Ethics in the classroom: the debate

Among the successive meanings of the word ethics offered by the RAE - "straight, in accordance with morality", "set of moral norms that govern the conduct of the person", "person who studies or teaches morality", "part of the philosophy that deals with the good ”, etcetera - that of“ controversy engine ”does not appear…, although it should.

Perhaps that is why, in the so-called 'Anti-pedagogical Notice' of his book

Ethics for Amador

(whose first edition is 30 years old), Fernando Savater offered in 1991 his personal meaning: "I do not think that ethics serves to settle any debate, although his job is to collaborate to initiate them all."

And time again proves the old professor from Zorroaga right: a harsh debate, although surely constructive for the future, has been generated by the new educational law approved in December by Parliament, the LOMLOE (Organic Law of Modification of the LOE, that is, of the Organic Law of Education of 2006), popularly known as the Celaá law by the name of its promoter and defender, the Minister of Education and Vocational Training, Isabel Celaá.

The controversy centers on the non-inclusion of the Ethics subject in 4th year of ESO, to which the Government has preferred another, Education in Civic and Ethical Values, which will include subjects such as the social value of taxes, constitutional values, gender equality, animal rights or how to behave on social media.

A world without Ethics for Spanish adolescents in times when a pandemic has sent the moral principles of so many political leaders to the canvas?

In times of transfuguismo and abandonment of institutional positions in exchange for a few coins in the form of electoral lists?

A school without the desirable “ethicity” that Hegel spoke about?

Without morality like the kingdom of freedom that Kant spoke about?

Without the integrating current of political philosophy and ideological debate that Habermas defends as vectors of democratic values ​​in today's societies?

Without sticking the educational scalpel into the perennial Aristotelian dilemma that we know we want to be happy, but we don't know what happiness is?

Hypertechnified, hypertechnologized adolescents, hyper-prepared for the interconnected world ..., but orphans of knowledge and moral values?

Let's not get terrifying either.

Let's go by parts.

Citizenship and ethics, united in the LOMLOESergio García Sánchez / EPS

Critics of the treatment given to the teaching of Ethics at LOMLOE, especially grouped around the Spanish Philosophy Network, denounce the decision to mix ethical values ​​with civic values ​​in the same subject instead of prioritizing the purely philosophical dimension of the subject.

According to these criticisms, the Celaá law ignores the parliamentary consensus reached in 2018. On that occasion, in effect, all the political forces in Parliament reached an unusual unanimity on the need for the compulsory Ethics subject in 4th year of ESO.

The objective was to complete an educational cycle of philosophical teachings: Ethics in 4th year of ESO, Philosophy in 1st year of high school and History of Philosophy in 2nd year of high school.

Even the Popular Party, whom the rest of the forces had harshly criticized in the past due to the educational law promulgated by the Minister of Education José Ignacio Wert (the LOMCE, where Ethical Values ​​was a simple optional to the Religion subject) , backed down and supported the inclusion of Ethics in secondary education in 2018.

“Not including Ethics in 4th year of ESO is denying young people the right to receive basic and rigorous training in moral philosophy taught by specialized teachers and in line with what society demands: responsible ethical behavior, both in citizenship and in in its leaders ”, denounces the Spanish Network of Philosophy, formed by the Spanish Conference of Deans of Philosophy, the Institute of Philosophy of the CSIC and more than 50 philosophical associations from different thematic fields, educational levels and autonomous communities.

Also, the platform Student in Defense of Ethics, born in social networks, harshly criticizes the law.

“We have nothing against something like Civic Values;

on the contrary, it is very good that the boys know what rights, the Constitution, equality, etc. are, but what we say is that, formulated like this, it is not enough ", explains Esperanza Rodríguez, president of the Education Commission within of the Spanish Network of Philosophy and professor of Philosophy at the Margarita Salas de Majadahonda Institute (Madrid) for more than 20 years: “It is useless to learn human rights or the percentages of inequality that exist by heart, the important thing is that the student think if other things would be possible and why, and that they resolve moral dilemmas and be able to decide which rights are above others: that is what Ethics does ”.

Specificity or transversality: the background of the debate

The background of the debate addresses, among other things, the dilemma between specificity and transversality.

Some believe that Ethics has to be that and only that, and in that sense we are talking about a Philosophy subject.

Others think that it can be taught by associating it with the concrete problems of daily life, and there we are already approaching the concept of an education for citizenship.

Isabel Celaá is convinced that both things can be combined in the same subject: "The LOMLOE makes a commitment to Ethics, which in our point of view far exceeds an ordering of subjects", comments the minister in the Goya Hall of the headquarters of the Ministry of Education.

In an energetic tone that does not hide a certain anger with some of the criticisms received, Celaá thus defends the new law: “The LOMLOE not only restores Philosophy and the History of Philosophy in the 2nd year of Baccalaureate making it mandatory again in the curriculum, but also incorporates Ethics with its own value, not as an alternative to Religion and only for half of the students, but for all.

So, far from withdrawing the Ethics of teaching, what we do is affirm it ”.

And what specific content will the subject of controversy have?

The minister details in detail the index of subjects that a priori Spanish adolescents will find in the future: “Well, neither more nor less than knowledge of constitutional values, respect for human rights, that of animals, that of childhood, and the culture of peace and non-violence, the social value of taxes, the meaning that religion can have in our lives, respect for the best interests of the minor, equality between boys and girls, education for sustainable development , the equitable distribution of vaccines against the pandemic between rich countries and developing countries, digitization with critical knowledge, and that the student is able to discern where the information comes from and to distinguish between information and opinion ”.

Celaá assures that those civic and ethical values ​​that will be given in secondary education will be taught by philosophers, "and this is very important," and that in primary education there will be "very specific training for some teachers to teach the subject."

The Spanish Philosophy Network considers Ethics "essential" in secondary school. Sergio García Sánchez / EPS

It should not be ruled out that, basically and like so many other times, this controversy was born from a question of words, of language.

In any case, the head of the Spanish Philosophy Network uses the classics to allude to that vocation of practical and civic teachings that LOMLOE herself claims: “If what they have tried in the law is to teach practical things, I tell them that Few things as practical as Ethics are taught today in an institute, Aristotle already spoke of it as a mostly practical science.

Let's take an example, the moral dilemma of vaccines.

The student should be told: "This is what happened, why? What do you think would be the best and what could be done from the point of view of the ethics of Kant, Aristotle, the utilitarians?"

From his home in San Sebastián, Fernando Savater wants to make it clear from the outset that “ethics” and “citizenship” are not the same thing: “Maybe it is useful for children to know what the Constitution is for, and how a Parliament works, and what is a judge and what is a tax, because it is true that every day we are verifying that people do not know anything about it, but of course it is something very different from ethics.

Let's say ethics is prior to civic values.

Philosophy is a reflection on human questions, what those questions point to that do not refer to what we are going to do but to what we are.

In no case should it be a cookbook on various things.

One thing is the practical questions, what to do and what not to do, and another thing is the questions about why you have to do them or why not.

But as Philosophy is not exactly in fashion and is more or less diluted in other subjects so as not to have to face it directly, it does not surprise me that they have discarded Ethics as a subject ”.

Savater published

Ethics for Amador

(Ariel) in 1991 precisely to focus the subject of Ethics, in response to the requests of numerous Philosophy professors of the time who were not clear about the subject they had to teach, and to make their essential position clear: that they did not it was an optional subject compared to Religion.

Today he still thinks that it is key to separate what has to be done from why it has to be done.

And that the sooner the students are taught that, the better: “It is that moment of late childhood and early adolescence that is ideal to respond to them with philosophical approaches.

Young minds are in a special disposition to the essential, to the broad, to the deep, to speculation and to eat the coconut, and not necessarily with practical and immediate aspects.

It is perhaps the only time in life in which the person really needs to ask the essential questions, because then they already begin to wonder about things like profitability or how to earn their wages.

Almost all children and adolescents are interested in Philosophy, which does not serve to clear up doubts, but rather to get into doubts.

Questions are asked as a child, and they are valuable.

In fact, Socrates, the sophists accused him of that, of asking questions as a child.

And Plato said that to philosophize is to play seriously: that is philosophy ”.

A civic ethic of minimums

But let's get back to the question of the specific and the transversal, and the possibilities that these concepts can even travel together.

And let's do it through the mouth of Adela Cortina, professor of Ethics and Political Philosophy at the University of Valencia and author of

Minimal Ethics

(Tecnos, 1986), one of the great treatises on moral philosophy published in Spanish.

In the prologue to the 18th edition, published in 2020, the author writes: "Promoting a civic ethics of minimums in daily practice from a solid philosophical foundation is an inalienable obligation for philosophy."

However, the teacher, thinker and writer wants to make her preference clear: she would have liked the educational law to have opted for the subject called Ethics to dry, without adding “civic” or “citizens”: “Mainstreaming a subject is, simply, delete it.

Transmitting ethical proposals is meaningless if the transmission is not accompanied by a dialogue in which arguments and experiences are exchanged, shared reflection and the justification of options.

All of this requires a monographic subject.

It does not occur to anyone to mainstream Physics or Mathematics, nor does History and Literature.

There are no oppositions to transversal subjects ”.

Cortina, who has just published a new book, Cosmopolitan Ethics: a bet for sanity in times of pandemic (Paidós), insists: “An Ethics subject is necessary in the education law of a democratic society.

As Aristotle said, the important thing is not only the 'what', but above all the 'why', and offering that foundation has been and is the task of moral philosophy, which is not a morality of everyday life ”.

And another distinction that this author considers indispensable: the one that delimits moral education and training in ethics: “Moral education is received by osmosis in the family, in the age group, in the social environment, through the media and in a way. overwhelming on social media.

The whole of society educates morally, whether we like it or not.

But in that education there is everything, as in the pharmacy.

Lies are taught, contempt for the worst off, blind obedience to gain advantages, conformity, lack of solidarity, enter the game of hoaxes and post-truth, exacerbate conflicts ..., but also respect for the dignity of each person, caring for nature, compassion for the vulnerable, the greatness of justice and solidarity.

That is why a subject is necessary in education, a space to reflect on the behaviors that are learned in the street and to choose with arguments those that are really worthwhile ”.

In 2018, a parliamentary consensus agreed that 'Ethics' would be taught in 4th year of ESO.Sergio García Sánchez / EPS

The Italian essayist Nuccio Ordine, author of one of the loudest knockers in book form against the progressive disappearance of the humanities in the order of priorities of educational systems at a global level, does not think exactly the same:

The usefulness of the useless

(Cliff) .

The professor at the University of Calabria is not in favor of specific subjects, but rather of a transversal spectrum that manages to cover the entire Civic Education (which is, in fact, the subject studied in Italy, albeit in a residual way, compared to to the French case, where Moral and Civic Education is taught as one of the preferred subjects).

“I think a fundamental mistake is made: there is no single discipline that can educate for citizenship.

All disciplines, in a transversal way, must contribute to the main objective of education: to form educated citizens capable of embracing the great values ​​that make us more human: democracy, justice, freedom, love for the common good, solidarity, pluralism, protection of the environment. environment, fight against inequalities… ”.

And he highlights the importance not only of the aptitudes, but also of the attitudes, of each teacher: “A good Literature or Philosophy teacher who reads Seneca in class will be able to make his students understand that only those who live for others can live for himself: that simple page will serve to question the common places against the foreigner or the different that today feed hatred and racism.

In the same way, the professors of Biology or Physics can show to what extent they are dangerous who, despising science, affirm that the Earth is flat or that vaccines are a serious threat ”.

One of the issues that have raised the most blisters among those like Nuccio Ordine who believe that the humanities are condemned to a slow death at school is the supposed professionalization of the student.

In other words: the important thing is that they prepare you in the technical and technological skills necessary to have a better chance of obtaining a job, and the rest are cheap speculations of intellectuals.

The most extreme and recent exponent of this school is George Mason University professor in Virginia (USA) Bryan Caplan, author of

The Case Against Education.

In his book he writes things like: "If you really want to learn, it is better to buy reference books or watch good tutorials on YouTube than to go to school or university."

Caplan, a libertarian economist who should not be paid more attention than fair, believes that school education is "widely overrated" and that "governments should stop supporting it so much and financing it so much."

Of course, it is surely better to listen to Nuccio Ordine, who has his own and argued position on the question: “Isn't it a way of washing the conscience to institute the time of civic and ethical values ​​in a school that makes students believe that Should the study respond to market demands?

We have forgotten that it is necessary to study above all to learn to live and to strive to be better ”.

Lucía Bodas, doctor in Philosophy and professor of Philosophy in high school and of Theory of Knowledge in international baccalaureate, coincides with him in the essentials at the private school Brains School María Lombillo in Madrid.

“Ha, ha, ha, yes, I have spoken with students who have told me that they have not taken Philosophy because it does not give money!

Maybe they still don't know that there are philosophers out there with a lot of money! ”He jokes.

More seriously, sitting in the lobby, she explains: "Education is not just about getting a job, it is about training yourself as a person, and you don't get trained if you don't know how to think critically."

Inquiry, emotional intelligence, coexistence ...

Among the educational projects of public and private schools to train in ethics, this center is a model of philosophical teachings taught from the first age to the end of the high school cycle.

Projects such as Philosophy for Children, School of Inquiry, Emotional Intelligence Program, Coexistence Plan or the Debate Club backbone education in school values, taught in both English and Spanish.

Regarding the debate around the specificity or transversality of the subject of Ethics, its director, Cristina Miralles, explains: “It is key to contemplate the student from both a human and a citizen facet.

The values ​​of freedom, respect, coexistence and honesty do not have because you are born with them, they have to be learned ”.

Miralles opts for a transversal vocation of teaching in ethics, and because it is linked to that of civic and citizen values: “The values ​​of citizenship must be maintained.

Ethics do not work for oneself, but in order to be in society ”, he reflects with the childish bustle of the patio hour as the background soundtrack.

One of the teachers at the center, Sergio Rodríguez, who teaches Philosophy and Ethical Values ​​in primary school, explains what that kind of self-protective shield is like that this center uses in the face of eventual ups and downs in educational laws: “Our pedagogical system allows us to always be present in our classes the disposition to philosophical thought, and whether or not there is a law that supports us ”.

And how?

“Procuring in the children the astonishment, the methodical doubt and the audacity to construct their own thought;

our method is the motivating question, which tries to look a little beyond the protocol and the politically correct to generate in children a feeling at least of strangeness, taking them, as they say now, from their comfort zone ”.

A school, it could be said, with its own laws regarding the education of philosophical subjects ...

The political disaffection of young people is at the center of the debate on citizen ethics.Sergio García Sánchez / EPS

His colleague, Professor Lucía Bodas, is openly upset at the Ministry's plans.

She opts for specificity: “The exclusion of Ethics as an autonomous matter seems to me a very serious error.

Although we approach all the subjects from a critical perspective, a specific subject is necessary that teaches to think critically and to understand why some points of view are better than others ”.

For her, it rains in the wet in terms of the treatment received by philosophical teachings: “The attitude of governments, whatever their color, has been very negative with Philosophy, and it is probably because Philosophy is uncomfortable, it has that point of dangerous because it doesn't take things for granted;

and at this moment in which we are living things like post-truth and alternative facts, leaving children without a tool like Ethics seems like outrage to me ”.

One of her students, Claudia Moreno, 16, who is in the 1st year of international baccalaureate, supports her thesis decisively: “Some believe that ethics is something innate in the human being, but it is not: ethics is learned, it is something that needs reflection and learning.

They can teach us rules, but I need to know the reason for those rules.

And ethics is that: it strengthens reflection and critical thinking ”.

Either as a specific subject or as the LOMLOE has decided, together with civic and citizen values, the truth is that many of the voices consulted for this report agree that the teaching of Ethics should serve to cure one of the great diseases current social issues: the deep and growing disaffection of citizens - and especially the youngest - for political issues.

So close the debate with the voice of Claudia Moreno, a student nothing more ... and nothing less: “We are, by nature, quite lazy when it comes to thinking and questioning things, but it is an exercise that we have to do voluntarily.

We can choose not to vote, not to be interested in the political life of our country, but from the perspective of a young person it is essential that we get involved in it, because we are going to be the future and, if we don't, who will? Are you going to do it?

Hey, who's going to do it?

Neither Aristotle nor his idiots could have put it better.