Thursday, April 3, 2008

Phrenology revisited

Checketh it out; teachers at Steinerskolen devote quite a bit of time on evaluating the student's body shape, and how that according to them is strongly tied to their personalities. Apparently, we can all be separated into four personalities by observing the bodyshape.

So; does it mean that a bodybuilder is going to change personality as he or she grows, or that the personality is dependent on whether it's off- or on-season (discarding any personality trait-altering effects one might have if one chooses to use illegal performance enhancers like androgenic anabolic stereoids, diuretics, growth hormones or what for all practical purposes is speed)?

Do they think that going on a diet will affect their personality? This might actually make sense - at least I'd be pretty upset if I bought into the Atkins diet hype and figured out that after eating nothing but bacon and butter for six months, the kilos I lost started piling back on again when I tried eating a normal diet ('cause the metabolism is shot to hell), and I'm two potato chips away from cardiac arrest, with kidney failure being imminent. I can also imagine that someone might be upset if they bought the Fedon Lindberg package before they saw a picture of the originator and thus the supposed paragon of health.

Do teachers at Steinerskolen believe that you can alter your personality by undergoing cosmetic surgery procedures? Or that by consciously changing your posture for one day you could essentially become a different person?

85% of these schools are funded by the government, meaning that my tax money goes into some pop psychology version of phrenology. Fortunately, the minister of education didn't react too well to this either, so hopefully things might change.

By the way; this is the type of school that our Prime Minister went to, and just about the only type of private school he approves of.

..but what can you expect from people who learn the alphabet by dancing each letter.........

8 comments:

Anders said...

Yes, I saw this article as well, and thought it would fit on this blog. But you beat me to it. It is really shocking the way Steinerskolen goes about. Reminds me about the "scientific" methods of the Church of Scientology...

Wilhelm said...

........there's no way that this type of school should get public funding when the government is totally unwilling to fund schools more akin to prep schools.

..you know; based on high academic standards and, what's it called....science?

Anders said...

Well, it's hardly any worse then all the Christian schools that more or less teaches "creationism".

Wilhelm said...

Thing is, though - it's easy to avoid the institutions who let their freak flags fly. When the school openly states that it's funded and influenced by The Association of Born-Again Reptilians from Niburu for the Awaiting of the Mothership Behind The Comet, you can be reasonably sure that it teaches "alternative" values and methodologies.

With the less open ones, however...

Anders said...

LOL.

Great point. But some of those private Christian schools do try to "hide" what they are doing. That is, they do want the rest of the Christian community to know about it, but not the rest of the world. So they have a very selective way of promoting their schools.

Anders said...

ok, this seems to be getting creepier by the day. It seems that Steinerskolen thinks that loss of baby teeth is an indication of how mature/ intelligent the child is*. The article even got an airhead from Steinerskolen who states that she believes in this. Yeah, believing. That's scientific and now I'm really convinced...


*My anger towards this assumption are totally uncorrelated with the fact that I lost my baby teeth very, very late and that this blog indicates that I lack a bit of reading/ writing skills...

Wilhelm said...

...you remember when you lost your baby teeth?

...this has something to do with that 70's to 90's time gap you experienced where you plain ol' skipped teh 80's?

..damn alphabet-dancing freaks, though

Anders said...

...you remember when you lost your baby teeth?

Off course. I counted two digit on my birthday cake the year I lost the last one...

...this has something to do with that 70's to 90's time gap you experienced where you plain ol' skipped teh 80's?

LOL
That could be the case, yes.