Inside Hill of Content bookshop. Photo credit What’s On, City of Melbourne government website. Accessed 15 Mar 26.
A couple years ago, my wife and I had the chance to fulfill a decades-long dream of visiting Australia. There are a hundred stories worth telling from this trip, but for now I will limit myself to a single happy encounter during our stay in Melbourne.
Let me preface this by confessing that I can be a tedious person with whom to travel. When I arrive in any city, my first priority is locating any and all bookstores (or even stores of other varieties that may contain small sections of books) and spending as much time in them as possible, attempting to commit their selections to memory for future reference. You can tell a lot about a city from its bookstores, and you can tell a lot about a bookstore based on what it chooses to stock.1 It behooves one, then, upon arriving in a new place, to map and gene-sequence the book suppliers in order to fully understand the Municipal Organism.2
Melbourne presented itself as a very fine book city, and one strand of protein we stumbled upon was the Hill of Content bookshop on Bourke Street, a cozy place with a richly rewarding variety of books available. Having opened over a century ago, it is Melbourne’s oldest book emporium.
With this, I tote the philosophical weight of a mighty question.
So much did I enjoy my time in their establishment that I chose to purchase one of their branded totes as a memento. The totes draw attention to the persistent mystery of Hill of Content: where should one put the emphasis? Is it the “Hill of CONtent” bookshop, conjuring up an image of an enormous mound of books? Or is it the “Hill of ConTENT” bookshop, evoking the sensation of quiet pleasure, joy, and satisfaction one often derives from a well-selected volume and a relaxing session of page-turning? No one can say for sure, and the debate rages on.
The more time I’ve spent with this bag and its provocative question, the more I’ve come to believe the same question plagues the world of education. Overwhelmingly, schools seem to be measured by their ability to deliver content, rather than contentment, to students.
In fairness, I know of a great many schools with powerful academic reputations that have worked diligently in the past ten years or more to address concerns around student stress and to promote well-being. Schools want their learning environments to be enjoyable spaces for young people. Many that I know provide “mental health days” with breaks from class, counseling sessions, even therapy dogs. Some have created “intersession” days during the school year, where students and teachers stop working with the normal curriculum and instead spend time on non-graded, new activities like pilates, crossword design, tae kwon do, knitting, model rocketry, or baking. Schools have tried to increase the individual time students have to talk about how they’re feeling; to this end many train older “peer counselors” who help by talking about how they coped when they were the age of younger students.
But…
Most schools still employ a specific mandatory curriculum, one that generally offers little by way of choice, particularly among younger ages. Most schools still utilize exams or tests of one sort or another as their primary mechanism for assessing student achievement of curricular standards. Most schools create tiered classes in at least one subject, which can have the effect of lumping the highest-performing students (from a conventional GPA standpoint) together in other – even all – subjects. Most schools encourage competition either through class rankings (to determine, ultimately, valedictorian and salutatorian awards) or through academic prizes of various sorts. Most schools want to be able to tell families that 100% of their graduates end up at a four-year college, and that a significant percentage of those graduates attend “extremely selective”3 universities.
It seems clear that removing any one of the above items as a school priority would go a considerable way to alleviating the stress felt by students. But I know when I write those words that most people find this idea laughable – even grossly negligent. Ambitious parents hope that schools, ultimately, will enable their children to compete and win places at selective universities; most believe this means enabling their children to achieve high grades and to win prizes that look good on college applications. Schools point out that universities and the work force are competitive situations, requiring students to demonstrate what they know and to try to edge ahead of others for limited opportunities. For a school NOT to prepare students to enter the real world would be criminal.
No doubt you, like me, see the situation as reminiscent of that iconic moment in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan.
We learn in Nicholas Meyer’s 1982 sci-fi masterpiece that Starfleet cadets seeking command positions are required to take part in the “Kobayashi Maru exercise.” This is a kind of role-playing game in which the applicant assumes command of a starfleet ship that receives a distress call from another (the Kobayashi Maru of the title) in enemy territory. Approaching to provide assistance, the applicant finds him/herself attacked by three enemy vessels and quickly outmaneuvered and outgunned.
The Kobayashi Maru scenario frequently wreaks havoc with students and equipment, Mr Spock informs us. (Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. Directed by Nicholas Meyer, Paramount Pictures, 1982)
The game is designed to be unwinnable, intending not so much to test battle strategy as to evaluate how the would-be captain faces up to certain death.
Only one cadet in the history of Starfleet has ever “won” – come out of the Kobayashi Maru exercise with his ship, crew, and person intact: James T. Kirk. We learn later in the movie that he won by sneaking into the simulator the night before his test and reprogramming the scenario so that there was a path to victory.
Effectively, then, as Kirk’s son points out, he cheated.
College game theory classes love putting students through these types of expansive thought experiments. The Prisoner’s Dilemma is a typical example. In it, two prisoners accused of the same crime are interrogated separately. If Prisoner A “confirms” (rats on Prisoner B) while Prisoner B “denies” (says nothing), Prisoner A goes free and Prisoner B serves 5 years in prison. If both confirm, they each serve 3 years in prison. If both deny, they each serve 1 year in prison. So if you’re Prisoner A, what should you say to the police, if anything?
Outcomes grid for the Prisoner’s Dilemma – here Player A denies (D) while Player B confirms (C). The diamond on the left shows the result – 5 years for A, 0 for B. (Credit: Veritasium Youtube Channel, 23 Dec 2023, accessed 17 Mar 2026)
When I first read about this game, I remember having the feeling Kirk must have had when faced with the Kobayashi Maru: what a lousy couple of choices. Let 300 people die on the stranded ship, or lead my own ship to certain doom? Speak up and likely face 3 years in prison, or say nothing and risk a 5-year sentence?
The Prisoner’s Dilemma asks us to turn philosophical considerations about our control over our personal freedom into some kind of minimum-information problem. In the situation, am I not guilty? What was the crime? Do I know for sure that the other prisoner did it? Is there evidence to defend the charge? If I’m in prison for 5 years, is there any chance of early release? Do I have a lawyer? What is s/he recommending?
I realize that asking these questions obscures the purpose of the game a bit (i.e. calculating best options in a linked-outcome situation when you have no information about the other linked choice), but the alternative is allowing a conversation around criminal justice and sentencing guidelines to be reduced to a statistical function, which I find problematic.
Like Kirk, I wanted to reprogram the game.
Returning to the question of schools and student mental health, I feel the whispers of the Kobayashi Maru in my ears again: what a lousy couple of choices – either enable systems that produce inordinate stress in young people, or send them into their futures largely hobbled in their ability to lead “successful” lives.
Why are these the only choices?
In virtually all the books and essays I’ve come across regarding the Prisoner’s Dilemma, it is treated as a problem of rational thought vs irrational thought: the way to avoid the longest sentence (5 years) is for each prisoner to confirm, though doing so will mean they each serve 3 years. On the other hand, if each does the irrational thing, they will both serve only 1 year. Most analyses discuss navigating the tension between rational and irrational decision-making.
No discussion of guilt, or the law, or evidence, or justice, or responsibility, or freedom, or conscience, or loyalty,4 or due process – all of which would form a part of pretty much any person’s decision-making were they to find themselves in this actual situation. The game asks us to remove important questions of human values from the equation – and then to take what we’ve learned and apply it to real-world situations. Which implies that we should also, what, disregard human values from the real-world situations as well?
Similarly, in the Kobayashi Maru scenario, cadets are asked to look past the hundreds of lives that would potentially be lost (including their own)5 and to somehow engage with the “leadership lesson” being taught as they make a series of futile commands in the fleeting final minutes of their simulated existence.
Kirk understood even one lost life can be an onerous burden, let alone hundreds. The fact is, if a no-win situation like Kobayashi Maru comes our way, no amount of preparation will change the ending. So, Kirk rightly considers, how is it a good use of time to practice this ending, when we could instead put that same energy toward finding ways to AVOID these no-win situations?
Kirk faces the loss first of a young ensign and then of his best friend (Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. Directed by Nicholas Meyer, Paramount Pictures, 1982)
(Incidentally, “Kobayashi” is one of the most common surnames in Japan, roughly as common as Davis in the US. “Maru” is a common ending word for ships, used to denote perfection and safety. But read literally, the phrase “kobayashi maru” can mean “small, round forest.” Throughout Star Trek II there are a number of small, round settings–including an underground forest of sorts on a distant moon–frequently used as spaces where characters face what appears to be certain death. On several occasions, Kirk finds his way out of these “small, round woods” with unconventional thinking.)
What if the lesson of the Prisoner’s Dilemma involved teaching game theory students how to identify analagous situations in other areas of life and work, and then how to ensure that the decisions made – by both the prisoners and interrogators – are based in strong morals and ethical behavior? What if the Prisoner’s Dilemma encouraged students, in matters of justice and freedom, NOT to be reductionist in our thinking, limiting our decisions to a single data point like, “What’s the other guy gonna do?” What if instead, it taught that decisions around weighty matters deserve lengthy, complex deliberations? Deliberations that reference connecting concepts (e.g. freedom) and fundamental human values (e.g. justice)?
Again, I can practically hear the eye-rolling of those who feel that I’m being purposefully obtuse – I continue, some will say, to miss the whole point of the Prisoner’s Dilemma exercise. I would prefer to say that I haven’t missed the point, I have simply tried to substitute it for a point that is far less dangerous.
Yes, that’s right: dangerous.
I recently read an interview with the environmental writer and analyst Ketan Joshi. Mid-way through, the interviewer (Vlad Bunea) pointed out a number of things:
“There are a lot of reports (1, 2, 3, 4) that tell us how bad the climate crisis is. If we were to use a metaphor it appears they are describing the water while we are drowning in it. They do not take a stance against the extra-scientific causes for these terrifying realities even though this would be perfectly well aligned with the scientific method.”
(Sufficiency and Wellbeing Magazine, 15 Mar 26)
Among the causes the reports could have identified are the corporations who knew that ongoing, mass use of fossil fuels on a global scale would produce precisely the environmental effects we’re seeing now.6
Edward Teller, the “father of the hydrogen bomb,” clearly had very specific ideas about what constituted dangerous technologies (Oppenheimer. Directed by Christopher Nolan, Universal Pictures 2023)
As early as 1959, renowned physicist Edward Teller addressed a conference of petroleum executives7 and told of the dangers of the “greenhouse effect” from burning their products. In 1965, at a meeting of the American Petroleum Institute, their president, citing a study by US government advisors, warned of “catastrophic consequences” due to the increase in CO2 levels, causing “marked changes in climate” by the year 2000. That same organization created a “CO2 and Climate Task Force” in the 1970s, with members from major oil companies, that foresaw ongoing fossil fuel use causing “globally catastrophic effects” in the 21st century; then the API hid their findings from world governments, advising them instead to dramatically increase their coal consumption. Exxon leadership received (and widely shared) a memo from one of its own managers linking their business ambitions to a catastrophic future for large portions of the planet.
A page from Stanford scientist John Laurmann’s remarks to the API in 1980.
The fact that all this happened (we have detailed evidence of the deceptions), but scientists don’t feel they should talk about these things as root causes of our current situation feels very Kobayashi Maru/Prisoner’s Dilemma to me.
More fundamentally, as an educator, I feel as though those of us adults charged with guiding young people (who suffer increasingly from anxiety and mental health concerns related to the environment)8 into the future are Starfleet offering up the no-win situation, asking them to accept that people are going to die no matter what choices they make. We are game theorists telling students to be rational and accept one of a few bleak futures. We know that there are others making decisions entirely connected to the bleakness of students’ futures, but we don’t really talk about that. We don’t discuss the future with them from the standpoint of responsibility, or truth, or evidence, or justice, or even the law.9
Instead, we teach them to be resilient, we offer them mindfulness exercises, we encourage them to cultivate “the perspective that comes from realizing the potential of recovery and rebuilding.” Which feels to me a bit like telling Starfleet cadets, “The Kobayashi Maru is a situation you will probably encounter at some indistinct point in your future; you’ll see it coming and be powerless to stop it,” and then providing them with grief counseling.
It can make young people believe that we adults aren’t really interested in changing the way things are or improving the way the world works for them. And, when we then train them up to go through a college application process fairly indistinguishable from the one their grandparents experienced10 (swapping out computers for the paper-and-pen process of yesteryear), the sense that adults want to keep everything just like it is feels profoundly reinforced. Such experiences can affect students’ trust in educational institutions, to say nothing of their joy, motivation…even hope.
But…
What if we cheated?
A few months ago, Cory Doctorow wrote a piece in which he pitted William Gibson’s quote, “The street finds its own uses for things,” against Margaret Thatcher’s line about liberal capitalism, “There is no alternative.”
I can’t really offer a better illustration of Doctorow’s essay than his own. Enjoy.
Thatcher’s point was that, if you want to have the nice things that we have in our world, then we have to accept the bad stuff that goes along with it. Do you like having cars? Well, then, we’ll need to bleach the world’s coral reefs. A fan of air travel? That means you don’t care if the ice caps melt.
Doctorow argues that this is, like the Prisoner’s Dilemma, a reductionist point of view and suggests that Gibson’s observation offers a strong counter to Thatcherist thinking. Gibson points out that, no matter what you intend when you make a doohickey – a new technology, a movie, a tool, anything – no matter what you tell people it’s for, once they get hold of it, they will do with it what they please.
Your novels will spawn thousands of pages of fan fiction, taking characters places of which you never dreamed. Your nail polish remover will become an antidote for SuperGlue mishaps. Your duct tape will produce a functioning wallet while your yellow packing tape will fashion articles of clothing. Your explosive will make a useful heart medication. Your under-oven food-warming drawer will be repurposed for storage.
If you’d like to make one of your own, head on over to My Silly Squirts for instructions.
Effectively, like Nathaniel Hawthorne’s Owen Warland in “Artist of the Beautiful,” once we release our exquisitely-engineered mechanical butterfly into the child-like hands of the world, we are powerless to stop the world from grabbing it and breaking it into its component parts. And then using those parts to make a lockpick or a trap for spiders or a mechanical page-turner for sheet music.
Put another way, once the street gets hold of cars, they’ll invent loads of ways to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, well beyond electric cars. Same with air travel.
So what if, in our schools, we offered our students the World with the expectation that they should do something radically different – and radically better– with it?
What if we treated our young people like wily Kirks and not doomed cadets? What if our education showed them the alternatives Thatcher denied and celebrated them as members of Gibson’s “street”? Our interrogators would offer the Prisoner copies of all the evidence and connect them with a great criminal defense attorney. Our Starfleet would hand Kirk the wiring diagram for the simulator and a bag of tools. And then explain what each tool is and how it can help revise the no-win situation.
The tools we must supply are many, myriad, and complex: our students must gear up with a sense of justice, responsibility, conscience, loyalty, compassion – all values that will enable them to identify problems that need correcting or avoiding. We must show them how to employ imagination, collaboration, open-mindedness, and resilience, so they can work together to find solutions to big problems. They’ll need to put in hours of training on reason, healthy skepticism, forgiveness, trust, and self-awareness to test themselves and their ideas and to own their mistakes.
This is a partial list of building blocks of a new curriculum. And what texts should we select?
One of Michael Reynold’s off-grid, recycled, sustainable home designs (“Earthship Biotecture.” Democracy Now, 11 Oct 2012, accessed 23 Mar 2026)
We could introduce students to Michael Reynold’s Earthship design concept for sustainable homes, which has evolved and improved and spread since he conceived it in the 1970s. We could immerse them in hopepunk, afrofuturism, and other artistic movements imagining positive outcomes stemming from troubled pasts. We could encourage them to listen to the Upstream podcast as a way to come to grips with alternative economic models that might be better suited to a sustainable, equitable future. We could point them toward their local officials who could enact worthy changes close to home.
We could do all this and more. And maybe our students wouldn’t notice or wouldn’t care. Maybe they would just leave the world on its current trajectory.
Certainly, if we cling to the familiar well-worn paths that schools have always followed, the odds of our students doing the same increase.
But if we show them other paths, and if we give them useful tools and knowledge, and if we cheer them on as they leave the spaces we find comfortable, they might explore different paths through the small, round woods into the future – not without pitfalls and dangers, but with the benefit of being NEW and rich with POSSIBILITY.
This said, I should amend my thesis for this little diatribe. Not that I don’t want the children of today to find a measure of inner peace – I absolutely do. But, as Rutger Bregman says in his preface to Moral Ambition, complacency is a poor fertilizer for the seeds of change. In our warming world, we must help rising generations find and inhabit their winter of discontent, using the tools of character to dismantle the world we’ve offered them and to build an entirely new, better one for themselves.
In this blog and the accompanying podcast, The Child Who Will Change the World, I explore edits to our educational approach – some tiny, some rather larger – to make small tweaks that might lead to big tweaks that might lead to cultural shifts and to young adults emerging from our schools with a human toolbox at their disposal that’s as impressive as their academic one. Put another way, let’s do more content development aimed at developing some virtuous contention in our young people.
1 I’ve got a whole theory about this – but that’s fodder for a future piece.
2 Time should also be spent investigating and cataloging restaurants for identical reasons.
3 Defined as colleges and universities who accept less than 15% of their applicants.
4 What even IS the relationship between the Prisoners supposed to be? Why were they picked up together for this crime? So very many questions…
5 Cadets in the simulation are assured that the enemy ships will wipe out everyone, effectively making this, then, the “No Prisoners Dilemma.”
6 All information in this next section comes from Jonathan Franta’s excellent 2021 article in The Conversation, “What Big Oil Knew About Climate Change, In Its Own Words.”
7 Energy and Man, “Energy Patterns of the Future,” pp. 56-58.
8 Another useful article from EdWeek, 2022 – “Teens Are Struggling With Climate Anxiety. Schools Haven’t Caught Up Yet.”
9 Indeed – when schools dare try to encourage students’ civic engagement on such matters, many accuse them of “making school political,” “promoting a left-leaning bias,” “brainwashing young people,” and worse. Schools can face hostile parents and even lawsuits which ultimately require the academic “both-sidesing” of an issue that almost the entire scientific community – as well as many oil company executives and almost all insurance companies – accepts as real.
10 No joke – the US Common Application was first offered in 1975 – and early admission has been around since the 1950s. In China, the current Gaokao (university admission test) was implemented in 1977, though the Gaokao has existed in some form or other since 1952. Although the UK’s UCAS system has only existed since 1993, it emerged in part from the UCCA system begun in the 1960s; both systems have always relied heavily on A-levels and comparable high-stakes testing in determining university admission.