The Value of a Civilization

By Ruben Rivera@ 27 Oct 2010

An administrator and colleague at the university where I teach, sent to the faculty a link with two videos: "So You Want to get a PhD in the Humanities," and "So You Want to go to Law School." You can view them by going to this link. They are about four minutes each.

While viewing them, you may well laugh. I know I did. But I was also a bit saddened. My colleague said that while the videos may be a corrective to the naivete and false idealism of the students being depicted, they did not provide "an appropriate vision to encourage or assist students."

No they did not.

"The Thinker," by Auguste Rodin.
Rodin could never have conceived of someone with the ability to "think" who had not been schooled in the humanities.

If some people had their way, would education and professions be merely money/market driven, vacant of all ideals but that utilitarian one? The videos could be seen as sarcastic commentary against such mentality. Or they can be viewed as sarcasm against those who seek any kind of education and career in the humanities or other professions out of a belief in virtuous ideals to improve inwardly themselves and outwardly the world.

To me the videos largely mock the latter (even if not intended), if for no other reason that the students with good intentions appear as comical but tragic boobs, naive idealists, who have no clue that the educational and career paths they seek, and the "thinking" that inspire their choices, are all things of the past, and a moronic romanticized version at that. Moreover what they seek is worthless for making a good living in money-driven America (long one of the highest values in the culture), but having no other value or respect in the eyes of the same.

Two versions of lawyers and the legal system:

Normal Rockwell, "The Law Student"

Meanwhile, the teacher and lawyer are clearly depicted as the sages, who, while jaded about their professions (and American culture as a whole?) at least understand the present reality of market demands and public values. Once like the students they mock, they are now cynics, but sages nevertheless. Sages: assuming of course that you overlook their fatalistic resignation and misery.

I've been thinking about the developments that the videos depict, and my last two blog posts reflect this. In them I lament the contemporary trends that the cynics in the videos lament.

But that is where any similarities between us end. Because for me, those disconcerting trends are all the more reason to hold the line on the classical ideal of education as soulcraft, which I have defined as: "The development of people who know the world in something approaching accuracy, who hold a worldview in something approaching honesty, and live by an inward character in something approaching charity."

I used to give a lecture on "Imperialism and Missions," sometimes titled "Christianity and Globalization," that among other things showed some of the tragic consequences of European expansion in the name of "God, gold and glory" -- which was challenged by the occasional prophetic Christian voice: to wit (in the words of Jesus) that one cannot serve both God and money.

Artist unknown

The lecture ended with the following quotation. It is from nearly a century back in history, and the sentiment it communicates is ancient. But I find it most relevant for today.

"Europeans, and especially to unthinking practical Englishmen, who are accustomed to take what modern political economists call 'the standard of living' as the test of the moral culture of a civilization of a people, the actual life of the Chinese and the people of the East at the present day, will no doubt appear very sordid and undesirable....

In order to estimate the value of a civilization, it seems to me, the question we must finally ask is not what great cities, what magnificent houses, what fine roads it has built...what beautiful and comfortable furniture, what clever and useful implements, tools and instruments it has made...no, not even what institutions, what arts and sciences it has invested; the question we must ask, in order to estimate the value of a civilization--is, what type of humanity, what kind of men and women it has been able to produce."
Ku Hung-Mi, The Spirit of the Chinese People, 1922

I have just of course defended everything that our culture increasingly seems to view as comically and tragically worthless. But I like to think that it was not a mindless defense, nor that cynicism and resignation to these trends are anything to admire or emulate.

"Now, one cannot think of a single area of American life that does not define itself proudly and brazenly by the bottom line...Keep staring at the bottom line, and that's how our civilization will be remembered. America? It knew the value of a dollar, and that's all it knew." Roger Rosenblatt, PBS Newhour, 10 July 2006.

Only time will tell if education based on the value of "the bottom line" will create a civilization of value.

Ruben Rivera©