Leave a Road for the Child to Walk Himself

On the first day of the Lunar New Year, I used the WeChat Reading app to browse free e-books and came across Einstein Relativity—I must honestly say I did not open it out of interest in its content; I skimmed it only because its author is the famous Einstein. I am not a physicist and cannot understand Relativity, so I did not intend to read its deep physical theories; I was only interested in the preface Einstein wrote.

In the preface Einstein poured out his grievances about regimented education. He said he intensely disliked rigid, dogmatic schooling and preferred to teach himself broadly according to his own interests, which is exactly what he did. Like Feynman, Einstein was a master of uneven interests, avoiding subjects he did not care for. Einstein even said that preparing for exams burned up all his enthusiasm for learning, so that after the exams he was tired of study for over a year.

Like Einstein, Feynman was full of dissatisfaction with education; he even suspected that his own teaching wasted his students time, unsure whether they understood what he said. Feynman believed no matter how good an educational theory is, it only works when its creator practices it himself; others cannot fully grasp it and merely copy the surface. Like Einstein, Feynman was also a self-taught genius.

Kant said the road of genius is self-made. Presumably for geniuses like Einstein and Feynman, ordinary education is of little use—indeed it can be destructive. In fact, education in every country unconsciously stifles creativity and curiosity, and even the most knowledgeable teachers inevitably obstruct students free growth; parents who fancy themselves education masters are probably mostly erasing their children gifts. Admittedly, the most outstanding people are largely self-taught.

Even an ordinary person like me is deeply weary of exam-centered education. As everyone knows, it goes against human nature; no one wants to study things they dislike and be tested on them. For me, studying politics felt like being beaten to the ground every day; memorizing political quotations was a sheer waste of life—I have no interest in politics, indeed I dislike it, and no wish to enter government, so why study it?

And our children? Every day they must learn much they do not like, and are mostly forced to do so. As Mr. Fei Xiaotong put it, even the most enlightened parent interferes more in a child within an hour than a tyrant does in his people over a whole lifetime—if Mr. Fei were still alive, I would ask him to change most enlightened parent to most enlightened teacher in a reprint of From the Soil, so as not to leave teachers out.

We have made too many arrangements for children, unquestioningly believing they are for their own good; in reality we may never have spent even a second seriously evaluating whether our actions are right. We take for granted that we are right and that we are independent thinkers rather than echo-chambers.

Many believe they can think independently, but this is because they deeply misunderstand those four words. As far as I know, independent thinking is inseparable from skepticism; a person in the habit of independent thinking is always questioning—others and also himself—and constantly updating his understanding. Perhaps until his last breath he is never quite sure whether his views are right. Take Feynman: even standing on the Nobel podium he still said he was not sure his own views were correct.

For many people, living in such skepticism is sheer torment, so they prefer to give up independent thinking and believe the world offers certainty; otherwise they feel adrift. Independent thinking is not only mentally costly but requires a habit formed in childhood—the habit of constantly admitting one own ignorance and therefore being willing to keep exploring. Yet most people we meet are unwilling to admit their ignorance; they prefer to feel they have deep insight and to lecture others, always arguing until red-faced over right and wrong. I do not know whether education causes this or human nature is simply so.

Why could Einstein and Feynman become great scientists? Perhaps because of the rebellious and skeptical spirit in them—though I am not sure of this guess myself. So as a parent, I choose to leave a road for my child to walk himself, and not to interfere. Too many people in this world already interfere with him; for me to add to that would be too inhumane.

Of course, this is not a total rejection of education. Even geniuses like Einstein and Feynman could not entirely do without it; both completed systematic higher education. After Feynman joined the Manhattan Project and developed the atomic bomb, becoming a world-class scientist, he still dutifully went back and finished his doctoral thesis. Education played an important role in their research, so their complaints were not a blanket rejection but a critique of the irrationalities in modern educational thought and systems.

Their path to success also tells us that in learning, what really dominates is a person self-study ability, not anything else. So in scholarship, what matters most is curiosity and the enthusiasm to learn on one own; if children have these, there is no need to force them through a rigid, uniform model. We can give them far more autonomy to choose the road they want to walk.