Update V

by | Monday, October 06, 2008

Here is an email from Rita Selle-Grider, of Young Bright Minds & Inventors Academy. I have spoken about her response (which I admired, contrasting it with some of the other responses I have been getting).

I include the complete email below (with her permission). What has been impressive, in my mind, is Rita’s approach to this entire mess. Not seeking to place blame (or cast aspersions) where they are not due, Rita has shown a transparency and a willingness to learn from this experience that speaks volumes to her open-mindedness. Isn’t this, at least to a large extent, what creativity and a creative mind-set is all about? This is, of course, in sharp contrast to some of the other emails I have been receiving from people who had hosted articles by Dr. Jiles.

Rita read my email and posting, but did not take my word for it. For all that she knew, I could be the fraud, seeking vendetta against David Jiles, Ph.D. for some reason. She ordered the Sparks of Genius book and checked it against Dr. Jiles’ writing and came to the same conclusion I did. But that’s not all. She will be pulling all of Dr. Jiles’ articles from her site AND will be adding a note and a link to my website about this unfortunate incident. She will mention it in her weekly newsletter and add a link there as well.

What a contrast to others who have attempted to merely sweep this issue under the carpet, or better still cast my actions as being nothing but “naming and shaming.” As she said in another email to me, ” If there is a wrong doing – it needs to be addressed and furthermore, justice claimed.”

In conclusion, I must say that if there is anything good that has come of this, as far as I am personally concerned, it is getting to know that people like Rita exist. She is truly deserving of my thanks.

For the record here is the email that she sent to me:

Punya,

I have double checked “Sparks of Genius” with the text from Dr. Jiles, and YES, you are right! Your findings are indeed incredible and mind-boggling!

I have attached some more articles from Dr. Jiles for your further research. In the Articles.DOC attachment are some additional articles then the once [sic] you compared along the book from the Root-Bernsteins.

[I have added these documents, which I have not had the time to read, to my list of downloaded files: Punya]

All articles from Dr. Jiles will be taken down from my website along with a note and link to your website. In addition, I will mention it in my weekly newsletter and put your link there as well.

I will also email Dr. Jiles to express my utter bewilderment and disappointment by your findings along with my encouragement to clarify things and to take a stand to his criminal actions. According to the Bible we’re all sinners in the one or other way and fallen short; it’s the confession of the wrong doing and bringing things in order again.

Thank you again for taking the time to research this all and for your devotion to not just sweep this under the carpet! May the LORD bless you for all your effort!

Please let me know of the further development. Thank you already.

Have a good day,
Rita

Topics related to this post: Creativity | Crime | Personal | Plagiarism

A few randomly selected blog posts…

The future of work & learning: An interview

The future of work & learning: An interview

I had posted earlier about my visit to Bangalore back in summer to participate in the Quest 2 Learn Annual Summit organized by the Quest Alliance. The two day conference focused on The future of work and learning. During my visit I was interviewed by Aakash Sethi, the...

New course: Creativity in teaching & learning

Announcing a new online course for the fall semester 2008:Creativity in teaching and learning Here's to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square holes. The ones who see things differently… You can praise them, disagree...

Ganapati Festival Photographs, 2011

The Hindu god Ganesh (the elephant-headed one) is celebrated across India, and the world, around this time of the year. The Hindu community in Lansing is no exception. A couple of days ago I was asked to take pictures of a music program at the local temple. It was a...

Design is for life

Quote for the day: Parents look at their children today when they are 3 years old and say "Oh god!, He doesn't know how to operate the computer! How is he going to go ahead like this?" They should instead be worried if their child doesn’t know design. They should say,...

Eye Twisters

Eye Twisters: Ambigrams & other Visual Puzzles to Amaze and Entertain is a book edited by Burkard Polster, a professor of mathematics at Monash University. It features some of my work... From the back cover: Eye Twisters is all about ambigrams--words that are...

Rate of change of technology

I just stumbled upon this image from a 1950 issue of Popular Mechanics. The tag line below the image says: Because everything in her home is waterproof, the housewife of 2000 can do her daily cleaning with a hose. Though it is easy to make fun of this image it can be...

Presentation at University of Zurich

Presentation at University of Zurich

I was invited by my friend Dominik Petko, Professor of Teaching and Educational Technology at the Institute for Educational Science at the University of Zurich to make a presentation to their faculty and staff. The video of my presentation (Contextualizing TPACK...

ChatGPT3 writes a Mathematical Proof (in verse)

ChatGPT3 writes a Mathematical Proof (in verse)

Many years ago I got interested in writing poetry about mathematics (all archived on my Math-Poetry page). Just to be clear, I am not a good poet (far from it) and I am even less of a mathematician—but it was a fun exercise to engage in. That said, a couple of my...

Putting technology first

Don Norman has a great essay titled Technology First, Needs Last that I strongly recommend. We have been making a similar argument in some of our more recent pieces, see here and here... What do you think of Norman's ideas? Read it first and come back here to discuss...

1 Comment

  1. Tomas

    Thank you for the informative post
    Thank you for the opportunity
    to leave my feedback
    Thank you for the reading that response
    Wow, what a bouquet of thanks!
    All they are the heartfelt.
    IS THAT NOT A DREAM OF THE PERFECT DESIGN?
    Symbolical languages should break through
    through the traps of interpretation
    “Thank you” is more lucky in the light of above
    Isn’t it?
    Thank you

    Reply

Submit a Comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *