ABSTRACT
Central to the history of Western educational thought has been the constantly developing notion of a liberal education. Rooted in beliefs propounded by classical Greek philosophers, this conception of education has been progressively reconstructed under many different influences, not least Cartesian dualism, British empiricism, Kantian rationalism and nineteenth-century liberalism. Its most recent detailed characterisation has been by philosophers of education much influenced by twentieth-century analytical philosophy. The resulting formulation, with its sharply focused aims and attendant philosophical underpinnings, has in fact widely determined at least the framework of almost all discussion of educational aims up to very recent times. But of late, the major philosophical beliefs behind the approach have been severely attacked, so much so that this whole formulation and not just its details now seem in need of radical reconsideration. In this chapter, via an examination of certain of these fundamental beliefs, I shall argue for a new and, it is to be hoped, more adequate approach to characterising the whole domain of educational aims.
