Education or Legislation? (Part 1), 7-3-2010

 I continue my way through Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics. I have now reached the discussion on continence and incontinence (Book VII, Chapter 1, §6):

Continence and resistance seem to be good and praiseworthy, whereas incontinence and softness seem to be base and blameworthy conditions. The continent person seems to be the same as one who abides by his rational calculation; and the incontinent person seems to be the same as one who abandons it. The incontinent person knows that his actions are base, but does them because of his feelings, whereas the continent person knows that his appetites are base but because of reason does not follow them.

(I see a connection between this discussion and The Epistle of James, 2, 14 - 26. True faith produces works. Merely saying one has faith is akin to being continent without being temperate, which Aristotle discusses in Chapter 4 of Book VII. The Baptist in refrains from seeing salvation in works without faith. Book VII, Chapter 4 covers a similar situation between continence and intemperance.)

What seems at the bottom of ethics for Aristotle is thinking. How do we get to the right kind of thinking: education or legislation?

All our state constitutions impose a duty to provide an education. This goes back to Jefferson (I believe this idea was picked up from Garry Wills' Inventing America). The idea of a state educting its citizens goes back to Greece and Rome.

Anyone picking up on my idea of a treatise on teaching the virtues should consider how we teach the students to think. I advocate the Socratic method blended with lecturing. Law schools once relied solely on the Socratic method (see The Paper Chase) to inculcate thinking into the heads of law students. Taking the method too far raises Nietzsche's criticism of the method serves no purpose than making the student look the fool (again, (see The Paper Chase). Mere lecturing misses the point of the exercise: teaching the student how to apply ideas to situations so that they can act ethically. Leaving students only with knowledge defeats the purpose of education - readying people for action.

A thought came to just now how training for an ethical life reminds me of Mark Twain's training as a riverboat pilot. Give Life on the Mississippi a read - the opening half - for a fuller demonstration of my meaning. Twain describes what it was like piloting a steamboat on a pitch black night. Does that not sound like the same thing as learning how to apply ethics to one's life?

I continue thinking there will be opposition to any teaching of ethics. Someone will say education should be limited to the three Rs, to the things that will get a person a job. I say these people are fools or worse.

If all the high school graduate know is reading, writing, and math, then what sort of citizen do we have? The sort who do not understand how to behave in society except to follow orders? I do not call that terribly American. Which ought to lead everyone to ask this question: what sort of person wants a citizenry incapable of thinking for themselves?

Good citizens mean to me people who are capable of living with one another. Here, I certainly believe the social encompasses the political. Who believes more in the good of unquestionably following orders: those who listen to Rush Limbaugh or those who voted for Obama? How many do not vote because they were never taught to think about social issues, but will obey whoever is in charge? How many are like me find Republicans blissful hypocrites and Democrats woefully feckless? Is this why so many are left with a cheerless cynicism?

Jefferson knew what the Romans knew - maintaining a republic requires an educated population. For Jefferson, a free, equal education was a way of avoiding the failure of the Roman Republic. That free, equal education only serves its purpose if we are training people as citizens as well as factory workers.

If we do not educate good citizens, then we must rely on legislation. One theory of the law is that it's the command of the sovereign. That theory grew out of the ideas of Jeremy Bentham (who is worth looking up). Bentham denied a natural law. American law professor love that law was what came from the legislature. American politicians loved it, too. However, a problem exists for Americans when natural law is denied: our national creed is founded on natural law. The Declaration of Independence invokes "Nature's God." In turn, our stat constitutions have mostly incorporated the Declaration.

Those following Bentham's ideas passed laws that would increase the happiness of the majority. Prohibiting alcohol and gambling and drugs were such laws. Legislatures were given the power to make us do and be better people - or else. Legislation is the command from the sovereign which the people are to follow.

Do not take me for a delusional fool who thinks we can change this view of legislation's purpose. Our best hope is for a more critical public and a more prudent group of legislators. I have serious doubts we will get either. Crises do not lend themselves to prudence or critical thought. When in the past have we not been presented with a crisis and no legislation? Terrorism brought us The Patriot Act. Enron's fraud brought us Sarbanes-Oxley. Drugs brought us the War on drugs. I think it is worse now than ever before, as if the politicians and media and interest groups find an issue, hype the issue into a crisis and legislation demanded to save us from the crisis. Opposition gets marginalized as being corrupt or anti-patriotic.

sch

 [Continued in Education or Legislation? (Part 2), 7-3-2010. sch 2/8/23.]