The influence of the Greek paideia as the pedagogy of the virtues in Goleman

Goleman goes back to the Hellenic world to find there the articulation between rational thought and good management of emotions. Following Jaeger (2000), it can be considered that pedagogy finds its roots in Greek paideia, where the goal was to form the disciples ethically and aesthetically. The kalokagathia (kalos: beautiful and agathos: good) formed a harmonious horizon for the virtuous formation of the citizen.

In this process of trying to overcome the model of intelligence by IQ and that agonizingly develops and hurts itself, Goleman travels the Hellenic path of an ethic founded on a concept of good life oriented towards happiness, that is, Socratic eudaimonia, and the Aristotelian ethics of virtues. The author resorts to maieutic, which starts from knowing yourself, to just go to the external reality, and all this in an intelligent way, thus recovering tasks of good management of emotions and feelings to reason. The author also insists on the self-knowledge of Socratic maieutic, as a mechanism to develop a morality of virtues, which would also bring us closer to the human goal par excellence, which is happiness.

I would like to imagine that, one day, education will include in its curriculum the teaching of such essentially human skills as self-knowledge, self-control, empathy, and the art of listening, resolving conflicts, and collaborating with others. In his Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle makes a philosophical inquiry into virtue, character, and happiness, challenging us to intelligently govern our emotional life." (Goleman, 2000, pp. 10-11)

Unlike the Hellenic time, Goleman also has scientific evidence about neural mechanisms, which begin to be able to measure reactions such as empathy, rejection, among others.

Intelligence as a good manager of emotions in Goleman´s paradigm

Goleman insists on being able to be aware of one's emotions and feelings, rather than denying them. That would allow the opposite to happen of when they are denied. Good management of them is only possible when they are known and accepted. And on the other hand, it allows us to better understand, and somehow relativize, the emotions and feelings of others. Emotional intelligence is that from which we know how to properly manage our emotions and sensitive impulses that suddenly harm us, others, or the environment and that ultimately have no virtue or benefit. Then the emotional intelligence that combines two sources that appear to us above all classically dissimilar such as intelligence and emotion, Goleman fuses them in an attempt to demonstrate that the so-called intellectuality as understood by that imperialist model in some exclusive way showed it and tries to show that emotional intelligence would precisely allow intelligence, wisdom, to develop fully and not be carried away by bad emotions, and in that sense, both Plato and Aristotle would agree.

With Goleman, we go a little further and it is through emotions, that is, through empathy that we manage to connect with the other and experience the need for ethics. In Goleman there is a double process: emotion leads to rationality and not merely rationality is what subdues emotions.

In an initial stage, typical of educational training, Goleman's proposal derives from empathy, altruism. In this way, a personal ethic would be reached:

...the root of altruism lies in empathy, in the ability to understand the emotions of others and that is why the lack of sensitivity towards the needs or despair of others is a clear sign of lack of consideration. And if there are two moral attitudes that our time urgently needs, they are self-control and altruism. (Goleman, 2000, pp. 8-9)

It can be affirmed that this Socratic process of introspection is what will allow us to better “understand the feelings of others”. (Goleman, 2000, p. 114). However, it remains to be demonstrated in Goleman if the feeling of empathy is a necessary factor for ethics, or if an ethic can or should be generated even in the case that there is no empathy.

There is a kind of empathy, ethics arises as a form of emotional rationality, a perception of the pain of the other, an unfair situation in which we can consider the other is found and then return to ourselves and somehow metaphorically feel the pain in ourselves.

The telos of happiness in Socrates and the imbalance of rationality

The good and the beautiful are explained in strictly rational terms. And if so, that is understood by reason. In the Renaissance, in the case of Spinoza, there is no distance between perception and reason, it is all in God, that pan(en)theism, surpasses the Cartesian system in complexity and beauty. Is this mystically constructed universe is compelling? Probably not. In the Renaissance world where beauty and metaphysics merged so spontaneously - in its literal sense - talking about an EI could probably have been easily understandable, but not to derive any advantage or practical knowledge. Simply, to contemplate the harmonic beauty of the universe in its deepest sense.

In the 20^th century what has occurred is an imbalance, a dissociation between intelligence as a discursive element, and the emotional as something autonomous that moves us dissociated. That dimension that Goleman seeks to rescue can and must be found in other authors that precede him so that there is continuity. The overcoming of the self-interested, calculating homo, biases the human to its advantage, segregates it, and can finally alienate it.

Extrapolating the concept of EI we can affirm that this concept has been present throughout history, highlighting the renaissance and the century of Pericles. What is missing in the case of Goleman's proposal is the systematic treatment of what has been called practical rationality.

Ethics as a derivative of empathy in Goleman

Finally, with empathy, we are going to name that phenomenon so dear and so human in which it is with the other. There is a kind of empathy, ethics arises as a form of emotional rationality, a perception of the pain of the other, an unfair situation in which we can consider the other is found and then return to ourselves and somehow metaphorically feel the pain in ourselves. Virtues strengthen the personality and achieve the freedom of individuals in a real plane (Gallego-Jiménez & Vidal-Raméntol, 2018).

Empathy introduces us to the path of humanity. In a way that is sometimes ambiguous or wrong, but ultimately always illuminating that makes clear to us our unique and irreplaceable moral responsibility. The 21^st century has become a moral calling, which has filled daily life. How to combine the individual and the universal in pedagogy? This work is dedicated to establishing a transdisciplinary bridge between Goleman's psychological paradigm called EI and the practical philosophy of Karl-Otto Apel of an ethic of solidarity-based responsibility.

Limitations of Goleman's emotional intelligence proposal

Goleman's book that has led to his popularity inside and outside the US is Emotional Intelligence. The examples on which he bases his studies and conclusions are typical of American culture, which he sometimes corroborates with parallel examples, generally in other related countries.

How the

On the other hand, from an expanded viewpoint, more

If emotional intelligence means the good management of our emotions, and that taking into account the values, it can approach temperance.

Universal Kantian ethics from intersubjectivity

Complex ways of understanding rationality are exhaustively covered in Kant's trilogy. Study the case of ethics and aesthetics in philosophy where calculating intelligence gives up received prominence.

The ethics of solidarity-based responsibility is a response to global problems, from a universal ethical dimension emanating from the rethinking of various theories of German ethics after assuming the horrors of the Holocaust and understanding the problems that have been exasperated during the cold war and the regional disparities and environmental disasters. The reflection on what happened in World War II is taken up by the philosopher Karl-Otto Apel, who overcomes Max Weber's alternative of an ethic of intention in the Kantian way and that of an ethic of responsibility, which puts its focus on consequences.

Ethics is not merely left to the contingent of facts, but moral action includes concern for what happens there, without making it subject to that in Apel´s renewed version. Faced with the Kant versus Weber dilemma, the overcoming proposal of it humanizes the second option, frees it from the possible justification of means by ends, and makes it solidary, from a global perspective, managing to preserve the Kantian ethical universality, which crystallized the inalienable conception of human dignity.

In this, we also return to the Aristotelian ethics of virtues, which does not fall into nonsense, where principles are dissociated from reality. It is not out of date with a reality that could turn them into an effect contrary to that of the original intention. So, on the one hand, we need to have good absolute ends, which can also be considered somehow by the individual. On the other hand, critically evaluate the methodology so that its action leads to the desired end and does not end up being counterproductive.

4.2.2. Solidarity without borders as a necessary condition of ethics and in complementarity with Goleman's paradigm

Rethinking the maieutic of Socrates or Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics, from various disciplines such as psychology, philosophy, and pedagogy, show the validity of ethics of happiness based on training in the virtues of the good man and facilitate a transdisciplinary and universal approach to understand its validity and, on the other hand, to face common challenges of humanity. Goleman, for his part, sees in the Greek virtues that fruitful horizon where those emotions guided by a correct education can be seen.

Apel resorts to the beautiful concept of solidarity, which is not limited to a group or community or country but rises to the macrosphere, to the recovery of all humanity, suffering intra and internationally.

Good work is essential to ethics, and thus universal and achievable ethics that puts human dignity as its pillar on a planetary level. In other words, the dimension of the good action is recovered, of doing well taking into account the other, always the bearer of human dignity. With this proposal, Apel manages to overcome the Weberian alternative, taking up the importance of the necessary global impact of it.

Education for freedom from UNESCO

UNESCO had already resized the concept of solidarity, giving the attributes of intellectual and moral at the same time, probably starting from the classic classification of intellectual and moral virtues.

In its Constitutional Act of 1945, solidarity is stated as a necessary condition for lasting peace. With this, there is no room for ambiguity, that solidarity has to belong to everyone and for everyone, with all the resources we have, whether it be of the academic or personal field. All science and humanities must be at its service. Solidarity is moral in an all-encompassing sense, which includes everything else of the human, reinforced by the values of the scientist, the humanist, and the artist, which reinforces that noble gesture of humanity.

Education as a practice of freedom, an ideal now universally raised by UNESCO, also finds roots in the Latin American world with Paulo Freire, among others.

4.3.2. The importance of universal education and the Convention on the Rights of the Child for education for the 21 ^st century

History must have passed to confirm that this ideal can be extended to all citizens, and also to global citizens. UNESCO has managed through its intercultural and intercontinental programs to promote inclusive education. "Education for all" is the prevailing motto when conceiving education today. And all this because today, education can be affirmed as one of the human rights that everyone deserves.

Education is a universal right, as stated in the Convention on the Rights of the Child (1989) – ratified by all the countries in the world except the United States- for which we speak of universal education. For this, we must reflect on what format should be assumed so that this is not merely an expression of desire, but is embodied in educational programs.

So, on the one hand, universality meets education insofar as it is required to include all children and young people in the world. On the other hand, that universality is crystallized in its content. It is perceived that this universality must become part of the learning material. Empathy should not be limited to a kind of comfort zone but should expand without borders.

An expanded and cross-cultural view of Goleman's emotional intelligence

How do you combine the individual and the universal in pedagogy? More emotional intelligence and ethics of solidarity-based responsibility for current times.

How to recover a humanist pedagogy, after the curriculum that was oriented to competitive skills? There must be an ethical discovery of the other. Who is the other in the pedagogical classroom?

The impact that emotional intelligence has had on the education of minors, not only in the US but in other regions, is remarkable. Its proposal has had a unique contribution to the formation of the person and society, and that objective is shared with the humanistic project of ethics and education, even reaching proposals such as that of "emotionally intelligent organizations" (Sánchez & M, 2016) on the basis that from the smallest to the most complex structures require a minimum of clear and inclusive rules for their operation and development (Contreras, Negrete, & G, 2018).

How is it taught? What is taught? For what is it taught for? In what way does this emotional intelligence reposition the goals of the current educational model? That other education guides, particularly philosophy and pedagogy itself, had reached similar results, which Goleman draws from his psychological experiments.

A policy of discrimination and exclusion, although the Greek world carries an elitist and therefore exclusive concept, on the other hand, it lays the foundations of a universal concept to think about human action within the framework of the ethics of Good, of course, the great tragedies of slavery, of the oppression of the other, partially appear before our eyes, but beyond that, today we can all rescue the legacy that we find that we have received from the Greeks towards a universal conception, a Universal understanding of Human Rights, the Greek virtues are thus abilities put into practice, human behaviors in harmony with others and ourselves, and that lead to a free and responsible fulfillment of the person, with this many of the consequences, or at least applications, of that instrumental intelligence, are ruled out, I wonder that Goleman criticizes which opposes the concept of emotional intelligence.

Annex: A reference to the Iberian and Latin American world

Goleman's proposals are already developed in some educational theories and practices in the Spanish-speaking region, such as the Institución Libre de Enseñanza (ILE). But it is true, many times censored and discouraged. Currently, progress is being made in the Iberian and Latin American worlds following Goleman's proposals. Socrates' "know yourself” teaching is rediscovered —to be aware of one's feelings at the very moment they take place— constitutes the cornerstone of emotional intelligence (Goleman, 2000, p. 58).

It is possible to verify the good coincidence between the historical trajectory that the philosophical tradition has had in Spain through the ILE as the most outstanding case, with what today emerges as a positive proposal of emotional intelligence, although without using that term. The purpose of showing this similarity between the two has a meaning, not only for historical reasons but also to reinforce good traditions and give a continuum to a process that deserves it.

The historical discontinuity given by the persecution of free thought, of educating from freedom, as the philosopher Emilio Lledó well emphasizes regarding the practices of the 1930s, invites us to return to a tradition that is our own. Sometimes it is thought that pedagogical practices must be imported to solve pedagogical demands that are considered unsatisfied. The fact that EI is deservedly imposed as a successful approach in the treatment of trauma (Salcido and Urías, 2016) and of re-educational diseases can and should be coupled with previously existing practices of pedagogy and philosophy, in at least Spain, that maximized the development of virtues and talents from education.

The ILE had as children Unamuno, Machado, Dalí, Buñuel, Zambrano, Lledó, and many others, and all of them in their way and the area of humanities and art, embodied forms full of freedom and self-realization, and emotional intelligence. Goleman's proposal can be embedded in that Spanish pedagogical and humanist tradition, and it would be a shame if a historical memory of an education in values, very developed in Spain, is omitted. The damage of the civil war and the subsequent endless dictatorship have resulted in truncating these great advances for the time, such as the ILE.

Likewise, drinking from the sources of Greek thought was at the basis for the training of the individual, not so much to combat the hegemony of calculating rationality, but rather as the full path to a paideia, as shown by Lledó or, in the German tradition, Jaeger.

The human was at the center of the pedagogical process. The cultivation of virtues, educating through empathy was at the center of the ILE classroom, which by the way was not a traditional classroom, but the pedagogical practice was transferred to the shared public space. Classes were given in the streets through theater, through experiencing in rurality the aesthetic perfection of a museum that reached all corners of Spain, men and women alike, boys and girls.

Rethinking or reinventing pedagogy, the formation of the individual or their re-education, is nourished by a historical memory as well as advances facilitated by Goleman's psychology. Emotional intelligence also invites a historical memory, in this case, pedagogical. Recovering those practices that were punished and then banned by Franco is also a way of re-educating in the way of emotional intelligence.

We see there with surprise that we discovered an advanced education coinciding with many of the educational proposals of emotional intelligence. The philosophical tradition in which both are nurtured inaugurates another way of thinking about the ILE. From the EI we see that the ILE is the pioneering paradigm of it and that recovering it to put it in the place it deserves today from a historical memory would be a fruitful tribute that Spain deserves. A parallel path to that of Goleman on the subject of ethics and empathy considering the Greek philosophical and also pedagogical roots of the paideia and the theory of the virtues of Aristotle partly because of the one considered as one of the sources of inspiration and, on the other hand, to carry out a contemporary journey together with Spanish humanist thinkers from the 20^th century where Greek sources are used and philosophically adapted to contemporary pedagogy, and seeing that in the Spanish world we have enormously creative and innovative aspects in the 20^th century, we will resort to considering the Institución Libre de Enseñanza in the times of the First and Second Republic to see how an adequate treatment of the wise or cognitive intellectual abilities of the human person is implicitly manifested regardless of what this exhausting paradigm of instrumental-functional rationality has been, but not achieving a range of flight.