Natorp on Social Education: A Paideia for all Ages :: Teaching Education Philosophy

Natorp on Social Education A Paideia for all AgesABSTRACT In Man and his Circumstances Ortega as Educator, Robert McClintock says that American educators have forgotten astir(predicate) the influence of Natorp. This essay proposes to discuss Natorps Platonic and Neo-Kantian view of the human be and of knowledge as a foundation to all education. It will get a line the influence of Friedrich Schleiermacher, the distinguished German philosopher, and of the great Swiss educator, Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi, on Natorps ideas. In Natorps view of Socialpadagogik (Social Education), it is non possible to have any positive sociable or political change without great alterations in educational philosophy. The name of the American educator, Robert Hutchins, will be discussed and defended as an exemplary attempt in the practice of higher education of these ideals. Although Hutchins programs were adapted for but a piddling time by the University of Chicago and by a few lilliputian liberal a rts colleges, his influence, as well as that of American disciples of Natorp and Pestalozzi, remedy has lasting value, since it is based on the idea that we are all souls in development. Paul Natorps several important works on the philosophy of education, such as Pestalozzi Sein Leben und seine Ideen, (1) are grounded in his Neo-Kantian epistemology. The post 1900 Natorp expanded his possibleness of knowledge from the purely Neo-Kantian idea that the Ding an Sich and the noumenal world were not only unknowable but also could not even be posited as existing. He expanded it to include the idea that the Ding an Sich is the X at the borders of the known which always moves into the unknown. As Natorp puts it in his own words, Erkenntnis ist nicht stillstand, sondern ewiger Fortgang. (2) (Knowlege is not rest still, but is eternal movement.) Our experience builds on itself. Each individual must(prenominal) be treated as a living soul ceaselessly building on experience in life (Erleb nis). Science is not the only criterion for knowledge, but the philosophical examination of the growth or degradation of the soul becomes the standard. In this sense, Natorp is a Neo-Platonist, because he does not serve limits to the possibilities of the soul. However, he never actually speaks of metempsychosis. This idea is noumenal. Finally, Natorps view of religion is inbred here. Religion is also not knowledge, but it is a repository of the rules of chaste behavior which should, nevertheless, be determined by reason.