Matthew Lipman shares how using ethical dilemmas in the class can help touch on many aspects of student development.

Children in today’s world are bombarded by an ever-increasing barrage of marketing and advertising as well as being presented with role-models of a dubious quality (Kirsch, 2009). As educators we have a responsibility to make sure that our students are making thoughtful choices (Packard and Babineau, 2008). Their ultimate choices may differ from those that we would make ourselves but it is critical that they are given the tools to think deeply and analytically about situations and events that they find themselves faced with. In the modern secular world, the lines of morality and acceptable conduct have shifted dramatically in the last few decades and there is no reason to expect that there will be any lessening in the rate of change.

The Jewish studies classroom is a particularly challenging setting to discuss in the context of how students should be educated to evaluate moral and ethical dilemmas. Jewish texts teach clear messages about many issues of ethical and moral understanding, yet to give students the bottom line without exposing them to the struggles and values that underpin those texts we miss an opportunity to sharpen their critical thinking skills. Let’s take the example of copying homework. Most educators would tell their students that “no, it is not okay to copy a piece of homework.” However, once we begin to add the gray and discuss changing variables then suddenly the discussion becomes nuanced, more challenging and ultimately more valuable to the student. For example, a student may feel the need to copy because on previous occasions the teacher has humiliated the student for not completing the assignment or the student has a chronically sick parent or sibling and was taking care of them. The background to the copying now provides us with a platform to discuss with students their value system and how to evaluate the course of action to take when two sets of values, in this case not copying and helping a sick relative come into conflict.

The need to resolve two conflicting values arises when discussing various ethical dilemmas. It would be very simple to teach students for example, that organ donation is acceptable or unacceptable (depending on our standpoint) according to Jewish sources. Teachers can cherry-pick sources to support the bottom-line answer that they wish students to leave with. That, however, does the students a disservice and misses an opportunity to use Jewish texts as a tool to help students to enrich the value system of their Judaism and of their personal values system. The use of ethical dilemmas is a wonderful way to engage students with the rich nature of Jewish texts but of equal importance is the way they can be used to challenge them to develop critical thinking and the ability to defend a position which is reflective of their own values. There are many creative ways to present the dilemmas, many of them are presented in popular culture and then used as a platform to develop arguments for and against. Some of the potential topics that could be taught in the context of an ethical dilemmas class include: abortion, capital punishment, organ donation, allocation of scarce resources, etc. – the list is almost inexhaustible. Below I describe some sample core questions, issues and sources related to the topic of triage.

Lifeboat ethics is an intriguing philosophical debate that students find to be engaging and thought provoking. The key questions that are approached include how is it possible to put the value of one person’s life above that of another? If it is possible, then how is that decision to be reached? What factors should or could go into one’s evaluation of who should have the right to live? In a clip from Batman: The Dark Knight, the students are confronted with a scenario where the Joker has placed a bomb on two boats on the Hudson River. One boat is filled with innocent commuters and the other is filled with dangerous convicts. Each boat has a detonator that would set-off the bomb on the other boat and therefore save their own lives. The passengers on each boat have to evaluate what action their boat should take. One of the arguments put forward by a commuter is that the criminals have had their chance and that they chose to live their lives in a negative way (www.youtube.com/ watch?v=K4GAQtGtd_0.) Does being a convicted criminal mean that their life is worth less than that of someone who has not been convicted of a crime?

Adding to the complexity of the basic question is the one of who should ultimately make the call as to who has the right to live and who does not? There are many stakeholders in a decision such as this. How does one prioritize who should have the greatest influence over such a decision? In the United States for example, the main arbiter is the legal system, but should the courts really have a greater say than the people directly affected by these questions? To a teenage mind, it arguably makes most sense for the impacted parties to make their own choices. In a class discussion following the clip above, one student was adamant that the commuters or the convicts should make a personal decision for themselves as to whether they should detonate the bomb or not. It was only after much debate that this particular student understood that any action (or in this case inaction) not only impacted on the person making the decision but also on the other members both of their own group and, perhaps even more obviously, members of the other group. In this situation it is worthwhile to extend the argument to include situations that confront the students themselves, on a daily basis at school etc.

These situations can include all sorts of dilemmas that students confront daily. Who, in the case of an ethical dispute, should be the primary arbiter – the teacher, the parents, the school administration or the students themselves and equally crucially who beside themselves does their action (or inaction) impact? Students grapple with these questions on a macro level while beginning to establish for themselves a value system which will aid them in other areas of life too. Lawrence Kohlberg’s attempt to categorize different stages of an individual’s development of understanding moral situations is useful to this discussion (www.simplypsychology. org/kohlberg.html). Kohlberg’s focus on the reasoning and arguments presented by a child help to understand the way that individuals employ their own rationales to develop their own moral compass rather than their actual answer is essentially what is being attempted here in the framework of the triage unit.

In the classic movie, Abandon Ship (www.youtube.com/ watch?v=xVm2dbMdXRs), the captain of the lifeboat is faced with the heartbreaking choice of throwing some passengers overboard in order to ensure the survival of the larger group. Students are gripped by how the captain makes his choices, in this case the captain makes a “survival of the fittest” policy. If someone is unable to contribute to the efforts to row the lifeboat ashore then they are cast overboard. Is this “survival of the fittest” policy the way that such choices should be made? Does this value system sit comfortably with students? An alternative policy could be formulated based on “women and children” first, or those who are sick should be given the best chance of survival. Again by presenting students with these complex scenarios they are being required to establish for themselves a set of values and to prioritize those values. The values that the students derive and identify with these from this sort of scenario can be tested against their approach to situations which confront them at school and home. If they agree that “survival of the fittest” is the best policy in a situation of lifeboat ethics, do they also agree with this at home? In a basic example, if there are three siblings and only enough ice cream for two of them, is it the two strongest siblings who get the treat? If the students most identify with helping the weakest of society, would they be okay with the weakest/ youngest etc. of the siblings being allocated the ice cream?

I have seen many examples of students watching this movie and deciding that a certain course of action and ethical principle is the best one to follow, only to change their minds when confronted with an analogous example. In the case of “survival of the fittest” for example, many students would passionately argue their point of view only to shift their position when the example of siblings and the ice cream was presented to them. The students’ priorities and desire to pursue a “fairer” option took over. It could be argued that this also fits in with Kohlberg’s position as his research focused on thought rather than behaviors. The behaviors exhibited by students in situations that are closer to their daily lives often contradict the answers they give when faced with a theoretical scenario.

The themes, discussion topics and triggers mentioned above are engaging in a secular context, but in a Jewish studies classroom they take on an added dimension on providing an entry point into the world of Jewish text and thought. There are many primary sources that deal with the themes that have been discussed here. Ultimately rabbinic authorities use these sources to build a case to decide outcomes of Jewish law one way or the other. However by opening up the sources and the values contained within them for students to grapple with, the students gain a greater understanding of Jewish philosophy while also having a contrasting or supporting viewpoint to their own. For example, the famous story of two men walking through the desert but only with enough water for the original owner of the water (Baba Metzia 62a) is a classic example of a Jewish text dealing with a case of triage. According to the Rabbinic source, who should receive the water, and – more importantly – how do the Rabbis arrive at this conclusion? What values are driving the decision of the Rabbis to say that the man with the water should drink it himself and thus condemning his fellow man to die?

Another modern case study that can be used to contextualize this text is conjoined twins and whether one child should die so that the other can be saved. There were many instances when students would argue that it would be impossible for parents to choose between two children and therefore should lose both children. When the discussion developed, many students agreed with a revised position that surely parents would rather have one child than none, Maimonides’ ruling that all must be done (with the exception of committing incest, idolatry and murder) to save another’s life (Yesodei Hatorah 5:6-7) is a very challenging text for students to understand due to the potential ambiguity of what constitutes murder. Is passive nonintervention considered to be on the same level of liability as being an active participant in an act? How would Rambam’s ruling be understood in the context of the narrative from Baba Metzia 62a? The mishnayot in Terumah 8 certainly differentiate between active and passive behavior in the cases of triage. Students can be engaged with the simple question of why: why does active behavior and passive behavior seem to be different in the eyes of Jewish sources when discussing these issues? Do students see a difference in for example throwing someone overboard off of a lifeboat and rowing away from someone trying to board the boat? If they do see a difference, why is that the case? If they do not, then why not?

The ideas presented in this article return to a central theme, namely providing students with the tools to decide for themselves the best outcomes in difficult situations. These tools can and will be used both in (hopefully) theoretical settings such as some of those presented in the suggested movies and clips and also in more practical cases like some of the examples presented as well. It is of course entirely possible that due to a number of factors, students’ behavior may ultimately not reflect their own set of developed principles, but by being given these tools they are also able to assess their behaviors in the context of their own judgement. In order to develop a holistic education for children and to ensure that they are equipped for the challenges of the world ahead, it is incumbent upon educators to allow students to explore ideas and sources and not just to tell them the “right thing to do is…” but rather “what do you think the right thing to do is, and why?”

References

Kirsch, S. J., ed. (2009). Media and Youth, A Developmental Perspective. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley.

Packard, B. W. and Babineau, M. E. (2008). Development: 9-12, in 21st Century Education: A Reference Handbook (ed., T. L. Good), 103-110. NY: Sage.

Matthew Lipman is the Director of Multimedia Development at the Lookstein Virtual Jewish Academy. He has been working in Jewish education and instructional design for more than 15 years. Matthew holds a Master’s Degree in Jewish Education from Hebrew University.