpretation of the flat organizational structure, the virtues of instant decision making, and the methods of showing dissent.

Learning Administration on the Job!

One of the roles an unsuspecting academic is invariably called to play sooner or later in one’s career is that of an administrator. That there is no prior training made mandatory for academics in this regard has never been understood as a serious omission in their continuing professional development. My own realization of the inadequacy of possessing such skills prompted me from fairly early on in my academic career to seek training aimed at mitigating this lack.

Owing to the limited training opportunities which were readily available in the areas that were relevant to the university setting, the setting up of the Staff Development Centre at the University of Colombo in the 1990’s was a most welcome phenomenon – providing me and other academics a very useful resource for self improvement. Apart from the learning opportunities it provided, the training programmes conducted by the Centre also brought together like-minded academics who were facing very similar issues.

Even though at the time, I did not hold any major administrative posts, these workshops prompted me to seek institutional membership of the British Council with the express view of borrowing the excellent training videos that started populating the then rather thin video collection. Some of the more relevant material was then shared with my fellow academics at the then Department of Statistics and Computer Science, with sometime for discussion after the viewing of the video concerned. Some of the areas covered in these videos included Time Management, Managing Meetings, Prioritizing Work, and Ethics at Work.

An extended ‘double-term’ sabbatical in 2001 and 2002 helped me in numerous ways to glean some of the essential skills and practices which were going to be extremely important upon my return to accept the headship of a department in the newly formed University of Colombo School of Computing (UCSC). While much of the learning happened through reading and finding resources on the Internet, the Human Resources Service Centre at the Carnegie Mellon University provided an excellent environment for concentrated learning of a wide cross-section of administrative and academic topics. Some of the areas of key importance included workshops and sessions on Emotional Intelligence, Conflict Management, Personality Types, Problem Based Learning, Peer & Student Evaluation, and Curriculum Design.

Since returning to the UCSC in 2003, I have had to play a progressively increasing administrative function commencing with being appointed the Head of the Department of Computation and Intelligent Systems. Several short periods as Acting Director of the School also helped equip me with some of the finer points related to administration in the Sri Lankan context, often requiring the adaptation of modern management practices of the West which dominates much of the literature and training content.

Level 3 Teaching for Deep Learning

In an increasingly competitive world, obtaining qualifications at any cost has come to be considered more important than gaining deep knowledge. A focus on getting a task over with in minimum time and with lowest possible effort characterizes surface learning. The skills thus practiced are the lower-end cognitive skills and do not usually have the effect of changing one’s behaviour at the end of the process.

The motivations for deep learning stem from a self-perceived desire to know something for ones self. A deep approach to learning is necessarily intrinsically motivated and results more often in some change in the behaviour pattern of the learner concerned.

McGregor’s (1960) categorization of human trustworthiness in the context of the enterprise can apply to the teaching-learning climate in the classroom. Teachers operating on the basis of Theory X assume that students are inherently lazy, they will always try to cheat at exams, they will not attend lectures, and they won’t make an effort at learning. So, strict attendance criteria, careful monitoring of examinations, deterrent punishments all become the modus operandi of the teaching process. Theory Y teachers on the other hand assume that students do their best when given freedom to take control of their own learning. As such more opportunities for self-learning, take-home assessments, peer-evaluation are provided in order to make them flourish.

John Biggs’ (2003) classification of 3 levels of teacher focus helps to clarify the different attitudes most commonly encountered in the teaching-learning environment. In this classification, a Level 1 teacher focuses on what the student is. In other words, the teacher sees him or herself as the transmitter of knowledge in a constant kind of way and leaves it up to the students to catch or miss what was meant to be transmitted. If learning does not happen, the reasons usually attributed to it are the students’ low Z-scores, lack of motivation, bad school background, and other innate weaknesses. This is fundamentally a blame-the-student theory of learning and is similar to the Theory X view in organizations described before.

The Level 2 teacher focuses on what the teacher does to achieve good learning in students. The responsibility of ‘getting through’ to the students in this view rests largely on the teacher. Hence the focus is to find better ways of performance in order to achieve better results. Plenty of preparation, variations of technique, use of multimedia, and in general a good management strategy of the teaching process characterize this kind of learning environment. In short this is a blame-the-teacher model. The results achieved through these means however often are not satisfactory enough to justify the effort and soon the teacher could be discouraged with the limited effect they have on learners.

A Biggs Level 3 teacher concentrates on what the student does rather than what the teacher does or what the student is. Here teaching is seen as supporting learning. So, like a level 2 teacher, a variety of techniques would be employed typically in this case too, but each with a specific purpose of engaging the student in learning. In level 3 teaching the fundamental epistemological questions are rephrased as “what does it mean to understand content the way we want it to be?” and “what kind of teaching-learning activities must the student be exposed to in order to achieve such understanding?”.

Integral Worldview: My Philosophy of Things... and Teaching!

In what I refer to as my new awakened state of life, my mission statement in life has become (indeed it has stood constant ever since my graduation) to live a life consistent to my belief/faith: in other words, to align my Weltanschauung[1] and my religious convictions. To this end, I am in a constant struggle to make sense of the world around me through the values of a creator-sustainer God of the Universe. These values include but are not limited to, the sacredness of human life, the intrinsic value of others, caring for the marginalized, stewardship of the environment, importance of forgiveness, and the centrality of humility.

My quest for imparting learning to students and other seekers in the walk of life stems from these values. Since my overall philosophy of life stems from a conviction of a Good God who creates and sustains the universe as we know it, Life to me is an act of gratitude to God in my worldview. In His mercy, He has also put me among some incredible people along life’s path who influenced me and gave me without seeking any return – thus displaying some of His very qualities. I in turn, don’t just believe in being grateful to those who give me – and using their wisdom for my personal benefit, but see the working out of my gratitude to them in the act of giving to others from whom I cannot expect any return.

This then is the basis of my motivation for improving the effectiveness of my teaching – both to students and to peers. Its result, especially in the fast moving discipline of Information and Communication Technology is of producing individuals far more knowledgeable in the field than me, far quicker. What motivates me to not be discouraged by this phenomenon is my confidence in my effectiveness in imparting such knowledge to a wider population when compared to most who learn from me.

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[1] A German word which roughly translates to ‘worldview’ in English.

Personality Types and Learning Styles

The most important lesson for teachers to learn is that it is unrealistic to expect the stereotypical ‘good student’. As research by Myers & McCaulley (1985) shows, the variety of personality types is fairly evenly distributed in society. Figure 1 shows the percentages of individuals from the various types in US society. As such, the biggest challenge facing teachers is determine how to ensure that only some personality types are not catered for – that no personality type is discriminated against. While studies have found (see for example data from the Centre for Applications of Psychology Type - http://www.capt.org/) that the population distribution among the 16 personality types in US undergraduates does not exactly reflect the national pattern, the amount of diversity even among them highlights the importance of catering to multiple learning styles.

Owing to the outward focus of Extravert types, they thrive on learning by interacting with others and the environment. Reading aloud and explaining to others are activities which stimulate the internalizing of knowledge for this personality type. In contrast, since introverts are energized by reflection, thought and contemplation, they need time to reflect and construct their own knowledge before being asked to contribute in a group. Asynchronous communication, as that provided through net based discussion forums provide an environment in which they could thrive.

By using inferential statistics an estimate of the preferences found in the US population has been gathered - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myers-Briggs_Type_Indicator

Sensing types take their information from real tangible facts and as such require practical examples if learning is to be effective. They also demand structure and organization (preferably linear) in the material they are presented with. They are good at memorization and pay careful attention to detail. Sensing types thrive in knowing beforehand the plan of the course, its objectives, what each lesson is meant to cover and how it will be evaluated. Intuitive learners try to discover patterns and relationships in the material presented to them in order to see the ‘big picture’. In trying to look for the big picture however, Intuitive students may miss important details. Once a concept is grasped, the intuitive student may lose interest and get bored or distracted. In order to assist them to avoid this, teachers would need to introduce some method of self-assessment in their teaching.

Thinking types will usually rely on logical reasoning in order to understand material presented in a course. They like to see the relationship between the various components taught and the reason for needing to know them. They also expect all students to be treated fairly and would be affected negatively if the teacher is not perceived to be reasonable. Feeling types are not only concerned about content that is taught but how it affects those who learn. They would in general seek to relate what is taught to personal experience. They will also thrive in an environment where they are able to help others learn. Teacher support and feedback are crucial to their internalizing process of knowledge.

The Judging type learner is one who wants to be in control of the learning process. They thrive on sticking to schedules and getting tasks done early. Clear instruction and consistency are essential in order to motivate judging types. Perceiving types thrive on spontaneity and are repulsed by being ‘boxed in’. They would often seek deadline extensions in order to gather more information to perfect their work. They could start many tasks enthusiastically but be unable to complete many of them. Breaking up a large assignment into sub-assignments is one strategy which could help perceiving types to complete work.

Personality Types

Any serious understanding of the complexity of human personality would no doubt label as futile any attempt to classify people by their personality types. Such classifications are prone to being gross simplifications usually limited to some given aspect of human behaviour about whose axis the classification holds. As a case in point, Howard Gardner’s (1983) classification of multiple human intelligences focuses on the aspect of inherent skill potential of people. Similarly, classifications such as those made by Felder and Soloman (online), and Litzinger and Osif (1992) among others are based on learning style preferences.

It is however the very complexity of human personality which demands that some model of it is required to make any headway in understanding it. As such, the only solution to this paradox is to apply a proposed model classification of personality and evaluate its effectiveness empirically, all the while recognizing that it is a necessarily simplified model of the real human condition.

Arguably, one of the most empirically tested models of human personality types stems from the work of Carl Jung (see for example George Boeree (online)). Arguably too, one of the most practical incarnations of his theories is the well known Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) personality classifier most popularly expounded by David Keirsey and Marilyn Bates (1978).

Apart from the multiple axes around which personality classification is modeled in this work, its empirical application in employee recruitment, team formation and self-analysis in a wide variety of settings ranging from commercial business to religious organizations bears witness to its merits as a reasonable simplification of human personality types.

According to this model, human personality is classified along four axes: the direction in which a person’s energy is focused (introvert, I or extravert, E), how a person prefers to receive information (primarily by sensing, S or intuition, N), how they prefer to make decisions (primarily through thinking, T or feeling, F), and how they prefer to organize their lives (primarily by judging, J or perceiving, P). Thus, each individual will be classified as belonging to one of sixteen possible groups in the model through the four letters most closely describing that person along the axes above. See Wikipedia entry for a summary of these types along temperament types due to David Keirsey. (You can take a test free at sites such as http://www.gesher.org/gwtest/gwtest.html)

This model has been applied to diverse areas of life including in self-understanding, relationship building, career choice decisions, team building, child raring and student learning. In most expositions of the model, care is taken to stress that it is not intended to pigeonhole people or give them excuses for their personal preferences, but rather to help them understand some of their limitations with a view to helping them adjust to others.

Where I Come From

Born to a lower-middle class professional family, I was brought up on the virtues of simple living, non-assertive behaviour and absolute integrity. From the anger shown by my father towards equipment vendors who brought Christmas hampers to our home in gratitude for tenders awarded to them at the Ceylon Electricity Board, to his refusal to drop us off in school or university on his way to office in his official vehicle, our family was inculcated with the values of integrity and of service to the nation.

The modesty and quiet confidence amidst which I was raised however also had the effect of making me less ambitious than most of my peers who seemed to have it all figured out about what they would end up to be and do. I on the contrary turned out to be a late developer – a very late one in fact.

One of my earliest recollections of personal skills, apart from that in the subject of mathematics, was that of identifying patterns and making connections. It would take me many years from then to realize the true potential of this skill – one that I’m eternally grateful to God for, the more I progress down the path of life.

Being an INFP[1] on the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) scale, I have known the virtues of reflection from a very early age without realizing its potential for personal development. Being a late developer, I had little encouragement from other late developer role models, but instead admired the whiz kids who seemed to have it all figured out from a very early age.

It was in my first year in university that my rate of conscious personal development started accelerating, and by the end of my degree, I underwent some sort of a meta-morphosis from a mild, unassuming individual to a more persistent contributor to the society and environment around me. While many influences had their part to play in this awakening, the primary I believe was an unquenchable quest for the meaning of life and a commitment to living a life consistent to such meaning.

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[1] Introvert, iNtuitive, Feeling, Perceiving – see: http://www.knowyourtype.com/ for example.

Changing me, Changing others

Reflective practice in the context of the ASTHE programme also afforded me the luxury of looking back not only at my teaching, but also on my thus far unstated philosophy of teaching and eventually my fundamental values and underlying worldview. It is with this very core personal value system, that I start the journey of my portfolio and travel through my philosophy of teaching, my teaching and learning practice, my more recent administrative role, my research experience and my efforts in fostering continuing professional development and towards ensuring a sustained commitment to continuous improvement at the institutional level.

While several of the lessons learnt by applying the principles of reflective practice were for problems faced personally by me, several overflowed into areas common to other academics, and more importantly, to areas which needed to be strengthened at the institutional level.

This last aspect was particularly pertinent for me as I had assumed duties as the Director of the School of Computing (UCSC) in 2004, and so was in a privileged position to see through some of the reforms being put to practice. The School’s own move from teaching to learning with the introduction of e-Learning in blended form with internal undergraduates and in online mode with external degree students contributed to, and benefited by my involvement in the ASTHE programme.

More than one year after the coursework component of the ASTHE programme, I am pleased that my commitment to continuous improvement in teaching and learning has not waned. On the contrary, thanks primarily to several juniors from the UCSC who have helped keep the momentum going, we have collectively been able to subvert the dominant culture of resisting change by inculcating pockets of good practice and thereby influencing the way we think and plan academic activities at the School.

Re-learning Teaching: Who does What?

The Accreditation of Senior Teachers in Higher Education (ASTHE) programme conducted by the Staff Development Centre of the University of Colombo in 2005/6 was finally successful in arresting the decay of what started as an exciting teaching career and degenerated into chore within a single decade. In particular, its emphasis on reflective practice using tools such as the Kolb Cycle gave me a glimpse of what effective teaching-learning could be. To be sure I had made some progress albeit sub-consciously over the previous years as an Academic. I had progressed from being a teacher who focused on what the student is (Biggs Level 1) where all blame for ineffective learning is attributed to the quality of students, to one who focuses on what the teacher does (Level 2). This was partly owing to my own personality type (INFP) which was characterized by making oneself responsible for things that are not right.

It is as a Level 2 teacher who was unsuccessful despite my best efforts at improving my performance, that I spent the last few years as an Academic in frustration. Reflective practice and Biggs’ definition of a Level 3 teacher - one who focuses on what the student does gave me a new perspective on where I had gone wrong. The past three semesters, during and following my ASTHE programme has brought back some of the early excitement and passion for teaching – or more accurately, of enabling learning.

Why I am a Teacher

Almost 20 years ago I decided to be an Academic – a Computing Academic. I knew I had the knack to teach another; something about being able to make a machine do what you wanted it to also fascinated me. Together, the effect was electric: I was actually going to be paid for doing something I loved – teach Computing!

I think I had got the beginning right: you’ve got to love what you do, as Steve Jobs, Founder of Apple Computer would say in a Convocation Address at Stanford some 17 years later. A certain passion for what you do is an essential initial ingredient for one to be an effective and fulfilled worker in the area of work that he or she chooses.

Somewhere down the years however I lost it. It wasn’t as if it happened suddenly either. Teaching became less exciting and more of a chore; the rapid advancement of ICT made the sheer effort needed to keep abreast of technology appear almost not worth it. This period was interspersed with short periods of regained splendor as a new technology would fall into my comfort zone or when some particular aspect of my teaching could be made more attractive. These few-and-far-between aspects however, failed to form any kind of cohesive progress towards improved learning in my students.

Language, Computers and Intelligent Systems

The successes of hardware technologies for Computers - transistors, integrated circuits and microprocessors - brought in a certain euphoria to Computer Scientists who set their sights pretty early on building the 'intelligent computer'. Spurred on by science fiction this 'Romantic Era' of 'Artificial Intelligence' made many pursue the holy grail of intelligence - human language processing.

Philosophers however were however interested in answering questions such as, the nature of intelligence, can a non-biological system really become intelligent, is intelligence a single faculty, is it inherited, how does learning occur, do creativity or intuition play any role in intelligence, and is self-awareness the ultimate test of intelligence.

Chief among these of course is the question whether intelligence is possible in artificial systems. The well known argument against its possibility is Searle's 'Chinese Room' argument, while counter arguments such as the 'Systems Reply' supported the view that intelligence was indeed possible in machines.

Two distinctly divergent schools pursuing the automation of intelligence defined their pursuit as follows:

• the study of mental faculties through the use of computational models
• a branch of Computer Science concerned with the automation of intelligent behaviour

The first group was more concerned with the study of human intelligence while the second was more interested in building intelligent computer systems.

A more pragmatics definition of artificial intelligence is that it is the 'study of how to make computers do things which at the moment humans do better'.

It appears that much of the confusion about the debate lies on the usage of terms such as intelligence, learning, knowing, understanding that have been up to now, associated almost solely with humans. The way forward is to do with the elevation of the meanings of these words to an abstract level so that there is a generic kind of intelligence for instance which has many specializations: Human intelligence being just one of them (and hence by definition different from machine - or indeed animal - intelligence.

Language... (final part) - Personal Note

On a personal note, I myself am interested in exploring these two models in the context of the linguistic problems in this country. It is my thesis that many of the original suspicions between our people groups were fueled by language. I invite you to join in making your life work in some way relate to getting us out of this mess and prospering in the new economy free of a digital divide.

A new manifestation of the Esparanto solution to human language translation is something called the Universal Networking Language (UNL). Its aim is to express all web content in this language and provide translators between this and our own local language in what could be a significant effort in internationalization (I18N) of the Internet.

The second approach is very knowledge intensive. Particularly, knowledge of linguistics! Since I am not gifted with this ability, I propose to implement a first-pass translation between primarily Sinhala and Tamil (later with English) using an approach known as text alignment. It is a statistical pattern matching technique that attempts to model translation using a corpus of parallel (human translated) text in two languages.

Language... (part 4) - Translation

The problem of multiple languages

There is language and then there are languages! We have been considering language as if we lived before Babel! The reality is not only that there are many hundreds of human language, but also that each of them have regional dialects numbering in thousands.

How then do we understand those who speak a different language to us? The answer has been to employ a highly specialised people called translators. We are all well aware of the perils of simultaneous translation of talks! But there was also another solution. One that we considered fanatical - everybody learn a common language. Esparanto was the proposed language. Today, we have a defacto standard - English. Not because of the English, but because of the Americans - and that too accelerated, thanks to the computer and the Internet. What we are at this moment doing is using this second solution!

In the world of networking, we have a plethora of protocols - languages used for computers within a network talking to each other. Since these were vendor dependent, they were different, and so needed to be translated between each other. If you think about it, we need one "gateway" to translate between two networks, but 3 to translate between 3, 6 to translate between 4 etc. Not a scalable solution!

Sometime in the mid 70's a proposal for an Esparanto for computers on networks was successfully made. It was called IP. Fundamentally it is a protocol for inter-network communication. Incidentally why it is better than English (in the human case) is that computers had no will to resist "learning" it! So, since 1984 in the UNIX world, and 1995 in the Windows world, all computers coming out of the production line came pre-installed with operating systems that were not only capable of speaking the proprietary vendor LAN protocol, but also a "second language", IP, that made it possible for them to talk to any other computer on the Internet - indeed any other device (cell phones, microwaves, hair dryers, lighting systems, cars…) on the Internet!

These two models for understanding languages of other "systems" (or people groups) can be explained thus:

• The inter-lingua model - where a "higher level" meaning representation language is designed or adopted
• The transfer model - where translation between any two languages requires a lot of hard linguistic expertise (fundamentally, how to replace the human translator)

Language... (part 3) - The Bane

Problems of language

So much for the magic - why is it the bane of human relationships? Let’s go back to the singularly human skill of abstraction. No doubt, humans are good at this. In fact, we are too good at this. At the heart of this lies the problem as I see it. The artistic form of this generalising is the cartoon. The cartoonist "exaggerates" (or abstracts) those features of a person that are characteristic. We don’t however need to be cartoonists to draw verbal caricatures. We have perfected the art. Just as categorization is the skill we posses that helps us survive, it is also the pitfall that makes us "label" people and events.

"Don't generalize", "You are always labelling people", "Stop branding people like that". These are as commonly heard as said. We say it to others, and have it said to us again! We do it subconsciously.

Just to illustrate, some common labels we attach (this is possibly a caricature itself!) to people and situations go something like this:

• Sarong clad - uneducated or uncultured or both
• Dark skinned and dressed in salva-khamis - suicide bomber
• Army soldier - Tamil hater
• Tamil - Tiger fund raiser/sympathiser
• Government servant - lazy, corrupt and dishonest
• Bearded Moslem - religious fanatic

Two particularly harmful adjuncts (adverbs) associated with such generalizing are "always" and "never". A good place to start would be to make yourself always think before saying always and never resorting to saying never! Try it. Think about the last few misunderstandings you had with someone, and find out how many of them were caused by the use of one of these words!

Some solutions, please

So, is there hope for us? Is there a way out of the "trap of generalization"? There is. Diplomats know the way! In their business, words are life-and-death. (An aside: They say a diplomat is one who must say very little when he knows much of the subject and say much when he knows very little of a subject!). Very rarely would a diplomat use the words always and never unless it is with a particular political agenda!

So, we need to practice the following:

• Always think twice before using always and never haste to use never
• Language is powerful, use words with car
• Before saying something, think:
• Is it true?
• Is it appropriate/ relevant?
• Is it wholesome/ uplifting/ productive or unhelpful/ destructive/ of no benefit?
• Be wary of generalising in general!
• Think contrary to the norm
• Be suspicious of 100% agreement
• Care for degrees of grey: not everything is just black or white
• Don't be afraid to retract
• There are inherent weaknesses in interactive communication
• Admitting wrong is sign of courage & character
• Better late than never/ a stitch in time save nine...
  
• Proves that you have thought about it seriously

Language... (part 2) - More Magic!

Ambiguity

This brings us to the efficiency of language. Without our knowledge (but because of psychological reasons) we humans have evolved a very efficient form of language. We don't have different words or sentences for absolutely everything we want to refer to. We re-use some of them. This is known as ambiguity!

What does "bank" mean for example? The money shop or the side of a river? Is that all? How about an alternative to "rely"? Not to mention the activity of doing transactions with cash or cheques. Or again, as happened to me last week, if I were to announce that ICT and BCC had forged a partnership in say networking, I wonder how many of you (like the person who proof read my article) would get a sour taste in their mouths? "Forge" in this context refers to the "hammering out" process, whereas to my colleague and maybe to you, as you listened, it had underpinnings of an illegal representation! There are many other forms of ambiguity apart from this (lexical or word sense) type. "I saw the man with the telescope", "I detest visiting relatives", "Time flies like arrows" are all ambiguous sentences, but we shall not worry about these here.

The point about ambiguity is that we rarely have trouble with it! Which bank you mean will be disambiguated often by the context in which you use it. If a lawyer were to say "I had to rush to the bar… to have a drink" it would only be to pull your leg of course. So, the context usually makes what would usually be an ambiguous word, very plain and clear. The benefit is that you don't have to know nearly as many words as concepts you understand. This is the efficiency of language.

There's magic in that too. Just any two words would not be suitable candidates to share a single lexical form. They must be sufficiently distant not to occur in the same context - since context is the tool we use to tell them apart in the first place!

Language: The Magic and Bane of Human Relationships

(or why TCP/IP is better than English)

Nothing really exists apart from language. Language creates the world - Witgenstien

Think about it. That large rectangular piece of wood barring entrance to this place was created by the word "door". Without language, it would have remained some part of a forest! How come we have Portuguese words for things like shoes, tables and things? These things were "brought into our world" by language! I will not go as far as Witgenstien, but language does indeed play a more crucial and central role in human affairs than often given credit for.

Human Language

Consider the basic human ability of abstraction. It is now quite fashionable, thanks to object oriented technology. It is fundamentally the ability to generalise a set of individual entities (or indeed events) into a class. It appears quite harmless in this regard.

Abstraction

But, consider the word "bird". For purposes of this example, lets limit ourselves to just one meaning of that word - the flying kind! It is an abstraction of a winged animal that flies, has feathers, a tail, a beak etc. Now, if you are an alien, and want to find out how big a bird is, the answer you would get would depend on the particular part of the world you happen to have visited. Indeed, even the particular part of a country! Or maybe even the particular person you met!! For me a bird is somewhat the size of my open palm. For you, it maybe as big as a crow. To someone from a part of Africa where birds like the albatross are common, it would be quite a bit larger.

A door for an Eskimo would also be quite different in meaning and purpose than to us. Incidentally, they are supposed to have some huge number of words for "snow". Well, we have many words for "rain" don't we?

Does all this matter? Well, what if the question was to ascertain if a bird could get into this room that had a small window - it could be a life and death matter! But, we survive! How? How do two people, who don't even agree on something as simple as what a bird is, manage to have daily conversations without much problem? This, is the magic of human language.

To take an analogy, from the world of IT, in order to "inter-operate" properly, we would first have to set up a committee of zoology experts to hammer out a standard meaning for the word "bird", publish it as an RFC in order to democratise its adoption, wait for any objections and repeat the cycle until we made everyone happy!

This is not to say that human abstraction is perfect. Ever so often, especially with foreigners (or those from other cultures) we experience that mismatch that comes from having two different ontological structures. One of my favourite examples is "rain". To a typical Britisher, there is absolutely no problem of walking in the rain without an umbrella. S/he is referring to "British rain"! (which we may call by some name closer to "drizzle").

Words, meanings and reasons

Manaskaraya (written මනස්‍කාරය in Sinhala) is a word coined by joining the stem 'Manass' (mind) and 'karaya' is a suffix roughly meaning (art). Together they mean something similar to the English word 'Reflection'.

My fourfold objective for starting this blog is:

• To preserve my thinking and reflection on life (possibly to be humbled at how naive I was and probably am)
• To help me develop and articulate the outlines of my worldview (which I could point to when I make new acquaintances and friends in order to connect)
• To enable others to respond so that my thinking might be sharpened
• To relate my work, interests and beliefs to each other

Some of what I post here will be stuff written before in other forms and published here for persistence.