Reference is made here to the debate on usefulness of Pendidikan Moral in school.

1999 SPM student said that "There's really nothing much to Pendidikan Moral other than being able to memorise, by rote (any other way fails), 16 major and 64 minor moral values".

I agree. There is no point in citing justice, mental and physical cleanliness, freedom, rationality, kind heartedness or moderation as the major moral values when there is no rigorous debate as to why these are good.

Students should be taught to see how each of these values apply to different contexts and situations, or how these principles should balance individual and community interests.

I understand that the Education Ministry is coming out with a new syllabus next year for the SPM Pendidikan Moral. There are seven learning units with 36 values instead of 16 plus 64.

Students will be examined through one written paper consisting of eight structured questions and two essays out of choice of three. There is Kerja Kursus and Laporan Sahsiah , which include school-based course work, assignments and evaluation of students' behaviour for six months only (from January to July).

I have been told that this new syllabus involves less rote-learning and memorisation and is more factual and content based. However, I still have reservations.

Being taught in school that certain values are moral is different from internalising these as a code of conduct for their lived experience.

Any intelligent youngster will soon be aware of the sheer hypocrisy of their elders and leaders, and of the fact that tokenism and hypocrisy are the prevailing values by which to survive in our society. There is racism, religious schisms, extremism, rampant corruption, sale of honorific titles, corruption and the twisting of logic for private ends.

Nothing is more insidious than the internalisation by youngsters of this principle - that in our society the values that really count are tokenism (as exemplified by our mantra Malaysia Boleh ) or saying one thing and doing something else.

There is however another more fundamental question: Can morals/ethics be taught? This question is an old one, for Socrates asked it of his fellow Athenians 2,500 years ago.

Let us assume that morals and ethics consist of knowing what we ought to do and not to do, and such knowledge can indeed be taught in a manner that it becomes internalised. (To assume that they cannot be taught is not only contrary to what psychologists would say can be done, but is also counter-productive).

For morals/ethics to be taught, certain conditions must prevail.

1. The commitment to intellectual values must be more important than cultural or religious ones. Here emphasis is on training the mind to draw conclusions from only empirical facts independent of what we have been programmed by cultural values to believe, and irrespective of our emotional likes and dislikes. This is the principle of 'objectivity'.

2. With objectivity, there must be the principle of moral relativism - where moral values are relative depending on one's cultural and religious background.

3. The acceptance of different cultural norms should not mean that there are no universal values that transcend moral relativism. The caveat is that these universal values have by definition to be 'universal' in the sense that they cannot be Western, Asian, Christian, Buddhist, Islamic, Chinese, Malay or Indian.

4. These universal moral values have to contend with the imperatives of our self-interest and self-preservation since, from time immemorial, we have been self-seeking creatures interested in personal gain. This is necessary for survival.

So what is there to make us moral when our self-interest dictates otherwise? How does one find the balance to gain 'enlightened self-interest' in the sense of being self-seeking, yet moral?

Shorn off all religious and cultural values, there is only one universal moral injunction that will serve as moral restraint against the natural unbridled quest of self-interest - as Confucius said: 'Do unto others as you would wish them to do unto you'.

If Malaysians can grasp and apply this, there will be no need to learn "16 major and 64 minor moral values" in Pendidikan Moral. There will also be fewer problems, divisions and contentions raging over malaysiakini 's letters forum as well.

Do we have here the prerequistes for morals to be meaningfully taught? It is my opinion that we are far, far, far away from being anywhere near that point.