Ethics, Dewey, Aristotle, and Plato discussion.

Tonight’s discussion about ethics, Plato, Dewey and Aristotle appeared to be interesting with the numerous points brought up about the law, consequences and the four steps to knowledge (imagination, belief, thought and understanding). What shaped the four steps are things like imagination vs. reality, what people believe is true, abstract thought and reasoning. Plato’s belief that both understanding and thought are the two largest components of education helped to shape the field as we know it today.

The statement about how education serves as a complete transformation of a person can be taken for truth. Starting with elementary school and moving up through either college or graduate school, the knowledge that one attains helps to not only transform them, it also shapes their thinking for the most part. While it seems easy to claim that what knowledge one attains is hard to forget, there is also the truth that if you either let that knowledge cease by not using it, then there is the small chance that you will forget what you learn. For example, what someone mentioned about their father talking about parallel and perpendicular lines while working at the Bowater facility.

Often, there is a social division between those that are educated and those that are not. Dewey argues that a great majority of the working class have no insights into social pursuits. No matter where one goes in this country, there is often resentment (everywhere) between those who are fortunate enough to get a liberal arts education in college and the rest of society that opted to straight to work after high school.

Finally, what is the right thing to do in school? Should be a question that students ask themselves before deciding to either cheat on a test or plagiarize their final paper. When it comes down to doling out punishment, there are two sides that teachers can take in dealing with a student who has been found guilty of an academic crime. Consequentialists like to believe that if the teacher lets the student get away with it, then the best thing to do is keep silent and hope that no one knows about the situation. On the other hand, non-consequentialists like to believe that the question “is the student actually learning anything by re-writing a paper going to teach them anything?” should be asked.