I used to think there was a pattern to one's studies in college. The typical progression would go like this: Suzie Student enters a prestigious liberal arts institution planning on majoring in something interesting like classics or neuroscience. Suzie has big plans, hoping to "study life from all angles" and "make a difference" or at least that's what she wrote on her application. Then Suzie gets chewed up by Dartmouth's introductory science classes, hears about her UGA's sweet hedge fund internship and decides to follow the money to a more practical and pre-professional major. So far, that's pretty much been the pattern I've noticed amongst my fellow freshmen.
But Dimensions made me rethink my theory. Instead of encountering '14s interested in Dartmouth's anthroplogy and religion offerings as I expected, I found myself fielding questions about Career Services and which economics courses would best prepare them for a job on Wall Street. I wanted to question these kids, but not about their squareness or lack of creativity. What I disagreed with was the assumption that there exists a field of study at Dartmouth that can prepare someone for a certain job.
Not too long ago a liberal arts course of study was a virtual requirement for students at schools like Dartmouth. Big figures of the past men (not women; don't give that era too much credit) like Theodore Roosevelt, Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr. and John Pierpont Morgan received their educations with the expectation that they would learn everything from the sciences to languages to history before embarking on careers in politics, medicine or banking. But as a new meritocracy came into place, students at the country's elite universities could no longer rely on a "good old boy" network to get them a job. At the same time, though, it was the country's liberal arts schools that remained at the center of power and prestige. As a result, students tried to eke out pre-professional utility from what were not originally pre-professional fields of study. Future Wall Street barons had to study economics; hopeful Supreme Court justices had to study government; potential doctors had to focus on biology.
Today the associations remain, but I don't think the degrees have become any more practical. It's relatively common to hear newly minted financial analysts lamenting how they never use their knowledge of product possibility frontiers or other obscure economic concepts in their job. Similarly, I don't think a doctor thinks back to that ecology class when she is setting bones, and I'm not sure government courses will be more useful to a lawyer than reading the Washington Post every day.
My point is not to say that we shouldn't bother with the stereotypically pre-professional subjects. They are often interesting in themselves and do have a certain utility, even if it is not the kind that will be of practical use in most professions. But if this is all we gain from studying these fields, why focus on them?
The liberal arts have a practical value that is different from, but not less than, the more "useful" majors. Instead of making sense of the world in purely empirical terms, the classics speak to those universals of life that have been experienced for generations. Men and women will always experience the pull to a simple life that Thoreau felt, will always face the moral uncertainties addressed by Immanuel Kant and John Mill, will always struggle with the corruption and human debasement that Joseph Conrad wrote about. These works have inspired and informed people through the ages. They will continue doing so no matter what industry one works in.
Every once in a while someone will say that philosophy or literature classes are necessary to be a moral person, to develop a world view and to do all those other things that make us more interesting to sit next to at dinner parties. I don't think that is true; it's certainly possible to think critically and develop a philosophy of life while taking pre-med courses or studying for a business degree. But the classic texts offer something different to our lives. Humanities courses offer us a chance to read people like Thoreau, who desired to "live deep and suck all the marrow out of life," and to learn about figures like Teddy Roosevelt, who sought "to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs even though checkered by failure." Maybe it's just me, but I think learning how to do either of those things will be more helpful in life than whatever pre-professional course I could take instead.
