"The humanities are, however, essential to the functioning of a body politic. You may not use what you learned in a philosophy class or a humanities class or a religious studies class on your job. But you will still use it every day of your life, if you actually learned it."
Before I say anything I am a firm believer and proponent that educating oneself is a good thing and that there is value in learning in learning most subject areas. But I would also say that it is not essential to spend nearly 20 years of ones life sitting in classrooms to do so, especially at the cost that many students are paying. Regarding your statement here you are essentially implying that it is vital that everyone in America (I suppose every country also) go to college and take the subjects/classes you mentioned in order to properly function in a "body politic" and in "every day life"? I assume that is what you are saying since you used the word "essential". One of the ironies about this statement is that we actually look at a segment of our society in which this is the case - our government. I'm certain that well over 90% (if not 100%) of our representatives are college graduates many of whom were "pre-law" majors (i.e. humanities/liberal arts). So what has that produced? One of the most disfunctional and divisive institutions in our country.
Four points, the last of which is a kind of conclusion:
1. To clarify: I contend that every person in this country with the intellectual capacity for education of any kind past about 8th grade level receive a grounding in the humanities that is
much more robust than that currently required to complete a baccalaureate at most major universities. By "the humanities" I do not mean pre-law, pre-med, business, grammar, math, physics, biology, psychology, sociology, engineering, finance, or other such classes. I mean classes in history, philosophy, literature, the arts, and similar such. I also mean that such education should be systematic. At minimum, students should be required to pass two classes in formal logic (with the second one including examination in S5 modal logic + K semantics, which is as close as we've yet come to formalizing human reason), three in various areas in philosophy, at least one in ethics and one in epistemology or metaphysics, three history classes, at least one in world history, and three classes in liberal studies, including one in literature and one in the history of early modern to contemporary western civilization, and finally at least one class in history and civilization of some marginalized non-western group--Indian, African, South American, Pacific Islander, etc. I would require comprehensive exams, with at least 90% competency, in all of these areas. That is, students should not be allowed to coast through these classes, but should be required to show that they have actually learned the subject matter and can actively and reasonably engage it.
2. Students currently get nowhere near that level of education in most university programs. Indeed, except for the few who major in philosophy, liberal studies, or religious studies, humanist education in the U.S. is basically a joke. There's been a long program of business and government interference in education, much of it oriented toward reducing or eliminating education in the humanities. As a result, university administrations regularly pressure, in various direct and indirect ways, professors to inflate grades and pass as many students as possible. That program is motivated by a belief that education in the humanities is basically an indulgence that has no value in "the real world."
3. Education ought to be publicly supported up through at least a first master's degree, and the administrative overhead in universities should be radically reduced to reduce the costs of education.
4. I think these answer your criticism. The idea that, for example, pre-law graduates have received a proper education in the humanities but have gone on to produce a deeply dysfunctional system is incorrect. They have (almost certainly) not received anything like an adequate education in the humanities, and the results are telling. Similarly, the notion that cost is such an issue for students that they cannot afford to pay for humanist education is true under our current system, but that system is absurd and ought to be changed. An educated society is a strong society, and everyone who benefits from being in a strong society (which is everyone who is in that strong society) ought to pay for those benefits.
