Sunday, May 29, 2011

Different

You may ask, "But, we should have all our examiners using the same yardstick for scoring!"

Alas, I am horrified.

No, I am horrified not because the task would be difficult; it is actually impossible to have everyone the same because of human nature. I am not worried because whatever our education purists do, it would not happen.

(It is, however, catastrophic if it were going to happen in utopia or planets outside the solar system, because it means that we will find our intensive care physicians having the same personality as palliative care specialists, or neurologists the same as gastroenterologists.)

But, I am horrified because you put up such a suggestion, implying a subconscious desire to put an end on individualism and autonomy (which are the basis of freedom and democracy). In fact, the very character of our society that we should find precious is everyone is different.

The last practitioner of attempting to eradicate individual character had shot himself in Berlin some 66 years ago, I hope.

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