Australian ethics classes under threat.

muppeteer

A little background:
An Australian parents group in 2003 proposed an ethics/philosophy based course as an alternative to scripture classes. (If the child was opted out of special religious education they were prevented from being instructed in anything else during the lesson time).
They contacted a center for ethics and prepared a submission for an ethics based alternative to the education minister. They were refused.

After a survey was conducted in 2004 which found strong and widespread support for the ethics based option, they resubmitted to a new education minister. They were refused.

Finally in 2009 a submission was resubmitted to the latest education minister and a trial was set up in 2010 in 10 NSW primary schools.




Now since the introduction in 2011 of ethics classes in NSW an inquiry has been launched by the Christian Democratic Party MP, Fred Nile, which seeks to repeal the 2010 legislation that allows for ethics classes to be held as an alternative to scripture.

A PARLIAMENTARY inquiry into whether ethics classes should be abolished in NSW schools has been criticised as discriminatory and lacking credibility for singling out the classes for scrutiny.

David Hill, a former managing director of the ABC who heads the lobby group parents4ethics, told the inquiry that in the interest of consistency and fairness, the content of other courses such as special religious education, or scripture, should be examined as well.

Read more: link to article


They achieve so much and they still get hounded for going against the religious status quo.
I really hope that we will have a similar success in Ireland. It took these people 7 years but it shows it can be done.

Turtwig

Australia's got an atheist PM so I don't see this going too far.

Jimoslimos

PM at federal level, but the states are mostly self-governing. The NSW government are the centre-right Liberal party.

Gbear

I'm not sure i'm entirely comfortable with the notion of an "ethics" class any more than a one that defines what's right and wrong based on scripture.

What exactly does it entail?

muppeteer

Curriculum information can be found here
Here's a snippit

Most of the topics in the curriculum provide students with the opportunity to develop increasingly sophisticated knowledge and skills in moral reasoning. Children in the younger primary years examine topics such as being left out, sharing and bullying, while older children reflect on issues such as homelessness and child labour to help them consider the feelings and interests of others – one important aspect of moral reasoning. Other aspects include understanding consequences, having empathy, appreciating difference, recognising common capacities, recognising and acting on duties and giving equal consideration. These are tackled through a range of topics as diverse as How Important is it to Look Good? Are Rules Always Fair? Pride, Teasing and Animal Rights.

As to how serious the threat to the program is I'm unsure. I just don't know enough about the local politics. But if I read this correctly the issue has been brought to inquiry by the NSW Premier as a sop to a minority party. But criticisms of the program are coming from the governing party as well as opposition members.
It's an interesting situation, I'll try to keep an eye out to see how they fair.



As an aside I found an article from the instigator of the inquiry, the head of a minor opposition party, where he says

I agree with the teaching of ethics in NSW schools, colleges and universities, provided it is based on history's greatest teacher of ethics, the Lord Jesus Christ.

which gave me a giggle:)

Gbear

muppeteer wrote: »

Curriculum information can be found here
Here's a snippit

Ah right so that's grand.
I was worried it might be about telling kids what was right and wrong, rather than exploring ways for them to come to their own conclusions.

The religious always get antsy when people promote thinking. You only have to look at Rick Santorum's outlook on University's.

It's kindof funny how this has played out. When the research says that educating people reduces levels of religion, the obvious ploy you might expect would be dismissing the evidence, but rather, they've decided that education is itself a bad thing.

joseph brand

Gbear wrote: »

Ah right so that's grand.
I was worried it might be about telling kids what was right and wrong, rather than exploring ways for them to come to their own conclusions.

The religious always get antsy when people promote thinking. You only have to look at Rick Santorum's outlook on University's.

It's kindof funny how this has played out. When the research says that educating people reduces levels of religion, the obvious ploy you might expect would be dismissing the evidence, but rather, they've decided that education is itself a bad thing.

Finally, Wallace pressed Santorum on the issue of higher education. The candidate had recently called Obama a "snob" for wanting "everybody in America to go to college," but Wallace pointed out that what Obama actually encouraged was for all Americans to have at least one year of higher education or some kind of vocational training or apprenticeship.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/03/04/rick-santorum-fix-news-birth-control_n_1319393.html

christians feeling threatened by education. Speaks volumes. "blah blah god damn smart-ass, educated, Atheists think they're so smart, blah blah".

recedite

muppeteer wrote: »

Read more: link to article

There's an interesting quote in there from the opposition;

But Dr Bernadette Tobin, the director of the Plunkett centre for ethics and an associate professor at the Australian Catholic University, warned of the dangers of teaching ethics to children before they learn what is right and what is wrong.
''If you encourage children to think in those ways before they've got that background, you run the risk of teaching them to be sceptical about right and wrong,'' she said.

It shows that, despite her job title, she hasn't really grasped that ethics is about learning how to tell right from wrong, and she is just treating it as plain old indoctrination. She fears exposing the kids to a rival indoctrination before her one has properly taken root in their minds.

robindch

Gbear wrote: »

The religious always get antsy when people promote thinking. You only have to look at Rick Santorum's outlook on University's.

Santorum? Look at Herr Ratzinger had to say about intellectuals:

Herr Ratzinger, 1979-12-31 wrote:

The Christian believer is a simple person: Bishops should protect the faith of their little people against the power of intellectuals.

Sarky

Kinda makes you want to go get another degree out of spite.

muppeteer

recedite wrote: »

It shows that, despite her job title, she hasn't really grasped that ethics is about learning how to tell right from wrong, and she is just treating it as plain old indoctrination.

Well from their website

The Centre [Plunkett Centre for ethics] expresses this commitment through research, teaching and community engagement, and by bringing a Catholic perspective to all its endeavours.

so it's hardly surprising she has this bias despite the secular sounding "center for ethics".

They may as well have said center for Catholic ethics:rolleyes:

Peregrinus

Bit of background:

Since always, public (i.e. state-run) primary schools in New South Wales (and other Australian states, but we’re only concerned with NSW here) have made time available for what’s called “special religious education” (SRE). This is one period a week of religious instruction, provided not by teachers but by personnel - usually volunteers - nominated by religious denominations. This only happens at schools where there is some demand for it, and where a religious denomination can provide volunteers.

Historically, this came about as part of the deal whereby the state took over the provision of education from the churches.

Traditionally, SRE has been the preserve of Protestant denominations, but in recent years Jewish, Muslim and Baha’i SRE sessions have been offered in a few schools, as these religions gear up to participate. Catholics don’t generally participate; they run their own schools instead, and that’s where their efforts are focussed.

Where SRE is offered, attendance is optional, but students whose parents opt for them not to attend don’t study curricular material during this period (so as not to disadvantage the students who do attend). They usually have a reading period, or something of the kind.

This is seen as unsatisfactory. It’s a wasted opportunity to have a period where students do (basically) nothing, and it sends the message that the time of the non-attending children is seen as less valuable than the time of the attending children.

A few years back, the proposal was advanced to offer a non-religious programme in ethics as an alternative to SRE. Like SRE, it would be optional. It would be run at the same time as SRE, and would be provided by volunteers in the same way, so that (in schools which offered both) students would have a choice of SRE, non-religious ethics or whatever non-curricular alternative the school provided.

This was slow to get off the ground, because the NSW schools legislation couldn’t accommodate it, so amending legislation had to go through parliament. But eventually that happened, on the basis that a trial programme would be run in a number of schools.

An existing think-tank called the “St James Ethics Centre” oversaw the whole thing. (It’s a non-religious outfit; St. James is a district in Sydney.) A programme aimed at students from Kindergarten to Year 6 was devised, volunteers were recruited and the programme was run for (I think) a year in a limited number of schools. The limiting factor, if I remember rightly, was the number of people willing to act as volunteers, and to receive the necessary training and police clearance. The programme was always intended to be a pilot programme, after which there was to be a review, consultation, and a decision taken as to where to go next.

The pilot programme has now ended. Experience was generally positive, and in 2011 the NSW government announced that they would approve the permanent provision of ethics classes - initially in years 5 and 6 only, which I suspect is a resource issue. (I.e. there aren’t enough volunteers/resources to provide the programme on a whole-school basis.)

Reportedly, the churches were initially leery of the programme - not that they objected to the content of the programme, but they suspected it would draw children away from SRI. (A large number of children who are not otherwise religious opt to participate in SRI - or, rather, their parents opt for them to participate.)

Reportedly, having lived through it, the churches are a bit less leery of it than they were before. The Catholic and Anglican churches have backed the continuation of the programme.

Fred Nile, who is agitating for the enabling legislation to be repealed, is a long-standing fixture on the NSW political scene. A minister of the Uniting Church, he comes from a Methodist background and represents the socially activist tradition of that denomination. for decades now he has run a large inner-city mission providing a variety of social and community services. He combines this activism with biblical Christianity of a very traditional flavour, and social conservatism. He heads up a pretty tiny political party, the Christian Democrats, and has been a member of the NSW Senate for many years. (The Senate electoral system in NSW favours the representation of minority parties.) From time to time he’s had a colleague from the Christian Democrats join him in the Senate, but they’ve never succeeded in getting anyone elected to the lower house.

He’s been in the Senate long enough to be quite senior, and he’s regarded as an effective and even respected parliamentarian - he’s headed up a number of senate standing committees, and is regarded as having done a good job. But he has not been conspicuously successful in having his more right-wing views translated into policy or action. He has the clout to get up a committee to review the legislation which allows for ethics education; it remains to be seen whether he can get that legislation repealed, when he doesn’t have the support of the most interested parties. The continuation of the ethics classes was an election commitment of the current NSW government, which was only elected last year.

My own assessment, for what it’s worth, is that the challenge to ethics classes doesn’t come from Fred Niles; his attempt to repeal the legislation will fail. The real challenge is one of enthusiasm and resources. The state government merely facilitates the provision of the ethics classes in schools; it doesn’t pay for the development of the programme, the recruiting and training of volunteers, the production of materials, etc. On the religious side, this is all done by the churches. On the non-religious side, it’s hard to see where the continuing commitment of resources, and the continuing supply of volunteer instructors, is going to come from.

recedite

Peregrinus wrote: »

The Catholic and Anglican churches have backed the continuation of the programme.

While I take your point that the ethics programme would not be happening in any catholic run schools anyway, how do you reconcile the view that "they have backed the programme" with the quotes earlier from The Plunkett Centre for Catholic Ethos Ethics regarding the moral dangers inherent in teaching kids how to think for themselves?

Peregrinus

recedite wrote: »

While I take your point that the ethics programme would not be happening in any catholic run schools anyway, how do you reconcile the view that "they have backed the programme" with the quotes earlier from The Plunkett Centre for Catholic Ethos Ethics regarding the moral dangers inherent in teaching kids how to think for themselves?

Couple of thoughts:

1. Bernadette Tobin may be a Catholic, but she’s not “the Catholic Church”, and she doesn’t speak for the Catholic church on this issue. (The NSW bishops, and the educational agencies they have established, do. They have dropped their earlier reservations about the ethics classes, largely since experience from the pilot programme is that they don't adversely affect the numbers attending SRE.)

2. This is the Sydney Morning Herald you’re quoting from. They’re not noted for their incisive analysis of anything requiring the attention span of someone older than about 13.

3. I’d like to see the wider context of the quote attributed to her, and the audience to which she was speaking. If she was answering a question, I’d like to see the question.

4. She may be addressing what is in fact a fairly central topic in the whole question of ethical education, which is the development of moral sensibility in the human being. In infancy, we initially learn to think of right and wrong in terms of happiness and unhappiness (“if it gratifies me, it’s good”); then in terms of punishment and reward (“it gratifies me because it’s good”); then in terms of people we care about and/or depend upon (“if it gratifies Mummy, it’s good”); and so on. We can only arrive at fully adult moral sensibilities when we are, in fact, adults - emotionally and psychologically, as well as physically. Any attempt at ethical education which ignores the stage of development that the student is at is going to fail, at best, and confuse, at worst.

5. I note that the programme currently is being offered only in years 5 and 6. I have assumed that this is a resource issue, and it probably is at least that, but it could also be a pedagogical issue - given that resources are limited, we focus them on years 5 and 6 because of a view that that is when (most) students will have reached a stage of development where ethical instruction will particularly benefit them.

6. Tobin’s comments may have been made in this connection. Her concern essentially seems to be that if you introduce children to the idea that ethical questions don’t have simple binary right-and-wrong answers (like, say, maths problems or spelling tests) before they can cope with that idea, they may respond by withdrawing from ethical reflection on the grounds that it is (a) too difficult or (b) pointless, because it doesn’t get you to a final answer. (Refusing to address a task is a common childhood technique for avoiding problems associated with the task.) This will retard their moral development, which is the opposite of the desired outcome.

7. In other words, her point may be a pedagogical one. The SMH report does not give us enough information to say whether it is or not and, if it is, whether it is a good point or a bad point, but that’s the SMH for you.

On Edit: I’ve checked up further on Tobin’s comments. (God bless Google!) They come from evidence she gave to the NSW Parliamentary Enquiry; you can read the full transcript here: http://www.parliament.nsw.gov.au/prod/parlment/committee.nsf/0/4d1cacd18a7925f6ca2579b000804df2/$FILE/Transcript%20-%2024%20Feburary%202012%20-%20UNCORRECTED.pdf

In her evidence, she makes the point (a) that she’s not representing anybody (she makes a submission because the committee asked her to, apparently in her capacity as editor of a relevant academic journal) and (b) that she does not favour Fred Nile’s attempt to repeal the legislative authority for the ethics classes; in fact she wants the ethics classes to continue.

Her main criticism seems to be that the classes get too soon to the “specifics” of how to decide whether a particular action is right or wrong, without adequately addressing the prior issue of whether, and why, that question matters at all. The course assumes (in her view) that children know that they should do what is right rather than what is wrong, and the only argument or amplification of that point is the occasional comment that something is illegal, or will attract punishment. Tobin feels that it is desirable to cultivate the sense that doing right is important in and of itself, and not merely because it will avoid punishment, and that the ethics classes as currently structured don’t devote enough attention to this.

In Aristotelian terms, she is looking for the cultivation of habits of virtue - a pattern of behaviour which routinely treats identifying what is right and behaving accordingly as fundamental to a decent life, as something you do in order to be satisfied that you are living well, rather than in order to avoid punishment, or to avoid infringing rules, or to avoid displeasing others. That's generally a strong theme in most traditions of Christian ethics, but it's not a fundementally Christian theme, or even a fundamentally theist theme - it comes, after all, from Aristotle.

I've no idea whether this comment of Tobin's is well-founded or not; I haven't looked at the substantive content of the programme for the ethics classes. And, if it is true that the programme gives little attention to the question of why identifying right and wrong is important, I don't know why that would be. But, whatever, I don't think we can easily parlay Tobin's comments into Catholic church opposition to the non-religious ethics programme in NSW schools.

Jumpy

Its just going through the motions.

Niles wanted it in exchange for support. The goverment agreed to run it through. Its going to fail immediately.
Niles doesnt even believe it will work. He just has to be in the papers like he has his entire life.

recedite

Peregrinus wrote: »

I’ve checked up further on Tobin’s comments. (God bless Google!) They come from evidence she gave to the NSW Parliamentary Enquiry; you can read the full transcript here: http://www.parliament.nsw.gov.au/prod/parlment/committee.nsf/0/4d1cacd18a7925f6ca2579b000804df2/$FILE/Transcript%20-%2024%20Feburary%202012%20-%20UNCORRECTED.pdf

In her evidence, she makes the point (a) that she’s not representing anybody (she makes a submission because the committee asked her to, apparently in her capacity as editor of a relevant academic journal) and (b) that she does not favour Fred Nile’s attempt to repeal the legislative authority for the ethics classes; in fact she wants the ethics classes to continue.

Her main criticism seems to be that the classes get too soon to the “specifics” of how to decide whether a particular action is right or wrong

Tobin also mentions that she is a member of the "Catholic Schools Board" as well as the catholic university lecturing job, so she is not just some maverick in disagreement with the main RC church.
There seems to be some dichotomy about the fact that the Anglican and RC churches are not officially opposing the ethics classes, but are doing everything they can behind the scenes to criticize and derail them.
IMO this is easily explained by one simple statistic; 92% of the community surveyed support the classes. To go against such an overwhelming majority would be political madness, and they know it.
Her main point is that children need to have a set of morals hammered into them. In this context she mentions the words shame and punishment as the way to go about this. She claims it is only as adults that they can safely look into ethics.

The classes actually involved are years 5th and 6th. I'm assuming then aged 10 -12 years. IMO they are old enough for most ethical discussions, and younger kids could have a simplified version if staff were available.

Tobin gets questioned on her attitude;

Dr Kaye wrote:

Do you have evidence of that phenomenon of kids being asked too early to make
moral inquiries before they have developed the habit of right thinking and doing? Do you have empirical
evidence? Are there studies that say, "Oh, these kids become cynical" or are you relaying on Aristotle's assertion
that was made 2,352 years ago?

and gives a reply typical of a religious person;

Dr Tobin wrote:

No, but the point I am making is not an empirical point

Mark Hamill

Peregrinus wrote: »

4. She may be addressing what is in fact a fairly central topic in the whole question of ethical education, which is the development of moral sensibility in the human being. In infancy, we initially learn to think of right and wrong in terms of happiness and unhappiness (“if it gratifies me, it’s good”); then in terms of punishment and reward (“it gratifies me because it’s good”); then in terms of people we care about and/or depend upon (“if it gratifies Mummy, it’s good”); and so on. We can only arrive at fully adult moral sensibilities when we are, in fact, adults - emotionally and psychologically, as well as physically. Any attempt at ethical education which ignores the stage of development that the student is at is going to fail, at best, and confuse, at worst.

Isn't it a case that any attempt at an ethical education informs this development? The whole reason for ethical education is that this development doesn't happen in isolation, and the type of early ethical reasoning that kids go through is a bit too self centred for adult life. I see no reason why we can't just teach kids the "adult" way to approach ethics, especially if you think that they go through this development anyway (because all you would be doing is pointing out the limitations of the stage they are at).

Peregrinus wrote: »

Her main criticism seems to be that the classes get too soon to the “specifics” of how to decide whether a particular action is right or wrong, without adequately addressing the prior issue of whether, and why, that question matters at all.

Kind of a laughable that someone who is pro religious morality classes would complain about the pedagogical basis of non religious ethics classes, as if religious morality classes give any attention to why identifying right and wrong is important (beyond appeasing god).
If nothing else, if you can assume that kids develop ethics anyway, as was assumed above, then you can assume that they know why identifying right and wrong is important, so it kinda becomes moot.
Not to mention how can someone on the one hand claim that kids are too young to discuss ethics, but on the other hand claim that the ethics classes are flawed for not discussing the importance of ethics? How can you do one without doing the other?

Peregrinus

Mark Hamill wrote: »

Isn't it a case that any attempt at an ethical education informs this development? The whole reason for ethical education is that this development doesn't happen in isolation, and the type of early ethical reasoning that kids go through is a bit too self centred for adult life. I see no reason why we can't just teach kids the "adult" way to approach ethics, especially if you think that they go through this development anyway (because all you would be doing is pointing out the limitations of the stage they are at).

I see what you’re saying, but I can only agree up to a point. There are important qualifications.

In this regard ethics education isn’t, fundamentally, different from other branches of education. Education can only develop and bring out capacities where are there to be brought out.

You can’t, for example, teach a child handwriting until he has the capacity for the fine motor skills which handwriting requires. And you can’t accelerate the development of that capacity by trying to teach him handwriting when he hasn’t got it; the only result of doing so is misery, frustration and a sense of failure for the child, all of which is thoroughly counterproductive.

(Now, if a child doesn’t have fine motor skills at a time when, developmentally, you’d expect that he would have, that can be addressed - but not by extra handwriting exercises. Specialist intervention by an occupational therapist is what’s needed, and that can be very effective indeed. But that’s a different point.)

And similar points could be made about, e.g., phys. ed. and gross motor skills, maths. ed. and the capacity for abstract reasoning, etc., etc.

(And this works both ways, incidentally. Some of the capacities useful in acquiring a foreign language decline with age, so there is - at least in the view of some educational theorists - an optimal age for foreign language teaching.)

OK, translate these ideas across to something like ethics education. There’s a variety of emotional and other capacities on which you build your ethical sensibilities - empathy is an obvious one, but there are others. And these develop over time - in fact we don’t fully develop our capacity to empathise until we are well into our later teens.

But we certainly don’t put off ethical education until people are well into their later teens; in fact we start it at a very early age, when we encourage toddlers to share their toys, and discourage them from biting one another. And we often try to do this by appealing to their sense of empathy (“You wouldn’t like it if little Johnny did that to you!”) But the truth is that this achieves very little; toddlers simply cannot understand or respond to an appeal on this level. Discipline (e.g. the naughty step) or the (learned) hope of reward is effective in the short term in persuading a toddler not to bite; appeals to empathy may have a cumulative long-term effect, if they are remembered and habituated and so are still capable of having an effect when the capacity for empathy does develop and the child, who is already in the habit of not biting his little brother, begins to understand why this habit is good.

So, can we teach, say, 10-year olds the “adult” way of doing ethical reasoning? Possibly we can, at any rate if they are bright ten-year olds, in the sense that we can teach them something that, later on, they will remember and understand. But in fact it’s going to be difficult - we’ll lose the less bright ones along the way - and may be pointless - even the bright ones will not be terribly interested, or see the relevance. Alienation is the likely result. By the same token, you can teach a bright and diligent 10-year old the techniques, if perhaps not the theory, of calculus. But the pedagogic benefits of doing so are doubtful.

Peregrinus

recedite wrote: »

Tobin also mentions that she is a member of the "Catholic Schools Board" as well as the catholic university lecturing job, so she is not just some maverick in disagreement with the main RC church.

Well, yes. She’s not in disagreement. She supports the ethics classes. So do the bishops’ spokespeople. No disagreement there.

recedite wrote: »

There seems to be some dichotomy about the fact that the Anglican and RC churches are not officially opposing the ethics classes, but are doing everything they can behind the scenes to criticize and derail them.
IMO this is easily explained by one simple statistic; 92% of the community surveyed support the classes. To go against such an overwhelming majority would be political madness, and they know it.

Well, I’m not seeing any actual evidence that “the Anglican and RC churches . . . are doing everything they can behind the scenes to criticize and derail" the ethics classes. They initially expressed reservations, but in the light of experience have withdrawn them and, since then, I’m seeing nothing. Is there anything concrete you can point to, or are you just trying to shoehorn Tobin’s inconvenient support for the classes into a preconceived narrative?

I think you should be wary of attaching too much importance to the 92% figure, or from suggesting that others do. It wasn’t a properly conducted survey; it was one of these on-the-website thingies that newspapers put up in which (self-selected) respondents could declare themselves to be “for” or “against” ethics classes in schools. In these polls survey samples are not representative, and the polls are notoriously easily skewed by those who care to. And, in this instance, the poll was placed on a web page whose primary content was an opinion piece headed “keep your politics out of our classrooms, Mr Nile”. As it happens, I agree completely with the sentiments in the opinion piece, but I can’t take seriously the suggestion that the a survey of people who had just read that article, and then elected to participate iin the poll, reflects public sentiment in any reliable way. Nor can I take seriously the suggestion that it provides a credible motivation giving colour to your suggestion that the Catholic and Anglican churches are opposing the ethics classes covertly rather than overtly.

recedite wrote: »

Her main point is that children need to have a set of morals hammered into them. In this context she mentions the words shame and punishment as the way to go about this. She claims it is only as adults that they can safely look into ethics.

I’m sorry, but that’s b*lls, and again looks like an attempt to shoehorn inconvenient facts into a preconceived narrative. Her main point is the classic Aristotelian one that a virtuous life requires virtuous habits and virtuous instincts, and not merely an intellectual understanding of ethical reasoning. Habits and instincts are cultivated from an early age. This is neither a bizarre religious perspective nor an abstract academic point; it’s a mainstream view, and one implicitly acknowledged by every parent who tries to teach their toddler to share toys, and not to bite or kick other toddlers.

“Shame” is the sensation we experience when we go against what we know to be our own virtuous instincts, just as “pride” or “dignity” is the sense we experience when we obey them. Tobin cites the academic philosopher Gaita on this, who - Australian readers will recall - came to public attention when he objected to evil tory John Howard’s profession of pride in the positive achievements of Australian history and simultaneous denial of feeling any shame for its darker points. Gaita’s point was that it is inconsistent to feel pride at the one, but not shame at the other. If you can’t feel shame, that suggests you have no virtuous instincts or sensibility, or that you have learnt how to deny or suppress them.

You may or may not agree with these points, but it’s an absolutely mainstream ethical view, and not a particularly religious one.

recedite wrote: »

Tobin gets questioned on her attitude . . . and gives a reply typical of a religious person;

It’s a reply typical of an ethicist, recedite. Ethicists pretty much by definition deal in concepts which are not empirically testable or verifiable and they regard them as important and valuable and worth talking about and considering despite their non-empirical character. We can hardly object to ethicists being involved in a discourse about ethical education. Nor can we object to non-empirical claims being advanced and taken seriously in a discourse about ethics, unless we wish to attract ridicule. And if we object to non-empirical claims being advanced only when they are advanced by ethicists who happen to be religious, we expose ourselves to the charge of bigotry, do we not?

Mark Hamill

Peregrinus wrote: »

So, can we teach, say, 10-year olds the “adult” way of doing ethical reasoning? Possibly we can, at any rate if they are bright ten-year olds, in the sense that we can teach them something that, later on, they will remember and understand. But in fact it’s going to be difficult - we’ll lose the less bright ones along the way - and may be pointless - even the bright ones will not be terribly interested, or see the relevance. Alienation is the likely result. By the same token, you can teach a bright and diligent 10-year old the techniques, if perhaps not the theory, of calculus. But the pedagogic benefits of doing so are doubtful.

Everything in you post boils down to this, so I will just respond here.
You can of course teach kids the adult way of ethics. The trick is not to give them adult examples that would confuse them or simply go over their heads. Once you give appropriate examples, or ask appropriate questions, you can get kids to reevaluate their ethics, because that's how it happens naturally. Think about it, a child's natural ethical development doesn't happen magically, there's no genetic marker that suddenly kicks in and causes some ethical reevaluation. Over the course of a childhood, kids, through their interactions with each other, adults and the media, reevaluate how they look at the world. There is no reason why this can't happen in a classroom, its probably better if it means the kids are given appropriate examples to think about by a teacher, rather than hearing of some horror on the news.
As you said, there does need to be a bare minimum reached before a specific level of education can happen - kids need fine motor skills before they can be taught how to write. But it would be completely unnecessary to say that you must wait for kids to figure out writing by themselves before you teach them spelling and grammar. At each step help can given, no single step needs to happen in isolation.

Peregrinus wrote: »

even the bright ones will not be terribly interested, or see the relevance.

If you fail to teach someone the relevance of a system of ethics, then you have failed to teach them ethics, full stop.

recedite

Peregrinus wrote: »

She supports the ethics classes.

Her submission in the transcript starts off with "support" that is so grudging she can't even say it directly, she can only bring herself to say in a roundabout way she does not support the opposition;

Tobin wrote:

In my submission I have said I do not support
the repeal of the amendment which authorised the classes. Have I got all the negatives in that right?

Then there follows a long polemic of criticism against the ethics classes she is supposed to be "supporting".

I think you should be wary of attaching too much importance to the 92% figure, or from suggesting that others do. It wasn’t a properly conducted survey; it was one of these on-the-website thingies....

I'll take your word for it, but I would guess that it was roughly representative of various surveys of parents that would have been done in individual schools before they went ahead with the ethics classes in the trial program.

I’m sorry, but that’s b*lls, and again looks like an attempt to shoehorn inconvenient facts into a preconceived narrative. Her main point is the classic Aristotelian one that a virtuous life requires virtuous habits and virtuous instincts, and not merely an intellectual understanding of ethical reasoning. Habits and instincts are cultivated from an early age. This is neither a bizarre religious perspective nor an abstract academic point; it’s a mainstream view, and one implicitly acknowledged by every parent who tries to teach their toddler to share toys, and not to bite or kick other toddlers.....You may or may not agree with these points, but it’s an absolutely mainstream ethical view, and not a particularly religious one.

I do agree with these points, but its a question of emphasis. When I talk about "hammering morals into a child" you talk about "cultivating virtuous habits". These are roughly equivalent. Its a question of how you do it.
It should be done with more emphasis on the positive reinforcement, and less on the shame and punishment.
You mention that toddlers need to be told to share. They are highly sensitive to unfairness. If you give a treat to one and not another, the one who has been left out will feel aggrieved and cry. The crying may stimulate empathy in the one with the sweet, and thus coax them into sharing. (not that I spend my time conducting these experiments )
The point is, at an early age these simple forms of ethics can be talked about in a reasoned way with them. Then there are tales containing morality and/or ethics such as Aesops Fables for young children. Those reaching "the age of reason" which the religious would use as a "confirmation age" can benefit from discussing more difficult cases of ethics, without being turned into cynical criminals. This idea that they should be told what to do, without being told why, is an authoritarian view typical of the religious viewpoint. The authority always fears that the blossoming mind of the child will reject the absolutes imposed on them, and become susceptible to what they like to call moral relativism. The moral relativist is seen as someone who makes up their own rules; ie the cynical criminal mastermind.

if we object to non-empirical claims being advanced only when they are advanced by ethicists who happen to be religious, we expose ourselves to the charge of bigotry, do we not?

We would be bigoted if that were the case;)
But in the example cited, she was asked a reasonable question;

Kaye wrote:

Do you have evidence of that phenomenon of kids being asked too early to make moral inquiries before they have developed the habit of right thinking and doing? Do you have empirical evidence? Are there studies that say, "Oh, these kids become cynical"

As schools, their methods, and their pupils are constantly being monitored and evaluated, it seems reasonable that some empirical evidence would be provided to back up the claims.

Peregrinus

Mark Hamill wrote: »

If you fail to teach someone the relevance of a system of ethics, then you have failed to teach them ethics, full stop.

That’s basically Tobin’s point, I think. Her objection - and I don’t know whether it is well-founded or not - is that the curriculum framework for the ethics classes introduces students to ethical reasoning, but doesn’t address at all the question of why ethical reasoning matters. Thus it might equip students to form an ethical judgment about, e.g. whether to tell on another student who is misbehaving, but leave them with no real idea as to why they should make ethical judgments, or leave them with the impression that the main purpose of doing so is to avoid punishment or secure social approbation.

And this, I think, ties in with my earlier point about age and capacity. It seems to me that our ethical capacities develop almost in reverse.

- At a very young age we can learn ethical behavior - share your toys, don’t bite - but our motivation for behaving ethically is the basically selfish one of avoiding punishment or earning a reward.

- Next, we acquire a slightly less selfish motivation - if I share my toys, that pleases Mummy, and it gratifies me to make her happy. Of course, I benefit when Mummy is happy, and there might even be a reward, so my motives here are not unmixed.

- Soon, we move on to, if I share my toys, that pleases another child, and it gratifies me to make him happy, even though I am not dependent on him and so don’t receive the same “downstream” benefits/rewards as I do when Mummy is happy.

- At some point I reach a level of development where I can think in more abstract terms about why sharing my toys is good; I can understand this in terms of concepts like fairness and equity and solidarity (even if I can’t name those concepts just yet). This is a big step forward in ethical thinking.

- But I need to be quite advanced before I can address “meta-abstractions” - not just identifying the abstraction of “fairness”, but saying why and in what sense that abstraction matters. At a very early stage, of course, I can address these questions in terms of self-interest (I am rewarded for being fair, Mummy is pleased when I am fair, avoiding dishonesty keeps me out of gaol) but you need quite a degree of maturity before you can think in solid, meaningful terms about why it is important and worthwhile to act with fairness or honesty even if there is no reward involved - even if, in fact, it costs me something. You need to have a conscious awareness of creating yourself, making yourself into the person you are going to become, by the acts you perform and the choices you make.

In other words if, as an adult, I set about writing a book on ethics, the most fundamental question is “why be good?”, and all other questions can be seen as specific instances of that, or consequences of it.

But, as a human being, gradually acquiring ethics, that’s actually the last question that I tackle, because it’s the one that requires the greatest degree of maturity to address.

In a sense, though, all our systems of ethical education do involve introducing our children to questions they’re not able to tackle yet. We demand that our toddlers act fairly and with respect for one another at a time when they can have no concept of fairness or respect. We enforce this behaviour through reward and punishment.

When they’re slightly older, we talk to them about fairness, etc, although, realistically, they cannot understand what we are saying, and they translate it in their minds into reward and punishment. (That’s why you’ll here a seven-year old, say, who is routinely beaten by an older sibling in a card game complain that “it’s not fair” that he always loses.)

But we do all this so that fair behaviour, and the language of fairness, is absorbed by osmosis, as it were, and when children are ready to deal with those concept, they have the concepts, and the language to discuss them, and they discover that we have already constructed within them an ethical framework based on fairness. They can evaluate it, make it their own and eventually even reject it.

Now, I’m not sure whether Tobin’s point is that, in Years 5 and 6, children are ready for the “meta-abstraction” of virtue - why it’s important to be good - or whether she merely thinks that the ethics course ought to cover this so that, when they are ready, they will have some intellectual equipment to work with. Either way, though, it seems to be a point worth considering. (Assuming, of course, that she is correct in her basic point that the course doesn’t tackle this.)

Peregrinus

recedite wrote: »

Her submission in the transcript starts off with "support" that is so grudging she can't even say it directly, she can only bring herself to say in a roundabout way she does not support the opposition;

There's a much more obvious and more prosaic explanation for her “roundabout” language; she is in fact explicitly addressing the terms of reference of the parliamentary committee,, which is not “should the ethics classes continue?” but “to consider whether the legislative change allowing ethics classes in government schools should be reversed”. She is saying no, she does not advocate reversal, which is the most direct possible address to the committee’s terms of reference. If you read the evidence from Parents4Ethics they put their position in similar terms (“we are strongly opposed to that proposal [to repeal the Education Amendment (Ethics Classes) Act 2010]”).

recedite wrote: »

Then there follows a long polemic of criticism against the ethics classes she is supposed to be "supporting".

It’s in the nature of these committees that the witnesses who come before them spend more time talking about things which they do want to see changed than about things which they don’t.

recedite wrote: »

I'll take your word for it, but I would guess that it was roughly representative of various surveys of parents that would have been done in individual schools before they went ahead with the ethics classes in the trial program.

I don’t see why you would “guess” that. It stands to reason that, in schools which introduced the ethics classes, majority parent opinion favoured them because, if it hadn’t, those schools wouldn’t have introduced them. But I see no early reason to “guess” that the majority was 92%, or even to guess that the majority could be identified with any such degree of precision. The practice in relation to SRE, and I suspect in relation to ethics classes, is for the principal to sound out the teaching staff, probably informally, and parent opinion, by putting the matter on the agenda at a P&C meeting and hearing what people have to say, and then considering other factors like classroom availability, timetabling issues and the number who are actually signing up for the classes. I’m not aware of any school conducting a plebiscite.

recedite wrote: »

I do agree with these points, but its a question of emphasis. When I talk about "hammering morals into a child" you talk about "cultivating virtuous habits". These are roughly equivalent. Its a question of how you do it.

Or maybe it’s a question of how you choose to talk about it!

recedite wrote: »

It should be done with more emphasis on the positive reinforcement, and less on the shame and punishment.

Sure, but if you can find an example of Tobin advocating inculcating shame as a pedagogic technique, now would be a good time to point to it.

This isn’t really my area, but as I understand it shame and pride are capacities that you develop, or at least exercise, if you have an ethical sensibility. If someobody has a well-developed ethical instinct, the corollary is not that they should necessarily feel shame, but that they should be capable of it, if in fact they let themselves down. (And vice versa for pride.)

recedite wrote: »

You mention that toddlers need to be told to share. They are highly sensitive to unfairness. If you give a treat to one and not Yanother, the one who has been left out will feel aggrieved and cry. The crying may stimulate empathy in the one with the sweet, and thus coax them into sharing. (not that I spend my time conducting these experiments )
The point is, at an early age these simple forms of ethics can be talked about in a reasoned way with them. Then there are tales containing morality and/or ethics such as Aesops Fables for young children. Those reaching "the age of reason" which the religious would use as a "confirmation age" can benefit from discussing more difficult cases of ethics, without being turned into cynical criminals. This idea that they should be told what to do, without being told why, is an authoritarian view typical of the religious viewpoint. The authority always fears that the blossoming mind of the child will reject the absolutes imposed on them, and become susceptible to what they like to call moral relativism. The moral relativist is seen as someone who makes up their own rules; ie the cynical criminal mastermind.

I agree with what you say about toddlers, but with the important caveat that the toddler has a very limited understanding of fairness, and in fact he really shoehorns it into his - much more well-developed - sense of reward and punishment. If I give toddler A a lolly and toddler B no lolly, toddler B will see that as unfair regardless of the reason for the difference in treatment. In other words, toddler B can only understand fairness in terms of equality of reward; lollies for all. If I’m giving out lollies as prizes for games in a children’s party, for instance, toddler B will provisionally tolerate not getting a lolly this time as long as he hopes to get one in the next game. But at the end of the party, as every parent knows, there must be a general distribution of lollies, or the unsuccessful toddlers will go home and report to their parents that “it wasn’t fair”, even though all the games were conducted with a rigorous fairness that would have satisfied the most demanding of Jockey Club stewards.

I reject your characterization of religious ethics as typically authoritarian; it’s altogether too glib. Where there are plenty of religious approaches to ethics which are authoritarian, there are also plenty of non-religious ethical systems which are just as authoritarian. And, conversely, there are non-authoritarian approaches to ethics to be found in the religious traditions. But this can be confused by the fact that all forms of ethical formation are, at least initially, authoritarian (command followed by punishment/reward) because, quite frankly, that’s the only thing that works with the little buggers.

I also think you are drawing a false opposition between authoritarianism on the one hand and moral relativism on the other; they are not opposites. It’s quite possible to be an authoritarian moral relativist or, conversely, to be highly moral, yet neither relativist nor authoritarian.

recedite wrote: »

We would be bigoted if that were the case
But in the example cited, she was asked a reasonable question;

As schools, their methods, and their pupils are constantly being monitored and evaluated, it seems reasonable that some empirical evidence would be provided to back up the claims.

And she gave a reasonable answer. The ethics programme has only run on a pilot basis for one year, and quite plainly it’s far too soon to say what the long-term effects will be. I;m not aware that there have been any studies yet, and in all honesty I rather doubt that there have been. Tobin makes it plain that her views emerge from her experience as an academic, dealing with successive generations coming into college in their late teens; plainly none of them have been through the NSW ethics classes.

Mark Hamill

Peregrinus wrote: »

That’s basically Tobin’s point, I think. Her objection - and I don’t know whether it is well-founded or not - is that the curriculum framework for the ethics classes introduces students to ethical reasoning, but doesn’t address at all the question of why ethical reasoning matters. Thus it might equip students to form an ethical judgment about, e.g. whether to tell on another student who is misbehaving, but leave them with no real idea as to why they should make ethical judgments, or leave them with the impression that the main purpose of doing so is to avoid punishment or secure social approbation.

I covered this in my first post:
if you can assume that kids develop ethics anyway, as was assumed above, then you can assume that they know why identifying right and wrong is important, so it kinda becomes moot.
If you claim that someone develops ethics on their own, then they already have reasons for making ethical judgements. And if you then try to educate them to mature their ethical reasoning, then you invariably have to explain to them why its important to make these decisions.

Peregrinus wrote: »

Now, I’m not sure whether Tobin’s point is that, in Years 5 and 6, children are ready for the “meta-abstraction” of virtue - why it’s important to be good - or whether she merely thinks that the ethics course ought to cover this so that, when they are ready, they will have some intellectual equipment to work with. Either way, though, it seems to be a point worth considering. (Assuming, of course, that she is correct in her basic point that the course doesn’t tackle this.)

Actually, she explicitly says the opposite, didn't you read the pdf you linked to?:

Tobin, pg 36 wrote:

I think it is a well-motivated initiative. As I say, I am not arguing for it to go. I would like to see it have more emphasis on conveying, strengthening, reinforcing children's sense of right and wrong than it seems to have at the moment. Now I am not so sure because I have only got the framework. I think on balance there is too much emphasis on difficult cases, dilemmas, complexities and questions about whether it really would be stealing in this case or not. I think there is too much emphasis on all of that, at the cost of making sure that the sense of right and wrong that every normal human being has gets encouraged, reinforced, sharpened up, precisified and corrected. I would have more balance towards that.

She is here explicitly saying that she doesn't want kids discussing why something is wrong, only that they have simplistic, objective notions of right and wrong hammered into them.

She also says:

Tobin, pg 34 wrote:

Aristotle's point is that unless you have already got the knowledge and the emotional responsiveness to be utterly ashamed, pained, by stealing, it is only when you have got that kind of background that you are well placed to think about the difficult cases, and you are well placed to think about the why, the reasons—all those wonderful things are going to go on in that class. And I think they are wonderful things. Now, the problem is that if you do them before, if you encourage children to think in those ways before they have got that first stage, that background, you run the risk of teaching them to be sceptical about right and wrong. You run the risk of teaching them to think that, well, maybe stealing is wrong, but the way to work out whether it would be wrong in a particular case is to look at the likely consequences.

Tobin, pg 35 wrote:

My point is that the reflection will not go well unless the person so reflecting already knows that she ought keep her promise, and knows it not just as a matter of knowledge, knows it as a matter of heart. She is motivated to keep her promise; she will be pained

Her point is that before children can actually think about the consequences of their actions, they must already have a certain desired outcome driven into them, so that they already know what the desired outcome is (with their heart). This is amazingly stupid. Its tautologically wrong, as how can someone actually be said to be honestly considering the outcomes of a given situation, if they have already decided which is the right one (with their heart :rolleyes:). Its justified with reference to Aristotle, as if he is the last authority on child development.
She then says:

Tobin, pg 35 wrote:

My point is not a point about what children are capable of, in one sense. Dr Knight—I think that was that the name of the lady sitting here—said the research now shows that very young children are capable of thinking in these ways. I do not doubt that. It is not a psychological point. This is a point about the nature of ethics, about the nature of moral development and moral maturity. Until someone knows that stealing is wrong, she is not well-placed to think about particularly tragic, difficult, cases, because if you do not have a really deep, deep knowledge and understanding and feeling about the wrongness of stealing, you will not see the problem. It will not be a problem. It will be just an imaginative exercise.

What the hell is she talking about? How can you have a "really deep, deep knowledge and understanding and feeling about the wrongness of stealing" without discussing various cases of it? How does she think kids naturally develop more and more mature ethical opinions of stealing without being introduced to more and more difficult cases (whether they want to or not)?

Everything the woman says, I've actually covered in my previous posts. Ethical development happens naturally, as a result of the unavoidable interactions children have with everyone around them as they grow up. But there is no reason why they can't have those interactions in class rooms, where they can discuss it maturely and with appropriate examples, rather than assume their "heart" will steer them in the right direction or that they will already have a "deep, deep understanding". And there is certainly no reason to hammer into kids simplistic, objective notions of right and wrong (which will throw all kinds of problems up when they mature and enter in the real world) simply because Aristotle said so.