For centuries in the East and West, the disciplines and ideas connected to “philosophy” were regarded as the most praiseworthy because without it, any practical activity is devoid of depth of meaning in relation to the human soul, to the environment, and ultimately to the Creator.
It was the reason that the term ‘university’ was named as such – that it is a place wherein universal matters were investigated and studied by a community of scholars with the goal of educating human beings with a universal outlook.
Unfortunately in the last one hundred years, we have unconsciously been influenced by secularization as a philosophical programme which have restricted the meaning of “university” itself. As a result the modern-day university has abandoned a universal outlook and instead promotes particularity; it emphasizes excellence without a soul.
Tied to this is the following scenario described by Budd Hall, a UNESCO Chair in Community Based Research and Social Responsibility in Higher Education: “…state funding is influenced by market forces themselves as corporate interests would like to see universities prepare particular types of students, students with flexible technical skills, politically ambivalent and mobile to work within the global market system. If a university decides to strike out in new directions focused on long-term results, it is likely to find its funding threatened.”
Therefore, the more urgent priority for universities of today is to redefine its educational philosophy – by “educational philosophy”, we mean the overarching vision or set of universal ideas that determines the meaning and direction of any educational activities. It should finally enable one to conclusively say whether the purpose of education is to simply produce good citizens, good workers, or good human beings.
In most cases today, an educator’s way of thinking or an institution is unconsciously shaped or colored through the prism of the dominant civilisation – the modern secular Western civilisation that restricts the purpose of education to the production of good citizens or good workers, leading to the commodification of education.
Therefore it is imperative that the educated class of other civilisations to rediscover and reclaim first and foremost their educational philosophy from their respective civilisations. Failure to do so will mean the displacement of their respective sense of self-meaning and reason for existence, which may in fact have something better to contribute to modern life.
In other words, not having sufficient clarity and depth in one’s educational philosophy will cause uncritical imitation of flawed theories or cause one to be unconsciously co-opted into the agenda of the corporations or a worldview that alienates one’s spiritual nature as observed by the likes of David Korten, former professor of Harvard Business School, in his When Corporations Rule the World (1995), “The Western scientific vision of a mechanical universe has created a philosophical or conceptual alienation from our own inherent spiritual nature. This has been reinforced in our daily lives by the increasing alignment of our institutions with the monetary values of the marketplace.”
Without greater effort in the realm of educational philosophy by all key stakeholders, we will continue to perpetuate a vicious circle that encourages further psychological dysfunction to a greater scale, as astutely observed again by David Korten in the aforementioned book: “The more dominant money has become in our lives, the less place there has been for any sense of the spiritual bond that is the foundation of community and a balanced relationship with nature. The pursuit of spiritual fulfillment has been increasingly displaced by an all-consuming and increasingly self-destructive obsession with the pursuit of money—a useful but wholly substanceless and intrinsically valueless human artifact.”
This state of affairs was also observed by our own thinker, Syed Muhammad Naquib Al-Attas in the 70s when he warned against the uncritical adoption of the Western higher education model: “In the West, the emphasis on the Sciences and on its technological aspects since the Renaissance till the present day has created problems connected with “dehumanization”, which has shaken the very foundations of the ethical and political systems of the West.”
A word about the recent introduction of philosophy courses in our university: the main objective of any “philosophy” course in our universities should be to develop men and women who profoundly understand the fundamental problems facing humanity and our environment based on the right knowledge framework, with the ultimate goal to serve our communities and the Creator – to discipline the soul to higher plane of existence instead of being dragged to the bestial self.
In other words, the true relevance of wisdoms from the past (contained in “philosophical” literatures) lies in addressing the fundamental challenges and issues of the contemporary world such as secularization of the mind, neo-colonization and the plight of modern life.
Thus every university should recognize and acknowledge the centrality of scholars and thinkers (of intellectual and moral integrity) from the field of the humanities by carving a unique space for them administratively and physically – as they are the beating heart for the intellectual, spiritual, and cultural survival of the nation.
