PHILOSOPHY IN SCHOOLS: The study of philosophy helps students to cope with the fundamental uncertainty of life - surely a useful skill in our rapidly changing 'flexible' job market? Mícheál Tierney, a former Irish diplomat in Belfast and Rome, argues the case for philosophy at second level

During the recent abortion referendum in the Republic, it was frequently claimed that abortion was a legal, medical and ethical issue rather than a "political" one. In such difficult debates, it is indeed important to distinguish between different types of argument in order to evaluate and understand the various arguments.

It is not uncommon for different types of considerations to be cooked up together, often leading to confusion, misunderstanding and even bad faith. One discipline can serve to clarify such debates and disentangle the different considerations in order to assist in evaluating opposing arguments. For thousands of years, philosophers have attempted to address the difficult issues of human life, including the greatest questions facing humankind relating to the meaning and purpose of life. One of the great tasks of philosophy is that of ethics, where moral arguments are rigorously examined using the tools of human reason and reflection on experience.

It, therefore, remains a source of considerable mystery as to why philosophy remains completely absent from the senior curriculum of our second-level schools.

While the new religious-education syllabus will provide an excellent opportunity to study and compare different spiritual traditions, the extremely important independent philosophical tradition has been completely ignored to date.

In one of his St Patrick's Day broadcasts in 1935, Eamon de Valera remarked that "Ireland remained a Catholic nation, and as such set the eternal destiny of man high above the 'isms' and idols of the day. Her people would accept no system that decried or imperilled that destiny."

In 2002, the Republic of Ireland by contrast might seem to be undergoing profound cultural uncertainty. The rapid collapse of ecclesiastical authority, whether it be welcomed or not, presents Irish society with serious challenges.

Religious tradition provided a coherent vision of life and death, of how one ought to live and order society. It is hardly controversial to say that that tradition is no longer in a position to function as it did before and that evidence exists of a growing moral vacuum, with money and economic success increasingly defined as the sole values worth believing in.

Our European neighbours have acknowledged the importance of the study of philosophy. Professor John Marshall, dean of the faculty of arts at NUI Galway, believes that philosophy is a particularly apt subject to offer to students at Leaving Certificate, given the natural tendency of students of that age to ask profound questions about personal and social identity and to be sceptical about received wisdom.

While the introduction of philosophy would require a supply of new teachers and would involve the addition of a new subject option to an already-crowded curriculum, these problems are not, in his opinion, insurmountable.

Good news then that a sub-committee of the Royal Irish Academy has recently submitted a proposal on the introduction of social and political philosophy as an optional Leaving Certificate exam subject to the NCCA, the statutory body which advises the Minister for Education on curriculum policy.

The Royal Irish Academy proposal will be examined in the context of the overall study of senior-cycle education currently under way in the NCCA, which may have far-reaching implications for the Leaving Certificate between now and 2005.

One of the arguments frequently used against philosophy is that it serves no useful purpose and is therefore somewhat obsolete in the employment market of the information age.

It was the great British philosopher Bertrand Russell who said that one of the great benefits of the study of philosophy was the ability it bestowed on students to cope with the fundamental uncertainty of life; surely a useful skill in the rapidly changing "flexible" employment market of the new economy!

When I myself worked for the Irish diplomatic service, I noticed that many of my colleagues were philosophy graduates. Civil service recruiters know the value of a philosophical training for the men and women who would make decisions about complex moral and political issues from Northern Ireland to human rights.

Philosophy has also served many business people, journalists, writers, artists and scientists. Or as Dr. Pádraig Hogan of the Education Department of NUI, Maynooth puts it: "Where someone claims that philosophy is irrelevant, that it is superceded by the educational imperative of a technological age, it must be pointed out that it is no more justifiable for a new technological-economic creed to presume upon the minds, hearts and abilities of students than it was for institutional churches to do so in former times."