Work should be like a game; just like learning

As coincidence doesn't exist (recall, a quantum reality), Le Monde of this Saturday February 2 writes about Google: "At Google, work becomes like a game". The article reiterates the observations I made in my previous post: healthy food, massages, a fifth free experimentation day, etc.

In l'Express of last week (24-29 January) Bill Gates wishes president Sarkozy that he would understand the importance of education and would invest more (all) in it. But what kind of education? Does France need more ENAs (Ecole National d'Administration) or more enterpreneurship?

And at the same time I get an evaluation of one of my courses, in which I try to give my students another paradigm, based on a quantum interpretation of business and complexity theory.  Not something what somebody would call "sectarian", but in France, some do. According to some French (apparantly) Nobel prizes are given to sects. I have to admit that most of the evaluations were rather good, but that one did trigger me.

In Canopee, a French magazine on nature, discovery and ecology, I read an interview with Vandana Shiva who says that "ecology is profoundly linked to spirituality".  Without the spiritual dimension, according to her, one becomes an ecological technocrat, untouchable by the pain that mismanagement causes. Good news, I am not alone.

I do not only wish Sarkozy to invest seriously in education, I wish him to invest in learning, from the very begining (primary school) onwards.  Learning should be fun and have a larger purpose than only making carreer (and money). And in order to support him, I wish him parents that would not be traumatised about sects.  What Al Qaida is for the US, sects seem to be for France. Not everybody who doesn't agree with the US foreign policy is a potential Al Qaida member; it is not a choice of being with or against "us". Equally, not everybody who is searching for meaningfulness in life and work is a member of a sect.

Comments

[Martien van Steenbergen]

Hi Walter,

Good to see your enthusiams for serious games. Serious games are one of the key assets for the cultural membrane of Aarde, a brand new country.

Come and help design this brand new country.

Take the bus tour on http://wiki.aardsource.org/

BTW, we met at Aduna in December of 2002. You then said: "Ik woon ongeveer op 3 minuten lopen van het Julianaplein [in Amersfoort], dus dat is even handig.