Ross Douthat, the Core Curriculum, and other tidbits from The Atlantic

Well, I finally got around to reading Douthat's Atlantic piece about Harvard. And, like the character in Green Eggs and Ham -- I have a two-year-old, what do you expect? -- having finally bothered to taste it, I find I agree with much of what he wrote, especially about the Core, which truly sucked ass as a means of getting a general education. The whole thing should be replaced with a Great Books curriculum coupled with real science and math courses. But this should come as no revelation; people have been complaining about the Core forever, so when Mr. Douthat claims to be revealing "The Truth About Harvard" I do think he's a bit, um, full of himself. And I saw he has a whole book out now about it, which I think is ridiculous and obscene. I am sick and tired of Harvard graduates undermining my self-esteem by getting book contracts at younger and younger ages. There oughta be a law, I swear.

But Douthat also trots out the old "the humanities are irrelevant and have an inferiority complex" canard:

Attempting to explain the left-wing biases of his Harvard colleagues, the libertarian philosopher Robert Nozick once hypothesized that most professors oppose capitalism because they consider themselves far smarter than boorish businessmen, and therefore resent the economic system that rewards practical intelligence over their own gifts. I'm inclined to think that such resentment -- at least in money-drunk America -- increasingly coexists with a deep inferiority complex regarding modern capitalism, and a need, however unconscious, to justify academic life in the face of the fantastic accumulation of wealth that takes place outside the ivory tower.

It does not seem to have occurred to Douthat that professors may oppose, not capitalism per se, but the idolatry of the believers in the absolute truth of the free market. Money-drunk America may consider it heresy that a democratic society might successfully implement something other than untrammeled capitalism and yet be a wonderful place to live; but such places exist -- not without their troubles, of course, but they are different troubles than those we have here, and some of us might prefer those troubles to our own. It is a question of values. Do people whose intelligence and efforts are directed to something other than business or science secretly believe they are smarter than businessmen? Some of them do, I'm sure, just as many businessmen believe, and not especially secretly, that humanities professors are parasitic elitist snobs who waste their lives thinking about useless crap that doesn't make any sense.

But perhaps, just perhaps, many academics do what they do because they believe that, especially in a society where the accumulation of wealth seems to have trumped all other concerns, it's important for some people to think about other things. Is it possible that some people might genuinely not believe that the fantastic accumulation of wealth is really that valuable in life? Douthat might reply that such statements are sour grapes: academics don't make much money, so of course they insist that money is not that important. Douthat cheerfully deploys a favorite tool of humanities professors when he psychoanalyzes them and pronounces their behavior to be the product of a "need, however unconscious, to justify academic life." (What behavior, exactly, is never quite clear. Grade inflation? Postmodernism? The teaching of courses on obscure subjects? Hatred of capitalism?)

Those of us who choose paths in life that are not primarily concerned with the accumulation of wealth are not immune to envy and resentment and feelings of inferiority and all the other nasty emotions Douthat says are 'really' behind whatever behavior he's complaining about in humanities professors. That we feel such emotions, however, does not mean that our behavior is dictated by them. Humans, happily, are able to make choices that are quite at odds with their urges, emotions, desires, and instincts. All the research that's been done on the accumulation of wealth, for example, shows that above a certain level of comfort, wealth has no particular effect on human happiness. Even though at times I think, "oh, if we just had more money, I could get that plasma TV, and then I'd truly be happy," and I truly feel it, I know, intellectually, that it's not true. Even though at times I wonder if I'm "not doing anything important with my life," or "not contributing enough", or "not successful enough," those values are not the ones guiding my life. So I let these thoughts and feelings pass, as they do, and I get on with the things that I think are actually important in life.

Of course colleges should provide a liberal education to future bankers, diplomats, doctors, lawyers, engineers, etc. And I agree with Douthat that they are failing to do so. But in a country as anti-intellectual as ours, where academia is constantly attacked, it may be difficult for the children of capitalist privilege, on their brief sojourn in a world where capital is not king, to even get a liberal education. Perhaps students like Douthat, groomed since childhood for success in the world, simply are unable to hear what their professors have to say. Is this the fault of their professors?