But this little prank would have, at best, forced students to reassign some hours out of their hectic Finals Week for no real purpose. At worst, some of the students who thought they did poorly on the first test and saw the retest as a chance at redemption might have studied all night for it.
I also question the logistics. This was in the early 70’s, right? No email, no cell phones. How would you get the word to students – put a flyer in the laundry room? The book says that the first test was only two days before the retest, so even if the “inadvertent burning” (which sounds like something a third grader would make up) happened the same day as the first test, the prof wouldn’t even have time to place an ad in the paper, let alone contact all the students individually.
And how could he possibly find a time when all 150 students would be free during Finals Week, with one day’s notice?
The whole thing stinks. I’m kind of amazed that his editor didn’t make him take it out.
Also, some of the students would be afraid to leave, thinking that if they left the retest, they’d get an automatic zero. And, the book says “as soon as we received the tests, the professor walked out of the classroom.” So why would students say that they could lie and pretend they didn’t see a notice? The first few students who walked out could think that they could bullshit things and try to retake a test, but after a third had left, the rest would know that the professor wasn’t a dummy and would remember that he had handed out tests to a full class and would expect that number of tests to be turned back in. There’s just no way to make this make sense.
Those stories are far more plausible than the glurge that appeared in the book. It was a psychological test about honesty? Really? And the professor invited a photographer in to record the event? Also reasons already stated.
Even Perceptions 301 sounds a little off, though there are at least courses in sensory perception.
I was unaware that the gullibility of his audience ran this deep. I guess some lack an operable bullshit detector.
Maybe I am ignorant, but I just don’t understand why he would make up stories about having been violent, tried to kill his mother or shoot a guy to death just to watch him die. It just all seems so freakin’ bizarre. Usually people lie to make themselves look “good”, not bad. If Benjamin Solomon Carson were trying to become the leader of a notorious gang and looking to boost his street credentials, I could understand these claims. But I don’t see how all this helps him to run for president of the world’s most powerful state.
It’s as I were to run for governor of my home state, California, and during the campaign write in my book or simply say that I used to rape women back in the day, tried to set my dog on fire and slash my sister’s throat. Makes no sense.
Maybe I am missing something here. Or we are living in an age where any attention, even bad one is better than no attention. I doubt he will get the nomination, I would bet money that Donald Trump would have a higher chance of making it to the White House than Carson.
Yet another point, by the way: Even if the class existed, there’s no way it’d be called “Perceptions 301”. The official listing in the catalog might be something like “Psychology 301: Perceptions”, and people might plausibly call the class “Perceptions”, or “Psych 301”, or maybe just “301” if the department was clear from the context (say, two psych students talking to each other). But no class is ever referred to as [title of class] [class number].
This is clearly a case of “he who is without sin cast the first stone”. How many of you can be sure that all your stories about your youth are 100% accurate? It seems a very strange thing for the media to investigate. They can knock themselves out if they want to, it comes with the territory of running for President, but this is just weird. We were told that investigation Bill Clinton or Barack Obama’s childhood was out of bounds.
Not sure were you get that it was out of bounds, I do remember that many did found a lot of evidence from the childhood of Obama, and I have to note here that a lot of it came from birthers that had an interest on finding dirt, not much there.
AFAIK the case with the early violent incidents of Carson are debunking his reported very bad behavior. Too me it is more curious that one should not be happy to find that some violent incidents of their past were imagined.
As for the ROTC meeting with Westmoreland he was already 17/18 years old.
AFAICT, he originally shared those stories, in his biographies and speeches, starting long before his presidential bid, as examples of his redemption, and the important role that his faith has played in his life. As the core supporters in his presidential bid seem to be the Evangelical Christians in the Republican party, that redemption story has undoubtedly played very well with them. It’s not uncommon for Evangelicals to have “testimony” stories, particularly those who came to their faith as adults, or after living particularly sinful lifestyles, and testimonies which show a tremendous turnaround once that individual has accepted Christ as his or her savior are seen as particularly strong examples of the power of Christ to redeem sinners.
Are you kidding? The very circumstances of Obama’s birth were discussed endlessly. The books he wrote before running were fact-checked over and over (surprise! he also probably lied in a way that many people wouldn’t - making it sound like he took more drugs than he did).
Why is it strange for the media to investigate? It’s not like he has a political record we can look at to learn more about him. We are looking at things he has repeated over and over, to various audiences, and finding out that he’s a serial fabulist.
The media did not actually fact check Obama’s biography. Some of the more fringe right-wing journalists did, but this is the first time I’ve heard of a Presidential candidate’s biography being investigated by mainstream media. The reason they haven’t before is quite understandable. It’s nearly impossible to prove such stories true or false. And so far, the stories have not been proven either true or false.
If it’s just Fox it’s not “the media”. I do however remember liberals objecting that this stuff shouldn’t be brought up, that it was irrelevant and possibly racist.
adaher, has it not occurred to you that everyone and their mama actually did fact-check his biography, but we didn’t “hear” about it (oh, it is to laugh!) because they didn’t find anything to talk about?
Or, maybe everyone was too busy focusing on the “debate” about his citizenship, or whether he was a racist like his pastor, who was just a front to hide how Muslim Obama was anyway. People could start accusing Carson of being a gay atheist Muslim Kenyan, and he still wouldn’t be hated half as much as Obama is.
Apples and oranges. Some was irrelevant (Ayers guilt by association bs) and some was racist (birther nonsense), but Carson tells these elaborate stories in his book to make a redemptive arc. It’s like his publisher said “This rags to riches story is good, Doc-but you know what would really move this book off the shelves? A good old fashioned redemption angle!”
“Like what?”
“You seem kind of quiet but was your youth exciting? Didja ever get in any fights? Steal anything?”
“Not really.”
“Hmmm.” Begins sliding manuscript back to Carson “Maybe this book isn’t for us-”
“Wait! I got in a fight one time. With a friend. I slapped him!”
“OK, maybe you should work on that part, a little. Guys don’t slap other guys.”
“I think I might have punched someone, too.”
“That’s more like it. See if you can ‘remember’ more stories like that.”
Obama’s book is a tale about growing up biracial. A lot of it was fabricated according to allegations by people who have looked into it, all of whom are right-wing sources. More mainstream sources showed zero interest in doing anything but lauding how wonderful his biography was.
Carson could have made stuff up. I’m sure most people embellish their biographies quite a bit, or details change in the retelling. And I’m not just talking about books, but just people gathered together in living rooms talking about their lives. Good luck proving any of it’s false, something which the media has thus far completely failed to do. “We cannot corroborate an event that happened on a street corner in the 1960s” is not the same as “he made it up.”
Carson’s been doing a great job lately of demonstrating that he’s completely unready to be President. But trying to expose his biography as a lie, I guess because exposing everything else about him hasn’t worked, just reeks of irrelevance.
In the end, if the worst case scenario is, “Carson’s always been a great guy”, I’m not sure how damaging that is.