It has become quite common within educational theory to highlight the non-instrumental and non-functionalist value of education. In this paper I ask if there can be any education without function and in what way, if any, human action, such as e.g. teaching, educating, learning or studying can be said to be non-instrumental and intrinsically valuable. 

R. S. Peters and Paul Hirst has argued that the pursuit of truth is intrinsically valuable and more recently Jan Masschelein and Maarten Simons argues that formation through study is not functional because it has to do with ‘knowledge for the sake of knowledge and skills for the sake of skills’ (p. 79). The purpose is not to argue that things cannot be valuable for their own sake. It is rather to stress the importance to distinguish between telic and deontic functions as well as between intrinsic and non-instrumental value and extrinsic and instrumental value. To make these distinctions I draw on previous work that has been done by Christine Korsgaard (1996) and Jane Gatley (2021) as well as social ontology. An additional question that arises from these distinctions is what kinds of values that can be considered as educationally valuable.

First, I present some well-known arguments for the intrinsic value of education and aims of education. I then introduce a distinction between deontic and telic functions from the field of social ontology. Next, I draw on previous distinctions being made between intrinsic and non-instrumental value and extrinsic and instrumental value. Finally, I argue that it is questionable if any human action, such as e.g. teaching, educating, learning or studying can be said to be intrinsically valuable and non-functional. It is also questionable if social kinds can exist without a function. Consequently, because education is indeed a social phenomenon it always has a function, and the value of education is rather instrumental and/or extrinsic than intrinsic.