THE PROGRESSING MACHINE OR LEARNING AS THE ART OF THE RIGHT MEASURE

This study is a long reflection, within a philosophical and humanistic tradition, about some mechanistic structures that seem to be the ridgepoles our society, and the main contributors for the engineering of subjects of this same society. These mechanistic structures, of which Education is part, are in our opinion, obeying to essentially rigid, isomorphic and mechanic laws, which clearly represent an inadequate perception of the dynamics implicit in each context, each situation, each environment as it is. These structures are what we call a progressing machine that is being globalised under various pretexts, namely education, development, modernity, etc. However, being a machine, its responses to challenge are restricted to a limited set of possibilities, whereas reality’s challenges demand much more than that as a response. In our opinion this systematic failure that is either felt or suspected both on a macro-scale, by countries and nations; or in a micro-scale, by the individuals, in bringing about such development, such education, is result of that inadequate and mainly mechanistic response that is being given to the multiple and interrelated challenges that our times present. Within this work we argue that what is clearly amiss both in society, in general, and in education, in particular, is a creative response as opposed to a mechanistic one. A response that represents something else beyond the pre-established set of possible responses. A creative response with the quality and nature of art itself. The art of the right measure.