Harry Brighouse On Education Essay

Throughout history, education has always played an important role in people’s lives. Education, or lack thereof, in many ways, shapes a person’s life and what they will become in society. Many people have argued over time on what the best form of education is and how it should be implemented. Harry Brighouse, in his book On Education, offers an argument that the central purpose of education should be to promote the flourishing of humans. While Brighouse does present a unique idea as to what the central purpose of education should be, his argument is impractical and not without its pitfalls. In this paper, I will argue against Brighouse’s soft and impractical aim for the main purpose of education. The argument that Brighouse makes is one that the central purpose of education should be to “promote human flourishing” (42). Brighouse asserts that schools must play a role in facilitating autonomy if they wish to promote human flourishing. According to Brighouse, “an autonomy …show more content…
The proposal to change the school curriculum and ethos is the most challenging part of Brighouse’s argument because it is the one that will take the most amount of time and cooperation to achieve. Changing the school curriculum to include more life-centered classes such as good parenting and emotional development would undoubtedly improve a child’s ability to flourish, however adding these courses while only keeping a bare curriculum of basic mathematics, language-arts, and science is contradictory because mastering those skills matter as well. Brighouse even admits that he does not “have the expertise to recommend a particular way of integrating life-skills into the curriculum” (55). The most crucial proposal for getting children to flourish by changing the curriculum and ethos of schools is also the most unachievable, and therefore