A teacher said to his students, “Write down a statement of absolute truth that cannot be refuted or doubted in any way.” At first the task seemed simple, but when the students failed to find a suitable answer, they began to question whether they knew anything at all. What good was this education if it did not teach them Truth? Education involves the process of acquiring knowledge for the purpose of finding fulfillment and happiness; however, since no single idea can be proven to be true, its fruitless attempts invariably cause depression and discontent.
The term “education” has several meanings. Socrates argues that it “isn’t the craft of putting sight into the soul,” but the redirection of the sight until the soul is “able to study that which is and the brightest thing that is” (Plato, p. 190). In other words, education has nothing to do with the knowledge that one retains, but with the conquest of the higher realm of enlightenment. In his Letter from Birmingham Jail, Martin Luther King, Jr. agrees with Socrates that tension is necessary for individuals to “rise from the bondage of myths and half-truths to the unfettered realm of creative analysis and objective appraisal” (King, p. 2). He hopes that through such tension, man will rise above prejudice to the “majestic heights of understanding and brotherhood.” His view on education calls for an ascent from the cave of intolerance. In today’s society, however, education does not necessarily imply an elevated level of universal understanding. One simply goes to school and “gets an education” by learning facts that are accepted to be true. People of the “civilized” world place an increasing emphasis on this fact-based education as a prerequisite for success. In his Narrative, Frederick Douglass remembers when he first associated reading with freedom. Referring to his master’s strong disapproval of his wife’s teaching him to read, Douglass says, “it served to convince me that he was deeply sensible of the truths he was uttering. It gave me the best assurance that I might rely with the utmost confidence on the results which, he said, would flow from teaching me to read” (Douglass, p. 20). Galileo had a hybrid view of education, uniting religious and scientific enlightenment. Dava Sobel writes that Galileo “endeavored always to conform his duty as a scientist with the destiny of his soul (Sobel, p. 12). Though he was not content with blind faith, he never let science distort his religious and moral convictions. Galileo had no qualms about trading accepted notions for more correct ones, and to prove his theories, he broadened scientific practices with his telescopes and realistic sketches of the heavens.
Regardless of the meaning of education, truth is an unattainable ideal. One might learn an infinite number of facts about a field of study, but they are all fundamentally based on some form of faith. Science requires faith just as much as religion because certain assumptions must be accepted as true, yet science deems faith as unacceptable in proving Truth. In Meditation I, Descartes proposed that it is unnecessary to consider each idea individually. Like a building, a belief cannot stand without a foundation. Descartes states, “it will be sufficient to justify the rejection of the whole if I shall find in each some ground for doubt.” For instance, Darwin provides a logical, seemingly irrefutable explanation for natural selection in his Origin of Species. It certainly seems reasonable that “individuals having any advantage…would have the best chance of surviving and or procreating their kind” and that “any variation in the least degree injurious would be rigidly destroyed.” Darwin proves his statements by pointing out that man has successfully domesticated and altered hundreds of species. Because “nature’s productions should be far ‘truer’ in character than man’s productions” and since they should be “infinitely better adapted to the most complex conditions of life,” it is only logical that species do in fact evolve to survive. However, creationists argue that evolution goes against the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics, which maintains that entropy increases over time. Creationists maintain that evolutionists disregard the fact that a system will become more disorderly and chaotic when they claim that through natural selection, the world becomes highly organized and complex. How can one explain this order without the intervention of a divine presence in the universe? By Occum’s Razor, if two explanations for a thing are given, the simpler of the two theories is to be preferred. Is it simpler to believe that life was born out of primordial, inanimate matter which gave rise to increasingly complex organisms over billions of years, or that a supreme being created life and continues to do so? Some people believe in evolution, some in creation, some in theistic evolution, and some prefer not to think about the subject at all. According to Descartes, since certain aspects of all sides can be doubted, any and all statements related to the debate must be rejected. Innumerable controversies such as this prove that Truth is idealistic and unattainable. Nothing is presently known with absolute certainty.
Thus far, it has been illustrated that people seek education for fulfillment but that because no single idea can be proven to be true, education is itself useless. Not only is it useless, education is actually detrimental to one’s soul. In The Matrix, Neo chooses to learn the truth about reality, and what he discovers almost kills him. He physically breaks down and becomes vulnerable to many previously unknown dangers, like the agents. Also, by accepting reality, Neo must forego the comforts and pleasures of his dream world, sentencing him to a life of uncertainty and unhappiness. Plato’s leader in the Allegory of the Cave comes out of darkness into painfully brilliant sunlight. He endures more discomfort when he returns to the cave to save his companions. By becoming aware of the superiority of the higher realm, the leader resigns himself to a life of misery in the cave. Frederick Douglass also attests to the painful effects of education: “I would at times feel that learning to read had been a curse rather than a blessing. It had given me a view of my wretched condition, without the remedy” (Douglass, p. 24). In Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, the monster recalls an extremely wretched educational experience. He explains to Frankenstein, “You minutely described in these papers every step you took in the progress of your work…I sickened as I read. ‘Hateful day when I received life!’” (Shelley, p. 92-93). The monster now understands why he seems so horrific but has no way to change for the better. Galileo further proves that education is injurious because even though he was correct, he was charged with heresy and exiled for his theories about heliocentricism. His ideas also caused chaos and insecurity for society as a whole because they challenged “reality,” just as they caused him much angst as an individual.
To sum it up, education is ineffectual because it does not lead to Truth and it is harmful because it causes unhappiness. But, by nature man seeks a higher understanding through education to achieve self-actualization. We will continue to search for Truth because since even uncertainty is uncertain, we still have a chance of realizing Truth. Through the process of education, we inherently strive for Truth, for as Fox Mulder of the X-Files puts it, “I want to believe.”
Works Cited
Darwin, Charles. The Origin of Species. New York, New York: Penguin Books USA Inc., 1859.
Descartes, Rene. Meditation I: Of the Things of Which We May Doubt.
Douglass, Frederick. Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass. New York: Dover, 1995.
King, Martin Luther Jr. Letter from Birmingham Jail. April 16, 1963.
Plato. Republic. Trans. G.M.A. Grubbe. Rev. C.D.C. Reeve. Indianapolis: Hackett, 1992.
Shelley, Mary. Frankenstein. New York: Dover, 1994.
Sobel, Dava. Galileo’s Daughter. New York: Walker, 1999.
Wachowski, Andy and Larry. The Matrix. 1999.