Anti-Education: On the Future of Our Educational Institutions

Anti-Education On the Future of Our Educational Institutions

Introduction and Lecture 1

Friedrich Nietzsche

Translated by Damion Searls

New York Review Book Edition 2016

For those afraid to toe into the murky waters of Philosophy, Anti-Education proves that the subject is attainable for all. Rather than a dry, monotonous lecture, Nietzsche uses the mode of a conversation to create an intriguing narrative that is easy to follow.

My copy of the book is indeed heavily underlined and noted in the margins, but Nietzsche’s points are clear, concise and often repeated to emphasize his message. His efforts to create a clarity in his presentation are well-founded. Even without active scribbling, a reader will walk away with a new perspective on the education system and the ideas of Classic Education.

In the following lectures, Nietzsche recites a conversation he overheard during his youthful university days between an old Philosopher and his young student. Whether Nietzsche uses this conversation as a literary tool to convey his message or if he actually overheard this dialogue and was so moved by it he remembered it in acute detail is unclear.

Lecture I

Delivered January 16, 1872

To set the stage, Nietzsche describes the deep friendships and the in- depth knowledge he acquired from the secret intellectual club that he started with his friends as a young man.

Think, “Dead Poets Society.”

A group of young men discussing and appreciating poetry, philosophy, history, and art on their own terms. No persnickety teachers breathing down their necks. Some rambunctious boyhood tussle mixed in with the serious nature of the group.  The group served as an integral part of the boys’ intellectual and personal growth as it helped to, “stimulate our drive for self-cultivation” (Neitzsche, 5). It was a safe place for intellectual growth and camaraderie. “We felt that we owed this curious club our greatest gratitude. It had been no mere supplement to our gymnasium studies, if anything the reverse. The club was what had truly borne fruit- it had supplied the framework for our quest for education, and we had sketched our formal schooling into it” (Nietzche, 12). There is something in self-motivated discovery. A beauty in the intrinsic pull toward self-cultivation.

This ‘philosophizing’ as young Nietzsche described it, was “making a serious effort to reflect on the best way to become truly educated” (Nietzsche, 12). These college boys discussed culture and also searched for the best, most effective education system.

This is the basis of the lectures that Nietzsche gives.

What is true education? Is it attainable? And what state is the education system in now?

On the day of one of the reunions of this secret brotherhood, the group was to assemble in their designated secret location in the woods. Nietzsche and his friend arrived early to the spot and found two strange men also waiting there.

An Old Man who is revealed to be a philosopher and a Young Man who is his student.

Grudgingly, Nietzsche and his friend share the space and wait for the rest of their group. During this time, Nietzsche overhears the conversation between these two strange men and is struck by the poignant interpretation of the German education system and the meaning of higher learning.

But first, he is lost in his own thoughts. He thinks back on his boyhood days and feels a deep sense of appreciation for the fraternity he had belonged to. He realizes that during this time in his life, money and careers were of no worry to him or his friends. He and his chums were not goal-oriented or reaching for some End Point in their education. Their only interest was to expand their understanding of the world as much as possible, regardless of any financial or status return.

For those who have been conditioned to constantly think of the future, to be constantly concerned with having a “stable job” and a “livable wage,” have been robbed of this innocent view of learning and expanding the mind. Our modern generations have been molded into a useful and hyper-generating tools that the state can benefit from. Nietzsche says, “The state tries to exploit those years, luring civil servants it can make use of as early as possible and then securing their unconditional obedience with exaggeratedly strenuous exams” (Nietzsche, 13).

Even as young children we are asked what we are going to be when we are older. We are asked by our elders, “What pistol, mortar or gear are you going to be in society’s giant machine?” Our education is modeled so that students can be something in the end.

Our society needs doctors. It needs lawyers and policemen. It needs teachers, politicians, and analysts. To keep society running we need statesmen to perform certain duties, and those duties are dispersed and delegated throughout the population. Everyone takes up a role and acts accordingly.

But by giving these professions titles, and by putting people into boxes, we take on a narrow-minded idea of how far to take our education. Policemen don’t need to know physics but why do we reduce them from attaining this knowledge?

But the purpose of education, of higher learning, isn’t to enlighten the masses, according to this Old Man that Nietzsche overhears. In fact, the Old Man believes of the enormous number of students that are wrung through the school system, only a very few will be truly educated people.

His idea of the purpose of putting a great number through a strict and rigorous system to discover geniuses.

Genius?

But why do we need geniuses?

And why aren’t we finding them now?

The Young Man expounds on the laggings of the “current” education system.

According to the Young Man, there are two opposing forces in the education system.

The First: The Expansion of Education

The Second: The Narrowing of it.

Is it possible that these two opposite forces can be in action at the same time?

Right now, the system is trying to reach as many people as possible, thus expanding.

But the system is also narrowing by trying to put out specific specialists. It teaches doctors medicine and lawyers law, but it doesn’t try to educate lawyers in biology or doctors in reason or legality.

Education has narrowed its scope based on the professions people are pursuing.

The education system has lost sight of the old Greek days when scholars didn’t necessarily serve the state. The educated were respected and held in regard for their knowledge, regardless if it was materially or monetarily useful.

The education system now only aims at keeping the people current and narrow-minded. The young man says that the system tries to, “train everyone to convert his innate capacity for knowledge and wisdom – into as much happiness and income as possible” (Nietzsche, 16).

I don’t think anything is wrong with wanting to be happy, but it makes sense that our so called ‘standards of happiness’ are reliant on how much money we make and how many objects we have.  According to the Old Man, this desire, this attraction to consumerism, is fed by the government. This in turn has an effect on our education, spurring us to find the most lucrative and ‘narrow’ profession to make us materially happy, but not at all worldly knowledgeable.

“Those who hold this view hate any education that makes a person go his own way, or that suggest goals above and beyond earning money, or that takes a lot of time” (Nietzsche, 16).

For anyone who holds a Liberal Arts degree, this might sound familiar. Critical thinking and intellectual experimentation are no longer fostered as they once were in universities. Literature and the arts are oppressed while sciences and maths alone are promoted as they reap high-producing and high-income individuals.

But getting back to this idea of finding Geniuses.

This Old Man that Nietzsche finds is greatly opposed to Universal Education, a topic that is hot in politics right now and something that the United States is very much striving toward. 

The problem with Universal Education, as the Old Man points out, is that if everyone has it, then the educated aren’t special.  “Striving for ‘universal education’ weakens education so much that it can no longer bestow any privileges or be worthy of any respect at all” (Nietzsche, 17).

To some effect, this is true for those who have just graduated with their Bachelor’s degrees. Being told that graduating from college was the key to getting a good job, many recent graduates are dismayed to find that it is only in having your Masters or Doctorates that set you apart from the masses in the work force. A Bachelors, though very helpful, has become nearly run-of-the-mill. Those who have run the gauntlet of undergraduate studies are rewarded with student-loans and not as affluent job opportunities as they had hoped.

The system, and people, now worry themselves over income and consumerism.

“Everyone wants to lie back in the shadow of the tree that the genius has planted, while avoiding the hard necessity of working for that genius” -OM (Nietzsche, 14).

The Young Man further divulges in the narrowing of education. In creating experts in specific fields, rather than individuals who are experts in multiple fields, “the current system reduces scholars to being mere slaves of academic disciplines,” (Nietzsche, 17).

“A scholar with such a rarified specialty is like a factory worker who spends his entire life doing nothing but making one single screw” (Nietzsche, 18).

Specialists are more like factory workers on an assembly line.

The Young Man then goes on to tear apart the profession of journalists.

Journalism today has become extremely emphasized. Citizens from all walks of life are prompted to read the newspaper to remain current, to know the goings-on of the world, but Nietzsche overhears the idea that journalism actually reinforces the dumbing of the population. He describes it as being, “as sturdy and permanent as the paper it’s printed on” (Nietzsche, 19).

Damn.

His opinion on this profession is merciless and does not consider the importance of journalism.

Journalism takes on a Who-What-Where-When-Why-How simplicity. In most cases, its aim is not to be a primary resource or a fountain of in-depth knowledge, but investigative journalism is extremely important in checking and regulating those who are in power. Journalists pay an important role in the checks and balances of governments.

To round things up:

A young Nietzsche overhears a stimulating conversation between an Old Man and a Young Man.

The Young Man believes that the current German education system is being both Widened and Narrowed simultaneously.

Widened in the sense that higher education is becoming more accessible to the public, but in a bad way. By having more people be educated, it nullifies the elite status that being ‘educated’ used to carry. Now, if everyone is educated, it is just another common thing.

At the same time, the Young Man believes that the system is being Narrowed as well. Rather than having our institutions attempt to make each student an expert in each and every field (it is recognized that this is no small feat), society now only concerns itself with manufacturing very singular specialists that are acutely knowledgeable in one subject, but completely oblivious to all other studies.

He also thinks that Journalism and newspapers further ‘widen’ the education of people. Newspaper articles give the very briefest of all explanations. Its readers get the most dry and basic material, and they walk away believing they know everything on the subject.

Two of my main confusions are:

1.       The Old Man and Young Man condemn the widening of education yet say that it is necessary to have a large pool of students to be able to seek out the geniuses that they think are necessary for society.
This ‘widening,’ the making-education-accessible-for-all, would in fact help society discover more geniuses.
These ideas are just a bit contradicting. That’s all I’m saying.

2.       These said men seem to be opposed to having average people be educated, but to keep society sustainable one must have a workforce that can progress and keep up with the modernization of the times.
No, not everyone is going to be a genius or reach the standard of being ‘truly’ educated as Nietzsche has put it, but can society depend on such a small group of geniuses to keep all of society running? Don’t we need some ‘extra,’ maybe even ‘superfluous’ educated people to help keep things coming along?
Their ideas seem to be that the majority of the population should be farmers and skilled tradesmen, and just a few elite should be educated and keep entire nations running. Just because someone isn’t a genius doesn’t mean they won’t make ground-breaking discoveries.
This view, of uplifting and celebrating a select few, results in the oppression of the rest of the population. By guarding many people out of education, it keeps them dumb and compliant when, if given the opportunity to be cultivated, this population could reap many more outstanding and important figures in history.