It sounds bizarre to say with Aristotle that philosophy--
or pure contemplation generally-- is the highest human activity. In particular, it sounds like pure self-congratulation
on the part of the philosopher. But what if the claim doesn't mean that at all? What if the reference
is truly to the activity and not to the man who carries it out?
Put the question another way: in an ideally-ordered society, who should
be paid out of the public trough, and why?
- Those who protect or serve the whole community equally: police, firemen,
soldiers, etc.
- Those who rule and administer the whole community: legislators, statesmen,
etc.
- Primary and secondary educators, because by teaching children to read
and write they (should) make it unnecessary for them to kill and steal, thus protecting the public more surely than the police.
But it is possible to make an argument (although I don't make it here)
that in a well-ordered society, public subsidies should also support higher education in the manner of Oxford or Cambridge
-- because the life of the mind, along with the arts, is the best thing to spend money on. That is what a society's
wealth is for, or it should be. And all the society benefits if there are people in it who attain the heights
possible to the human spirit. These people are like a leaven: it does not need many of them to breathe a higher spirit
into the whole society. And they must be aristocrats of the spirit -- men and women of the finest discernment and
delicacy. All this costs money, lots of it. For this reason such schools -- if they are to be created and funded at
all -- should not strive to be efficient, but rather lavish. Because they are not producing commodities,
nor even generating knowledge, but cultivating spirits; and that requires far greater pains and expense.
And (the argument would continue) it is fair to spend public funds, because it is these men and women who breathe
life into the community as a whole.
This is not the same argument that justifies paying for scientific research:
that can be a purely utilitarian investment. Rather this is an argument that it is fair for some few to live off
of others, because of the benefit that this aristocracy brings us all.
To get back to the main point, it is in this sense that the life of the
mind can be seen as the highest -- because all other tasks are undertaken in order to pay for it. This does
not say that scholars are the highest men -- as human beings there is nothing to prevent them being petty
and small. But the leaven which they make possible is worth the price of all.
