If you asked most Philosophers where Western Philosophy began, they would probably say “Ancient Athens” and leave it at that. But if you kept buzzing at them, gadfly-like, they would likely cite Socrates’s challenge to the Sophists for the hearts and minds of Athens’ youth (read: male, propertied elite) on the question of whether they should learn the Sophists’ art of winning arguments regardless of whether or not one is in the right, or instead Socratic pursuit of truth for its own sake. This is the mythic origin of the Philosopher’s creed that truth is more important than influence and other worldly goods. The unexamined life, as the say goes, is not worth living. And that  examination must be rigorous even if the rigor leads you toward denial of the world and your self. It’s a heady principle, with more than a little resonance with Christian asceticism. Socrates, too, was a martyr after all.

“Two words, fellows; two words: hemlock smoothies!”

I though about all this recently while pondering an open letter from San Jose State University’s Philosophy Department to Harvard Philosophy Professor Michael Sandel. (You can see the letter here and Dr. Sandel’s response here.) At issue is the attempt by the San Jose State to offer Sandel’s famous course on justice as a MOOC – a massive open online course. (If you don’t know what a MOOC is, you might consider it the educational equivalent of World of Warcraft. And if you don’t know what World of Warcraft is, I’m not going to corrupt your pristine worldview further here.)

This is actually a Moog synthesizer, not a MOOC. Isn’t it pretty?

The background for this case is the ongoing effort by colleges and universities to use technology to control instructional costs – an effort that has largely failed to date – and the corresponding response by faculties across the country to prevent what they see as the mechanization and de-professionalization of teaching. This letter fits neatly into the debate as it has developed to date, but is nevertheless noteworthy for being so public and for making a justice-based appeal to one of the world’s most prominent theorist of justice. That, I suspect, is why it made the Chronicle of Higher Education.

But that’s not why the letter interests me most. Instead, I’ve found myself thinking about how well it measures up to the standards of Socrates vs. those of the Sophists. Now, in Philosophical circles I’m using loaded terms here, and maybe even fighting words. The adjective “sophisticated” notwithstanding, no Philosopher wants to be compared to the Sophists. But I mean the comparison in good faith. It’s my view that the San Jose State Philosophy Department’s public protest holds up better if evaluated as a piece of political rhetoric, evaluated primarily on its persuasiveness, than if it is judged as an attempt at pursuing the truth in Socratic fashion. And I wonder if we should expect otherwise, even from Philosophers.

The letter’s argument is not by any means bad, but it does not meet the standards that I’m sure most of its authors would set for works in their field. Specifically, the authors: (1) direct their letter to Michael Sandel, but their disagreement is more properly with their university’s administration (and with similar-minded stakeholders in higher education generally), (2) don’t spend any significant time dealing with the values and interests motivating their opponents to offer this massive online class, and (3) pile their arguments on top of one another in a jumble instead of pulling each issue out for distinct consideration. Philosophically, each of these steps is a misstep, and collectively they threaten to turn the whole enterprise away from reasoning and toward rhetoric. The letter is otherwise well written. If a student majoring in another subject wrote such a piece in an upper level Philosophy class, her professor would likely praise it while noting at the end, “If you were a Philosophy major I would expect a little more from you at points.” A revised version directed toward the San Jose State administration, that dealt thoughtfully and charitably with the administration’s own words and positions, and treated each distinct issue independently would better exemplify Philosophy in practice. It might also lead the letter’s audience and authors alike to a greater understanding of this fraught moment in higher education, and even indicate some ways forward that would make effective use of new instructional technologies while preserving the aspects of the current system most professors would like to retain.

That may be setting the bar too high, but I do think that a more Philosophically rich letter than the one the San Jose Philosophy Department wrote could conceivably have such effects, bringing us at least a glimpse of the deeper truths of this situation rather than, in effect, just saying, “No!” to a perceived threat. Yet in that alternate universe, would anyone read such a letter? And would it persuade anyone who read it?  Those seem to me the relevant questions because the letter that appeared in our own universe is not only “sophisticated” in the three ways I listed, it is also highly effectively  so. By publicly targeting Michael Sandel, dismissing the motivations behind offering this MOOC, and layering their arguments one upon another in an emotionally resonant way, the department created a powerful piece of public persuasion. People are talking about it – at least as much as anyone ever talks about Philosophy departments. The bullet to bite here is this: let’s assume that this trade is necessary, and persuasiveness in this case comes at the cost of Philosophical rigor. Is the trade worth it? And how should we answer that question?

Cut to the house of a friend of a friend down in Portland, Oregon where I attended a barbecue last weekend.

Portlandia isn’t really making anything up.

At one point one of the attendees, a union organizer, told a story about being at a hotel in Washington D.C., realizing that the next hallway was full of demonstrators with, let us say, somewhat different political views from her own, along with their unattended homemade placards and signs, and being sorely tempted to engage in a little sabotage. When her six year old daughter started asking questions about this, she clarified that it’s never right to take someone else’s things without permission – “unless it’s politics,” in which case sabotage can be OK. My first thought was Philosophically smug: as a good Socrates-inflected liberal, I believe in free speech, particularly of the sort I disagree with – since, after all, that’s the only time that belief is tested (Why would I want to suppress speech I agree with?). Then I had my second thought: is that the right attitude for politics? This union organizer runs campaigns. She’s helped people. I still can’t agree with her on this issue of sabotage, but I also sympathize with the people she supports, who want decent wages and some job protections in an iffy economy, and who when faced with the choice between a little more wisdom or a little higher pay probably don’t hesitate long deciding.Go too far down this road toward political expediency and you can justify anything, which surely can’t be right. But do we really need to go all the way in the other direction, putting truth and reasoning and all that jazz ahead of persuasion and effectiveness?

I’ll answer this way: Philosophically the San Jose State Philosophy Department’s letter earns a C. I expect more from Philosophers. But politically it gets an A. I still long for the kind of analysis this group probably could write, that would honor their interests and values while also giving equal attention to the motivations of their opponents, some of whom sincerely want to provide students with good educations – and in the humanities no less – without leaving them with crippling loans. But I also know enough about how higher education makes decisions to know that no one’s waiting around for such analysis to help them make up their minds. I can long for the sort of debate Socrates would lead, but that may just not be feasible. Politics may necessarily be more like sausage-making. And the letter this Philosophy department actually wrote is pretty good sausage. If it earned a Philosophical F, I would reject it on those grounds. But it’s good enough Philosophically to pass, so I will cheer their political coup. Then I’ll root for this situation to work out well for everyone, including the students. Maybe even the orcs.

Picture credit: Jacques-Louis David, UC Santa Cruz, Portland Backyard Chicken Keepers.