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CRITICAL THINKING AND THE ETHICS OF TEACHING
(Thesis format: Monograph)
by
Sarah Patricia Lublink
Graduate Program in Philosophy
A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of
Doctor of Philosophy
The School of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies The University of Western Ontario
London, Ontario, Canada
© Sarah Patricia Lublink 2009
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Canada
THE UNIVERSITY OF WESTERN ONTARIO SCHOOL OF GRADUATE AND POSTDOCTORAL STUDIES
CERTIFICATE OF EXAMINATION
Supervisor Examiners
Dr. Samantha Brennan Dr. John Thorp
Supervisory Committee Dr. Robert Stainton
Dr. John Thorp Dr. Kelly Olson
Dr. Michael Milde Dr. Elisabeth Gedge
The thesis by
Sarah Patricia Lublink
entitled:
Critical Thinking and the Ethics of Teaching
is accepted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of
Doctor of Philosophy
Date Chair of the Thesis Examination Board
ii
ABSTRACT
In the area of practical ethics, contemporary philosophers have been quick to
study ethics in various professions such as medicine, law, business, and engineering.
They have been slow, however, to turn this ethical spotlight on themselves and to the
profession to which philosophers belong, that of educators in a university setting. To
some extent, of course, the student-professor relationship is covered by a broad code of
academic ethics, touching such matters as plagiarism, sexual harassment, unfairness, and
so on. This code of academic ethics concerns what could be called the "easy cases," for
they are cases in which the actions in question are generally seen to be obviously wrong.
But these "easy cases" are not alone in possessing moral significance. More
philosophically interesting are what can be called the "hard cases," in which determining
the morally justifiable course of action is complicated. How should teachers walk the
fine line between being sensitive to students' religious beliefs, and teaching critical
thinking about religion? How should teachers handle sensitive issues in-class, such as
sexual orientation, rape or abuse? What exactly does "desert" mean in grading? Does
good teaching require advocacy or neutrality of one's own beliefs? How should
philosophy teachers respond to student relativism? These questions present themselves
in particularly forceful ways in the undergraduate teaching of ethics.
The questions that arise for ethics teachers in the contemporary context are not
new, for similar issues arise in the writings of philosophers such as Plato, Locke,
Rousseau, Dewey, and Maritain. In order to address this question in the context of the
undergraduate ethics classroom I develop a framework for considering the issues
involved in teaching ethics and for moral deliberation about teaching goals and practices.
iii
This framework is a capabilities account of intellectual well-being that builds on the
account proposed, in the context of international development, by Martha Nussbaum and
Amartya Sen. I argue that this account is particularly well-suited to addressing the "hard
cases" mentioned above, as well as to the diverse contexts in which ethics is taught.
KEYWORDS: ethics, teaching, critical thinking, virtue, reason, capabilities
approach, well-being, autonomy, relativism, fundamentalism, advocacy, neutrality, Plato,
Locke, Rousseau, Dewey, Aquinas, Nussbaum
IV
"Men of Athens, I am grateful and I am your friend, but I will obey the god rather than you, and as long as I draw breath and am able, I shall not cease to practice philosophy."
~ Socrates ~
v
For my family, who have offered me unconditional love and support throughout the course of my graduate career.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
It is a pleasure to thank the many people who made this dissertation possible.
I owe an immense debt of gratitude to my supervisor, Samantha Brennan, whose expertise, commitment, and patience added considerably to my graduate experience. I would also like to thank John Thorp and Michael Milde for their work as my dissertation readers.
Special thanks go out to Richard Davis, without whose motivation and encouragement I would not have considered a graduate career in philosophy.
This research would not have been possible without the financial assistance of the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, the Ontario Graduate Scholarship, and the Department of Philosophy at the University of Western Ontario.
Many thanks to my graduate colleagues, especially Angela White and Jennifer Epp, whose steadfast encouragement through the ups and downs of graduate school was invaluable throughout the last five years.
Finally, I wish to express my heartfelt gratitude to my family, especially to my husband Mike, without whose love and encouragement I never would have made it this far.
vii
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Certificate of Examination ii Abstract and Keywords iii Epigraph v Dedication vi Acknowledgements vii Table of Contents viii
INTRODUCTION 1
CHAPTER 1: SOCRATES, PLATO, AND DIALECTICAL QUESTIONING 6
1.1. Plato's Warning about Dialectical Questioning 7 1.1.1. Plato's Warning 7 1.1.2. What is "Dialectic as Currently Practiced?" 9 1.1.3. Plato's Prescriptions 12
1.2. Socrates in the Apology 16 1.2.1. Socrates' Divine Mission 16 1.2.2. The Examined Life 18
1.3. Unrefiective Moral Beliefs and the Role of Dialectic 20 1.4. Plato: A Philosophical Parricide? 21
CHAPTER 2: REASON AND VIRTUE IN LOCKE AND ROUSSEAU 29
2.1. Locke's Educational Goals 30 2.1.1. Virtue 31 2.1.2. Rationality 34
2.2. Rousseau's Educational Goals 41 2.2.1. Virtue 43 2.2.2. Rationality 47
2.3. Conclusions 54
CHAPTER3: TRADITION AND COMMUNITY IN THE MORAL LIFE 55
3.1. Dewey's Pragmatic Approach to Education 56 3.1.1. Reflective Thinking as an Educational Goal 58 3.1.2. Moral Living as an Educational Goal 63
3.2. Virtue and Tradition in Thomistic Education 71 3.2.1. Aquinas: Human Reason and Natural Law 72 3.2.2. Maritain: Educating for Freedom 77 3.2.3. Maclntyre: Education and Tradition 84
3.3. Conclusions 89
CHAPTER 4: TEACHING ETHICS IN THE UNDERGRADUATE PHILOSOPHY CLASSROOM.90
4.1. The Purpose of University Ethics Courses 92 4.2. Teacher Advocacy or Teacher Neutrality? 97
4.2.1. The Possibility of Neutrality 98 4.2.2. Authenticity and Neutrality 102
viii
4.2.3. Neutrality and Relativism 103 4.3. Student Relativism 104 4.4. Student Fundamentalism 111 4.5. Reasonable Pluralism and Autonomy 120
CHAPTER 5: THE NEED FOR A RICHER ACCOUNT OF TEACHING ETHICS 128
5.1. The Need for a Richer Account 132 5.2. Possible Accounts of Teaching Ethics 146
5.2.1. Negative Obligations 146 5.2.2. Utilitarianism 150 5.2.3. Knowledge as the Good of Teaching 154 5.2.4. Virtue Ethics 155
5.3. What's Missing From These Accounts? 157
CHAPTER 6: THE CAPABILITIES APPROACH TO WELL-BEING 158
6.1. Desirable Characteristics of an Account of Teaching Ethics 158 6.1.1. Enabling Reasoning about Goals 158 6.1.2. Addressing Tough Moral Questions 159 6.1.3. Taking Account of Situational Factors 159
6.2. The Capabilities Approach to Well-Being 167 6.3. The Approach in Practice 172
6.3.1. Enabling Reasoning about Goals 173 6.3.2. Addressing Tough Moral Questions 179 6.3.3. Taking Account of Situational Factors 189
6.4. Conclusions 193
Bibliography 194
Curriculum Vitae 207
ix
1
INTRODUCTION
In the area of practical ethics, contemporary philosophers have been quick to
study ethics in various professions such as medicine, law, business, and engineering.
They have been slow, however, to turn this ethical spotlight on themselves and to the
profession to which many philosophers belong, that of educators in universities. To some
extent, of course, the student-professor relationship is covered by a broad code of
academic ethics, touching such matters as plagiarism, sexual harassment, unfairness, and
so on. This code of academic ethics concerns what could be called the "easy cases," for
they are cases in which the actions in question are generally seen to be obviously wrong.
But these "easy cases" are not alone in possessing moral significance. More
philosophically interesting are what can be called the "hard cases," in which determining
the morally justifiable course of action is complicated. How should teachers walk the
fine line between being sensitive to students' religious beliefs, and teaching critical
thinking about religion? How should teachers handle sensitive issues in-class, such as
sexual orientation, rape or abuse? What exactly does "desert" mean in grading? Does
good teaching require advocacy or neutrality of one's own beliefs? How should
philosophy teachers respond to student relativism? These questions present themselves
in particularly forceful ways in the undergraduate teaching of ethics.
In this dissertation I develop a framework for considering the issues involved in
teaching ethics, and for moral deliberation about teaching goals and practices in ethics
courses. In doing so I move beyond the narrow set of rules that concern the easy cases,
and consider what kinds of moral considerations are relevant in the teaching context. In
particular, I focus my attention on the context of the undergraduate ethics classroom.
2
Ethics courses are particularly interesting because their content is intimately connected to
students' and teachers' conceptions of the good life, and to their conceptions of self.
The framework I propose is a capabilities account of intellectual well-being that
builds on the account proposed, in the context of international development, by Martha
Nussbaum and Amartya Sen. It is particularly well suited to the teaching context for two
main reasons. First, the capabilities account allows for disagreements about the nature of
the good life. More specifically, teachers on this view should not aim to make their
students' lives good, but rather aim to enable students to make their own lives good.
Second, the capabilities approach counts many things as good, such as health, intellectual
development, and relationships. This plurality of goods makes room for a variety of
possible goals in different types of classrooms.
To ground this framework, I begin my project historically. While many
philosophers in the past century have turned away from the study of education,
philosophers of the ancient and modern periods had much to say on the subject. While
most of the authors considered in these first three chapters wrote in educational contexts
quite different from those in which philosophers teach today, many of the tensions and
questions that emerge are still vexing issues today.
In chapter one I bring to light a disagreement that subsisted between Socrates and
Plato on the topic of teaching young people to subject their moral beliefs to critical
examination. This disagreement represents a more general disagreement about the path
to the good life and the role of philosophy in living life well. This topic is significant
because it addresses a contemporary issue in Platonic interpretation, which questions
whether Plato's thought remained unified throughout his works. It is also significant,
3
however, because it points to a larger, more perennial issue: is exposing young people to
philosophy ultimately harmful? Could teaching young students to examine their beliefs
destabilize their moral convictions and leave them worse off? In the ethics classroom this
is a particularly significant question.
Chapter two is devoted to drawing out a tension that emerged in the works of
John Locke and Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Both philosophers believed that education
should lead to intellectual autonomy, which is based in one's ability to reason well, but
should also lead to sound moral character. On both accounts the two goals turn out to be
in tension. In the end, neither can see a way in which moral education could take place
without indoctrination or deference to authority. This is a similar issue to that which
bothered Plato in his concern about the dangers of questioning one's moral beliefs. This
same issue finds new meaning in philosophy teaching today, for one of the difficult
questions that arises for ethics teachers is the place of critical thinking training in an
individual's moral education, and more generally the place of an ethics course in an
individual's moral education.
Deweyan pragmatism and Thomistic thinking both represent a middle ground
between Locke and Rousseau's emphasis on autonomy and Plato's emphasis on
adherence to traditional norms. While Deweyan pragmatists and Thomists disagree on
many points, in their general approach to thinking they are similar in their emphasis on
thinking in community. In chapter three I outline John Dewey's views on educating for
reason and for morality, and I outline the educational views of two Thomists: Jacques
Maritain and Alasdair Maclntyre. I ground the views of these Thomistic thinkers by
beginning with Aquinas' own account of the relationship between thinking and virtue.
4
Dewey, Maritain and Maclntyre do not all agree about the degree to which tradition
should be valued, but each limits the scope of critical thinking by reference to shared
values and practices. The difficult puzzle for those who follow these views is
determining when traditions should be critiqued and when they should not be.
Having completed my historical analysis of the issues that pose difficult moral
problems for philosophers concerned about moral education and education for thinking,
in chapters four through six I consider the ways in which these issues and problems
manifest themselves in the contemporary ethics classroom. As noted above, the
underlying issues will turn out to be the same issues that emerged in my historical
analysis, though coloured by the new realities of teaching in the contemporary context.
In chapter four I sketch a picture of this contemporary context in two related
ways. First, I outline some of the major disagreements and issues that have arisen in
what has been written about ethics pedagogy. These disagreements concern two general
questions: what the purpose of ethics courses should be, and whether or not teachers
should be neutral with regard to their own moral, political and religious beliefs. Second,
I outline three contextual features of the contemporary ethics classroom: the existence of
religious fundamentalism, the prevalence of student relativism, and the reality of
pluralism. My analysis reveals what must be taken into account in reasoning about ethics
pedagogy and uncovers many difficult questions for philosophers teaching ethics.
The central issue for those concerned with the ethics of teaching has generally
been to determine the limits on the pursuit of teaching goals: to decide which acts one
must not perform in service of one's goals, no matter how good the results. In chapter
five I argue that what is missing is a rich view of teaching ethics that allows for careful
5
deliberation about teaching goals themselves, and about the difficult questions raised in
earlier chapters. I then consider and reject four possible views of teaching ethics that
might fill this gap. My rejection of these views brings to light the desirable
characteristics of an account of the ethics of teaching: it can take into account the
situational factors that are relevant in the undergraduate ethics classroom, it can address
the tough moral questions raised throughout the dissertation but especially in chapter
four, and it can enable reasoning about teaching goals.
In the final chapter I outline my adaptation of the capabilities approach to well
being for the teaching context and show how it meets the challenges I set for it in chapter
five. In the end, I do not propose to finally solve all of the problems I have raised in
chapters one through four. Rather, my raising those issues points to the need for careful
study of the ethics of teaching. My development of the capabilities approach provides a
starting point for this study.
6
CHAPTER 1: PLATO, SOCRATES, AND DIALECTICAL QUESTIONING1
No discussion of the practice of philosophy can be complete without considering
the works of Plato. One might even argue that the unifying theme in Plato's dialogues is
the idea that philosophy practiced well is superior to competitors like oratory or
sophistry. Explicitly, through arguments put forward by Socrates, and implicitly, through
his use of the dialogue form, Plato shows why philosophers outstrip sophists and orators
in their quest for the good life, and, perhaps even more importantly, in their role as
educators.
One might ask, however, why one ought to consult Plato's works for insights
about education. After all, Socrates claimed over and over again that he was not a
teacher, and Plato's vision of education described in Republic may not offer very much
that is appropriate in a liberal society. However, there is good reason to consult Plato in
the context of ethics education. He had much to say on the topic of teaching young
people to think critically about their moral beliefs, and by the time of writing Republic, as
I shall argue, he strongly disagreed with Socrates' views about the examined life being
good for everyone. The disagreement brings to light issues about the potential harms that
teaching philosophy brings about, and it calls into question which values should
undergird a commitment to teaching philosophy.
In this chapter I outline the disagreement that subsisted between Socrates and
Plato on the topic of teaching young people to critically examine their moral beliefs. This
disagreement represents a more general disagreement about the path to the good life and
the role of philosophy in living life well.
1 A version of this chapter has been accepted for publication in the British Journal for the History of Philosophy, forthcoming 2010.
In Republic VII Plato has Socrates make a curious argument: dialectic as currently
practiced causes lawlessness, and thus the practice of dialectic should be restricted to
those of a certain age who have been properly trained and selected (537e-539e). What is
even more curious is his description of the current practice of dialectic, as the questioner
who is described sounds suspiciously like the Socrates of the elenctic dialogues.2 That
Plato would restrict dialectic to a certain class of people is not surprising given the
overall view of justice in Republic, which is that justice is served best when each does
what he or she is best qualified to do, and that philosophers are best at ruling because of
dialectic. Further, it is not surprising that he would be concerned about current practices,
given his frequent criticisms of sophistry. However, that Plato should describe dialectic
in a way that seems to implicate the Socrates of the elenctic dialogues in harmful
practices is surprising, given his longstanding admiration of Socrates.
1.1. Plato's Warning about Dialectical Questioning
In this section I will argue that it is reasonable to believe that Plato's Republic VII
warning was intended to apply to a broad array of practices, including Socratic practices.
The main implication of this will be that Plato in writing Republic was concerned that not
only those who practiced sophistry or oratory could harm young people, but well-
meaning truth-seekers could do so as well.
Plato's Warning
In Republic VII Plato is attempting to show why philosophers make the best
rulers by describing the education, practice, and duties of philosophers, as well as the
2 The Socratic elenchus is a technical term for Socratic refutation.
8
potential pitfalls. He is also keen to rescue philosophy from its bad reputation, since it
has been 'undeservedly besmirched' (536c). Rather than say that those who criticize
philosophy are completely wrong, however, Plato writes: 'Don't you realize what a great
evil comes from dialectic as it is currently practiced? ... Those who practice it are filled
with lawlessness.' (537e)4 Plato then describes how this process occurs:
We hold from childhood certain convictions about just and fine things; we're brought up with them as with our parents, we obey and honor them. . .There are other ways of living, however, opposite to these and full of pleasures, that flatter the soul and attract it to themselves but which don't persuade sensible people, who continue to honor and obey the convictions of their fathers . . .And then a questioner comes along and asks someone of this sort, 'What is the fine?' And, when he answers what he has heard from the traditional lawgiver, the argument refutes him, and by refuting him often and in many places shakes him from his convictions, and makes him believe that the fine is no more fine than shameful, and the same with the just, the good, and the things he honored most.. .Then, when he no longer honors and obeys those convictions and can't discover the true ones, will he be likely to adopt any other way of life than that which flatters him? No, he won't. And so, I suppose, from being law-abiding he becomes lawless. (538c - 539a)5
In order to avoid this fate, people ought not to taste these arguments while they
are still young, for the young enjoy treating arguments 'as a game of contradiction. They
imitate those who've refuted them by refuting others themselves, and, like puppies, they
enjoy dragging and tearing those around them with their arguments.' (539b-c) These
youths will continue this game until they disbelieve what they believed before, and as a
result philosophy is discredited. (539c) On the other hand, Plato argues, sensible older
people will not play these games - they will look for the truth rather than playing at
3 This passage no doubt refers back to the long discussion of philosophy's bad reputation at 487-496. 4 All quotations of Republic from John M. Cooper and D.S. Hutchinson, eds., Plato: Complete Works (Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company, 1997). 5 This account can be compared to Plato's account of the democratic young man at 560b-c, as well as to 495a-c, where Plato describes how a person with a philosophic nature can be corrupted. The corruption of young men is a central theme in Republic.
9
refutation for sport. These older people will bring honour to philosophy rather than
shame. (539c) Plato also claims that only those of the right disposition should be allowed
to take part in these types of arguments: those who are 'steady by nature.' (539d) He
concludes by writing that those who become properly trained in argumentation must be
tested in the city's matters before being allowed to practice philosophy and rule the city.
(539e-540)
Given the remarkable similarity between Plato's portrayal of the Socratic
elenchus in the elenctic dialogues and his portrayal of the dangerous dialectician in
Republic VII, it seems easy to conclude that Plato had Socratic practices in mind when he
penned the words of Republic. However, more argument is needed to prove such a
strong claim.
What is 'Dialectic as Currently Practiced?'
Plato's warning about dialectic 'as currently practiced' comes at the end of a long
discussion about the ability of philosophers to rule the city. In particular, Plato argues
through the allegory of the Cave and the divided line that philosophers possess true
knowledge, and thus are best suited to be guardians. In this context, dialectic is the
means by which philosophers achieve this knowledge, for it is the journey to knowledge
of things themselves. It is the ascent from the Cave of Shadows.
Plato describes the journey thus: 'whenever someone tries through argument and
apart from all sense perception to find the being itself of each thing and doesn't give up
until he grasps the good itself with understanding itself, he reaches the end of the
intelligible, just as the other reached the end of the visible.' (532a-b) Dialectic is the
10
inquiry that attempts to grasp the being of each thing, (533b) though the power of
dialectic can only reveal the truth itself to someone experienced in all of the lower
subjects, such as mathematics. (533a) Dialectic pulls 'the eye of the soul' out of the
'barbaric bog' and turns it around, leading it to knowledge. (533d) All of this means, to
Plato, that in order to call a person dialectical, he must be 'able to give an account of the
being of each thing,' (534b) and be able to 'distinguish in an account the form of the
good from everything else,' and be able to 'survive all refutation.' (534b-c)
This is the kind of person at which the educational scheme for the guardians is
aiming. The city's guardians must be 'naturally dialectical,' which means that they must
be capable of achieving the kind of unified vision described in the allegory of the Cave.
In order to test for this capacity, Plato recommends testing them 'by means of the power
of dialectic' (537d) However, this task requires great care, because of the great evil that
comes from dialectic as currently practiced. (537d-e)
The description of dialectic 'as currently practiced' involves a questioner who
presses someone for an account of 'the fine,' and whose argument refutes the person's
every answer. In this respect, the questioner is the Socrates of the elenctic dialogues.
Socrates' questioning clearly models the description, for example, when he asks
Euthyphro 'Tell me then, what is the pious, and what is the impious, do you say?' (5d)
Euthyphro gives the traditional answer, and Socrates proceeds to analyse his responses in
order to draw out inconsistencies and contradictions. In other dialogues Socrates pursues
the same strategy: pushing his interlocutor to come up with an account of a thing, while
showing inconsistencies in that account. All of the so-called elenctic dialogues (Apology,
Charmides, Crito, Euthyphro, Gorgias, Hippias Minor, Ion, Laches, Menexemus, and
6 All quotations of Euthyphro from Cooper and Hutchinson, eds., Plato: Complete Works.
11
Protagoras)1 - show Socrates engaged in the kind of questioning that Plato describes in
Republic VII.
The philosopher of Republic VII uses dialectic to get to the truth of things.
Socrates, in the elenctic dialogues, is usually either trying to get at the truth of things,
trying to expose the ignorance of his interlocutors, or both. The aims of the dialectician
in this passage are not made explicit. The only hint given is that the one being questioned
is made to believe 'that the fine is no more fine than shameful, and the same with the just,
the good, and the things he honored most.' (538d) However, in Plato's description it is
not the questioner who makes the person questioned believe that the fine is shameful, but
the argument: 'The argument refutes him.. .and.. .shakes him from his convictions.'
(538d)8 This effect could be completely independent of the questioner's aim.
One difficult question is determining how broadly Plato's conception of
'dialectic' should be understood. This is a generally complex issue in the study of Plato's
works. There are several kinds of inquiry described and modeled in Plato's dialogues,
including the Socratic elenchus, the sort of one-sided inquiry that characterizes dialogues
such as the Republic, and the quite different method of collection and division that one
finds in dialogues such as the Sophist or the Philebus. Further, the dialectic prescribed
for the philosophers in Republic VII presupposes careful study of mathematics and other
crafts in order to get at the truth. Plato, in passages very close to one another, uses the
word 'dialectic' to describe the ascent from the Cave and also to describe refutation
'dialectic as currently practiced.'
7 For this traditional list see Gregory Vlastos, Socratic Studies (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994). 8 The relevant phrase is 'e^eXeyxn 6 Aoyos.'
12
Some have claimed9 that for Plato, 'dialectic' always aims at truth, and this is
what distinguishes it from practices such as eristic. However, if this is true, then when
Plato describes the harmful dialecticians of 537-539 he only has in mind those refuting
for the sake of the truth. To avoid this conclusion, we must attribute to Plato a rather
broad conception of 'dialectic,' at least in these passages. If the word is to be used
consistently in Republic VII, it must refer merely to 'questioning' or perhaps 'refutation.'
Dialectic, on this conception, is the method used by eristic refuters, by Socratic refuters,
and by Platonic guardians-in-training. There is thus no special word used for dialectic-
aiming-at-truth. The word 'dialectic,' at least in these passages of the Republic, can be
taken to refer to a means to an end: a method used to work toward whatever aims the
dialectician has in mind.
The initial description Plato gives of dialectic 'as currently practiced' is broad: it
involves refutation, but it is not clear what the refutation aims at. What follows this
description is Plato's set of prescriptions for avoiding the harms of dialectic. I will argue
based on these prescriptions that Plato's warning about the harms of dialectic applies to
all those practicing it, including Socrates.
Plato's Prescriptions
I now want to suggest that only by interpreting Republic 537-539 to apply to all
those involved in refutation, even those aiming at truth, can Plato's prescriptions make
sense. Plato claims that dialectic must be restricted to those of a certain age, who have
been properly trained and who are properly suited (539a-c). If Plato had only prescribed
being careful how young people are introduced to arguments (539a), this passage could
9 See, e.g., Richard Robinson, Plato's Earlier Dialectic (Oxford: At the Clarendon Press, 1953), 85-86.
13
reasonably be taken as simply a condemnation of some refuters but not others, for one
might argue that someone like Socrates is always careful. However, since Plato
introduces as a 'lasting precaution' (539a) the three prescriptions, his critique becomes
very broad. That is because the three prescriptions clearly refer to restricting those who
are questioned dialectically and not those who are asking the questions.
The story Plato tells is of a young person being exposed to a dialectical
questioner. The young person jettisons his conventional beliefs, and is unable to discover
true beliefs with which to replace them. Next Plato claims: 'Isn't it only to be expected
that this is what happens to those who take up arguments in this way, and don't they
therefore deserve a lot of sympathy?' (539a) This follows immediately, and implies that
'those who take up arguments in this way' are those who are being asked the dialectical
questions but cannot answer them. It makes no sense that we should feel sympathy for
the questioner; clearly, we should feel sympathy for the person being questioned whose
beliefs have been undermined. Plato then writes: 'if you don't want your thirty-year-olds
to be objects of such pity, you'll have to be extremely careful about how you introduce
them to arguments.' (539a)10 As outlined above, this passage is the beginning of Plato's
prescriptions about age and training, and follows his claims about sympathy for thirty-
year olds. Those who will be asked questions, then, must be at least thirty years old,
properly trained, and carefully selected.
The relevant phrase is 'OUK ouv 'fvoc nfi yiyvr|Tai 6 EAEOS OUTOS Tiepi TOUJ TPICCKOVTOUTOCS ooi, EuXcefka/UEvep TTCCVTI xpo TTcp TCOV Xoycov ccrrTEOv.' There are four textual variants on the word eulaboumenoi. It is possible that Plato had in mind eulaboumenois or eulaboumenous, both of which would mean that some persons must engage the arguments carefully, eulaboumenos, which is the adverb 'in a carefully-undertaken manner' and whose subject is not specified, or eulaboumenoi, which would mean that Glaucon must engage the arguments with every care. In any case, the passage surely mirrors 537d, in which Plato is addressing those who are training the guardians.
14
The reasoning Plato gives for this conclusion is this: when young people are given
their first taste of argument, they misuse it by refuting beliefs until they disbelieve what
they believed before. (539b) Here Plato is adding to his earlier warning. Not only can a
dialectician undermine a young person's beliefs, but that young person can imitate the
dialectician and imitate his own beliefs and the beliefs of others. Older people, on the
other hand, are more likely only to imitate those looking for the truth, and not to play
around at arguments for the sport of it. (539c)
This last comment by Plato may lead one to think that truth-seeking dialecticians
are not dangerous, since Plato is not worried about those who imitate those seeking after
the truth. However, this interpretation is not consistent with Plato's overall argument in
this section. If truth-seekers were not dangerous, then Plato would not have needed to
restrict who is exposed to dialectic, but only those practicing dialectic. In other words,
Plato would only have needed to stipulate that dialectical questions only be asked by
those seeking the truth. After all, in this section, Plato has Socrates in the midst of
addressing those who will be training up the guardians, and telling them to be careful
about who is exposed to their dialectical questioning (537d). Surely those doing the
dialectical testing will be committed to the truth. If truth-seekers are not dangerous, they
would not need to be concerned about who is exposed to their questioning.
In other words, if Plato believed that some kinds of dialecticians caused harm to
the young and others not, he need only have placed restrictions on those asking questions
of young persons. That he went further suggests that no such restrictions could protect
young people from harm. Only by preventing any dialecticians at all from questioning
young people can the harm be prevented. It is thus reasonable to conclude that Plato
15
believed that Socratic truth-seekers, Socratic imitators and sophists can all question
beliefs in a way that can be harmful. To prevent them from doing so, none may be
allowed to ask questions of young, untrained people. Plato is thus making the claim that
dialecticians are dangerous no matter how devoted to the truth they are.
This passage within the context of Republic is striking. The entire work is
devoted to defending Plato's conception of justice, which includes his conception of the
just city. The just city is one ruled by philosophers, and thus in books six and seven Plato
is defending his claim that philosophers make the best rulers, and by extension, the claim
that philosophy is useful. The analogy of the divided line and the allegory of the Cave
are both intended to defend this claim. Though philosophers might appear to have their
heads in the clouds, Plato argues, they are useful and are the most qualified to rule a city.
Thus, it is significant that right at the end of this section Plato makes the admission that
philosophical practice is dangerous. Dialectic, even when it is being put to the use for
which it is intended - climbing the path to knowledge of the Good - can be harmful.
Thus Plato's one and only method for escaping the Cave of Shadows is also something
that leads to lawlessness, and this means that dialectic must be kept out of the hands of
anyone who could be harmed by it. Not only that, but those who are rightfully practising
dialectic must not do so in the presence of those who are unsuited to practice it, lest they
be imitated in pernicious ways.
Plato's warning in Republic VII is thus a warning about the practice of dialectic in
general, and especially a warning about practicing dialectic with or in front of young
people. As it will become evident, it is thus a warning against the practices Socrates
16
defends in the Apology, which I turn to in the next section.11 I will argue that Socrates'
position in the Apology provides a sharp contrast to Plato's views in the Republic.
1.2. Socrates in the Apology
In the Apology, Plato has Socrates defend himself against several charges,
including that of corrupting the youth. This is noteworthy given that Plato's claim is that
dialectic can corrupt young people. It is thus significant that Plato believed by the time
of writing Republic that figures such as Socrates should not question others except in
carefully controlled situations.
Socrates' Divine Mission
In the Apology Socrates claims that his practice of questioning is a divine service
to the god. The oracle at Delphi prophesied that no one was wiser than Socrates, and
Socrates interpreted the prophecy to mean: 'This man, among you, mortals, is wisest
who, like Socrates, understands that his wisdom is worthless.' (23b) For this reason
Socrates believed that it was his god-given mission to expose the ignorance of others and
convince them that they are not wise. In response to the suggestion that he could agree to
cease practicing philosophy in exchange for his freedom, Socrates says:
If, as I say, you were to acquit me on those terms, I would say to you: 'Men of Athens, I am grateful and I am your friend, but I will obey the god rather than you, and as long as I draw breath and am able, I shall not cease to practice philosophy, to exhort you and in my usual way to point out to any one of you whom I happen to meet: Good Sir, you are an Athenian, a citizen of the greatest city with the greatest reputation for both wisdom and power; are you not ashamed of your eagerness to possess as much wealth, reputation and honors as possible, while you do not care for nor give thought to wisdom or truth, or the best possible state of your
11 All quotations of Apology from Cooper and Hutchinson, eds., Plato: Complete Works.
17
soul?' Then, if one of you disputes this and says he does care, I shall not let him go at once or leave him, but I shall question him, examine him and test him, and if I do not think he has attained the goodness that he says he has, I shall reproach him because he attaches little importance to the most important things and greater importance to inferior things. I shall treat in this way anyone I happen to meet, young and old, citizen and stranger. (29d-30a).
Socrates sees his role as a kind of gadfly - as an annoyance that never ceases to
rouse the citizens of Athens, 'to persuade and reproach you all day long and everywhere I
find myself in your company.' (31a) This mission includes citizens and strangers, and, as
Socrates repeats several times, both young and old.12 All can benefit from being shown
to be ignorant. This means that Socrates in the Apology believes that dialectical
questioning is beneficial to anyone, not only to those in the Republic's elite class of
guardians, and not only those who are of a certain age. It also means that Socrates
believes that undermining beliefs is beneficial, which is precisely what Plato is worried
about in Republic VII.
It should not be inferred from the passage above that Socrates only questions
those who are arrogant, or sophists, or anything of the sort. He claims that he will
question anyone who claims to care for his soul. That someone claims that he cares for
his soul does not make him arrogant. It is likely true that anyone would think that he
cares for his soul, given the religious nature of the city, and thus Socrates is really saying
that he will dialectically question anyone.
In the Socratic dialogues one can find Socrates doing exactly this - questioning
those he happens to meet, pushing them to come up with definitions of concepts such as
12 Cf. 33a: 'If anyone, young or old, desires to listen to me when I am talking and dealing with my own concerns, I have never begrudged this to anyone,' or 37d-e: 'It would be a fine life at my age to be driven out of one city after another, for I know very well that wherever I go the young men will listen to my talk as they do here.'
18
piety (Euthyphro), the fine (Hippias Major), or temperance (Charmides), and so forth.
While he is not often seen cross-examining a young person, he often cross-examines
others in the presence of young people. He describes this in the Apology: 'The young
men who follow me around of their own free will, those who have most leisure, the sons
of the very rich, take pleasure in hearing people questioned; they themselves often imitate
me and try to question others.' (23c)
It is not clear from the text what Socrates thinks of this imitation. He may be
expressing regret that young people imitate him. Given the possibility that these
imitations may have led to the accusations against him, he may be complaining about
what has occurred.13 He may or may not believe this imitation was a perversion of his
own method. He may even be expressing satisfaction that his practice was continued by
others.14 Given the context of this passage, where Socrates is describing how he
acquired a bad reputation, but also defending his practice, it is not clear which of these
two views is right.
The young men in question are the sons of the very rich, and they take pleasure in
questioning. This suggests that at least some of the young men are contradicting one
another for sport. The point that is crucial here is that Socrates did not believe it to be
harmful to expose all sorts of young people to his questioning.
The Examined Life
Perhaps the most famous quotation ever penned by Plato is Socrates' claim that
the unexamined life is unlivable:
13 This is defended in Norman Gulley, The Philosophy of Socrates (London: Macmillan, 1968), 58. 14 This is Grote's view. George Grote, Plato, and the other Companions ofSokrates, vol. 4 (London: Murray, 1888), 210.
19
If I say that it is impossible for me to keep quiet because that means disobeying the god, you will not believe me and think I am being ironical. On the other hand, if I say that it is the greatest good for a man to discuss virtue every day and those other things about which you hear me conversing and testing myself and others, for the unexamined life is not worth living for men, you will believe me even less. (38a)
The disagreement between the views in the Republic and the views in the Apology
becomes even starker when considered in this context. Plato's warning in the Republic
and its attached prescriptions imply that the vast majority of people ought never to be
exposed to dialectic, for their own good. Carefully selected philosopher-rulers of a
certain age are a minority group in the just city, and Plato thus has in mind that dialectical
investigations are reserved for that minority. This means that the majority of people
ought not to lead the 'examined life,' only those who are mature adults with a particular
kind of training.15 Plato seems to echo this idea elsewhere in the Meno, when he has
Socrates claim:
Is it not correct that when true opinion guides the course of every action, it does no worse than knowledge? ... Correct opinion is then neither inferior to knowledge nor less useful in directing actions, nor is the man who has it less so than he who has knowledge. (98b-c)16
Plato's views in the Republic thus imply that most people should be left in their
unreflective state, for their own good. That this is true is even more evident when one
considers elements of his republic which would fall apart if the ordinary citizen lived an
examined life, such as the noble lie that men are created of different substances based on
which class they belong to (414-416). That said, for Plato, the examined life is not just
This has been noticed by several commentators. See, e.g.: Julia Annas, An Introduction to Plato's Republic (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1981), 91-92, Richard Kraut, "Socrates, Politics, and Religion," in Reason and Religion in Socratic Philosophy, ed. Nicholas D. Smith and Paul B. Woodruff, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), 19, C.D.C. Reeve, "The Socratic Movement," in .4 Companion to the Philosophy of Education, ed. Randall Curren, (Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, 2003), 14, Gregory Vlastos, Socrates: Ironist and Moral Philosopher (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1991), 125. 16 All citations of Meno from Cooper and Hutchinson, eds., Plato: Complete Works. Cf. Republic 589c, where Plato alludes positively to existing conventions.
20
incompatible with the just city, it is generally dangerous. Plato, after all, does not simply
limit the practice of dialectic in the just city but also argues that it is dangerous in the
current context - 'as currently practiced.'
It is thus clear that the views expressed in the Republic and those expressed in
the Apology differ markedly with respect to the examined life, with regard to who should
be exposed to dialectical questioning, and with regard to whether or not dialectical
questioning is dangerous.
1.3. Unreflective Moral Beliefs and the Role of Dialectic
It should be evident now that the import assigned to dialectical questioning differs
from the Apology to the Republic. While both claim that dialectic properly practiced
aims at truth, it has different aims within that framework. Republic dialectic aims to
allow an elite group of leaders to discern the true and the good, in order that those leaders
might be more effective rulers. Socratic dialectic in the Apology aims to rouse the
ordinary citizen from his unreflective life. While for both, dialectic is supposed to help
the ordinary citizen, in the Apology this help is direct rather than mediated through the
philosopher-rulers. In the Republic, dialectic is potentially dangerous in the hands of any
practitioner and thus its practice must be limited, whereas in the Apology, even in the
hands of ordinary people, it is the remedy for such dangerous practices as sophistry.
Further, the views in the Republic imply that ordinary citizens are better off
holding unreflective, conventional moral beliefs, than questioning those beliefs for
themselves. Socrates in the Apology, on the other hand, is a moral revolutionary who
uses dialectical questioning to expose the weakness of traditional views and those who
21
hold them. 7 By exposing dialectical weakness in the presence of young people,
Socrates encouraged young people to question conventional moral beliefs.
It is thus reasonable to believe that by the time Plato wrote Republic he had
changed his views about Socrates' practice. Given that the content and style of his
writings has also changed from being Socrates-centred and in lively dialogue style, this is
not an improbable conclusion. This leads to a difficult question. Since the most
famous charge against Socrates was corrupting the youth, is it possible that Plato in
Republic 537-539 has begun to believe that Socrates' accusers were right? That is, if in
the Republic, dialectic is a dangerous tool that can lead young people astray, has Plato
joined Socrates' accusers by the time he wrote Republic!
1.4. Plato: A Philosophical Parricide?
There are several potential arguments against the claim that Plato was joining
Socrates' accusers in his writing of the Republic. In what follows I will propose five
such arguments. I will argue that the first three should be rejected, and leave the last two
as relatively plausible 'ways out.'
The first argument turns on the meaning of 'currently' (vVv). On this line of
reasoning, Plato's warning does not apply to Socrates because it only refers to those who
are practicing dialectic at the time he is writing, that is, years after Socrates' death. It
17 In this connection, cf. Thomas C. Brickhouse and Nicholas D. Smith, Socrates on Trial (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1989), 199. Though they claim that 'Socrates' mission had the effect of showing young people how little their fathers really knew about how to live, and how ill-supported their values and traditions were,' they do not refer to Republic 537-539 in this connection, even though they claim that such an effect led to scepticism. 18 Beversluis and Kraut both take the moderate view that Plato had changed his mind somewhat about Socrates, though did not fully endorse his accusers' claims. John Beversluis, Cross-Examining Socrates: A Defense of the Interlocutors in Plato's Early Dialogues (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000), 382, Kraut, "Socrates, Politics, and Religion," 19.
22
should first be noted that to make this argument work, one would have to argue that
'currently' refers to the time within which Plato is writing the Republic, rather than to a
time within Socrates' lifetime. This is because the word is in Socrates' mouth in the
dialogue, and he is not portrayed as speaking from beyond the grave. While this would
be a tricky question in Plato interpretation, there is a good contextual reason to reject the
idea that Plato was referring only to the time of his writing. Plato's statement about
dialectic is so strong that in order for it to apply to all dialecticians practicing in Athens at
the time of writing the Republic, it would also have to apply to anyone practicing
dialectic in a relevantly similar scenario. That is, it is implausible to think that Plato
believed that Athenian youth were different enough in Socrates' day than in the time he is
writing the Republic that the warning would not apply a few years earlier. It would also
be implausible to argue that dialectic was completely different in Socrates' day, since as I
have argued Plato's use of the word in this passage is very broad. For this reason, I
believe this argument should be rejected.
The second argument involves the content of the Athenian court's accusations.
Socrates' accusers appeared to understand the corruption in terms of introducing new
gods, which is not Plato's worry in the Republic. In the text of the Apology it is clear that
those charging Socrates believe that the corruption involves religion:
Nonetheless tell us, Meletus, how you say that I corrupt the young; or is it obvious from your deposition that it is by teaching them not to believe in the gods in whom the city believes but in other new spiritual things? Is this not what you say I teach and so corrupt them?—That is most certainly what I do say. (26b)
This is the charge to which Socrates replies, and the only charge that is ever raised
in the text with regard to corrupting the youth. Of course, it is possible that the charges
23
were formulated in such a way as to ensure that Socrates could be charged with impiety
and so that is why the 'new gods' charge is introduced. Perhaps Socrates was condemned
because his accusers reasoned that since he had the ability to knock down beliefs, he must
have done it to people like Alcibiades and Critias, and thus corrupted them.19 Alcibiades
and Critias were both students of Socrates, and Alcibiades was especially cared for by
Socrates, but both became notorious tyrants in the reign of the Thirty Tyrants in Athens.
Even if this is so, however, Plato clearly has a different understanding of
Socrates' practices than the Athenian court does. After all, Plato has Socrates describe in
the Republic why virtuous philosophers are slandered, in the analogy of the navigator and
the ship-owner. The sailors on the ship do not know what a true captain should be like,
and so they reject him as a useless stargazer. (488-489) This simile should bring to mind
the Gorgias, where Plato has Socrates compare himself to a doctor who is being
prosecuted by a pastry chef, and judged by a jury of children. (52 le) Plato, in writing the
Republic, could still believe that the Athenians were unable to fully understand Socrates'
true purposes and his true usefulness, but could have come to believe that Socratic
practices were dangerous.
The trouble is here that though this explanation casts some doubt on the extent to
which Plato agreed with Socrates' accusers about the particulars of the case, or about the
usefulness of philosophy, it still has Plato agreeing that Socrates' practice is dangerous.
While Plato's reasoning is not the same as the court's reasoning, the conclusion they
come to is the same: Socrates is a dangerous practitioner whose philosophizing should be
stopped. Socrates certainly would not have been allowed into Plato's just city unless he
promised to stop practicing dialectic with or in the presence of young people. For this
19 This is Vlastos' position. Vlastos, Socrates: Ironist and Moral Philosopher, 296-97.
24
reason, this argument does not undermine the claim that Plato is a philosophical
parricide.
The third argument is to say that Plato did believe everything I have ascribed to
him in the first sections of the paper, but did not realize, or did not allow himself to
realize, that these condemnations would apply to Socrates as well. One would have to
make some kind of argument based on the idea that 'love is blind' in order to avoid the
idea that Plato is just stupid. As such, it is not a very appealing view. Socrates is, after
all, the main character in many of Plato's dialogues, and was his own teacher. It would
be surprising indeed if Plato did not notice the implication of his own view, and would be
inconsistent with his overall carefulness as a writer.
The fourth argument draws a distinction between the actual city in which Socrates
practiced, and the idealized city with which Plato is working in the Republic. The city of
which Plato speaks in the book is a description of what a fully just city would look like.
It is certainly not Athens. It is a city in which young people are communally raised and
divided into classes, where a noble lie is told in order to keep the lower classes
subservient, and where the philosophers rule.
It is implausible to argue on this basis that Plato believed that dialectic was
dangerous in the ideal city, but not dangerous in Athens. After all, his argument proceeds
as follows: since dialectic with the young brings harm in its current context, it will bring
harm in the ideal city as well, and thus it must be banned. It is also implausible to argue
that Plato would want to ban dialectic in the ideal city because he did not want the noble
lie challenged, but would permit it in Athens because those having their beliefs
challenged should reject those beliefs anyway. It is key to the story of the young person
25
in Republic VII that he would have been better off holding on to his conventional beliefs
than rejecting them entirely. The most plausible line of reasoning here is that in both
cases Plato believed that dialectic was dangerous, but in Athens he also believed it to be
necessary, since in general the moral and religious views of the Athenians were so far
from the true and the good that they needed to be thrown down. In other words,
Socrates' practices were dangerous but also necessary to moral progress.
On this view, Plato believes that Socrates' practices brought both harm and good,
but that the good could be outweighed by the harm. In other words, while some young
people will have their lives destroyed, at least someone will be challenging the ruling
conceptions of justice and injustice, and that is necessary for eventually changing minds
in the city as a whole. In the ideal city, however, since the philosopher-rulers are ruling
based on truth and goodness, there is no need for such destructive practices. Moral
progress, on this explanation, comes at the expense of the goodness of those young
people who fall into the trouble Plato describes in Republic VII. This explanation
commits one to the view that Plato agreed with the court that Socrates was corrupting the
youth, but did not agree that he should be stopped, or that his practices, when taken in a
larger context, were wrong. On this view, Plato believed Socrates harmed young people,
but did so for the greater good.
This kind of view is not terribly startling once one considers that if Plato is taken
literally, he is willing to take very drastic measures to bring about the just city: he is
willing to put all Athenians over a certain age into exile in order to indoctrinate the
young. It would not be too far of a stretch to say that he approved of casualties along the
road to goodness and justice. It does avoid the conclusion that Socrates should have been
26
put to death, but the disagreement between Plato and Socrates has deepened: not only do
they disagree about whether dialectic helps or harms a young person's soul; they disagree
fundamentally about what justice requires.
The fifth and final argument is based on the possible difference between claiming
that a method is dangerous and claiming that in actual fact it corrupted young people. In
other words, Plato could have believed that all dialectic was dangerous, but that Socrates
managed to avoid actually harming anyone. While Socrates' followers and interlocutors
were in some way exempt from harm, Plato believed that in order to be sure that dialectic
not be misused, its practice must be limited in the just city. This seems reasonable given
that the safeguards he introduces are consistent with his view that justice involves each
playing the role for which one is best suited.
The trouble with this argument is that it is clear from the first half of this chapter
that Plato's warning refers to all those practicing dialectic, 'currently,' and he claims that
it is 'only to be expected' (539a) that young people will be corrupted. As argued in the
first sections of this chapter, for Plato, it is the method itself that is dangerous, not the
intent or the character of the dialectician. Plato gives no reason to think that even
someone such as Socrates could practice dialectic without harming anyone. His
restrictions on the practice of dialectic imply that he does not hold this belief. Otherwise,
as I have argued above, to avoid harm, it would only be necessary to choose questioners
of Socrates' sort. The only way to make this argument work is to say that Plato believed
that Socrates had a kind of special protection from harming others not available to anyone
else, i.e., not available to those who would be training the guardians. Socrates' virtue or
knowledge would not be enough protection, since the guardians and those training them
27
are educated for such virtue and knowledge. One way to explain Socrates' uniqueness
would be to refer to Socrates' 'divine sign,' which according to Socrates in the Apology
warned him before he made a mistake. (3 lc-e)
Now it must be noted here that Socrates himself does not draw this connection,
and claims that he will question anyone he meets.20 But, it is possible that Plato believed
that Socrates had this kind of special protection. This argument would require the idea
that there are some young people who would not be harmed by being questioned or by
being exposed to questioning, but only Socrates' daemon has the knowledge to determine
who these young people are, and so to protect Socrates from harming others. There is no
direct textual evidence for this claim in the Republic, but an argument in favour of Plato's
special regard for Socrates could be made based on general indicators, such as Plato's
positive portrayal of the character in his dialogue. This argument relies on Plato
considering Socrates to be the recipient of a form of miraculous protection.
I have argued here that the final two arguments do explain away the claim that
Plato believed that the Athenian court was right to do what it did. They are consistent
with my analysis of Republic VII because they do not rely on the idea that dialectic is
only harmful when used for problematic ends. Of course, accepting one or other of these
sets of implications is not the only recourse we have in reading Plato. One can claim that
Plato really has become a philosophical parricide. Some authors have taken this view.21
What I have argued in this final section is that as things stand one can only avoid this
10 Apology 33a. 21 See Grote, Plato, and the other Companions ofSokrates, 211, Gareth B. Matthews, "Socrates's Children," in The Philosopher's Child: Critical Essays in the Western Tradition, ed. Susan M. Turner and Gareth B. Matthews, (Rochester: University of Rochester Press, 1998), 13.
28
view by attributing to Plato the beliefs I have laid out in either one of the two final
arguments.
To return to the question which began this investigation, it is certainly clear that
the difference of views between the Republic and the Apology is a profound one. The
difference in views between Socrates and Plato is quite deep. Fundamentally, the
Republic rejects the Apology's conception of the role and importance of dialectic in living
well, and rejects Socrates' defense of his practices in that work. It is a clear departure
from Socrates' views in the early dialogues.
For philosophers, it raises questions in our own context. Teachers of philosophy
in universities, colleges, and public schools worldwide are committed to teaching
students to think critically about their most fundamental beliefs. Yet there could be
something harmful about exposing a young person to dialectical questioning. Given that
university students are young and inexperienced (and sometimes, as Socrates' imitators
were, privileged and arrogant) it is possible that philosophers run a risk when giving
students tools they can use to dismantle their belief systems or the belief systems of
others. How should philosophers respond to this possibility? For those who agree with
Socrates about the importance of the examined life, this remains an open question.
29
CHAPTER 2: REASON AND VIRTUE IN LOCKE AND ROUSSEAU
John Locke and Jean-Jacques Rousseau had much to say about education, as both
were concerned to remedy the social ills they saw arising from bad educational practices.
Each believed that education failed in its inattention to reason and virtue. Both believed
that education should lead to intellectual autonomy, which is based in one's ability to
reason well, but should also lead to sound moral character. In the end, on both accounts
the two goals turn out to be in tension. This chapter is devoted to drawing out this
tension.
Locke and Rousseau were writing in an educational context very different from
today's university context. However, it is worth asking what kinds of factors brought
about the contradictions in their views in order to see whether or not these factors play a
role in teaching today. At bottom what is at issue for both is an inability to see a way in
which moral education could take place without indoctrination or inculcated deference to
authority. This also arose for Plato in his concern about the dangers of questioning one's
moral beliefs. In today's context, the underlying issue is still present. There are those
who believe that exposing children to various points of view is in tension with providing
them with moral or religious education. Parents who are religious fundamentalists often
seek to prevent their children from being exposed to that which they believe will
undermine their efforts to instil a particular kind of virtue.
Many university ethics teachers will encounter students who have been raised in
this kind of environment, for whom thinking critically may well destabilize their belief
systems. It is a difficult question to determine how to respond to such students. As well,
the question remains for ethics teachers what teaching goals should look like: should
30
ethics courses be part of a students' moral education in some way? How do teachers'
efforts to teach students to think critically fit into the students' overall educational
programme?
These and other difficult questions arising for ethics teachers are not new, but
they find new meaning in today's teaching contexts. As such, it is worth looking at
where and how philosophers such as Locke and Rousseau have erred, in order to learn
from their mistakes.
2.1. Locke's Educational Goals
Locke begins his Some Thoughts Concerning Education by claiming that "of all
the Men we meet with, Nine Parts of Ten are what they are, Good or Evil, useful or not,
by their Education."1 Some Thoughts was thus written to address what Locke considered
to be the bad educational practices of his day, and was based on Locke's letters to his
friend Edward Clarke. In the Epistle Dedicatory, Locke writes to Clarke that errors in
education "carry their afterwards-incorrigible Taint with them, through all the parts of
and stations of Life."2 Though much of the work is dedicated to pointing out how current
educational practices lead children to vice, Locke proposes his own system of education
dedicated to leading a young gentleman into virtue.
As the overall goal of Some Thoughts is to outline an educational scheme that will
lead its students to virtue, I begin by examining Locke's conception of virtue and the
ways in which he intends his methods to achieve it. However, Locke's view of virtue is
1 John Locke, Some Thoughts Concerning Education, John W. Yolton and Jean S. Yolton (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1989), §1. 2 Ibid., Epistle Dedicatory.
31
closely connected to his view of reason, and accordingly I devote a section to how
Locke's educational scheme is intended to lead its students to a life of reason.
Virtue
"A Sound Mind in a sound Body, is a short, but full Description of a Happy State
in this World." For Locke, the strength of both the mind and the body is being able to
endure hardships, and "the great Principle and Foundation of all Vertue and Worth, is
placed in this, That a Man is able to deny himself his own Desires, cross his own
Inclinations, and purely follow what Reason directs as best, tho' the appetite lean the
other way."5 This ability is engendered by custom and habit, and thus beginning "from
their very cradles,"6 children are to be taught to go without that for which they long.
While they are young children, and cannot reason on their own, the reason to which they
are to submit their desires is that of their parents or tutors.7 Children are to be taught not
to be slaves to pleasure and pain,8 but to submit those desires to reason, in order to
achieve overall happiness. They begin by submitting to the authority of their parents and
tutors, and gradually learn to submit to their own reason.9
Much of what Locke says about inculcating virtue in Some Thoughts involves
ways in which the father of the child can maintain authority. Because submitting to the
father's authority teaches the child to submit to his own reason, it is paramount that this
authority be established as early as possible. Locke writes:
Locke, Some Thoughts Concerning Education, § 1. 4 Ibid., §33. 5 Ibid. 6 Ibid., §38. 7 Ibid., §36. 8 Ibid., §55. 9 Ibid., §39.
32
Those therefore that intend ever to govern their children, should begin it whilst they are very little, and look that they perfectly comply with the Will of their Parents. Would you have your Son obedient to you when past a Child? Because then to establish the Authority of a Father, as soon as he is capable of Submission, and can understand in whose Power he is. If you would have him stand in awe of you, imprint it in his Infancy; and, as he approaches more to a Man, admit him nearer to your Familiarity: So shall you have him your obedient Subject (as is fit) whilst he is a Child, and your affectionate Friend when he is a Man.10
I cite this passage at length because some11 have argued that this passage suggests
that Locke's educational scheme aims at making people perpetually obedient to the wills
of their fathers. It is hard to resist this conclusion, especially because Locke writes
further on:
Your Authority is to take place and influence his Mind from the very dawning of any Knowledge in him, that it may operate as a natural Principle, whereof he never perceived the beginning, never knew that it was, or could be otherwise. By this, if the Reverence he owes you be established early, it will always be Sacred to him, and it will be as hard for him to resist it, as the Principles of his Nature.
The concern that arises for readers of this passage is that the grown child's
obedience to reason is merely obedience to his father. Locke claims that morality
requires submitting one's desires to reason, but in these passages it appears as though one
is submitting one's desires to the reason of another rather than to one's own reason.
One attempt to avoid this conclusion is Peter Schouls' argument that "since it is
the parents' reason that forces the child to the freedom of rational action, it is, in effect,
10 Ibid., §40. 11 Joseph Carrig, "Liberal Impediments to Liberal Education: The Assent to Locke," The Review of Politics 63 (2001), 48, Nathan Tarcov, Locke's Education for Liberty (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1984), 95. 12 Locke, Some Thoughts Concerning Education, §100.
33
reason that is the child's teacher."13 For Schouls, this follows from the fact that, for
Locke, good parents are those who are ruled by their reason.
It is true that Locke directs his writings at those who are reasonable. Locke ends
Some Thoughts by writing that he has published his thoughts in the hope that it will give
"some small light" to those who "dare venture to consult their own Reason, in the
Education of their Children, rather than wholly to rely upon Old Custom."14 However,
that one is willing to consult one's reason does not imply that one is wholly ruled by it.
Further, even if Locke's intended audience includes only those ruled by their reason, and
thus the will of the fathers he is describing is a will dominated by their reason, this is not
an adequate reply. The concern is that Locke's educational scheme produces adults who
cannot be governed by their own reason, who believe they are governed by their reason
when they are truly being governed by their father's will. Even if that father is governed
by his own reason, it is still the case that one is submitting to the reason of another.
Another way to respond to this worry is to argue that in the passages cited above,
Locke is not referring to adults, but to older children. Thus, when Locke writes of the
son who is "past a child," he refers to a son who is an adolescent. This interpretation,
however, does not take into account two factors: one, that in the first passage Locke
speaks of "a Child" and "a Man" without mentioning a third category, and that in the
second passage, he refers to a "natural principle" which will "always be Sacred to him."
This is a tension in Locke's view. Locke has in mind that when a child matures
he will be ruled by his own reason, and yet he also argues that deference to paternal
authority should be instilled so deeply in a child that it will remain there through
13 Peter A. Schouls, Reasoned Freedom: John Locke and Enlightenment (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1992), 217. 14 Locke, Some Thoughts Concerning Education, §217.
34
adulthood, and will appear to be an innate principle.15 This tension is echoed in Locke's
writing about rationality, which I explore in the following section.
Rationality
Rationality stands alongside virtue as an important educational goal for Locke,
and this is manifest in the fact that reason is an integral part of his conception of virtue.
Locke also claims that children should be reasoned with from the earliest possible age,
for "they understand it as early as they do language; and, if I misobserve not, they love to
be treated as rational creatures, sooner than is imagin'd."16 Reasoning with children will
help them to understand moral rules more easily than dictation, and listening to children's
reasoning will help them to love learning. "Particularly in Morality, Prudence, and
Breeding, Cases should be Put to him, and his Judgment ask'd. This opens the
Understanding better than Maxims, how well soever explain'd, and settles the Rules
better in the Memory for Practice."
Locke is quick to point out that the type of reasoning one should perform with
children is not the same type of reasoning that one would expect of adults. Instead,
children should be taught that what you are asking for is reasonable, "by such Reasons as
their Age and Understanding are capable of, and those proposed always in very few and
plain Words."19 He writes:
The Foundations on which several Duties are built, and the Fountains of Right and Wrong, from which they spring, are not perhaps easily to be let
15 Locke's view of parental authority in the Second Treatise finds some parallels here, and according to Susan Turner, the same tension emerges there as does here. Susan M. Turner, "L'il Savages: Locke and a Sort of Parental Dominion," (Unpublished Manuscript). 16 John Locke, Conduct of the Understanding, Thomas Fowler (New York: Burt Franklin, 1971), §81. 7 Locke, Some Thoughts Concerning Education, §98.
18 Ibid., §81.
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into the Minds of grown Men, not used to abstract their Thoughts from common received Opinions. Much less are Children capable of Reasonings from remote Principles.
The reasons, Locke claims, must be "obvious," and capable of being "felt, and
touched." If no other reasons are available, Locke suggests telling children that the
action in question "will be a Discredit and Disgrace to them, and displease you." He
does not write further as to what kind of reasoning is appropriate for young children.
Locke's description of appropriate reasoning for young children, which involves
not "remote principles" but more simple reasons, leads some to the conclusion that on
Locke's view, there is no real distinction between reasoning with children and using
esteem and disgrace.22 According to Nathan Tarcov, Locke's view is that reasoning
simply involves letting children know in advance which actions will be esteemed and
which will result in disgrace. Locke claims earlier in Some Thoughts that "Good and
Evil, Reward and Punishment, are the only Motives to a rational Creature," and that
children are to be treated as rational creatures.23 Tarcov understands reasoning with
children to be making them aware of the stakes, so that the children can act from the
motives of rational creatures.
Tarcov's conclusion is too quick. While Locke certainly suggests that as a last
resort, one may appeal to the consequences that will arise from the action in question,
especially punishment, his words do not imply that these are the only kinds of reasons
that can be used with children. While children cannot understand long deductions, it is
possible that they could understand a third kind of reason that Tarcov does not mention.
1L/IU. 21 Ibid. 22 Tarcov, Locke's Education for Liberty, 118. 23 Locke, Some Thoughts Concerning Education, §54.
36
In the second part of Some Thoughts, after Locke has given a general outline of a
gentleman's education, he proceeds to speak of particular subjects. These subjects are to
be chosen based on four intended outcomes: wisdom, virtue, good breeding, and
learning.24 While virtue is defined throughout as the power of one's reason to overcome
desire, in this section Locke sets out a new understanding of virtue, the foundation of
which is belief in God. Children should be taught "that God made and governs all
Things, hears and sees every Thing, and does all manner of Good to those that love and
obey Him."25 Locke follows this with an injunction to take notice of a child's particular
tendencies in order to remedy those which lead toward vices. One possibility for the kind
of reasons Locke believes one might give to children for behaving in a particular way is
that Locke had in mind reasons springing from a conception of a good God.
Aside from this, however, there is no reason to think that one could not use as
reasons other kinds of consequences that do not involve punishment, esteem or disgrace.
If one is telling a child not to steal, it is perfectly reasonable to give as a reason that
stealing will harm the person from whom one is stealing.
Given that Locke distinguishes between the kind of reasoning that is appropriate
for children and the kind of reasoning that should be engaged in when one is an adult, it
is worth asking how one is supposed to lead to the other. An adult who is making use of
his reason should be able to reason from remote principles, but Locke maintains that
children are incapable of doing so, at least when they are very young. Locke does not
outline in specific terms how this process is to occur, but it can be expected that he would
suggest that the manner of conversing with children and reasoning together will change
Ibid., §134. Ibid., §136.
37
as the child matures, so that the child could learn through conversation and reasoning
with his parents and tutor how to make full use of his reason. In both the Conduct of the
Understanding26 and in Some Thoughts21 Locke suggests that the study of arithmetic can
help in this regard.
However, Locke also rejects the study of rhetoric and logic as a means to better
one's rationality. He rejects these because "of the little advantage young People receive
by them. For I have seldom or never observed any one to get the Skill of reasoning well,
or speaking handsomly by studying those Rules which pretend to teach it." Locke's
emphasis is on reasoning well, and the "contemplation and study of those Formalities" is
not the best way to get there: "Right Reasoning is founded on something else than the
Predicaments and Predicables, and does not consist in talking in Mode and Figure it
self."29 Locke does not say outright that his curriculum excludes logic and rhetoric, but
his tone suggests it. He introduces them thus: "Rhetorick and Logick being the Arts, that
in the ordinary method usually follow immediately after Grammar, it may perhaps be
wondered that I have said so little of them,"30 and then follows this introduction with the
passage cited above. There is thus no reason to believe that he includes them, especially
considering the fact that he speaks negatively about teaching logic throughout Some
Thoughts.
Locke also objects to the current educational practice of disputations, formal
debates which took place in the context of the university, and with which Locke would
26 Locke, Conduct of the Understanding, §7. 27 Locke, Some Thoughts Concerning Education, §180. 28 Ibid., §188. 29 Ibid. 30 Ibid. 31 Yolton and Yolton, who claim that he does include them, are therefore wrong. Yolton and Yolton, Some Thoughts Concerning Education, 33.
38
have had first-hand experience at Oxford.32 Locke claims that in current education, "we
learn not to Live, but to Dispute; and our Education fits us rather for the University, than
the World." Disputations, according to Locke, do not teach one to distinguish between
truth and falsehood. Teaching one's son disputations will either lead him to become an
"insignificant Wrangler," "priding himself in contradicting others," or worse,
"questioning every thing, and thinking there is no such thing as truth to be sought, but
only Victory in Disputing."33 Disputations teach students not to yield to reasoned
arguments, but to stick to one side of a dispute no matter what. According to Locke, the
truth is found by due consideration of things themselves, and not by artificial terms and
ways of arguing.34 In the Conduct, Locke adds that disputations teach one to judge
matters by one argument rather than by all of the relevant arguments,35 and to make
artificial distinctions and to use words which do not correspond to clear ideas.36 One
cannot help making the connection here to Plato's concern at Republic VII 537-539, that
young people exposed to dialectical questioning will play at contradiction for sport, and
lose sight of truth and falsehood.
In speaking of education to reason, Locke rejects logic, rhetoric, and disputations
as not being conducive to finding the truth. He suggests that arithmetic can help one's
reasoning skills, and that parents can reason with their children based upon their age and
abilities. What is still missing from this account is an understanding of what the rational
adult formed by Locke's educational scheme will look like. This is not spelled out in
32 According to Richard Yeo, "Locke was describing "practices which he knew first hand as a student and teacher at Christ Church, Oxford." Richard Yeo, "John Locke's 'Of Study' (1677): Interpreting an Unpublished Essay," Locke Studies 3 (2003), 156. 33 Locke, Some Thoughts Concerning Education, §189. 34 Ibid. 35 Locke, Conduct of the Understanding, §7. 36 Ibid., §31.
39
Some Thoughts, and it is thus useful to consider Locke's writings about mature rationality
in the Conduct of the Understanding.
It should first be noted that Locke's use of the word "understanding" in the
Conduct should not be equated with his use of the word "reason" in Some Thoughts.
Locke begins the Conduct by claiming that "the will itself, how absolute and
uncontrollable it may be thought, never fails in its obedience to the dictates of the
understanding."37 Since Locke's definition of virtue in Some Thoughts is reason's
mastery over one's passions, unless all human beings are virtuous by definition, which is
certainly false, "understanding" has a different sense here than "reason" does in Some
Thoughts. Reason in the Conduct is a faculty of one's understanding,38 a definition
which seems consistent with its use in Some Thoughts.
There are two aspects of the Conduct that I wish to highlight. The first is that
Locke believes that right use of one's reason comes through practice.39 The second is
that one should only come to believe some proposition if the evidence is in its favour, and
the evidence will always favour the truth rather than falsehood. Locke writes that "I
never saw any reason yet why truth might not be trusted to its own evidence; I am sure, if
that be not able to support it, there is no fence against error, and then truth and falsehood
are but names that stand for the same things."40 Until we have evidence favouring one
proposition over the other, we must be indifferent toward what we believe is true or false.
We must not desire that one proposition be true rather than the other until we have
Ibid., §1. Ibid., §3. Ibid., §4. Ibid., §34.
40
evidence for it.41 Reason thus requires that one rids oneself of prejudice and to consider
all of the relevant arguments for and against a particular proposition before believing the
proposition that the arguments favour.43 It requires thinking for oneself, rather than
following the opinions of others.44
The question to ask here is whether the person educated in the method prescribed
in Some Thoughts can mature to become an adult who uses his reason in the way
recommended by the Conduct. Several commentators argue that he cannot. Joseph
Carrig argues that the project of habituation and paternal authority means that "the
'educated' are not ruled by their desires, but are 'rational' merely through force of
habit."45 Tarcov claims that Locke finds himself in the position of "simultaneously
siding with reason against custom and advocating the use of custom rather than reason to
teach the qualities that Locke's own reason favors and the world's custom rejects."
Alex Neill, in trying to avoid this conclusion, suggests that Locke's view is that education
instills habits that are necessary in order to allow reason to develop; that education
involves creating the circumstances under which reason can develop on its own.47 Even
if this is so, however, the problem which remains is how the child educated through habit,
through submitting his desires to the will of his father, and through reputation, can grow
up to use his reason to question prejudice, and common opinions, and to believe only that
which he has discovered to rest upon firm foundations.
41 Ibid., §12. 42 Ibid., §10. 43 Ibid., §7. 44 Ibid., §3. This is echoed in the Essay, 4.20. John Locke, An Essay Concerning Human Understanding (London: J.M. Dent & Sons, Ltd., 1961). 45 Carrig, "Liberal Impediments to Liberal Education: The Assent to Locke," 62. 46 Tarcov, Locke's Education for Liberty, 92. 47 Alex Neill, "Locke on Habituation, Autonomy and Education," Journal of the History of Philosophy 27, no. 2 (1989). 48 Locke, Some Thoughts Concerning Education, §58.
41
The underlying tension in Locke's writings on education is thus that Locke's
method for instilling virtue is also a method which seems to undermine rationality.
While children raised on Locke's scheme may acquire good habits, they do so in a way
that prevents reflection on the habits themselves. Further, the way in which they are
trained to think about morality undermines the possibility that they could critically reflect
upon the principles instilled by their fathers. This sort of critical reflection is essential for
intellectual autonomy, according to Locke, and yet it is undermined by his own
educational scheme. After all, as I have outlined above, Locke appears to intend that the
adult remain in awe of his father, accepting his father's esteem as an innate principle. In
other words, Locke's two major educational goals - rationality and virtue - create a
tension in his work that he cannot resolve.
This tension mirrors the tension raised by Plato's concerns in Republic. I have
already noted that Locke's concern about disputations brings this to light, but it is also
true that the same tension exists in Locke and Plato: between instilling moral virtues or
values and encouraging the development of a critical attitude toward received opinions.
In what follows I will outline a similar tension in Rousseau's work.
2.2. Rousseau's Educational Goals
John Locke and Jean-Jacques Rousseau agree on a significant point: that vice is
learned, and a good education leads to virtue. While Locke advocates instilling virtuous
habits from a very young age in order to safeguard against vice, Rousseau advocates for a
"negative education" in a child's early years, which means keeping children away from
42
that which can corrupt, and avoiding the formation of any habit.50 Rousseau's
educational scheme is based on the idea that happiness is achieved by keeping as close to
nature as possible. Unnatural influences, such as the corrupting influence of society,
must be guarded against in a child's education.
For Rousseau, a person within civil society who attempts to preserve the primacy
of the sentiments of nature is always in contradiction with himself, for that person is
always torn between his wishes and his duties. If one is educated solely in the
education of nature, one is raised uniquely for oneself, but if one is raised solely in
society, one is not free. In order to avoid the contradiction, and to remove the obstacles
that impede happiness, education for self and education for society must be integrated.
Rousseau's most important educational work, Emile, ou de I 'education,52 outlines the first
steps toward achieving this integration. This does not mean that education for citizenship
is combined with an education for nature, for Rousseau believes it to be impossible to
make, at the same time, a man and a citizen. This passage has puzzled commentators,
for it appears to undermine the possibility of integration. Joseph Reisert suggests that
what Rousseau has in mind is that "a man 'educated uniquely for himself will also, as a
consequence of his education, be good for others."54 This seems to be what Rousseau has
in mind, given that he claims that the task of Emile is to understand the natural man.53
49 Jean-Jacques Rousseau, "Emile, ou de l'education," in Oeitvres Completes de Jean-Jacques Rousseau, ed. Bernard Gagnebin and Marcel Raymond, (Paris: Gallimard, 1969), 323. 50 Ibid., 282. Rousseau speaks favourably of habit at p. 339, when he claims that imitation can lead to the formation of good habits. Rousseau's overall framework of negative education suggests that the p.339 passage is an anomaly. 51 Ibid., 249-250. 52 Ibid. 53 Ibid., 248. 54 Joseph R. Reisert, Jean-Jacques Rousseau: A Friend of Virtue (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2003), 9. 55 Rousseau, "Emile, ou de l'education," 251.
43
Emile is brought up in accordance with nature, and the later books in the work show what
such a man will look like and how he will relate to others.
Just as it did for Locke, so too for Rousseau reason plays a significant role in
morality. However, the interplay of reason, morality, and moral development is quite
different in Rousseau than it is in Locke.
Virtue
Rousseau offers a complex account of moral development, one in which reason
and sentiments work together to create a virtuous adult, under the guidance of a patient
teacher. A child in his56 early years has no real understanding of morality. Rousseau
claims that though young children have some self-regarding moral sentiments,57 they do
not yet have any moral sentiments which extend to others. This means that young
children should not be punished for failing to act morally,59 though natural consequences
of actions can be used to teach various lessons, such as the concept of property rights.
Rousseau, however, is quick to point out that these kinds of lessons should be limited to
the concept of not harming others, and should only be taught through natural
consequences, not through moral injunctions.61 The most important educational task for
the early years, aside from shielding the child from negative influences, is to teach him to
561 use the masculine pronoun throughout, as Emile's education is only for male children. The education Rousseau prescribes for females will be discussed below. 57 Rousseau, "Emile, ou de l'education," 286. 58 Ibid., 504-505. 59 Ibid., 319. 60 Ibid., 330-334. 61 Ibid., 340.
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suffer, for the content of a young child's virtue is learning not to fight against the laws
of necessity.
When a child reaches puberty, he is born for a second time, for this is when he is
truly born to life. It is also, in a sense, the beginning of his education.64 At puberty,
Emile's passions begin to emerge, and his education takes that into account. Emile's
passions cannot and ought not be destroyed, for as they are a part of nature, they are the
work of God. However, some passions are artificially inflamed and are not the work of
nature. The original passion, and the source of all others, is amour-de-soi, which is
always good as it is the passion which drives us to our own preservation.65 Amour
propre, on the other hand, makes comparisons with others and can lead to unhealthy
passions.66 Much of Emile's adolescent education is devoted to ensuring that amour
propre gives rise to pity for those who are worse off than him, rather than to envy of
those who are better off.67
Pity is the first relative moral sentiment, and involves the act of putting oneself in
the place of others by use of one's imagination. It is not unhealthy, for even though
Emile compares himself to those he pities, he feels the happiness of his own situation.
What it requires is the recognition that he could find himself in the situation in question,
and that is how it arises from self-regarding sentiments. Once a sense of pity is
cultivated, it takes time for the sentiment to generalize to become affection for
Ibid., 300. Ibid., 488. Ibid., 490. Ibid., 491. Ibid., 492. Ibid., 523-526. Ibid., 504. Ibid., 507.
45
humanity.70 When Emile becomes capable of affection, he becomes aware of it, and the
tutor has the ability to acquire a hold over him, because Emile will realize all that his
tutor has done for him. That said, the tutor must be careful to ensure that Emile realizes it
himself rather than being told.71 When Emile is capable of affection, he has entered the
79 '
moral world. The emergence of this sentiment begins Emile's education in helping
others, and his training as a man involves him learning to do good deeds, for it is in doing
good that we become good.73 Emile's learning affections and acting on them is the basis
for learning virtue.74
When Emile reaches the age of twenty or so, he is ready to learn to submit his
passion and desires to his reason. I will speak of the development of Emile's reason
below, as it is developed gradually and carefully. Emile is kept ignorant of his own
sexuality even past puberty, for his own protection.76 However, at the point where he is
ready to enter society, he is to be taught about sexuality in order to protect him from the 77
potential dangers, and to teach him to act on his reason rather than on his passions.
Having learned of the dangers from his teacher's passionate warnings, Emile will place 7S '
himself under his tutor's care in order to learn how to submit to his own reason. Emile
learns the true meaning of virtue when he falls in love with Sophie, and is told by his
teacher that he must leave her for two years. When Emile realizes that he must act
against his passions is when he learns that virtue requires a struggle. Even Emile's pure 70 Ibid., 520. 71 Ibid., 521. 72 Ibid., 522. 73 Ibid., 543. 74 Ibid., 547. 75 Ibid., 637. 76 Ibid., 641. 77 Ibid., 641-651. 78 Ibid., 651.
passionate love for Sophie must be controlled, or else he will be enslaved by it.
Rousseau tells Emile:
Ce qui nous est deffendu par la nature c'est d'etendre nos attachemens plus loin que no forces, ce que nous est deffendu par la raison c'est de vouloir ce que nous ne pouvons obtenir, ce qui nous est deffendu par la conscience n'est pas d'etre tentes, mais de nous laisser vaincre au tentations. II ne depend pas de nous d'avoir ou de n'avoir pas des passions; mais il depend de nous de regner sur elles. Tous les sentiments que nous dominons sont legitimes, tous ceux qui nous dominent sont criminels. °
This rule, according to Rousseau, is not only the guiding principle of virtue and
the rules of morality, but is also the basis of happiness.81 At first glance this seems
identical to Locke's view, but Rousseau's view is more complex than this. Emile's
passions are part of what makes him a good person, for his moral sentiments are the basis
of his care for others. Virtue means not being ruled by one's passions, but one's passions
are also the basis of living well. It is thus not entirely clear what the relationship is
between Emile's correctly groomed passions, and his virtue. Rousseau does claim that
when Emile falls in love with Sophie, he experiences his first passion.82 It follows from
this and the fact that Emile is described as having passions emerge at puberty that the
word "passion" is being used in more than one sense. Further, Rousseau claims earlier
in the work that concepts like justice and goodness are not merely abstractions but are
true affections of the heart enlightened by reason, and that reason alone does not account
79 Ibid., 817-819. 80 Ibid., 819. "What is forbidden us by nature is extending our attachments further than our strength; what is forbidden us by reason is wanting what we cannot obtain; what is forbidden us by conscience is not being tempted, but letting ourselves be conquered by temptation. It does not depend on us having or not having passions, but it depends on us ruling over them. All sentiments which we dominate are legitimate; all those which dominate us are criminal." 81 Ibid., 819-821. 82 Ibid., 818. 83 Rousseau does admit that the words he uses sometimes have more than one sense. Ibid., 345.
47
for any laws of morality. The relationship between reason, affections and virtue is thus
complicated. One interpretation could be that this is an instance where Rousseau's two
aims, making a man and making a citizen, yield a conflict. Emile's natural passions are
what makes him a man, but virtue is required to live in society. However this complexity
is resolved, it is clear that on Rousseau's view, both affections and reason are needed for
moral development, and the educational path chosen for Emile leads him to a kind of
interplay between correctly trained reason and correctly bred affections and passions.
For this reason, it is difficult to separate out Emile's moral education from
Rousseau's conception of reason, but Rousseau's conception of reason is so complex that
it deserves a section of its own. In this next section I will consider Emile's education to
reason and its place in his moral education.
Rationality
Rousseau's conception of educating reason begins with his conception of
happiness, which, for Rousseau, is a state of equilibrium between one's power and one's
will. In other words, the unhappiness that is engendered by society is based on the fact
that society triggers one's imagination to desire more than one has the power to get.
This is why virtue means keeping one's passions in control, so that one does not desire
more than is possible. The only man who is free, according to Rousseau, is the man who
follows his own will and relies on his strength alone.86
This aim is not to be sought by teaching children to reason from a young age,
however. It is not to be taught as Locke teaches it, by having children submit to the
84 Ibid., 522-523. 85 Ibid., 304. 86 Ibid., 309.
48
reason of their parents in order to learn to submit to their own reason. Instead, it is to be
taught in two ways. Children's imaginations must not be allowed to be inflamed by
living in society, and children must be taught to live within the bounds of natural laws.
Rousseau's education "from things," means that young children should only find
resistance in things, not in the wills of others, so that they do not develop
rebelliousness.88 Through this kind of learning children discover that nature imposes
some boundaries on what they may have. Children learn to suffer, and not to fight
against the laws of necessity.90
In the early years, children are capable of what Rousseau calls sensitive reason,
which consists in the formation of simple ideas through the association of sensations.
Once they reach puberty, they are capable of learning to reason at a higher level, which
Rousseau calls intellectual reason, and which consists in the formation of complex ideas
through associating simple ones.91 In coming to learn to use this reason, Emile is
encouraged by engineered circumstances to seek out only that knowledge which is useful
to him. As well, Emile must be encouraged by circumstances to learn and invent things
for himself, rather than to learn from authority of any kind. Substituting authority for
reason will result in Emile being bound by the opinions of others rather than his own
reason.93 Rousseau's method teaches Emile to love truth above all, and to teach him to
find it when needed, and to find it himself.94
87 Ibid., 247. 88 Ibid., 287. 89 Ibid., 300. 90 Ibid., 488. 91 Ibid., 417. 92 Ibid., 448-450. 93 Ibid., 430. 94 Ibid., 486-487.
49
One of the ways in which Rousseau and Locke disagree is about the use of reason
in moral development. While Locke advocates reasoning with young children in order to
persuade them to act in certain ways, Rousseau explicitly rejects this notion. According
to Rousseau, it does not make sense to use reason, a faculty which develops later, to help
develop the other faculties. If children understood reason they would not need education.
Instead of being helpful, reasoning with children is harmful:
En leur parlant des leur bas age une lange qu'ils n'entendent point on les accoutume a se payer de mots, a controller tout ce qu'on leur dit, a se croire aussi sage que leurs maitres, a devenir disputeurs et mutins, et tout ce qu'on pense obtenir d'eux par des motifs raisonables, on ne l'obtient jamais que par ceux de convoitise ou de crainte ou de vanite qu'on est toujours force d'y joindre.95
Rousseau gives an example of what such reasoning will look like - it is always
either circular or dependent upon threats of punishment. 6 The fear of punishment
makes children deceitful and makes them rebel against what they perceive as the tyranny
of their teacher. All of a young child's education is devoted to avoiding the corrupting
influence of authority, which can lead a child to develop inflamed amour-propre. The
idea of not reasoning with children is based on this premise.
However, once young children become adolescents and their intellectual reason
begins to develop, the ban on reasoning with children is lifted. While Rousseau, like
Locke, recognizes that adolescents should be kept away from disputations, he
endeavours to teach Emile to seek the truth.
Ibid., 317. "In speaking to them from a young age a language they do not hear, we accustom them to use words to their advantage, to control everything that is said to them, to think themselves as wise as their masters, to become disputatious and mutinous, and everything that we think we can obtain from them by reasonable motives, we only obtain by the motives of greed, fear or vanity which we are always forced to join to the reasonable ones." 96 Ibid., 318. 97 Ibid., 319. 98 Ibid., 237, 546.
50
One way in which Rousseau explains how Emile will learn to use this
intellectual reason is outlined in the sub-section entitled "Profession de Foi du Vicaire
Savoyard" (Profession of Faith of the Savoyard Vicar). Rousseau claims that Emile will
not have his religion chosen for him, for religion is mostly the opinions of men, but he
will be placed into a condition to choose for himself the one to which the best use of his
reason leads him." Rousseau uses a story from his own life as an illustration of how
such a preparation could occur. As a young man, who through his own folly was poor
and exiled, and through his experience of corrupt people, including corrupt clergymen, he
learned to see nothing but evil, to renounce virtue and religion as a mask for selfishness
and hypocrisy, to see heaven and hell as mere prizes for disputations.100 A kind vicar
takes him in, and to help him to find truth about virtue and religion, recounts his own
similar story, in which the vicar himself was subject to similar doubts. Philosophers
multiplied those doubts by caring more about winning than about seeking the truth, and
so the vicar decided to rely on his reason and experience alone to find the truth.101
The vicar's story amounts to a vindication of natural religion,102 and morality
based solely on one's conscience.103 For Rousseau, teaching Emile about religion should
take something like this form. Generally:
Tant qu'on me donne rien a l'autorite des hommes ni aux prejuges du pays ou l'on est ne, les seules lumieres (sic) de la raison ne peuvent dans l'institution de la nature nous mener plus loin que la religion naturelle, et c'est a quoi je me borne avec mon Emile. S'il en doit avoir une autre, je n'ai plus en cela le droit d'etre son guide; c'est a lui seule de la choisir.104
99 Ibid., 558. 100 Ibid., 560. 101 Ibid., 568-569. 102 Ibid., 607. 103 Ibid., 594-599. 104 Ibid., 635-636. "So long as nothing is given me by the authority of men or by the prejudices of my native country, reason's light alone can only, in the institution of nature, lead us as far as natural religion,
51
Once Emile has an understanding of God, Rousseau believes that he will have a
new understanding of morality, for the love for God mingles with his own amour de soi,
and then alone does Emile find a true interest in being good.105 This appears to be
connected to the idea that Emile is learning to submit his passions to his reason, for
Emile's reason tells him that he has an interest in pleasing God. As I have already noted,
Rousseau's conception of virtue is full of complexities. While he is being taught to
submit his passions to his reason, his tutor is making use of those passions in order to
convince Emile to follow the right path. Rousseau claims that when he is attempting to
convince Emile to act rightly, he is not reasoning "drily," but passionately.106 Early on in
the work, Rousseau claims that the reason that young children are not capable of
understanding morality and why their actions have no moral content is that reason alone
teaches us to know good and evil. Conscience teaches us to love the one and hate the
other, but cannot develop without reason.107
Perhaps the reason Rousseau's view is so difficult to sort out is that the book
seems to be attempting to aim at many goals at once. It is, by Rousseau's own admission,
an attempt to understand what a man educated from nature would look like. However, it
is also a work in moral psychology, political philosophy, and philosophy of religion. It is
not always clear whether a claim that Rousseau is making about moral psychology is
intended to be a description of one stage of Emile's education, a description of an ideal
citizen, a description of natural man, or a construct for the sake of examining a particular
and that is to what I limit myself with my Emile. If he needs another, I no longer have the right to be his guide; it's up to him alone to choose it." 105 Ibid., 636. 106 Ibid., 645-649. 107 Ibid., 288.
52
type of education. Working out the relationship between reason, morality and virtue is
thus not a straightforward matter.
These difficulties aside, there are many criticisms that can be made with regard to
Rousseau's description of Emile's moral education. Julia Simon worries that Emile's
unrestricted liberty in childhood makes it impossible that Emile could one day learn to
submit his desires to his reason, and that Rousseau's reliance on concepts of
contractual obligations and rights means that Emile will be incapable of forming healthy
attachments to others.109 Timothy O'Hagan critiques Rousseau for his use of
concealment and manipulation in Emile's education, for he claims that such an education
will not likely produce an autonomous, honest adult.110
One serious criticism concerns Rousseau's prescriptions for the education of
Emile's wife, Sophie. Sophie is given what Rousseau believes is the correct education
for a woman, given that the primary role of women is to please men. Her education is
almost precisely the opposite of Emile's, for her virtue is based on reputation rather than
on personal freedom,112 and thus her life is characterized by learning to submit to others
rather than to her own reason. Her early education involves discipline and punishment so
she can learn the tasks expected of her as a woman,113 and she is to have little freedom, so
that she can learn to submit to her husband's injustices and life's annoyances without
complaint.114 Further, as a woman's conduct is ruled by opinion, so her religion is ruled
108 Julia Simon, "Jean-Jacques Rousseau's Children," in The Philosopher's Child: Critical Perspectives in the Western Tradition, ed. Susan M. Turner and Gareth M. Matthews, (Rochester: University of Rochester Press, 1998), 111. 109 Ibid., 114. 110 Timothy O'Hagan, Rousseau (London: Routledge, 1999), 81. 111 Rousseau, "Emile, ou de l'education," 693. 112 Ibid., 702-703. 113 Ibid., 708. 114 Ibid., 710.
53
by authority.115 Rousseau does claim that she should use her reason to balance prejudice
and her own conscience, but this is done solely so that she can maintain her good
reputation for the sake of her family.116
Though Rousseau's treatment of the education of women is long and complex,
those are its central tenets. Given Rousseau's rejection of prejudices, it is surprising that
his view of women is so in line with the prejudices of his day. Some commentators claim
that this is simply a result of his unreflective patriarchy and violates his overall social
theory,117 while others believe that it is the genuine application of his social theory and
I 1 Q
views about nature. Whatever the origin of his views about women, however, they are
a startling example of patriarchal thinking, and should be rejected.
The final major criticism of Rousseau's educational work is that it produces an
adult who is incapable of freedom and autonomy. In the final pages of Emile, Emile
claims that now that he has a child of his own, he needs his teacher more than ever, and 1 1 Q r
will need him for the rest of his life. In the unfinished sequel to Emile, once Rousseau
leaves Emile and Sophie, their lives fall completely to pieces. It should be asked
whether Rousseau's man educated by nature is really capable of living in society, or
whether his plan was, even in his own view, a failure.
115 Ibid., 721. 116 Ibid., 730-731. 117 Susan Moller Okin, Women in Western Political Thought (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1979), 99. 118 Susan Meld Shell, "Emile: Nature and the Education of Sophie," in The Cambridge Companion to Rousseau, ed. Patrick Riley, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001), 273. 119 Rousseau, "Emile, ou de 1'education," 867. 120 Jean-Jacques Rousseau, "Emile et Sophie, ou Les Solitaires," in Oeuvres Completes de Jean-Jacques Rousseau, ed. Bernard Gagnebin and Marcel Raymond, (Paris: Gallimard, 1969).
54
2.3. Conclusions
All of these criticisms of Rousseau's work point to one overriding concern: that
Emile's moral education does not produce a virtuous and autonomous adult. While he is
taught to question all authority, he is perpetually submissive to his tutor's authority. In
this way, the failing of Rousseau's view is similar to the failing of Locke's view.
Locke's young pupils are also perpetually submissive to the moral authority of another.
While both authors intend to create adults who are both virtuous and critical of authority,
they both end up producing adults who are in perpetual obedience to the reason of
another. Neither can see a way in which moral education could take place without
indoctrination or deference to authority.
55
CHAPTER 3: TRADITION AND COMMUNITY IN THE MORAL LIFE
In the historical background I have outlined so far, two views have emerged. In
the tradition of Socrates, both Locke and Rousseau emphasized the value of intellectual
autonomy. What is central to both thinkers' educational projects, and indeed to Socrates'
mission, is the idea that thinking critically and independently is crucial to a life lived
well. While I have argued that both Locke and Rousseau failed in their attempts to
create an educational project that realized this goal, it is nonetheless true that both
attempted to reach it because they believed it to be valuable.
On the other hand, there is Plato's elitist conception that only a few should be
permitted to think critically, especially about received traditions, because the masses are
not able to think in a productive way. Plato's view, in contrast to the Socratic view, is
that the examined life can only be lived by a select few. In the case of ordinary people,
their lives are best lived by unreflectively believing what is told them by the intellectual
elite.
In this chapter I consider a third strand of thought, which is in contrast to the
individualism about reason present in Locke and Rousseau's educational aims, and in
contrast to Plato's elitism. This is the view that thinking necessarily occurs in particular
contexts, and is best when performed in a community rather than on one's own. While
Deweyan pragmatists and Thomists disagree on many points, in their general approach to
thinking they are similar in their emphasis on thinking in community.
This community-based thinking is intended in part to be a remedy against Plato's
worry that too much critical thinking can be destructive. In each case the value of
received tradition is emphasized. Not all of the thinkers considered here agree about the
56
degree to which tradition should be valued, but each limits the scope of critical thinking
by reference to shared values and practices.
In the contemporary context this third way provides an alternative to the emphasis
on individualism that might be present in an ethics classroom or indeed a critical thinking
classroom.1 It is an alternative to an ethic of belief that claims that each person must be
able to justify each of his or her own beliefs. It opens the door to the possibility that
justification might be a shared enterprise; that in order to be intellectually virtuous each
person need not question all of his or her beliefs.
3.1. Dewey's Pragmatic Approach to Education
John Dewey's theory of education is a theory of education for a democratic
society. On his view, education aims at transmitting the aims and habits of life to the
next generation, and is thus a fundamentally social process. Since it is a social process,
any critique of education must presuppose a particular social ideal, according to Dewey.
Dewey's democratic social ideal measures the worth of a form of social life by
two points: "the extent in which the interests of a group are shared by all its members,
1 To see the individualism that is often present in critical thinking teaching contexts one need only look to the introductions to many critical thinking textbooks. Perhaps the starkest example is in Lewis Vaughn's textbook: "If you passively accepted beliefs that have been handed to you by your parents, your culture, or your teachers, then those beliefs are not really yours. You just happened to be in a certain place and time when they were handed out. If they are not really yours, and you let them guide your choices and actions, then they—not you—are in charge of your life. Your beliefs are yours only if you critically examine them for yourself to see if they are supported by good reasons. To examine your beliefs in this way is to examine your life, for your beliefs in large measure define your life. To forego such scrutiny is abandon your chance of making your life deliberately and authentically meaningful." Lewis Vaughn, The Power of Critical Thinking: Effective Reasoning about Ordinary and Extraordinary Claims (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005), 5. Most textbooks do not make this claim so explicit but certainly many laud Socrates' ideal of the examined life. 2 John Dewey, "Democracy and Education," in John Dewey: The Middle Works, 1899-1924, ed. Jo Ann Boydston, (Carbondale, II: Southern Illinois University Press, 1980), 6. 3 Ibid., 105.
57
and the fullness and freedom with which it interacts with other groups." A society that
scores well on these points is democratic, and a society which does not is not democratic.
Societies that are not democratic set up barriers to free communication of
experience, and thus cannot have values in common. This lack makes intellectual
stimulation unbalanced, and means that thoughts and routines are not challenged.5
Democratic societies, on the other hand, make provision for the participation of all
members on equal terms, and allow interactions between different forms of associated
life to adjust its institutions.6 Dewey frequently emphasizes the fact that social progress
comes from social intercourse between various groups, especially socio-economic groups
and those with varying kinds of livelihoods. Interactions between those whose work is
menial and those whose work is more cerebral can not only help in creating
understanding between the two groups, but can contribute to improving the situation of
those who find themselves in disadvantaged groups. In this light, Dewey argues against
the idea that education should be divided into liberal and technical schools, and supports
the idea of the comprehensive school.
According to Dewey, this conception of democracy means that education has two
primary and interrelated goals: to promote reflective thinking and to enable individuals to
live well in society. These two goals together mean that "all educational institutions
should be equipped so as to give students an opportunity for acquiring and testing ideas
and information in active pursuits typifying important social situations." Activities are
4 Ibid. 5 Ibid., 90. 6 Ibid., 105. 7 Ibid., 169.
58
central to Dewey's conception of education, and are understood to enable thinking well
and living well.
In this section I will offer an analysis of Dewey's views on these two educational
o
goals, by reference to several shorter early works, as well as Democracy and Education,
a mid-career work which was his most important work on education, and his later work
on teaching thinking, How We Think?
Reflective Thinking as an Educational Goal
For Dewey, reflective thinking consists in "active, persistent, and careful
consideration of any belief or supposed form of knowledge in the light of the grounds
that support it and the further conclusions to which it tends," which "includes a conscious
and voluntary effort to establish belief upon a firm basis of evidence and rationality."10 It
is thus distinguished from other types of thinking such as daydreaming or simply having
images or thoughts appear into one's mind.
Reflective thinking is not, however, found only in ivory towers, for it occurs in
ordinary situations. While it involves considering one's belief and one's grounds for
holding it, reflective thinking takes place in situations where determining which belief is
true or justified is important to resolving some problem. An ordinary situation such as
attempting to arrive at an appointment on time and weighing one's options can involve
reflective thinking, for one is considering which path is most likely to result in success,
and the reasons one has for believing that the path in question is the best one. Reflective
8 Ibid. 9 John Dewey, "How We Think," in John Dewey: The Later Works, 1925-1953, ed. Jo Ann Boydston, (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1986). 10 Ibid., 118.
59
thinking can take place in situations involving concrete problems such as this, or in
situations involving more abstract problems to be solved, such as proposing to students
hypothetical situations where a moral judgment is required. In all cases it involves two
stages: a state of doubt or perplexity, which is the origin of thinking, and the act of
searching for material that will resolve the perplexity. ' Thinking consists in problem
1 9
solving, and no thinking will take place unless there is some problem motivating it.
In defending these claims Dewey points to three values that he ascribes to
reflective thought. First, it "emancipates us from merely impulsive and merely routine
activity," or, in positive terms, it allows us to plan our actions.13 Without being able to
make connections between events and ideas, we would not be able to act in a deliberate
way. Second, it makes possible systematic preparations and inventions, allowing us to
develop signs, such as lighthouses and warning buoys, to remind us in advance of
consequences.14 Finally, it enriches things with meanings, by conferring upon physical
events and objects "a very different status and value from those which they possess to a
being that does not reflect."15 Rather than being "mere excitations of sense organs," they
are charged with significance through repeated, thoughtful experience of them.16 In this
light, reflective thinking is what separates us from unthinking animals, and allows us to
act consciously and intentionally.
Given all of this, the two main reasons for training thought are that although
thought "frees us from servile subjection to instinct, appetite, and routine," it also "opens
11 Ibid., 121. 12 Ibid., 135. 13 Ibid., 125. 14 Ibid., 126. 15 Ibid., 127.
the possibility of failures," such as errors in reasoning and mistakes about consequences,
"to which the animal, limited to instinct, cannot sink."17 Though reflective thought
allows us to act deliberately, since it is prone to error, it must be trained well.
Because many of the errors involved with thinking come from dispositions, such
as the disposition to place too must trust in authority figures, Dewey argues that training
thought requires training dispositions. Set exercises in correct thinking cannot by repeat
performance cause one to think well, for "no individual realizes their value except as he
is personally animated by certain dominant attitudes in his own character."18 Though one
may have all of the thinking skills required to think well, if one is not motivated by
dispositions to use those thinking skills, one will not use them.
Dewey argues that there are three dispositions that are favourable to thinking
well. First, open-mindedness, which consists in "freedom from prejudice, partisanship,
and such other habits as close the mind and make it unwilling to consider new problems
and consider new ideas." This is active rather than passive, for open-mindedness does
not mean taking in any idea that comes along, but seeking out new ideas which are
illuminating.19 The second is whole-heartedness, which means taking interest in the
subject itself, rather than working for some external cause. Dewey argues that it is
especially important to allow students to pursue activities for their own sake, rather than
in order to receive some external reward. Whole-heartedness appears to be a
combination of two dispositions in Dewey's earlier conception, called "directness" and
Ibid., 130. Ibid., 135. Ibid., 136. Ibid., 137.
61
"single-mindedness," in Democracy and Education.21 He repeatedly criticizes
classrooms in which the only motivation to pursue some task is to gain the teacher's
approbation or to receive a high grade. Students must be enabled to pursue activities
which they deem to be intrinsically important. Finally is responsibility, which involves
willingly adopting the consequences of a position one already has taken. This last
99
attitude secures integrity, which consists in "consistency and harmony in belief."
Essentially, "upon its intellectual side education consists in the formation of wide
awake, careful, thorough habits of thinking."23 This does not happen through external
pressures or the imposition of formal structures, but through placing students in situations
where thinking is required of them in order to solve some problem in which they are
interested. 4 To give an example, in order for students to learn mathematical skills,
instead of setting textbook examples, they can be sent to the store to buy materials for a
carpentry project they are working on, and left to calculate the bill themselves.25 Rather
than learning mathematical skills in order to do well on exams, students will learn the
same skills because they see them as useful in real situations.
Generally, each educational situation should involve an activity pursued for its
own sake, a point that Dewey stresses throughout. The students in the above example
who are buying materials for a project they are working on are pursuing the overall
project for its own sake, not in order to receive a grade. Basing education upon such
principles involves creating an environment in which students pursue projects because
they deem them to be worthwhile. Dewey claims that this is essential for true learning. 21 Dewey, "Democracy and Education," 181-83. 22 Dewey, "How We Think," 138. 23 Ibid., 177. 24 Ibid., 180-83. 25 Ibid., 194.
Each educational situation should also involve a move from uncertainty to clarity
through thinking.26 In the contexts in which a student finds him or herself, it should be
useful to think reflectively in order to solve some particular problem. In the mathematics
case above, it is clear to the students that some amount of thinking is required in order to
pursue the carpentry project.
Given these two requirements for educational situations, it should come as no
surprise that Dewey advocates a certain amount of freedom in schools. Not only is it
necessary for encouraging students to pursue activities for their own sake, it is necessary
97 98
for thinking. For Dewey, one is only truly thinking if one is free to think for oneself,
for thinking involves solving a problem in which one is personally invested. Dewey
claims that freedom "designates a mental attitude rather than external unconstraint of
movements, but that this quality of mind cannot develop without a fair leeway of
movements in exploration, experimentation, application, etc." In other words, the
mental freedom required for reflective thought cannot develop without a relatively free
environment in which to learn. Students cannot pursue what they perceive to be
intrinsically valuable activities if their education is overly structured. Freedom is
required in order for students to think reflectively at all, and also for students to learn to
use reflective thinking well.
In this light, a useful distinction can be drawn between what Dewey calls
"objective knowledge," which is what is taken for granted in social intercourse, and
"subjective thinking," which starts from uncertainty and critiques and revises
26 Ibid., 195. 27 Dewey, "Democracy and Education," 311. 28 Ibid., 312. 29 Ibid., 314-15.
63
knowledge.30 Objective knowledge is necessary for social interactions, as it is the
common ground for those interactions. However, living in a democratic society as
Dewey conceives it means constantly learning from social interactions how to improve
those interactions and to improve social life. In this way, objective knowledge and
subjective thinking remain in balance, where customs make thinking possible, but
thinking can question those customs in order to improve them.
That said, the process of revising should be done a little at a time, without
throwing out all that has come before, and in order to allow for a "reorganization of prior
intellectual habitudes." The role of the individual is thus the "redirection, or
reconstruction of accepted beliefs," a role which can only be played in a society which
allows individuals to think freely and trains them to think critically. The training to
reflective thinking thus prepares students for becoming free individuals who can live in
and contribute to democratic societies.
Moral Living as an Educational Goal
Dewey argues that since moral considerations are the deepest and most common
of all the problems of life, it is most important for students to think about them
intelligently, since their habits will then extend out to other problems as well. While in
most areas transfer of thinking is difficult, thinking on these "human and social factors,"
can carry over, and "furnish the material best suited for developing generalized abilities
of thinking."33
30 Ibid., 304. 31 Ibid., 305. 32 Dewey, "How We Think," 165. 33 Ibid., 167.
64
Thinking about moral considerations is not thinking about abstract principles,
however. Dewey carefully distances himself from traditional theories of morality and
conceives of the study of morality as a fundamentally practical one. In "Teaching Ethics
in the High School," an early work, Dewey claims:
Ethics, rightly conceived, is the statement of human relationships in action. In any right study of ethics, then, the pupil is not studying hard and fixed rules for conduct; he is studying the ways in which men are bound together in the complex relations of their interactions. He is not studying, in an introspective way, his own sentiments and moral attitudes; he is studying facts as objective as those of hydrostatics or of the action of dynamos.34
For this reason, the teaching of ethics must not fall back onto principles, but must
inculcate in the pupil the habit of mentally constructing some actual scene of human
interaction, and of consulting that for instruction as to what to do. The focus is on cases
rather than on principles. Thus, in the process of teaching, cases where a person is in
need should be put to students, and they should be expected to think about how to decide
what to do in a given case: whether to offer help, and what kind of help to offer.
Dewey has in mind here cases where charity is called for, such as meeting a person who
is in a state of miserable poverty. In such cases, students can think reflectively about how
to be charitable in the most helpful way possible. Dewey claims that the goal in such a
method is "the formation of a sympathetic imagination for human relations in action; this
is the ideal which is substituted for training in moral rules, or for analysis of one's
sentiments and attitude in conduct."
34 John Dewey, "Teaching Ethics in the High School," in John Dewey: The Early Works 1882-1898, ed. Jo Ann Boydston, (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1971), 56. 35 Ibid., 57. 36 Ibid., 56. 37 Ibid., 57. Emphasis in original.
65
Studying human relationships in the context of action allows students to conceive
of acting morally rather than to think abstractly about moral rules. Dewey emphasizes
that the study he has in mind is not the study of ethical theory, but of the content of
human relationships.38 For this reason, the study of ethics is the study of how human
beings actually do interact, and is thus a study of empirical facts rather than normative
ones. In studying these facts, Dewey believes that students will be better able to interact
well with others, without being given rules or principles for how they ought to do so.
Dewey does not explain further how this process will occur. However, it is
possible to better understand his claim by returning to his view of thinking as problem-
solving. Each student learns the facts of how humans interact, and in so doing learns
about the various problems which arise from human interactions. Having learned to think
reflectively, students can think about how to address or resolve those problems. In
thinking about troubling cases, students can conceive of how those cases might be
resolved. What is still missing, however, is the mechanism by which a sympathetic
imagination will develop. One can imagine students who can think well about how to
resolve a particular problem without being at all motivated to put their solution into
action. Dewey's solution appears to be the inculcation of habits. Just as habits of
thinking are intended to lead to dispositions, what might be called "moral habits" can
lead to moral dispositions.
Determining whether Dewey is correct, that is, whether it is true that learning to
think through situations which involve human interactions will lead to the development
of moral dispositions and a sympathetic imagination, would involve complex sociological
and psychological studies tracking the moral development of children. For this reason, I
38 Ibid., 60.
will put this particular issue aside and return to Dewey's general claim about moral
education. For Dewey, moral thinking, like all reflective thinking, must be grounded in
activity and practice rather than in abstractions. Learning to live the moral life is not
merely a matter of intellect but a matter of practice. Thus, though students can learn by
thinking about hypothetical cases, participating in shared activities is even more effective
at teaching students to live with others. An activity which involves cooperation with
others imparts moral knowledge, for it "builds up a social interest and confers the
intelligence needed to make that interest effective in practice." One can assume that
Dewey has in mind the same type of process as that which occurs when students are
studying cases. By learning how to respond to problems that arise from human
interactions, students learn to think morally and to cooperate with others.
Since morality involves living with others, to be virtuous does not consist merely
in cultivating a few character traits, but means "to be fully and adequately what one is
capable of becoming through association with others in all the offices of life."4 In other
words, a fully moral person is one who lives well with others in every respect. Education
for morality thus means a social education that involves cooperation, and which involves
connections with life outside school to breach the gap between the school and the society
of which it is a part.41 In this way, the school is not an artificial institution which is
separate from human interactions, but an integral part of human interaction.
Dewey's overall context is that education's main purpose is for social life. This
means that all education has a moral component, and even the intellectual dispositions
discussed above are called moral ones, for they enable individuals to live well in
39 Dewey, "Democracy and Education," 366. 40 Ibid., 368.
society. The implication of this educational context is that cooperation with others is
the method of education, and also its goal. By sharing activities with others in school,
students learn to think well and to interact well, so that they can think and interact well
when they are sharing activities with others outside school.
The process of teaching students to interact well with others is not only intended
to contribute to individual improvement, but also to contribute to social progress. In his
early "My Pedagogic Creed," Dewey claims that because education involves learning to
adjust one's activity on the basis of social consciousness, "education is the fundamental
method of social progress and reform."43 Dewey claims in "Moral Principles in
Education" that "the introduction of every method that appeals to the child's active
powers, to his capacities in construction, production, and creation, marks an opportunity
to shift the centre of ethical gravity from an absorption which is selfish to a service which
is social."44
This means that activities in school ought to teach students to think reflectively
and to cooperate, but ought also to encourage a spirit of social service rather than
selfishness. Dewey's ideal school involves students working together in practical
projects such as gardening and small-scale farming. These types of activity can be
pursued for their own sake, but they also teach students to cooperate. As well, since an
important feature of school activities is that they connect with the world outside the
school, choosing activities such as farming is a good way to bridge the gap between
school life and extracurricular life. This is especially true in cases where the activity
42 Ibid., 366. 43 John Dewey, "My Pedagogic Creed," in John Dewey: The Early Works, 1882-1898, ed. Jo Ann Boydston, (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1972), 93. 44 John Dewey, "Moral Principles in Education," in John Dewey: The Middle Works, 1899-1924, ed. Jo Ann Boydston, (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1977), 277.
68
itself bridges the gap by involving members of the community in some way; e.g., by
trading produce with local farmers, or buying tools from local tradespeople.
Dewey's commitment to social progress means that his two educational goals,
reflective thinking and moral living, work together to enable individuals to contribute to
positive social change. Individuals with a well-formed moral imagination use their
reflective thinking to consider how to address problems caused by shared social practices.
Some of these problems arise from unreflective habits which must be questioned.
Dewey's view, as noted above, involves an attempted balance between unreflective
habits and reflective thought. On the one hand, education involves the formation of
habits, and societal customs are called "objective knowledge." On the other hand,
individuals are trained to use reflective thinking to analyse and critique this knowledge.
However, this reflective thinking does not consist in upturning habits for the sake
of change. Dewey claims that much of common life relies upon the assumption that
individuals share a common background. This assumption is what makes social
intercourse possible, and it is sometimes best left in an unconscious attitude. Trying to
formulate it simply for the sake of making it conscious "is both an impertinent influence
and a source of boredom,"45 however, it is also fatal to good thinking "to fail to make
conscious the standing source of some error or recurring failure."46 While Dewey claims
that it is impossible to give a strict rule which will keep these in balance,47 the loose rule
seems to be that "where the shoe pinches, analytic examination is needed."
Dewey, "How We Think," 343. Ibid., 344. Ibid., 343. Ibid., 344.
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This claim follows from Dewey's idea that reflective thinking always begins with
doubt. In other words, inquiry should never involve doubt for the sake of doubting, but
work toward resolving some doubt which is already present. Inquiry should not
introduce new doubts; rather it aims to resolve doubts that arise from experience and
from attempts at living together. This theme also presents itself in Dewey's conception
of philosophy. Taking the stance of an inquirer is taking the stance of a scientist, and
"philosophy is the standpoint of science extended to all life."49 Philosophers go "beneath
the surface and inquire," but "inquiry proves that a man has already had something which
he believed to be true, and also some doubt or dissatisfaction."5
In interpreting Dewey's views on this matter, it is important to keep in mind that
the relationship between his empirical claims and his normative ones is often less than
clear. It is not entirely apparent whether he is saying that thinking always does begin
with doubt, or that good thinking only should begin with doubt. However, for Dewey,
this lack of clarity exists because the subject matter is itself neither fully empirical nor
fully normative. Dewey begins How We Think by claiming that "no one can tell another
person in any definite way how he should think, any more than how he ought to breathe
or have his blood circulate,"51 but that one can describe the various ways in which people
do think, and give reasons for why some are better than others. If one has a good
understanding of how one's thinking could be better, it is easier to improve.
What is evident is that inquiry always has practical ends, for it is always directed
at understanding and solving a particular problem. Moral inquiry is directed at solving
49 John Dewey, "The Relation of Philosophy to Theology," in John Dewey: The Early Works 1882-1898, ed. Jo Ann Boydston, (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1971), 365. 50 Ibid. 51 Dewey, "How We Think," 114.
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practical problems which arise from living in society, not at elucidating the metaphysical
foundations of moral claims. This is Dewey's pragmatism at work.
In this light, Dewey's thoughts about teaching thinking and teaching morality can
be read as attempting to combine reflective thinking with the acceptance of some
customary morality. Though thinking can lead to change, moral practices need not be
questioned unless there is some reason to question them in the form of a practical
problem needing to be solved. Though Dewey is short on examples, one might think
here of something like the "murderer-at-the-door" example. One ought to question the
rule against lying if lying would mean revealing the location of one's friend to a
murderer. In a situation where a moral practice such as truth-telling would lead to
appalling consequences, Dewey would recommend thinking reflectively about whether or
not that practice is always a good one, and perhaps abandoning it as an absolute rule.
Though students should not be taught to question all moral rules for the sake of critical
inquiry, they should be prepared to question them in situations where following them
leads to problems.
Dewey's educational goals thus involve teaching students to take a practical
view of all inquiry, and especially of moral inquiry. Reflective thinking begins with
doubt, and in this context it begins with doubt about a particular social practice.
Questioning one's own beliefs begins with doubt; for Dewey, the examined life is worth
living insofar as it contributes to improving social relations.
While Dewey and Aquinas and his followers are not generally considered to be
similar thinkers, they share a rejection of the individualism that is so central to Locke and
Rousseau's views of reason and morality. Neither Dewey nor any of the Thomists value
71
intellectual and moral autonomy in the way that Locke and Rousseau do; at least they do
not believe that tradition and inherited social practices should be rejected for the sake of
autonomy. In what follows I will elucidate the Thomistic way of thinking in more detail.
3.2. Virtue and Tradition in Thomistic Education
Though Thomas Aquinas wrote no treatises on education, his work in related
areas has been used by many Thomists to ground particular views about education. His
conceptions of natural law and of first principles, which are central to his moral theory
and theology, have been influential in many Thomistic educational writings. These
conceptions also form the background assumptions of much work in Catholic moral
philosophy and theology, including many papal encyclicals.
In this section I will examine the relationship in Thomistic thought between
reason, first principles, and natural law. What emerges from this analysis is the primacy
of moral virtue in the moral life, for one's moral judgment depends upon the possession
of virtuous habits. This conception, central to Aquinas' moral theory, is also central to
the educational theories of many Thomists. I will position two of these theories by
beginning with Aquinas himself. Next, I will outline the educational philosophy of
th
Jacques Maritain, who is one of the most influential Thomists of the 20 century. Last, I
will explore Alasdair Maclntyre's examination of the relationship between tradition and
moral inquiry. Generally, I will draw out the ways in which these thinkers have
understood the relationship between education to reason and education to virtue.
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Aquinas: Human Reason and Natural Law
In this section I outline Aquinas' views on reason and natural law. Much of what
Aquinas claims about reason depends upon the presupposition that God exists. His
conception of the provenance of human reason, as well as the source of moral principles,
is theistic through and through. That said, central to his view of moral reasoning is his
idea that moral virtue is a necessary precondition for good moral reasoning. This idea is
not necessarily linked to the belief that God exists, and it is in fact the common thread
that I will pursue throughout this section on Thomism. However, I will first situate that
idea in Aquinas' general view of reason.
For Aquinas, there are two kinds of truths, and this is most evident in the context
of theology. There are those truths which are attainable by natural reason, such as the
reality of God's existence, and there are those truths which surpass natural reason, such
as the reality of the Trinity. This is because the human intellect depends upon its senses
for knowledge, and those things which do not "fall under the senses" cannot be grasped
by the human intellect, except insofar as knowledge of them is gathered from sensible
things.54 On this basis, Aquinas argues that one should not reject a claim about God
simply because it cannot be demonstrated by reason.55 Believing in truths which surpass
human reason can aid in curbing presumption56 and in teaching the soul to aim for higher
perfection.
Thomas Aquinas, On the Truth of the Catholic Faith: Summa Contra Gentiles, trans. Anton C. Pegis, vol. I (Garden City: Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1955), 1.3.2. 54 Ibid., 1.3.3. 55 Ibid., 1.3.8. 56 Ibid., 1.5.4. 57 Ibid., 1.5.5.
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Aquinas argues that since natural reason is given to human beings by God, it
follows that it cannot be opposed to the truth of the Christian faith.58 What follows from
it, for Aquinas, is that any arguments brought forward against the Christian faith, even if
they are based on "first and self-evident" principles embedded in nature, are either invalid
or they only make their conclusions probable rather than certain.5 Aquinas'
recommendation is thus that if one encounters an argument which contradicts one's
Christian faith, one should assume that the fault is with the argument, not with
Christianity. The task is then to discover where the error occurred in the argument.
His conception of God-given reason grounds his two-fold conception of truth,
which according to Aquinas is best understood by comparing theology to a science. For
Aquinas, while some sciences are based on principles that are evident through natural
reason, other sciences are based on the principles of higher sciences. Theology, for
Aquinas, is like this second kind of science, for "just as the musician accepts on authority
the principles taught him by the mathematician, so sacred science is established on
principles revealed by God."60 Aquinas reasons that just as these sciences do not argue to
prove their premises, but take them as given to make something known, so theology takes
its premises as given as well. This is why St. Paul can infer the resurrection of all from
the resurrection of Jesus Christ.61
What this two-fold conception of truth implies is that if an opponent accepts none
of the first principles in question then there is no way to make the articles of faith
reasonably credible, except those that are accessible through natural reason. Thus, all one
58 Ibid., 1.7.2. 59 Ibid., 1.7.7. 60 Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, trans. Fathers of the English Dominican Province (1920), 1.1.2. 61 Ibid., 1.1.8.
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can do when responding to an opponent of this kind is to attempt to solve the difficulties
the opponent raises. Because any argument which contradicts Christian doctrine will
contain some flaw, this is a project that can be pursued successfully given enough time
and effort.
This two-fold division of truth exists not only in the realm of theological inquiry,
but in the realm of moral inquiry as well. There is the divine law, which concerns those
things which are necessary for our eternal happiness, but which are beyond our human
reason, and there is the natural law, which is within the grasp of our natural reason.
For Aquinas, a law is a "dictate of practical reason emanating from the ruler who
governs a perfect community."65 Since God is the ruler of the whole human community,
the laws governing that community emanate from him, and are the content of the natural
law. 6 These laws are instilled by God into the minds of human beings so that they can
be known naturally.67
The natural law instilled in the minds of human beings is but one part of the
eternal law, which is imprinted on all things. Each living thing acts in accordance with
fro
the eternal law, because each thing's inclinations are ordered to its proper ends. Every
law of nature flows from the first law of nature: that "good is to be done and pursued, and
evil is to be avoided." This law is not intended to be vacuous, but to capture the fact
that each thing pursues its own good by nature. Each acts toward its own end, which is
the good for that thing in particular. 62 Ibid. 63 Ibid., 11.91.4. 64 Ibid., 11.90.4,11.91.3. 65 Ibid., II.91.1. 66 Ibid. 67 Ibid., II.90.4. 68 Ibid., 11.91.2. 69 Ibid, II.94.2.
75
For Aquinas, because human beings are rational creatures, they participate in the
70
eternal law in a special way, and this participation is what he calls the natural law.
Human reason is the rule and measure of actions, since "it belongs to the reason to direct
to the end."71 All human acts of reasoning are based on principles that are known
naturally, and thus "every act of reason and will in us is based on that which is according 79
to nature" and every act of appetite is derived from the natural appetite. Reason directs
a person's actions to our good, which means that "whatever the practical reason naturally
apprehends as man's good (or evil) belongs to the precepts of the natural law as
something to be done or avoided."73
From the general conception of the natural law, human reason can move to
particular cases. Aquinas' conception of reason in general is that it always moves from
principles to particulars, and reasoning about natural law is no different. However,
universal human knowledge only extends to the general principles of natural law, not to
its instantiation in particular cases. This means that some will run into error with regard
to what should be done in particular cases, and this is why it is necessary to enact civil
laws.74 For Aquinas, human understanding of the natural law can become perverted and
blotted out completely, though never in its general principles. Thus, some have a better
understanding of what should be done in particular cases than others do.
This understanding is dependent upon possession of the moral virtues. Aquinas
claims that "for a man to do a good deed, it is requisite not only that his reason be well
70 Ibid., 11.91.2. 71 Ibid., 11.90.1. 72 Ibid., 11.91.2. 73 Ibid., II.94.2. 74 Ibid., 11.91.3. 75 Ibid., 11.91.4-6.
disposed by means of a habit of intellectual virtue; but also that his appetite be well
disposed by means of a habit of moral virtue." For Aquinas, both reason and appetite
interact in directing human action. The acquisition of moral virtues, which comes about
through habituation,77 involves training one's appetites in the direction of the human
good. Even if one's reason is capable of understanding what good ends to pursue, if
one's inclinations and appetites urge a person in the wrong direction, that person can end
up choosing the wrong action. Thus Aquinas claims that sometimes the universal
principle to pursue the good and avoid the evil, "is destroyed in a particular case by a
passion: thus to one who is swayed by concupiscence, when he is overcome thereby, the
object of his desire seems good, although it is opposed to the universal judgment of his
reason."
In this way the passions and appetites, when they are not trained properly into
virtue, can cloud a person's ability to see the true good. Though one never acts toward
what one believes to be a bad end, one's ability to discern a good end from a bad end can
be compromised when the moral virtues are not present. When the moral virtues are
present, and a person's appetites are directed toward the good, prudence, which is the
faculty of human reason which determines what should be done, can lead that person
aright by determining how best to act toward that good. Even though the appetites are
directed toward the good, prudence is required to determine how best to achieve those
Ibid., II.58.2. Ibid., 11.55.1. Ibid., II.58.5. Ibid., II.57.5.
77
Thus, for Aquinas, education into virtue, which involves habituation, and
education into reason, which involves learning to reason from principles to particulars,
are both necessary for the moral life. One cannot reason rightly about morality without
possessing the moral virtues, for without the virtues one cannot see truly.
Both of the Thomists I will be examining in this section make use of Aquinas'
ideas about morality and reason in their educational theories. This brief overview of
Aquinas' views should serve as a basis for understanding their theories more deeply, and
understanding their connections with each other and with Aquinas. Each is writing in the
context of the twentieth century, and each uses the context of Thomistic principles to
ground their views about moral education.
Maritain: Educating for Freedom
Jacques Maritain wrote in the early part of the twentieth century, and his most
SO
significant writing about education was Education at the Crossroads, though he also
wrote several shorter works on the subject.81 For Maritain, education's ultimate end is
that its students become truly human beings. In long form, this means that the aim of
education is: to guide man in the evolving dynamism through which he shapes himself as a human person—armed with knowledge, strength of judgment, and moral virtues—while at the same time conveying to him the spiritual heritage of the nation and the civilization in which he is involved, and preserving in this way the century-old (sic) achievements of generations.
Jacques Maritain, Education at the Crossroads (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1943). 81 These are collected in Jacques Maritain, The Education of Man, ed. ed. Donald Gallagher and Idella Gallagher (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1962). 82 Maritain, Education at the Crossroads, 9. 83 Ibid., 10.
78
Education thus enables individuals to become autonomous and free, but also to
become part of the tradition in which they live. Individuals must become liberated from
the bondage of common opinion,85 and taught to seek after truth.86 Philosophical training
in the college setting can help in this regard, for developing one's own philosophy is "the
only way of avoiding the damage wrought by an unconscious belief in a formless and
prejudiced philosophy."87
Maritain claims that intellectual cultivation involves learning to see things as they
really are, and that knowledge is an end in itself.88 The liberal education that Maritain
advocates for all89 prepares each young person to think in a genuinely free way.90 In this
light it is important to note that Maritain presupposes that truth understood in a universal
way is something that can be attained by careful study. To give one example, Maritain
suggests that students in schools with a particular religious affiliation such as Christian
schools should meet various people from different schools of thought. However, he sets
as an "inviolable rule" that after such meetings, discussion should continue in seminars
between the students and their teachers, "until they have completely mastered the
problem and brought out the truth of the matter."91 Similarly, he claims that teachers
should not raise problems for students that the students cannot solve, a practice he
believes burdens the mind rather than frees it. Maritain makes his presupposition
explicit when he claims that the reason many in the twentieth century have lost their way
84 Ibid., 12-14. 85 Ibid., 16. 86 Ibid., 55. 87 Ibid., 72. 88 Maritain, The Education of Man, 47. 89 Maritain, Education at the Crossroads, 64. 90 Maritain, The Education of Man, 48. 91 Ibid., 140. 92 Maritain, Education at the Crossroads, 49-50.
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is because they have lost their faith in truth. Teaching students to have faith in the
power of reason to find truth is one of Maritain's most emphasized educational goals.
However, like Aquinas, Maritain claims that knowledge is insufficient for moral
virtue, for an upright will is needed in order for reason to judge well what to do in a
particular case.94 The key to an upright will is love, on his view, which can only be
learned through trial and suffering, and through help from those who possess moral
authority. For Maritain, the primary educational sphere for learning to love is the
family.95
However, institutional education can also make a positive contribution to moral
development, in five ways.96 First, the school can provide a kind of premoral training,
which consists in learning to obey rules. This constitutes a direct influence on the
student's will, and prepares him or her for the moral life. Second, the school can enable
intellectual enlightenment, which contributes indirectly to moral development by
liberating the "spiritual energy of love within the soul."98 By this, Maritain has in mind
the idea that false philosophies and "pseudo-science," such as "cheap Darwinism" or
"cheap Machiavellianism," can cause a person's love to wither and die. Thus, Maritain
believes that such errors or any systems of thought which mock the idea of truth and
goodness should be thoroughly discussed and criticized.99 Though teaching which
93 Ibid., 115. 94 Ibid., 95. 95 Ibid., 96. 96 Maritain, The Education of Man, 75. 97 Ibid., 120. 98 Ibid., 121. 99 Ibid.
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inspires trust in goodness and truth is not enough to cause a student to love, it can protect
a student's awakening love and set it free from bad influences.100
Third, Maritain claims that education has a civic role because it prepares young
people to live in a free society. For Maritain, "a society of free men implies agreement
between minds and wills on the bases of life in common,"101 such as equality and
freedom, and this "democratic charter" should be promoted through education.102
However, Maritain argues, since the body politic has no right to impose a rule of faith or
a philosophic creed, the body politic cannot impose one basis for the democratic charter.
Each citizen should adhere to the democratic charter from his or her own mind, based on
his or her own rule of faith or philosophic creed.103 This overlapping consensus raises a
problem for education, however, for questions arise regarding how one can teach such a
democratic character without also teaching what justifies it. Maritain claims that teachers
should justify it with their own reasons, but must possess a sense of intellectual openness
and generosity toward those who justify it in a different way.104
Fourth, the school can inculcate what Maritain calls "natural morality." Natural
morality consists of morality not based on faith; in other words, it concerns those moral
considerations that are not connected to the afterlife.105 It is best taught through literature
and history, for by studying these students learn about moral heroes and moral villains
and in general can be taught moral virtues through the example of others.106 According
to Maritain the reading of literature and history "feeds the mind with the sense and
100 Ibid. 101 Ibid., 62. 102 Ibid., 63. 103 Ibid. 104 Ibid., 64-65. 105 Maritain, Education at the Crossroads, 94-95. 106 Maritain, The Education of Man, 123.
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knowledge of the natural virtues, honor, pity, of the dignity of man and of the spirit, the
greatness of human destiny, the entanglements of good and evil, [and] the caritas humani
i r\n
generis.'"
Natural morality is not only distinguished from morality based on faith, but also
from moral philosophy. Moral philosophy, on Maritain's account, is a systematizing of
moral principles at an abstract level. Maritain calls moral philosophy a "highly and
delicately rationalized" system of thought. It is essentially abstract, and engaging in it
requires an understanding of how the principles of the natural law fit together in a
systematic way. For Maritain, an understanding of how these principles fit together is the
most valuable part of moral philosophy. For this reason, Maritain argues that moral
philosophy should only be engaged in by those in the last two years of college, for it is
only at that point that students can understand moral philosophy well enough for it to be
valuable.109
Natural morality, on the other hand, can and should be taught to young children as
the basis for their moral knowledge. Being steeped in it is a necessary step toward moral
development, as moral knowledge is necessary for virtue.110 Maritain recommends the
discussion of particular cases taken from ordinary life as a tool "to sharpen ethical
awareness."111 These discussions should rely upon the "natural moral instinct" of the
student. Later, more general considerations can be studied, culminating in the course
of moral philosophy Maritain recommends for the last two years of college study. The
107 Ibid., 124. 108 Ibid., 123. 109 Ibid. 110 Ibid., 105. 111 Ibid., 124. 112 Ibid.
82
teaching of natural morality involves the passions, as well, for in reference to natural
morality and the "great ideas" of civilization he claims that "teaching should be
i i "i
permeated with the feeling for such values."
Though Maritain recommends teaching natural morality in schools, he also
believes that morality without religion is incomplete. For Maritain, natural morality
provides non-religious reasons for the kinds of rules that govern interactions with
others,114 because they are based on the good of living together with others in a civilized
way, rather than being based on the afterlife.115 However, personal virtue and piety can
only be justified based on religion.116 This follows Aquinas' distinction between natural
law and divine law.
For this reason religious teaching, according to Maritain, cannot be left out of the
curriculum. Since the schools are secular, however, such religious training should not be 1 1 7
compulsory, and should be provided by representatives of various faiths. This is the
fifth way in which Maritain believes that schools can contribute to moral development.
Though he does claim that natural morality can furnish much of what is required
for the moral life, he is sceptical about its ultimate effectiveness in terms of virtue. He
writes: "I confess at this point that, although I believe in natural morality, I feel little trust
in the educational efficacy of any merely rational moral teaching abstractly detached
from its religious environment."118 The tension that Maritain feels here appears to be
based on his own beliefs about the failure of secular moral education, and his resulting
113 Maritain, Education at the Crossroads, 68. 114 Maritain, The Education of Man, 124. 115 Maritain, Education at the Crossroads, 95. 1,6 Ibid. 117 Maritain, The Education of Man, 76-77. 118 Maritain, Education at the Crossroads, 68.
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conviction that education can only be fixed if religion is re-introduced into the curriculum
with new purpose. On the one hand, he believes that natural morality furnishes reasons
for acting well toward others, but on the other hand he believes that the only reasons
which will be effective in securing good action are religious ones.119
In the end, it is a difficult tension to resolve. Maritain is committed to the
necessity of religious education for moral virtue but is also committed to the existence of
the natural law. It is not simply that he desires the divine law to be taught as well as the
natural law, but that he believes that people will only follow the natural law if they have
the motivation that comes from religious belief. One way to interpret this is to say that
Maritain is drawing a distinction between knowing what is right and doing what is right.
His reference to the necessity of an upright will for virtue could be evidence of this,
though when he discusses forming the will, he claims that what is necessary is love, not
religious belief. However, one could still say that the knowledge of natural law that
comes from the teaching of natural morality has to be supplemented by something else:
love, or the motivation that comes from religion. While there are non-religious reasons
available, Maritain appears to believe that these alone are not enough to bring about good
choices. In the end, Maritain agrees with Aquinas that knowledge without a good will is
insufficient for virtue.
In the discussion of Locke in the previous chapter, the worry emerged that habit
and autonomy exist in a potentially problematic relationship. That is, how can one think
freely and make autonomous choices about how to behave when one has been trained
into particular habits by one's parents and teachers? This theme recurs here. By the time
Maritain, The Education of Man, 76. Maritain, Education at the Crossroads, 96.
84
one is able to use one's moral reason well, one's patterns of action and one's dispositions
have been formed by someone else, and religious belief has been inculcated from an early
age. Since for Maritain this must precede good moral thinking, one cannot determine
what is virtuous before one is virtuous oneself. Thus on the Thomistic scheme one must
rely on the moral authority of others in order to develop one's own moral judgment.
However, Aquinas is not as concerned as Locke, Rousseau, or Socrates are with
the kind of intellectual autonomy that they advocate. While Maritain argues that freedom
is an important educational goal, he also claims that one of the goals of education is to
enable individuals to become part of the tradition in which they live.121 Habits and some
deference to tradition are not inherently bad on Aquinas' view and Maritain's view.
Indeed for Alasdair Maclntyre, the Thomist I consider in the following section, they are
not negative intellectual traits, but are necessary for a life lived well.
Maclntyre: Education and Tradition
Maclntyre, in Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry, a book published a
decade after his best-known work, After Virtue,121, outlines what he believes moral
inquiry must look like if it is to be at all useful in the moral lives of human beings. He
rejects what he calls the "encyclopaedic" conception of moral inquiry, in which morality
is seen as fixed and knowable, as something that can be written about in an
encyclopaedia. He also rejects the conception of moral inquiry offered by the
genealogist, in which there is no truth to be found, and nothing can be fixed. What he
suggests instead is a conception of moral inquiry as rooted in tradition.
121 Ibid., 12-14. 122 Alasdair Maclntyre, Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry: Encyclopaedia, Genealogy, and Tradition (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1990). 123 Alasdair Maclntyre, After Virtue, 2nd ed. (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1984).
85
Maclntyre defends the conception of tradition-based inquiry by arguing that
without a tradition, moral inquiry can get nowhere. The current state of moral inquiry,
according to Maclntyre, is characterized by a lack of consensus, and an inability to reach
any kind of consensus. This is due to three facts: the absence of any agreement about
where the justification of belief ought to begin, in other words the lack of agreed-upon
first principles, the existence of "ineliminable conflicts" as to how types of considerations
ought to be ranked as reasons, and the fact that since much of logical reasoning consists
of entailment relations, there are limited resources for deciding whether a particular
premise ought to be rejected because it leads to a particular conclusion.124 For example,
if a moral theory entails that torture is permissible, there is no way to determine whether
that means that the moral theory should be rejected.
This is what leads Maclntyre to the conclusion that there are only two options
with regard to moral philosophy: either one takes up the Enlightenment project of
attempting to ground moral rules in reason apart from any particular tradition, in which
case one must eventually end up concluding that Nietzsche was right that morality is
simply the manifestation of one's will, or one rejects the Enlightenment project
altogether. Maclntyre takes the second option and advocates for a conception of
tradition-based morality. He argues that there is no other option if one wants to avoid
Nietzsche's conclusions. If one sticks with the thinkers "at the heart of the contemporary
curriculum in moral philosophy, Hume, Kant, and Mill" it is not surprising "that the
teaching of ethics is so often destructive and sceptical in its effects upon the minds of
those taught."125 No doubt Maclntyre has in mind that young people will be unconvinced
Maclntyre, Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry: Encyclopaedia, Genealogy, and Tradition, 10-11. 125 Maclntyre, After Virtue, 118.
86
by the efforts of those thinkers to ground moral rules in reason, and since they have also
been taught to reject tradition, they will reject the concept of moral truths altogether.
Maclntyre is thus not only echoing Plato's worry that young people will not be able to
defend morality through the use of their reason, but adding on a more serious worry:
well-trained philosophers will not be able to do so either. Moral injunctions, according to
Maclntyre, cannot be justified by reason alone without reference to tradition, and any
attempt to do so must eventually lead to scepticism.
Maclntyre's alternative involves the idea that standards of rationality and
justification can only emerge from particular traditions, and can only count as the best
standards so far. These various traditions can coexist within the university, where they
can each develop their own inquiries.127 Traditions can interact with each other when
each defends itself and critiques the traditions of others, taking into account the different
conceptions of rational justification by taking on traditions on their own terms.
This account of tradition is not surprising given Maclntyre's conclusion in After
Virtue that moral concepts are rooted in particular traditions. In that work he argues that
virtue cannot be understood without "some prior account of certain features of social and
moral life in terms of which it has to be defined and explained." At base, Maclntyre's
account is rooted in the idea of a practice, which, in short, is any kind of cooperative
human activity that requires certain kinds of dispositions, which come to be called the
Maclntyre, Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry: Encyclopaedia, Genealogy, and Tradition, 64. Ibid., 222. Ibid., 231. Maclntyre, After Virtue, 186.
87
virtues, in order to flourish. That said, virtues must also be understood in the context of a
whole human life which is aiming at the good.
Just as one must learn a practice from those already practicing it before one can
become proficient enough to improve it, so one must have a certain moral character
before one can enter into moral inquiry.131 However, since for Maclntyre possessing the
virtues means having some idea of what those virtues are, and knowing in some way
what makes particular habits virtuous, we are led to the paradox described in the Meno:
seeking after an understanding of the virtues requires having some understanding of what
they are before one begins one's search, and thus it seems impossible to begin at all.
Famously, Meno asks Socrates: "How will you look for [virtue], Socrates, when you do
not know at all what it is? How will you aim to search for something you do not know at
all? If you should meet with it, how will you know that this is the thing that you did not
know?"132
Maclntyre escapes the paradox by concluding that one must take the virtues on a
teacher's authority before one can engage in moral inquiry. One follows the moral
virtues established in one's moral tradition, and only when one becomes virtuous in the
context of that tradition can one begin the moral inquiry necessary to change that
tradition.134 Maclntyre thus follows Aquinas in claiming that knowledge of what is good
requires that one be virtuous.
130 Ibid., 203. 131 Maclntyre, Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry: Encyclopaedia, Genealogy, and Tradition, 60. 132 Plato, Meno, ed. John M. Cooper and D.S. Hutchinson, trans. G.M.A. Grube, Plato: Complete Works (Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company, 1997), 80d. 133 Maclntyre, Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry: Encyclopaedia, Genealogy, and Tradition, 63. 134 Ibid., 64-65. 135 Maclntyre, After Virtue, 219.
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Of course for Aquinas, Maritain, and Maclntyre, virtue and vice is not an all-or
nothing affair. Most human beings are neither perfectly virtuous (in which case all of
their particular moral judgments would be true) nor perfectly vicious (in which case all of
their particular moral judgments would be false). Most are moderately virtuous, and thus
have a somewhat reliable but imperfect moral judgment. Determining what to do in a
particular case will thus involve attempting to discover whether what appears to be good
is actually good, and this will involve determining whether the appearance of good is a
manifestation of one's passion or of one's reason. Thus an implication of the Thomistic
view is that part of moral education should involve training young people to make such
determinations as part of their moral reasoning. This, of course, is only possible if it is
possible to adjudicate between what one's reason is calling good and what one's passion
is calling good. However, if this were not possible, then an individual cannot correct his
or her own vicious behaviour and develop virtues instead.
This does point again to the importance of the moral community in making moral
decisions on the Thomistic view. Since one's own judgment can be clouded, it is useful
to learn from the judgment of others who are virtuous. This also suggests that if one
cannot on one's own see the justification for a particular moral injunction, that in itself is
not a good enough reason for rejecting it. Since one's reason may be clouded by vice,
one may simply not be able to see the justification that others see. If Thomists are right
in their conceptions about virtue and moral reason, the challenge for an individual thinker
is to determine whether he or she is mistaken, or everyone else in one's tradition is
mistaken and change in the current practices is required. This challenge is particularly
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relevant to university students, who enter university before their habits are fully formed
and who encounter there rival traditions to the one from which they emerged.
3.3. Conclusions
Reason and morality are closely interrelated in Thomism. Each of the thinkers
has emphasized the importance of thinking well to acting well. However, that thinking is
only useful if it is practiced by someone with a virtuous character. Further, Maclntyre
worried that a certain kind of thinking could be inimical to moral virtue: that modernist
thinking leads to Nietzsche's conclusion that all moral claims are merely manifestations
of will. Moreover, moral thinking for Thomists cannot exist in a vacuum; it always
begins in a particular tradition, for it always occurs in individuals who have been raised
with particular virtues. Critiquing that tradition must be done carefully, since one's
judgment can be clouded by vice, but it must be done nevertheless.
While Thomists and Deweyan pragmatists take very different approaches to
philosophy, both reject the individualistic notion of moral and rational autonomy present
in Locke and Rousseau. Dewey argues that thinking must only be in response to a
problem, and should occur in community in order for it to be good thinking, and all of the
Thomists considered here argue that while thinking is crucial to learning to be a good
person, it should not involve tearing down the tradition in which one inhabits. In these
ways, they represent a kind of middle ground between Plato's views in the Republic and
those spoken by Socrates in the Apology.
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CHAPTER 4: TEACHING ETHICS IN THE UNDERGRADUATE PHILOSOPHY CLASSROOM
Education in the last century has seen drastic changes. While for writers such as
Locke and Rousseau the paradigmatic educational setting was a private tutor in a
gentleman's home, for writers today it is the public school system. As well, the number
of people (at least in the English-speaking world) with university degrees has been
steadily increasing. In Canada, the percentage of the population attending university has
risen from less than five percent in the early twentieth century to over twenty percent at
the end of the twentieth century.1 The numbers continue to rise in the twenty-first
century, though Canada's enrolment rates are lower than the United States' or the United
Kingdom's. While many barriers to higher education still exist, it is more accessible
now than it was a century ago.
Added to this is the relatively recent proliferation of ethics courses at the
university level. In most of the nineteenth century most American colleges offered a
course in moral philosophy, generally taught by the university president. This course was
required for all senior students and had two functions: to function as the capstone of a
student's entire course of study, and to equip graduates with ethical sensitivity and
insight. As universities became more specialized in the early twentieth century, moral
philosophy became isolated within the philosophy department.3 In its isolation, however,
1 Warren Clark, "100 Years of Education," Education Quarterly Review (Statistics Canada) 7, no. 3 (2001). Clark traces the numbers from 1921 to 1996. 2 Trends in Higher Education, vol 1 - Enrolment, (The Association of Universities and Colleges in Canada, 2007). In 2003 Canada was at 22% enrolment, the United Kingdom at 25%, and the United States at 28%. These numbers represent the percentage of young people aged 18-21 enrolled in university education. 3 An outline of the history of the teaching of ethics in American colleges and universities is available in Douglas Sloan, "The Teaching of Ethics in the American Undergraduate Curriculum, 1876-1976," in Ethics Teaching in Higher Education, ed. Daniel Callahan and Sissela Bok, (New York: Plenum, 1980), 318.
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it began to be recognized as a field of study in itself rather than as a subject that anyone
with good character could teach.
Ethics as a field of study was for the most part limited to meta-ethics until the
second half of the twentieth century. However, the last part of the twentieth century has
seen a move toward studying more practical topics. As a result of this and the increased
demand for professional schools to produce ethical doctors, lawyers, and so on, a new
phenomenon has emerged: the practical ethics course. Professional schools such as
business schools and medical schools are now beginning to offer professional ethics
courses, often taught by faculty from a philosophy department. As well, philosophy
departments themselves have begun to offer a wider variety of ethics courses, in
metaethics, moral theory, and especially practical ethics.
This surge of teaching in ethics brings with it many intriguing philosophical
questions, not only because it is a relatively new context for teaching, but also because of
the nature of the course material. In ethics courses, philosophers encourage students to
critically examine moral concepts. This is done in various ways and at various levels of
abstraction. Many of these courses will require students to do precisely that which Plato
rejected in the Republic: to investigate through dialectical procedures the meaning of
moral terms and the content of moral claims. This is thus an interesting new context in
light of the difficult relationship between critical thinking and virtue in the writings of the
philosophers considered in the previous chapters.
It is also a complex environment in which many difficult questions arise. There
are the questions that arise for all university teachers, such as those raised by plagiarism,
the student-teacher relationship, issues of sex, gender, and race, and the limits of
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academic freedom. However, there are also questions that arise specifically for the ethics
teacher, such as whether philosophical exploration of ethics should be conceived as a part
of an individual's moral development.
The teaching of ethics has received relatively little attention from philosophers,
and most of what has been written about university teaching is by non-philosophers.
That said, work has been done, and disagreements have arisen.4 In this chapter I will
outline some of the major disagreements and issues that have arisen in what has been
written about ethics pedagogy. Through my analysis of these issues, and through my
analysis of the context of the undergraduate ethics classroom itself, I will illuminate some
of the morally salient features of the ethics classroom. I will argue that these features
must be taken into account when thinking about how to teach ethics in a morally
responsible way.
4.1. The Purpose of University Ethics Courses
All of those teaching philosophy in North America are aware that the discipline is
constantly fighting to protect itself from those who believe that universities should give
up the liberal arts, especially "useless" ones like philosophy, and focus on those fields of
study that will make young people more productive, such as science or business. One of
the methods philosophy departments use to attract students is to tell them how well they
can do with a philosophy degree in business or law school, or in any profession that
requires critical thinking skills.
Many students enter philosophy courses announcing that they look forward to
learning how to better their lives, not by learning to examine their lives, but by learning
4 This has for the most part happened in the journal Teaching Philosophy and in a few edited collections.
the argumentative skills necessary for attaining a well-paying career. It is not clear why
some students have this perception of what philosophy is; perhaps it is a result of a lack
of exposure to philosophy before university. At any rate, ethics courses appeal to these
students because they offer a chance for them to improve their arguments about issues
they have long been debating with their friends and family: abortion, euthanasia, and now
perhaps same-sex marriages. For students with this view of the matter, philosophy
classes look like debate classes.
There is good reason to reject this view of ethics courses. After all, learning to
make arguments for material gain or for the sport of it is the province of sophistry, not
philosophy, and philosophers have rejected sophistry since the time of Plato. However,
things are not so simple. There is a difference between a marketing strategy and the
actual goals of ethics courses. Further, one might argue that teaching students to make
good arguments is a valuable goal in itself, no matter what reasons they may have for
wanting to learn to make such arguments.
What this tension brings to light is that students and teachers may have different
goals in mind when participating in ethics courses. The purpose of an ethics course can
also be different in the eyes of the university itself or department within that university.
For example, if a business or law school decides to offer an ethics course, the aim of
doing so may have nothing to do with learning to make arguments, but instead with
teaching a particular code of ethics, or with encouraging moral improvement in their
students.5
5 Groarke and Scholz argue that this is in fact how professional schools perceive ethics courses, and that they are right to do so. Leo Groarke and Sally J. Scholz, "Seven Principles for Better Practical Ethics," Teaching Philosophy 19, no. 4 (1996), 338.
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In the late 1970s the Hastings Center commissioned a study on the teaching of
ethics in the university environment. The result was the book Ethics Teaching in Higher
Education,6 which stands alone as a comprehensive treatment of the topic. Among the
many contributions in that volume is an attempt by Daniel Callahan to outline the
purpose of university ethics courses. Generally, Callahan argues that the overall goal of
an ethics course should be to "make it clear that there are ethical problems in personal
and civic life, that how they are understood and responded to can make a difference to
that life, and that there are better and worse ways of dealing with them."7
This general conception leads Callahan to five goals that are important to teaching
ethics at any level. First, stimulating the moral imagination, which involves evoking the
emotional side of students in order to lead them toward empathy, feeling, caring, and
Q
sensibility. Second, distinguishing those emotional responses that represent a moral
judgment from those that do not. Third, eliciting a sense of moral obligation, which
means to "highlight with students an internal requirement of ethical thinking: that it calls
us to act in the light of what we perceive to be right and good."10 According to Callahan,
this avoids the charge of indoctrination because it only concerns what is formally
required in order for ethical thinking to take place, not what actually counts as a good
act.11 The fourth goal is to develop analytical skills, since concepts, rules and principles
are the tools of rationality in ethics. Students must be taught some amount of logical
analysis in order to consider the status of moral rules, the relationship of principles to
6 Daniel Callahan and Sissela Bok, eds., Ethics Teaching in Higher Education (New York: Plenum, 1980). 7 Daniel Callahan, "Goals in the Teaching of Ethics," in Ethics Teaching in Higher Education, ed. Daniel Callahan and Sissela Bok, (New York: Plenum, 1980), 62. 8 Ibid., 64-65. 9 Ibid., 65. 10 Ibid., 66. 11 Ibid.
95
ethics, and so on. Finally, the fifth goal is to tolerate and reduce disagreement and
ambiguity. In order to make it possible for students to make progress in ethics, it is
necessary to seek out points of agreement and to clarify what actually is vague as
opposed to what merely appears vague.14
That said, Callahan rejects the idea that ethics courses should aim to change
behaviour. On his view, ethics courses may only aim to change behaviour in a potential
way by providing students with the tools they need to evaluate their own behaviour. He
reasons that in order to aim at changed behaviour in a direct way, a teacher would have to
have "a pre-established blueprint of what will count as acceptable moral behavior," and
this conflicts with critical inquiry, which should be the purpose of an ethics course.16
It is surprising that Callahan makes this claim, given that he argues that there are
areas of agreement in ethics, and that one of the goals of an ethics course is to seek out
those areas. A teacher attempting to change the behaviour of his or her students need not
aim to provide them with a fully worked-out moral code, but merely aim to change their
behaviour in those areas in which there is substantive agreement in the moral community.
Further, aiming to change students' moral thinking is in fact aiming to change their
behaviour, especially if thinking counts as a form of behaviour. Changing the way
students think about morality requires taking a stand on normative matters such as the
place of rationality in the moral life, and what kinds of critical and rational attitudes are
worth instilling.
Ibid., 67. Ibid. Ibid., 68. Ibid., 70. Ibid., 69-70.
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For example, Mike McNulty, who follows Callahan in arguing for the conclusion
that teaching virtue is not a legitimate goal in teaching ethics, nevertheless argues in
favour of instilling a kind of intellectual virtue. His general goal in teaching applied
ethics is "to guide students in coming up with sound ideas for conduct," and stresses that
this implies that teachers must attempt to "instill a critical, rational attitude in the
students."17 Such guidance enables students to keep those moral beliefs that can be
rationally justified and to jettison those that cannot.18
It is here that the terms start to become slippery. Callahan rejects "behavioural
change" as an aim, but argues in favour of a kind of change of thinking. McNulty rejects
"virtue" as an aim, but argues in favour of intellectual virtues. Several philosophers on
the academic weblog "PEA Soup" (Philosophy, Ethics, and Academia), in the comments
on an article19 about the usefulness of moral theory in helping students improve morally,
reject the idea of "moral improvement" but argue in favour of "better moral thinking."
90 91
Judith Andre and Michael Davis argue that ethics teachers ought to have as an explicit
goal to "foster moral growth." By this, Andre means that students should become "moral
professionals" who have the following characteristics: they can see the world and respond
to it accordingly, they are able to think fruitfully about ethical dilemmas, and they have
strength of character. Davis's conception includes raising sensitivity, increasing
17 Mike McNulty, "Teaching Applied Ethics Effectively," Teaching Philosophy 21, no. 4 (1998), 362. 18 Ibid. 19 Matt Zwolinski, How Useful is Moral Theory for Applied Ethics? (2006 [cited September 29th 2007]); available from http://peasoup.typepad.com/peasoup/2006/10/how_useful_is_m.html. Similar comments can be found here: Heath White, Teaching Ethics (2006 [cited September 29th 2007]); available from http://peasoup.typepad.eom/peasoup/2006/10/teaching_ethics.html#more. 20 Judith Andre, "Beyond Moral Reasoning: A Wider View of the Professional Ethics Course," Teaching Philosophy 14 (1991). 21 Michael Davis, Ethics and the University (London: Routledge, 1999), 164-65. 22 Andre, "Beyond Moral Reasoning: A Wider View of the Professional Ethics Course," 364-65.
knowledge of professional codes, improving judgment, and enhancing willpower. Joan
C. Callahan argues that "influencing behavior" is the goal that must underpin all of
Daniel Callahan's goals.24
It is difficult to make sense of all of the distinctions made here, but two basic
disagreements emerge. First, philosophers disagree as to whether or not teaching
students to improve their moral thinking is in fact contributing to improved moral
behaviour. This is at least in part a matter of one's moral theory, since, for example,
Socratic ethics would not allow a distinction between improved moral thinking and
improved moral behaviour. Second, whatever the answer to this question, these
philosophers disagree as to which goals should be on the list aside from "improved moral
thinking." Neither of these questions is easily answered.
4.2. Teacher Advocacy or Teacher Neutrality?
Alongside the disagreement about the purposes of ethics courses vis-a-vis moral
improvement is a disagreement about whether or not teachers should advocate their own
moral beliefs. These disagreements are not wholly distinct. As noted above, Callahan
argues that aiming at behavioural change involves abandoning neutrality, and that that is
reason enough not to have such an aim.
There has been much written about whether teachers should be neutral in their
teaching or not. However, as Linda Bomstad points out, the locus of the disagreements is
not always clear, for "it is sometimes difficult to tell exactly what pedagogical policies
23 Davis, Ethics and the University, 164. 24 Joan C. Callahan, "From the Applied to the Practical: Teaching Ethics for Use," in Teaching Philosophy: Theoretical Reflections and Practical Suggestions, ed. Tziporah Kasachkoff, (Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 1998), 67-68.
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are being defended or rejected by disputants in this discussion."25 That is, it is not simply
a matter of whether teachers should be neutral in their teaching or not. Questions arise
regarding what neutrality means, what it would mean not to be neutral, whether advocacy
means merely disclosing one's beliefs, defending them, or actively showing that all other
belief systems are false, and so on. In what follows I will outline some of the major
disagreements that have arisen with regard to these matters.
The Possibility of Neutrality
The debates about advocacy and neutrality often begin with the question of
whether neutrality in teaching is even possible. Some philosophers have argued that
since all philosophy teachers do have substantive positions, it is more honest for teachers
to disclose their position than not, since their moral commitments will influence the way
in which they teach. As Diane Raymond claims, our moral commitments influence "the
very topics we select for our courses, [and] even the order in which we teach them."27
Teachers' moral beliefs can affect anything from the readings selected to their tone of
voice in presenting the course material. Whether or not teachers intend to persuade
students of their views, it is impossible to be completely neutral in teaching.
However, this does not commit us to advocacy. Even though complete neutrality
is impossible, we can take one of several views. There is the idea that teachers should
strive to be as neutral as possible, that teachers should actively advocate their views, and
that teachers should disclose their views but not advocate them.
25 Linda Bomstad, "Advocating Procedural Neutrality," Teaching Philosophy 18, no. 3 (1995), 197. 26 See, e.g., Michael Goldman, "On Moral Relativism, Advocacy, and Teaching Normative Ethics," Teaching Philosophy 4, no. 1 (1981), 9. 27 Diane Raymond, "Moral Commitment and Teaching Philosophy," Teaching Philosophy 5, no. 2 (1982), 106.
A stronger view than any of these three is that taken by Hugh Wilder, who argues
that teachers should reject the idea of neutrality in grading. In other words, students
should (at least sometimes) be graded down for disagreeing with the teacher's beliefs. In
other words, he rejects what he calls the "principle of liberal tolerance," which he
describes to his students thus:
In evaluating papers, I care more about the arguments you give than the conclusions you defend. Although I care about what you believe, my immediate concern is why you believe what you believe. Papers will be graded more on cogency of argumentation than on the substantive claims made. And of course, students don't have to agree with me on substantive issues in order to get a good grade.
This principle or some variation thereof is likely familiar to most of those who
teach philosophy to undergraduate students. However, Wilder explains that he rejected it
after being presented by a rejoinder by one of his students: he was accused of being
disingenuous in his adherence to the principle. The student argued that Wilder could not
give a paper a good grade if he disagreed with the conclusion. Since, on this view,
Wilder had professed to be an atheist, he must believe that there are no good arguments
for theism, since a good argument is a sound argument, and a sound argument, by
definition, has a true conclusion. Therefore, since a good paper contains a good
argument, he cannot consider a paper to be good unless he agrees with the conclusion.
Wilder amplifies this argument by claiming that implicit in the principle of liberal
tolerance is a faulty distinction between cogent argumentation and true conclusions.
Arguments include conclusions, and good arguments include true conclusions. Wilder
claims that even though it is sometimes difficult to determine when we know that a claim
28 Hugh T. Wilder, "Tolerance and Teaching Philosophy," Metaphilosophy 9, no. 3-4 (1978), 311. 29 Ibid., 312. 30 Ibid., 318.
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is true, it is obvious that we do know that some claims are true, e.g., "that murder is
wrong, that "affirming the consequent is a fallacy, etc., etc."31
Wilder's conception of a good undergraduate essay is rather surprising, for as
Elias Baumgarten notes, if Wilder were a utilitarian, and Kant was a member of his class,
"Kant himself could not earn an "A" (or be judged an excellent philosopher) unless he
changed his mind." Wilder's mistake is in his assumption that any argument containing
a false conclusion includes a flaw large enough in it to deserve a lowered grade. Not only
are such expectations unreasonable in the context of the undergraduate classroom, this
policy is fundamentally coercive. As Mike Martin notes, all this will do is "pressure
many students either to drop the course or to lie about their beliefs,"33 especially since
Wilder advocates his atheism in class.
What Wilder fails to recognize is that for teachers to notice their own biases in
grading does not have to lead to the conclusion that they should act on those biases,
especially if they adhere to a kind of principle of reasonableness. That is, if the teacher in
question knows that there are reasonable people with whom he or she disagrees, he or she
can be sure that there are reasonably good arguments for those positions. A person can
be committed to his or her view, and believe that the arguments for that view are the most
persuasive, without believing that the arguments for other views are terrible arguments
and worthy of bad grades.
A variation on the "impossibility of neutrality" argument is based on the idea that
a philosophical commitment to reason is itself a form of non-neutrality. In other words,
31 Ibid., 319. 32 Elias Baumgarten, "The Ethical and Social Responsibilities of Philosophy Teachers," Metaphilosophy 11, no. 2 (1980), 189. 33 Mike W. Martin, "Advocating Values: Professionalism in Teaching Ethics," Teaching Philosophy 20, no. 1(1997), 22.
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expecting students to give reasons for their views is not being neutral with regard to the
use of reason.34 However, it is worth asking what it would look like to be completely
neutral about the use of reason. As Robert Simon notes, expecting students to argue
rationally is not a kind of advocacy, but merely a commitment to the academic
enterprise.35
However, conceptions of reason, and of "good philosophy," differ from thinker to
thinker. Philosophers have deep disagreements about what counts as a justified belief,
about whether one's beliefs have to be justified objectively, whether one has to know that
one knows a proposition, and so on. These disagreements are the stuff of contemporary
epistemology, but also affect teaching thinking, which relies at least in part upon
conceptions of reasons, justification, and rationality. Students cannot be taught to give
reasons for their beliefs without also being taught what counts as a reason. Further,
teachers' ethics of beliefs will affect how they teach students to think critically about
their beliefs. If one follows Clifford in his evidentialism, justifying beliefs may look
quite different than if one follows James' pragmatism. The differences between Anglo-
American and continental philosophy are also relevant here.
However, as argued above, noticing that it is impossible to be fully neutral does
not mean that one must accept advocacy as the only alternative. There are other
possibilities that should be acknowledged even though neutrality is impossible. In other
words, in order to defend advocacy it is not enough to claim that neutrality is impossible:
one must further claim that advocacy is desirable.
34 Michael Goldman and Diane Raymond both make this argument. Goldman, "On Moral Relativism, Advocacy, and Teaching Normative Ethics," 7, Raymond, "Moral Commitment and Teaching Philosophy," 106. 33 Robert L. Simon, Neutrality and the Academic Ethic (Lanham, Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield, 1994), 22-23.
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Neutrality and Authenticity
One way in which this argument might go is to claim that a person's teaching
cannot be fully authentic if that teacher stifles his or her passionate moral views in order
to maintain neutrality in teaching. In other words, one's deepest moral commitments are
so fundamental to one's sense of self that they should not be hidden from view, even
from students. This seems especially true when considering issues of social justice and
injustice. Mike Martin argues that when teaching about issues of race or sex, it would be
wrong to be perfectly neutral about racism or sexism. On his view, advocacy in issues
that concern basic respect for persons is the only morally acceptable option, for non-
advocacy compromises a person's integrity.37 Martin suggests, however, that teachers do
not need to advocate for all of their beliefs, but simply for those they hold particularly
strongly. He does recommend complete openness with students, who should be told what
the teacher is doing in every case, whether it be advocating or withholding views.38
Martin's view is thus a kind of middle ground between complete advocacy and
complete neutrality. One reason to take his view seriously is that it allows for a
distinction between kinds of moral commitments: fundamental versus peripheral, non
negotiable versus negotiable, those which one believes are necessary to reasonableness,
and those about which one believes that reasonable people can disagree. For example, a
person might believe that it is impossible to reasonably be a racist, but that others can
reasonably disagree with his or her views about affirmative action. This kind of middle
36 Martin also cites homophobia as an example. Martin, "Advocating Values: Professionalism in Teaching Ethics," 30. 37 Ibid., 29. 38 Ibid., 27.
view allows us to treat at least some those with whom we disagree as reasonable, where a
view like Wilder's does not.
Neutrality and Relativism
The second argument for advocacy is based on the idea that only advocacy can
avoid or mitigate student moral relativism. This is an echo of Plato's worry in Republic
VII that being exposed to argumentation can lead to moral relativism or scepticism, or
simply a distrust of reason. Students are shown good arguments for conflicting views,
and as a result abandon the idea that there is a right answer, or that reason can lead them
to it. To avoid this, teachers should advocate for a particular moral position.
This argument has not been well worked out in the literature. Authors making
this argument have asserted the link between relativism and neutrality rather than argued
for it, and the connection between relativism and seeing many arguments has not been
made clear. However, even if the connection is real, this is not a good argument for
advocacy. Arguments such as these only make sense if students only ever learn from one
philosopher, for as soon as students are exposed to a professor advocating an opposing
view the same problem will re-emerge, especially if each professor claims to know that
his or her position is true.40 As in the case of the first argument for advocacy, this
argument is inconclusive.
Much more work needs to be done if either advocacy or neutrality is to be
defended. The disagreements about goals in teaching ethics have also been inconclusive.
39 Wilder, Goldman and Raymond each make this argument. Goldman, "On Moral Relativism, Advocacy, and Teaching Normative Ethics," 5, Raymond, "Moral Commitment and Teaching Philosophy," 106, Wilder, "Tolerance and Teaching Philosophy," 320. 40 Baumgarten makes this point explicit. Baumgarten, "The Ethical and Social Responsibilities of Philosophy Teachers," 187.
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This points to a need for foundational work in the ethics of teaching ethics. In the rest of
this chapter, I will outline some of the morally salient features of the ethics classroom
that need to be taken into account when doing this foundational work. These features are
those that must be taken into account when making teaching decisions as ethics teachers.
In the final chapter, I will develop a framework for considering the ethical issues arising
in the ethics classroom.
4.3. Student Relativism
Student relativism has been of concern to many philosophers writing about
teaching. In particular, many philosophers have written about student moral relativism as
an obstacle to overcome.41 Stephen Satris calls student relativism "one of the most
serious, pervasive, and frustrating problems confronting most philosophy teachers
today." Thomas Carson claims that "the issue of moral relativism is very troublesome
for those of us who teach ethics," because relativism is inimical to rational discussion. 3
From the writings of philosophers considering how to understand the
phenomenon of student relativism, three major positions have emerged as to what it
consists in. These positions emerge primarily from the teaching experiences of these
philosophers.
The first is that student relativism is a belief that students hold about the meaning
and source of moral claims. In other words, student relativism is a primitive
41 See, e.g., Judith Andre, "Dealing With Naive Relativism in the Philosophy Classroom," Metaphilosophy 14, no. 2 (1983), Thomas L. Carson, "An Approach to Relativism," Teaching Philosophy 22, no. 2 (1999), Goldman, "On Moral Relativism, Advocacy, and Teaching Normative Ethics.", Stephen A. Satris, "Student Relativism," Teaching Philosophy 9, no. 3 (1986). 42 Satris, "Student Relativism," 193. 43 Carson, "An Approach to Relativism," 161.
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philosophical position. It is philosophical relativism, though perhaps a shallow version of
it. This is the understanding of student relativism that is presupposed when teachers
tackle relativism by adducing arguments for and against it and weighing their relative
merits.
Two philosophers who have argued that student relativism is philosophical
relativism are Roger Paden and Harry Brighouse. Paden argues that relativism is at least
sometimes the result of an argument that students have come to accept without being
fully aware that they have done so. This argument is an argument from toleration, where
students seem to believe that respecting others means insulating them from our beliefs
and arguments. Paden believes that student relativism is the result of an argument
because he has observed students who appear to hold to relativism "against their will,
interests, and beliefs, in defense of positions which they found both mistaken and
repugnant." Brighouse argues that student relativism comes from students' misguided
ideas about what tolerance entails. Students mistakenly believe that tolerance requires
treating all beliefs as equal, rather than treating all persons as equal.46
If Paden and Brighouse are right, then students who are relativists have developed
a kind of embryonic philosophical position that, in the eyes of many philosophers, is
false, or at least unsupported by good reasons. However, this is not the experience of all
philosophy teachers. Several have argued that student relativism is not a philosophical
position at all, and should not be treated as such.
This is the second position regarding student relativism: that student relativism is
a psychological defense mechanism rather than an intellectual position. Students entering
44 Roger Paden, "The Student Relativist as Philosopher," Teaching Philosophy 10, no. 2 (1987), 99. 45 Ibid., 98. 46 Harry Brighouse, School Choice and SocialJustice (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), 96.
university classrooms do so with moral and religious beliefs that they are often
unprepared to have challenged. Many of these students have never before been asked to
think critically about their most cherished beliefs. They have not been prepared for the
kinds of skeptical assaults they will encounter in some of the thinkers they are expected
to read, and for the high standards of justification they are expected to adhere to in
writing papers and in defending their opinions. On this view of student relativism,
students make relativistic claims in order to protect themselves and their beliefs. If all
beliefs are equally valid, then one is spared the task of having to show why one's own
beliefs are true.
Two philosophers who have argued that at least some student relativism is of this
sort are Stephen Satris and Richard Momeyer. Satris argues that students seem to be
making relativistic claims at the same time as they are making conventional moral claims
that they cannot defend well and do not want challenged.47 Richard Momeyer suggests
that in some cases words like "who's to say" can be "less matters of conviction than
expressions of fear."48
Determining which characterization of student relativism is true is a matter of
experience in the classroom and a certain amount of sensitivity to students' mental states.
Both explanations of student relativism seem plausible, and it is certainly possible that
student relativism is an amorphous phenomenon, and that most student relativism is a
hybrid of the kinds of characterizations outlined here. This could mean that one
classroom could contain many types of student relativists. If this is the case then dealing
with student relativism is a complicated endeavour.
47 Satris, "Student Relativism," 199. 48 Richard W. Momeyer, "Teaching Ethics to Student Relativists," Teaching Philosophy 18, no. 4 (1995), 304.
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It is further complicated by the possibility that student relativism is merely a
developmental stage that students must pass through in their university years. This idea
has been developed by sociologists and psychologists.
Student development gained importance as a research area beginning in the
1960s, and several types of student development theories have arisen. These theories are
generally classified into four categories: psychosocial theories, which are concerned with
psychological development in the context of a person's social environment, identity
theories, which are concerned with the development of identity, cognitive-structural
theories, which examine intellectual development more specifically and concentrate on
the ways in which thinking patterns change during college, and typology theories, which
look at how students develop based on personality type and learning style.49 Each kind of
theory maps the progress of students from the time previous to entering university until
shortly afterward. Some theories place this development in the context of development
throughout life, drawing on theorists such as Erikson and Piaget.
The most relevant kind of theory to this context is a cognitive-structural theory,
and the most influential research in this area was that performed by William Perry.50
William Perry conducted research in the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s on university students
For a general introduction to various student development theories of the late 20 century, see Nancy J. Evans, Deanna S. Forney, and Florence Guido-DiBrito, Student Development in College: Theory, Research, and Practice (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1998). 50 Other prominent theorists include M.B. Baxter Magolda, Knowing and Reasoning in College: Gender-related Patterns in Students' Intellectual Development (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1992), M.F. Belenky et al., Women's Ways of Knowing: The Development of Self, Voice, and Mind (New York: Basic Books, 1986), Bomstad, "Advocating Procedural Neutrality.", Arthur Chickering and Linda Reisser, Education and Identity, 2nd ed. (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1993), Ruthellen Josselson, Finding Herself: Pathways to Identity Development in Women (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1987), P.M. King and K.S. Kitchener, Developing Reflective Judgment: Understanding and Promoting Intellectual Growth and Critical Thinking in Adolescents and Adults (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1994), J.E. Marcia, "Development and Validation of Ego-Identity Status," Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 3 (1966), S.L. Mustapha and J.A. Seybert, "Moral Reasoning in College Students: Effects of Two General Education Courses," Education Research Quarterly 14 (1990), J.R. Rest, Moral Development: Advances in Research and Theory (New York: Praeger, 1986).
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at Harvard.51 Though this research is dated, it is still very influential in theories of
student development. Perry is also the first theorist to point to relativism as a
developmental stage. His research generated a theory of nine "forms" or "positions"
which were points of view that shaped how people view their experiences. Perry's
structure is complicated but I will outline it in its most basic form by looking at the
overall process of development that students generally seem to follow.
Students begin in a position of what Perry calls dualism. In this position of
dualism students see the world as divided between right and wrong, good and bad, we
and others, and what teachers want versus what teachers do not want. In the earliest stage
students do not recognize that a question could have more than one answer. In the later
stages students see this, but assume that there is only more than one answer because the
other answers are all clearly wrong. Students in this position tend to complain that
teachers do not "stick to the facts."
There are several ways in which students move from dualism to what Perry calls
"multiplicity," but almost all arrive there at some point. A student viewing the world
from this position believes that "everything goes" - that all opinions are equally valid,
and that all marking is therefore arbitrary. No final answers can be found. All assertions
are simply matters of opinion, and the teacher's opinion matters no more than anyone
else's.
From multiplicity students move to what Perry describes as relativism. In this
position students are capable of committing to one position, but they do not see this as
absolute or objective. Students in this stage realize that there are many ways to live, and
51 William G. Perry, Forms of Intellectual and Ethical Development in the College Years: A Scheme (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston Inc., 1970).
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that they cannot necessarily judge other ways to be morally wrong. They also see
knowledge as contextually based and not absolute. The final stage of development
occurs when students have made commitments within this relativistic framework. They
recognize that their values, beliefs, and decisions are based on individual choice, and
make those choices. Students recognize that they have made a choice, excluding other
alternatives, and take responsibility for that choice. This is often seen as discovery
what one really believes, or who one really is.
Here are the remarks of several students who have reached Perry's final stage of
cognitive development. "I think a person who spends his time at cocktail parties, and
spends four evenings a week on the telephone getting dates for the other three evenings is
not accomplishing anything. . .1 can reject this way of living because I think that you
should really do more in the way of work. But on the other hand, I would have to say
that there is no absolute moral right and wrong to this. I can't condemn such a person on
any final grounds." Another student: "You can't let go of your own standards, but you
can't really afford to look down on anyone who has a different - I won't say lower
anymore - a different set of standards. Perhaps it isn't tolerance, perhaps it's just
awareness of the fact that that's the way it should be, if it isn't."53 Again, '"if you're
confronted with a person who doesn't do things like you do, 'Well, he has decided to do
things like this - /wouldn't. I don't think it's right.'' And yet you have to come back and
say, 'But this is only subjective - this is only my way of looking at things.'"54
Thus, the difference between relativism and multiplicity is that on multiplicity,
students see all positions as equally valid and cannot choose one, but on relativism,
52 Ibid., 163. 33 Ibid. 54 Ibid., 173.
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students are able to choose a position, and see that position as best for them, but not
necessarily for anyone else. However, the students do appear to be somewhat conflicted
about this, as if they want to make a judgment but believe they cannot do so.
It should be noted that it appears that Perry was, at the time of the study, a
relativist, and sees this as the highest stage of intellectual development in university
possibly in life. He does not specifically point to what adults might develop into after
college, but seems to imply that this is the position people do or perhaps should stick
with. One question that is worth asking about the study itself is whether Perry's own
relativism influenced him to see students developing toward a higher level of critical
thinking and self-reflection as developing toward relativism. At times he seems to
conflate the two. One possible implication of this study and the fact that it has been
widely referred to is that university professors in many disciplines see this progression
toward relativism as a good thing. Perhaps many see relativism as a good thing in the
realm of morality, even if most professors of philosophy do not.
Student relativists in ethics classroom could be either at the multiplicity stage or
at the relativism stage. Those philosophers who worry that relativism makes moral
discourse and in particular moral philosophy impossible ought to be concerned about
students in either stage. While the "relativists" on Perry's view are capable of making
commitments, they are also incapable of or unwilling to make objective moral judgments.
Since in their case morality is a matter of personal choice, the role of moral philosophy is
not clear.
Given these possibilities, as well as the further possibilities suggested by
philosophers above, it is not clear how ethics teachers should respond to student
I l l
relativism. If it is a defense mechanism, dealing with it on a philosophical level may not
be appropriate. If students are merely using the words normally associated with
relativism to express tolerance and politeness, then it may be a mistake to attribute a
substantive position to them. Things become even more complicated if it is a
developmental stage, for the role of philosophy courses in cognitive development is not
clear.
It should also be noted that characterizing student relativism as a problem that
needs to be overcome is taking a substantive position about the merits of relativism. This
position is perhaps not very controversial, since student relativism often appears to shut
conversation down in a classroom. Claims that a student, by defending a moral position,
is forcing his morality on others often have a silencing effect that has negative
consequences for open discussion. It is perhaps simply a presumption in favour of
rational discourse vis-a-vis morality, but this should be flagged as a presumption that may
not be shared by all philosophers.
4.4. Student Fundamentalism
Related to the subject of student relativism is the subject of student
fundamentalism; in particular, of religious fundamentalism. Religious fundamentalism is
significant in the context of the ethics classroom because of the close relationship
between beliefs about morality and beliefs about religion, in particular when those beliefs
are fundamentalist ones.
Students in university classrooms come from various socio-economic,
educational, religious, and cultural backgrounds. These backgrounds form the
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conceptions of morality and the good life that they bring to ethics courses. Not only do
students hold divergent beliefs about particular moral issues, they hold divergent beliefs
at the level of moral theory and metaethics, even though they may not yet know how to
distinguish between these three levels of moral thinking. In other words, not only are
there disagreements between students about issues like abortion, euthanasia, or same-sex
marriages, there are disagreements as to the source or status of those moral judgments.
Generating a definition of religious fundamentalism that captures neither too
much nor too little is a complicated task that I will not attempt. Instead, I will draw
attention to some of the attributes of religious fundamentalism that are especially
pertinent to the context I am considering. I will do this by relating some of what is
happening in the evangelical Protestant Christian context, especially in the United States.
At the outset, however, I must stress that not all evangelical Protestant Christians are
fundamentalists in the sense I am considering, and of course not all Christian
fundamentalists are evangelical Protestants. Many evangelical Protestants, even though
they resemble their fundamentalist neighbours in their devotion to the Bible and to
proselytizing, do not share their views about women or about education. These believers
will be discussed further at the end of this section.
According to a recent study55 by the U.S. Department of Education, the number of
children being homeschooled is on the rise. The percentage of children being
homeschooled rose from 1.7 percent in 1999 to 2.2 percent in 2003. This translates into
over one million children being homeschooled in the United States in 2003. For thirty
percent of those parents choosing to homeschool, providing "moral and religious
55 Homeschooling in the United States 2003: Statistical Analysis Report (U.S. Department of Education: National Center for Education Statistics, 2006 [cited October 17 2007]); available from http://nces.ed.gov/pubs2006/homeschool/.
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instruction" was the most important reason they chose to do so. The study did not inquire
further into the particularities of this moral and religious instruction. However, since
many homeschooled teenagers are using media such as weblogs and online forums to
communicate with each other and to propagate their views, it is possible to get a glimpse
at the kind of instruction many homeschooled children are receiving.
One online community of particular interest is The Rebelution. Founded by two
homeschooled teenagers, Alex and Brett Harris, it is devoted to inspiring teenagers to
rebel against "the low expectations of an ungodly culture" by "doing hard things."56 The
pair has traveled the country to hold conferences, and maintain active online forums on
the site. Much as the idea of inspiring teenagers to defy low expectations is
commendable, much of what The Rebelution seeks to promote is returning to traditional
gender roles, including the idea that women should first submit to their fathers, and then
to their husbands. In 2006, they hosted a "modesty survey," which consisted of
questions, submitted by teenage girls and responded to by over 1600 (mostly) teenage
boys. Almost 700 of the respondents were homeschooled.57 The idea was that girls
wanted to find out what kinds of clothing and attire could cause boys to lust. The
underlying principle is that Christian "brothers and sisters" should not cause each other to
sin, and therefore girls have a certain amount of responsibility to dress modestly. While
most of the male respondents agreed that they were responsible for their own behaviour,
the idea was that women should do their best not to make a man's struggle against lust
harder. Recently, as they are now at the age where they are deciding about college, the
56 Alex and Brett Harris, About The Rebelution ([cited October 17 2007]); available from http://www.therebelution.com/about/. 57 Alex and Brett Harris, Modesty Survey: Overview ([cited October 17 2007]); available from http://www.therebelution.com/modestysurvey/overview.
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Harrises have recommended two college guides, to help conservatives avoid "liberal
indoctrination."
Many homeschooled Christian students choose to attend Patrick Henry College,
in Purcellville, Virginia. Established in 2000 by Michael Farris, founder of the Home
School Legal Defense Association, it now enrols several hundred students per year.
Many of these students are homeschooled, and refer to the school as "Harvard for
Homeschoolers," due to its rigorous academic standards. Its website claims that their
goals are "to prepare Christian men and women who will lead our nation and shape our
culture with timeless biblical values and fidelity to the spirit of the American founding."59
Several Patrick Henry students have ended up working in the White House, and many are
intent on political careers.60
At Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, students (only women) have the
opportunity to take a B.A. with a "homemaking" concentration, which according to a
recent Los Angeles Times story61 "includes lectures on laundering stubborn stains and a
lab in baking chocolate-chip cookies." Courses include "Biblical Model for the Home
and Family," which teaches "that God expects wives to graciously submit to their
husbands' leadership." According to the story, this program is the first in several planned
programs at Southern Baptist seminaries. According to one student, the program is
valuable because it helps her to "restrain her instincts to take charge." As she claims, "I
have to be able to shut my mouth." Another said: "I'm not one of those out to rebel, out
58 Hanna Rosin, God's Harvard: A Christian College on a Mission to Save America (Orlando: Harcourt, Inc., 2007). 59 About Patrick Henry College (Patrick Henry College, [cited October 17 2007]); available from http://www.phc.edu/about/default.asp. 60 Rosin, God's Harvard: A Christian College on a Mission to Save America. 61 Stephanie Simon, They Love To Do Their Homework (Los Angeles Times, 2007 [cited October 17 2007]); available from http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-nahomemakingl loctl l,0,6958746,full.story?coll=la-home-nation.
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to-be-my-own-woman types." Still another, when asked whether it would matter if she
did not enjoy homemaking: "It really doesn't matter what I think. It matters what the
Bible says."
Some fundamentalists, such as the women who run the website Ladies Against
Feminism, urge against women going to college at all, for going to college only
encourages women to choose a career, and a woman's place is at home serving her
husband.62
Generally, these fundamentalists are fighting against those who they believe
would destroy Christianity, especially liberals and feminists. Because liberals refuse to
legislate "Biblical" standards of morality, and because feminists reject "Biblical" gender
roles, they are seen as the enemy. Higher education is often seen as dangerous, because
universities are filled with liberals and feminists (and Marxists and other kinds of so-
called radicals) hell-bent on disabusing Christians of their faith. Online communities
such as TrueU.org (an offshoot of James Dobson's Focus on the Family), promise to help
students to "stay Christian in college." Young Christians are often given books in
apologetics to help them through their philosophy classes. The oft-told story of the
atheist philosophy professor out to ridicule Christians and undermine their beliefs is used
to motivate young people to learn to defend their faith.
There are two major features of religious fundamentalism that must be considered
in the context of thinking about teaching in ethics classrooms. I will continue to use the
example of Christian fundamentalists who are evangelical Protestants.
Ladies Against Feminism FAQ Database (Ladies Against Feminism, [cited October 17 2007]); available fromhttp://pub32.bravenet.com/faq/show.php?usernum=2692425141&keywords=education#ql.
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The first is the source of moral beliefs. For Christian fundamentalists, the
ultimate authority on how to live is the Bible. This is often taken to mean that the only
source of knowledge on how to live is the Bible. Last year, at Patrick Henry College, a
professor came under fire for suggesting the opposite. In a government class, while
discussing a "lifeboat example" and its relation to the state of nature, he asked students
what Hobbes or Locke would say about the example. He suggested that quoting the
Bible verse about laying down one's life for one's friends was too simplistic. As a result,
he was almost fired.63 Following this, several members of the faculty published a short
article arguing that there was valuable truth to be found in the "great works" of Western
history other than the Bible. They were subsequently denounced by the college
president, who claimed that they did not believe the Bible, and that "the wisdom of this
world is foolishness with God."64
Religious fundamentalists are sometimes expected to justify their beliefs, but the
only source of justification is often taken to be the Bible itself. While all Christians take
the Bible to be an important source of insight into the character of God and his
expectations for how to live, Christian fundamentalists who are evangelical Protestants
often take it to be the only source.
The second feature of religious fundamentalism that should be considered is the
content of the moral beliefs often held by fundamentalists. Moral beliefs emerge from
religious beliefs in the context of fundamentalism. The relationship between the two is
sometimes complicated, but several beliefs are typical of evangelical Protestants who are
fundamentalists: a rejection of homosexuality as diseased and sinful, a rejection of
63 Thomas Bartlett, Give Me Liberty Or I Quit (The Chronicle of Higher Education, 2006 [cited October 19 2007]); available from http://chronicle.com/free/v52/i37/37a01001.htm. 64 Ibid.([cited).
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egalitarian conceptions of marriage in favour of traditional gender roles, and a rejection
of legal access to abortion. Politically, most reject the idea of the separation of church
and state.
It may seem as though this analysis ignores the most important feature of
fundamentalism, which is the certitude with which many fundamentalists hold their
religious and moral beliefs. One might think that in the case of many fundamentalists,
certitude is disproportionate to objective certainty. However, the idea that this is the
main feature that distinguishes fundamentalist students from their classmates should be
rejected, for the disproportion between certitude and certainty is not limited to religious
believers. As well, when comparing young people from fundamentalist backgrounds to
their more secular classmates, it is important to note that young fundamentalists are often
driven by passion and the desire to please God and live well. This may mean they are
actually more receptive than some of their more cynical classmates.
While I have made general claims about what typifies evangelical Protestant
fundamentalism, especially in the United States, it should also be pointed out that
fundamentalism is not a homogeneous phenomenon. However, the existence of religious
fundamentalism in general raises many questions for ethics teachers at the undergraduate
level. Should ethics teachers be in the business of disabusing students of fundamentalist
beliefs? For example, some say that philosophers should be undermining anti-feminist
beliefs, which are central to some versions of fundamentalist Christianity.65 Are there
some moral convictions that philosophy professors have a duty to actively challenge?
65 Ann Cudd takes this view. Ann Cudd, "Revolution vs. Devolution in Kansas: Teaching in a Conservative Climate," Teaching Philosophy 30, no. 2 (2007). The rest of the essays in that volume are devoted to first person accounts of teaching in American fundamentalist contexts, though the focus is more on academic freedom than on ethical obligations.
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These questions raise issues of autonomy and religious freedom, as well as the limits of
the role of the teacher, but also practical issues, since some fundamentalist students are
avoiding secular universities on the grounds that they do not want their anti-feminist
beliefs challenged.
Some believe that the business of philosophy courses is to teach students to
defend the beliefs they already possess, and some students seem to believe that this is the
role of such courses. However, questions arise as to whether such practices can be
justified and what end they are intended to serve.
Finally, there is the complicated relationship between student relativism and
religious fundamentalism. As Momeyer and Satris noted above, these two can exist in
tandem: students can profess to be relativists but also hold fundamentalist beliefs. As
well, it is often the case that students fail to see a third option: either one is a
fundamentalist, or one is a relativist. One might ask whether the role of philosophy
teachers is to help students find such middle ground.
As noted above, there are many Protestant evangelicals who are not
fundamentalists, or who even if they might call themselves fundamentalists, do not fit the
profile sketched here. There are evangelical feminists, evangelicals who are
evolutionists, evangelicals who are liberals, and evangelicals who are committed to the
ideals of liberal education. The authors whose essays are collected in the book Should
God Get Tenure?66 cannot be accused of being anti-intellectual; they are evangelical
intellectuals. Their version of liberal education incorporates the exploration of religious
faith and an emphasis on the study of religion, but it is nonetheless liberal in its focus on
David W. Gill, ed., Should God Get Tenure? Essays on Religion and Higher Education (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans, 1997).
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training the mind and discovering truth for oneself. Such evangelicals can find
themselves facing difficult questions when determining how to balance their commitment
to their faith and their commitment to their students' freedom of inquiry. These difficult
questions mirror the tensions in the debate between those who defend teacher advocacy
and those who defend neutrality. For evangelicals, the issues are made even weightier
because the eternal salvation of their students hangs in the balance.
Evangelicals of this sort are worried, just as fundamentalists are, about the anti
religious bias they see in many universities. However, instead of isolating themselves
they advocate for the integration of religion in the university curriculum. Evangelical
parents of this stripe, just as the fundamentalists above, are concerned that their children
will lose their faith in college, in particular in philosophy courses. In general, they
believe that religion is an integral part of one's lived identity and should not be ignored in
the formative years that are spent in college or university.
This raises the issue of whether and how discussion about religion should find a
home in ethics courses. As the authors in Should God Get Tenure? have argued, while
today most moral philosophers reject divine command theory, religion and ethics remain
closely bound together for many members of our societies. If these evangelicals are
right, it is wrong to expect students to deliberate about morality without allowing them to
consider their beliefs about God. Teaching ethics without religion therefore requires
taking a stand about the place of religious belief in moral deliberation.
The questions raised above with regard to fundamentalism can apply to religious
believers, especially evangelicals, more generally. Should ethics teachers encourage
students to defend their religious beliefs? Should ethics teachers try to undermine divine
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command theory? What is the relationship between dogmatic religious belief and
relativism? In general, the questions concern how philosophers should respond to their
students' religious beliefs when teaching ethics. The next section will explore more
questions relating to these.
4.5. Reasonable Pluralism and Autonomy
Western societies in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries have become
increasingly diverse. To use John Rawls's terminology,67 such societies are characterized
by the fact of pluralism. Disagreements abound regarding religious, philosophical, and
moral doctrines: the idea of the good life is not agreed upon by all citizens. According to
Rawls, this is the inevitable result of the political and social conditions in democratic
societies, for free institutions tend to generate a variety of doctrines and views.68
What Rawls calls particular attention to, however, is not simply the fact of
pluralism, but the fact of reasonable pluralism. According to Rawls, the various
religious, philosophical and moral doctrines that develop as a result of the public culture
of democracy are not merely a product of self-interest and class interests, and they are not
merely a product of the standpoints of individuals. Instead, "they are in part the work of
free practical reason within the framework of free institutions." 9 In other words, not
only do individuals in democratic societies disagree about morality, religion, and
philosophy, it is possible that they do so reasonably.
Rawls does not make claims about the reasonableness or unreasonableness of
particular disagreements about the good life, but explains how such disagreements can be
67 John Rawls, Political Liberalism (New York: Columbia University Press, 1996), 36. 68 Ibid. 69 Ibid., 37.
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reasonable. "The burdens of judgment" (detailed below) constitute Rawls's explanations
for why reasonable and intellectually careful people can disagree so deeply. On Rawls's
view, a reasonable person recognizes that the burdens of judgment often make agreement
difficult or even impossible. They answer the question "Why does not our conscientious
attempt to reason with one another lead to reasonable agreement?" They allow us to
explain the existence of disagreement without positing that the beliefs of individuals only
reflect their narrow interests or their irrationality.
These burdens of judgment are: the conflicting nature and complexity of
evidence, differences about weighing of considerations, vagueness of concepts and
borderline cases, the disparate experiences of diverse people, the varying normative
considerations of differing force on both sides of issues, and the tendency of social
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institutions to force us to select some values for emphasis and de-select others.
While Rawls allows that some disagreement is unreasonable, that "prejudice and
bias, self- and group-interest, blindness and wilfulness" play a role as well, he claims that
it is "unrealistic - or worse, it arouses mutual suspicion and hostility - to suppose that all
our differences are rooted solely in ignorance and perversity, or else in the rivalries for
power, status, or economic gain."72
For those interested in education, the question that arises here concerns how
moral education, and educating students about ethics and morality, should proceed in the
context of reasonable and unreasonable pluralism. Liberal philosophers have wondered
for some time what moral education in the public schools should look like in a pluralistic
context. In particular, two questions have arisen. The first concerns the content of moral 70 Ibid., 55. 71 Ibid., 56-57. 72 Ibid., 58.
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education. If moral education means teaching students a particular set of moral values,
then questions arise as to which values should be taught. If moral education means
character formation, then some conception of character must be presupposed, for some
character traits must be selected as more desirable than others. This raises the issue of
whether it is possible to have moral education devoid of the kind of content that requires
adherence to a particular conception of the good. Possibilities here include a conception
of shared values, or a conception of moral education as content-free, as in the case of
models based on "values clarification," in which students are not taught what their values
should be, but enabled to discover what their values are.
The second question is related to the first, and concerns how parental authority
should be balanced with a concern to enable students to make autonomous choices about
how to live. Liberal philosophers have argued that moral education should enable
students to make their own moral commitments. However, the question arises as to
how this should be balanced with a concern for the rights of parents to raise their children
in their own religious or cultural traditions. Should schools teach students to think
critically about their moral and religious beliefs, so that they may make autonomous
choices about them? This, as well as the practice of exposing children to various cultural
and religious traditions, is often seen by parents as an unjustifiable intrusion on their right
to pass on their religious and cultural ways of life. However, if children are not enabled
to make decisions autonomously about their lives, it appears as though they are being
denied their rights.
See, e.g., Brighouse, School Choice and Social Justice, Amy Gutmann, Democratic Education (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1999).
Distinguishing between reasonable and unreasonable comprehensive doctrines
adds a layer of complications to these issues. One might argue that education should be
aimed at allowing students to choose a reasonable comprehensive doctrine for
themselves, but should not aim at allowing them to choose unreasonable ones. A
stronger position would be that unreasonableness in comprehensive doctrines ought to be
actively undermined, and reasonableness encouraged.
This is one way of understanding the idea that philosophers and teachers more
generally ought to be teaching students to think critically. This would mean that teachers
would work toward indirectly eradicating unreasonable comprehensive doctrines by
teaching students to think critically about them. This could serve political ends in a
liberal state, but also could be understood to be in the best interests of those being taught.
In the university context, the rights of parents are less significant since students are
entering adulthood, even though fundamentalist parents do not see it that way.
Putting aside the issues of parental rights, however, even in the university context
these practices should be interrogated. I have indicated two possible goals in teaching
critical thinking in the context of pluralism. A teacher's goal could be to enable students
to choose any conception of the good for themselves, or to enable students to choose a
reasonable conception of the good for themselves. It is also possible for a teacher to
have neither of these goals, for one's goal in teaching students to think critically about
their beliefs could be something else, or could be an end in itself.
These potential goals should be evaluated based on what is reasonable to expect
students to be capable of, however. It is probably unrealistic to expect that each person
can, from a completely neutral position, choose his or her values and commitments, or to
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expect that each person can do so all at once. It is more likely that individuals choose
their conceptions a piece at a time, adding to and subtracting from what they inherited
from their parents and communities. It follows that any conception of teaching which
encourages students to evaluate all of their moral beliefs and make new moral
commitments within the context of one course is probably expecting too much. That is
not to say that the undergraduate ethics course is not a place for students to evaluate their
moral commitments. However, it is likely not the place for them to evaluate and replace
all of their moral commitments.
Another consideration in evaluating such goals is the possibility that a teacher's
efforts to encourage students to critically evaluate their moral and religious beliefs may
turn out to be counter-productive. Several philosophers have found this to be their
experience while teaching. Wesley Cragg claims that students can become moral
sceptics as a result of taking an ethics course. This is because students find objections to
their beliefs and reject them, but are then unable to find new beliefs that survive criticism.
Cragg claims that "the fact that the very process of reflection can lead to scepticism and
sometimes cynicism is widely known and frequently discussed, at least informally, by
those who care about the impact of their teaching activity on the lives of their students."74
Similar worries have arisen for Annette Baier75 and for Daniel Calcutt,76 and for those
mentioned above who believe that the only way to avoid this is to practice advocacy. It is
this kind of situation that had Plato concerned in Republic VII. Once students come to
74 A. W. Cragg, "Bernard Williams and the Nature of Moral Reflection," Dialogue 28 (1989), 356. 75 Annette Baier, "Doing Without Moral Theory?," in Postures of the Mind: Essays on Mind and Morals, (London: Methuen, 1985), 234. 76 Daniel Calicut, "The Value of Teaching Moral Skepticism," Teaching Philosophy 29, no. 3 (2006), 22324. See also Ronald D. Lawler, "Professional Ethics Courses: Do They Corrupt the Young?," Listening 16 (1982).
believe that some of their moral beliefs are not well founded, and are open to refutation,
the worry is that students will abandon all their moral beliefs. This theme is also echoed
in Aristophanes' Clouds where a young man is taught by a fictionalized version of
Socrates to question all of his beliefs, and then proceeds to perform morally reprehensible
acts.77
There are no statistics about whether or not ethics courses have this sort of effect
on students, but that several philosophers have raised the concern and believe it to be
universal should carry some weight. This possibility means that if a teacher's purpose in
teaching students to reflect on moral philosophy and ethics is to enable them to rationally
and autonomously choose how to live, it is possible for the means to undermine the end.
However, one might argue that this line of reasoning is too short-sighted, and that
an ethics course can function as one step along the path of an individual's moral
development. Even if students doubt all of their beliefs in an ethics course, they may
rebuild an edifice of beliefs and values further along the road. It is not essential that all
of that work be done within the ethics course itself. Martha Nussbaum argues that the
overall purpose of liberal education is to teach young people to distinguish between
objective moral laws and human conventions, and generally to enable individuals to live
a life "that accepts no belief as authoritative simply because it has been handed down by
tradition or become familiar through habit, a life that questions all beliefs and accepts
only those that survive reason's demand for consistency and for justification." An
ethics course could serve one role within this overall goal. Following in the Socratic
77 This is described well in Martha Nussbaum, "Aristophanes and Socrates on Learning Practical Wisdom," in Yale Classical Studies: Aristophanes Essays in Interpretation, ed. Jeffrey Henderson, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1980). 78 Martha Nussbaum, Cultivating Humanity: A Classical Defense of Reform in Liberal Education (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1997), 9.
tradition, philosophers could be the gadflies who encourage students to question
traditional beliefs, even if they are not finally involved in the process by which students
replace their rejected beliefs with new ones.
However, it should be asked whether Nussbaum's goal is too far-reaching. After
all, a life which questions all beliefs may well turn out to be an overexamined life. A
worry here is that such a use of a person's critical thinking skills would negatively impact
their interpersonal relationships and happiness in general. While reason must play a role
in making decisions about relationships, it could be destructive when used in a way that
denigrates the role of emotion and intuition, or forces like love and devotion. As well,
perhaps Dewey and the Thomists are right that some practices and beliefs can usefully
remain unquestioned.
However, even if Nussbaum's goal is too far-reaching, her general framework can
be of use. Perhaps the overall purpose of liberal education is to enable students to make
reasoned decisions about their beliefs and values, and the ethics course plays one role
within that, albeit a destructive one. The ethics course on this conception is akin to the
wrecking ball that must take down buildings before new ones can be built. That said, if
the conception above of how beliefs are formed is accurate, the metaphor of demolishing
the entire edifice only to rebuild it again is misguided. In the end, whether or not one
accepts the idea that philosophy courses should play a destructive role, it is certainly
possible to accept the view that an ethics course should be understood as part of a larger
process of moral and intellectual development. What all of these considerations point to,
of course, is the question with which this chapter began, which concerns the purpose of
ethics courses. This question will be dealt with in more detail in the next chapter.
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I have argued in this section that the existence of pluralism about comprehensive
doctrines raises many complex questions for the ethics teacher at any level of schooling.
I have also argued that the liberal ideal of education as enabling students to choose their
conception of the good is a promising view generally speaking, but that such choices
should be seen as emerging within long and complicated processes. The potential goals
of ethics teachers are constrained by what is possible in the lives of their students.
Generally, pluralism is significant as a social phenomenon but also significant
personally for students who are negotiating the terrain between relativism and
dogmatism, and for teachers who are torn between advocacy and neutrality. The features
of the classroom that have emerged from this chapter's analysis are not, in the end,
completely separable from one another. In combination, they make undergraduate ethics
teaching a morally complex practice. The many complexities are the features that must
be addressed in a reasonable account of the ethical obligations of ethics teachers. In what
follows, such an account will be explored.
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CHAPTER 5: THE NEED FOR A RICHER ACCOUNT OF TEACHING ETHICS
Moral philosophers have applied their skills to a wide range of professional roles
in attempts to specify what duties and obligations properly attach to people who occupy
such roles. Such attempts recognize that there are (at least) two sorts of moral obligations
that an individual might have. First, there are the general obligations that the individual
has by virtue of being a moral agent. Different moral theories will give different
accounts of what these obligations consist in, but all moral theories agree that there are
some obligations that apply to everyone. Second, there are the obligations that arise from
the role(s) that individual occupies. For example, a parent has a special obligation to care
for his or her child that arises from his or her role as a parent, not just from his or her
status as a moral agent. A doctor has moral obligations that a non-doctor does not have,
such as to treat those who are sick. This obligation arises not from the doctor's general
obligation to help anyone he or she can (if anyone has such an obligation), but from the
role of healer that he or she has chosen to occupy. In other words, as Michael Hardimon
claims, there is a distinction between the obligations human beings have as human beings
and the obligations that arise from what he calls "institutional roles," which are
"constellations of institutionally specified rights and duties organized around an
institutionally specified social function."1
There are difficulties working out all of the complexities inherent in the idea of
role obligations. For example, in ordinary situations a doctor does not have an obligation
to treat every sick person. Some obligations are strictly relational, such as the role
obligations of parents. A mother has obligations to care for her children, but not for all
1 Michael Hardimon, "Role Obligations," The Journal of 'Philosophy 91, no. 7 (1994), 334. Hardimon's paper is an excellent analysis of role obligations.
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children. However, what is important to note is the particularity of the obligation: it
attaches to the person by virtue of the role he or she occupies, not by virtue of being a
person. The way in which these role obligations are related to general obligations will
depend upon one's view of moral theory in general and one's conception of the source of
moral obligation.
Given this rise in philosophical theorizing about obligations, philosophers have
concerned themselves with the obligations that arise from various roles. Thus, there have
been philosophers writing about the particular obligations of doctors, of lawyers, and
more recently, of parents4 (to give just a few examples). But rarely have philosophers
considered what obligations apply to those who occupy the professional role of
philosopher. It is a notable absence in an otherwise rich and productive field. Not only
this, but philosophers who do choose to write about teaching often find themselves
feeling marginalized by others who believe that teaching is not a subject for legitimate
philosophical research.5
It is not within the scope of this project to inquire as to why so many philosophers
appear to believe this. In part, that would be a sociological analysis. There is certainly
no prima facie reason to believe that teaching should be treated differently from
professions such as medicine, law, or business; if these professions are amenable to the
methods and techniques of philosophical analysis, then surely teaching is as well. While
2 The involvement of philosophers in medical ethics is well-established; especially in this age of ethics consultants. 3 There are many philosophers writing about legal ethics, e.g. David Luban, Legal Ethics and Human Dignity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007). 4 See, e.g., the recent edited collection on obligations to children by Brennan and Noggle. Samantha Brennan and Robert Noggle, eds., Taking Responsibility for Children (Waterloo, ON: Laurier University Press, 2007). 5 This has been reported to me in informal conversations with philosophers from Canada, the United States, and the United Kingdom.
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the study of each requires the kind of empirical study that is the province of fields such as
sociology or psychology, and the skills learned from years of practice, each also benefits
from the kind of conceptual inquiry that is the province of philosophy.
Where philosophers have thought about professional ethics in an academic
context, the main questions asked have concerned the limits on the pursuit of goals: on
the acts one must not perform no matter how good the results in terms of achieving those
goals. In the field of research, good philosophers do not plagiarize the work of others, for
example. In the field of teaching, good philosophers do not humiliate students in an effort
to motivate them to perform. Indeed, in the field of teaching almost all of the rules
specify what sort of behaviour on the part of the teacher is prohibited. The rules against
sexual harassment are a classic example of this sort of rule.
This focus on rules rather than on moral behaviour more generally is not limited
to academia. In her recent book on workplace ethics, Cynthia Estlund argues that our
conceptions of workplace ethics in general should go beyond adherence to codes of
conduct and general obligations to others and should take account of the importance of
relations of cooperation, sociability and connectedness.6 In academic ethics, what is
missing is a rich view of teaching ethics that allows for careful deliberation about
teaching goals and practices, aside from reference to practical matters or to codes of
ethics.
It must be pointed out how wide-ranging the term "academic ethics" really is. As
it stands, it applies to all those who are researching and/or teaching in higher education,
and perhaps even in other educational sectors. There are many ways in which a
6 Cynthia Estlund, Working Together: How Workplace Bonds Strengthen a Diverse Democracy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003).
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philosopher interested in academic ethics might proceed, and one way to narrow the field
of inquiry is to choose one context in which teaching takes place. This is the approach I
take. My focus is on philosophers, more particularly on philosophers who are teaching,
and even more particularly on philosophers who are teaching ethics. This is still a broad
field. There are many types of ethics courses taught by philosophers, and in many
contexts, such as philosophy departments and professional schools. The conclusions I
draw from my analysis will have broader implications.
However, ethics courses are particularly interesting because their content is
intimately connected to students' and teachers' conceptions of the good life, and to their
conceptions of self. There are also a great many ethics courses being taught not only in
philosophy departments but in many relatively new contexts such as professional schools.
Finally, as I discussed in the previous chapter, there exist many varied expectations for
what an ethics course should achieve. All of these factors make the ethics course
particularly worthy of careful consideration.
In this chapter, then, I consider academic ethics in the context of the ethics
classroom. I first reject two views. I reject the conception of academic ethics mentioned
above: the "code of ethics" approach. Such an approach forbids any action which
violates the rules (such as harassment or sex with students), but permits any other action.
The second view I reject combines the "code of ethics" with just one general role
obligation: that teaching practices reflect carefully considered goals, or in other words,
that a teacher always acts in a way that promotes teaching goals. I argue that neither
approach is rich enough to engage the difficult questions that arise in teaching ethics.
These questions must be addressed by reference to other moral factors.
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Once I have made this argument, in the second half of the chapter I will consider
frameworks for academic ethics. This requires considering which moral conceptions are
appropriate for the teaching context and which enable fruitful deliberation. I will outline
several possibilities and discuss their shortcomings. In the next chapter, I will defend my
own view in contrast to the others. I will claim that an account of well-being, specifically
a capabilities account of well-being, is the most promising fit.
5.1. The Need for a Richer Account
It is easy to see that the code of ethics approach is inadequate to the moral
complexities of teaching. Good teachers do more than simply obey the rules: they are
careful and reflective about their practices on a deeper level. This leaves the second
approach I suggested: the idea that good teaching means acting on the basis of carefully
considered goals. As I have defined this approach, the two general role obligations of
teachers are, first, that they not violate the code of ethics, and second, that they are
careful about choosing their goals and acting on them. Now, by "careful," in this context,
I do not mean that teachers choose morally acceptable goals. If this is what the word
means, then this is the beginning of a rich account of teaching ethics, the sort I am
looking for. Here I am describing something quite different, and so morality cannot enter
the picture aside from the moral injunction to be careful about goals. No, what "careful"
means in this context is that teachers do not simply teach on a whim, that they choose
their goals based on good reasons, and that they act on the basis of those goals.
In other words, on this approach, good teaching practice looks like this: the
teacher respects the rules, and deliberates carefully about his or her practices. He or she
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thinks well about what his or her goals should be - perhaps settling on, e.g., "to enable
students to read well" because he or she sees that as a valuable skill at the university
level. Then, he or she thinks hard about which strategies would best achieve this, and
implements them. Would a course with mostly tests be more effective, or a course with
mostly writing? Which philosophers should come first? The questions about means are
entirely practical: they are addressed by reference to experience and to facts about
students and the classroom, not by reference to moral principles or rules.
Teachers operating in this way are using practical reasoning almost exclusively:
they are not asking themselves a lot of moral questions, since the moral injunctions (aside
from the injunction to teach carefully) concern acts that are not seriously considered by
good teachers. Good teachers do not ask themselves whether they ought to harass their
students until they learn, or whether beating their students would be a good way to teach
them Kant. They are not guilty of a lack of carefulness, nor do they deliberately harm
their students. What they are missing, however, is one feature of what reasoning about
teaching practices should look like. In other words, they are failing to recognize
normative questions that arise from their practices, and normative factors that should
influence their decisions.
In other words, teachers operating in this second approach to teaching ethics are,
if they succeed in their teaching, good teachers. However, their decision-making about
teaching could be enriched by a consideration of moral factors as well as practical ones.
In what follows, I will show this to be the case. In other words, I will argue that purely
practical reasoning about goals leaves important normative considerations unaddressed.
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Practical reasoning about teaching, in this context, takes place on two levels: at
the level of goal-setting, and at the level of means-end reasoning. Means-end reasoning
means deliberating about which means best promote one's teaching goals, and is almost
entirely based on teaching experience and knowledge about one's students. Reasoning
about goals is more difficult. It is not clearly like means-end reasoning, because the
question concerns choosing one's ends. In what follows I will consider some possibilities
for how teachers might reason about their teaching goals on a purely practical level.
Here is the first possibility: an appeal to the profession of philosophy itself and to
the idea of what it means to teach philosophy. In other words, perhaps there are certain
goals that are presupposed by the concept of philosophy that philosophers share (or at
least, that most philosophers share to a certain degree). Let us say that it is generally
agreed upon that philosophy involves seeking after truth through the consideration of
arguments. This is, for the vast majority of philosophers, what it means to do philosophy.
This means that goals in teaching philosophy could derive from this general conception.
One's general goal as a teacher is thus to teach students philosophy, and what that means
is to teach students how to seek after truth through the consideration of arguments. Of
course, this can be modified given the subject matter at hand: in an epistemology course;
students learn how to seek after the truth regarding knowledge, and so on.
However, even in that simple formulation, a word has slipped in, and it is not
clear whether it should be there or not. I could have written "to teach students to seek
after truth through the consideration of arguments," rather than introducing the "how."
The presence or lack of "how" signifies the difference between teaching a capacity for
doing philosophy and teaching students to do philosophy, and thus significantly changes
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what a teacher's goals are. A teacher whose goal is to teach students "how" achieves that
goal if the students leave the course with developed philosophical skills; a teacher whose
goal is to teach students "to do philosophy" only achieves that goal if the students utilize
those skills. The first goal involves giving students the skills they need should they
choose to use them; the second involves taking responsibility for students' behaviour.
This preliminary analysis shows that even this attempt at non-normative reasoning
about teaching goals runs into a normative question right at the beginning: should
philosophy teachers take responsibility for whether or not their students use their
philosophical skills, or not? This question hits harder if we ask whether or not a teacher
should take responsibility for the way students use their philosophical skills. One can
imagine a student who learns how to argue in his or her philosophy course, and then uses
those skills to further the interests of a racist group in the public square. Whether that
student's teacher should be held accountable is a moral question. Deriving teaching goals
from the concept of philosophy itself thus runs into moral questions right from the
beginning.
It also runs into the problem of being overly general. Whether or not the "how" is
included, in the context of ethics what the formula produces is something like: an ethics
course should teach students (how) to seek after the truth about ethics (or perhaps "ethical
truth") through argument. This immediately raises questions regarding the meaning of
"the truth about ethics" or "ethical truth." Philosophers have strong disagreements about
what truth is, what moral truth is, and whether objective or absolute truth in ethics is
possible. At this level of generality, this goal cannot inform particular practices in ethics
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teaching. If the agreed-upon "truth about ethics" has little content, it is not clear how
teachers can use it as a goal.
This conception of philosophy teaching goals also appears at first glance to
exclude some of the possible goals listed in the previous chapter, such as "increasing
moral sensitivity" or "stimulating the moral imagination." They do not obviously fit into
the picture of teaching students (how) to seek out the truth through argument. Perhaps,
though, they could be included as a necessary condition for truth-seeking or for arguing
well. It would be reasonable to argue, for example, that moral sensitivity and
imagination are needed in order to argue well in the context of ethics, or in order to be
more likely to find the truth. The trouble here is that this way of setting things out does
not necessarily reflect the attitudes of those actually taking these as goals. In other
words, it is probable that many of those who think moral sensitivity is important think it
important regardless of whether it makes students better at arguing or not, or better at
discovering truth or not.
On the line of reasoning I am following, however, all other goals must be means
to seeking out the truth through argument. This is at odds with current practices, for
aside from moral sensitivity and imagination, there is the idea of the importance of
history. Many philosophers teach the classic works of philosophy as important in
themselves, either as a matter of personal improvement or as a matter of cultural literacy.
For example, many (probably most) philosophers take great pains to ensure that students
remember not just what the categorical imperative is, but whose name it is associated
with. These teachers aim at teaching not only arguments, but also about the great
thinkers in the philosophical tradition. Not everyone does, and of course this is a vexed
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issue, especially in first year courses. It arises whenever someone asks whether an
introductory course should be a "problems" course or a "history" course. Again, one
could understand learning about history as a means to an end. However, those who think
history is important, like those who think moral sensitivity is important, often think it is
important regardless of whether it makes students better at arguing or not, or better at
discovering truth or not.
What this analysis shows is that deriving teaching goals from the general
conception of philosophy as seeking truth through argument ends up devaluing many
goals philosophers set for themselves. Two options emerge from this. Either all goals
are subsumed to the one ultimate goal, or other goals are allowed in that are not a means
to that goal. The first option denies the convictions of those who take those other goals
(sensitivity, imagination, cultural literacy) to be important regardless of their contribution
to finding out the truth about philosophy in general, and ethics in particular. The second
option means abandoning the project of deriving all teaching goals from this general
conception of philosophy. In other words, if this second option is taken, then one is
forced to appeal to considerations other than the concept of philosophy itself, and then
will find oneself back at the beginning: trying to figure out which considerations should
be relevant in determining teaching goals.
There is a possible way out. Perhaps what has gone wrong is that the definition of
philosophy with which I began (seeking out the truth through the consideration of
arguments) is too narrow. Perhaps those other goals (sensitivity and so on) reflect a
broader conception of philosophy on the part of teachers. In other words, perhaps those
philosophers who take moral sensitivity as a goal see good philosophy at least in the
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realm of ethics as consisting (in part) of moral sensitivity. To be a good philosopher on
this view is to be morally sensitive, because only when a person is morally sensitive can
he or she have reasonable views about morality. This attempt to broaden my definition of
philosophy can also be seen in the context of the importance of history: many of those
who take history as important in teaching do so because they see the study of history as
part of what philosophy is.
Taking this way out will mean adding to the original definition of philosophy that
I proposed, or at least making it more inclusive. The trouble here is figuring out what
this new definition should look like. It should be pretty obvious that it will be impossible
to get the majority of philosophers to agree to a definition that goes beyond the very
general one I proposed. What has emerged in the consideration of issues such as the
history of philosophy is that even the definition I proposed may not be general enough to
generate broad agreement. If teaching goals are to be derived from a conception of
philosophy, then some conception of philosophy will need to be generated, and it will
need to be broadly acceptable to philosophers. What my analysis has suggested,
however, is that any conception that is specific enough to generate teaching goals will be
too specific to garner broad agreement.
Here is what someone might say to all of this: we can base our goals on a
conception of what philosophy is, and such a conception will be specific enough if each
of us uses our own conception. So long as our own conception is based on good reasons,
there is nothing wrong with each of us generating our own teaching goals based on our
own conception of philosophy. This is possibly how many teachers go about setting their
goals, anyway. So what's wrong with that picture?
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There are two problems with it. The first is that it leaves the question unanswered
that I posed at the very beginning of this analysis: whether a teacher is responsible for
ways in which students use their learning. That question cannot be answered without
regard to moral factors, for it is a moral question. The second is that it makes teaching
into an individualistic exercise. The line of reasoning I am examining in this section
presupposes that the courses we teach are fixed: that is, all a teacher has to do is look at
the course title (Ethics!) and determine what his or her goals should be. This ignores the
fact that we as philosophers are also in the business of determining what courses should
be taught, and in which contexts. Why choose to teach any particular course? It cannot
just be because the subject matter exists, and the more knowledge a person has, the better.
This approach does not give us a basis for collectively deciding, as teaching departments,
what parts of philosophy should be taught to which students and in which contexts. In
other words, even if an individual's conception may furnish everything he or she needs to
make a decision about his or her own teaching goals, it cannot provide a shared
background against which a department can deliberate. Decisions about courses will
have to either be compromises between differing camps, or based on something other
than each individual's conception of what philosophy is.
Many of these issues are in the realm of metaphilosophy, which is full of difficult
problems that I do not propose to resolve here. My point in raising these issues is to
show that deliberating about what philosophy "is" does not cover enough ground in
determining what one's teaching goals should be. It does not answer why a teacher
should teach philosophy to particular students, it does not address how goals should differ
in differing contexts, and with different students. It cannot differentiate between teaching
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philosophy to first-year students taking philosophy as an elective, and fourth year
students taking an honours seminar. In other words, trying to figure out teaching goals
requires considering what we are trying to do to particular students. We cannot answer
this by referring to a conception of philosophy.
What this analysis shows is that a teacher's conception of philosophy alone
cannot do all of the work when it comes to determining teaching goals. But, perhaps
there is another source of teaching goals that is purely practical, and that is a conception
of what a university education ought to achieve, in general.
It must be noted right away that the "ought" in this sentence immediately
introduces a normative consideration. However, what is going on here is that the
normativity applies to the general purpose of a university, and teachers use practical
reason to think about how they might contribute to that. In other words, a teacher's
reasoning about teaching goals is means-end reasoning, because he or she is reasoning
about how promoting teaching goals in a particular course could further the general ends
that the university has set for itself.
Determining what ends universities set for themselves is rather difficult. There is
much disagreement about what the purpose of a university education is. For parents of
college students, a university degree is often most valuable as a ticket to a promising
future, career-wise. For academics, this is not necessarily the most valuable outcome of a
university education, and especially for those in the liberal arts, it may seem wrong
headed to consider degrees in terms of jobs rather than in terms of knowledge for its own
sake. There is certainly not room here to canvass all of the disagreements regarding the
scope and purpose of higher education. A teacher could reason through these
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disagreements for him or herself and determine what he or she believes the purposes of a
university should be, and then tailor his or her teaching goals appropriately. The trouble
that arises here is that doing so will require that he or she appeal to something or other in
order to determine what the purpose of a university should be. If that "something or
other" is normative, then this approach fails in explaining how teachers could limit their
reasoning to practical concerns. If it is not normative, then a new layer of complication
has been introduced, for now it must be determined what that "something or other" is.
One possible way to think about university goals in general is to consider what
universities are expected to do, policy wise. There is a movement in the United States
and in the United Kingdom toward independent evaluation of universities. Standards are
being set by external bodies (accrediting agencies and governmental commissions) and
tests are being devised to see if universities are meeting those standards. In the United
States, there are assessment programs at various levels of government. These programs
are intended to assess student learning over the course of their university career, in order
to assess what kind of a job the university is doing. These assessments take the form of
interviews, or marking student essays, usually by committee. The idea is that faculty
reports of their own teaching success are not enough to judge whether students are
learning or not, and some kind of objective tool must be employed. Many academics are
Q
struggling against such practices, which they see as intrusive and a waste of time.
7 Robert Ennis has written a critical summary of one of the major assessment programs in the United States. The "Spellings Commission" has urged critical-thinking testing for all college students. Ennis explains how this works and how teachers ought to respond to it. Robert H. Ennis, "Nationwide Testing of Critical Thinking for Higher Education: Vigilance Required," Teaching Philosophy 3\, no. 1 (2008). 81 have gained this knowledge through many conversations with teachers in colleges and universities in the United States. A quick internet search reveals how widespread these practices are.
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What academics are forced to do in an institution that does assessment is to
consider at which student outcomes they are aiming. Assessment programs make lists of
characteristics that university students should have by the time they graduate, and assess
student learning based on these criteria. For example, the capacity for critical thought
might be one such outcome. Particular courses are then evaluated by their ability to
contribute to the outcomes. Philosophy courses are often understood to contribute to
critical thinking in particular.
The United Kingdom's assessment system is centralized in the Quality Assurance
Agency for Higher Education (QAA).9 This agency is an independent body whose
mission is "to safeguard the public interest in sound standards of higher education
qualifications and to inform and encourage continuous improvement in the management
of the quality of higher education."10 In other words, they are evaluating universities on
behalf of the public. Many academics in the United Kingdom resent this intrusion as
the QAA evaluates not only teaching but research.
As far as teaching is concerned, universities are evaluated by student outcomes,
just as in the assessment projects in the United States. Essentially, the QAA defines what
it means to be a graduate, or in other words, what those who receive an honours
bachelor's degree ought to be able to do. According to the QAA, a graduate of any
discipline should be able to "deploy techniques of enquiry; comment on current research;
9 http://www.qaa.ac.uk/ http://www.qaa.ac.uk/aboutus/default.asp
11 Again, this was discovered through personal interactions with philosophers in the United Kingdom.
10
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appreciate uncertainty, ambiguity and the limits of knowledge; manage their own
learning; evaluate critically; and solve problems.12
I have described these assessment programs to suggest one source for philosophy
teaching goals that is not based on moral deliberation. Philosophy teachers could look at
what the university experience is supposed to achieve for students, and tailor their goals
appropriately. The reasoning a philosopher does thus is means-end at both levels: he or
she chooses which goals to pursue based on how well they contribute to the overall
university outcomes, and chooses which practices based on how well they contribute to
those goals. It might also be possible to bypass the middle step and base the choice of
one's teaching practices on their possible contribution to assessment outcomes.
This method, like basing one's decisions about teaching goals on the concept of
philosophy, does make much reasoning about teaching possible, especially when
combined with the practical reasoning abilities of an experienced teacher. The outcomes
themselves are reasonable. However, this scheme solves the practical reasoning problem
by adding another level of reasoning: the reasoning that has to take place on the part of
those who are deciding what the assessment goals should be. So, while a teacher, a
department, or even a university may be able to rely on the assessment criteria in order to
make teaching decisions, at some point someone will have to be reasoning based on
normative considerations. As well, concerns for academic freedom may conflict with
accepting such a scheme as valid. There is also the reasonable assumption that teachers
ought to be making at least some decisions about goals themselves, given that they are
12 The QAA standards as they are written in the official documents are rather complex. This summary comes from George MacDonald Ross, Making Them Think (University of Leeds Learning and Teaching Bulletin, 2008 [cited August 10th 2008]); available from http://www.lts.leeds.ac.uk/bulletin/issuel8/page5.php.
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uniquely placed to understand the needs of their classes, and that they have chosen
teaching as a profession and thus should have some say in what their professional goals
and standards are.
In this section I have surveyed two practical ways in which one might reason
about teaching goals, and I have shown that these methods do not provide enough
information for deciding which goals to pursue. Furthermore, these approaches leave
important questions unanswered. These questions, aside from those discussed above, are
those I raised in the previous chapter. These questions are normative, not practical, and
are not covered by the scope of a code of ethics. For these reasons, they are left
unanswered by the frameworks I have been considering.
• Should ethics teachers aim at moral improvement in their students? If so,
what would moral improvement consist in, and what is its relationship to
improvement in moral reasoning?
• Should teachers be neutral with regard to their own moral, political and
religious views, or does good teaching require advocacy or at least
disclosure of one's beliefs? If teachers should be neutral, what should that
look like, and is it even possible?
• How should ethics teachers respond to religious fundamentalism, and to
student relativism? Given that these are both strong forces in the
classroom, and that they concern moral beliefs, how should philosophers
position themselves? Are there some forms of belief that must be
challenged or even deliberately undermined?
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• Generally, what should teaching goals be with regard to the students' own
moral, political and religious beliefs, that is, the beliefs with which they
entered the course?
These questions concern moral and political goals, and religious considerations.
Addressing them means considering issues such as what it means to be a good person,
whether university teachers have moral authority, what the relationship between morality
and religion is, and the ethics of belief. Questions of neutrality involve moral and
political ideals. The relationship between morality and reason is a deeply contested
question within normative moral theory and metaethics. The issues I have raised in the
foregoing chapters are not resolved by practical considerations alone, but concern deep
issues of the good life. In other words, the teacher I described above - the teacher who
abides by the code of ethics, and is careful about goal-setting - cannot answer these
questions without regard to moral factors.
The existence of these unanswered questions, as well as the problems I have
raised with purely practical reasoning about teaching goals, give good reason to reject the
view that a teacher can make all important teaching decisions using purely practical
reason within the bounds of a code of ethics. Non-moral considerations are not enough
for dealing with the difficult questions that arise for philosophers teaching ethics. In
order for a teacher to be able to reason fruitfully about teaching decisions, moral factors
must be considered. This moral reasoning must go beyond determining whether or not
one is violating the code of ethics.
Many philosophers talking about teaching practices have appealed to moral
factors in their arguments. However, these moral factors are usually mixed in with
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practical considerations, and the moral claims made are often not defended. What I will
do in the second half of this chapter is to look for a framework that will enable
philosophers teaching ethics to appeal to moral factors in their reasoning about teaching.
I will look at several possibilities and discuss their shortcomings. In the next chapter, I
will defend my own framework. It is not the only plausible way to think about the ethics
of teaching, but I will give reasons to prefer it over a few alternatives.
5.2. Possible Accounts of Teaching Ethics
In this section I will lay out several alternative frameworks for teaching ethics and
show some of their weaknesses. This analysis will reveal those characteristics that a
preferable framework should possess. In keeping with the conclusions of 5.1., what a
good account of teaching ethics will need to do is to help with deliberation about goals, to
take into account the characteristics of the ethics classroom discussed in the previous
chapter, and to address the tough moral questions I have raised in chapters one through
four. These requirements will be discussed in further detail in the next chapter.
Negative Obligations
The first framework that should spring to mind emerges from my rejection of the
"code of ethics" approach. Perhaps what was wrong with the code of ethics approach
was that it was too narrow, and what needs to be in its place is a fuller account of
Brook Sadler's insightful article on student participation is a good example of this sort of mixed reasoning. Brook J. Sadler, "How Important is Student Participation in Teaching Philosophy?," Teaching Philosophy 27, no. 3 (2004).
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negative obligations. In other words, a richer account of teaching ethics can be based
solely on the idea of negative obligations so long as those obligations are not too narrow.
The obvious way to think about this is to speak of autonomy, for the idea of
respect for autonomy is closely tied to the idea of negative obligations. Autonomy can be
roughly defined as the capacity for self-governance, and has historically been the central
concept of Kantian moral philosophers. To violate a person's autonomy is to undermine
that person's ability to govern him or herself. One classic Kantian case of violating a
person's autonomy is to tell that person a lie, since in that case one is making it
impossible for that person to make an informed choice. Respect for autonomy is often
contrasted with paternalism, where one person makes choices for another person in an
effort to do that person good. If I believe my friend is making a poor choice with regard
to who she is marrying, it is a violation of her autonomy if I try to prevent her from acting
as she chooses. Attempting to convince her to change her mind is one thing; forcibly
preventing her from showing up at the wedding is another.
Thus one could think of a teacher's moral obligations as being entirely negative,
and as stemming from the obligation not to violate his or her students' autonomy. On
this view teachers should not trick their students, or lie to them, or interfere with their
self-governance in any way.
This is not the place for a full-scale analysis of deontological moral theories.
However, there is good reason to reject a purely negative view of moral obligation in the
context being considered here. I have argued above that the fuller account of teaching
ethics I am seeking must enable decision-making about teaching practices and goals, and
must address the questions I listed above. A purely negative approach cannot enable
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productive deliberation about teaching goals. It can say which practices are off-limits,
and which goals are off-limits. For example, one's goal cannot be to brainwash one's
students, for that violates their autonomy. However, if a person is deciding between two
competing goals, neither of which involves violating his or her negative duties, this
approach cannot give any moral weight to one over the other. To put this another way,
there are no moral factors to appeal to when deciding between two goals, aside from
whether or not the goal involves violating a student's autonomy.
An example will help, here. As discussed above, one of the most debated issues
in teaching philosophy, particularly in first-year courses, is the "history versus issues"
approach to teaching. Some disagree on the basis of whether historical or contemporary
works are more conducive to getting students to think about the "issues." The deep
disagreement, however, is not about means but about ends. It is about what counts as
valuable in a philosophy course, and indeed, in philosophy itself. Essentially, the
disagreement comes down to whether or not it is valuable for students to learn the history
of philosophy, and by extension, whether or not the history of philosophy itself is
valuable to philosophers.
A teacher trying to decide for him or herself whether or not history is valuable
cannot appeal to a conception of negative moral obligations. A teacher's conception of
what philosophy is can provide an answer as to whether history is valuable to philosophy
generally or at least to his or her own research. However, it cannot give an answer as to
whether history should be taught in philosophy courses, and especially not in particular
contexts, as I have argued above.
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In essence, the problem with an entirely negative approach is that it does not give
an answer to questions about what teachers ought to do to their students, only what they
should not do. The negative approach leaves the teacher with a list of morally acceptable
practices and goals from which to choose, but gives no reason to choose one over the
other.
Now some may believe that this is a good thing. After all, teachers should be
allowed to make decisions for their own courses and in their own contexts. And, perhaps
much deliberation about teaching should be practical rather than moral. However, with
regard to the former concern, extending the reach of moral obligation from negative
duties to positive ones does not prevent individual teachers from deliberating about what
they should do, and taking into account the intricacies of their contexts. As for the latter
concern, as I have argued, it makes perfect sense for much of a teacher's deliberation
about teaching to be practical. Once a teacher has goals in mind, even very broad goals,
determining which practices will best achieve those in a given context can be an entirely
practical enterprise, within the bounds of moral constraints. However, deciding about
what those goals will be cannot be an entirely practical matter, as I have argued above.
Moral factors are needed, and if those factors take the form of negative constraints alone,
there is still much to choose from. Teaching the history of philosophy and learning
contemporary philosophy are both morally permissible in that neither violates students'
autonomy. How should teachers decide between them? What good is one trying to
achieve by teaching them?
I do not want to discount the negative view completely. Certainly, it has good
potential for addressing many of the questions I posed above, to do with advocacy,
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neutrality, and so on. However, what is missing is an account of the good, or perhaps the
goods, of teaching. In making decisions about teaching goals one is deciding about
goods, and so a moral conception which defines the good, rather than just the bad, is a
natural fit. Therefore, in the rest of this chapter I will consider moral conceptions which
involve conceptions of the good.
Utilitarianism
Utilitarianism is an obvious choice with which to begin, since it has classically
been the moral theory with the most to say about the good. This is because for
utilitarianism, all questions about which actions are right and which are wrong reduce to
questions about which actions produce the most good overall. According to
utilitarianism, the good consists in pleasure. Moral decision-making involves
determining which actions promote the good and avoid the bad. Of course, all of these
conceptions have been given very deep treatment by philosophers, but that is
utilitarianism's general outline.
This conception, simply understood, would mean evaluating teaching decisions
based on their contribution to overall happiness. Given utilitarianism's broad scope,
"overall happiness" refers to the happiness of all those affected by a teacher's decisions,
not just his or her students. This means that if a given decision results in more pleasure
or happiness overall, it is the right thing to do, even if it results in pain for one's students.
This version is not very plausible. More sophisticated versions of utilitarianism propose
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that there are two levels to moral thinking. Two level-theories make a distinction
between the kind of deliberation that should precede action and the kind of deliberation
that is involved in normative judgments. One classic example of a two-level theory is
rule utilitarianism, which proposes that ordinary decisions should be a matter of
following a set of moral rules rather than trying to maximize the good. The idea behind
the two levels is that in general, people following those moral rules just is the way to get
the most good overall, rather than people deliberating about how to do the most good.
The overall good is still the end of moral action, but it is not achieved when each person
directly aims at it.
There are many variations on the idea of a two-level theory, and many of these
use the idea of two levels to account for "special obligations," such as a person's
obligations to friends and family members. When parents make decisions about how to
treat their children, they do not try to maximize the overall good, but to do good for their
own children. The idea underlying this is that if each parent cares for his or her children
well, that is more likely to bring about the most good than if each tries to care for all
children. This kind of idea could work in the classroom if the relationship between
teacher and student engenders special obligations to a teacher's students.
There is one major reason to think that utilitarianism in general is not the best
moral conception for our purposes here. Utilitarianism, even in its sophisticated forms,
would have teachers evaluating their teaching goals based on what is likely to lead to
happiness and pleasure. This is in one way very narrow, and in another way very broad.
14 This view was first proposed by Hare. R.M. Hare, Moral Thinking: Its Levels, Method and Point (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1981).
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In its narrowness, it does not account well for many teaching goals. For example,
consider a teacher trying to decide whether or not the year-long introductory course he or
she is teaching should include a unit on predicate logic. The other readings in the course
do not require an understanding of predicate logic, and many of those in the course are
non-majors. The analysis of this decision will vary depending on which conception of
utilitarianism he or she chooses to employ. At its base, however, it is a decision about
what will lead to the most happiness. However, it is not easy to justify teaching predicate
logic, or the history of philosophy, or any other subject that does not immediately affect
the way students live, on the basis of happiness. This is clearest once it is admitted that a
teacher cannot just argue that teaching predicate logic will lead to more happiness than
not, but that it will lead to more happiness as opposed to teaching anything else that
teacher is in a position to teach. It is also not going to line up well with the way many
teachers think about the value of logic, history, and philosophy. This is because these are
generally seen as valuable in themselves, rather than as means to happiness.
I argued that one problem with an entirely negative account of teaching ethics is
that it gives teachers no way to decide between two goods. Utilitarianism resolves this by
positing that the only thing that is good is happiness (or pleasure). Anything else that is
valued is valued only as a means to that end. This reduces possible teaching goods such
as knowledge or moral improvement to means rather than ends, for only happiness is a
true end. This is what makes utilitarianism a narrow view of ethics.
Utilitarianism is also very broad in establishing happiness as the end of action. If
a teacher's ultimate teaching goal is his or her students' happiness, then the permissible
range of action and goals can be quite wide. Since so many things contribute to
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happiness, such as health, wealth, and friendship, then when deciding what to do in
teaching, a teacher's goals could be to improve his or her students' physical health or
their ability to make friends.
Now, one way to respond to this apparent problem is to refer back to the idea of
two levels, and argue that happiness is best obtained overall when those in particular
roles stick to the tasks prescribed by those roles: philosophy teachers should teach
philosophy, not health or life skills. Just as parents should concern themselves with their
own children, so philosophers (and indeed any other university professor) should concern
themselves with their own sphere rather than with their students' happiness in general.
This may well be a good way to understand the role of philosophers. However,
what this does is to make it impossible for philosophers to use utilitarian thinking in their
deliberation about goals, for happiness has been consigned to the second level rather than
to the level of individual deliberation. In other words, this version of utilitarianism would
say that philosophers should not concern themselves with student happiness but with
teaching their material well, and that will in turn lead to the most student happiness
overall. The problem here is that this does not provide a moral framework for
philosophers to use when making teaching decisions. Utilitarianism thus suffers from the
same drawback as deontology does in this context: it does not enable reasoning about
teaching goals.
These considerations are good reasons to believe that utilitarianism is not the
optimal way of thinking about teaching ethics. This means that what is needed to avoid
the problems of both a negative theory of ethics and a utilitarian theory is a different
account of the good. The next section will explore one possible account.
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Knowledge as the Good of Teaching
I argued in the previous sections that what is needed in thinking about the ethics
of teaching is an account of the goods of teaching. That, beyond a list of actions or goals
which are prohibited, is what will allow teachers to deliberate about which goals they
should pursue in teaching ethics courses. I began by considering happiness or pleasure
rather than the more obvious candidate for the good of teaching, which is knowledge.
I call student knowledge a more obvious candidate for the good of teaching
because this is the way so much of teaching and learning is constructed. Most exams test
for student knowledge, and most course goals (as represented on syllabi) consist of
claims about what kinds of knowledge a student will gain. What that knowledge looks
like will depend upon a teacher's field of study, but in general the idea is that the student
will gain knowledge, either of facts or practical knowledge of skills. On this view of
teaching, teaching goals should either consist of student knowledge or be a means to
student knowledge.
There is no space here to canvass the many epistemological issues that arise for
such a conception: questions regarding what knowledge is, what counts as knowledge,
how knowledge can be transmitted, and so on. The conceptual issue that is most relevant
to our purposes here is that, as in the case of happiness, if there is only one teaching good
then all other goals and practices are means to that end. Choosing this moral conception
will mean that the only thing that counts, in the end, is whether or not students have
gained knowledge. Of course, there are moral constraints on how one may teach, which
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come from a basic code of ethics or something of the sort, but aside from that teachers are
only ever aiming at one thing: student knowledge.
Some may find this to be a virtue of this conception. Others, however, who value
other things aside from knowledge, such as insight, imagination, or moral sensitivity, will
find that these can only be means to an end. One way around this would be to stretch the
definition of knowledge so that it encompasses these things, but that would be stretching
it quite far, and it would be difficult for it still to count as one good rather than many.
Of course, it might be said that the mere fact that this conception will not line up
with the views of many teachers is not a good enough reason in itself to reject it. Indeed, I
have not given a knock-down argument for rejecting any of these views, but merely what
I have argued to be negative implications of following them. The major negative
implication of this view is that it contradicts the deeply held convictions of many
philosophy teachers that knowledge is not the only good of teaching. This points to the
need for a pluralistic account of teaching goods. In the next chapter I will develop such
an account, but before doing so I turn to the one moral theory that has been overlooked so
far: virtue ethics.
Virtue Ethics
In arguing for a broader conception of teaching ethics I am making a similar
argument to that which is made by many virtue ethicists: that rule-based approaches do
not take into account all of the moral life. Perhaps a good account of teaching ethics can
come out of virtue ethics. Virtue ethics, with its focus on character and moral
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development, seems well suited to the context of education, especially moral education.
It does not focus on just one good, but on a good life in general.
I have argued throughout this chapter that what is needed in teaching ethics is an
account that enables reasoning about teaching goals. On a virtue ethics approach, a
teacher could ask him or herself whether he or she is being virtuous in the way in which
he or she is acting. Is a particular teaching goal the kind of goal that a virtuous person
would perform? Does it exhibit kindness, justice, and so on? The trouble here is that
these considerations do not translate in a straightforward way into answers to difficult
questions about teaching goals. This is partially because virtue ethics in general does not
specify which virtues should take priority for teachers in particular. Kindness and justice
may come into conflict, and in the context of teaching such a conflict will most likely be
resolved in a different way than it would in a personal context. Justice may be more
important than kindness in the teaching context but not in the context of friendship, for
example.
That said, the possibility exists that an account of teaching ethics could be
developed by virtue ethicists. It is not in principle impossible to resolve the questions I
have raised here. I argue in favour of the account I propose in the final chapter because it
comes with a conception of the good that enables reasoning about teaching goals in a
straightforward way.
Another way in which virtue ethics might enable reasoning about teaching is to
focus on the virtues in students. A teacher could ask of a particular teaching goal
whether it will contribute to or undermine students' virtue. This is, of course, what
concerned Plato: will expecting people to question their moral beliefs lead to a loss in
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virtue? This second approach assumes that teachers are in some way responsible for their
students' moral lives, either positively as contributors to their moral improvement, or
simply negatively as those who should not undermine moral improvement. In this way it
is subject to the same sorts of difficult issues that arose in the consideration of Locke,
Rousseau, Dewey and Aquinas: namely that basing teaching decisions on a conception of
virtue runs into trouble if one wants to emphasize autonomy. It is a consequentialist
approach, similar in some ways to the approach I propose in the next chapter. Where my
account is preferable is that it can respond to those difficult issues by taking pluralism
into account, as I shall argue.
5.3. What is Missing from These Accounts?
In this section I have laid out several possibilities for a conception of teaching
ethics. I argued earlier that the three characteristics that a good conception must possess
are: it must take into account the characteristics of the ethics classroom that I raised in
previous chapters, it must be able to address the questions I raised in the previous
chapters, and it must enable fruitful reasoning about teaching goals. Where these
accounts are flawed is either in their inability to adjudicate between competing goals in
teaching, and also in their focus on one good rather than a plurality of goods. In the next
chapter I will defend my own proposal for an ethics of teaching, and I will argue that
because it involves a plurality of goods, it is best suited for the context of the
undergraduate philosophy classroom.
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CHAPTER 6: THE CAPABILITIES APPROACH TO WELL-BEING
In the previous chapter I argued that what is needed in academic ethics is a richer
account of the ethics of teaching. In this chapter I propose and defend such an account.
Before I do that, however, I will lay out the general characteristics of a good account of
the ethics of teaching as they have arisen in the chapters above. Then, I will outline my
development of the capabilities approach for the teaching context, and show how it can
meet the challenges I set for it.
6.1. Desirable Characteristics of an Account of Teaching Ethics
I have brought many issues to light in previous chapters with regard to morality,
critical thinking, and the environments in which ethics is taught. In this section I will lay
out the three desirable characteristics of an account of teaching ethics that have emerged
from that analysis.
Enabling Reasoning about Goals
The first characteristic of a desirable account of teaching ethics is that it can
enable fruitful reasoning about teaching goals. This was the major shortcoming of the
accounts considered in the previous chapter. Because they either focused on only one
good, or because they were unable to adjudicate between goods, they failed to make
possible the kind of reasoning that is necessary when making teaching decisions. As I
argued at length, since even practical decisions in teaching must refer to goals, teachers
must be able to reason about goals in order to teach well. This means that an account of
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the goods of teaching is needed. As well, as I argued, such an account must involve a
plurality of goods.
Addressing Tough Moral Questions
In the previous chapters I outlined a series of difficult moral questions that arise in
the context of teaching ethics. In short form, these questions are: 1) Should ethics
teachers aim at moral improvement in their students? 2) Should teachers be neutral with
regard to their own moral, political and religious views, or does good teaching require
advocacy or at least disclosure of one's beliefs? 3) Should teachers try to undermine
student relativism and/or student fundamentalism? 4) Are teachers responsible for the
use to which students put the skills they have learned? 5) Should teachers try to change
their students' moral, political, and religious beliefs? As argued earlier, these questions
concern moral, political and religious considerations and are thus best addressed by
appeal to normative factors. A good account of the ethics of teaching will be able to
address these questions.
Taking Account of Situational Factors
In chapter four I laid out several important situational factors, or morally salient
features, of the undergraduate ethics classroom. These were, in brief: the disagreements
between philosophers about teaching goals for ethics courses, the existence of student
relativism in various forms, the influence of religious fundamentalism, and the
widespread fact of pluralism. These features, I argued, make teaching ethics a
complicated matter, since so much of what is discussed in ethics courses is subject to
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deep disagreement. Topics in ethics are emotionally, politically, and religiously charged,
perhaps more so than in most university courses.
My analysis of the morally salient features of environments in which ethics is
taught did not begin there, however, but began with my analysis of Plato's thought, and
in particular his worry that teaching young people to think critically about their moral
beliefs can run the risk of enabling them to dismantle their own belief systems in a
destructive way. His worry raises the possibility that there could be something harmful
about exposing a young person to dialectical questioning. Given that university students
are young and inexperienced (and sometimes, as Socrates' imitators were, privileged and
arrogant), philosophers may be engaging in risky behaviour when they give students tools
they can use to dismantle their belief systems or the belief systems of others.
This worry was not limited to Plato, but recurred in Locke's and Rousseau's
rejection of disputations and in several contemporary philosophers' writings about
teaching. The worry is that given the superior reasoning ability of teachers, and the
relative inexperience of students, there is a possibility that in the face of dialectical
questioning or even of studying the works of philosophers, students will feel unable to
find good enough reasons to hold on to their moral beliefs. Many university students,
especially first-year students, have never before been asked to think critically about their
most cherished beliefs. They have not been prepared for the kinds of sceptical assaults
they will encounter in some of the authors they are expected to read, and for the high
standards of justification they are expected to adhere to in writing papers and in
defending their opinion. Related to this is the worry often expressed by those who defend
advocacy, that students will see so many different belief systems defended and then
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undermined, and so will come to believe that no rational beliefs are possible in the field
of ethics. When students are taught to understand each philosophical system (Aristotle,
then Kant, then Mill and so on) and then to consider objections and move on to the next
system, the worry goes, they will develop scepticism about the ability of reason to get
them to truth, and even scepticism about truth itself. Thus one of the morally salient
features of the ethics classroom is the relative inexperience of students and the possible
fragility of their convictions.
In the works of Locke and Rousseau, a related issue emerged, and that was the
tension that existed for them between educating for virtue and educating for rationality.
Locke argued that educating for virtue meant instilling moral principles in children that
they will never question. These principles, according to Locke, will be instilled by their
parents, who will be seen as absolute moral authorities through the course of the young
person's life. Locke's insistence on the importance of intellectual autonomy, which
involves taking no belief as certain and investigating claims for oneself, is in tension with
this approach. As it was for Plato, Locke believed that a good moral character could only
be ensured if the young person did not have the opportunity to question his or her deeply
held moral principles. Though he is never explicit about it, this is an implicit rejection of
intellectual autonomy in the realm of morality.
Rousseau's views involved a similar tension. For Rousseau, the main aim of
education is to achieve happiness by keeping as close to nature as possible. Rousseau's
pupil Emile is to be kept away from the corrupting influence of society until his character
is almost fully formed. Like Locke, Rousseau places at the centre of the young person's
education the importance of learning to think for himself. However, as I argued in my
analysis of Rousseau, given the denouement of the book, it is clear that Emile's moral
education does not produce a virtuous and autonomous adult. While he is taught to
question all authority, he is perpetually submissive to his tutor's authority. Similarly to
Locke's, Rousseau's educational scheme, while it aims at both virtue and reason, fails to
achieve either goal.
The question to ask of this is how these issues in the writings of Locke and
Rousseau are relevant to the contemporary context. After all, what I have argued for is
not problems in the practical working-out of their views, but conceptual contradictions in
the views themselves. While it may be tempting to dismiss their views, in an effort to
learn from the mistakes of other philosophers, it is worth looking at what sorts of factors
brought about these contradictions, and whether or not these factors are an issue for those
teaching today.
At bottom what is at issue with both Locke and Rousseau is an inability to see a
way in which moral education could take place without indoctrination or deference to
authority. As well, neither is able to see how a young person, having been educated in
this fashion, could become a morally autonomous adult. This difficulty is not easy to
solve, and is relevant to the present day, because moral education often takes this type of
form. There have, of course, been many new approaches to moral education that have
arisen in the past few decades, but when one looks at how individual children are
educated, especially, though not exclusively, in religious contexts, many are still being
educated by means of appeals to authority. This means that a difficult issue for an ethics
teacher is to determine whether their role is to help such young people to reach moral
autonomy, and if so, what they can do to help them to do this. These questions are
related to the question about goals in ethics classrooms, but arise specifically from the
existence of students who have been educated in broadly similar ways to Locke's
program of indoctrination and Rousseau's program of deference to another's moral
authority - in Emile's case, his tutor. These issues are also related to issues of religious
fundamentalism, for they concern similar methods of education in the pre-university
years.
Morally salient features that are relevant to today's classroom arise in Dewey's
work as well. As I argued in chapter three, Dewey's educational goals involve teaching
students to take a practical view of all inquiry, and especially of moral inquiry.
Reflective thinking begins with doubt, and in this context it begins with doubt about a
particular social practice. One central claim that Dewey made with regard to teaching
reflective or critical thinking is that skills should not be taught without dispositions to
accompany them.' In other words, teaching critical thinking does not consist merely of
inculcating particular skills, but of inculcating particular attitudes toward those skills.
For those who teach critical thinking, should a teaching goal be to influence and change
their students' dispositions towards thinking, such as pushing students to be more open-
minded or individualistic? If so, which dispositions are to be inculcated?
These questions are difficult because of two related issues in the context of
teaching: the plurality of views about what constitutes good thinking, and in particular
good thinking dispositions, and the fact that many of the thinking dispositions already
possessed by students are ones that teachers seek to change. Teachers often set
themselves the goal of teaching their students to be more open-minded, more critical, and
1 John Dewey, "How We Think," in John Dewey: The Later Works, 1925-1953, ed. Jo Ann Boydston, (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1986), 135.
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so on. This means that the students in the classroom have been judged to have
dispositions that are not optimally good. These issues relate to the questions I posed
above regarding the responsibility of teachers for the actions of their students. In the
previous chapter I argued that there is an important distinction between teaching students
how to do philosophy and teaching students to do philosophy. This distinction appears
again here. Given that many students arrive at university with thinking dispositions that
their teachers may find to be less than optimal, what should teaching goals be with regard
to these dispositions? Are teachers responsible not only for teaching thinking skills, but
for teaching particular dispositions so that students will use those skills in particular
ways?
While Dewey and Aquinas and his followers do not have a lot in common, one
belief they share is a rejection of the individualism that is so central to Locke's and
Rousseau's views of reason and morality. Neither Dewey nor any of the Thomists value
intellectual and moral autonomy in the way that Locke and Rousseau try to do; at least
they do not believe that tradition and inherited social practices should be rejected for the
sake of autonomy. If such an approach can be justified, then the question remains what
role teachers play with regard to that tradition, and with regard to determining which
practices should be questioned and which should not.
The Thomists especially maintain that learning morality involves learning moral
habits in a particular tradition, and then coming to learn how to reason about morality
once one has good moral habits. The implication of this is that for a thoroughgoing
Thomist it would only make sense for a student to study ethics at the undergraduate level
if that student has had a good moral education already, otherwise his or her judgment will
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be clouded by vice. The other way a Thomist might reason is that one of the goals of the
undergraduate classroom is to help those students who have not had a good moral
education to change their habits so that they might learn to reason truly. This is very
much the same issue as whether ethics courses should aim at student moral improvement,
but does bring to light the fact that students in ethics classrooms may have vastly
different moral conceptions and behaviours depending on how their moral education was
carried out. For example, a person who has been encouraged to develop his or her moral
imagination throughout his or her childhood and adolescence may be better at moral
reasoning than someone who has not. This is a simple example, but the many
complexities involved in moral education and their interaction with a person's
environment and personality make for a classroom full of students with very different
abilities with regard to moral reasoning and sensitivity.
This raises the broader issue of the variability of students and teaching contexts.
To talk of "the undergraduate ethics classroom" is to talk of many different classrooms,
filled with many different students. The makeup of a given classroom will vary based on
region, on the type of university or college, on the type of course, and so on. An ethics
course could be a professional ethics course designed for professionals studying part-
time, a general ethics course designed as an elective, a philosophical ethics course
designed for philosophy majors, or some combination of these types of courses. Students
come from families rich and poor, religious and non-religious, urban and rural. A student
might be the first in his or her family to attend post-secondary education, might be
attending thanks to government grants, or might be from another country on a study
permit. A given student might have just barely made the admissions criteria, or may be at
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the top of the class. These situational factors are perhaps what make teaching well such a
difficult task.
One final situational factor that has been in the background in these chapters but
never discussed in detail is the fact of deep disagreement between philosophers who are
teaching. Philosophers studying morality disagree about just about everything having to
do with morality, at the level of metaethics, normative ethics and practical ethics. I have
already discussed the varying beliefs about morality, religion and politics in society at
large, but it should now be emphasized that it is possible that the disagreements between
philosophers are even deeper than those of their students, because philosophers teaching
ethics have spent more time and energy thinking about moral concepts, and have thus
developed more beliefs about them.
A good account of the ethics of teaching should take this pluralism into account; it
must allow for reasonable disagreement between teachers. A completely successful
account of the ethics of teaching would transcend the deep disagreements between
philosophers and allow those of very different persuasions to agree about the
fundamentals of obligations and responsibilities toward students. Such an account is
probably not possible, but in what follows I will show how the capabilities approach can
come close to this kind of success, with regard to the existence of disagreements, and
with regard to the rest of the morally salient characteristics and features I have outlined in
this section.
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6.2. The Capabilities Approach to Well-Being
Philosophers who write about well-being are concerned with one central question:
what makes a person's life go well? In other words, what ingredients are necessary and
sufficient for a person's life to be described as going well? The answers to these
questions make up the various theories of well-being that are on offer.
Philosophers have proposed several theories of well-being, of which four major
types have emerged. Utilitarian accounts postulate that an individual's well-being
consists of his or her happiness. Desire-fulfillment accounts explain well-being in terms
of the fulfillment of an individual's desires. These two kinds of theories are subjective in
that they depend entirely on the subjective experience of the individual concerned.
Objective-list accounts of well-being involve a list of basic ingredients which can be
present in an individual's life and by which that person's well-being is measured.
Finally, the capabilities approach to well-being is the idea that the possession of certain
capabilities is what makes up well-being. The capabilities approach can involve a list as
well, but the list is made up of capabilities; for example, the capability to love rather than
the experience of loving. Both the objective-list accounts and the capabilities approach
are objective accounts, because a person's well-being can be defined by external criteria
rather than by an individual's subjective experience.
The two main proponents of the capabilities approach to well-being are Martha
Nussbaum3 and Amartya Sen.4 Both of these theorists have developed their accounts of
2 For a brief outline of the distinctions between types of views of well-being, see Derek Parfit, "What Makes Someone's Life Go Best," in Reasons and Persons, (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1984). For a more detailed look, including arguments for and against several views, see James Griffin, Well-being: Its Meaning, Measurement and Moral Importance (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1986). 3 Martha Nussbaum, Women and Human Development: The Capabilities Approach (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000). 4 Amartya Sen, Development as Freedom (New York: Random House, 1999).
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well-being in the context of international development. Each is searching for a way to
measure development, and argues that human capabilities, rather than gross national
product, or other economic indicators, are what should count. In other words, the way to
know that a nation is doing well is to look at whether or not its citizens possess particular
capabilities.
In this chapter I am defending the capabilities approach in the context of
education. In doing so I will be developing the approach in a context quite different from
the context in which it was originally developed. Both Nussbaum and Sen conceive of
capabilities as the starting point for decisions in the political realm. That is, they use a
conception of well-being as a foundation for political deliberation. In my development of
this approach, I use the capabilities as a foundation for moral deliberation. This means
that the capabilities play a different role on my account than they do on either
Nussbaum's account or Sen's account. In my framework, the capabilities act as a
foundation for teaching goals, rather than for political rights. This means that I will have
less to say about thresholds for capabilities and about equality, and more to say about
how particular capabilities can be developed in particular contexts such as the
undergraduate classroom. That said, there are many political issues surrounding
education that could be addressed very well on the capabilities approach. However, I will
not be taking up these issues here, but focusing only on the way in which the approach
can be used in the context of moral deliberation.
The focus on a multi-faceted list of capabilities is what distinguishes the
capabilities approach from a more general utilitarianism. The way in which I deploy the
capabilities approach, however, is consequentialist in nature. I argue that the capabilities
perform the role of goods or goals at which teachers should aim. This should not be
surprising, given that in the previous chapter I argued that what is necessary for a rich
account of teaching ethics is an account that will define the goods of teaching in such a
way as to enable moral deliberation about goals.
The main difference between Nussbaum's account of well-being and Sen's
account is Nussbaum's inclusion of a list5 of capabilities that are central to well-being.
Sen does not propose such a list, and rejects the idea that such a list should be developed.
He argues6 that theorists should not develop such lists because they cannot possibly take
into account all of the various situational factors. Nussbaum, on the other hand, argues
that her list is broad and revisable, and can be endorsed by overlapping consensus by
those who choose many different ways of life.7 This possibility, which is based on the
emphasis on capability rather than on the ways in which those capabilities are used, is
what separates the capabilities account from perfectionist accounts. The disagreement
between Nussbaum and Sen is ongoing and I do not propose to settle it here. However, I
will adopt Nussbaum's perspective because the existence of a list, however revisable,
makes possible moral deliberation about particular cases, as I will argue below.
Broadly, Nussbaum's ten capabilities can be divided into three categories. First,
there are the capabilities that concern physical well-being, which are life, bodily health,
and bodily integrity. Second, there are the capabilities that concern intellectual well
being: senses, imagination, and thought, emotions, and practical reason. Third, there are
5 Nussbaum, Women and Human Development: The Capabilities Approach, 78-80. 6 Amartya Sen, "Capabilities, Lists and Public Reason: Continuing the Conversation," Feminist Economics 10, no. 3 (2004). 7 Nussbaum, Women and Human Development: The Capabilities Approach, 74. 8 Martha Nussbaum, "Aristotle, Politics and Human Capabilities: A Response to Antony, Arneson, Charlesworth and Mulgan," Ethics 111 (2000), 128.
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the capabilities that concern social well-being. These are: affiliation with other human
beings, relations with other species, play, and political and material control over one's
environment. The first and third categories of capabilities are somewhat relevant to the
teaching context; a student's safety, for example, is of concern to any good teacher.
However, in the university classroom the second category is the most relevant.
While teachers can promote their students' well-being in many ways, they are in a unique
position given their role as teachers to promote intellectual well-being: that is, the
capability of students to think, feel, reason, imagine, and to make their decisions about
their beliefs and their life goals and plans. One more capability should be added to this.
Part of Nussbaum's capability for affiliation with other human beings is that one be able
"to imagine the situation of another and to have compassion for that situation." This can
certainly be counted as part of a person's intellectual capabilities. Given this "intellectual
well-being," using the capabilities account of well-being to understand the obligations of
university ethics teachers would mean asking of a given practice or goal what
relationship it has to the intellectual well-being of the students concerned.
In Women and Human Development, Nussbaum claims that education can be
addressed within the context of the capabilities approach, though she does not further
discuss it.10 Nussbaum's earlier book, Cultivating Humanity, is devoted to defending
reforms in higher education and thus examines the idea of education in more detail.
That work provides insights into how her conception of intellectual well-being fits into
9 Nussbaum, Women and Human Development: The Capabilities Approach, 79. 10 Ibid., xiii. 11 Martha Nussbaum, Cultivating Humanity: A Classical Defense of Reform in Liberal Education (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1997). She reaffirms the three goals in higher education in Martha Nussbaum, "Education for Citizenship in an Era of Global Connection," Studies in Philosophy and Education 21 (2002).
her conception of higher education, for she argues that there are three central intellectual
capacities which are necessary for democratic citizenship. The goal of higher education,
according to Nussbaum, should be to create world citizens who are able to participate
well in democracies and to be fully human.
The first and most important of these capacities is the "the capacity for critical
examination of oneself and one's traditions, for living what, following Socrates, we may
call 'the examined life'." The examined life is a life which questions all beliefs,
arguments, and statements and only accepts those that survive the demands of reason.
The second capacity is that to be effective citizens people need "an ability to see
themselves as not simply citizens of some local region or group, but also, and above all,
as human beings bound to all other human beings by ties of recognition and concern."14
In other words, higher education should develop "world citizens." This means learning
about the lives of others in different countries and within multicultural societies. The
third capacity is the narrative imagination. This means "the ability to think what it might
be like to be in the shoes of a person different from oneself, to be an intelligent reader of
that person's story, and to understand the emotions and wishes and desires that someone
so placed might have."15
Cultivating Humanity is a detailed proposal for changes to higher education. As
amplification of her conception of intellectual well-being, however, it fails. The trouble
is that it is too detailed; her educational goals involve too many contentious normative
claims. In chapter four I discussed her first goal in detail, and so here I will just highlight
Nussbaum, Cultivating Humanity: A Classical Defense of Reform in Liberal Education. 13 Ibid., 9. 14 Ibid., 10. 15 Ibid., 10-11.
1
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the fact that Nussbaum is setting a very high standard for the examined life. If one sets
the bar for rationality that high, then the capacity for faith is undermined. This is in
conflict with Nussbaum's claim in Women and Human Development that the capacity for
a religious life is one of the central human capabilities.16
In general, if we want to generate a universal list of central capabilities, it cannot
include such strong claims about the nature of the good life. Otherwise, it will be
impossible for the list to be affirmed in an overlapping consensus, as Nussbaum claims it
can be. For this reason, in developing an account of how the list of capabilities can be
used in the educational context, I will not make reference to her detailed proposals in
Cultivating Humanity, but only to her general framework in Women and Human
Development. This general framework is that intellectual capability consists of the
capability to think, feel, reason, imagine, and to make decisions about one's beliefs, goals
and plans.
I argued in this and the previous chapter that what is needed is a framework for an
ethics teacher's moral reasoning. I argued that this framework must include an account
of the good, and that account must involve a plurality of goods. In this section I have laid
out an account of the goods of teaching: the capabilities of students. The next section
will show how this account can facilitate moral reasoning about teaching.
6.3. The Approach in Practice
I argued at the beginning of this chapter that a rich account of teaching ethics
should have three desirable characteristics. In what follows I will show how the
Nussbaum, Women and Human Development: The Capabilities Approach, 179.
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capabilities account can enable reasoning about teaching goals and address difficult
moral questions, and take situational factors into account.
Enabling Reasoning about Goals
In deliberating about teaching goals, one is really deliberating about what goods
to aim at. The capabilities in Nussbaum's list, in particular those capabilities that are
intellectual capabilities, constitute the list of teaching goods upon which deliberation can
be based.
There are several levels at which reasoning about goals can take place. A teacher
can reason about individual teaching goals within a course, about a course's goals in the
context of a program, about a course's goals in the context of the university experience,
and so on. What this means is that courses do not need to aim to promote every good. In
general terms a course on logic is well-suited to promoting students' capability for
reasoning, but a literature courses is better suited to promoting student's capability to
imagine. It does not have to be the case that the list of capabilities should constitute each
teacher's list of goals. However, these goods must be in the background: teachers should
either see their teaching as contributing to some sub-set of the goods, or as contributing to
some or all of them indirectly. In determining teaching goals, the list of teaching goods
(the capabilities) should be the basis for a teacher's reasoning, and the justification for
those teaching goals.
A few straightforward examples will help, here. Critical thinking courses
normally aim at improving reasoning directly: that is, by teaching students reasoning
skills. To put this in the terms I have been using here, teachers in critical thinking
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courses are promoting students' capability to reason. This is an instance in which a
particular teaching practice is aiming directly at one of the goods in the list of central
capabilities. Other courses do not aim so directly. An upper-year seminar on Kant aims
to improve student thinking, not by assigning exercises in critical reasoning, but
indirectly. Students who learn to read and interpret Kant are not only achieving the goal
of deeper understanding of a particular philosopher, but are developing their intellectual
capabilities as well. A course in a discipline outside of philosophy, such as an art course,
may not be aiming at students' reason at all, but at their capacity for imagination and
creativity. Of course, it is not as easy as this, for the various capabilities are related to
one another, and a course that promotes one as its focus may be promoting others in less
direct ways. A critical thinking course might aim at promoting reasoning directly, but
could end up promoting students' imaginations by encouraging them to think in new
ways. In general, what should be noted is that there are a plurality of goods which can be
aimed at in more or less direct ways depending on a teacher's context.
There are three questions that must be asked in order to make sense of how moral
reasoning about teaching goals would go within this framework. One, are these
considerations (the capabilities) ultimately the only considerations upon which reasoning
about teaching goals should take place? Two, on what basis do teachers decide which
goods or goals should be chosen for a particular context? Three, how do these goals
inform particular teaching decisions?
To address the first question is to return to the things I have flagged along the way
in this and the previous chapter as being intrinsically valuable to particular philosophers
who are teaching ethics. These were: the history of philosophy, the moral imagination,
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and moral sensitivity. I also argued, especially in the context of showing the
shortcomings of other views, that to see these sorts of things as merely instrumentally
valuable is to reject the viewpoints of those who view them as intrinsically valuable. So,
what should be avoided now is just that: viewing these things as merely instrumentally
valuable. Two choices remain. Either these three things can be accounted for on my
approach without being given second-class status, or they exist as important goals outside
the capabilities framework.
Teaching students to develop their moral imagination and their moral sensitivity
can easily be seen as part of Nussbaum's list of central capabilities. For Nussbaum, the
senses, the imagination, and thought are all part of the intellectual capabilities. These are
therefore intrinsically valuable on the capabilities view.
The history question works itself out a bit differently. What is necessary in order
to answer it well is to dig a little deeper into why philosophers value history. One answer
that I have already rejected as plausible is the view that pro-history philosophers all
believe that the more knowledge one has, the better. There are many good reasons to
value history: it broadens cultural awareness and a person's view of the world; it sharpens
reading and interpretive skills, and so on. It is quite likely that not all pro-history
philosophers value it for the same reasons. Given the remarkable diversity in
philosophical viewpoints, this is almost certain. Here is the trouble, though. Once one
starts to give the kinds of reasons I have given here, it looks like giving history a kind of
second-class status by making history instrumentally rather than intrinsically valuable.
Understanding history to be instrumentally valuable in the sense I have just
described is both unavoidable and unproblematic. It does not give history second-class
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status. What it does is put learning history on the same level as any other subject which
does not involve learning skills directly. Learning history is one way to develop one's
capabilities, just as the study of great literature is another, or the study of art another
again. Thus history is not intrinsically valuable, only because on the capabilities
approach, nothing in teaching is intrinsically valuable, except the capabilities themselves.
History, on this view, is only instrumentally valuable because almost everything is.
Does this mean that I must rescind my objection to utilitarianism, to the
"knowledge only" view, and to the "argument only" view? After all, one of my
objections to those views was that they gave history, the moral imagination, and moral
sensitivity second-class status. No. The moral imagination and moral sensitivity are
intrinsically valuable as capabilities. As for history, while it is true that it is only
instrumentally valuable, it is valuable in more ways on the capabilities account than it is
on those other accounts. Only on the capabilities account is its true value recognized,
because instead of being a means to learning to argue, or to be happy, or to know as much
as possible, it is a means to greater understanding, moral sensitivity, cultural awareness,
and so on. The reasons that pro-history philosophers can give for valuing history are
reasons the capabilities account can give as well. Thus, the trouble turns out to be not
that history is instrumentally valuable, but that utilitarianism and the knowledge-only
view can only see history as valuable for reasons that pro-history philosophers may
reject: its usefulness to happiness, or its contribution to knowledge.
For these reasons the capabilities account furnishes all the normative material
needed for reasoning about teaching goals. The list of capabilities is the list of teaching
goods, and when a teacher is deliberating about goals, he or she should refer to teaching
goods. This means that ultimately the only way in which a particular teaching practice
can be justified is by reference to a teaching goal, which itself must be a teaching good or
a means to some teaching good. Of course, this normative material must be
supplemented by knowledge of situational factors. It is in explaining this that the second
question arises: on what basis does a teacher decide which goods or goals should be
chosen for a particular context? In more general terms, how do departments or
universities decide which courses should be in the curriculum, and for what reasons?
This is the heart of where moral reasoning will take place on the capabilities
approach. I argued in the previous chapter that a good account will enable reasoning
especially for individual teachers, but also for departments and committees as well.
Given a list of potential capabilities, how is one to adjudicate between them and to
determine which will be the focus of a particular course?
In general terms, the answer is straightforward. One looks at the possible goods,
which are the capabilities in general, and the intellectual capabilities in particular. Then,
one looks at the situational factors and determines which of the goods are best aimed at
given the resources at one's disposal. For the individual teacher who is given a course
description, this will be more constrained than a department committee that is
determining what the course descriptions should look like; however, the general approach
is the same for both. Of course, this does not allow teachers to teach just anything. A
philosophy teacher cannot just decide to teach chemistry because he or she thinks it is a
better fit for his or her students' nascent capabilities. Here what can be said is that
philosophers (like all other academics) are teaching within a certain field of expertise.
There are many ways to teach philosophy, but the capabilities approach does not allow
for anyone to just teach anything they like. Situational factors include the fact that one is
teaching in a philosophy department and that one is expected to teach philosophy rather
than something else, as well as the fact that a philosophy teacher's expertise is in
philosophy, not chemistry or something else.
What should become immediately apparent is that the capabilities approach will
not generate just one answer for what an ethics course should look like. It may not even
give just one answer to what a particular ethics course should look like. Teachers using
this approach will not find that the approach will give them an absolute answer as to what
goals they should have in teaching. What they will find is a list of teaching goods, and
the requirement that they think about what resources they have at their disposal, what
kinds of students they have, and so on, and determine what goods they are best able to
promote. Though the list is broad, it is a list of a particular kind of things, and is a much
narrower account of teaching goods than (say) "happiness" or "knowledge." As well, in
discussing teaching matters with other philosophers, teachers may find they disagree
about which capability is most important in a given context, and so on, but can find
common ground in affirming the capabilities as the general teaching goods. This will be
discussed further below.
The third question that I asked above is how a teacher's reasoning about teaching
goals in the context of the capabilities approach can inform particular teaching decisions.
This follows in much the same way as what I have just outlined. Once a teacher has
determined, given a sufficient understanding of the context in which he or she teaches,
which goods to pursue, teaching decisions are made through practical reasoning. This is
means-end reasoning that is best performed by those with knowledge and experience, but
of course can be performed by new teachers as well. As I argued in the previous chapter,
practical reasoning can account for teaching practices so long as teaching goals are in
place.
That said, this view is not the view that I rejected in chapter five; that is, that a
good teacher obeys the rules and deliberates carefully about teaching practices. That
view did not have an account of the goods of teaching, but merely a requirement that
teachers reason carefully about whatever goals they do end up pursuing. On my view, it
is not that a teacher may aim at anything he or she has thought carefully about. The
account enables reasoning about goals by providing a basis for that reasoning, and that is
what I argued was missing from the accounts in chapter five. Though experience is
crucial to reasoning about teaching, what I am defending is still a normative account.
I have discussed in this section how the capabilities approach enables reasoning
about teaching goals. In the next section, I will show how it fulfills the second
requirement for a good account of academic ethics: it can address tough moral questions.
Addressing Tough Moral Questions
At the beginning of this chapter I listed five tough moral questions. In short form,
these questions are: 1) Should ethics teachers aim at moral improvement in their
students? 2) Should teachers be neutral with regard to their own moral, political and
religious views, or does good teaching require advocacy or at least disclosure of one's
beliefs? 3) Should teachers try to undermine student relativism and/or student
fundamentalism? 4) Are teachers responsible for the use to which students put the skills
they learned? 5) Should teachers try to change their students' moral, political, and
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religious beliefs? What I say here will not provide complete or fully determinate
answers, but will show how such questions can be addressed on the capabilities approach.
Moral theories generally specify two types of moral obligation. First, there are
those obligations that arise from the good, whatever that good is. So, in utilitarian moral
theory, one's obligation is to promote happiness. In Kantian theory, one's obligations
toward the good are the imperfect duties: to help others, and to develop one's talents. In
any case these obligations involve trying to bring about some good in the world. On my
development of the capabilities approach, the obligations that apply to those occupying
the role of philosophy teacher arise from the goods of teaching, that is, student
capabilities. This means that one's obligation as teacher is to promote the capabilities of
one's students.
The second type of moral obligation concerns what one may and may not do in
pursuit of the good. If a theory only specifies the first type of obligation, then it is
permissible to go about promoting that good in whatever way one likes. So, on classical
utilitarianism, if we can make the majority happy by torturing some small minority then
this is a permissible (even obligatory) course of action. In the language of contemporary
moral theory, this second type of obligation is called a "side constraint."17 Side
constraints are rules that may not be broken in one's pursuit of the good, no matter how
good the results. On Kantian theory it is impermissible to violate the perfect duty to treat
all humans as ends. On a rights-based moral theory, the existence of side-constraints
forbids a moral agent from violating the rights of others in the pursuit of some overall
good.
17 Robert Nozick first developed this notion explicitly. Robert Nozick, Anarchy, State, and Utopia (New York: Basic Books, 1974), 28-33.
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Some strict consequentialists reject the idea of side constraints and maintain that
one should always promote the good no matter what. They argue that it is always best to
achieve the most good overall, and that the existence of constraints can prevent bringing
about the most good. At the other end of the spectrum, a strict deontological view
(perhaps best called a libertarian view) only concerns itself with side-constraints and not
with promoting the good. On this view, morality consists merely in a set of rules that
must not be broken, but when one is acting within the bounds of those rules morality has
nothing more to say. These are two kinds of monist moral theories that stand at either
extreme of the theoretical landscape. Standing between these two extremes is any theory
that includes both the obligation to promote the good and the obligation not to violate
constraints.
The "code of ethics" view of teaching ethics concerns itself only with constraints.
It concerns only what one may not do in pursuit of one's goals, whatever those goals may
be. I argued in chapter five that this view of ethics is too narrow: teaching ethics, if it is
to give answers to tough moral questions, must also concern the good; that is, what one is
aiming at within side-constraints.
The capabilities approach is this kind of theory, for it includes a conception of the
good (the capabilities). This good is what is aimed at within the constraints of the code
of ethics, which constitute the constraints. The code of ethics limits what teachers may
do in the pursuit of teaching goods: they may not physically harm their students, harass
them, and so on. On the capabilities approach, a teacher's reasoning concerns how to
promote the good, within the side-constraints (the code of ethics). As in the case of any
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account that includes the obligation to promote the good, much of that reasoning will be
practical reasoning about how best to do so.
In this way, the capabilities approach is a moderate deontological theory, but only
in the sense that all theories which include both types of obligation are moderate
deontological theories. It is not moderate deontology in the stricter sense in which the
term is often used, where the term refers only to those theories in which constraints can
be overridden in order to promote a large enough good.
The tough questions raised in previous chapters are not answered by the code of
ethics. This means that they are not about side-constraints, but about goals. The
capabilities approach in my formulation requires that any teaching practices be justified
by reference to teaching goals, and that those goals are justified by reference to the goods
of teaching, that is, the intellectual capabilities. Within the bounds of the code of ethics,
it provides the normative material needed for deliberations about teaching practices and
goals, as I shall argue below.
I will begin with the idea of moral improvement. On the capabilities approach,
this question is actually relatively straightforward. If the conception of moral
improvement in question involves changed behaviour, then the answer is clear: teachers
acting within the capabilities approach should not aim at moral improvement itself. If
teachers are aiming moral improvement, or even happiness or fulfillment, then they must
have some idea as to what happiness, fulfillment, or moral improvement consists in.
Further, there would have to be some agreement between teachers what this would
consist in, or each teacher would be aiming to make his or her students good on his or her
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own view of goodness. Instead, teachers should aim to promote the capabilities students
need in order to make their own decisions about goodness.
Not only is it unlikely that teachers will agree about what happiness or goodness
consist in, an approach which aimed at fostering happiness or goodness in this way is not
an appropriate stance to take in the face of widespread pluralism in society at large. The
capabilities approach, however, allows for agreement between teachers on capacities that
are necessary for achieving happiness or goodness on many diverging views of what
happiness or goodness consists in. For example, while ethics teachers will not agree
about whether someone would be better to be a vegetarian or not, they can agree that it is
instrumentally valuable to any conception of goodness that a person be able to reason
about practical matters and to imaginatively identify with others. With regard to religion,
while there will be a plurality of views, there can be agreement about the usefulness of
reasoning and emotion in coming to understand one's own religion and to make decisions
i o
about one's religious observance.
Now, I argued in chapter four that the term "moral improvement" has many
possible referents. If what one means by "moral improvement" is simply an increase in
moral reasoning skills, or in the capacity for moral imagination, or moral sensitivity, then
we can say that a teacher working within the capabilities approach may (and possibly
should) aim at moral improvement in ethics courses. So, in addressing this question it is
crucial that the terms be carefully understood.
The second moral question concerns advocacy and neutrality. It is a particularly
tough issue in the ethics classroom because of the deep disagreements between 18 Nussbaum herself claims that the capabilities approach is by no means an account of the "good life" in its entirety. It is a moral account used for political purposes, and in my case, for educational purposes. Nussbaum, Women and Human Development: The Capabilities Approach, 77.
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philosophers about the nature and content of moral judgments and concepts, and even the
place of moral reasoning in the moral life. While philosophers may share many ideas
about right and wrong, when it comes to theorizing about ethics there is no agreed upon
set of beliefs or ideas that should be taught to students. Almost everything is open to
discussion. Thus, those who believe that ethics teachers should advocate their own beliefs
in class do so at least in part because they believe that the course should have some
substantive content - that students should come away having added to their beliefs rather
than simply questioned them. So, how might the capabilities approach address such a
question?
In my analysis of reasoning about teaching, I have stressed that there are always
(at least) two levels of reasoning. Teachers reason about teaching goals, and about how,
practically, to achieve those goals. Of course, these levels interact: one sometimes
discovers through trial and error that a particular goal is just not realistic for a particular
classroom. On the capabilities approach, the question to ask about advocacy is: can
advocacy be justified by reference to promoting capabilities? The other side of the
question is: must teachers be neutral in order to promote capabilities?
In my discussion of the history of philosophy I argued that some teaching goals
are not the capabilities themselves but means to those capabilities. An ethics teacher
might reason that, for example, the capability for moral imagination requires the belief
that other human beings are worthy of respect. This would be a reason to think that to
aim at students' acquiring certain beliefs is a legitimate aim on the capabilities approach.
However, this line of reasoning can only take us so far in terms of advocacy and
neutrality. Certainly, the idea of equal respect for others is viewed as important among
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philosophers teaching ethics, just as the concept of the periodic table is widely viewed as
crucial for chemists. However, these are not the sort of beliefs that those concerned
about neutrality are normally worried about. "People are worthy of equal respect" is not
very contentious as it stands, but once we attempt to define what it means to be a person,
what is meant by "respect," and so on, we are in the realm of substantive positions about
which philosophers disagree. So, when trying to determine whether some beliefs are
necessary for particular capabilities, we must tread very carefully.
On the whole, what the capabilities approach suggests about advocacy and
neutrality is that the practice of advocacy - or of neutrality - must be justified by
reference to the capabilities. This rules out other justifications for advocacy such as
political or social change, or moral improvement. In the end, this means that the
advocacy question should be addressed at least in part on a practical level. This is the
reasoning I have described above: considering one's situation and the situation of one's
students, determining which capabilities are best promoted in that context, and
determining how those capabilities are best promoted. An experienced teacher may find
that for his or her students advocacy is the most effective way to promote their critical
reasoning, and another teacher may find that for his or her students a stance of careful
neutrality is best. Either way, it is the promotion of capabilities that is the central focus.
The third tough question is: should teachers try to undermine student relativism
and/or student fundamentalism? As it turns out, the capabilities approach as I have
applied it addresses this question in much the same way as it does the advocacy and
neutrality issue. The question must be asked at both levels of reasoning: at the level of
goal-setting and at the level of practical reasoning.
186
At the level of practical reasoning, it is a matter of determining whether or not
trying to undermine such beliefs is a good way to promote the capabilities of one's
students, and whether or not doing so undermines any capabilities. Perhaps it promotes
the students' capability to reason at the expense of their capability to feel, or to be part of
a social group. These kinds of decisions have to be made given all of the complexities of
the situation.
The other level of reasoning about fundamentalism and relativism is at the level
of goals: is it a justifiable goal that students reject fundamentalism and/or relativism?
Here I refer back to what I claimed earlier: such questions must concern the promotion of
capabilities. This means that in order to justify the goal of eliminating student relativism
or fundamentalism, one must argue that such a goal is in the service of promoting student
capabilities. As above, situational factors must be taken into account, and the possibility
that attempts to eliminate student fundamentalism may have problematic effects in terms
of other capabilities, such as the capability for religious affiliation and faith.
What this brings up is the fact that a goal's being in the service of a particular
capability is a necessary but not sufficient reason for it to be adopted by a good teacher.
If that goal promotes one capability at the expense of other capabilities, then one is not
promoting teaching goods overall. This means that deliberations about goals must
concern any capabilities affected by teaching decisions, not just those capabilities that are
affected in a positive way. While it is not necessary to aim at promoting all of the
capabilities, it is necessary to take all of those affected into account.
What emerges from all of this analysis is the student-centredness of the
capabilities approach as it applies to education. A teacher cannot aim at eradicating
187
religious fundamentalism in general by undermining it in the classroom, because that
teacher must only consider the impact on students' well-being. In other words, teaching
decisions should not be political in that the classroom is not a place for social change, but
for individual change. Teachers may hope that the individual change will lead to social
change, but may not aim at it.
The fourth tough moral question asks whether teachers are responsible for the use
toward which their students put their learning. This question arose in the previous
chapter, and it has two components. The first is what arises from one of Dewey's claims
in the third chapter. One central claim that Dewey made with regard to teaching thinking
is that skills should not be taught without dispositions to accompany them.19 In other
words, teaching critical thinking does not consist merely of inculcating particular skills,
but of inculcating particular attitudes toward those skills. In more recent discussions
concerning critical thinking this is an issue about which there is some dispute. Should
teachers of critical thinking be aiming at influencing and changing their students'
dispositions towards thinking, such as pushing students to be more open-minded or
individualistic? If so, which dispositions are to be inculcated?
The most evident way in which the capabilities account can help here is to keep
the focus on the capability for critical thinking rather than the exercise of that capability.
In other words, a teacher's responsibility is to promote students' capability for reasoning
rather than students' use of that capability.
This is a little too easy, however. A proponent of inculcating dispositions could
very well argue that the only way in which students will be capable of using their
thinking skills is if they possess certain dispositions. A student who defers excessively to
19 Dewey, "How We Think," 135.
188
authority, for example, may not be psychologically capable of exercising his or her
thinking skills in the real world, even if he or she has acquired them in the classroom.
Framing the dispute in terms of capabilities does not rule out the possibility that teaching
dispositions is necessary, but requires that if such dispositions are to be taught it must be
because doing so is necessary for promoting students' capability for reason. To aim at
promoting students' use of reason is to go too far.
This is where the second component of the question emerges. In aiming at
promoting students' use of reason, and thus their behaviour, one is taking responsibility
for the behaviour of those students. The capabilities approach focuses on capabilities,
and thus would say that teachers should teach their students how to think. In this way
teachers are not actually responsible for whether or not their students actually think, but
whether or not their students are able to do so. Otherwise, what one is doing is taking
responsibility for the behaviour of other moral agents. The capabilities approach explains
quite well why this is not necessary.
The fifth and final question concerned whether or not teachers should aim to
change their students' moral, political and religious beliefs. I do not need to say anything
further, here, as this has been fully addressed in the sections concerning advocacy and
neutrality.
I have argued in this section that the capabilities account can address several
tough moral questions that arise for ethics teachers, and that I have outlined in chapter
four. In this way it fulfills the second requirement I set out for a good theory of academic
ethics. The third and final requirement is that the account be able to take account of the
189
various situational factors I have outlined in this and previous chapters. It is to this that I
now turn.
Taking Account of Situational Factors
It should be evident by now that a central feature of my development of the
capabilities approach is that when a teacher is deliberating about what to do, an
understanding of context is crucial. In order to make a good decision about which
capabilities to promote in which courses, a teacher needs to know the backgrounds of his
or her students as well as the general cultural milieu. While in one context it might make
sense to foster the capacity for abstract reasoning, in another it may be more appropriate
to foster the capacity for practical reasoning, or to stimulate the moral imagination. This
plurality of goods is what makes the capabilities approach so well-suited to a context in
which many factors are at play.
At the beginning of this chapter I outlined several situational factors that a good
account of teaching ethics should take into account. These were:
$• the disagreements between philosophers about teaching goals
$• the existence of student relativism
$• the influence of religious fundamentalism
$• the widespread fact of pluralism
& the relative inexperience of students and the possible fragility of their convictions
•& the variation in student ability and background
190
One final situational factor should be added here, and that is the variation in class
size. An ethics course might have twenty students, or two hundred, or anything in
between.
The first four of these have already been explicitly addressed; that is, the
disagreements between philosophers about teaching goals, the existence of student
relativism, the influence of religious fundamentalism, and the fact of pluralism. That
leaves three to consider here.
The worry about the fragility of student convictions is the worry I traced through
Plato, Locke and Rousseau. How should ethics teachers respond to the fact that students
may use arguments on their own beliefs in a destructive rather than a constructive way?
That is, what should teachers do given the possibility that students may reject the
reasonableness of morality or the majority of their moral beliefs?
In many ways, these questions are similar to those questions that arise in the
context of the issues of student relativism and religious fundamentalism, and about
teaching goals in ethics courses. In the end, the question of whether a particular student
is likely to become a relativist or a moral sceptic as a result of learning to think critically
about ethics is a question that only teaching experience, or empirical research, can
answer. Ethics courses are also not the only types of courses that could have this effect
on particular students: courses about evolution, or about the history of religion, or any
course that promotes the examination of received tradition, could have this effect as well.
The capabilities approach can take this issue into account in two ways. The first it
that it emphasizes the consideration of students' characteristics, and the context in which
one is teaching, in one's decisions about which capabilities to promote and how to
promote them. This emphasis is not necessarily limited to the capabilities approach,
however, and so the second is more important in this context. The second way in which
the capabilities approach addresses this is to keep the focus on student capabilities: on
promoting them in general (especially intellectual capability) and on noticing if one is
promoting one capability at the expense of another. A teacher's method or goal could
promote the capability for reason at the risk of undermining the capability for religious
affiliation, or the capability to relate to others. If this is the case, then that method or goal
should be re-evaluated in light of what is likely to produce the most good. It may be that
the benefits outweigh the risks, or it may be that teachers can alter their methods so as to
reduce the risks.
In the end a central factor in addressing this is the fact that not all of a teacher's
students are the same; a class of two hundred or often will have many different students,
of varying abilities, and learning to reason critically will affect them in various ways.
Unless a teacher is teaching one student at a time, then he or she cannot tailor teaching
goals and practices to a particular student's abilities and background. One student could
be a fundamentalist whose beliefs need to be shaken up in order for him or her to be able
to think critically about them; another a cynical relativist who needs to be inspired in
order to learn to develop moral convictions.
What the capabilities approach provides is a list of the goods of teaching, not a
manual for how to reach those goods. A teacher's goals might be very general in a large
class. A teacher might find him or herself teaching a class of two hundred students from
very similar backgrounds, or a class often from varied backgrounds. In either case the
overall goal is the promotion of capabilities, and the teacher reasons as best as he or she
192
can about how to promote them given the particularities of the teaching situation. This is,
in the end, practical reasoning. In this way the capabilities approach does not provide all
of the answers a priori, but then neither will any student-centred account. As soon as a
teacher focuses on how his or her teaching will affect students, and bases decisions on
that, then he or she runs into complicated decisions about how to teach many students at
once, and even how to teach one student at a time.
In the end, however, the student-centredness of the account is its strength, even if
it does not solve every teaching issue a priori. An account of the ethics of teaching
which purported to do so would have to ignore just how complicated teaching is and how
much of it is based on experience.
I do not wish to understate my case, here. Setting out the goods of teaching, as I
have done, is necessary for reasoning about teaching goals, even though one's reasoning
about teaching goals will also involve practical considerations. The capabilities, more
than the idea of moral improvement or knowledge transmission, are the kind of goods
that can be promoted in many contexts and with many different kinds of students, even if
they are promoted in different ways. The capabilities approach is thus well-suited to
complicated teaching situations and to taking into account the varying situational factors I
have outlined in these chapters.
In this analysis I have emphasized two major features of the capabilities approach
to well-being: its plurality of goods, and its focus on obligations to promote the
capabilities of others rather than the achievements of others. These two features are what
enables the capabilities approach to take account of the morally salient features above,
and what distinguishes it from the other approaches considered in the chapter five. In
193
other words, they are what make the capabilities approach so well-suited to the
educational context.
6.4. Conclusions
In my promotion of the capabilities approach I do not mean to have solved any
and all problems with applying it to the context of education. All of the tough questions I
have raised throughout these chapters point to the need for careful study of the ethics of
teaching. My development of the capabilities approach provides a starting point for this
study by developing an account of the goods of teaching. In further developing this
account, there will be disagreements about what exactly each capability consists in, how
to balance the promotion of some capabilities with other capabilities, or even which
capabilities are significant in the teaching context. I am not suggesting that unanimous
agreement is even possible. What I am suggesting is that agreement can be more
widespread when it concerns instrumentally valuable capabilities rather than substantive
issues of happiness, goodness, or knowledge. Widespread agreement about basic
capabilities can form a background of shared values within which discussions of teaching
goals and practices can take place. In the end, this is the most important feature of the
account.
194
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VITA
Sarah Patricia Lublink
Ph.D., Philosophy, The University of Western Ontario, 2009 M.A., Philosophy, York University, Ontario, 2004 B.A. (Hons.), Philosophy, York University, Ontario, 2003 B.R.S., Arts/Theology, Tyndale University College, Ontario, 2000
Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) Doctoral Fellowship, 2007-2008
Ontario Graduate Scholarship, 2003-2004, 2004-2005, 2005-2006
Mary Routledge Fellowship, 2007, 2008
Western Graduate Thesis Research Award, 2007, 2008
Harold Johnson Memorial Scholarship in Medieval Philosophy, 2006
Canadian Society for the Study of Practical Ethics Graduate Student Essay Prize, 2006
Entrance Scholarship, York University, 2003
Sarah Lublink Daley, "Who May Live the Examined Life? Plato's Rejection of Socratic Practices in Republic VII." British Journal for the History of Philosophy, forthcoming 2010.
Adjunct Professor, Tyndale University College, 2008-2009
Limited Duties Faculty, The University of Western Ontario, 20082009
Research Assistant, Teaching Support Centre, The University of Western Ontario, 2008
Instructor, The University of Western Ontario, 2005-2007
Teaching Assistant, The University of Western Ontario, 20042005, 2007-2008