Thinking Vs Doing


THINKING Vs DOING
Cl. Mario D’Couto SDB
          For all of us who have studied philosophy we surely would have at some point of time come across the statement made by Heraclitus, “No one can cross the same river twice” and perhaps  this is reflected in so many of life’s situations. In the field of education, we see that there has been a transition of ideas and consequently, we have different forms of education.
            However, amidst the diversity that one finds in the different forms of education, the common element that one could pin-point is that no matter what the education system maybe, ultimately there has to be a teacher and a student. Without these two elements, education will not be possible. Ofcourse, there has been a vast shift from one idea of education to another. In the past, the education system would regard the student as a “tabula-rasa” and the teacher as a “walking-talking encyclopedia”, where the teacher knew everything. Hence, education at that time tended to be more abstract. That is why subjects like philosophy, rhetoric, logic, literature and so on were regarded as the important subjects.
            With the passage of time, the education system had changed drastically. It became more “method-oriented”. It is for this reason that after the Renaissance, the focus of education was on the “doing” and not so much about the “thinking”. Educationists such as Rousseau, Pestalozzi and so on would probably come under this category. During this time, educationists began to divide education into different categories for different age groups.
            On the whole, one question that we could raise in this regard is what is important, “thinking” or “doing”? Each of us may have a different answer though for me, I feel that both are important. We cannot keep one and do away with the other. If one were to be only a “thinker”, then he or she could become abstract while on the other hand, if one had to be only a “doer”, then he or she would probably be doing things without knowing ‘why’ he or she is doing something. Another good example that we could cite in this light is the aspect of faith and reason. To be too rationalistic could lead one to being a hardcore skeptic while to be overtly involved with faith could make one to get caught up with “blind faith” thereby making one stupidly naïve. Hence both are important for a good education.  
  

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