A Philosophy Professor’s Letter to Santa
Dear Santa,
It is not the intention of this letter to debate that nature of “good” and “bad,” or “naughty” or “nice.” As Hume claimed in his 1777 work An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals, morality is a human construct based solely upon societal norms which are themselves based upon society’s expectations. Given the relative nature of what constitutes “decency,” it is pointless for me to argue that I have, in fact, been a “very good boy” this year.
Based on my students’ end-of-term evaluations of overall instructor efficacy, however, I can conclude that I was reasonably effective in fostering academic growth through the rigors of dialectical inquiry. Perhaps I spent too much time on Kant, as one student pointed out, and not nearly enough time on Heidegger. Cartesian inquiry was perhaps not the best way to teach systematic analysis of Truth, given the preponderance of “fake news” and an ever-increasing skepticism in what had heretofore been the most universally-accepted axioms of human existence: that the world was a sphere, that birds were living creatures, or that election tampering was generally bad form. My students learned the lessons of Descartes too well, and are now confident that the only universal truth can be found in mathematics. Each of my PHIL 2200 students have now switched their major to one of the numerous math-intensive STEM offerings on campus.
Insofar as I have accidentally encouraged my students to major in a more lucrative industry, I suppose it can be argued that I have been, in fact, a good professor this year. Granted, the caveat is that such a thing as “goodness” exists at all. An ontological proof for the existence of goodness is forthcoming in my article “Being Good in Bad Times: Morality in the Age of Covid19,” wherein I argue that goodness, if it is an admittedly intangible but desirable trait, must exist because of the presence of badness. Ultimately, though, we can never know true “goodness” or “badness” in and of itself, but rather in comparison to other admittedly relative traits derived from metaphysical cognition.
I would end by saying that I hope this letter finds you “well,” but what constitutes “well” is naturally likewise relative and dependent solely upon perception and comparison and also it’s 2020 so there is that. Another frequent comment on my students’ end-of-term evaluations is that I tend to wander into tangentials and never recover my original course, and I fear that may have happened with this letter.
Therefore, I will simply conclude it, in as far as it is possible to conclude anything. For whatever my purpose in writing may have been, I hope you’ve found this missive worthwhile.
Best regards,
Professor Fields
