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Open Source Pedagogy

An Experiment in the (Re)Distribution of Grades: UPDATE (2026)

September 5, 2026 Leigh M. Johnson Artificial Intelligence, Big Data, Blog, Capitalism, citizenship, Codifying Civility and Collegiality, critical thinking, Democracy, ERG, Ethics, Internet, Marx, Media, Open Source Pedagogy, Pedagogy, Philosophy, Social Media, Teaching Comments Off on An Experiment in the (Re)Distribution of Grades: UPDATE (2026)

Do “grades” even matter anymore?

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Humanity vs. Technology (in 5 minutes)

July 31, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Aesthetics, Artificial Intelligence, Big Data, Biotech, Blog2024+, critical thinking, Democracy, Digital Humanities, Emergent Tech, Ethics, Internet, Justice, Labor Issues, Machine Learning, Open Source Pedagogy, Philosophy, Politics, Posthuman, Public Philosophy, Social Media, Surveillance, Teaching, Technology, Technology and Human Values, Uncanny Valley Comments Off on Humanity vs. Technology (in 5 minutes)

Dr. Leigh M. Johnson summarizes the challenges technology poses to humanity (and the humanities) in 5-minute PowerPoint.

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Lying Artificial Intelligence

July 27, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Artificial Intelligence, Big Data, Blog2024+, Emergent Tech, Ethics, Hotel Bar Sessions, Internet, Justice, Machine Learning, Media, Open Source Pedagogy, Philosophy, podcast, Politics, Posthuman, Social Media, SPEP, Technology, Technology and Human Values Comments Off on Lying Artificial Intelligence

Should we worry about a robot capable of lying about being a robot?

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Determining a Judgment of Taste

July 16, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Aesthetics, Blog2024+, critical thinking, Ethics, Open Source Pedagogy, Philosophy, Politics, Race and Racism, Relativism, Uncategorized Comments Off on Determining a Judgment of Taste

On Kant’s strange anecdote of the rue de la Huchette

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Dear Student, At The End Of The Semester

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Open Source Pedagogy, Philosophy, RMWMTMBM Archive, Teaching Comments Off on Dear Student, At The End Of The Semester
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How It Will Go, Episode 5: Teaching J.S. Mill

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson HIWG, Open Source Pedagogy, Philosophy, RMWMTMBM Archive, Teaching Comments Off on How It Will Go, Episode 5: Teaching J.S. Mill

This is the fifth installment of my series How It Will Go, documenting the regularity of students’ responses to certain figures/texts and, in the occasional rare instance that it happens, noting whatever variations I witness. Today’s episode: John Stuart Mill, Utilitarianism Context in which I teach this figure text: Like Kant, I teach some variation of…

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Trolleys, Fat Men and Drones

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Open Source Pedagogy, Philosophy, Politics, RMWMTMBM Archive, Teaching Comments Off on Trolleys, Fat Men and Drones

Just a random”Philosophy pedagogy” insight today: I’m teaching three sections of a course entitled “Contemporary Moral Problems” at Christian Brothers University this term, which is more or less CBU’s version of  “Intro to Ethics.”  As I’ve done in all of my past Ethics courses, I spend the second day of class leading students through a…

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A Conversation with Your Past Self

April 14, 2020 Leigh M. Johnson coronavirus, Online Learning, Open Source Pedagogy, Philosophy, Public Philosophy, RMWMTMBM Archive Comments Off on A Conversation with Your Past Self

This semester, I’m giving my students the option to submit a video “Conversation with My Past Self” in lieu of taking the Final Exam. I was inspired by this video that I saw on Julie Nolke’s YouTube channel, in which she sits down at the breakfast table and chats with the January 2020 version of herself….

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Studenting White Quarantined

March 15, 2020 Leigh M. Johnson coronavirus, COVID-19, Open Source Pedagogy, Public Philosophy, RMWMTMBM Archive, Teaching Comments Off on Studenting White Quarantined

I created this infographic for my students. Feel free to steal, share, edit, whatevs. You can also access it at this link.

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What If You Were Gerald McGrew?: A “Rebuild the Internet” Thought Experiment

January 28, 2020 Leigh M. Johnson Anonymity, Big Data, Ethics, Internet, Open Source Pedagogy, Philosophy, Privacy, RMWMTMBM Archive, Technology, Technology and Human Values Comments Off on What If You Were Gerald McGrew?: A “Rebuild the Internet” Thought Experiment

You may remember the story by Dr. Seuss (né, Theodore Seuss Geisel) from 1950 entitled If I Ran the Zoo, in which the pint-sized protagonist, Gerald McGrew, imagines the amazing creation he could bring about if he were allowed to run the zoo. If I Ran the Zoo is not only a great story about the never-before-seen exotic animals…

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