Fareed Zakaria: STEM and the Liberal Arts Were a Power Couple | Big Think.

Fareed Zakaria: STEM and the Liberal Arts Were a Power Couple
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In its ancient origins, the liberal education featured science as an abstract elective rather than a practical subject that would net you a job. Science was studied for stimulation, to attempt to grasp truths about the universe. The current mindset that science will provide you with a career is a very modern concept. Journalist Fareed Zakaria explains that we should continue to prioritize liberal arts and subjects such as English, history, and rhetoric for the same reasons why our predecessors valued science before it became practical or fashionable to do so.
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FAREED ZAKARIA:
Fareed Zakaria has been called “the most influential foreign policy adviser of his generation” (Esquire). He is the Emmy-nominated host of CNN’s Fareed Zakaria GPS, a contributing editor for The Atlantic, a columnist for The Washington Post, and the bestselling author of The Post-American World and The Future of Freedom. He lives in New York City.
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TRANSCRIPT:
Fareed Zakaria: In its origins a liberal education always had science in it. Though interestingly, people studied science in ancient Greece and Rome and the Middle Ages until very recently for precisely the opposite reason that people are now told to study it. We are now told you should study it because it’s a practical skill that you could use in the real world. Well in ancient Greece, the practical skills that got you jobs and got you a career were rhetoric and oratory and a study of history and law. Science was seen as a kind of abstract quest for knowledge. The only reason you were doing it was mental stimulation. And yet for hundreds and hundreds of years, people studied science really just to try to answer the big questions. There was no sense that it could be applied in a way that was practical, would provide you with a career. That’s a very modern conception of science. And so I think what’s interesting is that even then when we thought science was useless, we studied it — useless in a practical sense — today my argument would be, you know, think about that length and breadth of history when you say that English is useless.

Yale has opened a campus in Singapore and what they’ve done is they’ve tried to reimagine what a liberal education would look like and they’ve also tried to reimagine what it would look like in a global context. There is a core that for the first two years there is a series of required courses. But the requirements are more in method of inquiry. That is in critical thinking rather than in a particular subject or a particular set of books. You study Aristotle, but at the same time you read Confucius, who was Aristotle’s contemporary. And you ask yourself why did Aristotle have certain concerns about politics, but Confucius had others? What explains this difference?

So the idea here would be to try to understand that the West is not the only thing in the world. That there is a much broader universe and you understand the differences and similarities. All these subjects have deep, long traditions and feed various parts of the human brain and the human soul. And so recognize that what seems fashionable when one era will not seem fashionable in another, but they all together interact and comprise a liberal education.



In its ancient origins, the liberal education featured science as an abstract elective rather than a practical subject that would net you a job. Science was studied for stimulation, to attempt to grasp truths about the universe. The current mindset that science will provide you with a career is a very modern concept. Journalist Fareed Zakaria explains that we should continue to prioritize liberal arts and subjects such as English, history, and rhetoric for the same reasons why our predecessors valued science before it became practical or fashionable to do so.

[mdalikhoja]

Here in Pakistan we had abandoned the liberal arts long ago. Everybody is going with science(STEM). Do you know what happen ??? We are all Masters, Doctors, Engineers and Science graduates without having any practical experience of real life world. Every one is high achievers in Maths, Science, Engineering and technology without producing and designing anything, doing the job of technicians and mechanics who are neither liberal artist nor science graduates. Even nobody knows what is Art??We can not develop in science without Art first.

[hershdawgmusic]

A key problem now is that college education has now become career training. That's for vocational schools(we need more)/ Education should be more about expanding your mind and broadening your thoughts. Methods of thinking vs. rote learning.stream of facts. I'm a physics major math minor with a large amount of music coursework(old major). I see the value of both. Creativity actually helps stem majors.

[TheYopogo]

Absolutely right.
I am currently studying for a postgraduate Physics Degree.
I can see the enormous value of an education in History, English, Philosophy etc.
I don't know how human civilisation could possibly make any progress without my friends on the other side of campus.
Evidently I love Physics and see the enormous value of STEM, that's why I've put myself in many thousands of debt to get myself an education in it.
But the idea that these things are the only things of value?
The idea that our professional economy, culture, society and civilisation have nothing to learn from the past?
Nothing to learn from thousands of years of rigorous, skeptical, doubting, probing western philosophy?
Nothing to learn from Literature, or Music or Art? I mean; why does art even exist if not to educate us about the human condition?

Of course the questions of "how does thermodynamics work" and "why do electric circuits work in the way they do" etc. are beautiful, profound and staggeringly important.
But so are the questions of, what is good?
What is right?
What are our responsibilities to one another?
Has a problem like this happened before in the history of humanity?
How did we stumble through it then?
What is true?
What is noble?
What is pure?
What is beautiful?
We can never, ever fall into the terrible trap of thinking that we've answered them decisively.
That we should abandon the study of the furthering of human civilisation.
No!
The conversation around these questions must always go on.
To say that STEM is the only fragment of this jigsaw of intellectual investigation worth pursuing?
For God's sake!
Of course not!

[acp]

I agree that STEM and Liberal Arts really shouldn't be disputed as much as they are. There shouldn't be this "war" between the two. Broad based education is key for a diverse and adaptable labor force, not to mention a vibrant and intellectually curious civil society. 

If you want to shun anyone, I wouldn't place a war between STEM and LA, but rather, think of all the Business majors. These majors are not intellectually curious at all, but rather, focus on how to extract the most money out of some entity. They are often the ones leaving without knowledge of the scientific method AND basic knowledge of the social sciences such as economics (and no, economics and business are not the same thing).

[jahrfuhlnehm]

American universities are little more than debtors' prisons nowadays. It's all about making a big investment and expecting to make a return on that investment. This is why liberal arts are shunned, because the U.S. is a country about climbing the economic food chain at the expense of everyone else, and there is no use for knowledge and growth, and you can't make any kind of return investment with the debts being handed out to students with liberal arts degrees. Hell since our corporate overlords took the economy and gave it a major railing from behind most majors are now inadequate for getting jobs, even some STEM ones, though they didn't get hit quite as hard. That STEM fields are looked highly upon more because they are more likely to get you a job more than because of the other benefits and skills they provide should tell you something.

As long as Reaganites have their stranglehold on education and, well, everything else in this country we will continue to be the land of anti-intellectuals (no wonder we are falling so far behind the rest of the first world) and a college education is there purely for profit motive and little else.

[celestialnubian]

“We want one class of persons to have a liberal education, and we want another class of persons, a very much larger class of necessity in every society, to forgo the privilege of a liberal education and fit themselves to perform specific difficult manual tasks.”
-Woodrow Wilson

[maureenbiddle]

Years ago I was at Fairfield. The Jesuit educational tradition was well established. We had many requirements in philosophy, theology, in addition to other areas.  I will always value what I learned, but decades later in a very different world some of the courses seem naive. Still, the discipline and the methodology of how to think remain. The liberal arts education's value transcends content  and is best realized in how it is applied in a changing world.

[benmac]

It's like liberal arts and humanities are best when you learn them on your own and not in college, at least that's what I take from experience. I took a semester of liberal arts at a community college and quit because, even though I didn't regret going to see what it was like, I felt that I could do better to study on my own. I decided that I would go to college only if it was for something very specific and could only be learned there as well as having enough money not to go into debt and having enough skill writing essays while going in.

[DJWESG]

Confucius was not Aristotle's contemporary, That honour goes to Diogenes, who's greater understanding of the simple things gave Aristotle a frame to work from, they studied together. And it was Alexander the great who on hearing about Diogenes greatness traveled back across his expanding kingdom to meet Diogenes. When he met Diogenes who was sat in the street, he asked "what can do for you Diogenes", Diogenes replied "you can stand out of my sunlight"..

[MoreAmerican]

Great guy! Like a lot of his work. Obviously very intelligent.
I do have to disagree with some of his stances on Islam. Watch him on bill maher.

[OmniphonProductions]

The internet makes available a practically endless supply of information, yet many people think in sound bites provided by agenda-driven media sources...without any contemplation beyond initial, emotional reaction.  I love the idea of an education that places specific emphasis on analytical thought, so people can start weeding out, rather than embracing, the exploitation and promotion of ignorance and laziness.

P.S. To his earlier point, in ancient Greece, Music (one of the fundamental aspects of a Liberal Arts education) was actually taught as a Science and highly regarded for its mathematical aspects.

[mageover]

The problem with a liberal education is it has became a little too liberal. I got 3 BS in physics math and astronomy, but i still had two writting components, 6 hours of upper division liberal art classes, plus symbolic logic from the philosophy department, as well as the same history, government, engish lit and composition that every liberal art student needs. But most liberal art students can get away with college algebra(in fact they offered basic math class as a substitute for this) maybe only one remedial science class, like intro astronomy for non major or science ideas. I feel the problem for the average liberal art major today is when they get out college, they don't understand basic sciences or scientific method, or basic math like statistics. Most of them complain they don't need to know these things, and yet anti vaxers and climate deniers with liberal art backgrounds go out into the world getting jobs like lawyers/politicians journalist entertainers, and wonder why our country is falling behind.

[NickYT]

The difference between STEM and Liberal Arts is the fact that one has intrinsic, immutable, undeniable truths that can be found through testing and reason.

If you think that's the latter, then I've got some bad news for you.

[alyssasharma]

It’s not about whether or not the liberal arts are important to humanity, it’s about whether they’re necessary to do the job you went to school to do. These classes are thousands of dollars and they’re absolutely not about free thinking, they’re about learning to parrot the narrative of social justice and shit your mouth and nod in the required diversity and inclusion seminars when you get to the corporate world.

[OneAndOnlyRocker]

Liberal arts and technology go hand in hand.  I think Steve Jobs of all people really understood this.

[Xedus]

Liberal arts degrees are worthless now a days, and should be. I go to a liberal arts school where 90% of the kids are some type of liberal arts degree. However I am part of the other program that fits the other 10% (Professional Accounting CPA major, includes your BS and graduate courses needed to take the CPA exam in NY state). 

Anyways, these liberal arts kids, for the most part, will not be working in their chosen field once they graduate because there is a smaller demand  for their jobs than there is a supply by a large margin. The reason for this is that liberal arts classes are extremely easy when compared to something like my accounting/auditing classes. This is from my own personal experience, having to take some electives in liberal arts in my first years of college. 

THE POINT:
Liberal arts are 90% useless. We need more specializations that are math/science based. The free market related to career acquisition in America shows us this. I don't really have a solution for this problem because most people are inherently lazy/average and do not want to put the hard work it takes to specialize into math/science majors. So I guess there really is no solution unless you guys can think of one

[PinuyashaRPG]

In today's world we have the internet and libraries to provide an infinite source of liberal arts education. Liberal arts education sure made sense back in the old days because book were expensive, and we didn't have a huge database of files where you can get every literary work for free. It makes far less sense now to study most liberal arts majors because you can read up on anything you want related to it now for free. Anyone can learn English, History, Literature, etc. on their own, but how many people can learn Mathematics, Physics, Computer Science and Electrical Engineering without being taught by a professional?

Middle school mathematics eludes most U.S. students. How would they ever move to Precalculus with that poor level of understanding? Is it really that important that someone know all the works of Shakespeare instead of knowing something as simple as calculating compund interest to know how terrible of a loan you signed up for to pay for your crappy degree?

Meanwhile, the biggest problems of our time are the fact that scientifically illiterate morons are ruining the world for people with their phony religions and pseudoscience. I think a STEM education is far more useful now just to curb this trend of people using feelings and rhetoric to argue a point rather than bothering to provide any evidence. The less liberal arts majors running around trying to tell me homeopathy works, GMOs are "Frankenfoods" and that the U.S. has "rape culture" the better I say.

[teslabamf]

"Come on guys liberal arts is still super duper important. I am super cereal."

[miguelflores]

I would love to see Jim Carrey giving life advise.

[DJWESG]

Very loose interpretation of 'liberal'. And wasn't use in the 'extra cheese' way we do today.