Justice_ What's the Right Thing to Do_ - Michael Sandel [90]
With the advent of modern science, nature ceased to be seen as a meaningful order. Instead, it came to be understood mechanistically, governed by the laws of physics. To explain natural phenomena in terms of purposes, meanings, and ends was now considered naïve and anthropomorphic. Despite this shift, the temptation to see the world as teleologically ordered, as a purposeful whole, is not wholly absent. It persists, especially in children, who have to be educated out of seeing the world in this way. I noticed this when my children were very young, and I read them the book Winnie-the-Pooh, by A. A. Milne. The story evokes a childlike view of nature as enchanted, animated by meaning and purpose.
Early in the book, Winnie-the-Pooh is walking in the forest and comes to a large oak tree. From the top of the tree, “there came a loud buzzing-noise.”
Winnie-the-Pooh sat down at the foot of the tree, put his head between his paws and began to think.
First of all he said to himself: “That buzzing-noise means something. You don’t get a buzzing-noise like that, just buzzing and buzzing, without its meaning something. If there’s a buzzing-noise, somebody’s making a buzzing-noise, and the only reason for making a buzzing-noise that I know of is because you’re a bee.”
Then he thought another long time, and said: “And the only reason for being a bee that I know of is making honey.”
And then he got up, and said: “And the only reason for making honey is so as I can eat it.” So he began to climb the tree.4
Pooh’s childlike line of thought about the bees is a good example of teleological reasoning. By the time we are adults, most of us outgrow this way of viewing the natural world, seeing it as charming but quaint. And having rejected teleological thinking in science, we are also inclined to reject it in politics and morals. But it is not easy to dispense with teleological reasoning in thinking about social institutions and political practices. Today, no scientist reads Aristotle’s works on biology or physics and takes them seriously. But students of ethics and politics continue to read and ponder Aristotle’s moral and political philosophy.
What’s the Telos of a University?
The debate over affirmative action can be recast in terms that echo Aristotle’s account of flutes. We begin by seeking just criteria of distribution: Who has a right to be admitted? In addressing this question, we find ourselves asking (at least implicitly), “What is the purpose, or telos, of a university?”
As is often the case, the telos is not obvious but contestable. Some say universities are for the sake of promoting scholarly excellence, and that academic promise should be the sole criterion of admission. Others say universities also exist to serve certain civic purposes, and that the ability to become a leader in a diverse society, for example, should be among the criteria of admission. Sorting out the telos of a university seems essential to determining the proper criteria of admission. This brings out the teleological aspect of justice in university admissions.
Closely connected to the debate about a university’s purpose is a question about honor: What virtues or excellences do universities properly honor and reward? Those who believe that universities exist to celebrate and reward scholarly excellence alone are likely to reject affirmative action, whereas those who believe universities also exist to promote certain civic ideals may well embrace it.
That arguments about universities—and cheerleaders and flutes—naturally proceed in this way bears out Aristotle’s point: Arguments about justice and rights are often arguments about the purpose, or telos,