Philosophical Cud: Autonomous life

One of the prevailing themes in the American educational system is the belief that children should be educated to enable them to live autonomously. Autonomy, it is supposed, allows the country’s youth to build their own destinies, to do great things, to live the American dream (to have a white picket fence, an SUV and 2.3 children). While at first glance this seems like a good idea, I’d like to explore it for a few minutes.

If the end goal of education is to enable children to live a life of flourishing, then autonomy is paramount in the development of this life. It is evident that a flourishing life is a life intrinsically interested in happiness. Marriage, financial security and meaningful work are all institutions which are usually associated with a life of flourishing. There is no coincidence here; these things are esteemed because they make us happy. Nobody wants to be lonely or hungry. Even if flourishing manifests itself in self-sacrifice or martyrdom, the element of happiness, or at least the hope for it, must be present. How could someone sacrifice a part of their life and consider it flourishing without a better (happier) future in mind? It follows that insofar as autonomy facilitates flourishing, it must also facilitate happiness. While this is a compelling reason to advocate education geared towards autonomy, I don’t believe that forcing circumstances which foster autonomy is an ethically justifiable imposition for any authority to undertake, let alone the government.

While exposure to alternative lifestyles and belief systems may lay the groundwork for an autonomous life, these exposures also make one particular way of living impossible, the way of life that a person was born into. After someone’s horizons have been broadened, it is impossible to shrink them. When someone’s eyes are opened and she is disabused of the truths (read: beliefs) imposed by the community, her understanding of the world is broadened and an autonomous life becomes possible. At this point, she is free to wander and learn, to expand her mind in whichever way she chooses – save one. Upon grasping a meaningful degree of autonomy, the life, the state of mind previously known to her becomes alien and unattainable. When people realize that every other religious faith in the history of the human experience has been as valid as theirs, it becomes impossible to retain their former spirituality. This isn’t to say that someone who questions faith is unable to believe again, but they are unable to believe in the same way ever again. Some people might call this growth, but it could just as easily be called corruption. If, for example, an Amish youth leaves the farm and learns of the darker human evils, she will never be able to unlearn them (the Amish do do this – it’s called Rumspringa). After a life of choice has been established, it is both impossible to refrain from choosing a destiny and impossible to return to a state of ignorance.

While an education geared towards autonomy may serve to ‘enable’ the youth, ignorance often is bliss, and this cannot be ignored. My question, then, is what exactly it is that differentiates between the flourishing of autonomous happiness and the flourishing of ignorant, sheltered happiness? If someone grows old and dies confidently and happily, never having strayed from the ideals taught by their parents, could anyone say that this person has been disadvantaged? Conversely, if another person leaves the community they were raised in, experiments with different religions, drugs and philosophies but retains the same measurement of happiness in their life, who is to say that they are better off than those who have lived in restraint? Flourishing can happen with or without a measure of autonomy, but in our society, autonomy is not offered as an option. It is imposed as a law.

Forced autonomy is wrong only insofar as it is an ambiguous ideal which has been deemed mandatory. By forcing ‘growth’ through education, a measure of an individual’s culture and upbringing is permanently lost, and so is an avenue of happiness. Flourishing may justifiably be the premiere goal of human life, but autonomy is not the only path towards the good life. As long as flourishing remains as loosely defined as it is, there is no real reason to privilege autonomy over blissful ignorance. So, until next week, go and flourish however you like.