Berlin and Metronomes, part II

Jeff Berlin is famous in the bass education circle for speaking out against the metronome. I, and many others, have found them useful. The debate has raged for months on end through regular myspace bulletins which always get a heap of responses.

I have posted here about this before, but the following is yet more of my own thoughts about the metronome as a tool for practicing an instrument.

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I get the idea that if you don't know your instrument you will have bad time. I get that you will drag if you can't confidently put the next note where it needs to go and when, so that explains where DRAGGING comes from. I'm pretty satisfied with that.
But then I ask myself, what explains RUSHING? And this is where I get less satisfied with an explanation that excludes the metronome as a possible part of the remedy.
I suppose the anti-metronome stance would explain RUSHING as the player not being sufficiently aware of where his/her fellow musicians have negotiated the unspoken time agreement. The only remedy I can see for that is directing the rushing player to listen to many good examples of excellent time agreement in music and then try to emulate that kind of agreement.
But this isn't enough for me. I think it is good to have some kind of benchmark by which to honestly assess one's propensity for either rushing or dragging, and when one or the other is diagnosed, then seek the appropriate remedy.

If I turn on a metronome and play a few bars of music, and I hear that I can't keep up, then I have just gotten INSTANT FEEDBACK -- I have some deficiency, some lack of mastery of the passage at the metronome's tempo. I can set the metronome slower and determine exactly the tempo at which I can play the written passage perfectly in time. This establishes my starting point, the place where the work begins. I can then seek out and fix the specific problem (a fingering, a string-cross, whatever it is). If I can play the piece in time at a faster metronome marking than before, this tells me I have made some progress. For me, instant feedback is good. You could argue that this part isn't about music but psychology, but I contend that the practice of music necessarily introduces a psychological component. I am more motivated when I can measure my progress in an immediate, ongoing, incremental fashion. If this helps me keep the bass in my hands and keep working toward getting better, then seriously, HOW CAN THIS BE A BAD THING?

The metronome is not a replacement for an internal clock or a keen ear for locking in with other musicians. But it is an absolute against which I can evaluate my own tendencies as a player (do I tend to rush or drag?) and to check my progress on difficult technical passages (can I play this at a given BPM?).

While I will continue to disagree with Mr. Berlin by insisting that metronomes can be useful tools, I am starting to appreciate this ongoing discussion which, though I have found it tiresome at times, has forced me to think very deeply and carefully about what I practice and teach. And for that he has my thanks.