Purpose: So far, the work of Josef Mitterer has not been widely recognized in philosophy of education, even though it offers many points of contact not only for epistemological and methodological questions but also for empirical and educational issues. Among these points of contact there is an outstanding sentence (see motto), which can be taken as a starting point for conceptual considerations in philosophy of education. The article takes this sentence as a hub for some corresponding investigations. Method: The article seeks to make progress in these investigations through reflecting on Mitterer’s sentence in ten steps, beginning with translational aspects and ending with questions of power relations and inconsistency. The arguments are made through (a) reference to concepts that are currently being discussed in philosophy of education and constructivist discourses, (b) through contrasting various conceptualizations, and (c) through discussion of selected examples. Findings: The article proposes a translation of Mitterer’s sentence that may be from Mitterer. It points out several similarities with and differences to positions related to (presumed) positions of Mitterer. Furthermore, it shows innovative options for argumentations in educational philosophy on that basis. Benefits: The contribution sounds out some interfaces between Mitterer’s philosophy and current debates in philosophy of education. It contributes to differentiated understandings of Mitterer’s sentence and it opens up a new field of discourse.

Key words: philosophy of education, philosophical constructivism, contextualism, non-dualistic philosophy, politics of truth, governmentality

Excerpt: The effects of constructivism are not as obvious because constructivism is not a theory of learning. Nor is it a model for designing instruction. Rather, it is fundamentally an epistemology that has affected the way that educators in the past decade conceive of learning. As an ontology, it has significantly affected the fields of art and sociology for more than 60 years. More than a decade ago, I tried to articulate constructivist models of design, but I soon discovered that such a concept is oxymoronic. One can argue that it is impossible to directly and empirically demonstrate the effectiveness of constructivism. That was not its intention, despite the claims of many designers who claim to be constructivist.

Key words: functional contextualism, constructivism, behavior analysis.

At present, social constructivists agree on little more than the important assumption that knowledge is a social product. Beyond this, there is little agreement about proems. Different viewpoints about what it means to negotiate meaning and what the object of that negotiation ought to be (i.e., strategies/skills versus big ideas) reflect different assumptions about learning and the nature of truth. We examine these assumptions by contrasting three underlying world views: mechanistic-information processing, organismic-radical constructivism, and Deweyan contextualism or transactional realism. This third world view, we argue, is most consistent with idea-based social constructivism.