BEZGRANICZNOŚĆ GŁUPOTY I GRANICE MĄDROŚCI. NA ROZDROŻACH SOKRATEJSKIEJ PEDAGOGII NIEWIEDZY
ON THE BOUNDLESSNESS OF STUPIDITY AND THE BOUNDS OF WISDOM: THE DILEMMAS OF THE SOCRATIC PEDAGOGY OF IGNORANCE

Summary/Abstract: The relationship between stupidity and wisdom is marked by a multitude of dramatic and not entirely transparent tensions. While stupidity grows abundantly like self-seeding weeds, finding fertile ground in every area of human activity, there is a constant lack of wisdom. Since antiquity, the conviction seems to prevail—also in the tradition of the Socratic pedagogy—that there is ‘too much’ of both overt and hidden stupidity and that its ‘excess’ keeps growing, continuing at the expense of the desired wisdom and values associated with it. In Western culture, the complexity of the relationships between wisdom and stupidity is scrutinized already in Plato’s classical works The Apology of Socrates and The Symposium: namely, in the speech of Socrates, and in the story of Eros begotten as the child of Poverty and Resource, respectively. Both texts manifest the key ideas of the Socratic pedagogy of ignorance and the condition of Eros symbolizes that of a philosopher, a lover of wisdom who is “betwixt wisdom and ignorance,” and incessantly striving to overcome this state. The story about Eros has largely determined the ways in which the complexity of and tensions between stupidity and wisdom have been perceived in Western culture as such and, in particular, in its philosophy and pedagogy. The lack of a critical discernment of stupidity is coupled with a persistent failure to recognize or respect boundaries. While stupidity appears in the outlined perspective as dangerously infinite, still unimaginable for its cognitive penetration and untamed despite the pedagogical activities directed against it, somehow spilling its limitlessness into relatively ordered spheres, it reflects its limits due to the pursuit of wisdom.

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