I. MAN AND EDUCATION
My remarks represent my own amateur views on education, and I am afraid that they might be somewhat off target. As someone who is completely non-educational, I am quite unable to speak about the technical aspects of education in any concrete and specific manner.
In what sense is education possible or perhaps impossible? Like all of you, I have been educated in a certain way, and it seems to me that there must be some commonalities in the experiences of those who have been educated. I would like to speak now on the basis of these commonalities.
When I think about education, I am actually a bit skeptical about whether something like a good or excellent education exists. There are certainly cases of bad education, but I wonder if there is really something like good education. I am somewhat doubtful. I write fiction, for example, but I don’t think it is possible to arrive at true fiction without going beyond its limits or one’s despair over it. I am not alone in feeling this way, as such sentiment is quite common among writers. In terms of education as well, when one feels overly zealous about education, regarding it as unquestionably containing vast possibilities, that is often the sign of subjective bias, one less revealing of actual results than of the complacency of educators themselves. That is fine, and my remarks will return to this point at the end, but let me now explain what I mean by this.
My generation came slightly after the so-called “postwar” writers. We received a completely militarist education. As far back as I can remember, socialist thought had been eradicated: there were no books about it and no one alluded to it.
Ōe Kenzaburō, who is about ten years younger than I am, is seen as a postwar writer, and he received a strictly postwar democratic education. Ōe was a child of an age of pure democracy prior to the reaction against this system. Thus he very much trusts his own sensibility.
When I met Ōe and began regularly speaking and associating with him, however, I didn’t feel that there was such a big gap between us. Yet I did feel a gap with those who were ten years older, who in a sense were quite knowledgeable about socialism and were very discouraged during the war.
This shows that I in fact wasn’t so influenced by the militarist education I received.
In recalling that time, no one trusted any of the teachers. That is, distrust of teachers was something of a common practice.
In truth, this attitude was quite strange. Our distrust of teachers did not spring from any antithetical convictions against militarist education. Rather, we middle school students were taught in a strictly militarist way, and yet it had become common practice for us to distrust our teachers.
For example, there was the ceremony of the imperial portrait, which required us to bow. Our teachers would all bow their heads at the command “Bow!” and so had no idea what we students were doing. It was popular among us to see who could remain the longest without bowing. In that environment of pure militarist education, this trend actually became a common practice for us. Such behavior can be said to reveal the force of intuition or resistance in children. Yet it can also be considered an immunity to a kind of foreign sickness, an immunity that exists fundamentally in man and latently in children. It is because of the emergence of this immunity that we are able to live among bacteria.
It is a major question for education to consider whether this latent force of resistance could have been developed.
In looking back at that period, I have asked myself whether education was unhelpful or if it was perhaps best if I hadn’t graduated. But this is a very difficult question.
For example, there are those who didn’t attend school at all. Yet their sense of judgment about various things was not worse than those who graduated.
Thus it is a fundamentally difficult question to know to what degree education is helpful.
II. POSSIBILITIES FOR EDUCATION
Education is possible even for animals. In the case of animals, conditioned response can be made more complicated by various conditions. Yet that is the extent of it, and this differs from our notion of education. In contrast to animals, what does it mean to say that man can be educated?
For example, the case of Helen Keller has been described as miraculous, since even someone who is deaf, dumb, and blind was able to communicate as a human being.
On a medical basis, I long believed that the Helen Keller case was a lie. That is to say, it was a show: I was unsure about her response since she responded with specific signs rather than with words, in the manner of an animal’s conditioned response. Perhaps she was trained in the way that one teaches a monkey, and this involves interpreting hand signals. I was convinced that her case was fake, since the interpreter could arbitrarily make up things based on her hand signals. I even considered writing an essay about Helen Keller as a phony.
But I was mistaken in this. I realized my error when I happened to judge a commercial broadcast competition. I agreed to do this because of the opportunity to see documentaries that were generally inaccessible. One documentary concerned a deaf, dumb, and blind child whose case was studied at a certain university; footage of that child was taken until the age of twenty. While watching this footage, I understood that Helen Keller’s story was real.
There was some basis to my suspicion that the Helen Keller case was fake.
Human beings can in no way be formed without the mediation of language. As is well known, Pavlov formulated the theory of conditioned response. His theory of language builds on this but is surprisingly not well-known. I studied in the Medical Department at Tokyo University, but even there the physiology textbooks we used contained no more than two pages of explanation about conditioned response. This shows how much Pavlov has been denigrated or ignored in Japan, even among experts.
What is known about the theory of conditioned response, for example, is simply that food is offered when a bell is rung, and that a dog begins salivating merely at the sound of the bell. Yet Pavlov’s theory builds on this, leading to something very different in its unveiling of a revolution in thought comparable to the change from a geocentric or Ptolemaic system to a heliocentric or Copernican one.
An unconditioned response can be seen when salivating is caused by the stimulus of placing something sour in the mouth. A conditioned response occurs when this sour object is placed in the mouth at the same time that one rings a bell. The next step involves salivating merely at the sound of the bell: this is a conditioned response. In order for such a response to be formed, a brain is required that combines these two things. This is called the first conditioned response.
Let’s say we then pronounce the phrase “summer orange.” Physically, this involves nothing more than a vibration of air. The phrase contains a certain wavelength and stimulates the tympanic membrane. In order for this word to signify, there must be something higher than a conditioned response. I would like you to understand that this requires a different level, just as two lines create a surface and two surfaces create a space.
An unconditioned response is a line, whereas a conditioned response is a surface. When two surfaces unite, the second (second system) conditioned response appears. This is language.
Pavlov reached the conclusion that language represents the second system of conditioned response.
However, there are various theories about language. According to both pragmatism and American behavioral psychology, for example, language is a means to communicate thought.
Thus language picks up and conveys human thought, which means that thoughts can be formed even without language.
According to Pavlov’s theory, this notion is completely wrong. Language is not the means to transport thought, but rather thought itself. In other words, the question of whether a given phenomenon is to be understood as thought or as language is entirely a matter of perspective.
Pavlov’s achievement was massive, since he was the first to understand language physiologically or materially.
Subsequent research about Pavlov’s theory remained undeveloped, and there was often a tendency to use the phrase “conditioned response” when referring to something as uninteresting or unsophisticated.
When someone was described with the phrase “conditioned response,” this generally meant that he was a bit simple.
Far from being simple, however, conditioned response is today more elaborate than even the most sophisticated machinery. Elaborate computer systems barely reach the elementary stages of this theory.
The human brain contains both an old cortex and a new cortex. The latter makes language acquisition possible while also helping to distinguish man from other animals.
A dog will sit when told “Sit!” This represents the first conditioned response from the old cortex and involves no understanding of language whatsoever.
In terms of what it means to understand language, a monkey will use a stick (tool) in order to reach objects above it. Yet a monkey cannot make a stick (tool). Monkeys use sticks (tools) only when sticks happen to be lying around in their field of vision.
The same is true of throwing stones. It is not the case that monkeys think, “Oh, I believe there are some stones behind the house,” and then go off in search of them. In other words, tools are understood strictly as an extension of the senses. For monkeys, a stick (tool) is practical and empirical as opposed to conceptual. When man needs a stick, however, he makes one by breaking off the leg of a chair. For man, sticks have an infinite existence. This is because he has acquired the concept of “stick.”
The monkey’s stick is strictly visible, an extension of experience.
We can see here the fundamental difference in the brain between the old cortex and the new cortex.
It was through the acquisition of language that man first distinguished himself from the other animals. My suspicion of the Helen Keller case derived from this blind spot in my understanding.
Helen Keller can neither hear nor see: how can she acquire language? How was language acquisition possible for her? I considered this question in various ways but could find no such possibility. Aha! Helen Keller is a mere impresario, I thought! She does good business traveling around earning money. It was only when I saw that television program, however, that I realized that she was authentic.
Even if human beings are deaf, dumb, and blind, they still possess a new cortex. But this cortex remains inaccessible to them. For such people who cannot see or hear and are locked in a world without those images, sense is limited to the skin. How could they develop their new cortex? This was a major question and concern for me.
When I watched the television program, I learned that education for these children consisted of something entirely different than for those with fully functioning senses.
These children acquired fairly advanced knowledge, equivalent to the first year of middle school. But they were unable to jump. They could not do things that children generally do without thinking.
The word “jump” combines two meanings: to raise oneself off the ground and to move in a certain direction. For those whose senses are not fully functioning, the combination of these two things can be surprisingly frightening. Leaving a fixed position involves a momentary departure into the void, and it is hard to understand the sense of direction accompanying it.
In order to teach these children to jump, one first introduces the concepts of distance and direction by throwing a ball. One then walks with the child in that direction. Next the child attempts to jump, which he or she is now finally able to do. In other words, these children can now leave the ground with both feet.
When I saw this, I felt enlightened by the fact that the educational sequence was so different from what it is generally. At the same time, I learned that there was enormous potential to educate people, and that infinite possibilities were available if one could just find the right methods to unlock that potential.
This closely resembles Pavlov’s formulation of the second system of conditioned response. That is to say, it is related to the material understanding of human thought.
III. DEVELOPING THE TALENT TO MAKE LEAPS
I have discussed the question of how to draw out man’s inherent qualities, those that make him human. If these methods are elucidated, then man’s educational potential is unlimited.
Now I would like to speak about my ideas on the importance of these methods in the context of the education received by most people, that is, those with fully functioning senses.
I feel skeptical about the necessity of educating children in a way that puts substantial focus on memorization—and I am not saying this merely because my own grades at school were so lopsided.
In considering Chinese characters, for example, there has been a movement these days to limit their usage. Some people claim that it is now impossible to write, since the number of characters has been excessively reduced. Indeed, I too would find it difficult to write if I had to do so without using any characters. Nonetheless, I believe that fewer Chinese characters would be best.
Kamei Katsuichirō says that when the word “Kyōto” is written in katakana rather than in Chinese characters, the sense of the word is lost. He adds that such linguistic confusion represents a confusion in the spirit of the Japanese people, and that this will gradually lower the level of the Japanese. This claim is utterly preposterous. I can assure you that it is false.
While it is true that parts of man’s thinking derive from accumulated habits, one can nevertheless always learn things when one is forced to do so after having graduated from school.
Drills involving the writing of Chinese characters in place of hiragana were quite popular long ago, and one’s ability to study was primarily measured by this skill.
But such drills are completely useless.
I write fiction and so know people who believe that these drills are useful, but that is incorrect.
There is also the question of reading. It is quite stupid to have a student read and interpret something. Students can interpret if you leave them alone; this is not something that can be taught.
There is absolutely no need to memorize such things as correct Chinese characters and correct interpretations.
What is needed is the talent to make leaps. The ability to make leaps in thought involves leaping away from certain kinds of thinking. This alone should be taught.
I am referring here to the ability to recognize different ways of thinking. If this can be taught, then I believe that students will go quite far. Thus I am asking how meaningful it is to educate students in an excessively complicated manner.
This notion of leaps in thought can be seen in geometry in the drawing of auxiliary lines. When one cannot draw these lines, one tries various things within the framework of the original diagram. But the problem is suddenly solved as soon as these lines are drawn. That is the trick.
This is a trick of leaping. If one understands the trick, then math becomes truly enjoyable, a kind of recreation. Thus the question concerns how it is possible to develop the talent to make leaps. In the case of math, one quickly figures things out by oneself as soon as one grasps the fundamentals. It seems to me that very few things can be taught here.
Thus I don’t believe that man’s knowledge arises from an accumulation or extension of experience.
IV. THE MEANING OF “ENRICHING EXPRESSION”
One often hears people speak of enriching expression. While expression should certainly be enriched, this nevertheless represents a misunderstanding of the notion of power of expression. For example, this notion is mistaken to mean power of description. In Japan, “power of expression” is generally understood to refer to imaginatively describing something. Such force of description might be helpful in writing tanka poetry, but not much more.
The most important factor here concerns the manner in which content is drawn forth from things or observation. This involves, in other words, the construction of theories based on facts. Japanese people are very poor at this. Although they can construct theories on the basis of concepts, they have difficulties constructing theories from facts.
An example of this can be found in reportage. Much reportage in Japan merely scratches the surface. I have gone to some of these sites and found things that completely contradicted this reportage. Most of this reportage, in other words, is utterly false. This is due to the poor powers of observation on the part of reportage writers. It is well-known throughout the world that Japanese reportage writers are not very observant: they are unable to deploy a distinct perspective in observing things from a distinctly comprehensive field of vision. This is due to deficiencies in Japanese school education. One must go beyond the view that sees the accumulation of experience as leading somewhere.
V. CULTIVATING ORIGINALITY
Because education is so individual and experimental, it seems to me that each teacher should teach according to those methods that they find to be the most enjoyable. This wouldn’t represent such a big difference and the results would be neither good nor bad. But perhaps there might be some difference. What is most important, then, is the teacher’s enthusiasm. Such enthusiasm should be understood not in terms of a sense of mission but rather as enjoyment. I can even see no harm in treating the students as guinea pigs. For people are extremely strong regardless of how much they are treated in this manner. Even if one twists them a little, they never become as twisted as one thinks. People are quite resilient and will survive even if one leaves them alone.
One thus needs to fearlessly engage in educational experiments. Since the materials here are so durable, one can experiment with peace of mind.
Without such experiments, both children and teachers become bored. This would be horrible. In order to reach this ideal goal, improvement of teachers’ labor conditions—including its social and financial aspects—must be a precondition.
I discovered only much later that our math teacher was a socialist. He was persecuted for this and seemed to have pent-up feelings. The students immediately understood. In one year of high school, we studied the equivalent of three years of math by ourselves.
As for why we did this, there must have been something there. In terms of what that something was, I suspect that the teacher’s role was fundamental.
How then can one give children the chance to leap? And how can one elicit a different and original sense of judgment from within real life? It thus seems to me that the logic of a continuously looping series of cause and effects is unnecessary for education. It is more important to ask: how can one escape such chains of thought? In other words, emphasizing the importance of identifying exceptions and developing ways of thinking that can release one from these chains will lead to the cultivation of resistance, defense, and discernment vis-à-vis those forms of control that emerge together with the increases in social hardship that are sure to come. Such resistance, defense, and discernment are intuitive in nature and cannot be taught by language. The point is how to cultivate these things.