WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:04.720 [music] 00:00:37.720 --> 00:00:44.800 Well, we could ask ourselves what the purpose of an educational system is 00:00:44.800 --> 00:00:50.550 and there are sharp differences on this matter. 00:00:50.550 --> 00:00:54.010 Now, there's the traditional interpretation 00:00:54.010 --> 00:00:57.469 that comes from the Enlightenment 00:00:57.469 --> 00:01:04.320 which holds that the highest goal in life is to inquire and create, NOTE Paragraph 00:01:04.320 --> 00:01:12.160 to search the riches of the past, 00:01:12.160 --> 00:01:18.720 and try to internalize the parts of them that are significant to you 00:01:18.720 --> 00:01:24.126 and carry that quest for understanding further in your own way. 00:01:24.126 --> 00:01:28.202 The purpose of education from that point of view 00:01:28.202 --> 00:01:34.970 is just to help people determine how to learn on their own. 00:01:35.076 --> 00:01:41.400 It's you, the learner, who is going to achieve in the course of education. 00:01:41.400 --> 00:01:46.388 It's really up to you what you'll master, 00:01:46.388 --> 00:01:49.268 where you'll go, how you'll use it. 00:01:49.268 --> 00:01:57.756 How you'll go on to produce something new and exciting for yourself, maybe for others. 00:01:57.756 --> 00:02:00.336 That's one concept of education. 00:02:00.336 --> 00:02:03.460 Now the other concept is essentially indoctrination. 00:02:03.460 --> 00:02:08.290 People have the idea that from childhood 00:02:08.290 --> 00:02:19.600 young people have to be placed into a framework in which they'll follow orders, 00:02:19.600 --> 00:02:24.360 accept existing frameworks, and not challenge. 00:02:24.360 --> 00:02:26.680 And this is often quite explicit. 00:02:26.680 --> 00:02:35.240 For example, after the activism of the1960s, 00:02:35.271 --> 00:02:42.052 there was great concern across much of the educated spectrum 00:02:42.052 --> 00:02:48.800 that young people were just getting too free and independent, 00:02:48.800 --> 00:02:52.640 that the country was becoming too democratic. 00:02:52.838 --> 00:02:59.160 There was an important study on what's called the crisis of democracy--too much democracy-- 00:02:59.160 --> 00:03:08.640 claiming that there are certain insitutions responsible for the indoctrination of the young-- 00:03:08.640 --> 00:03:13.120 that's their phrase-- and they're not doing their job properly. 00:03:13.120 --> 00:03:18.160 That schools, universities, churches---we have to change them 00:03:18.160 --> 00:03:22.223 so that they carry out the job of indoctrination and control more effectively. 00:03:22.223 --> 00:03:31.326 That's actually coming from the liberal internationalists' end of the spectrum of educated opinion. 00:03:31.480 --> 00:03:34.720 In fact, since that time there have been many measures taken 00:03:34.720 --> 00:03:40.951 to try to turn the educational system towards more control, 00:03:40.997 --> 00:03:45.360 more indoctrination, more vocational training. 00:03:45.360 --> 00:03:53.680 Imposing a debt which traps students--young people--into a life of conformity. 00:03:53.680 --> 00:04:01.760 That's the exact opposite of what I referred to as the tradition that comes out of the enlightenment. 00:04:01.760 --> 00:04:03.760 There's a constrant struggle between those. 00:04:03.760 --> 00:04:13.817 In the colleges and the schools, do you train for passing tests? 00:04:13.817 --> 00:04:18.368 Or do you train for creative inquiry? 00:04:18.368 --> 00:04:25.892 Pursuing interests that are aroused by material that's presented, you want to pursue either on your own 00:04:25.892 --> 00:04:27.120 or in cooperation with others. 00:04:27.120 --> 00:04:34.120 And this goes all the way through up to graduate school and research. 00:04:34.120 --> 00:04:37.680 Just two different ways of looking at the world. 00:04:37.680 --> 00:04:42.600 When you get to a research institution like the one we're now in, 00:04:42.600 --> 00:04:49.640 at the graduate level, it essentially follows the enlightment tradition. 00:04:49.640 --> 00:05:05.523 In fact, science couldn't progress unless it was based on inculcation of the urge to challenge, 00:05:05.523 --> 00:05:17.000 to question doctrine, question authority, search for alternatives, use your imagination freely of your own impulses. 00:05:17.000 --> 00:05:22.130 Cooperative work with others is constant as you can see just by walking down the halls. 00:05:22.130 --> 00:05:28.280 That's my view of what an educational system should be like down to kindergarten. 00:05:28.280 --> 00:05:34.809 But there certainly are powerful structures in society 00:05:34.809 --> 00:05:38.653 which would prefer people to be indoctrinated, 00:05:38.653 --> 00:05:43.804 to conform, to not ask too many questions, to be obedient, 00:05:43.896 --> 00:05:51.062 to fulfill the roles that are assigned to you and not shake systems of power and authority. 00:05:51.062 --> 00:06:01.140 Those are choices we have to make, wherever we stand in the educational system. 00:06:01.140 --> 00:06:07.520 As students, as teachers, as people on the outside trying to help shape it in the direction that we think it ought to go. 00:06:20.509 --> 00:06:28.175 Well there certainly has been a very substantial growth in new technology-- 00:06:28.175 --> 00:06:33.040 technology of information, communication, access interchange. 00:06:33.040 --> 00:06:37.967 It's surely a major change in the nature of the culture and society. 00:06:37.967 --> 00:06:44.654 We should bear in mind that the technological changes that are taking place now, 00:06:44.654 --> 00:06:51.574 while they're significant, probably come nowhere near having as much impact 00:06:51.574 --> 00:06:57.200 as technological advances of a century ago. 00:06:58.308 --> 00:07:02.597 Let's take just communication. 00:07:02.597 --> 00:07:13.563 The shift from a typewriter to a computer or a telephone to email is significant. 00:07:13.563 --> 00:07:20.645 But it doesn't begin to compare with a shift from a sailing vessel to a telegraph. 00:07:20.645 --> 00:07:27.360 The time that that cut down in communication between England and the United States 00:07:27.360 --> 00:07:31.884 was extraordinary as compared with the changes taking place now. 00:07:31.884 --> 00:07:34.484 The same is true of other kinds of technology. 00:07:34.484 --> 00:07:42.080 The introduction of widespread plumbing in the cities had a huge effect on health, 00:07:42.080 --> 00:07:45.908 much more than the discovery of antibiotics. 00:07:45.908 --> 00:07:48.200 So the changes are real and significant, 00:07:48.200 --> 00:07:53.571 but we should recognize that others have taken place that were much more dramatic. 00:07:53.571 --> 00:07:58.819 As far as the technology itself and education is concerned, 00:07:58.819 --> 00:08:04.995 technology is basically neutral. 00:08:04.995 --> 00:08:06.481 It's kind of like a hammer. 00:08:06.481 --> 00:08:11.822 The hammer doesn't care whether you use it to build a house 00:08:11.822 --> 00:08:15.909 or whether a torturer uses it to crush somebody's skull. 00:08:15.909 --> 00:08:17.905 A hammer can do either. 00:08:17.905 --> 00:08:22.320 Same with modern technology, say, the internet, and so on. 00:08:22.320 --> 00:08:27.280 The internet is extremely valuable if you know what you're looking for. 00:08:27.280 --> 00:08:30.320 I use it all the time for research, I'm sure everyone does. 00:08:30.320 --> 00:08:35.880 If you know what you're looking for, you have a kind of framework of understanding 00:08:35.880 --> 00:08:39.825 which directs you through particular things, 00:08:39.825 --> 00:08:43.623 and lets you sideline lots of others. 00:08:43.623 --> 00:08:46.745 then this can be a very valuable tool. 00:08:46.905 --> 00:08:48.881 Of course, you always have to be willing to ask 00:08:48.881 --> 00:08:50.413 "Is my framework the right one?" 00:08:50.413 --> 00:08:52.040 "Maybe I have to modify it. 00:08:52.040 --> 00:08:57.920 "Maybe if there's something I look at that questions it, I should rethink how I'm looking at things." 00:08:57.920 --> 00:09:08.897 But you can't pursue any kind of inquiry without a relatively clear framework 00:09:08.897 --> 00:09:14.887 that's directing your search and helping you choose what's significant and what isn't. 00:09:14.887 --> 00:09:17.720 What can be put aside, what can be pursued, 00:09:17.720 --> 00:09:20.971 what ought to be challenged, what ought to be developed. 00:09:20.971 --> 00:09:25.801 You can't expect somebody to become a biologist 00:09:25.801 --> 00:09:35.040 by giving them access to the Harvard University biology library 00:09:35.040 --> 00:09:37.120 and say, "Just look through it." 00:09:37.120 --> 00:09:40.080 That'll give them nothing. 00:09:40.080 --> 00:09:43.494 The internet is the same except magnified enormously. 00:09:43.494 --> 00:09:47.320 If you don't understand or know what you're looking for, 00:09:47.320 --> 00:09:51.320 if you don't have some kind of conception of what matters-- 00:09:51.320 --> 00:09:56.497 always with the proviso that you're willing to question-- 00:09:56.497 --> 00:10:03.649 if you don't have that, exploring the internet 00:10:03.649 --> 00:10:08.897 is just picking out random factoids that don't mean anything. 00:10:08.897 --> 00:10:16.885 Behind any significant use of contemporary technology-- 00:10:16.885 --> 00:10:22.643 the internet, communications systems, graphics, whatever it may be-- 00:10:22.643 --> 00:10:33.120 unless behind it is a well constructed, directive, conceptual apparatus, 00:10:33.120 --> 00:10:37.643 it is very unlikely to be helpful. 00:10:37.643 --> 00:10:39.120 It may turn out to be harmful. 00:10:39.120 --> 00:10:43.913 For example, random exploration through the internet 00:10:43.913 --> 00:10:48.040 turns out to be a cult generator. 00:10:48.040 --> 00:10:51.900 You pick up a factoid here, a factoid there 00:10:51.900 --> 00:10:53.920 and somebody else refers to it. 00:10:53.920 --> 00:10:58.820 All of sudden you have some sort of crazed picture 00:10:58.846 --> 00:11:02.256 which has some factual basis but nothing to do with the world. 00:11:02.256 --> 00:11:05.920 You have to know how to evaluate, interpret, and understand. 00:11:05.920 --> 00:11:09.920 Say biology again. 00:11:09.920 --> 00:11:13.402 The person who wins the Nobel prize in biology 00:11:13.402 --> 00:11:18.742 is not the person who read the most journal articles and took the most notes on them. 00:11:18.742 --> 00:11:20.800 It's the person who knew what to look for. 00:11:20.800 --> 00:11:25.894 And cultivating that capacity to seek what's significant-- 00:11:25.894 --> 00:11:30.240 always willing to question whether you're on the right track-- 00:11:30.240 --> 00:11:34.080 that's what education is going to be about. 00:11:34.080 --> 00:11:38.805 Whether it's using computers and the internet or pencil and paper and books. 00:11:53.630 --> 00:11:59.285 Well, education is discussed in terms of whether it's a worthwhile investment. 00:11:59.285 --> 00:12:01.754 Does it create human capital 00:12:01.754 --> 00:12:05.229 that can be used for economic growth and so on. 00:12:05.229 --> 00:12:14.981 And it's a very distorting way to even pose the question, I think. 00:12:14.981 --> 00:12:22.226 Do we want to have a society of free, creative, independent individuals, 00:12:22.226 --> 00:12:29.555 able to appreciate and to gain from the cultural achievements of the past, and to add to them? 00:12:29.571 --> 00:12:30.817 Do we want that? 00:12:30.817 --> 00:12:34.560 Or do we want people who can increase GDP? 00:12:34.560 --> 00:12:39.348 It's not necessarily the same thing. 00:12:39.348 --> 00:12:49.811 An education of the kind that Bertrand Russell, John Dewey and others talked about, 00:12:49.811 --> 00:12:52.240 That's a value in itself. 00:12:52.240 --> 00:12:56.731 Whatever impact it has in the society, it's a value 00:12:56.731 --> 00:13:00.840 because it helps create better human beings. 00:13:00.840 --> 00:13:04.000 After all, that's what an educational system should be for. 00:13:04.000 --> 00:13:06.320 On the other hand, if you want to look at it 00:13:06.320 --> 00:13:09.734 in terms of costs and benefits, 00:13:09.734 --> 00:13:15.818 take the new technology that we were just talking about, where did that come from? 00:13:15.818 --> 00:13:19.400 Well, actually a lot of it was developed right where we're sitting, 00:13:19.400 --> 00:13:27.056 Down below where we now are was a major laboratory back in the 1950s, 00:13:27.056 --> 00:13:29.360 where i was employed in fact. 00:13:29.360 --> 00:13:39.223 Which had lots of scientists, engineers, people of all kinds of interests-- 00:13:39.223 --> 00:13:40.560 philosophers, others. 00:13:40.560 --> 00:13:45.523 Who were working on developing the basic character 00:13:45.523 --> 00:13:51.480 and even the basic tools of the technology that has now come. 00:13:51.480 --> 00:13:53.520 Computers and the internet for example, 00:13:53.520 --> 00:13:58.840 were pretty much in the public sector for decades, 00:13:58.840 --> 00:14:04.400 funded in places like this, where people were exploring new possibilities 00:14:04.400 --> 00:14:08.898 that were mostly unthought of, unheard of at the time. 00:14:08.898 --> 00:14:10.895 Some of them worked, some didn't. 00:14:10.895 --> 00:14:14.982 The ones that worked were finally converted into tools that people could use. 00:14:14.982 --> 00:14:18.976 Now that's the way scientific progress takes place. 00:14:18.976 --> 00:14:24.847 It's the way that cultural progress takes place generally. 00:14:24.847 --> 00:14:28.800 Classical artists, for example, 00:14:28.800 --> 00:14:33.976 came out of a tradition of craftsmanship that was developed 00:14:33.976 --> 00:14:38.680 over long periods with master artisans, with others. 00:14:38.680 --> 00:14:47.211 Sometimes you can rise on their shoulders and create new, marvelous things. 00:14:47.211 --> 00:14:51.533 But it doesn't come from nowhere. 00:14:51.533 --> 00:14:59.982 If there isn't a lively cultural and educational system 00:14:59.982 --> 00:15:06.205 which is geared towards encouraging creative exploration, 00:15:06.205 --> 00:15:16.760 independence of thought, willingness to challenge accepted beliefs. 00:15:16.760 --> 00:15:24.560 If you don't have that you won't get the technology that will lead to economic gains. 00:15:24.560 --> 00:15:32.537 Though that I don't think is the prime purpose of cultural enrichment in education. 00:15:46.755 --> 00:15:56.480 There is, in the recent period particularly, an increasing shaping of education 00:15:56.497 --> 00:16:03.930 from the early ages on towards passing examinations. 00:16:03.930 --> 00:16:12.120 Taking tests can be of some use, both for the person who is taking the test-- 00:16:12.120 --> 00:16:16.920 seeing what I know, and where I am, and what I'm achieving-- 00:16:16.920 --> 00:16:23.620 and for instructors--what should be changed and improved in developing 00:16:23.620 --> 00:16:26.640 the course of instruction. 00:16:26.640 --> 00:16:29.480 But beyond that, they don't really tell you much. 00:16:29.480 --> 00:16:36.299 I mean I know for many many years, I've been on admissions committees 00:16:36.299 --> 00:16:42.880 for entry into advanced graduate programs-- 00:16:42.880 --> 00:16:45.215 maybe one of the most advanced anywhere-- 00:16:45.215 --> 00:16:50.602 and we of course pay some attention to test results, but really not too much. 00:16:50.602 --> 00:17:00.215 A person can do magnificently on every test and understand very little. 00:17:00.215 --> 00:17:05.138 All of us who've been through schools and colleges and universities 00:17:05.138 --> 00:17:06.531 are very familiar with this. 00:17:06.531 --> 00:17:14.920 You can be in some course in which you have no interest 00:17:14.920 --> 00:17:18.466 and there's demand that you pass a test, 00:17:18.466 --> 00:17:20.920 and you can study hard for the test, 00:17:20.920 --> 00:17:25.732 and you can ace it. 00:17:25.732 --> 00:17:30.791 And a couple of weeks later you've forgotten what the topic was. 00:17:30.791 --> 00:17:32.630 I'm sure we've all had that experience. 00:17:32.630 --> 00:17:33.720 I know I have. 00:17:33.720 --> 00:17:39.132 It can be a useful device if it contributes 00:17:39.132 --> 00:17:43.219 to the constructive purposes of education. 00:17:43.219 --> 00:17:46.376 If it's just a set of hurdles you have to cross, 00:17:46.376 --> 00:17:49.627 it can turn out to be not only meaningless, 00:17:49.627 --> 00:17:52.367 but it can divert you away from things that you want to be doing. 00:17:52.367 --> 00:17:56.320 I see this regularly when I talk to teachers. 00:17:56.320 --> 00:18:00.541 If you want an experience from a couple of weeks ago-- 00:18:00.541 --> 00:18:06.299 I happeneed to be talking to a group which included many schoolteachers. 00:18:06.299 --> 00:18:09.120 One of them was a sixth grade teacher 00:18:09.120 --> 00:18:12.200 who teaches kids who are ten or eleven. 00:18:12.200 --> 00:18:18.374 She came up to me afterwards and I'd been talking about these students. 00:18:18.374 --> 00:18:24.132 She told me of an experience that she had just had in her class. 00:18:24.132 --> 00:18:30.640 After class a little girl came up to her and said she was really interested 00:18:30.640 --> 00:18:35.371 in something that came up and she asked if the teacher could give her some ideas 00:18:35.371 --> 00:18:37.042 of how she could look into it further. 00:18:37.042 --> 00:18:39.364 And the teacher was compelled to tell her, 00:18:39.364 --> 00:18:41.680 "I'm sorry, but you can't do that, 00:18:41.680 --> 00:18:46.080 "you have to study to pass this national exam 00:18:46.080 --> 00:18:49.320 "that's coming that's going to determine your future." 00:18:49.320 --> 00:18:51.680 The teacher didn't say it, "but it's going to determine my future, 00:18:51.680 --> 00:18:57.522 whether I am rehired." 00:18:57.522 --> 00:19:01.470 The system is geared to getting the children to pass hurdles, 00:19:01.470 --> 00:19:04.680 but not to learn and understand and explore. 00:19:04.680 --> 00:19:10.061 That child would have been better off if she had been allowed to explore 00:19:10.061 --> 00:19:14.960 what she was interested in and maybe not do so well on the test about things she wasn't interested in. 00:19:14.960 --> 00:19:19.760 They'll come along when they fit into her interests and concerns. 00:19:19.760 --> 00:19:26.547 So, I don't say that tests should be eliminated, 00:19:26.547 --> 00:19:30.123 they can be a useful educational tool. 00:19:30.123 --> 00:19:35.975 But ancillary--something that is helping improve ourselves, 00:19:35.975 --> 00:19:39.550 for instructors, and others, what we're doing--tell us where we are. 00:19:39.550 --> 00:19:51.676 Passing tests doesn't begin to compare with searching 00:19:51.676 --> 00:19:59.080 and inquiring into pursuing topics that engage us and excite us. 00:19:59.080 --> 00:20:02.720 That's far more significant than passing tests. 00:20:02.720 --> 00:20:09.133 In fact, if that's the kind of educational career 00:20:09.133 --> 00:20:11.200 that you're given the opportunity to pursue, 00:20:11.200 --> 00:20:14.380 you'll remember what you discovered. 00:20:14.380 --> 00:20:17.680 (Someone) is a world famous physicist 00:20:17.680 --> 00:20:27.720 right here at MIT who was teaching freshman courses. 00:20:27.720 --> 00:20:32.249 He once said that in his freshman course, 00:20:32.249 --> 00:20:36.720 students will ask, "What are we going to cover this semester?" 00:20:36.720 --> 00:20:39.095 And his standard answer was, 00:20:39.095 --> 00:20:42.560 "It doesn't matter what we cover, it matters what you discover." 00:20:42.560 --> 00:20:43.963 That's right. 00:20:43.963 --> 00:20:49.840 Teaching ought to be inspiring students to discover on their own. 00:20:49.840 --> 00:20:55.387 To challenge if they don't agree. 00:20:55.387 --> 00:20:59.120 To look for alternatives if they think there are better ones. 00:20:59.120 --> 00:21:05.046 To work through the great achievements of the past and try to master them on their own 00:21:05.046 --> 00:21:06.360 because they're interested in them. 00:21:06.360 --> 00:21:12.560 If that's the way teaching is done, 00:21:12.560 --> 00:21:19.211 students will really gain from it and will not only remember what they've studied 00:21:19.211 --> 00:21:22.800 but be able to use it as a basis for going on their own. 00:21:22.800 --> 00:21:25.062 And again, education is really aimed 00:21:25.062 --> 00:21:31.471 at helping students get to the point where they can learn on their own. 00:21:31.471 --> 00:21:35.464 Because that's what you're going to do for you life. 00:21:35.464 --> 99:59:59.999 Not just absorb materials that are given to you from the outside and repeat it.