The Problem of the Object in Pedagogical Theory

When regarding education as the object of pedagogics, we acknowledge the de facto legitimacy within. However, this assertion cannot serve as the sole foundation for the emergence of pedagogy. The object of pedagogics naturally is education itself, yet it is not a simple abstraction from external experience. On the contrary, "education itself" is an object created and provided by thinking, inherently opposed to the cognizing subject. This subject infers to the fundamental-theoretical question of "What is education". From the perspective of logical analysis, education can be traced back to the existence of a definite, simple, and even unanalyzable object. The analytical tradition can only formally achieve a syntactic gestalt of "what is education?". However, the essential connotation of education must be obtained through the phenomenological essential intuition(Anschauung). The process of confirming the educational object is also the process of filling the meaning of educational intention. By employing the form of thought image and the method of free imagination, the knower establishes an intellectual connection with the universal concept of the object, thereby enabling cognition of the object. Simultaneously, the original giving nature of the educational object itself, as the purpose and intention of the universal essence, can be revealed.