Socratic questioning

In the Meno, Socrates says the following about his pupil:

S: Do you think that before he would have tried to find out that which he thought he knew though he did not, before he fell into perplexity and realised he did not know but longed to know?

M: I do not think so, Socrates

S: Has he then benefitted from being numbed?

M: Yes

I wish to take this idea and explore it further. Socrates contends that in order to feel philosophical problems as puzzling, as problematic, we must sometimes be confronted directly with the problem, with what remains unresolved. By posing short closed questions with straightforward answers, Socrates enables his interlocutors to follow the premises of their arguments straight up to their problematic conclusions. Because they had their eyes on each step along the way, when they look up at the outcome of their process of reasoning they are struck with aporia; a feeling of puzzlement which forces them to re-assess what they had previously thought.

I think there are four particular ways that Socrates questions his interlocutors in a leading way that can be employed in philosophy with children.

(1) Questioning which highlights the inferences that lead to a puzzling conclusion

‘Is the train moving?’
‘Yes’
‘Is the ball stuck to the train?’
‘Yes’
‘If the train is moving, and the ball is stuck to the train, is the ball moving?’

In this type of questioning, the facilitator sets out premises which are relatively uncontroversial to the student in the form of questions. Because each step is clearly signposted, the eventual inference to the conclusion is easily grasped and the problem is felt directly and immediately. The student is often torn between thinking that the premises must be true, so the conclusion must be true, and the competing intuition that ‘the ball isn’t moving- look!’ This forces the student to find a way out of the puzzle- either by accepting the conclusion, making a distinction (e.g. there is a difference between ‘moving by itself’ and ‘moving with’) or rejecting the implied dichotomy between moving and not moving (e.g. ‘it could be moving and not moving at the same time. In a way it is moving and in a way it isn’t moving). All of these strategies are motivated by an acknowledgement that there is something problematic that needs to be resolved.

(2) Questioning which lays bear the specific application of general principles

‘What do you own?’
‘What you have made’
‘Have you made your bed?’
‘No’
‘Do you own your bed?’
‘Yes’

This type of questioning is taken from the logical strategy of reducing your opponents’ claims to absurdity (i.e. reductio ad absurdum). After a general principle is introduced and a specific example has been identified which poses a counter-example (from a student), this strategy can be employed. The student must then either reject or amend the general principle, or amend the specific example so that it fits with the general principle. In both cases, the main problem is one of alignment; the particular case and the general principle are not in sync with each other.

(3) Questioning which presents a dichotomy and challenges people to resolve it

Is the ball moving and not moving?
Yes
Are moving and not moving the same or different?
Different.
If they’re different, can the ball be moving and not moving?
Yes
Is it moving and not moving at the same time?
Yes
Is it moving and not moving in the same way?

This strategy can help students to see the force of logical opposition. It seems that moving and not moving are opposed to each other, so only one can be true. This is an application of Aristotle’s law of noncontradiction. If students do see a problem with saying that they are moving and not moving at the same time and in the same way, they may try to resolve the problem by saying that they move in a different way, or at different times, or perhaps it seems to not be moving but it really is. These are all logical ways of attempting to find a way out of a straightforward contradiction.

(4) Questioning which unpicks circular reasoning

So is it true because he said it?
Yes
And why did he say it?
Because it’s true.

Sometimes students will just say something that is blatantly circular. In this situation, it is best to follow the circle all the way around so that they can see it for themselves and in the process perhaps other students will notice as well.

Ten reasons to do philosophy with children

There are many reasons for doing philosophy with young children and different justifications will appeal to different audiences. Schools may be particularly interested in the benefits to speaking and listening and progress in literacy and numeracy. Parents may be interested in how it engages children with the rest of their education. Academics might be more concerned about long-term and systemic factors. Moreover, some philosophers might welcome philosophy for children for the intrinsic value in philosophy itself. This diversity is to be welcomed. No single justification of philosophy with children need be given. Rather, a broader approach might be more appropriate which incorporates utilitarian and idealistic, short-term and long-term, political and non-political reasons for doing it. I think different justifications can be given for philosophy that are notionally separate and appeal to different interested parties.

1. Philosophy helps students to reason confidently and not be taken advantage of

The purposes of public education are varied, but we might say that one of the most important is the creation of an engaged citizenry who know enough not to be taken advantage of. Journalists have a special role in this respect, but more broadly in a democracy it is vital that everyone has the ability to reason for themselves so that they are not (overly) swayed by charisma, cheap rhetoric, and unsubstantiated claims. In philosophy children are not given prescribed answers to difficult ethical and political questions. They need to come to their own conclusions on the basis of reasons and evidence that can be used to defend their views to others. The facilitator encourages students to think for themselves by using others’ views as counter-weights to students’ own views.

2. Philosophy plays a key role in cultivating students’ curiosity by highlighting ‘known unknowns’; things that we know we don’t know

According to the psychologist George Loewenstein, curiosity arises when we acknowledge a gap between what we don’t know and what we could know that we want to fill. The first part of engaging our curiosity is acknowledging that a gap worth filling exists. The former US secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld once said that ‘There are known knowns, thing we know we know. There are known unknowns, that is to say there are things we know that we don’t know. There are also unknown unknowns, things that we don’t know that we don’t know.’ We might say that a large part of philosophy consists in moving from things that we don’t know we don’t know to things that we know we don’t know. In philosophy we often begin with questions that appear unproblematic. During the course of our discussions students come to acknowledge the problematic nature of their world; they come to see puzzles that they didn’t know were there. For example, a discussion on thoughts often leads to a discussion of whether the mind is different from the brain. Prior to the discussion students may not have known that they didn’t know the relation of mind to brain. By the end of the lesson some will have come to the conclusion that they know they don’t know (or, at the very least, are aware that a puzzle exists that demands resolution).

3. Philosophy encourages people to find out what they really think, rather than what they think they should think, or what they are told to think. It is a powerful tool for self-discovery

Some students find school an alien world. The subjects they study, and the knowledge they acquire, is ‘out there’; something foreign and imposed. In philosophy, students are encouraged to think with their own experiences, intuitions, and judgements. This requires a shift of responsibility for self-correction and evaluation from the teacher to the student. An authority figure will not step in to evaluate their views or correct them. Rather, they will need to justify their views and give an account for their reasons in a company of their peers. The opportunity to air their views in a public forum has an additional advantage for the self’s recognition of itself. The German mystic Jakob Boehme claimed that ‘nothing is revealed to itself without opposition.’ In philosophy students are presented with opposition to their own views. This means that they see their view as their own; not as the definitive view that everyone has.

4. Philosophy enables students to look beyond what the truth/the answer is, to see how we can show it is the truth and what makes it the truth

It is a common refrain in philosophy enquiries; but what is the answer, Miss? If we point to the whole answer, we make the answer the whole point, which it isn’t. Of any answer, even in supposedly answer-focused subjects like maths at primary level, we can ask what makes it the answer and how we can show it is the answer. If you can’t give a reason for your answer, then there’s no reason to say it is the answer! Philosophy helps us to shift our preoccupation away from the destination to the process of arriving there. The destination by itself doesn’t tell the story of justification, and indeed correct answers can be arrived through faulty justification. Philosophy shines a spotlight on this process we take to arrive at our conclusions.

5. Philosophy provides an educational setting in which critical thinking is both acknowledged and encouraged

There are a number of critical thinking moves that philosophy can help to encourage and promote. The following are some examples:

– Asking questions

– Agreeing/disagreeing

– Giving reasons

– Offering a proposition, hypothesis or explanation

– Making inferences

– Making distinctions

– Making comparisons

– Reevaluating

– Giving an example or counter-example

– Entertaining multiple perspectives

– Classifying

– Making analogies

– Offering definitions

– Reasoning syllogistically

– Identifying assumptions

– Re-stating others’ views

6. Philosophy can help forge links between seemingly disconnected, disparate subjects

Philosophy, according to the philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein, is ‘not a body of doctrine, but an activity.’ It might best be considered not as a subject in its own right but as a critical method of examining the assumptions and presuppositions that underlie all other subjects. In philosophy sessions we might alternate between discussing questions about value, art, science, mathematics, and religion. This crisscrossing approach encourages students to make connections between areas of inquiry that are commonly considered separate. The writer Robert Twigger points out that between birth and the age of ten or eleven, a part of the brain called the ‘nucleus basalisis’ is permanently switched on. This contains a large quantity of the neurotransmitter acetylcholine which means that new connections are being made all the time. In early childhood, children are learning all the time and combining their experiences in creative ways. Philosophy can help to nurture this natural polymathic tendency in young people before the brain becomes more selective in later teenage years.

7. Philosophy encourages intellectual stamina; the persistence needed to deal with difficult problems

Darren Chetty argues that ‘philosophy requires comfort with discomfort.’ Many of the most intractable puzzles in philosophy stem from discomfort with how things, concepts, and ideas fit together. The philosopher is often confronted with confusion and doubt in their attempt to understand the world. Instead of dispelling doubt through dogma or a defeatist relativist attitude (‘I guess we must all be right then’) philosophers sit with their doubts as long as necessary and work to resolve them patiently. As children come to understand the puzzles of philosophy the facilitator encourages them to identify what is puzzling, identify possible ways of resolving it, and then see if these work. This can help develop intellectual stamina and resilience; the willingness to stay with the problems longer.

8. Philosophy prepares children for the future of work by encouraging them to view the world as something open for innovation and improvement

In a widely circulated video on YouTube, the late Apple CEO Steve Jobs talks about the secret of life as he sees it. He says, “when you grow up you’re told that the world is a certain way and your life is just to live within the world, try not to bash into the walls too much, try to have a nice family life, have fun, get a little money. But that’s a very limited life. Life can be much broader than that once you discover one simple fact, that everything that you call life was made up by other people who are no smarter than you and you can change it…That’s maybe the most important thing; to shake off the erroneous notion that life is there and you are you just going to live in it versus embrace it, change it, improve it, make your mark on it.” Philosophy with children can encourage students to view “the world” not as something given but as something which is up for negotiation and improvement. Philosophy dissolves the fixity of the real by encouraging us to think of alternative ways of living and of thinking, and examining the suppositions that underlie the “real world.” As Jennifer Morton notes, ‘Philosophy allows us to question how things are and, often, to realise that how things are isn’t how they have or ought to be.’ It is a critical antidote to complacency and a naïve realism that views the contingent factors of history as necessary.

9. Philosophy encourages children to view education as an end in itself, rather than simply as a means to an end

Many frameworks for education’s value are instrumentalist; its value is perceived to lie in something outside of itself, in some projected future value. If we say that education is valuable in so far as it helps children to integrate into society, or prepare for working life, then education is valued only if it accomplishes those things. In philosophy students are encouraged to wonder for the sake of wondering and to think of the truth for its own sake. Plato claimed that the philosopher’s life is one for contemplating of truth, beauty, and goodness. These are held to be valuable not for some external purpose, but in themselves. At its best, philosophy with children can encourage this contemplation of the best things for their own sake.

10. Philosophy enables students to see things from others’ points of view, helping them to develop empathy

One of the facilitator’s roles in a philosophical inquiry is to encourage reasoned and respectful disagreement. After a child offers a contentious view, the facilitator is quick to seek out dissent and find a controversy that provides fuel for further discussion. This tendency to look for divergent, rather than convergent, thinking in the inquiries means that students quickly become used to having their views challenged by their peers. Students are encouraged to break out of a shallow egocentrism that sees only their own views as legitimate. In the long term, philosophy aims to internalise the missing opponent or interlocutor in a discussion so that students can anticipate objections to their own views. I have had some students from philosophy who say that they now instinctively seek out alternative perspectives on difficult questions. Philosophy can help to cultivate the disposition towards looking for problems, examining alternative arguments, and engaging with the other in a responsible way with empathy.

Philosophy at the dinner table

P- Have you finished your broccoli?

C- No

P- Well, if you don’t finish your broccoli you can’t have any dessert

C- Hey, that’s not fair!

P- Look, your sister has just finished her broccoli. Now eat your broccoli and then you can have some dessert

C- But Sophie loves broccoli! She would eat it even if she didn’t get any dessert

P- So?

C- So, I don’t like broccoli. She does. It’s unfair that she should be rewarded for doing something that she likes to do and I should be punished for not doing something I don’t like to do

P- It’s not a punishment! It’s to make you stronger and healthier. Just try and eat as much as you can

C- But mum, I really want to like broccoli. But I can’t just make myself like it

P- Sure you can. You have to try harder to like it.

C- Mum, I’ve tried. Really I have. But every time I eat those awful stems it makes me want to gag

P- Just pinch your nose

C- That doesn’t help! Look, Mum I didn’t get to choose my taste buds- that was out of my control. And it’s unfair to make me suffer for something that is out of my control. 

P- Maybe you can’t choose your taste buds. But you can always choose your actions. That means you can eat the broccoli; that’s in your control.

C- I still don’t think I should eat it. It’s just not fair.

The curator and the improviser

There are a couple more roles that I play in my job as a philosophy facilitator in schools.

10. Curator

Students will frequently make remarks that are deserving of philosophical attention that others will fail to engage with. If I am alert and manage to note down the remarks (either mentally or physically) I can preserve the insight for further investigation in subsequent weeks. By writing down what my students say I can spot more connections and relate their remarks to the wider community of inquiry. It also has the beneficial side effect of motivating others to make noteworthy remarks as well.

11. Improviser

The basic principle of improvisation is ‘yes, and…’ Instead of rejecting or ignoring offers, the improv artist accepts that an offer has been made and runs with it. Similarly, in a philosophy inquiry someone might make a comment and I sometimes take the opportunity to make something of it, either posing a thought experiment or question related to it, or otherwise spinning off it. The facilitator shouldn’t be too anxious about steering the ship in the right direction. Rather, she should allow the discussion to flow and seek only to deepen the discussion already emerging.

‘Anyone who tries to control the future of the story can only succeed in ruining it. Every time you add a word, you know what word you would like to follow. Unless you can continually wipe your ideas out of your mind, you are paralysed.’ (Keith Johnstone, Improv) 

I have great taste: a dialogue

P- Hey, what was that song we heard it earlier? I can’t get it out of my head.

S- That was Taylor Swift- blank space. Are you sure you’ve never heard of it?

P- Yeah, pretty sure

S- It’s a huge song. My sister plays it all the time on the radio. It’s actually kind of annoying. People who like it don’t really have great taste in music

P- And you do?

S- Yeah

P- So how do you know you have great taste?

S- Well, all my friends say so

P- So if other people say you have great taste you have great taste?

S- Well, if enough people say it yeah. And they have to have great taste too, to be able to tell.

P- So only people with great taste can tell who has great taste?

S- Yeah, I guess so

P- And how do you know that those people have great taste?

S- Well, I guess it’s because other people say they have great taste.

P- Ok. But at some point don’t you need to be able to prove that someone has great taste without asking others? Otherwise it just goes on and on.

S- Yeah I see what you mean. If you could just ask everyone in the whole world to listen to all the music in the world to rate it, I guess you could then find out

P- How?

S- Well, the people who picked the most picked songs would have the great taste

P- Ok. So who is number 1 in the charts right now?

S- Taylor swift

P- So people who like her have great taste?

S- No!

P- But you just said…

S- Look, when you know you know, you know?

The magician’s apprentice: a dialogue

Source: Curb Your Enthusiasm 

S- Hey, could you show me how to do that trick you did earlier?

P- Ah I’m sorry, I couldn’t tell you

S- Come on, just tell me how you did the trick

P- Hmm, no magicians don’t tell people how they do their tricks

S- Yeah, well you’re not really a magician

P- Oh yeah I am

S- So you do one trick and that makes you a magician?

P- Err, did I trick you?

S- Well, yeah. Were you a magician before you did that trick?

P- Not really

S- So who taught you how to do the trick?

P- A magician

S- Ok. So you weren’t a magician… A magician taught you how to do the trick. Right?

P- Yeah

S- Ok. So I’m not a magician, now you’re a magician so you teach me how to do it.

P- I can’t just because you said so

S- You didn’t know that trick before the magician taught it to you, right?

P- Yeah

S- So why did the magician tell you?

P- He can tell that I’m a magician

S- Well, you can tell that I’m a magician

P- But I’m a magician, just naturally a magician

S- That’s what you’re saying, I’m saying I’m naturally a magician

P- You know, because I’m a magician I would feel that you’re naturally a magician

S- Are you going to tell me this trick?

P- Nope

Everything happens for a reason: a dialogue

My students in a year 7 class have a project on free will so I wrote a dialogue to examine some of the main ideas. The dialogue begins with Penelope’s question to Claire.

P- Hey, why are you upset?

C- I found out today. I didn’t get accepted

P- Ah, I’m sorry. That’s a shame

C- Yeah, I really thought I could get in

P- I know how you feel. Look, I’m sure there are lots of other places you can get into. In any event, everything happens for a reason I guess

C- You think everything happens for a reason? You believe that?

P- Yeah, I guess I do

C- Does everything happen for a good reason or do some things happen for bad reasons?

P- Hmm, I think everything happens for a good reason in the end, but we might not be able to see the reason right away

C- Huh. I heard in the news today that people are trying to escape from Syria on boats to Europe and many have drowned. Do you think that happens for a good reason?

P- Ok sure, it’s hard to see why that happens for a good reason, but that’s only because our perspective is so small. Maybe World War Two prevented a bigger war that would have happened otherwise. You need to think more long term.

C- Ok I get what you’re saying. So if everything happens as it is supposed to happen, because it is good in the long term, are we free to make our own decisions?

P- Yeah, we’re free to do things that are good in the long term

C- And we aren’t free to do things that are bad in the long term?

P- Yes, but we’re still free to choose to do the good things. We’re the ones making the decisions.

C- Ok. Let’s say I invited you over to dinner tomorrow. I offer you two desserts: a chocolate cake and a fruit salad. What you don’t know is that there is no fruit salad, so you can only have the chocolate cake. You decide to have chocolate cake. Is your decision free?

P- Yes, I am free because I am the one making the decision, not anyone else. I was going to make that decision anyway.

C- If it isn’t possible for you to do otherwise, are you free?

P- Yes, I would still say I am free

The nine lives of the facilitator

In my job as a Philosophy Specialist Teacher I play a number of different roles.

1. Host

Since there are often many voices clamouring to be heard in the classroom, one of my main responsibilities is to create an inclusive atmosphere. In my role as host I am responsible for ensuring that my students feel comfortable. Students should not feel left out if they want to enter the discussion, and equally the quieter ones shouldn’t feel forced to speak although I will invite them to do so. I want to make clear that I would like everyone to feel welcome sharing their views.

2. Storyteller

The story is the most efficient instrument ever devised for hijacking someone’s attention. If I want to get my students attention, I will usually tell a story and this is my primary means for beginning to engage my students with the philosophy.

3. Referee

Philosophy enquiries typically fall flat for two reasons: either the students aren’t engaged with the philosophical problem itself or they are distracted by bad behaviour. While good behaviour isn’t sufficient for a good enquiry it could be argued that some level of good behaviour is necessary for one. In my role as referee, I enforce the rules of philosophy; namely, only one person speaking at a time and no disrespect of others’ views (although you can disagree respectfully).

4. Mediator

Disagreements are the lifeblood of philosophy. In fact, one of my students once said that if everyone agrees on something it can no longer be considered as philosophy. Since a good enquiry will involve a lot of disagreement, my role as mediator is to engage students with the substance of their disagreement without affirming one side or the other. This might involve merely pointing out where someone disagrees and inviting a response, or it might entail writing up opposing arguments to delve deeper into the reasons for the disagreements.

5. Midwife

Sometimes children have an inkling of an idea but find it difficult to put into words. In my role as ‘midwife’ in the classroom I help children to ‘give birth’ to their ideas. This often means following their chain of reasoning step by step and asking them questions to clarify for themselves what they think. The philosopher Socrates famously compared his role to that of a midwife in Plato’s dialogue The Theaetetus,

‘Those who frequent my company at first appear, some of them, quite unintelligent, but, as we go further in our discussions, all who are favoured by heaven make progress at a rate that seems surprising to others as well as to themselves, although it is clear that they have never learned anything from me. The many admirable truths they bring to birth have been discovered by themselves from within’. (150c, Theaetetus)

6. Gadfly

Since philosophy is concerned with, as Michael Sandel put it, ‘awakening the restlessness of reason’ it is sometimes necessary to sting my students into wakefulness by saying something provocative. This keeps them alert and prevents them from getting complacent. I often adopt this role when there is an outbreak of consensus on an issue where there is usually considerable and vocal opposition. I might use the strategy of the ‘imaginary disagreer’ (Peter Worley, The Philosophy Foundation) by invoking an absent perspective or pretend to hold an opposing and deliberately controversial view for dramatic purposes. Socrates said that his aim was ‘to sting people and whip them into fury, all in the service of truth’ (Apology, 30e). Sometimes a sting is needed to shake us from our dogmatic slumbering, ready for a truth we weren’t expecting.

7. Numbfish

Philosophers are often motivated by a need to make sense of their doubts and confusions. As Arthur Schopenhauer noted, ‘A man becomes a philosopher by reason of a certain perplexity, from which he seeks to free himself.’ Sometimes I will deliberately lead my students to the point of confusion or controversy so that they may feel this need to untangle themselves from it. Socrates was a master at this. In one dialogue Meno turns to him and says,

‘Socrates, before I met you I used to hear that you are always in a state of perplexity and that you bring others to the same state, and now I think you are bewitching and beguiling me, simply putting me under a spell, so that I am quite perplexed.’ (80a, Meno)

Socrates claimed that it was necessary to bring others into perplexity so that they could *see* the problem clearly. Then, being aware of their ignorance, and their need to resolve the problem, they would be motivated to investigate further.

8. Coach

Since progress is often difficult to quantify in philosophy, students need to feel that they are improving and moving in the right direction. I often give my students encouragement before we start and give post-enquiry match reports as well. I will sometimes single out individual examples of improvement in a philosophical skill (e.g. Asking pertinent questions, giving a deeper argument, looking at implications etc) to model to the rest of the class as well. However, I will not praise the substance of their contribution but only the reasoning process that has gone behind it.

9. Clue giver

Often, around half way into a philosophical enquiry, I will introduce some philosophical terms, theories, or arguments that are useful tools for moving the conversation forward. Here my goal is not to take the discussion to a different place but to add further fuel to the fire and to motivate those searching for a deeper understanding. The authors Chip and Dan Heath describe the importance of such clue-giving as follows,

‘It’s no accident that mystery novelists and crossword-puzzle writers give us clues. When we feel that we’re close to the solution of a puzzle, curiosity takes over and propels us to the finish. Treasure maps, as shown in the movies, are vague. They show a few key landmarks and a big X where the treasure is. Usually the adventurer knows just enough to find the first landmark, which becomes the first step in a long journey toward the treasure. If treasure maps were produced on MapQuest.com, with door-to-door directions, it would kill the adventure- movie genre. There is value in sequencing information—not dumping a stack of information on someone at once but dropping a clue, then another clue, then another. This method of communication resembles flirting more than lecturing. Unexpected ideas, by opening a knowledge gap, tease and flirt. They mark a big red X on something that needs to be discovered but don’t necessarily tell you how to get there.’ (Made to Stick)