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How much do we tell the children? Q5 Is Truth any sort of guideline?
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From: Charles Bayless <charles.bayless_at_ttmd.com>
Date: Sun, 27 Nov 2011 13:55:54 -0500
In several responses, there has been the suggestion that we rely on the truth as the guiding principle for what to tell children when.
I would disagree quite strongly with the proposition that we simply tell the truth. A) We all have different truths and B) Just as a pile of bricks don't make a home, a pile of truths don't make a person until they are assembled in the right sequence and in the right way. What is right? "ah, there's the rub."
Socrates in The Republic: "Don't you understand, that we begin by telling children fables, and the fable is, taken as a whole, false, but there is truth in it also?" Such is how we deal with our children. We tell them what we think they are able to comprehend even if it is not true because it omits the whole truth. We introduce more complex topics and more difficult/challenging topics as we think they are able to comprehend and digest them. The age at which we do that varies enormously by child.
It is certainly not the case that 90% of our reading occurs in childhood. However, it is likely true that that which we learn when young sticks the deepest and longest. The freshest clay takes the strongest impression.
Perspective also makes liars of us. The poorest quintile of Americans have the asset ownership profile of the middle quintile of the average European and the top quintile of the average world inhabitant. So when we point out an American as poor, are we telling the truth? Depends on perspective. There is a vast array of topics on which there is honest and legitimate dispute. Causes of poverty, who was responsible for the financial crisis of 2008, global warming, what caused WWI, etc. etc. These are all topics at the frontiers of our evidence and at that frontier, Truth is as much a matter of opinion as it is of provable fact.
Storytelling is like a variant of a Yevgeny Yevtushenko quote which I originally heard attributed to the translation of poetry: If beautiful, not true; If true, not beautiful. What we leave in and leave out of a story is very much at the heart of the achievement of great authors. There are problems in telling too much and in telling too little. The crafty balance is where we acknowledge true art.
Likewise with cultivating a child's epistemological garden. We may want them to know the Truth X but we usually break it up into components - this element at this age, that element at a later age, until they arrive at a point when they have the whole truth and it all makes sense. At each step of the way we have usually lied by omission, and sometimes we have to lie by commission in order to get to the real truth later. Try and introduce it all too early and you crash and burn.
A practical example: We live in the downtown of an African-American majority city. When they were young, we would not allow our children to watch the evening news. If they did so, from just watching the pictures, they would have come away with the "truth"/impression that all murderers are black as are most robbers and other accused suspects. Whites are the policemen and firemen, the volunteers that raise money and take donations for hurricane relief, are businessmen and inventors, etc. I actually did a rough one week sampling back a few years ago and the results were striking and appalling. That is not the truth we wanted them to come away with. What we did instead was have the daily paper on the breakfast table. When they were reasonably young, all they would read was the comics. Around ten or twelve they would begin reading selected stories, but because it was in a communal area, there was plenty of opportunity to discuss and round out stories and give context. It is only as they approach adulthood that it
becomes feasible to address unpleasant underlying truths. Blacks (13% of the population) do commit 50% of the murders. 90% of patents and scientific publications are by whites with the balance by people of (South Asian) Indian and Chinese origin. There is a history and context for why those "truths" might be so and it is important to understand that history but it is too complicated to address to a five year old or a ten year old. You have to parse it out and build up to it. Just tell the truth won't cut it.
Charles
Received on Sun 27 Nov 2011 01:55:54 PM CST
Date: Sun, 27 Nov 2011 13:55:54 -0500
In several responses, there has been the suggestion that we rely on the truth as the guiding principle for what to tell children when.
I would disagree quite strongly with the proposition that we simply tell the truth. A) We all have different truths and B) Just as a pile of bricks don't make a home, a pile of truths don't make a person until they are assembled in the right sequence and in the right way. What is right? "ah, there's the rub."
Socrates in The Republic: "Don't you understand, that we begin by telling children fables, and the fable is, taken as a whole, false, but there is truth in it also?" Such is how we deal with our children. We tell them what we think they are able to comprehend even if it is not true because it omits the whole truth. We introduce more complex topics and more difficult/challenging topics as we think they are able to comprehend and digest them. The age at which we do that varies enormously by child.
It is certainly not the case that 90% of our reading occurs in childhood. However, it is likely true that that which we learn when young sticks the deepest and longest. The freshest clay takes the strongest impression.
Perspective also makes liars of us. The poorest quintile of Americans have the asset ownership profile of the middle quintile of the average European and the top quintile of the average world inhabitant. So when we point out an American as poor, are we telling the truth? Depends on perspective. There is a vast array of topics on which there is honest and legitimate dispute. Causes of poverty, who was responsible for the financial crisis of 2008, global warming, what caused WWI, etc. etc. These are all topics at the frontiers of our evidence and at that frontier, Truth is as much a matter of opinion as it is of provable fact.
Storytelling is like a variant of a Yevgeny Yevtushenko quote which I originally heard attributed to the translation of poetry: If beautiful, not true; If true, not beautiful. What we leave in and leave out of a story is very much at the heart of the achievement of great authors. There are problems in telling too much and in telling too little. The crafty balance is where we acknowledge true art.
Likewise with cultivating a child's epistemological garden. We may want them to know the Truth X but we usually break it up into components - this element at this age, that element at a later age, until they arrive at a point when they have the whole truth and it all makes sense. At each step of the way we have usually lied by omission, and sometimes we have to lie by commission in order to get to the real truth later. Try and introduce it all too early and you crash and burn.
A practical example: We live in the downtown of an African-American majority city. When they were young, we would not allow our children to watch the evening news. If they did so, from just watching the pictures, they would have come away with the "truth"/impression that all murderers are black as are most robbers and other accused suspects. Whites are the policemen and firemen, the volunteers that raise money and take donations for hurricane relief, are businessmen and inventors, etc. I actually did a rough one week sampling back a few years ago and the results were striking and appalling. That is not the truth we wanted them to come away with. What we did instead was have the daily paper on the breakfast table. When they were reasonably young, all they would read was the comics. Around ten or twelve they would begin reading selected stories, but because it was in a communal area, there was plenty of opportunity to discuss and round out stories and give context. It is only as they approach adulthood that it
becomes feasible to address unpleasant underlying truths. Blacks (13% of the population) do commit 50% of the murders. 90% of patents and scientific publications are by whites with the balance by people of (South Asian) Indian and Chinese origin. There is a history and context for why those "truths" might be so and it is important to understand that history but it is too complicated to address to a five year old or a ten year old. You have to parse it out and build up to it. Just tell the truth won't cut it.
Charles
Received on Sun 27 Nov 2011 01:55:54 PM CST
