Blog by Hazel McHaffie
As I stood in the queue around
Charlotte Square waiting to go into the Main Theatre, a young man approached
the elderly gentleman in front of me to ask what this session was about. 'Money
and greed', came the answer. 'Ah, that's why there's such a big queue,' the
young man said, and walked away. The summary was only partly accurate; the
discussion was much more finely nuanced than that.
And I use the word 'discussion'
advisedly because American political philosopher, Michael Sandel, adopted
the same techniques he uses in his now famous course on 'Justice', at Harvard
University, a course which he's taught for two decades: a winning combination
of facts, case studies, and challenges to provoke active participation. Nearly
a thousand students pack the halls of Harvard to listen to him, and there his challenges
include questions like: Is torture ever justified? Would you steal a drug that
your child needs to survive? Is it sometimes wrong to tell the truth? How much
is one human life worth?
