February 24, 2005
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Topic: Thoughts in the NYC public library
First of all…the following is my attempt to perform practical philosophy. I am not trying to argue for an absolute truth, I am trying to argue for what makes sense based on general observations:
What is the purpose of learning?
As a student, you’re taught things. But for what greater purpose?
If you become a teacher, this means the purpose of your learning when you were a student, was so you can teach what you’ve learned, so other can learn what you learned.
Is teaching merely a process of passing down knowledge?
Think of a crowded library. Hundreds of people learning. But why?
1) Learning is an act of living
-pleasure
-stimulation
-social
-connectoin with the learning
2) Learning is an act of preparation for future living
-learning leads to more learning
-learning leads to more living
The supreme act is LIVING. Learning is important to the extent that it adds to living. The purpose of education is to add to life.
People exist in 3 distinct life phases:
1) student
2) worker
3) post-work / retiree
Only thorugh work, or the work of others (parents) can we exist in the other two non-working stages of life.
We work so our children can be students, and we work so we can one day be retirees.
Work is also an act of living:
-pleasure
-stimulation
-social
-learning
Why is school, work, and the transition from school to work often so difficult?
(This is the essential cultural/psychological question that has led to this post)
1) School is not seen as an act of living
-school is seen as a preparation for work
2) Work is not seen as an act of living
-Work is seen as a preparation for life post-work and as a tool to sened kids to school
What is living?
While living is technically the opposite of being dead, here, I’m using it to mean what most people do to experience pleasure, stimulation, social, and learning. Living is doing something both for its value now, and for its value later. For most, living is what people do when they’re not in school and not at work.
ex)
partial living – Going through the motions/routines of life (secular/mundane)
….student hates school, loves extra-curricular activities
….worker hates work, loves things after work
graphically, this would look like a wave, up, down, up, down, up, down, up, down
fully living – passionately grabbing life by the balls (secular/spiritual)
….student loves school and extra-curriculars, the two almost blend into one
….worker loves job and lifestyle after job, the two almost blend into one
graphically, this would look like a rising stock, up up up, down, up up up, down (since some downs are inevitable)
I do not believe there is an objective/abstract truth regarding “living,” however, I think psychology is probably the closest science I can use. I am trying to understand the human condition, and that is psychology.
Comments (5)
Psychology doesn’t address the difference between existing and living. It hopes to, but really what it does is to explain why behaviors exist.
Religion or other spiritualities tend to address the issue of living (versus existing), but without a real framework for exploring that reality. The argument goes something like this: “Jesus was fully alive. Be more like Jesus. Amen.”
The purpose of a teacher is irrelevant. One has to ask oneself what one’s purpose as a student is. All teachers are students, and vice versa… They’re just roles. But in order to learn, you have to come from student-mind. So one’s purpose as a student determines one’s practice of learning, and subsequently one’s practice of living.
If a Teacher(tm) can’t learn to learn, then there’s no point in being his student.
I decree it thus.
I’m with Homer’s decree 100%. Everybody is a teacher. Everybody is a student. Life stages should never be simply viewed as preparatory. They are to be lived.
I greatly enjoy your reading writing and this is another good one.
I think education is a lifelong pursuit, that by being alive is the very act of experiencing new things, even just thinking about them. If we reduce ourselves to just working so we can put food on the table and watch TV at night, are we really alive? Many times, the people we love grow old and we can observe almost their very soul leaving them, because as anyone gets old, their mind starts to go. Their lost capacity to learn almost makes them less alive.
So to me, education is very important and questioning things in one’s mind is what makes us alive, it seperates us from the animals.
A lot of people I know think I am smart. I do not think I am stupid, but I have for many years believed that I was never naturally gifted with intelligence. My very thought process is the result of refining my beliefs and the way I go about developing them. It was an reorientation of thought, not the gaining of knowledge. I dare to agree with Plato, because I did before ever reading him, that all education is the reorientation of the mind. Learning to think differently is being educated.
that’s my opinion.
I see things as Homer and thenarrator do. Teaching cannot be “merely the passing down of knowledge” because much (if not most) of what we learn is self-taught. We learn it over time, through living. And if you want an excellent discussion on life and work, read some Wendell Berry.
Dan came back on my site: “i think psychology can measure some form of “quality of life,” happiness and sadness are things that show up in the brain. so, while psychology can’t explain the difference between existing and being alive, and can show different moods associated w/ being alive.”
I started to respond to this, and ended up two hours later with a huge (and rambling) discourse which I’ll snip down and put on my ‘blog. But I wanted to make a few points here:
There’s a really interesting movement called co-counseling. I first heard of it as Re-evaluation Co-counseling (RC). It turns both the teacher/student and therapist/patient roles upside down and inside out, which is why it’s relevant here.
It’s a grassroots mental health movement, and it’s many successes validate my belief that psychology is basically the study of how ineffective psychology is at solving mental health problems. RC doesn’t involve measuring quality of life or map happiness on an EEG. It’s just getting together and listening to your RC partner’s story, and then letting them listen to yours.
The point here is that the goal of psychology is understanding behavior and mental states (and mental states are really behavior, too). That’s a narrow definition, but it’s correct. RC says this: “Re-evaluation Counseling is a process whereby people of all ages and of all backgrounds can learn how to exchange effective help with each other in order to free themselves from the effects of past distress experiences.”
I’m not trying to be an ad for RC, but to contrast the relatively academic nature of psychology with the boots-on-the-ground nature of RC. This same contrast exists not just between psychology and RC, but also between psychology and just about every other social aspect of the human experience.
To tie this back to learning versus teaching, mental health comes from hanging out with the right teachers. Psychology doesn’t seek to teach, it seeks to explain. Sometimes you need an explanation, but don’t mistake those explanations for lessons.
Oh, and Wendell Berry r00lz. He has a collection of essays called ‘What Are People For?’