Dave, ok, I was probably overreacting, but it is amazing what a little word like “just” or “only” does to change the meaning of a sentence.

I am not pushing a “solitary” learner agenda and I understand that language and culture are “social” in the sense of requiring more than one person (though I do think your statements about reading a book being a “social” activity tortures that phrase unnecessarily.) I definitely resist totalizing learning as always social though; not only is it possible to learn in ways that aren’t social (ask someone who’s been tossed into a pool but didn’t drown and went on to learn to swim, “on their own”) this point you seem intent on making, that the phrase “PLE” is dangerously over-emphasizing the solitary learner seems a straw man to me, at least I haven’t seen people using it to mean that and indeed the opposite always seemed implied to me.