Now easier to swallow from Disenchanted: The pre-digested form of education found in passive media, combined with hot blooded debate, conspire to provide an education which rivals formal schooling.
Broadly, idea is Pearl Harbor + Usenet = humiliation or preemptive self-elucidation for the ignorant. The more subtle idea is every time in a conversation you remark, I learn something new every day,
that's because you do, rather than memorizing this and that for a test.
It's reminiscent of the adage from Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance that the way to paint a perfect painting is to become perfect, then paint naturally: be smart by ensmartening oneself, then being. Engaging in discourse (especially, the story goes, the asbestos-attracting sort on Usenet) is the most basic form of be-ing that motivates one to research and learn.
The problem I find with such a plan is that debate must be sought out and, as built into the structure of Usenet, is typically on a particular topic. I don't speak from experience, but I wouldn't expect to discuss topics as widely ranging as the historical veracity of blockbuster films and classical physics on, say, alt.drinks.kool-aid. Usenet groups aren't bundled that way, and I wish I could hold up a site like Kuro5hin as a better model for that, but the range of articles posted to Kuro5hin, while broader than on, say, Slashdot, isn't as broad as ideal.
Picking a group's topic and discussing, though, is certainly educating in that topic. However, that's not what school is purported to be about, anyway--it's supposedly about bringing up the basic level of literacy of a variety of broad topics. I would think a trivia game would be better than that.
