Every subject that is systematic has a certain inherent order to it that dictates how it should be approached. In some subjects this order is more explicit than others. In mathematics, for example, there is a widely acknowledged sequence in terms of what should be learned and when it should be taught. In other subjects, […]
Stephen Hawking once pronounced that he thought his brain was little more than a computer and that, because of this, he was unafraid to die: “I regard the brain as a computer which will stop working when its components fail. There is no heaven or afterlife for broken down computers; that is a fairy story […]
The most basic thing we can ask about anything is “What is it?” Young children explicitly ask this question all the time. But even adults do it, although they may not do it explicitly, or even think about doing it at all. We ask this about words we don’t know, and things we encounter for […]
You’ve heard the word before, but what does it mean? Here’s the lowdown on the second leg of the trivium. Introduction The best way to answer the question “What is logic?” is with a definition. But that is easier said than done. Throughout history, many people have thought and written about the subject of logic, […]
The United States is in the midst of a presidential election. Like all such elections, it involves two, sometimes three, major candidates, each of whom tries to persuade the voters to vote for him or her. Some candidates do this well and others don’t. But they could all do it better if they knew Aristotle’s principles of rhetoric. Classical rhetoric is […]
Rhetoric. To most modern minds, the word smacks of cunning—the empty polemic or self-aggrandizement of a political figure, or perhaps the crafty prose of a present-day sophist selling overpriced or unnecessary products to the unlearned. To those who have delved a bit into classical education, rhetoric is the third liberal art, the top of the trivium, the noble art of persuasion, a […]
The oracle at Delphi stated that no man was wiser than Socrates. Socrates was so shocked by that claim that he went around questioning everyone in Athens, hoping to find someone who was wiser than he. He was such a nuisance, such a “doubter,” that he was put on trial. Like the Athenians Socrates questioned, […]
…and how to know when you see it. One of the most overused terms in the Christian education lexicon is the expression “worldview.” And although it is frequently used, it is almost never defined. We are told how important “worldview” is. We are supposed to have a “worldview” and make sure we teach “worldview” to […]
In the old natural philosophy, the purpose of inquiry into nature was to better know what creation is. It taught nomenclature (the names of things), taxonomy (how the thing fits in with other things), morphology (how things are internally structured), and scientific method (how to investigate natural things). It was focused on the wonder and […]
What is the classical view of literature and art? In his book The Mirror and the Lamp, M. H. Abrams observed that art could be viewed from four different perspectives: First there is the emphasis on the universe of art, that is, the thing or idea the work is about, its subject; for example, Mona […]