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What Good Are the Humanities?
Marco Rubio insulted me; see the video here. He said I was useless, and called me a fool for practicing my useless profession. It was the final proof that Republicans are anti-intellectual. Or so the stories say. Actually, I don’t believe a word of it. All I can say for sure is that he said that we shouldn’t denigrate vocational training, and that having more welders and fewer folks like me is a good way of increasing overall wages. And that was only after he went over a pretty solid laundry list of economic policies supporting freer markets and fiscal sanity.
While I could dwell happily enough in a world in which I’m proven wrong about this, I can still vote for a man who insults my profession, provided he’s the best man for the job. (Never mind that the best woman for the job also happens to be the only presidential candidate who studied philosophy . . . and has also made more money than most welders . . . and is a Republican.) Anyway, though it now seems like last year’s news, it’s still a good excuse to hear from the Ricocheti on the following question: What good are the humanities?
Please select the option that best describes your view:
- No good at all! Nothing but intellectual pretension! This country needs more welders and fewer philosophers!
- They might have been good once, but the Left owns them now. They’re more trouble than they’re worth. Ignore formal education in the humanities. Let the university bubble burst. Anyway, you can read Shakespeare on your smartphone.
- Long live the humanities! Even under Leftist influence, the humanities are great! They teach us how to think, and Shakespeare is better when you study with a specialist. We still need Socrates and Herodotus. Every welder should have to study a little bit of this stuff in college!
- Reform education! Bring back the Trivium. Stick to the basics: literature, history, art history, and philosophy. We need the humanities, done rightly.
- You, Mr. Augustine, are a perfect example of why this country needs more philosophers.
- You, Mr. Augustine, are a perfect example of why this country needs fewer philosophers.
- Actually, in my opinion, ______________________________________.
Lovely remarks, especially the refutation of # 2!
(# 2 would survive the refutation, I think, if it’s taken to refer to the formal study of humanities. Of course, you also suggest that it should not so refer.)
For my own part, no.
This is a pragmatic, rather than an ideal, position. I do not say that it is philosophically impermissible for any state to support any training ever. I’m saying that, given the governments we have today, government funding for any type of educational endeavour does more harm than good.
What good are the humanities? Let me quote my favorite philosopher, H. Beam Piper:
That is what the humanities are supposed to be for. Unfortunately they have been hijacked by anti-intellectual thinkers who despise wisdom and embrace ignorance. My answer is 2 through 4. We need them, but, except at Hillsdale and such schools, do not have them at present.
Seawriter
Thanks. I really do believe what I’m saying. My family may have been unusual in that it’s always been intellectually curious (I’m talking about my Dad’s side), highly verbal, and argumentative. From a young age, I was introduced to, and absorbed, all sorts of ideas and concepts that I found out only later I was supposed to ‘learn about’ in school. I was also encouraged to read a lot. And I did.
But I’ve also noticed, living out in the sticks as I do, the breadth of what, I’ll call ‘knowledge’ among my friends and neighbors, many of whose education ended way short of twelfth grade. They know some Shakespeare and many can recite yards of Longfellow and Coleridge. They can talk about the ideas of the philosophers, even if they’re a little fuzzy on the terminology. They have very clear ideas on ethics, morality, and the fact that there’s good and evil in the world.
I don’t think this is specific to my geographic area or time period. I noticed the same thing in Prince Edward Island, among the farmers and fishermen I worked with in the early 1970s.
All these people who never made it anywhere near a university are, and were, for lack of a better word, perfectly well ‘educated.’
Had any of them made it to college, they would have been well prepared to dig into subjects that they were already had a good grounding in.
But they didn’t. Because, you see, practicality intervened, in many different ways. Sometimes it intervened because parents died and children had to grow up quickly to take care of the family. Sometimes it intervened because there just wasn’t enough money, and someone had to go to work. Sometimes it intervened because of a horrible sawmill accident that took off a father’s hand, so even though the son had a full “Young Farmer’s” scholarship to Penn State, that summer he had to go to the local hospital, join the union, and get a job in the boiler room to support his parents.
So they just did it. And they never complained. (Forty years later, my friend, one of the smartest and best people I know, is the supervisor in that same boiler room, and he has a small farm on the side).
But, although they went into trades and became farmers, fishermen, electricians, plumbers, and yes, even welders, none of these people ever stopped thinking.
We can do both, people. All we have to do is start young. And stop believing that it has to be one or the other.
Dr Michael Hammer, one of the (relatively few) management consultants who are worthy of attention, argued that the best undergraduate preparation for the future executive would be a rigorous humanities program *combined with* a science/math/technology program. His logic would seem applicable to political as well as business leaders.
His (rather contrarian) recommendation for aspiring businesspeople is this–a double major in computer science and classics. For those who don’t find this combination particularly appealing, he suggests alternative double-major possibilities:
–electrical engineering and philosophy
–mechanical engineering and medieval history
–aeronautics and theology
The general idea is one “hard” and one “soft” discipline. (I’m sure, though, that Hammer would be looking for humanities disciplines/programs which, while “soft” in the conventional sense, are taught in a highly-rigorous manner.)
http://photoncourier.blogspot.com/2004_11_01_archive.html#109987771486855810
Okay, so you start with the base sentence (I think?):
Yeh maza hai. Which means “this is fun”.
You could change it to: yeh hi maza hai. Which emphasises the yeh. Iow “this is what’s fun”. Or in South Asian English, “this only is the fun”.
Or
You could say: “yeh maza hi hai”. Which emphasises the maza. Iow “this is just fun”. Or in SAE: “this is fun only”.
It depends on where you place the “hi”, which can be translated as “only” or “just”. Place it after the element in the sentence that you want to emphasise as the point.
Samajhey janaab?
Ya main shayad nahin samajha?
My baccalaureate degree was Naval Architecture and Marine Engineering. I filled my free electives with humanities and history courses.
Although I have a day job, I write in my spare time and have nearly 20 books published or awaiting publication. All combine history with engineering. (Military history is inexorably intertwined with engineering.) I could not have done that without the combination of engineering and humanities I took in college.
I do not disagree Marco Rubio. At this point we could use more welders and less philosophers. Especially philosophers who lock themselves away from the reality they are supposed to be explaining. But that is more a reflection of the shortage of welders and the inadequacies of today’s liberal arts education than a belief we do not need philosophers.
I recommend high school graduates learn a remunerative trade and then get that 4-year degree in liberal arts (if they desire one). Especially if they have to borrow money to get the degree. Unless of course, they have found their vocation at graduation from high school and it requires a four-year degree (engineering, medicine, etc.). Moving lemming-like from high school to college, without reflection, and without purpose is an invitation to disaster.
Seawriter
We absolutely need the Humanities.
We absolutely do not need arrogant Leftists (or Conservatives) politicizing the Humanties.
We also desperately need welders, carpenters, plumbers, and tradesmen of all stripes (says a power-tool-impaired musician). It is a shame that so many honorable job choices are sneered at by elites with college degrees. Interestingly, the best handyman I ever hired had a degree in philosophy.
Yes, the people who are interested in thinking can capably educate themselves. You can learn as much as you want to learn, whether in university or not.
People who are not interested in thinking are prone to indoctrination.
That is why conservatives decry the state of contemporary academia in America. We see that there are too many universities that are crammed with too many students who are being indoctrinated into the foolishnesses of the Left.
Put me down for answers 2, 4, and 5. That does not imply a complete rejection of answers 1 or 3.
Well spoken, Sir.
One distinction to make, in addition to that between federal and state and county funding, is between vocational training in a formal educational setting and vocational training in jobs-training programs of other sorts. I believe the latter has been a part of welfare reform in the past.
Well spoken, Sir. And well quoted.
I would add that, in addition to Hillsdale and some other unsung institutions, we do have a number of good teachers teaching the humanities at other institutions. Many even who are liberals at heart teach, with integrity, Plato and Cicero and Herodotus and Homer and Dante and the rest.
There is no need to go to college in order to develop a program of study. There are plenty of books for that, and syllabi can be had for free. There is no need to undertake a massive reading campaign without guidance. Look where your interests are, and try some things. The internet is a great place to find a community in the topic.
Excellent.
I am in agreement with Arahant that the study of humanities should be well-started in high school. I went to a good high school and got a great start. In my engineering curriculum I took electives in philosophy and history and ended up with more humanities credits than I could use to satisfy my degree requirements. I did not stop reading when I left the university, and I doubt if anyone who is a member of Ricochet would say that they had stopped reading and learning after college.
If you don’t have a good high school available, then homeschool. We did. Both sons took philosophy and economics classes when they got to university, and both made As in those courses. They were well-grounded from their early teens, as I had been.
Snooks went to a sub-par high school, but the dinner conversations and reading matter at her home were of such a quality that she ended up with a great education. Sh also took humanities electives beyond the minimum required for her technical subject degrees.
Again, it’s called a book club… or even a recommended book list.
Consider Ricochet. What guidance on books, philosophy, history and such is not offered here that would be offered in a classroom? How difficult is it to get feedback from knowledgeable and helpful persons who don’t teach for a living?
If colleges did not offer degrees in the humanities (though they could still teach those courses in pursuit of more professional degrees), there would be even greater availability of informal learning communities.
Colleges and the classical humanities began for non-professional formation. We should similarly distinguish today between professional training and formation of enlightened souls. The humanities generally regard the training of good character and wisdom, which serve people in all professions and in none. They belong in the realm of non-contractual study with theology and sports.
I believe that in Germany for a long time, it was *required* to do an apprenticeship in a related manual trade before attending engineering school…at least this is what Gerhard Neumann (who eventually ran GE’s jet engine business) said in his interesting memoir of growing up in that country in the 1930s.
(Neumann said that foreigners were excused from this requirement, since the regime wanted their tuition money, but felt that this lost them much of the value of their training)
Really? I thought maza meant “taste.” I learned an adjective for “funny,” and an adjective mazahiya, and I thought they were the same!
Yeh acha hai! I might be able to remember some of that, but I haven’t even learned the hi. (Hang on, lemme think: I learned sirraf, which I think is “only” or “just.”)
Most of this is lost on me due to my ignorance. I wonder if there are some differences between Lahori Urdu and dialects you know better.
Your last remarks are mostly lost on me. I’m pretty sure samaj means something like “understanding” because I’ve learned a sentence Mujhe samaj nihi aee (or something like that), meaning (more or less) “I don’t understand.”
I’m pretty friendly to this # 2 stuff, but I do think there can be tremendous benefit to studying with an expert. But you yourself didn’t rule out # 3 altogether, and # 2 itself suggests some of those benefits. So I doubt we disagree (much).
And they can educate their children. I took in C. S. Lewis with my mother’s milk and Francis Schaeffer with my father’s lectures.
I like a good spread of answers on this question. I can’t pick just one myself, at least not without sitting down with a cup of tea and reworking all the options in a more orderly fashion.
But I think I put in number 5 as a joke. (If anyone means it seriously, don’t let me know. That sort of information could be pretty dangerous in the wrong mind–namely mine.)
Along similar lines:
That’s right! We all listen to The Great Courses all the time!
(Ok, seriously, The Great Courses is a good thing. Even if we don’t all buy it. But I hope a fair number of us do. I don’t myself, because I’m a loser.)
Well done!
Well spoken. Succinct and, as far as I can tell, correct!
And, whoever is the best person for the job, the best woman seeking the job of POTUS studied medieval philosophy!
Again, well spoken, Sir.
<Sigh.>
Aug,
What good are the Humanities?
Because man can not live by statistics alone.
Regards,
Jim
Yeah, I can’t really object to that, except to say that you might be able to know a degree by its university–and know the university by the fruits of its degrees, given enough time.
I suspect graduates of the University of Dallas, for example, reliably think very well with their liberal arts degrees.
Hey, I finally read that. I really like it: a great emphasis on the tools of learning, the same thing Dorothy Sayers was emphasizing when she argued for the Trivium.
(Even a revolutionary like Dewey understood the importance of the tools of learning, in this case the practice of the scientific method. I imagine virtually all of us would agree with Dewey on that much at least.)
Aug,
Just to let everyone know that there is an exception to every rule. Carl Icahn has a degree in Philosophy. He is a logical positivist and a billionaire.
Unfortunately, there is also an exception that I’d rather not admit to. George Soros has a degree in Philosophy. He is a philosopher of science in the Karl Popper mode and an incredibly annoying man.
Well, you can’t win them all.
Regards,
Jim
I’ve gone 11 years on nothing more than “acha” and “Chai pini heh?” I come across as a rather agreeable gent.