Posted on 05/12/2014 5:53:31 PM PDT by SJackson
Not every intellectual freedom that we have an inherent right to is a priority for education.
Charles C.W. Cooke opened up a can of worms at NRO when he opined, on 7 May, that asking 8th graders to prove to themselves whether the Holocaust had actually happened was a perfectly good exercise in academic honesty. He certainly has no doubts about the reality of the Holocaust, he stressed. But he also thinks we shouldn’t fear the outcome of an empirical investigation into the question, which can be compared with debates over value questions like whether “war is always wrong,” or whether “sharia law would be good for the West.”
Jonah Goldberg responded promptly, making the main points that occurred immediately to me. First, 8th graders are not college students; it’s the rare 8th grader who is up to the rigors of an Oxford Union debate. Second, debating a factual point that’s subject to empirical disproof is a different game from debating what our moral values should prescribe for us (or, indeed, what those values should be).
Cooke acknowledged both points. He still thinks we shouldn’t reflexively object to a research-and-reasoning exercise on the reality of the Holocaust. He compares it in his response to a similar exercise treating the reality of the Declaration of Independence. In his view, it would be an opportunity to stress the value of empiricism and the use of critical thinking skills.
And while he doesn’t state it explicitly, an implied advantage of doing this with a topic like the Holocaust is that a student’s success would be measurable. Since we know there was a Holocaust, and we know a great deal about it, a student’s performance will be indicated by whether he concludes that the Holocaust most certainly happened.
Right? Well, that’s where the elevation of abstract reasoning over all else breaks down for me. What about the student who doesn’t conclude that the Holocaust happened, but can make a compelling argument – in the abstract – that doubt, at least, should be cast on it; and can even “show his work,” very possibly running logical rings around the instructor?
The question about this scenario is not whether we should “fear” it. The question is what good it has done to put time and effort into it. (There’s also a question whether putting effort into it is actively harmful. More on that in a minute.)
Not every intellectual freedom that we have an inherent right to is a priority for education. A 13-year-old could congratulate himself, for example, on demonstrating that there’s no objective proof of his existence; and from the standpoint of intellectual freedom, we’d all say, “Knock yourself out, buddy.” But whether we want him to devote his educational time to that effort, and what we expect him to get out of it, depend on our scale of values. Education is intrinsically a process in which we make value-based choices about what to emphasize and what to do. No such thing exists as abstract, non-value-weighted education.
There’s thus a big value difference between giving children the tools of thinking, and selecting things for them to approach with skepticism. The latter can never be a neutral action, in any context.
In recent decades, in fact, much of academia has made something of a fetish of it for very specific purposes, like casting doubt on whether America’s Founders were Christians or not. The upshot of this has been that “skepticism” itself has been turned on its head, and middle- and high-school students are encouraged to think they’ve been endowed with a refreshing skepticism on one topic or another, when in fact they’ve simply been indoctrinated with an arguable falsity.
If you’d like to be on or off, please FR mail me.
..................
In the US the important issue isn't Holocaust denial, the issue is the ability of the Federal government to set the agenda for states, counties, cities.
In my experience, “Critical Thinking Skills” means blind acceptance of Marxist doctrine, as far as the education establishment is concerned.
...the issue is the ability of the Federal government to set the agenda for states, counties, cities.
Which in turn could lead to a holocaust, as indeed
happened in Germany. Take no chances, keep your
freedom.
I think in asking 8th graders to determine if a Holocaust occurred is an opening for a bad teacher to tell them they are wrong, if they say... yes. Almost like a set up to contradict the truth, which is logical thinking, when dealing with a Marxist.
What liberals call critical thinking is anything but. The liberal version of critical thinking has predetermined outcomes with lots of prodding to get there. Kind of like global warming.
I agree in general with Mr. Cooke. The truth has the unique property of being true - thus in an intellectually honest exercise the truth will win out. Unfortunately we cannot count on intellectual honesty from our libtard dominated schools (regardless of school grade or level of college).
Try this exercise with, “Is anthropomorphic global climate change real.” And watch liberal heads explode...
I agree in general with Mr. Cooke. The truth has the unique property of being true - thus in an intellectually honest exercise the truth will win out. Unfortunately we cannot count on intellectual honesty from our libtard dominated schools (regardless of school grade or level of college).
Ding, Ding, A well said winner. It appears the libtard mind is not capable of determining what is or is not truth. Hence their religion is based on the abstract, and they have to assume Godlike qualities to make up for the fact that God isn’t around to protect his creation, that they must protect from the real enemy, man.
Cooke is an idiot. Mohammed Z Islam was not looking for debate.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.