Question Why is it that the subject Philosophy is irrelevant for the secondarian level? Do we really have to wait until College just for us to enjoy this "mysterious gift"?

Accepted:
December 22, 2008

Comments

Plato famously thought that you should master mathematics before you turn to philosophy.

No one would quite think that these days (though it is interesting that, among my faculty colleagues, over a quarter of us in fact have first degrees in mathematics, and turned to philosophy later). But perhaps Plato has a point. For a start, it is good to first hone your skills of sharp accurate reasoning, and to practice intellectual humility in the face of really difficult problems, when working on matters that aren't too conceptually tangled (let alone often bound up with your emotions or with cultural/religious prejudices). Not that doing serious mathematics is the only way of getting in the practice, of course: doing a degree in classics is another well-trodden route!

Further, outside moral and political philosophy, a great deal of the best work -- philosophy that isn't just the higher arm-waving waffle -- is closely bound up with science, in the broadest sense. To do serious philosophy of physics, or philosophy of biology, or philosophy of psychology, or philosophy of mathematics, it helps first to have got under your belt some serious physics, biology, psychology, or mathematics (again). Even general "metaphysics", which thinks more sweepingly about notions like time or causation, better not be inconsistent with what our best theories of the world tell us about time, or with how the notion of causation in fact features in developed science.

So there is actually quite a lot to be said for leaving the formal study of philosophy until pretty late in your education. Which isn't to say that you can't have "philosophical" conversations with quite young children (as any philosopher who has had children knows) -- conversations which are instructive and can be great fun, for both sides! So, sure, philosophical questioning can play its place earlier in education. But studying philosophy itself is another matter.

Iagree with Peter that the older you are, and the more you have read andstudied, the more likely it is that you will get something out of astudy of philosophy. But I think that philosophy can usefully bestudied before college (at what is called in the US the "secondary"level of education, i.e., high school) and that philosophicaldiscussions can usefully be had even earlier, at the primary, orelementary, school level.

The American philosopher Gareth Matthews haswritten several wonderful books detailing his work withelementary-school kids on philosophy and has a website devoted to it: "Philosophy for Kids".

And Montclair State University has a program on both elementary and secondary education level philosophy: the Institute for the Advancement of Philosophy for Children.

Inaddition, the American Philosophical Association publishes a Newsletteron Teaching Philosophy, which often treats of what is sometimes called"pre-collegephilosophy" (which term you can "google" for more information). Also take a look at the website of the APA Committee on Pre-College Instruction in Philosophy.

Question Why is it that the subject Philosophy is irrelevant for the secondarian level? Do we really have to wait until College just for us to enjoy this "mysterious gift"? Accepted:December 22, 2008

Question Why is it that the subject Philosophy is irrelevant for the secondarian level? Do we really have to wait until College just for us to enjoy this "mysterious gift"?

Accepted:
December 22, 2008