{"id":1851,"date":"2021-04-01T12:18:05","date_gmt":"2021-04-01T12:18:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-jefferson-practicalfoundations\/?post_type=chapter&p=1851"},"modified":"2021-04-02T15:22:25","modified_gmt":"2021-04-02T15:22:25","slug":"avoid-the-trap-of-essentialist-thinking","status":"publish","type":"chapter","link":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-jefferson-practicalfoundations\/chapter\/avoid-the-trap-of-essentialist-thinking\/","title":{"raw":"Avoid the Trap of Essentialist Thinking","rendered":"Avoid the Trap of Essentialist Thinking"},"content":{"raw":"
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In biology especially, we see the workings of essentialism.<\/div>\r\n<\/div>\r\n<\/div>\r\n
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\r\n\r\nHere's a good long quote from the \"Footnotes to Plato<\/a>\" webpage at: https:\/\/platofootnote.wordpress.com\/2016\/11\/28\/biological-essentialism-no-thanks\/comment-page-1\/\r\n\r\nI took the liberty of bolding the spots I think are key to our discussion:\r\n
\r\n\r\nEssentialism<\/a>\u00a0is the notion that there are some attributes that are necessary to the identity or function of a given entity, and in the Western tradition is usually traced back to Aristotle and, before him, Plato. Plato\u2019s idealism, his notion of a realm of abstract Forms of which the world as we experience it is a pale reflection, is a form of essentialism. But the kind of essentialism that has been most debated throughout the last couple of millennia is Aristotle\u2019s<\/strong>, which American linguist George Lakoff characterized as the idea that some properties make the thing what it is, and without which it would not be that\u00a0kind of thing. An essential property of a triangle, for instance, is that the sum of its internal angles amounts to 180 degrees; the essence of the element oxygen is that it has an atomic number of 8 (i.e., its nucleus is made of 8 protons).\r\n\r\nIn philosophy, however, that sort of essentialism has gone the way of the dodo, because it applies to very few things<\/strong>, which do not even include chemical elements (given the existence of isotopes).\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\nThings don't just have essential qualities.\u00a0 Women who get essentialized get seen in terms of being childmakers, objects.\u00a0 Feminism attacks essentialism.\u00a0 Teachers aren't \"third grade teachers\" due to body size.\u00a0 (You laugh, but a former North Country elementary principal in the 1990s made her hires and grade-level selections based on body type.\u00a0 \"You're a thin girl.\u00a0 You are a Kindergarten teacher.\")\u00a0 We can use essentialism as a shortcut to actual observation, so it's a dangerous thing.\r\n\r\nStrangely enough, essential traits give us the biological naming system (Linnean) that we have.Socrates has some essentialist leanings whenever he asks those big questions and uses examples.\u00a0 The essence of a horse is horseness.\u00a0 The telos (Aristotle) of a horse is to be horselike.\u00a0 So much of our learning in the West is based on these two thinkers.\u00a0 How obsessed we are with these end goals, these arrows on nonexistent number lines!\r\n\r\nEssentialism influences unconscious bias, microaggressions, attitudes toward gender, ethnicity, and race.\u00a0 That's easy to point out, but here's the more difficult query: To what extent do you employ essentialism?\r\n\r\nIf you believe yourself to be immune to this thinking, check out the Harvard Implicit Association Test<\/a>.\u00a0 Take one and you'll see the extent to which your actions may differ from your beliefs--even on matters directly related to yourself.\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\n<\/div>\r\n<\/div>\r\n<\/div>","rendered":"
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In biology especially, we see the workings of essentialism.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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Here’s a good long quote from the “Footnotes to Plato<\/a>” webpage at: https:\/\/platofootnote.wordpress.com\/2016\/11\/28\/biological-essentialism-no-thanks\/comment-page-1\/<\/p>\n

I took the liberty of bolding the spots I think are key to our discussion:<\/p>\n

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Essentialism<\/a>\u00a0is the notion that there are some attributes that are necessary to the identity or function of a given entity, and in the Western tradition is usually traced back to Aristotle and, before him, Plato. Plato\u2019s idealism, his notion of a realm of abstract Forms of which the world as we experience it is a pale reflection, is a form of essentialism. But the kind of essentialism that has been most debated throughout the last couple of millennia is Aristotle\u2019s<\/strong>, which American linguist George Lakoff characterized as the idea that some properties make the thing what it is, and without which it would not be that\u00a0kind of thing. An essential property of a triangle, for instance, is that the sum of its internal angles amounts to 180 degrees; the essence of the element oxygen is that it has an atomic number of 8 (i.e., its nucleus is made of 8 protons).<\/p>\n

In philosophy, however, that sort of essentialism has gone the way of the dodo, because it applies to very few things<\/strong>, which do not even include chemical elements (given the existence of isotopes).<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Things don’t just have essential qualities.\u00a0 Women who get essentialized get seen in terms of being childmakers, objects.\u00a0 Feminism attacks essentialism.\u00a0 Teachers aren’t “third grade teachers” due to body size.\u00a0 (You laugh, but a former North Country elementary principal in the 1990s made her hires and grade-level selections based on body type.\u00a0 “You’re a thin girl.\u00a0 You are a Kindergarten teacher.”)\u00a0 We can use essentialism as a shortcut to actual observation, so it’s a dangerous thing.<\/p>\n

Strangely enough, essential traits give us the biological naming system (Linnean) that we have.Socrates has some essentialist leanings whenever he asks those big questions and uses examples.\u00a0 The essence of a horse is horseness.\u00a0 The telos (Aristotle) of a horse is to be horselike.\u00a0 So much of our learning in the West is based on these two thinkers.\u00a0 How obsessed we are with these end goals, these arrows on nonexistent number lines!<\/p>\n

Essentialism influences unconscious bias, microaggressions, attitudes toward gender, ethnicity, and race.\u00a0 That’s easy to point out, but here’s the more difficult query: To what extent do you employ essentialism?<\/p>\n

If you believe yourself to be immune to this thinking, check out the Harvard Implicit Association Test<\/a>.\u00a0 Take one and you’ll see the extent to which your actions may differ from your beliefs–even on matters directly related to yourself.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":53936,"menu_order":13,"template":"","meta":{"_candela_citation":"[]","CANDELA_OUTCOMES_GUID":"","pb_show_title":"on","pb_short_title":"","pb_subtitle":"","pb_authors":[],"pb_section_license":""},"chapter-type":[],"contributor":[],"license":[],"class_list":["post-1851","chapter","type-chapter","status-publish","hentry"],"part":28,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-jefferson-practicalfoundations\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/1851","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-jefferson-practicalfoundations\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-jefferson-practicalfoundations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/chapter"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-jefferson-practicalfoundations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/53936"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-jefferson-practicalfoundations\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/1851\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1910,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-jefferson-practicalfoundations\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/1851\/revisions\/1910"}],"part":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-jefferson-practicalfoundations\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/parts\/28"}],"metadata":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-jefferson-practicalfoundations\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/1851\/metadata\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-jefferson-practicalfoundations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1851"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"chapter-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-jefferson-practicalfoundations\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapter-type?post=1851"},{"taxonomy":"contributor","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-jefferson-practicalfoundations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/contributor?post=1851"},{"taxonomy":"license","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-jefferson-practicalfoundations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/license?post=1851"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}