The Need for Tolerance; D. Weast

secular world of sports (where questions are being raised con cerning the value of winning), to the sacred world of religion (where questions of relevance have become a source of bitter debate), one struggles to discern whether a common ethic exists. There was once a university in the heart of America where all life seemed to be in harmony with its surroundings. The university lay in a verdant grove of academe; autonomous, self-perpetuating, and buoy ant.ln the spring black and white clouds of commencement robes sig naled the end of another properous year of learning; a year in which professors had taught and students had listened. Then a strange blight crept over the university, and everything began to change. Some evil spell had settled on the academy. Everywhere there was the shadow of death. There was a strange stillness in the classroom. Teachers no longer taught; students no longer listened. The professors,for example, where had they gone? Many people spoke of them, puzzled and dis turbed. Classrooms once vibrant with dialogue were now dull with apathy. The campus, once green, was now arid with alienation or else afire with revolt. No. witchcraft, no enemy action had silenced the rebirth of new life in this stricken world. The professors had done it themselves!1 DONALD E. WEAST.

The Restoration of Intellectual Virtues in Academic Life Dr. Weast is Assistant Professor of Sociology at the University of Wisconsin-Waukesha County Campus. As SOCIETIES become more complex - as the population grows, as the statuses and roles multiply, as the exposure to conflicting ideologies increases -there seems to be wan ing agreement over the validity and propriety of abstract values and norms. Such is the case with American institutions. From the 411 412 THE FREEMAN July The institution in American so ciety which appears to be the epitome of the present bewilder ment is the university. Witness the contradictory attitudes and be havior which not only exist in aca demic life, but are considered beneficial by their various repre sentatives: From so-called "teach ins" where speakers plead that others "see the light" so that the "correct" actions will be taken, to those whose idea of teaching leads them to reject va~ious forms of political proselytizing; from pro fessors who insist that students have a right to "relevant" courses to those who question the mean ing and dimensions of the term "relevance"; from those who agree that government has no place in academic life and that therefore R. O. T. C. should be abolished, to the insistence by the same people that Pea~e Corps and Draft Counseling courses have a proper place on the campus.

A Perplexing Contradiction Why such contradictory be havior not only occurs but is ra tionalized at great length by lead ers in the academic world as being part of "education" is, to say the least, perplexing. Perhaps Irving Kristol provides at least a partial answer by his observation that, "when an institution no longer knows what it is doing, it starts trying to do everything."2 Grant ing the accuracy of this pessimis tic insight, it may be useful, nev ertheless, to develop models of what education ought to be; other wise there is little prospect of ever realizing a coherent educa tional system. As a step in this direction, I will attempt to clarify what I see as one of the essential purposes of education, explore some of the necessary conditions for its fulfillment, and illustrate how these conditions are often violated by those who transmit "education" - the professors. A statement from the Harvard Report, "General Education in a Free Society," provides a point of departure.

Education is not merely the im parting of knowledge but the culti vation of certain aptitudes and atti tudes in the mind of the young ... These abilities, in our opinion, are: To think effectively, to communicate thought, to make relevant judgments, to discriminate among values. 8 It may be inferred from this statement that one of the essential purposes of the university is the 2 Irving Kristol, "What Business is the University in?" New York Times Magazine, (March 22, 1970), p. 30. 3 William H. Burton, Roland B. Kim ball and Richard L. Wing, Education for Effective Thinking (New York: Apple ton-Century Crofts, Inc. 1960), Preface, p.v.

1973 THE NEED FOR TOLERANCE AND HUMILITY 413 cultivation of the individual mind - a mind which is committed to the sea,rch for and the transmission of true knowledge. 4 It is this prin ciple which. gives credence to the institution of learning - in spite of its diverse curricula and indi vidualisticpractitioners. It is this principle which validates the "community of scholars" concept. The very existenc~ of the uni versity reveals the recognition that a cultivated mind is not ob tained automatically, but requires intensive intellectual training. 5 This involves, of course, such things as "sound training in the fundamental ways of thinking" represented by the various disci plines and "the ability to handle and apply complex ideas, to make use of a wide range of accurate knowledge, and to command the means of effective expression."6 It is my judgment, however, that this training will be undermined, or 4 The reason for emphasizing the word "search" is to recognize not only the fallibility of human thought, but to underscore what science has taught us: what is deemed true today, may be false tomorrow.

5 I do not mean to suggest that the actual training the individual receives in the university necessarily leads to a cul tivated mind. Nor do I suggest that the university is the only setting in which intellectual growth can be achieved. I do assert, however, that the university should be devoted to this cause. 6 Arthur Bestor, The Restoration of Learning, Alfred A. Knopf, Inc., 1956, pp. 7-8. will be, at best, superficial unless certain attitudes prevail in the hearts and minds of those charged with doing this training - the pro fessors. That is, it is imperative that professors show by word and deed their commitment to virtues which are the life-blood of the cul tivated mind: tolerance and hu mility.7 To Develop an Open Mind By tolerance I am not referring to the narrow and topical applica tion of racial tolerance, but to a commitment to having an open, re ceptive mind. Whatever the issue is about, no matter how contrary the view may be to one's own (or no matter how favorable), the commitment of the professor must be to discovering, through the painstaking use of intellectual skills, whether and to what extent it is true or false.

It is extremely difficult to de velop an open mind. One of the reasons for this may be that our parents, and paradoxically, even our professors have failed to dem onstrate, by their own actions, the virtue of this goal. Given the na7 These are not the only crucial vir tues in this regard. Among others are suspension of judgment and curiosity. At least in a superficial sense, these at titudes are part of the academic folk lore. As an illustration of their impor tance for effective thinking see Burton et aI, op. cit. pp. 34-45.

414 THE FREEMAN July ture of their non-academic roles, the behavior of parents can be easily understood if not excused. But this is obviously not the case with professors. What are some indicators that some professors have failed to be models of tolerance? A~ far as their actual classroom perform ance is concerned, it is very diffi cult to obtain reliable information; it is a time-honored tradition that "outside observers" are only wel come by invitation. Students, of course, may cite instances of pro fessors failing to give balanced presentations of highly contro versial issues (controversial in the sense that reputable scholars do not agree) or of their failing to give serious consideration to the questions and opposing views of their students. But though these charges may indeed be true their validity rests on the integrity of the student as well· as on his com petence to make such judgments. s Fortunately, we do not have to rely on classroom· evidence. In re cent years there have been occa sions outside the classroom· in which some professors have failed 8 1 do not mean to imply that being a student necessarily means that the per son lacks integrity or competence., In deed, in this regard, I have known stu dents who outshine some professors. The point is that observer reports of this type are fraught with possibilities for error.

to grasp the opportunity to show their students, as well as the gen eral public, the virtue of tolerance. Their behavior at some of the teachins· on Vietnam provides a striking example. A professor of sociology observed one of these TeachIns . at the University of Wisconsin and made the following report: The professors who spoke were al most completely biased. They did nothing to restrain and much to en courage the hissing, groaning, and jeering that immediately greeted any assertion or question suggesting de viation from their own views. They engaged in question-begging witti cisms - "The Lingo of The N eo Jingoes", one professor titled his talk. They permitted the display and dis tribution of inflammatory photo graphs, literature, and signs in the classrooms. They scheduled the TeachIn amid a week-long round of placard-toting, petition-waving, vigil keeping activities 'To end the war in Vietnam' all to be climaxed by a 'March on Washington.'9 It is crucial to understand that the central issue here is not that some professors have violated the rights of others to speak freely.

To emphasize this is to miss the significant intellectual issue: hiss9 Michael Hakeem, "Rusk Should Ig nore 'Teachin' Professors", Letter to The Editor, Wisconsin State Journal, May 13, 1965.

1973 THE NEED FOR TOLERANCEAND HUMILITY 415 ing, groaning, jeering,or walking out on guest speakers are a repu diation of thought and thus make a mockery of the "house of intel lect."lo 8iased Presentations Another way professors demon strate their intolerance of oppos ing views is, ironically, through their tolerance of· one-sided pre sentations. It is intellectually de fensible to argue for a certain point of view, say, concerning the causes of poverty, or crime, or war. It is then up to the minds of others to assess whether the argu ment can withstand the applica tion of rigorous, disciplined think ing. But if, for example, students are constantly subjected to one sided views concerning subjects which abound in controversy among experts and are not even exposed to the opposing views in an objective, scholarly fashion, the professor is, unwittingly or not, supporting the norm of indoctri nation.

This was a key argument I presented in opposing the format 10 Of course it is not a sign of anti intellectualism if a person refrains from attending an event because it has little or no educational value. Indeed, it may be the sign of intellectualism of the highest order for a person not to take the time to hear bias-ridden speeches. (On the other hand, the intellectual might well attend in order to study an other specimen of propaganda.) of the University Forum on my own campus last year. This forum, entitled: "University Forum on Social Change," presented a series of speakers who were chosen be cause of their political ideologies. Moreover, instead of seeing to it that diverse ideologies were given equal representation, one-sided views prevailed. Finally, and most importantly, this course was given for academic credit. Now, of course, every professor and ad ministrator should have realized the implication this has forthe in tellectual integrity of any of the courses in the curriculum. The idea of granting academic credit is based, at bottom, on the prem ise that the student is being ex posed to and learning from a pro fessor who is deemed qualified be cause of his a·cademic· credentials.

If this is not the case, why give academic credit? Why have disci plines? Graduate school programs? Degrees? Professors? Techniques of Propaganda I might well· assign my students to hear one-sided speeches all year in order to provide them with ex amples of how ideologues use vari ous techniques of propaganda in order to. win converts. Thus, they may be instructed to look for and report on examples of connotative speech geared to arouse the audi ence to the "right" response, for 416 THE FREEMAN July the appeals to numbers and au thority, for the failure to acknowl edge the conflicting views of rep utable scholars, for the failure to acknowledge basic assumptions, for the begging of questions, for making generalizations from in sufficient evidence, and so on. Through such assignments, the students would be trained to de velop their minds so that they would be able to make decisions for themselves. These carefully conducted procedures would be in keeping with the educational phi losophy which holds that a basic function of the professor is to en hance the intellectual power of his students. It recognizes that the acquisition of such power does not occur by the simple exposure to various ideologies. Rather, it as sumes that the development of ef fective thinking is a most difficult task. It assumes that the mind cannot grow under all conditions, but must be carefully nurtured.

This is a basic reason for insist ing on vigorous standards in pro fessional disciplines and academic courses. To assume that students already have the tools necessary for clear and responsible think ing, and therefore can protect themselves from being misled when confronted with a series of "stimulating" speeches, is to sug gest the irrelevance of the pro fessor. Freedom Violated There are those who will hold that the demand for high stand ards in an academic course contra dicts the virtue of tolerance in that it"infringes on the freedom of teachers, students and, in the case cited above, the speakers as well. I can respond to this no better than to quote the words of the his torian Arthur Bestor: To insist that instruction must meet the exacting standards of schol arship is not to infringe upon free dom of teaching. Such infringements occur when pressure groups - wheth er reactionary or radical - force the schools to conform to their precon ceived ideas, to limit the curriculum, to censor textbooks, or to forbid the teaching of controversial subjects.

Scientists and scholars must vigor ously resist such efforts to impose upon the schools any narrow dogma in politics, economics, religion, or science, for learning itself is thereby threatened with destruction. They must also resist anti-intellectualism in the schools themselves, for if free dom of thinking and respect for in tellectual effort are undermined there, it will be easy for demagogues to convince a larger public that in tellectual effort is of little value in any case, and that freedom of thought is not worth preserving. ll There are even some professors who not only do not see anything wrong with indoctrination but 11 Arthur Bestor, op. cit., p. 9.

1973 THE NEED FOR TOLERANCE AND HUMILITY 417 openly espouse it. To illustrate, Professor George Adams, a self proclaimed radical teacher at the Wisconsin State University at Whitewater apparently sees noth ing wrong in using the classroom as a setting for attacking the status quo. But whether the radical criti cism is from the point of view of Marxism (Lukacs), women's libera tion (Millett), Anarchy (Goodman), or Black Power (Thelwell), its pur pose is always the same - to subvert [my italics] the existent bourgeois culture.l 2 It is important to stress that Mr. Adams is not simply calling for the presentation of "radical views" to the students. If this were the case, it would hardly be new. Indeed the university has fought long and hard for the right of scholars to present controver sial material to their students. Mr. Adams is calling for some thing else: The use of the class room to indoctrinate students to the professor's own political ide ology.

To argue that this open espou sal of indoctrination is rare on campus is to miss its real sig nificance. The fact that it occurs at all, without a corresponding sense of bewilderment, alarm, and 12 George B. Adams, "Radical Teach ers," Letter to The Editor, Change, Jan. Feb., 1971, p. 5. outrage by the faculty as a whole, indicates not only the lack of any real commitment to the open, re ceptive mind that is guided, never theless, by the highest standards of scholarship, but the degree to which the university has become a normless institution. The Virtue of Humility Closely related to the virtue of tolerance, and possibly a condition which must precede it, is intellec tual humility. It is the attitude which makes us acutely aware of the limitations of our own minds, limited not only by the available resources of the brain, but the ig norance of or failure to compre hend what other minds have dis covered.

To proclaim the virtue of hu mility is not to suggest that the tongue must forever be silent that true knowledge is an illusion and that therefore one man's per ception of it is as good as an other's. To assert such things is to reach the end of reason and to exalt the god of absurdity. In such a state, surely, all. conversation, from the problem-solving of the coffee klatch to the painstaking analyses of the seminar becomes redundant. We might as well moan and arm wrestle. No, the virtue of humility does not imply all of this. But it does demand that the knowledge the 418 THE FREEMAN July professor offers to the public is presented with full awareness of the mistakes of the past and the possibility for errors in the pres ent. It demands that he not at tempt to coerce others, either physically .or through some psy chological device, to accept his views. It demands that he refrain from making claims on controver sial issues without demonstrating how his intellectual skills led him to accept one point of view rather than another.

It is not a significant test of humility when a professor ac knowledges in an abstract sense that he does not know it all, that what he perceives to be the truth may turn out to be false, that his enthusiasm for a certain point of view is tempered not only by the recognition of his own fallibility but by the knowledge that sincere and reputable scholars disagree with him. The test comes when the professor is confronted with the task of responding to a social crisis - to a problem that height ens the emotions of the public. Will he practice the virtue of hu mility at this moment or not? If not, it shows the superficiality of his commitment to the abstract principle of intellectual humility, and at the same time indicates the priority he gives to an ideological position or to the whims and emo tions of the moment. There are signs that some pro fessors are either unaware of, fail to see its importance, or simply and arrogantly scoff at the virtue of humility. Ironically, these signs seem· to be pronounced in times of social crisis. It is during these times when various professors demonstrate that they are no dif ferent than the public which they claim to be teaching. Like the most avid partisan of some special in' terest group, these professors clamor that others "see the light"

and follow their lead. In Times of Crisis It is the time that petitions and resolutions begin to circulate, when placards and bumper stickers become more evident, when car toons and editorials appear on of fice doors. To illustrate: A resolu tion was introduced and supported by a number of professors at a University of Wisconsin-Waukesha faculty· meeting which read in part that the faculty "condemns the U.S. invasion of Cambodia." A petition was circulated on campus and signed by some professors which included the phrase that the "National Guard are the hired killers of the U.S. government." Cartoons and editorials have ap peared on office doors which de pict various public figures as he roes or villains - from idolizing Daniel Berrigan as a paragon of 1973 THE NEED FOR TOLERANCE AND HUMILITY 419 virtue to presenting Richard Nixon as a symbol of sin. It would be a serious error to criticize these faculty members on ideological grounds - that is, to condemn their actions because they reflect antagonistic views. Such a criticism is merely political and self-serving. As a consequence it fails to provide an intellectual ra tionale for condemning such tac tics per se. Thus, if a resolution were proposed hailing the U.S. in volvement in Cambodia, if a pe tition were circulated which praised the National Guard in its handling of the Kent State Affair or if cartoons were to appear equating Father Berrigan with the devil and Nixon with the savior, we would be left with the same problem. The significant criticism to make of professors who do these things is that knowingly or unknowingly (I'm not sure which is worse) they are proclaiming that the techniques of the Madi son Avenue huckster, whose effec tiveness is related to the unthink ing reactions of the masses, have a proper place in an institution of higher learning; that to oversim plify, to mislead, to appeal to emo tions, to give only one side - to violate the most fundamental ele ments of scholarship - is all right, as long as it promotes the "cor rect" view. This is the end for minds that are bankrupt, as far as intellectual humility is con cerned.

The Need to Explain Now it may be true that the U.S. invasion of Cambodia was wrong for various reasons, that the description of the National Guard as "hired killers" is accu rate and not misleading, that Father Berrigan is a virtuous man and that Richard Nixon is not. But it is a gross act of arrogance to imply that such things are self evident - that a simple proclama tion from a professor's pen will do. The virtue of humility does not suggest silence, but it does call for demonstrability. It implies that if the professor has some knowledge to offer mankind on pressing mat ters he cannot rely on his status, but must demonstrate how he came to these conclusions, by what processes of thought and by what kinds of evidence. To ask this of a professor is to ask him to be no more than what he claims to be: an educator. To fail to ask - to see nothing wrong or indeed to see something noble in these simplis tic resolutions, petitions, cartoons, and the like - is to discredit the ideal of scholarship and perpetu ate one of its most deadly enemies: intellectual arrogance.

It may be argued at this point, and rightly so, that this long dis course on tolerance and humility 420 THE FREEMAN July is not warranted. It is an old re frain. Moreover, like so many eth ical appeals, whether voiced from the pulpit or the political forum, this call to high principles in aca demic life is rationalized away or soon forgotten as we go about our daily chores. I have no illusions about the matter. But, unless one rejects the contention that ideas have consequences, it is necessary to reaffirm those things which can help to restore to the university the integrity that it once had. , IDEAS ON LIBERTY Freedom of Opinion FIRST, if any opinion is compelled to silence, that opinion may, for aught we can certainly know, be true. To deny this is to assume our own infallibility. Secondly, though the silenced opinion be an error, it may, and very commonly does, contain a portion of truth; and since the general or prevailing opinion on any subject is rarely or never the whole truth, it is only by the collision of adverse opinions that the remainder of the truth has any chance of being supplied.

Thirdly, even if the received opinion be not only true, but the whole truth; unless it is suffered to be, and actually is, vigorously and earnestly contested, it will, by most of those who receive it, be held in the manner of a prejudice, with little comprehension or feeling of its rational grounds. And not only this, but, fourthly, the meaning of the doctrine itself will be in danger of being lost, or enfeebled, and deprived of its vital effect on the character and conduct: the dogma becoming a mere formal profession, ineffi cacious for good, but cumbering the ground, and preventing the growth of any real and heartfelt conviction, from reason or per sonal experience. JOHN STUART MILL, On Liberty ANDREW v. SANTANGINI \ 1// ~.,,-. (i (i; ~ / ~ Weather Forecast ( ,~~ for 1984! (rf( ~,,) ~J ~ r By curious coincidence, the weather seems to be the worst where government most intervenes to promote the welfare of the people. For instance: • Cuba, where there is a shortage of sugar.

• Russia, where there is a shortage of wheat. • India and China, where shortages are chronic and five-year plans are forever be ing frustrated by unpredictable weather. • The United States, where more and more disaster areas are left in the wake oj flooding and drought and freezing and storms. As intervention increases throughout the world, we may be sure that the weather every where will be quite terrible. Mr. Santangini is Vice President of Financial Service Corporation of America and lives in Montgomery, Alabama. 421 ANNE WORTHAM Giving and Receiving with Respect AMERICANS have always helped each other and the spirit of charity continues to prevail. But even as it does, there are those benefactors and beneficiaries who abuse the responsibilities inher ent in the lending and receiving of help. The motives of goodwill and justice have been removed from the relationships between individ uals well off and those in need.