Introduction

This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book intends to recover some understanding of the most fundamental alternative ideas of the nature and value of education, and of normative methodology, so to clear the debris from one path leading back to these philosophical questions with fuller vision, greater diversity of ideas, and a renewed sense of urgency in public debate. Philosophical study of education has a continuous history, from classical antiquity until the present day. The most common normative method in the history of educational philosophy is doctrinal conditional deduction (DCD), by which the goals and value of education are deduced from an axiomatic political doctrine which defines justice. In the Parmenidean-Platonic (P+P) tradition education is not subordinate to politics and the normative criteria and goals of education are not deduced from or relative to any political doctrine.