15315-wolbert

Summary 112 (a) It should be clear that a flourishing life cannot be achieved by human effort alone, it is for a significant part up to luck, i.e. it should be clear that (striving for) flourishing is inherently fragile. (b) It should be taken into account that child-rearing, as a necessary part of aiming for a flourishing life of children, inherently involves taking an existential risk, in the sense that 1) there is always the risk that the child does not become what the parent intended, and 2) the parent risks herself in undertaking this endeavour. (c) It should be made clear in what way flourishing is conceptualised, and what consequences that has for aiming for the future flourishing life of children. Flourishing is best conceptualised as an ideal, but it should always be made clear that there is a gap between a perfect flourishing life and what is realistically possible, and between those two and what is actually happening in the world at this moment. (d) There should also be nonideal theory on education for flourishing, to counterbalance the ideal theory that is currently available. A combination of ideal and nonideal theory on education for flourishing is most desirable, because this allows both a description of ideal education and a necessary focus on actual problems that threaten even getting anywhere near(er) this ideal. Points (a) and (b) are important for what I regard to be a good conception of flourishing, whereas points (c) and (d) set a standard for the theory in which flourishing is being defended as an aim of education. If these criteria are met, I do think it is worthwhile to think about human flourishing as an ideal aim of education.