We are all equal

I have come across an interesting article, "The equality of intelligence", in the philosopher's magazine by Nina Power. It is one of a series, "Ideas of the century" (I am not sure which one).

Power, whose dissertation is entitled From Theoretical Antihumanism to Practical Humanism: The Political Subject in Sartre, Althusser and Badiou and who is a senior lecturer at Roehampton University, refers to the work of Jacques Rancière,

"who never tires of repeating his assertion that equality is not just something to be fought for, but something to be presupposed, is, for me, one of the most important ideas of the past decade. Although Rancière begins the discussion of this idea in his 1987 text The Ignorant Schoolmaster, it is really only in the last ten years that others have taken up the idea and attempted to work out what it might mean for politics, art and philosophy. Equality may also be something one wishes for in a future to come, after fundamental shifts in the arrangement and order of society. But this is not Rancière’s point at all. Equality is not something to be achieved, but something to be presupposed, universally. Everyone is equally intelligent."

Just in case you thought she was kidding:

"In principle then, there is no reason why a teacher is smarter than his or her student, or why educators shouldn’t be able to learn alongside pupils in a shared ignorance (coupled with the will to learn). The reason why we can relatively quickly understand complex arguments and formulae that have taken very clever people a long time to work out lends credence to Rancière’s insight that, at base, nothing is in principle impossible to understand and that everyone has the potential to understand anything."

Power seems to be living in a different universe from those of us in the academic periphery. Perhaps she is actually pulling a Sokalian stunt but I suspect not. This sort of thing might be funny to many of us but it seems to be taken seriously in departments of education around the world. Just take a look at the model teaching philosophy statements found on the Internet.

Another example of her writing is Sarah Palin: Castration as Plenitude. Presumably that is  potentially understandable by everybody.