Making LEMM relevant to students

A reader writes in:

I'm a long time reader of the Philosophers' Cocoon and have benefited from it immensely. Not trying to be humble, I admit that I'm not a good and talented teacher. And your blog has provided me with a lot of valuable information to help me get by in my job. Thank you for creating and maintaining the platform.

I might be dead wrong. But it seems to me that most of the teaching tips/posts on the blog have been about teaching normative stuff (broadly construed), which is natural given how much ethics is being taught out there. My problem is, my teaching duties are on non-value stuff (e.g. philosophy of mind, metaphysics), at a pretty vocation-oriented school. Whereas I learned a lot from the posts on teaching ethics, aesthetics, political philosophy, etc., it seems that many of the activities and approaches that work for value theory don't seem to work for the kind of topics I'm teaching to make students care about those topics (Probably due to my lack of creativity as well). For example, topics like substance dualism just don't have much direct, real life application to work with. To be honest, I feel emotionally drained and lost. I'm sorry for going on and on venting. But I'm wondering whether you and your readers have any advice or suggestion. Any help on this would be greatly appreciated!

This is a great query, and I'm curious to hear how readers answer. Here are a few brief thoughts about possible ways to make LEMM (language, epistemology, mind, and metaphysics) courses and content relevant to students.

One general way is to relate these subjects to things in popular culture that students may find interesting and relevant. For example, I've found that when discussing issues in language, meaning, and metaphysics, students may find some of the traditional philosophy of language examples (Hesperus/Phosphorous, 'The present king of France is bald', etc.) boring. On the other hand, I've seen students be fascinated by what 'violence' means, and by extension, what violence is. So, when discussing philosophy of language and its relation to metaphysics (via e.g. the Quinean notion of 'semantic ascent'), my sense is that it may be good to lead with examples that students may find relevant to their lives (what does 'violence' mean?), and then bounce back and forth between these kinds of examples that are philosophically important but not obvious relevant to students (e.g. Hesperus/Phosphorous and proper names). Similarly, consider epistemology and mind. These topics seem even easier to relate to things in pop culture. I recently taught part of entire course relating philosophy to the HBO series, Westworld, using episodes and parts of episodes to discuss everything ranging from the nature of reality, to the nature of consciousness, free will, semantics (viz. the Chinese Room thought experiment), and so on. Similarly, I taught personal identity in conjunction with the Duncan Jones film, Moon. Or consider the rapid development of AI. In my experience, it's not that hard to get students to begin wondering whether Apple's Siri or Google's Alexa 'think', and about how important issues of consciousness are here. My experience is that students found this really exciting, particularly given how at least some of the science fiction involved doesn't seem all that too far away from what might be possible in during our students' lifetimes.

A second, related way to make LEMM topics relevant to students, in my experience, is to connect these topics to ethics and value theory. Derek Parfit was, I think, a model of how to do so. Language, mind, personal identity, and so on, quite naturally raise all kinds of moral questions--about how to use words, which things have minds and warrant moral concern, etc. Here again, I think science fiction is often helpful. Some of the best science fiction films (Blade Runner, Ex Machina, etc.) raise moral questions in relation to LEMM topics. So, why not exploit those sources, using film clips to draw students in and foster discussion about the moral implications of LEMM topics, whenever reasonably possible?

A third way to make LEMM more relevant to students, I think, is by appeal to things they are likely to independently care about, simply as human beings. For example, free will may not seem all that relevant to students when you simply have them read about it--but if you show them some episodes from Westworld where we learn that some of the hosts were simulated millions of times, always making the same decisions, I think you can really get students to worry about the problem, about compatibilism, and fatalism. Similarly, I've found that substance dualism can appeal to students insofar as you get them thinking about questions of life, death, and the afterlife (since many of them seem to think that if the mind is merely physical, then life after death probably isn't a thing--whereas if they become convinced of substance dualism, suddenly life after death may seem to them more probable). 

Finally, insofar as many students are vocationally minded, I think there may be creative ways to make LEMM issues relevant to academic and career interests. For example, many of my students are communication majors. Here, things like semantic meaning, speaker's meaning, pragmatic meaning (and all kinds of Gricean and Davidsonian issues) may be very much relevant to their interests. Similarly, if you have a lot of students in computer science, philosophy of mind and AI may indeed be relevant to their interests. And (or so I've found), if you have physics students, metaphysical questions about physicalism, naturalism, etc., may seem very relevant.

But these are just a few thoughts I had, and some things I've tried that seem to work fairly well. What do you all think? Do you have any helpful tips for the reader who wrote in? How do you get vocationally-minded students interested in LEMM?

Comments

[Anon2]

In my opinion, if it doesn’t have any real life application, then what’s the point? At least, this is what your students are asking, right?I think the key is going to be to figure out why someone would care about these questions. For example, you mention substance dualism. I would connect that to questions of personal identity. How would being two things change how I see myself and others? Why would that matter? Students could write journals for a few days from each perspective.

The fact that you think your areas of study have no real life application, strikes me as a fatal starting-point. I suggest you build your class around the question of why do any of these questions matter? Application doesn’t have to mean case studies, but it should connect to how one lives a life.

Maybe too you could show how these questions you’re discussing are the foundations for their work in other classes.

Seeing the value of knowledge purely for its own sake strikes me as an aspirational goal achieved only after a long and arduous path. But I don’t think it’s reasonable to expect students to start there.

[Michel]

Most contemporary philosophy of art (as opposed to aesthetics proper) is applied LEMM. As a result, it's a good place to look for compelling applications of otherwise pretty theoretical work.

So, for example, you can make a lot of hay in the philosophy of language by considering its application to fictional contexts. Or a course on the metaphysics of abstract objects could use musical works as its core case study. There's a ton of similar connections across LEMM, just waiting to be explored.

[G]

Thanks for the great suggestions, Marcus! I would like to add two quick thoughts.

First, I personally think it is fine that LEMM areas do not have real life applications. Maybe I am alone, but I think some areas are essentially not relevant to real life and this is what makes those areas interesting! Of course, in my intro class, I cover areas that are relevant to real life and those not. I think it is important for students to see different questions and approaches. Consider mathematics. There is applied math, and there is theoretical math. It seems to me that number theory is less relevant to real life, but this does not make math less interesting--some students choose to be math majors just for the pure intellectual activities that are not relevant to real life.

Meanwhile, I think it is important to see that although the content of some LEMM areas is not relevant to real life, the skills--critical thinking, writing, etc.--are very relevant. The vocationally-minded students may find the skills relevant to their career goals. I had a non-degree student who's working full time as a manager, and he found it helpful to develop his thinking and writing skills in my Phil of language class.

[Greg Stoutenburg]

I've never been able to understand why so many philosophers think some major areas of philosophy are practical and relevant and others are 'abstract'. I think that most of what we consider LEMM is just as practical as anything in applied ethics in philosophy. Much of thinking about what we should do involves thinking about what we have reasons to believe, and that's the E in LEMM.

It is tough to think of suggestions without a clearer idea of what OP wants to cover in class, but here are two easily-applicable LEMM ideas that I've used:

--Motivate external-world skepticism, but not through Matrix-type examples. Start with the closure principle, and then put the possibility that must be eliminated something that doesn't involve science fiction. Example: If I know where my car is (through memory), and I know that (knowing that my car is behind my house entails that it hasn't been stolen in the last thirty minutes), then I'm able to know that my car hasn't been stolen in the last thirty minutes. Make a game out of listing things we take ourselves to know, then another list of things that are entailed by what we take ourselves to know, then discuss some reasons to think we don't know at least some of those things in the second list. Then, and only then, bring in global scenarios like the Matrix. (This helps block the lazy objection, 'but that's just abstract sci-fi stuff'). Career-minded students will have to draw inferences, after all, so they will be relying on closure and principles like it.

--Minds and bodies. If your campus is much like the rest of the country, then a majority of your students think they will have an afterlife after they die. If substance dualism is false, then they almost certainly won't. So, of course substance dualism matters! Talk about brain death, out-of-body experiences, and those terrifying incidents in which a person's heart stops but the person later revives. Use popular articles to make the problem sharp. Let them talk about people they know who they think have psychic powers, or who believe in ghosts. (Side note: I used to give an example that presupposed my students were with me on the idea that there are no ghosts. It turns out that a significant percentage--not a majority, but many--of my students over the years do believe in ghosts.) Then bring in a couple of theories of mind and personal identity. You could make a whole course out of this and never even touch ethics.

My general suggestion, for anything that anyone wants to teach in philosophy to a group of students like those OP has, is to ask oneself, "Why would anyone care about this?" and then to painstakingly answer that question. The trick is to think of the problem from the student's perspective.

I'm happy to talk more if you'd like to--gstoutenburg@ycp.edu

[PPT]

Students certainly argue with each other about the existence of God, free choice in a deterministic universe, whether we can know we're not in a simulation, etc. Hence, students care about (e.g.) basic ontological questions, the metaphysics of free will, global skepticism, even if they do not know that it is those issues under those names that they care about.

Students probably watch Westworld and find the themes it raises deeply puzzling and engaging. Hence, they care about phil mind even if they do not know that it is phil mind which they care about.

Students nowadays almost certainly believe that there are physical bases for mental properties, perhaps believe that every interesting question about the world can be answered naturalistically, etc. Hence, students engage with metaphysical views about science even if they do not know it is metaphysics under that name with which they are engaging.

My advice is: don't try to "make" LEMM relevant to students, if by 'relevant' you mean "make them care". It already is relevant to them. They already do care about it. They just don't know that it is LEMM under that name which they care about.

And, if someone just doesn't care whether they're a brain in a vat, then that just means they're not going to care about the other issues.

EDIT: now that I read Marcus's response and the other comments, I see that I've been preempted here. But I'll keep what I've written as another vote in favor of this method.

[OP]

Thank you for all the advise! What you guys say give me a lot to think about -- and confirm my suspicion that it's all about my lack of creativity as a teacher! I take the point that whether a topic is practical is a matter of degree and that, in a way, all topics can have practical implications. Many of you suggested ways to connect non value issues to topics in value theory. I will try to do that more often in the coming semester! Hopefully things will improve! (And a belated happy new year!)

P.S. And I might take up your offer, Greg, and reach out for some further questions!