[Khaled mentions the NPR story]
Are Colleges Obligated To 'Save The World'?
[Arlo]
Greetings, Khlaed. Always good to see your voice among the chorus
(and cacophony) here. The story is interesting, and Fish seems to
think advance the notion that "critical thinking skills" are really
all higher education should be about. In many ways, I agree with him.
But the problem backs up into curriculum development where the
limited time of the classroom mandates that certain positions are
included while others are not. While Fish seems to feel that
"Intelligent Design" should be given equal time to "Darwinian
evolution", he doesn't indicate criteria on which of any other
competing theories should be assessed. Do we teach the KKK's theory
that black people are inferior and Jews are subhuman in our
humanities classes alongside theories that profess all humans to be
equal? Do we teach each and every creation story alongside the Big
Bang as equally valid alternate theories? Do we teach that the eating
of human flesh (cannibalism) is a view of cuisine equal to
vegetarianism, presenting "both sides" in a discussion about
agriculture? And, consider this, do we present the theories that Bush
was behind the 9/11 attacks as equally worthy of respect as those
that it was perpetuated by Al Qaeda? Do we teach alchemy alongside
chemistry? Do we teach theories which place the orbit of the sun as
going around the earth, or the earth as the hub around which the
entire universe spins, alongside "competing" theories that place the
earth as going around the sun?
That is, Fish makes the argument that universities should expose
students to every possible theory about everything equally and
without prejudice, and the let the students decide. What happens when
an student in an astronomy class professes that the stars are merely
tiny dots God uses to decorate our night sky, and denies that they
are balls of hydrogen burning billions of lightyears away? Or when an
anthropology student turns in a paper about Bigfoot being the missing
link between aliens and humans? Or when a student hands in a term
paper proclaiming Jews to be rats who, while the should be
exterminated, never were. Do we praise these students for selecting
one theory from among the multitude so presented?
Its a nice idea in many areas, but I think its a bit naive and
devalues the entire endeavor of "knowledge". My thoughts anyways.
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