Educational Ideology, Philosophy, and Theory

Educational Ideology, Philosophy, And Theory

Differentiating Ideology, Philosophy, and Theory

The concepts of ideology, philosophy, and theory are interrelated in ways that account for difficulty in understanding their distinctions (Rosenstand, 2008). The fact, for example, that all ideologies incorporate (or are based on) one or more philosophy is one source of potential confusion; the fact that the converse is sometimes but not necessarily always true is another source of potential confusion (Rosenstand, 2008; Wiley, 1995). In principle, ideology refers to a set of beliefs and often to a larger view (or a worldview); philosophy represents a systematic intellectual inquiry intended to help understand the nature of reality; and theory is a methodological approach to interpreting reality accurately and in a manner consistent with the available empirical data (Rosenstand, 2008; Wiley, 1995).

Within the realm of education, for example, the belief that modern education is deficient for specific reasons would be an ideology; the position that the key to improving education lies in better meeting the needs of all students through recognition of the differences in their learning styles and preferences would be a philosophy; and a testable hypothesis about the efficacy of various teaching methods in relation to different learning styles would be an example of a theory.

Ideology and Philosophy Differentiated

In general, ideologies are beliefs or sets of beliefs about the world or about a subset of the world of particular interest (Taylor, 2002). In contemporary American society, both political conservatism and political liberalism would constitute ideologies, as would Communism, Marxism, and Socialism. All of those ideologies encompass underlying philosophies consistent with the overall worldview shaped by the ideology. To a certain extent, different (meaning mutually inconsistent) philosophies can fit within the same ideology, provided only that they do not conflict with the more general principles or set of beliefs that define the ideology.

For example, Republican conservatives may differ substantially in their particular philosophies in many areas without deviating from the core ideology of Republican conservatism. That is particularly evident today in the political extremism voiced by segments of the Republican Party whose members refer to themselves as "Tea Partiers." Likewise, every Democratic primary election campaign demonstrates the wide range of political and social (and other) philosophies among political liberals, most of whom share the worldview and ideological perspective of the Democratic Party.

Ideologically, most politically conservative republicans share the worldview that government should exercise only minimal control over private business; nevertheless, certain conservative Republicans may consider health insurance reform a valid exception from that general principle, philosophically. Similarly, most conservative Democrats might share the worldview that government has a fundamental obligation to regulate business as necessary to maintain certain standards and public policy; nevertheless, certain liberal Democrats may oppose the idea of a public healthcare option administrated by the federal government.

Philosophy

Philosophy is further differentiable into several different components. Specifically, metaphysics is the study of what exists (ontology) and how it relates to and fits into the world (cosmology), while epistemology is the study of knowledge and the identification of what is and is not knowable (Mihaly, 2007; Taylor, 2002). Axiology is the study of the relative merit or value of ideas and consists of an ethical branch that focuses on right and wrong or good and evil, and an aesthetic branch that concerns what is beautiful and what is ordinary (Hursthouse, 1999; Rosenstand, 2008; Taylor, 2002). Finally, logic consists of the study of formal argument and is fundamentally related to other branches of philosophy and to the process of human reason, more generally.

The metaphysician might study such things as where the lines are properly drawn between identifying something as living or nonliving, whether our perception of being alive necessarily means that we are alive, and whether or not we can trust that we are awake and not merely dreaming that we are awake (Taylor, 2002). The epistemologist might study whether (and how) one can know whether our assumptions and perceptions are capable of yielding information on the basis of which any conclusions can be drawn at all. The epistemologist would be concerned with how we know what we know and with what we can possibly know, whereas the metaphysician would be concerned with understanding the nature of what we perceive around us (Taylor, 2002).

Axiologists are ethicists and artists depending on whether they study relative virtue or relative beauty, respectively (Hursthouse, 1999; Rosenstand, 2008; Taylor, 2002). The ethicist is primarily concerned with differentiating moral right (or good) from moral wrong (or evil); the aesthetist is primarily concerned with what tangible things or ideas (such as poetry or even mathematics) are beautiful. Finally, the logician studies the relationship and degree of consistency or inconsistency between conceptual ideas. His tools consist of formal rules of argument and deductive reasoning that enable him to distinguish conceptually valid conclusions from those that are not supported by the evidence or information upon which they are supposedly based (Rosenstand, 2008; Taylor, 2002; Wiley, 1999).

Theory

Theory refers to a process of formulating an idea that proposes to explain observed phenomena (Rosenstand, 2008; Taylor, 2002; Wiley, 1999). More specifically, a theory consists of a formal hypothesis (or set of hypotheses) that make testable claims about a phenomenon or series of related phenomena. The hallmark of any theory is that it be testable and capable of being disproved by empirical data. A proposed theory must also be testable in ways that allow it to be tested and retested repeatedly by independent testers sharing only the same initial hypothesis (or hypotheses) and the same methodology for conducting the tests of the validity of the theory. Hypotheses that are confirmed by empirically valid tests are said to prove the theory, although more technically, nothing is ever actually "provable" for reasons that raise questions within the realm of epistemology (Taylor, 2002).