Teacher's Guide to "Chatness".

Seemingly an ordinary text about some children chatting on the net. But the chatting
develops into a philosophical area. Philosophy is definitely not the issue on the chat,
which seems to be a meaningless way of talking with each other. Typically you never chat
using your own name, as we see it in this text – you could perhaps say, that you as a
chatting person remove your own responsibility because of the distance you have to your
chatting partner. It is dutyless to chat – it is close to being meaninglessness – and you
can withdraw from the programme, if somebody comes too close to you.
Life is certainly not like that. So it might be a good beginning to take a talk with the
students about the difference between chatting and taking part in the real life.

Suggested questions to open the dialogue:

Does any of you sometimes chat?
What do you chat about?
Why do you do it?
Why do you not use your real name on the chat?
Do you want to be anonymous?
Why?
Is chatting better than talking to real people?
Why/why not?
Is it possible, that chatting on the net makes people lonely?
Can one imagine, that if you chat too much every day, you forget what Life is all about?

Virtual Reality

The net-world, the computer-world, the e-mail-world. Just think about it. Are they a way
to escape Life, to slip away from your own emotions? Or are they a harmless game and
nothing but that?
Take a deep debate about that.

In the real life there are fantasy, dreams, hopes, imagination. These concepts belong to
be alive, but they are not in the virtual world.
Is the IT-world taking all this away from us?
Try to make each student express his/her opinion.
Is virtuality dangerous or does it change our inner I?
(some scientists would agree with this, others would disagree)

Pokemon

The children are chatting about Pokemon, which you can find everywhere in the world.
Of course it will disappear again, but other games will occur. Children are collecting
Pokemon-cards and spend thousands of dollars on this. They rush to see the films, as
they always have been doing with trendy concepts. They do it with Harry Potter, they do
it with Lego and so on.

So try to open a discussion about collecting.

Why do people collect things (stamps, plastic bags etc.)?
Does any of you collect something?
What?
Why do you do it?
Is it in order to possess more than others?
Has collecting anything to do with competition?
If yes:
What is so positive about competition?
Is there a negative side to it, too?
Make every student express an opinion and let the discussion run.

(it might be important to tell the students, that the Pokemon-world is built on Shintoism,
and one can understand the Pokemon-fever as a shintoistic attack on Christianity)

Dreams

In the next chat the children chat about Life and dreaming. Life could be a dream, and
Death could as well.

Questions

How can I be sure, that I am not dreaming right now?
Can one dream, that one is dreaming?
In Steven Spielbergs film "Empire of the Sun" a boy says:
"Maybe we are God's dream, and God is our dream.
What do you think?
The aboriginals in Australia see this in another way:
The life, you live now, is your ancestors' dreams. You do not die, but wander into the
realm of dreaming eternally.
Try to discuss this as well.
Sigmund Freud saw dreaming as the mind's way of getting rid of things, you have
experienced, but cannot live with?
Try to compare these three ways of seeing dreaming.

Time

"There are time differences between ---"
What is time?
Try to make your students come up with a definition.
Is it something, which we have invented for practical reasons, but which does not exist?
What is the connection between time and distance?
Albert Einstein saw time as the fourth dimension, seeing time and distance being the
same thing.
It is difficult, but try to discuss anyway.
Tycho Brahe saw a star explode when he a clear night went to his lab. He was excited,
maybe being the first human being to have seen that. But then he stopped for a while,
pondering: "What I saw happened maybe thousands of years ago. So perhaps some of the
stars I see on the sky now are not there anymore".
Try to make your students ponder as well.
And then again:
What is time?
Would the world be changed, if we took away time?

At the end of this text the chatters chat about time once again:
"If time and distance ---"

THE DEEP QUESTION TO THE CLASS COULD BE:

Is time a presupposition for difference and distance?
Ups!
Do not expect that your students can handle this totally – but they are sure able to give
some suggestions. Even the fact that you take a talk about these profound concepts
spread "mental seeds" in their minds which will ripen and mature them later on in their
lives.

Newton said:
Time is independent from events.
Leibniz said:
Time is a special relation between events.
Zenon said:
Space and time are parted all the time, so moving between two spots is impossible.

(this is only meant as an inspiration to you as a teacher)

Mental Levels

Andreas says: There is a deeper meaning to everything, but it dwells on different levels."
What could he possibly mean?
Are there different levels in our minds?
So that we never see "the whole truth", but only parts of it?
Buddhists try to find this very truth through meditation, and they seem to be able to
jump from level to level in their minds?
Do you know the feeling, that what you find right today was wrong for you yesterday?
Do we change every day or every month, or are we just on different levels during the day?
Or is there a dialogue going on in our minds between the levels?
Could doing philosophy possibly help us to find our own way between the levels?
Could philosophy possibly help us not to strand in a maze?
Is philosophy so profound?
(investigations in different countries show, that doing p4c make the students their whole
lifetime able to see things clearer and to be better readers)

Eternity

Have a look at Andreas' last words.
Eternity is always there.
Ask your students:
What is eternity for you?
Make every student answer.
Has eternity anything to do with time?
Or is it a religious concept?
What is the opposite of eternity?
These questions could rise a real deep discussion, and philosophical debates are
mentally healthy for children, because they create a room, in which it is legitimate to
express one's own thoughts.

Per Jespersen

Back