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It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it. (Aristotle)
Since philosophy is the art which teaches us how to live, and since children need to learn it as much as we do at
other ages, why do we not instruct them in it? .. But in truth I know nothing about the philosophy of education
except this: that the greatest and the most important difficulty known to human learning seems to lie in that
area which treats how to bring up children and how to educate them.
(de Montaigne, On teaching Philosophy of Education)
Plants are shaped by cultivation and men by education. .. We are born weak, we need strength; we are born
totally unprovided, we need aid; we are born stupid, we need judgment. Everything we do not have at our birth
and which we need when we are grown is given us by education.
(Jean Jacques Rousseau, Emile, On Philosophy of Education)
This crippling of individuals I consider the worst evil of capitalism. Our whole educational system suffers from
this evil. An exaggerated competitive attitude is inculcated into the student, who is trained to worship
acquisitive success as a preparation for his future career. I am convinced there is only one way to eliminate
these grave evils, namely through the establishment of a socialist economy, accompanied by a educational
system which would be oriented toward social goals. In such an economy, the means of production are owned by
society itself and are utilised in a planned fashion. A planned economy, which adjusts production to the needs
of the community, would distribute the work to be done among all those able to work and would guarantee a
livelihood to every man, woman and child. The education of the individual, in addition to promoting his own
innate abilities, would attempt to develop in him a sense of responsibility for his fellow-men in place of the
glorification of power and success in our present society. (Albert Einstein, 1949, On Education)
Introduction - Albert Einstein / Philosophy of Education - Plato / Education - Jean Jacques Rousseau / Education - de
Montaigne / Philosophy of Education - Educational Quotes by Famous Philosophers - Links Educational Philosophy - Top of
Page
Introduction
(Philosophy of Education / Educational Philosophy / Teaching Philosophy)
My dear children: I rejoice to see you before me today, happy youth of a sunny and fortunate land. Bear in
mind that the wonderful things that you learn in your schools are the work of many generations, produced by
enthusiastic effort and infinite labour in every country of the world. All this is put into your hands as your
inheritance in order that you may receive it, honour it, and add to it, and one day faithfully hand it on to your
children. Thus do we mortals achieve immortality in the permanent things which we create in common. If you
always keep that in mind you will find meaning in life and work and acquire the right attitude towards other
nations and ages. (Albert Einstein talking to a group of school children. 1934)
This page on Educational Philosophy has some lovely intelligent philosopher's quotes on both the
importance of education, and what is a good education.
As a philosopher it is clear to me that teaching people how to think correctly and to use language
carefully (to work out the truth for themselves) is a pretty good start for education (i.e. by teaching
philosophy to students from a young age). However, I realise that this is an unfashionable view in our
postmodern times of 'no absolute truths' - where all knowledge is incomplete, evolving, and relative to
some cultural construction - thus teaching philosophy is seen as some abstract and largely useless
exercise. If you browse around this website you will quickly realise that I do not support this current
paradigm, which I see as being very destructive in both its affects on the individual and our collective
society.
There are clearly many problems with our current education / teaching system, an evolutionary
philosophy of education has important contributions to make to improving things. Below you will find a
short introduction and then an excellent collection of education quotes from many of the greatest
minds in human history. And as Aristotle so astutely observed;
"All who have meditated on the art of governing mankind have been convinced that the fate of empires
depends on the education of youth." (Aristotle)
Geoff Haselhurst, Email
Philosopher of Science, Metaphysics, Theoretical Physics.
PS - I am currently re-writing all the main philosophy / physics pages. For these education pages I
hope to write a short treatise on how we can improve our educational system, founded on one simple
principle.
All things in the universe are interconnected and evolving (the dynamic unity of reality).
The central thesis is that education should be founded on truth and reality, and in particular how this
relates to the interconnection of Mind (cultural knowledge and truth), Matter (biological knowledge
and how our bodies are interconnected with other matter around us) and Space (our environment,
society). These three things are clearly interconnected (in physical reality), so you could call this an
evolutionary / ecological approach to education, founded on a metaphysics of Space / wave structure
of matter.
I think there are some good things happening with the new Outcomes based curriculum that is
currently being implemented in the West Australian state schools I was involved with this at
Nyindamurra Family School. What this means is that rather than prescribing a curriculum based upon
certain content that must be studied, instead we prescribe the outcomes that we want. (e.g. A child
can add up numbers in their head, or appreciate the importance of Nature and the interconnected
ecology of life.) Now the way to teach these skills is open. You could go down the beach and count
seashells by the seashore if you wanted.
And this is how I bring up my children every day I use daily things around us to educate them to all
sorts of different knowledge. For example, we recently built a giant swing - and children can learn a
lot by building and playing on swings (pendulums and pendulum clocks are interesting phenomena, a
very great philosopher Christiaan Huygens first studied pendulums at the time of Newton and Leibniz
in the late 1600s.). They have to be creative how do you get a rope over a branch ten meters off the
ground? how do you build a tower using materials in the bush around you, such that you have a
platform to jump onto your swing from (using gravity to push you!)?
I should add that an outcomes based system also has numerous problems, as it is difficult to ensure a
uniform quality of education. The real solution is to consider both the curriculum used, and the
outcomes you hope to achieve - combined with intelligent use of the internet so that the best
curriculums that show empirically that they work (produce desired outcomes) can be shared / adapted
by teachers from all over the world (we do not need to keep re-inventing the wheel).
I certainly do not believe in just sitting in a classroom which is unnatural, unhealthy, and should be
limited. It is obvious we did not evolve to learn by sitting in classrooms, in segregated age groups but to be active, out and about doing things, talking, watching and learning from other people and
other objects around us. (This is what I would call an evolutionary approach to teaching / philosophy
of education - and getting kids more active at school would also greatly help to combat the obesity
epidemic of the western world.)
I particularly agree with Einstein, that education (and teaching students philosophy from a young
age) has two central functions relating to the individual and their society.
i) To educate the individual as a free individual To understand and use critical thinking skills for
determining the Truth for themselves.
ii) To educate the individual as a part of Society Virtually all our knowledge, our clothes, our food is
produced by others in our society, thus we owe Society and have a responsibility to contribute back to
Society (that everyone must give as well as take.) This is ultimately why I began to study Physics and
Philosophy, and why I have now read most of the great philosophers, because I believe that Nature is
being destroyed on this planet, and that the truth is that this is very foolish and dangerous to
humanity. That we evolved from Nature, thus we depend upon Nature for survival. This is not just the
obvious concern of global warming and climate change, but the very food we eat, the air we breath,
the water we need, all these things are produced by Nature and are being forever changed. Of concern
is the obvious fact that there are limits to our evolution as to how far we can change our environment
before it starts to adversely affect us (we are well past that point now I think.)
I also strongly agree with Einstein that education should be fun rather than forced that force and
punishment play no part in a good education. Thus I detest the attitude of punishing children for not
doing their homework!
I think a lot of education problems could be solved by giving everyone 100 great books to read and
discuss with their children - from philosophers like Plato, Aristotle, de Montaigne, Leibniz, Spinoza,
Hume, Tolstoy, Einstein etc. There are many great minds through human history, and I largely agree
with Nietzsche that education is often corrupted by educators that we should seek the source of
great knowledge, not the corrupted interpretations of it from lesser minds. (Read the original works!)
I further agree with Friedrich Nietzsche that:
There is nothing more necessary than truth, and in comparison with it everything else has only secondary value.
This absolute will to truth: what is it? Is it the will to not allow ourselves to be deceived? Is it the will not to
deceive?
One does not want to be deceived, under the supposition that it is injurious, dangerous, or fatal to be
deceived. (Nietzsche, 1890)
The fundamental principle of education is to understand the truth for oneself. The fundamental
principle of philosophy is to realise that all truth comes from reality. Thus educational philosophy must
be founded on the truth of what exists. Recent discoveries of the properties of Space and the Wave
Structure of Matter shows that we can understand reality in a simple and sensible way.
Geoff Haselhurst
Introduction - Albert Einstein / Philosophy of Education - Plato / Education - Jean Jacques Rousseau / Education - de
Montaigne / Philosophy of Education - Educational Quotes by Famous Philosophers - Links Educational Philosophy - Top of
Page
Somebody who only reads newspapers and at best books of contemporary authors looks to me like an
extremely near-sighted person who scorns eyeglasses. He is completely dependent on the prejudices and
fashions of his times, since he never gets to see or hear anything else. And what a person thinks on his own
without being stimulated by the thoughts and experiences of other people is even in the best case rather
paltry and monotonous.
There are only a few enlightened people with a lucid mind and style and with good taste within a century. What
has been preserved of their work belongs among the most precious possessions of mankind. We owe it to a few
writers of antiquity (Plato, Aristotle, etc.) that the people in the Middle Ages could slowly extricate
themselves from the superstitions and ignorance that had darkened life for more than half a millennium.
Nothing is more needed to overcome the modernist's snobbishness. (Einstein, 1954)
As Philosophers, Scientists and Educators we have a responsibility to maintain great knowledge from
the past, for as Einstein beautifully writes;
... knowledge must continually be renewed by ceaseless effort, if it is not to be lost. It resembles a statue of
marble which stands in the desert and is continually threatened with burial by the shifting sand. The hands of
service must ever be at work, in order that the marble continue to lastingly shine in the sun. To these serving
hands mine shall also belong. (Einstein, On Education, 1950)
When, after several hours reading, I came to myself again, I asked myself what it was that had so fascinated
me. The answer is simple. The results were not presented as ready-made, but scientific curiosity was first
aroused by presenting contrasting possibilities of conceiving matter. Only then the attempt was made to
clarify the issue by thorough argument. The intellectual honesty of the author makes us share the inner
struggle in his mind. It is this which is the mark of the born teacher. Knowledge exists in two forms - lifeless,
stored in books, and alive, in the consciousness of men. The second form of existence is after all the essential
one; the first, indispensable as it may be, occupies only an inferior position. (Einstein, 1954)
My dear children: I rejoice to see you before me today, happy youth of a sunny and fortunate land. Bear in
mind that the wonderful things that you learn in your schools are the work of many generations, produced by
enthusiastic effort and infinite labour in every country of the world. All this is put into your hands as your
inheritance in order that you may receive it, honour it, and add to it, and one day faithfully hand it on to your
children. Thus do we mortals achieve immortality in the permanent things which we create in common. If you
always keep that in mind you will find meaning in life and work and acquire the right attitude towards other
nations and ages. (Albert Einstein talking to a group of school children. 1934)
I believe, indeed, that overemphasis on the purely intellectual attitude, often directed solely to the practical
and factual, in our education, has led directly to the impairment of ethical values. I am not thinking so much of
the dangers with which technical progress has directly confronted mankind, as of the stifling of mutual human
considerations by a 'matter-of-fact' habit of thought which has come to lie like a killing frost upon human
relations. Without 'ethical culture' there is no salvation for humanity. (Einstein, 1953)
formerly.
Sometimes one sees in the school simply the instrument for transferring a certain maximum quantity of
knowledge to the growing generation. But that is not right. Knowledge is dead; the school however, serves the
living. It should develop in the young individuals those qualities and capabilities which are of value for the
welfare of the commonwealth. But that does not mean that individuality should be destroyed and the individual
become a mere tool of the community, like a bee or an ant. For a community of standardised individuals without
personal originality and personal aims would be a poor community without possibilities for development. On the
contrary, the aim must be the training of independently acting and thinking individuals, who, however, see in
the service of the community their highest life problem.
To me the worst thing seems to be for a school principally to work with methods of fear, force and artificial
authority. Such treatment destroys the sound sentiments, the sincerity, and the self-confidence of the pupil.
It produces the submissive subject. it is no wonder that such schools are the rule in Germany and Russia.
..the desire for the approval of one's fellow-man certainly is one of the most important binding powers of
society. In this complex of feelings, constructive and destructive forces lie closely together. Desire for
approval and recognition is a healthy motive; but the desire to be acknowledged as better, stronger, or more
intelligent than a fellow being or scholar easily leads to an excessively egoistic psychological adjustment, which
may become injurious for the individual and for the community. Therefore the school and the teacher must
guard against employing the easy method of creating individual ambition, in order to induce the pupils to
diligent work. (Einstein)
It is, in fact, nothing short of a miracle that the modern methods of instruction have not yet entirely
strangled the holy curiosity of inquiry; for this delicate little planet, aside from stimulation, stands mainly in
need of freedom; without this it goes to wreck and ruin without fail. It is a grave mistake to think that the
enjoyment of seeing and searching can be prompted by means of coercion and a sense of duty. On the
contrary, I believe that it would be possible to rob even a healthy beast of prey of its voraciousness, if it were
possible, with the aid of a whip, to force the beast to devour continuously, even when not hungry, especially if
the food handed out under such coercion were to be selected accordingly. (Albert Einstein on Education)
Introduction - Albert Einstein / Philosophy of Education - Plato / Education - Jean Jacques Rousseau / Education - de
Montaigne / Philosophy of Education - Educational Quotes by Famous Philosophers - Links Educational Philosophy - Top of
Page
'It only does harm,' he said, 'because it makes itself at home and gradually undermines morals and manners;
from them it invades business dealings generally, and then spreads into the laws and constitution without any
restraint, until it has made complete havoc of private and public life.'
'And when men who aren't fit to be educated get an education they don't deserve, are not the thoughts and
opinions they produce fairly called sophistry, without a legitimate idea or any trace of true wisdom among
them?'
'Certainly'.
'The first thing our artist must do,' I replied, ' - and it's not easy - is to take human society and human habits
and wipe them clean out, to give himself a clean canvas. For our philosophic artist differs from all others in
being unwilling to start work on an individual or a city, or draw out laws, until he is given, or has made himself, a
clean canvas.'
'Because a free man ought not to learn anything under duress. Compulsory physical exercise does no harm to
the body, but compulsory learning never sticks to the mind.'
'True'
'Then don't use compulsion,' I said to him, ' but let your children's lessons take the form of play. You will
learn more about their natural abilities that way.' (Plato)
Introduction - Albert Einstein / Philosophy of Education - Plato / Education - Jean Jacques Rousseau / Education - de
Montaigne / Philosophy of Education - Educational Quotes by Famous Philosophers - Links Educational Philosophy - Top of
Page
Introduction - Albert Einstein / Philosophy of Education - Plato / Education - Jean Jacques Rousseau / Education - de
Montaigne / Philosophy of Education - Educational Quotes by Famous Philosophers - Links Educational Philosophy - Top of
Page
And I loathe people who find it harder to put up with a gown askew than with a soul askew and who judge a man
by his bow, his bearing and his boots. (de Montaigne)
Learning is a good medicine: but no medicine is powerful enough to preserve itself from taint and corruption
independently of defects in the jar that it is kept in. One man sees clearly but does not see straight:
consequently he sees what is good but fails to follow it; he sees knowledge and does not use it. (de Montaigne)
.. since it was true that study, even when done properly, can only teach us what wisdom, right conduct and
determination consist in, they wanted to put their children directly in touch with actual cases, teaching them
not by hearsay but by actively assaying them, vigorously molding and forming them not merely by word and
precept but chiefly by deeds and examples, so that wisdom should not be something which the soul knows but
the souls very essence and temperament, not something acquired but a natural property. (de Montaigne)
But in truth I know nothing about education except this: that the greatest and the most important difficulty
known to human learning seems to lie in that area which treats how to bring up children and how to educate
them. (de Montaigne)
Socrates and then Archesilaus used to make their pupils speak first; they spoke afterwards. Obest plerumque
iss discere volunt authoritas eorum qui docent. [For those who want to learn, the obstacle can often be the
authority of those who teach] (de Montaigne)
Those who follow our French practice and undertake to act as schoolmaster for several minds diverse in kind
and capacity, using the same teaching and the same degree of guidance for them all, not surprisingly can
scarcely find in a whole tribe of children more than one or two who bear fruit from their education.
Let the tutor not merely require a verbal account of what the boy has been taught but the meaning and
substance of it: let him judge how the boy has profited from it not from the evidence of his memory but from
that of his life. Let him take what the boy has just learned and make him show him dozens of different
aspects of it and then apply it to just as many different subjects, in order to find out whether he has really
grasped it and made it part of himself, judging the boys progress by what Plato taught about education.
Spewing food up exactly as you have swallows it is evidence of a failure to digest and assimilate it; the
stomach has not done its job if, during concoction, it fails to change the substance and the form of what it is
given. (de Montaigne)
The profit we possess after study is to have become better and wiser. (de Montaigne)
Nor is it enough to toughen up his soul; you must also toughen up his muscles. (de Montaigne)
Teach him a certain refinement in sorting out and selecting his arguments, with an affection for relevance and
so for brevity. Above all let him be taught to throw down his arms and surrender to truth as soon as he
perceives it, whether the truth is born at his rivals doing or within himself from some change in his ideas. (de
Montaigne)
As for our pupils talk, let his virtue and his sense of right and wrong shine through it and have no guide but
reason. Make him understand that confessing an error which he discovers in his own argument even when he
alone has noticed it is an act of justice and integrity, which are the main qualities he pursues; stubbornness
and rancour are vulgar qualities, visible in common souls whereas to think again, to change ones mind and to
give up a bad case on the heat of the argument are rare qualities showing strength and wisdom. (de Montaigne)
In his commerce with men I mean him to include- and that principally- those who live only in the memory of
books. By means of history he will frequent those great souls of former years. If you want it to be so, history
can be a waste of time; it can also be, if you want it to be so, a study bearing fruit beyond price. (de
Montaigne)
The first lessons with which we should irrigate his mind should be those which teach him to know himself, and
to know how to die and to live. (de Montaigne)
Since philosophy is the art which teaches us how to live, and since children need to learn it as much as we do at
other ages, why do we not instruct them in it? (de Montaigne)
Any time and any place can be used to study: his room, a garden, is table, his bed; when alone or in company;
morning and evening. His chief study will be Philosophy, that Former of good judgement and character who is
privileged to be concerned with everything.
(de Montaigne)
For among other things he had been counseled to bring me to love knowledge and duty by my own choice,
without forcing my will, and to educate my soul entirely through gentleness and freedom. (de Montaigne)
Learning must not only lodge with us: we must marry her. (de Montaigne)
Introduction - Albert Einstein / Philosophy of Education - Plato / Education - Jean Jacques Rousseau / Education - de
Montaigne / Philosophy of Education - Educational Quotes by Famous Philosophers - Links Educational Philosophy - Top of
Page
Every serious student of the subject knows that the stability of a civilisation depends finally on the wisdom
with which it distributes its wealth and allots its burdens of labour, and on the veracity of the instruction it
provides for its children. We do not distribute the wealth at all: we throw it into the streets to be scrambled
for by the strongest and the greediest who will stoop to such scrambling, after handing the lions share to the
professional robbers politely called owners. We cram our children with lies, and punish anyone who tries to
enlighten them. Our remedies for the consequences of our folly are tariffs, inflation, wars, vivisections and
inoculations vengeance, violences, black magic. (George Bernard Shaw)