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One of the functions of a moderator is to put everyone at ease. I am not going to do so as the subject tonight is a vital one to each and every one of us. It is a subject concerning issues about which we cannot be at ease. Being at ease slips over too easily into complacency and smugness. Each of us has a part to play which is active and not reactive.
Another function of a moderator is to remind you, not to inform you. To remind you that we live in a technocracy and that we are victimized by it. While education with a small “e” has given us this wonderful mechanized age, it has failed to give us the capacity to enjoy it and use it creatively. Instead, we have today as offshoots from this technocracy, cultural trends and reactions which are stifling healthy growth.
We find human values distorted, submerged or subordinated to a materialistic philosophy which has eventuated in lop-sided growth; and education, again with a small “e,” has overlooked the whole man—the “homo die” of Thomas Mann—or the man of Goethe who lives “in the all.” The whole man with his feet on the ground and head in the clouds: where is he? Now man has both his head and his feet on the ground. We have become afraid of the dreamer, the poet and the philosopher. The only thinker we will accept is the cold, logical dialectician.
How does a technocracy influence education and how does education influence technocracy? What does Education with a large “E” have to say in answer to these questions?
We are fortunate in having here tonight three individuals who are deeply moved by these issues. We are to have the benefit of their lengthy experience and concentrated thought on problems which influence all of us.
This is an age which has variously been designated The Mechanized Age, The Atomic Age, The Age of Industrialism, The Age of the Masses and the Mass Man. One may take any aspect of the current scene, and by over-simplifying and stressing that aspect, give it the dignity of a label. However, if