Thinking is in Our Name, Why Not in Our Schools? by Amanda

Thinking is in Our Name, Why Not in Our Schools? by Amanda - August 2015 Scholarship Essay

There is one course the American high school curriculum lacks that would help students immensely. Like math, it teaches students to use logical reasoning. Like science, it instructs us to question our world. Like English (or any other language for that matter), it educates us on the art of expression. Like history, it trains us to analyze our past to predict our present. What kind of subject could be so interdisciplinary and vital to learning not what to think, but how to think, and yet still be overlooked by the standard American education system? That, my pupils, would be philosophy.

Philosophy is, by nature, thinking. It is such a broad topic, yet it is all bound together by the one and only activity that we all do (hopefully), yet are never really taught how to do it. Thinking is like bowling; it’s easy to learn the basics, but doing it well is a whole different story. Philosophy guides us, molding us into the best thinkers we can possibly be solely through instructing us on how to evaluate evidence. Also, who could pass up learning such a richly interdisciplinary subject? In fact, let’s go through each of the aforementioned subjects and illustrate philosophy’s way to address each of them.

Well, math was listed first, so we might as well start with math. What is math, anyway? Before you roll your eyes at such an idiotic question, realize that I’m not addressing numbers here. You can do math with letters (sorry for the spoiler, elementary students), so obviously numbers alone are not math’s sole feature. No, math is simply logic, most of which involves numbers. Philosophy revolves around logic as well, predominantly when one constructs a particular viewpoint. For example, if you wanted to discuss human morality, you couldn’t just say “Humans are moral at times because they think a giant fire breathing pterodactyl will eat them if they don’t hold the door for the person with a bag in hand”, that’s an absurd notion! The majority of people are not afraid of giant fire breathing pterodactyls, so why would it motivate human morality? Now, if logic were to be used, you could turn this statement into a far more believable one. While math might deal largely with numbers and philosophy largely with the human condition, both have logic at their core.

Next up is science (my favorite!). Science can be summed up as people questioning something about the world, then testing different ideas to figure out why that particular piece of the world is the way it is. Science is devoted to questioning our world, as is philosophy. Science asks why the world is the way it is, while philosophy asks questions about the human condition. The very basis of science mirrors that of philosophy, leading to something where, if taught well in school, it would supplement both the understanding of science and philosophy that the students have.

Languages are particularly important in philosophy. On one hand, language is important to philosophy by providing the particular diction necessary to get the point across in an appropriate way, however, there is another reason, a more important one, if I do say so myself. Think about this; how do philosophers express their philosophy while making it accessible to more people than just fellow philosophers? Well, most of the time, they wrote a novel that centered on their philosophy. Really, they did! For example, Plato’s philosophies are detailed through story or in his famous book (The Republic). Albert Camus expressed his ideas about absurdism through The Stranger. Voltaire even criticized and satirized a philosophy he disagreed with through his novella Candide. The list goes on and on, really, but the point is that philosophy has nearly always been presented in a literary way, so teaching philosophy would inevitably give students more practice with literature and language.

Last, but not least, is history. History is simply learning about the past to understand ourselves and to help us not repeat the mistakes we have made. Philosophy’s connection to history is twofold. First, it also requires us to look to the past, but instead of using it as a tool to teach people about culture and mistakes, it is used to find a pattern and develop an explanation for the pattern relating to the human condition. However, philosophy itself is an important part of history. In fact, I’m sure all of you have learned at least a little bit about a few well known philosophers. Don’t believe me? Well, I’m sure John Locke was a frequent name while you were learning about the Constitution, right? Perhaps Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle came up in that unit on ancient Greece? Did Buddha, one of the world’s most famous religious philosophers, ever get a bit of mention? Here’s a good one, did Marcus Aurelius, one of Rome’s most famous emperors, get mentioned as a philosopher on the side? While you may not have learned about many important philosophers, it would be quite wring to say your history class has forgotten them all.

Now that we’ve covered how philosophy is one of the most interdisciplinary subjects around and how it helps us with thinking, what’s next in line to help implement it in school? If you’ve been inspired by this essay, go to your school board, and petition for it. Convince teachers and classmates, just try to give philosophy a chance.