Nowhere Motel,Light beyond Being

Abstract

and therefore inevitably encourages moral virtue—or, if the college is a Nowhere Motel, vice. Since Aristotle and recent research on the human brain indicate that, throughout the college years, reason gains power to influence behavior, college is a logical place to study virtue. Many characteristics of college students suggest areas for attention to the teaching of moral virtue; but the essence of college is the development of intellectual virtue, which influences moral virtue. College teachers teach intellectual virtue through their approach to their subject, their conducting of the game or ritual of the classroom, and their moving back and forth between fact and spirit. Because the strongest intellectual virtues can go the most profoundly wrong, Socrates and Confucius suggest that, with the exceptionally gifted, the teacher keep in mind the Good, thought of as a light beyond being. Virtue is inevitably taught in college because real learning is learning to love, and love shapes virtue.