Having read much recently about Tea Parties and Tea Partiers, I decided to try to grok the Tea Partier last Saturday morning. Fortunately it wasn't Sunday, or I would have had to decide whether I was a Libertarian Tea Partier or a Fundamentalist Christian Tea Partier.
Anyway, I got up in the morning and drove to the donut shop. No walking for me. What do I care if I pollute the environment or add to global warming. Global warming is a hoax created by Al Gore so he could get a Nobel prize and sell books. Pollution was a big deal back when they made that American Indian ad on TV, but the free market took care of that long ago.
When I got to the donut shop, I ordered a dozen donuts even though I didn't really plan to eat them all. The cashier was Indian, so I berated her for taking an American job and probably living on welfare too. But since I wanted the donuts, I bought them from her anyway.
When I got the donuts, I refused to pay sales tax on them. I didn't vote to have a sales tax, so the government should not have the right to charge me for it. She refused to sell me the donuts if I didn't pay the sales tax, and I refused to pay it. We stood staring each other down in silence as the other customers became somewhat restless, no doubt preparing to support me in the event of violence if jackbooted government thugs showed up. For at least a minute, I stood up for liberty from oppression while she represented the hand of tyrannical government. Then I took the sales tax money from the "Take a penny, leave a penny" jar. Another victory for liberty!
After my victory, I tried to get the other customers, several black fellows, to form an impromptu tax revolt, but they wouldn't take up my chant of "Taxation is Slavery!" I'm not a racist, but I began to suspect these were not my kind of people.
On the way out, I saw a homeless guy looking for a handout. I had lots of donuts, but I wouldn't be doing him any favors by giving him one. Like me he should pull himself up by his own bootstraps, go to college with government-subsidized student loans, go to a public, government-supported university, and get a government-supported job and buy his own donuts. People need to do things on their own or they'll never learn.
As I was driving home, I passed a Walk for something. Breast cancer? Who knows. I yelled at the Walkers to go home. Giving to charities is only rewarding people's bad behavior. If people can know that they'll have their breast cancer treatments paid for by charity, why shouldn't they just skip the mammograms and do whatever it is that causes them to get breast cancer in the first place--having breasts or breathing or whatever.
When I got home, I ended up eating all my donuts. I know the elitist medical establishment, the doctors and "experts", say that type-1 diabetics like me should be careful about what they eat, but what do they know? Experts keep selling us things like global warming, evolution and "medicine". We're better off without their carping; they just make that stuff up to stop us from doing anything fun. Anyway, I've been paying for health insurance for years, and it practically pays me to go blind and lose my kidneys. After all, since I've already paid for this health insurance, I might as well get my money's worth.
Thinking about my health insurance reminded me of all those years I'd been paying for death and dismemberment insurance. I must be some kind of chump to pay for something all these years without getting anything in return. The only questions are whether I want the $1,000 for a single limb, and if so which one, or to go for the whole $10,000.
Sunday, March 28, 2010
Friday, March 26, 2010
The Greatest (Tim Tebow) Story Ever Told
As a partisan of Oklahoma football, I have to hate Tim Tebow. Tebow's self-righteous evangelism is also offensive. But it is the embarrassing man-love showered upon Tebow for his supposed manliness, rugged good looks, sterling character and heroic tumescence (or so I infer from the gushing quality of the various encomiums) that make this story I found linked on Pharyngula particularly entertaining. Here's the most entertaining paragraph.
I assume I do not have to explain why this is the greatest Tim Tebow story ever told, but I will anyway. Tebow's self-righteousness has been enabled by the sports establishment at his various schools (or academic institutions with which his football-playing was loosely affiliated) that coddles all good players. And the media clearly encouraged these outward displays of piety. So, I am happy to see someone puncture his self-satisfaction.
P.Z. Myers includes the information in the story that Tebow scored a 22/50 on a relatively simple junior high level mathematics exam. Presumably many adults and professional football players perform worse than Tebow on this test, so I won't make fun of him for that (although his poor score indicates a less-than-divine intellect which might cool some of the ardor or deflate some of the engor--er, I mean, turgid, , um..., no, I mean, overblown adulation of his worshipers in the press). I would recommend that Tebow-enthusiasts get a grip on themselves and . . . wait. . . stop their breathless. . . um . . . panting. . . no, never mind.
At the least the derision of Tebow's peers should indicate to the media and journalists that his public expressions of piety are more appropriate for small children and trained animals than they are for a self-determining, responsible adult.
Update: Actually, I was overthinking this. What's really annoying is that he expects other people to pray with him instead of just praying on his own.
At the Scouting Combine, the Wonderlic exam is administered to players in groups. The 12-minute test is preceded by some brief instructions and comments from the person administering the test.
Per a league source, after the person administering the test to Tebow's group had finished, Tebow made a request that the players bow their heads in prayer before taking the 50-question exam.
Said one of the other players in response: "Shut the f--k up." Others players in the room then laughed.
I assume I do not have to explain why this is the greatest Tim Tebow story ever told, but I will anyway. Tebow's self-righteousness has been enabled by the sports establishment at his various schools (or academic institutions with which his football-playing was loosely affiliated) that coddles all good players. And the media clearly encouraged these outward displays of piety. So, I am happy to see someone puncture his self-satisfaction.
P.Z. Myers includes the information in the story that Tebow scored a 22/50 on a relatively simple junior high level mathematics exam. Presumably many adults and professional football players perform worse than Tebow on this test, so I won't make fun of him for that (although his poor score indicates a less-than-divine intellect which might cool some of the ardor or deflate some of the engor--er, I mean, turgid, , um..., no, I mean, overblown adulation of his worshipers in the press). I would recommend that Tebow-enthusiasts get a grip on themselves and . . . wait. . . stop their breathless. . . um . . . panting. . . no, never mind.
At the least the derision of Tebow's peers should indicate to the media and journalists that his public expressions of piety are more appropriate for small children and trained animals than they are for a self-determining, responsible adult.
Update: Actually, I was overthinking this. What's really annoying is that he expects other people to pray with him instead of just praying on his own.
Tuesday, March 23, 2010
Stanley Fish on Teaching Ethics in Universities
"When you find yourself in a battle of wits with a Fish, you face an unarmed opponent."--Old Proverb
We had a speaker in the department last night talking about teaching ethics and making ethical decisions in the contemporary university or liberal arts college. She mostly wanted to address some arguments by Stanley Fish in support of his contention that universities should not teach ethics. As usual, with Fish, his arguments were hyperbolic, misguided, directed at strawmen and generally unconvincing. Before discussing them, however, I'd like to make a clarification about teaching ethics and instilling ethical behavior.
Most academic philosophy departments, in which ethicists are housed and in which ethics is taught, do not attempt to encourage people to be ethical but only teach people how best to think for themselves about ethical issues. I think underlying this teaching is a Socratic assumption that once people know what the most ethical way to act is, they will act in that way, so that, if we want people to be ethical, we really need to little more than teach them how to reach the best ethical conclusion. In many respects this is a naive assumption. There are lots of excuses people make to avoid doing the ethically best thing, and I think philosophers should also point these out. And teaching people to be good may also involve learning to identify these excuses and develop responses to them. In addition, people often do not do what they know is the right thing because of, say, weakness of the will. In these cases, the best thing to do may be to inculcate certain habits in people that they learn to follow not so much by rational decision but by custom or habit.
So, with that distinction and the obvious difficulties of teaching a behavior in mind, let's look at Fish's arguments (as best I can remember them from the talk--I'm too lazy to be more careful and get the original Fish paper or book--they're not likely to be worth the effort).
1. Teaching ethics is impossible or useless since an ethics class cannot change people's behavior.
2. Teaching ethics is antithetical to the goal of the academy which is to teach critical thinking. Getting people to act morally involves a kind of dogmatic acceptance of certain rules for action, or a kind of mindless discipleship or follower behavior that could only be accepted if one were not critical.
3. Teaching ethics is not the job of the academy. The academic's job is to teach people to understand and interpret reality, not to try to change it.
4. It is unethical for a university or university official (presumably acting in his/her official capacity) to take a stand on any moral, political or social issue.
Needless to say, when one thinks how ethics classes are actually taught, these objections are seriously misguided. Ethics classes do not attempt to change behavior (and one class of anything has little effect on most students); they do not encourage action or undermine critical thought about ethical questions (quite the reverse); they do attempt to get people to understand reality (in this case moral reality if there is any); they generally don't take stands as part of their classroom curriculum (unless that stand is to encourage critical thought).
Could some of these critiques face a more robust ethical education program (perhaps a university-wide program) that did try to instill ethical behavior in the students. One might ask, if we do not encourage people to be morally good, then what is the point of teaching ethics in the first place?
I do think that universities can instill norms of conduct--although these norms at present tend to be epistemic and discipline-specific--and so it is possible that they might take a more active role in encouraging norms of conduct in society generally. In fact, doing this is unavoidable and, I think, beneficial to society. Universities have limited resources, and so the courses and programs they teach must be chosen based on implicit assumptions about what benefits society (and not just their "customers", the students or employers, although that does play a role and often a problematic one). We teach biology and psychology. These could be used to cure disease or cause it. Yet we do not offer schools of torture, but rather schools of medicine or nursing. This is an implicit moral stand taken by the university based on its, quite correct, assumption that torture is morally reprehensible and nursing/medicine are valuable. Should universities offer schools of torture or cease to teach medicine/nursing in an attempt to remain ethically neutral? It's hard to see why they should; universities exist in society in order to produce well-informed, capable, critical citizens and professionals. Not only is it beneficial to society to produce such people, it is necessary to do so in order to have a moral and functioning society. Producing hardened torturers would severely undermine the mission of universities, and that mission should be an unabashedly ethical one.
Is it impossible to teach students to behave morally? It is entirely possible that this is the case. A person's basic moral character may be based on education that occurred long before he/she comes to a university, and even university-wide education may be unable to change that basic character. I'm not sure this is the case. We certainly need empirical data on this before drawing any conclusions about this. However, there are still two possible benefits to teaching ethics (again in this "change the behavior" sense taught across the university).
First, we can direct preexisting moral character toward good or better ends. If students do have the basic character to be good (let's say they have a suite of virtues considered morally good), then it is still not obvious how they should act. Is it better to be courageous in the face of opposition to your political position or empathetic and compromising in order to achieve a better, but perhaps imperfect, result? Critical thinking about ethics can help one decide such an issue. Indeed, what goals should one work towards given one's preexisting moral character? It is rarely obvious what one should do even if one has a character sufficient to do it.
Second, we can have longer-term effects on society by educating the parents who will raise children according to the parents' moral beliefs. Even if the parents' character is set, they can set their children's moral character according to principles they learn in college. So the university's ethical teachings can have an effect on future generations even if not on the current generation.
I think these goals are worthwhile even if, and this is a big "if", ethical behavior/character cannot be significantly altered once one is in college. There could still be moral benefits achieved by a university-wide focus on instilling moral character and ethical behavior even given this assumption.
Lastly, I think it's obvious that this is not inconsistent with teaching students to adopt a spirit of free inquiry and critical thought. That teaching should be integral to the kind of ethical instruction that helps people to decide what they should do (rather than follow some list of rules by rote) in a complex and dynamic world. This kind of critical thought is necessary for people to become fully capable and informed citizens and persons. Indeed, teaching critical thought, a commitment to free inquiry, non-conformity and self-determination are themselves moral teachings that should be part of the university's goal in teaching ethics.
We had a speaker in the department last night talking about teaching ethics and making ethical decisions in the contemporary university or liberal arts college. She mostly wanted to address some arguments by Stanley Fish in support of his contention that universities should not teach ethics. As usual, with Fish, his arguments were hyperbolic, misguided, directed at strawmen and generally unconvincing. Before discussing them, however, I'd like to make a clarification about teaching ethics and instilling ethical behavior.
Most academic philosophy departments, in which ethicists are housed and in which ethics is taught, do not attempt to encourage people to be ethical but only teach people how best to think for themselves about ethical issues. I think underlying this teaching is a Socratic assumption that once people know what the most ethical way to act is, they will act in that way, so that, if we want people to be ethical, we really need to little more than teach them how to reach the best ethical conclusion. In many respects this is a naive assumption. There are lots of excuses people make to avoid doing the ethically best thing, and I think philosophers should also point these out. And teaching people to be good may also involve learning to identify these excuses and develop responses to them. In addition, people often do not do what they know is the right thing because of, say, weakness of the will. In these cases, the best thing to do may be to inculcate certain habits in people that they learn to follow not so much by rational decision but by custom or habit.
So, with that distinction and the obvious difficulties of teaching a behavior in mind, let's look at Fish's arguments (as best I can remember them from the talk--I'm too lazy to be more careful and get the original Fish paper or book--they're not likely to be worth the effort).
1. Teaching ethics is impossible or useless since an ethics class cannot change people's behavior.
2. Teaching ethics is antithetical to the goal of the academy which is to teach critical thinking. Getting people to act morally involves a kind of dogmatic acceptance of certain rules for action, or a kind of mindless discipleship or follower behavior that could only be accepted if one were not critical.
3. Teaching ethics is not the job of the academy. The academic's job is to teach people to understand and interpret reality, not to try to change it.
4. It is unethical for a university or university official (presumably acting in his/her official capacity) to take a stand on any moral, political or social issue.
Needless to say, when one thinks how ethics classes are actually taught, these objections are seriously misguided. Ethics classes do not attempt to change behavior (and one class of anything has little effect on most students); they do not encourage action or undermine critical thought about ethical questions (quite the reverse); they do attempt to get people to understand reality (in this case moral reality if there is any); they generally don't take stands as part of their classroom curriculum (unless that stand is to encourage critical thought).
Could some of these critiques face a more robust ethical education program (perhaps a university-wide program) that did try to instill ethical behavior in the students. One might ask, if we do not encourage people to be morally good, then what is the point of teaching ethics in the first place?
I do think that universities can instill norms of conduct--although these norms at present tend to be epistemic and discipline-specific--and so it is possible that they might take a more active role in encouraging norms of conduct in society generally. In fact, doing this is unavoidable and, I think, beneficial to society. Universities have limited resources, and so the courses and programs they teach must be chosen based on implicit assumptions about what benefits society (and not just their "customers", the students or employers, although that does play a role and often a problematic one). We teach biology and psychology. These could be used to cure disease or cause it. Yet we do not offer schools of torture, but rather schools of medicine or nursing. This is an implicit moral stand taken by the university based on its, quite correct, assumption that torture is morally reprehensible and nursing/medicine are valuable. Should universities offer schools of torture or cease to teach medicine/nursing in an attempt to remain ethically neutral? It's hard to see why they should; universities exist in society in order to produce well-informed, capable, critical citizens and professionals. Not only is it beneficial to society to produce such people, it is necessary to do so in order to have a moral and functioning society. Producing hardened torturers would severely undermine the mission of universities, and that mission should be an unabashedly ethical one.
Is it impossible to teach students to behave morally? It is entirely possible that this is the case. A person's basic moral character may be based on education that occurred long before he/she comes to a university, and even university-wide education may be unable to change that basic character. I'm not sure this is the case. We certainly need empirical data on this before drawing any conclusions about this. However, there are still two possible benefits to teaching ethics (again in this "change the behavior" sense taught across the university).
First, we can direct preexisting moral character toward good or better ends. If students do have the basic character to be good (let's say they have a suite of virtues considered morally good), then it is still not obvious how they should act. Is it better to be courageous in the face of opposition to your political position or empathetic and compromising in order to achieve a better, but perhaps imperfect, result? Critical thinking about ethics can help one decide such an issue. Indeed, what goals should one work towards given one's preexisting moral character? It is rarely obvious what one should do even if one has a character sufficient to do it.
Second, we can have longer-term effects on society by educating the parents who will raise children according to the parents' moral beliefs. Even if the parents' character is set, they can set their children's moral character according to principles they learn in college. So the university's ethical teachings can have an effect on future generations even if not on the current generation.
I think these goals are worthwhile even if, and this is a big "if", ethical behavior/character cannot be significantly altered once one is in college. There could still be moral benefits achieved by a university-wide focus on instilling moral character and ethical behavior even given this assumption.
Lastly, I think it's obvious that this is not inconsistent with teaching students to adopt a spirit of free inquiry and critical thought. That teaching should be integral to the kind of ethical instruction that helps people to decide what they should do (rather than follow some list of rules by rote) in a complex and dynamic world. This kind of critical thought is necessary for people to become fully capable and informed citizens and persons. Indeed, teaching critical thought, a commitment to free inquiry, non-conformity and self-determination are themselves moral teachings that should be part of the university's goal in teaching ethics.
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