"Indifference" and the restlessness

 An article by Mark Lilla in the new journal Liberties (only available in print, alas) solidified some of my thinking on the restlessness. He talks about the concept of "indifferent" acts in ethics and theology. Do all of our actions carry inevitable moral weight? Is it possible to engage in some small activity without being good or bad, or is even a small act of leisure a sin? What if that act of leisure promotes morality? We see this all the time in modern lefty discourse, with endless articles about how "problematic" something or other is. One needn't be amoral or nihilist to recognize that you'll go crazy if you agonize over the ethics of every small deed. But people do that nonetheless. Just a few hours ago I was scolded over some small joke, because even though the person I told it to totally got it, some outside observer might lack context and think I was doing something bad. Lilla goes through the history of indifference in theology and philosophy, and I won't attempt to rehash it here. But I will note that the modern scolds of political correctness are searching for sin everywhere, and the modern restless educators feel like we must keep trying to further purify everything.

My one key complaint about The Cult of Smart

I still have one chapter to go, so maybe Freddie will address this in the remaining fifty pages, but there's one big thing I dislike about his argument: He joins everyone else (including many of the people who want to retain absolutely every kid in STEM) in critiquing meritocracy. But there isn't one meritocracy, or at least there shouldn't be. There are many meritocracies. The credentials that will get you a job as a software engineer won't get you a job fixing cars. The credentials that will get you a job fixing cars won't get you a job selling real estate, and a real estate license won't get you a job as a dentist.

There are plenty of things to be said against particular forms of professional licensing, but the basic idea of people getting jobs if they demonstrate that they can do the job (or at least learn on the job quickly enough) is inoffensive to me and probably most people. Everyone, socialist or capitalist or whatever, wants the brakes on my car repaired by a person who knows what they're doing. The other drivers want it, the pedestrians want it, and the bicyclists want it. The capitalists want me to have my consumer desires fulfilled by that service provider and the socialists want my car to be maintained in a condition that won't hurt the interests of society.

We can debate whether that brake technician should go to trade school, get a certification from an industry organization, or just train on the job under the supervision of people who know what they're doing, but one way or another we all want that brake technician to demonstrate his skills and knowledge to the satisfaction of people in the field. We want the repair shop down the street to hire qualified brake technicians. That's meritocracy. It won't be perfect--maybe the shop owner prefers to hire friends and family--but as long as they cross some threshold of competence we accept that an imperfect meritocracy is way better than no meritocracy.

If meritocracy means that your ability to enjoy basic human decency and some safety net of protection hinges on some form of desert, well, yes, we can morph any concept into something insane. But if it just means that getting a job requires some demonstrated competence or ability, I don't think most people object. Likewise, nobody except certain co-workers thinks a kid should invest time and money in a physics degree if they struggle with freshman calculus after repeated attempts. But arguing against "meritocracy" in general sounds like arguing for unqualified brake repair technicians, or arguing for dentists who don't sterilize their instruments. It sounds like arguing for accountants who haven't read an updated tax code document in a decade. It sounds like arguing for the boss's idiot son over the qualified applicant with a great resume.

I have read other things by Freddie, and heard him engage with people in various discussions, so I know that he doesn't want dentists who don't sterilize their instruments. And I know from his book that Freddie, critiques of meritocracy notwithstanding, disagrees with my colleagues who want to keep kids in degree programs that aren't working out for them. But I still think that critiquing meritocracy in broad terms, without being clear on the kind of meritocracy one supports, is a dangerous style. If somebody reads all 240+ pages of Freddie's book then they know he's not opposed to the more sane forms of meritocracy. (I doubt he wants his MRI read by a total dunce.) But in the current rhetorical climate, I think it helps to be clear on what one means when arguing against a term that has several usages, some far more benign than others.

Cult of Smart, Chapters 7 and 8

 Chapter 7 explores educational discourse in light of Rawls' concept of the "Veil of Ignorance." Philosopher John Rawls argued that a just society is the sort that people would agree to live in if they viewed it from behind a "veil of ignorance", i.e. they had no idea what sort of station they'd occupy, or what sorts of abilities or limitations they'd have. People would want to live in a society where they know that if they are disabled they'll be cared for, if they're whatever race they won't be discriminated against, and if they're talented they'll get some benefit from doing what they do well (even while contributing to the care for the disabled, etc.). Rawls has been influential on the left, and Freddie's key point is that leftists have accepted an ethical philosophy built around the notion that some people might have different abilities.

Also, while Freddie makes his argument in a way that should appeal to people with many different perspectives, he doesn't hide the fact that he himself is very, very left-wing. And one staple of socialist thought is "From each according to their abilities, to each according to their needs." It's not so different from the Parable of the Talents, in which Jesus says that those who have more should do more for all. Again, the key point is that it is perfectly possible to conceive of a charitable, egalitarian, and compassionate ethos that allows for differences in talent.

I like this quote on page 161:

Many people seem to believe that an assessment of academic potential necessarily involves an assessment of someone's overall human worth, despite the fact that the later does not at all follow from the former.

Indeed. Being bad at something can be a fact that does not diminish one's moral worth. I might be incapable of carrying a tune but that doesn't mean a musician needs to think less of me as a human. A musician might be terrible at physics but that doesn't mean I should think less of them.

Page 163:

When we look at a school system that we say is flawed, thanks to the impossible task that we've handed it, we are eeing our basic failure to really grapple with the reality of unequal human potential.

To be fair, Freddie is giving short shrift to the other inequalities that plague some school systems. If Chet McRitchie doesn't get the same high test scores as Rich Nobleford, the McRitchie parents might complain to the principal of their suburban high school, and the principal might need to take some headache medicine, but the higher level authorities are unlikely to strip away funding from the school. OTOH, if kids in an inner-city school get bad test scores (because of course they do), we know that authorities will continue to use that school as a canvas for their latest educational fad.

But, again, the fact that the task is hindered by nurture as much as nature does not make it any less impossible. What can a teacher do in the face of parents and neighborhoods and injustice and everything else that affects the kids in all the days and hours that they aren't in school?

Chapter 8 deals with Freddie's recommendations. I don't want to enumerate and address all of them. I just want to look at a few that interest me, because I blog books for fun, not for work.

Page 169, regarding whether it's a good idea to provide preschool and daycare and after school programs and other things for kids whose parents have to work and don't have good access to safe, enriching environments outside of school:

To constantly harp on the supposed academic advantages that these programs confer is to leave them vulnerable: they can then only be defended so long as those academic advantages actually assert themselves. As I've said, the research record for these programs is mixed at best, running to poor. If we make test scores and related indicators our primary argument, then we preemptively disarm ourselves in this fight.

Indeed. What if the "only" effect of afterschool programs or pre-K or whatever is that kids have a warm, safe, fun thing to do when their parents are working? What if the only effect of helping people is some human comfort but not an educational miracle? I actually see that as wholly consistent with my insistence that kids who do badly in physics shouldn't major in physics. What if the effect of them changing majors is that we don't solve a systemic issue but some people do spend 4 years actually learning something and experiencing the satisfaction of success? That doesn't guarantee a particular long-term outcome for them, but it won't hurt, and it will make 4 years of life genuinely good. Is that not good in and of itself?

Also, Freddie addresses and basically concurs with the argument made by Andrew Hacker in The Math Myth and Other STEM Delusions. I like Freddie's version better because he makes it clear that he's totally fine with closing down some paths early on. He's considered all of the dark possibilities of our educational system and he accepts that some paths and tracks should be closed off early.