How can stories contribute to ethical education, when they reach people who have already been shaped by many stories, including ethically problematic ones? This question is pursued here by considering Plato's allegory of the cave, focusing on a reading of it offered by Jonathan Lear. Lear claims that the cave allegory aims to undermine its…

This article explores the role of educators in our current environment, where truth and truthfulness must fight their corner in a world of 'alternative facts'. The article opens with a review of the effects of the 24/7 news cycle on our sense of the overall well-being of the world, then discusses the meaning of moral identity and questions whether…

This self-study examines my work as a teacher of "Moral Preparation for the Army," a program inspired by Freire and implemented in an Israeli public high school. Together with a fellow teacher educator serving as critical friend, I reflected on my practice through memory-work, and analyzed it in light of critical pedagogy. Looking back,…

One of R. S. Peters' interests was psychoanalysis. In this paper, I explore the relation between Peters' philosophy of moral education and his Freudian psychology. In section 2 of the paper, I introduce Peters' Freudian supplementation of the Piaget-Kohlberg model of moral development. To clarify the way in which Peters deals with two unresolved…

Kant's commitment to autonomy raises difficult questions about the very possibility of Kantian moral education, since appeal to external pedagogical guidance threatens to be in contradiction with autonomous virtue. Furthermore, moral education seems to involve getting good at something through repetition; but Kant seems to eschew the notion of…

Interest in the topic of wisdom-focused education has so far not resulted in empirically validated programs for teaching wisdom. To start filling this void, we explore the emerging empirical evidence concerning the fundamental elements required for understanding how one can foster wisdom, with a particular focus on wise reasoning. We define wise…

Iris Murdoch's famous case of M and D illustrates the moral importance of learning to see others in a more favourable light through renewed attention. Yet if we do not read this case in the wider context of Murdoch's work, we are liable to overlook the attitudes and transformations involved in coming to change one's mind as M does. Stanley Cavell…

In this paper I lay out the bare bones of my conception of practical reasoning, which I understand as similar in all relevant respects to theoretical reasoning except that (as it is put) the conclusion of practical reasoning is either action or intention, while the conclusion of theoretical reasoning is belief. I then turn to ask how, on this…

To make a convincing argument, people are nowadays expected to speak the language of economics. Neoliberalism has become notorious for making an economic worldview dominate politics, yet it offers only a partial and ideologically inclined explanation for the zeitgeist of today. This paper expands upon the term, or ideology, of economism as a…

In this essay, I try to make sense out of Kant's unusual concept of grace, particularly as regards its uneasy relationship to education within the context of the effort to overcome evil. The key to the puzzle, I argue, lies in what I call 'moral receptivity'. Part of education's job is to make us morally receptive to grace by preparing us for its…

The role of exemplification and exemplars is receiving increasing attention in educational theory. Usually, this is connected to emulation models in character and moral education. Exemplars in this framework are those who show us how to act and what to do, and inspire us emotionally to improve. In Hannah Arendt's unfinished work on judgement, the…

While Spinoza stipulates an ideal moral person in the propositions on the 'free man' in "Ethics" IV, this account does not seem to be intended to function as a pedagogical tool of political relevance. Hence, it does not seem to correspond to the purpose of moral exemplarism. If we look for that kind of practical guidance, Spinoza's…

In medicine, concern about preserving the humanity, empathy, and moral reasoning of prospective doctors during their medical education has spawned the field of medical humanities. Building on the logic of the medical humanities, I propose an educational humanities to support the relational, emotional, and ethical bases of teaching practice. After…

Within the rough ground that is the field of education there is a complex web of ethical obligations: to prepare our students for their future work; to be ethical as educators in our conduct and teaching; to the ethical principles embedded in the contexts in which we work; and given the Southern context of this work, the ethical obligations we…

As a famous contemporary educator and educational theorist in China, Jie Lu has always been concerned about people and their lives and moral conditions since the 1970s and 1980s. With this as the center, a systematic "human understanding" pedagogy and moral education were constructed. His thoughts reflect the times' distinctive…