virtual philosopher

Angie Hobbs given post to increase public understanding of philosophy

Angie Hobbs, whom I've interviewed a couple of times for the Philosophy Bites podcast (on Plato on Erotic Love, and Plato on War) has just been promoted to a new post at Warwick University with a brief to promote the public understanding of philosophy. She will clearly be an excellent advocate, particularly on the importance and continuing relevance of ancient philosophy. She has been superb on Philosophy Bites and on In Our Time.

Perhaps other universities will create such a role too...(I'd love to have that brief!).

Angie Hobbs has just begun tweeting as @drangiehobbs

School of Life Expert: Nigel Warburton

The School of Life in Marchmont Street, London, offers you a chance to meet and discuss whatever you want to with a range of experts...including me! Check out School of Life Experts.

Early Modern Texts in Philosophy: An Amazing Resource

Jonathan Bennett has produced a remarkable set of 'translations' of classic texts in early modern philosophy. The texts are available free from Early Modern Texts in Philosophy. The idea is to provide versions of the books which are accessible to present day readers, particularly students, many of whom are stumped by the archaic language of the originals. There are works by Descartes, Spinoza Hume, Kant, Mill, and others. This involves some selection and paraphrase. Put this way it sounds as if it couldn't possibly work; and very few people would have been able to pull this off (or have the vision to see that it could work), but from my quick survey of some of these texts, it is a genuinely useful way of approaching these works (and check out the endorsements by eminent philosophers!). Amazing.

Philosophy of Art Course at Tate Modern October 2008

Tate Modern course:

Classic Aesthetics: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Art

Tate Modern, Monday evenings 20th October - 24th November 2008 (six sessions), 6.45 p.m. - 8.15 p.m followed by drinks. £95 (£60 concessions), booking required (details of how to book ). Price includes drinks afterwards.

Led by Nigel Warburton

An opportunity to explore classic aesthetics from Plato's Ion to Kant's Critique of Judgement. Each week we'll discuss a reading from Aesthetics: A Comprehensive Anthology (Blackwell, 2008). Key themes include the nature of art, beauty, the sublime and value judgements about the arts. We'll also look at works in the gallery and analyse them in relation to these ideas. No knowledge of philosophy or art is needed.

This is the first of three six-session courses I will be teaching based on the Aesthetics anthology. The other courses are Modern Aesthetics (start date 16th Feb. 2009) and Contemporary Aesthetics (start date 1st June 2009). Further details about all three courses are available on the Tate Modern website.

How Things Have Changed

I wrote this article 'Why Don't Our Schools Teach Philosophy?' for The Independent in 2001. It has dated very quickly. Six years later many schools offer Philosophy A/S and A Level, and even more offer offer Religious Studies A/S and A Level. Things are looking up.

How Podcasts are Changing the Way People Encounter Philosophy

Hubert Dreyfus is in the strange position of being a critic of distance learning and one of its best exponents. I've already posted several pieces about his book On the Internet (e.g. this one), where he argues that  face-to-face tuition is essential, particularly for Philosophy. I've also linked to his excellent (though unedited) lectures podcast on iTunesU (see this post).

There is an interesting article about his impact in The Los Angeles Times 'The iPod Lecture Circuit'. There is also a weblog linking together his virtual community of distant fans here. In his Heidegger lectures he talks about how his views about Heidegger have changed since he wrote his commentary on Being and Time; I wonder whether he will be changing his views about distance learning too...

Who Says Science and Religion Don't Conflict?

A professor at London's Institute of Education, Michael Reiss, wants science teachers to handle questions about Creationism sensitively. This seems harmless. But may not be. It depends how this is interpreted. If a pupil from a religious background who believes in Creationism questions Darwinism when it is taught, then of course that  pupil needs answers. Science teachers need to answer the student's questions - and no doubt would answer without having read Reiss's book. But there is surely not an obligation to give much time to discussing the ideas or treat them as scientifically respectable in any way. These are science lessons. If we go down this route, then we may end up needing to include some alchemy in Chemistry lessons as a serious alternative to empirical science. The real danger here  is that this will be seen as an admission that Creationism (or alchemy) is a theory that merits discussion in a scientific context...something that has proved disastrous in the US educational context.

This is a bit like the issue of including papers by Holocaust deniers in an academic History conference. Only some false ideas are sufficiently coherent and evidence-based to justify their entry into the debate. Just by discussing some of the wilder ideas alongside evidence-based ones they are inadvertently given far greater respectability than they deserve. Creationism as an idea-virus is a good subject for sociological study; but given the US experience, educationalists should be wary about lending it as a 'theory' a seriousness that it does not in the least deserve...we might end up taking seriously the idea that thunder is caused by Zeus's anger too. Something like ten percent of students in the UK seem to believe in Creationism in some form according to Professor Reiss; but probably more than that believe in astrological predictions too...but that doesn't mean science lessons should get sidetracked into discussions of the evidence base for astrology (I'm an Airies by the way so of course I would be aggressive about this).

I like Dr Hilary Leevers's response that science teachers would be teaching evolution not creationism and so should not need a book to tell them how to "delicately handle controversy between a scientific theory and a belief". This raises interesting questions about what the role of a science teacher is. Surely it is at the most basic level to teach students about science, its methods and value. It is also to model good scientific practice which is certainly not to take all beliefs equally seriously.

If a Holocaust denier asks a question in a History lesson we wouldn't expect a History teacher to treat the student's position as just another belief: the point would be to show why this is not a position that a historian could hold without denying overwhelming evidence, and then move on swiftly. Presumably we wouldn't want a History teacher to engage in an extended debate about the actual evidence at this point as that would give deniers a credibility as part of the evidence-based debate that they don't merit (I support  Deborah Lipstadt's action here - she declines to appear on the same platform as deniers such as David Irving, despite having refuted Holocaust denial in great detail in an English court following a libel action from Irving. For more on that, see her excellent book History on Trial).

Teaching Children to Be Insincere: Compulsory 'Acts of Worship' in UK State Schools

According to an article in The Observer a headteacher from a Tyneside state school, Dr Paul Kelley, has tried to challenge the idea that pupils should perform a Christian act of worship every day. As a result his school loses points on educational inspections.

Bizarrely, in the UK state schools have a legal requirement for pupils to take part  in a daily collective act of  worship of a broadly Christian nature (apparently there are exceptions for non-Christian faith schools where the relevant religious act can be substituted). Parents are allowed to request that their children be withdrawn from this (I don't believe that children can themselves opt out).

This is very different from the quite reasonable requirement that pupils should learn about other religions (and, we hope, about those who have no religion at all) as part of the curriculum.

Given that large numbers of children don't have religious beliefs, and certainly don't have Christian beliefs, what this means in practice is that all over the UK thousands of children are encouraged to engage in insincere religious utterances on a daily basis. This has very dubious educational and moral value.

Back in the Seventeenth Century John Locke in his A Letter Concerning Toleration (1689) had already spotted that religious coercion is counterproductive:

"It is in vain for an unbeliever to take up the outward show of another man's profession. Faith only, and inward sincerity, are the things that procure acceptance with God...In vain, therefore, do princes compel their subjects to come into their church communion, under pretence of saving their souls. If they believe, they will come of their own accord; if they believe not, their coming will not avail them."

And again:

"A sweet religion, indeed, that obliges men to dissemble, and tell lies to both God and man, for the salvation of their souls!"

That argument should still hold some force with the sincerely religious. But for many of us who are firmly secular in outlook it is disturbing that in the UK this sort of superstitious practice carried out in a state educational context is opt-out rather than opt-in.