The Important Book raises the question of whether everything that exists has an essential property. The distinction between essential and accidental properties dates back to the Ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle. Aristotle thought that there were certain features of a thing – its essential properties – that it could not lose and still be the thing it was. Other properties can be altered without changing the nature of the thing. Think about hair color. You can certainly remain yourself even if you dye your hair. But what about more significant features of yourself, such as your personality or your central interest? Could you still be you even if you, say, no longer enjoyed listening to opera or whatever is your passion?
In thinking about whether things have essential properties or not, it is important to distinguish different types of things. It’s pretty clear that implements or artifacts – things that we have created – have an essence. A knife can only be a knife so long as it can cut. But natural things are different. Can something be an apple if it’s not round? Sure. In fact, most apples are not really round, if that means spherical. And we can certainly imagine scientists creating an apple with a flat side so it will sit still on your kitchen table. So, is there any property that an apple has to have to be an apple? This is the sort of question that the children will have fun discussing even as they learn to think more deeply about the nature of things. (Since apples hold the tree’s seeds, might that be its most important property?...)
People are, of course, the most complex. The Important Book says that the most important thing about you is that you are you. What exactly does this mean? It’s hard to say, but it is still a fun thing to discuss. Is there something that makes each of us the individuals we are? One important German philosopher, Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, thought that everything that is true of us is equally important to making us the individuals that we are. Most of us would disagree. But then what do you think the most important thing about you is - the thing that makes you you?
In discussing this book with children, it’s important to let them say that the book is wrong about what’s most important about some things. This gives them the opportunity to see that books are not always right, that they may have more insight into a question that the book (or even its author) does.
We’ve structured the discussion of this book differently than that of most of the other books on this website. Starting with the activity we describe will make it easier to raise the deep metaphysical issues discussed by this book. Enjoy!
Continue
to question set for this story
