Moral Education and Indoctrination

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Abstract
In the first half of the paper, the author puts as strongly as he can the case for saying that there is no real distinction between moral education and indoctrination; or rather, that ‘moral education’ is the term we use for such moral influencing of the young as we approve of, ‘moral indoctrination’ for such as we happen to deplore. Such a conclusion would presumably gratify the moral relativist, but would hardly give satisfaction to any moral educator worth the name. At the end of the paper, a sketch of moral education is attempted which is such as to yield the distinction needed. It is argued that the same basic epistemological principles apply to moral knowledge as to knowledge of other kinds, even though our knowledge of the relevant states of affairs has not been and presumably cannot be refined to the degree of technical precision which characterizes the physical scientist or the historian.

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