A Theory of Educational Reform

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Every turning point in European history has been associated with a change in education or a movement of educational reform. We are today in the presence of one of these turning points of history and consequently the time is ripe for a new movement of educational reform.

Christopher Dawson

ABSTRACT: This theory calls for shifting the emphasis from analytical thinking to creating conditions that encourage and facilitate the process of enlarging one's vocabulary of ideas. Its success depends on the following assumptions:

Ideas, when articulated in clear sentences which are termed “idea statements,” can be learned in somewhat the same effortless and efficient manner as the vocabulary of our mother tongue—providing we acquire them in a similar way.

The idea statements which best lend themselves to being acquired in this way are those which, when organized into a coherent structure, constitute a liberal education.

In general, the interests of liberal education are best served when analytical thinking follows and is subordinated to the acquisition of idea statements.

Despite its astounding success in the realm of science and technology, the analytical method should be treated with both caution and scepticism where the humanities are concerned. In fact, the analytical habit of mind can easily undermine not only the attainment, but the very idea of a liberal education.

__________________________

To the question “Does analysis mean falsification?” I believe the only correct answer is “Yes, if you don't know what you are doing.”

Alan Wood

Someone who can write [or collect] aphorisms should not fritter away his time writing essays.

Karl Kraus

No one doubts that it is possible to learn to speak a language fluently without ever having studied or thought about its structure. Moreover, this learning is rapid, efficient and accomplished without a painful and tedious effort of memorization. When the need for self-expression arises, we do not scan mental lists of vocabulary. Nor do we consult the rules of grammar. Yet, quicker than thought, the words and sentences we need come to us. This is what it means to “acquire” a language. The miracle of language acquisition may be explained by Noam Chomsky's hypothesis that language is an innate mental faculty that develops when brought into contact with one of the world's varied languages. According to Chomsky, we don't learn a language so much as language grows in us like a physical organ.

Knowledge that is acquired is typically learned through a natural and effortless process that combines repetition with the need or desire to know. This kind of learning differs greatly from memorization by rote, or cramming. Knowledge that is memorized by rote is retrieved with difficulty and fades with time. Crammed material has an even more tenuous foothold in the mind. Most of it will be forgotten within days or even hours of dumping it for some temporary purpose or emergency, such as an exam. But barring a stroke or a severe head injury, acquired knowledge is permanent and instantly available for use.

Modern systems of state sponsored education are predicated on the assumption that learning is the result of an institutional process managed by the educator. Yet it is universal human experience that most learning happens casually, and that even most intentional learning is not the result of programmed instruction. Language, as we have seen, is the most obvious example. Normal children learn their first language casually, although faster if their parents pay attention to them. Most people who learn to speak a second language fluently do so as a result of odd circumstances and not of sequential teaching.

In our quest for a theory of educational reform, let us experiment with the following hypothesis: Human beings are born with an innate capacity for ideas and belief systems that is somewhat analogous to our innate capacity for language. From this assumption it follows that we should try to recreate in our educational methods the same conditions that existed when we acquired our mother tongue.

As children we learn language piecemeal, with common words and sentences establishing themselves in what we will call “recognition memory.” As we start to use these words and sentences for our own purposes they move into another kind of memory—let's call it “command memory.” Once we have accumulated a critical stock of words and sentences in command memory we rapidly develop the mysterious ability to generate an endless number of new sentences that we have never heard before. Moreover, these sentences are, to a remarkable degree, consistent with the rules and structure of the language we are acquiring.

Proceeding on the hypothesis that acquiring a “language of ideas” has something in common with the process of acquiring our mother tongue, I would like to propose two analogies between them. First, let a word correspond to a definition, perception, or proposition that has been clearly articulated. Here is an example of a definition: Love is a union of persons under the condition of preserving one's integrity and individuality; of a perception: Technology produces more technology whether it makes sense or not, whether it is wanted or not; of a proposition: There exists a supreme being that possesses such characteristics as intelligence, will, creative power, and protective love. For statements that fall into these categories, and any other statements which seem to be of the same type, I propose to use the general term “idea statement.” Note that concepts are often represented by single words—for example, the word justice stands for the concept of justice, and the word truth stands for the concept of truth. Like words, concepts are usually neither true nor false. Idea statements, on the other hand, though rarely true or false in an absolute sense, typically possess some degree of truth value. Here is an example: Justice is truth in action.

Second, let a sentence correspond to an argument. Here is an example argument from George Bernard Shaw: Whoever admits that anything living is evil must either believe that God is malignantly capable of creating evil, or else believe that God has made many mistakes in His attempts to make a perfect being. An argument, such as the one above, may consist of a single sentence, but most arguments will involve more than one sentence. A sustained argument (or thesis) might be the length of a book, for example, Das Kapital by Karl Marx, or The Critique of Pure Reason by Immanuel Kant. But the distinction between a short and a long argument is of little importance for our purposes. The important analogies can be reiterated as follows:

words --> ideas statements

sentences --> arguments

Having supposed that idea statements are “words” in the “language” of ideas, it follows that idea statements are the “vocabulary” of this language. Moreover, just as words are the building blocks of sentences, so idea statements are the building blocks of arguments.

Now it just so happens that it takes relatively few words to construct an almost infinite number of sentences. We might suppose, therefore, that it takes relatively few idea statements to construct an almost infinite number of arguments. Whatever the case, the theory indicates that an impoverished idea statement vocabulary will inhibit arguments that are truthful or significant, despite the enormous number of possible arguments that can be formulated. This situation corresponds to the fact that an impoverished word vocabulary will inhibit sentences that are accurate or precise, despite the enormous number of possible sentences that can be expressed.

The explanation, I believe, is that reality, though complex and subtle, has a definite shape or character. Therefore, thought about reality is constrained by fact—notwithstanding modern tendencies to call objective reality into question. By contrast, the number of arguments that can be formulated by someone with even a modest vocabulary of idea statements is unconstrained, and therefore very large. Does it follow then that people, however intelligent and conscientious, who possess a narrow vocabulary of idea statements will construct arguments which have a much higher probability of being false or meaningless? I don't mean entirely false or meaningless —almost everything is a matter of degree—but deficient in truth or significance. Bryan Magee, author of Confessions of a Philosopher, was intimately familiar with the intellectual currents at Oxford during the heyday of linguistic philosophy in the 1950s. Though not a professional philosopher, he is thoroughly acquainted with the whole subject of philosophy, and was personally acquainted with Bertrand Russell, Karl Popper, and A. J. Ayer. Here is what he has to say on the problem of significant utterance:

In ordinary life one knows that it is possible even with the best of intentions to utter words and yet say nothing...empty utterance is the order of the day throughout the mass media, including the so-called quality press. Given that speaking without saying anything is compatible with both high intelligence and good intentions, how are we to distinguish between statements that really do say something (true or false) and statements that say nothing at all?

According to this theory of educational reform, the answer to Magee's question is simply to concentrate on enlarging and broadening one's vocabulary of idea statements. Only in this way can one gain the experience needed to be a good judge of ideas, not necessarily a good judge of their truth, but a good judge of their value.

The number of words in standard, non-technical English is large, but manageable. If there are 14,000 words in your vocabulary you will almost never see a non-technical word on the printed page that you don't recognize. The surprising thing is that the number of idea statements—at least for the purposes of a liberal education—is also manageable. The explanation seems to be that most idea statements fall into a rather limited number of categories, and you need only acquire a modest number from a given category to gain a sense and familiarity with everything that belongs there.

The same, however, is not true of arguments. As with sentences, there is no end to the number of arguments. Moreover, it often requires a great deal of time and thought to understand an argument well enough to be able to pass a fair judgement on it. However, a few additional idea statements in one's idea vocabulary will often make it possible to dismiss many long and sophisticated arguments without having to fully comprehend them. Why expend time and intellectual energy on an argument that contradicts or ignores some widely held perception or proposition? An example of the former would be Aristotle's, He who wishes to learn must believe; while an example of the latter might be: There is nothing inherently improbable in the belief that the Creator might make a revelation of Himself to His creatures. It is quite possible, of course, that a widely held perception is erroneous, or that a widely entertained proposition is implausible. Nevertheless, to quote Jane Austen, Where an opinion is general, it is usually correct. And similarly, experience teaches us that arguments which ignore or dismiss the settled conclusions of mankind are more likely than not to be little more than self-contained worlds of text, mental exercises without the taste or substance of reality.

An idea statement must possess two characteristics. Consider the following idea statement from M. Scott Peck:

To put it in a rather crass way, falling in love is a trick that our genes pull on our otherwise perceptive mind to hoodwink or trap us into marriage.

It certainly is a proposition. It is also a common perception, though not necessarily a true one. In my opinion it is partially true, and true in an important sense. But even before we weigh its truthfulness we can see that it meets the two requirements for any idea statement. First, it can be evaluated and placed on a true-false scale, though where it is placed will undoubtedly be a matter of opinion. Second, it is not trivial. The statement, The cat sat on the mat is trivial. So is, The moon is not made of green cheese. There are vast numbers of trivial statements, since the word ‘moon’ could be replaced by every star in the astronomer's catalogue, and every statement would be equally true and equally trivial. Being able to assign truth-value to a sentence does not ensure that it will make a good idea statement, but triviality will definitely disqualify it.

To qualify as an idea statement, then, a statement must possess truth value—which it has even if you think it is false—and it must be inherently interesting. How interesting an idea statement is, will more often than not be a matter of legitimate disagreement. The same goes for how much truth it contains. Ultimately the test for both attributes must be a matter of consensus, though not merely a democratic one. The settled opinion of the human race is that William Shakespeare is a great playwright, even though most people have never read him. He is a great playwright even though three very great literary men, Voltaire, Tolstoy and George Bernard Shaw despised him. It would seem that a consensus can only be established by those who, in addition to being interested and informed, are also in some way that is not easy to define, sympathetic. One way or another it should be possible to create one or more collections of idea statements that over time could win a broad acceptance as core idea vocabulary.

Here is how the theory might be applied. Instead of asking the students to read a classic, such as Machiavelli's The Prince, to be followed by a test or an essay, they would be asked to acquire a dozen idea statements of their own choosing from a list of ideas on government, politics, and power. It is essential that they not be restricted to the list. Nevertheless, because of the great time and tedium involved in collecting all one's own material, the list is necessary. The list may be arranged by subject or theme. Using the theme approach, ideas can be grouped into small sets, each with a title and connectors that suggest a relationship between successive statements. The organization of ideas in this way, rather than simply by subject, is the preferred method, since the additional organization provided by sets, titles, and connectors also serves as a memory aid. It is very important, however, to make it absolutely clear that the students are free to change the connectors, the order, and the material—which they can author—to suit themselves. Here is an example set from the theme “Government, Politics & Power”:

SHOULD NORMAL BAD GOVERNMENT

BE A CAUSE FOR INDIGNATION?

Government comprises a large part of the organized injustice in any society, ancient or modern.

consequently

Every decent man is ashamed of the government he lives under.

H. L. Mencken

in fact

I work for a Government I despise for ends I think criminal.

John Maynard Keynes

unfortunately

Government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil; in its worst state, an intolerable evil.

Thomas Paine

in other words

The choice is not between good government and bad government, but between bearable government and unbearable government.

The students would be asked to acquire two or three such sets in preparation to discuss (in groups of three or four) either the entire subject of “Government, Politics and Power,” or a more specific question set by the teacher. Each student would be provided with a compact booklet containing several thousand idea statements, including a selection relating to the current topic. As well as being used to stimulate discussion when necessary, the booklet could also serve as the primary source of idea vocabulary. Note that there is nothing in this approach to dissuade a teacher from highly recommending The Prince. But it would never be required reading. Moreover, the student would be advised to learn the art of skimming books and of dipping into them here and there. He would also be encouraged to make every effort to avoid being bored, for boredom is the nemesis of the educational process.

Every essay is an exercise in analysis. The student who is seized by the analytical impulse should be strongly encouraged to respond to it by writing an essay. Few things are as engaging as the search for understanding or clarification, and the enjoyment of writing when the search has been successful is the reward for intellectual perseverance. Any essay that was submitted to him, the teacher would be honour bound to read and comment upon. Such a policy would spare the student the agony of writing an essay merely as a grade requirement, and it would spare the teacher the ordeal of reading it. Why should a teacher waste time and energy reading a lot of barely intelligible rubbish that the student wants no part of the moment he receives his mark?

Real knowledge is always acquired in the pursuit of real goals. Thus it is vastly expensive, and often futile, to try to teach people things they are not motivated to learn. Under the present system, few students genuinely seek understanding and self-development. What they want are the credentials that make them eligible for the better paying jobs. As a consequence they are destined to forget most of what they are taught in school. But suppose, if by reforming education according to the proposed theory, the average student is able to acquire five hundred or so idea statements over his time in school, and that he was afforded numerous opportunities for discussion and self expression that he remembers with pleasure and judges to have been intellectually fruitful. What kind and degree of success could then be claimed for this method? And how would it compare with the results of our current educational system?