This just in. . .
From the new census data:
In 1970, 79 percent [of college freshmen] said their goal was developing a meaningful philosophy of life. By 2005, 75 percent said their primary objective was to be financially very well off.
I've been musing over this for a little while now. What does it mean? Why did it happen? Is this a good thing or not?
I started out in college thinking I was preparing for a lucrative career, and then became a history major and went on to study theology, and I'm still struggling to develop a "meaningful philosophy of life." My parents, who themselves went to college in the 1970s, told me that it wasn't worth spending tens of thousands of dollars on a college education if you weren't going to use that education to make money - in other words, a college education for the sake of developing a "meaningful philosophy of life" is not worthwhile. My parents grew up relatively poor; they didn't have the luxury, I suppose, of thinking that they could just "waste time" as they would say dreaming about life philosophies. They went to college to prepare for their careers. I grew up a little more privileged; I went to college for an education, scientia gratia scientiae.
So maybe the fact that in the 1970's a college education AT ALL was, for most people, a luxury only the privileged - those who had the option of seeking a "meaningful philosophy of life" - were able to afford. Now, colleges abound, and those who may not have sought out a college education thirty or forty years ago are doing so in order to further their careers - that whole "a bachelor's degree today is what a high school diploma was yesterday" sort of affair. That may be a reason for the shift.
But I don't think that's the only one - I think that today, even among the privileged, there is this growing sense that developing a "meaningful philosophy of life" is simply purposeless. It's a product of utilitarianism, perhaps - the idea that your education is only worth anything if you get something back for it or do something "useful" with it. It's a product of rampant capitalism and consumerism, too. I read an article a little while ago lamenting the fact that so many college students are choosing "pre-professional" routes to prepare them for careers in business, law, medicine, social work, etc., etc., etc., instead of getting a good solid liberal arts education. It is very saddening, in my view. It reminds me of (and here comes a banal movie quote) what Mr. Keating in "Dead Poets Society" said: such careers are noble pursuits, noble ways to make a living, but they are not what we stay alive for. What do we stay alive for? Not simply to make money, I would hope! Jesus, at any rate, would take real issue with that.
It's so hard to articulate a non-utilitarian reason for why someone would want to spend time and money pursuing "scientia gratia scientiae." I could even say, "If we don't pursue a good classical liberal arts education, then we'll have a less moral, less literate, less thoughtful society, less principled society," and that would still be too utilitarian for my tastes. I don't study theology, at least primarily, in order to restructure society - and, in fact, if I thought that was my goal I think I'd be pretty discouraged. This is not to say that I don't think studying theology can change the world for good; it most certainly can. But that's certainly not my primary motive in studying. Nor is it purely selfish (although it is, I'll admit, at least partly selfish) - I'm not studying simply to "fulfill myself" or to "feel good about myself" - that would still be too utilitarian for my tastes. The only way to explain it, I suppose, is to speak in terms of the inherent value of TRUTH and of a human person's natural inclination towards seeking it.
It's about maintaining a balancing act that Catholics, for one, have always been good at. Take, for instance, the balance between enjoying "created goods" on the one hand, and the utter dependence on God to which Christ calls us on the other. The Church has always insisted that it is not dualist about this - it does not say, "Depend on God and hate all things material." But the Church does say that you can only genuinely enjoy created goods in the way they were meant to be enjoyed if you depend on God wholeheartedly and cultivate the virtue of temperance first. A similar pattern, I think, holds here: it's not that you can't use your education, for instance, to make money or fulfill yourself or reform society (and, in fact, we are morally obliged to seek to improve both ourselves and our societies to make them conform to divine law); but you will only do that properly if you first seek truth for the sake of truth, knowledge for the sake of knowledge.
In other words, I think ultimately this shift is not unrelated to what JPII would have called the "crisis of truth" in our society. If truth is relativistic, if every person can decide for themselves what they think is true, then what's the point of wasting time searching for wisdom, knowledge, truth?
Aaaaand speaking of subordinating the quest for a "meaningful philosophy of life" to the quest fora, I have to go do my hall monitoring duties.
In 1970, 79 percent [of college freshmen] said their goal was developing a meaningful philosophy of life. By 2005, 75 percent said their primary objective was to be financially very well off.
I've been musing over this for a little while now. What does it mean? Why did it happen? Is this a good thing or not?
I started out in college thinking I was preparing for a lucrative career, and then became a history major and went on to study theology, and I'm still struggling to develop a "meaningful philosophy of life." My parents, who themselves went to college in the 1970s, told me that it wasn't worth spending tens of thousands of dollars on a college education if you weren't going to use that education to make money - in other words, a college education for the sake of developing a "meaningful philosophy of life" is not worthwhile. My parents grew up relatively poor; they didn't have the luxury, I suppose, of thinking that they could just "waste time" as they would say dreaming about life philosophies. They went to college to prepare for their careers. I grew up a little more privileged; I went to college for an education, scientia gratia scientiae.
So maybe the fact that in the 1970's a college education AT ALL was, for most people, a luxury only the privileged - those who had the option of seeking a "meaningful philosophy of life" - were able to afford. Now, colleges abound, and those who may not have sought out a college education thirty or forty years ago are doing so in order to further their careers - that whole "a bachelor's degree today is what a high school diploma was yesterday" sort of affair. That may be a reason for the shift.
But I don't think that's the only one - I think that today, even among the privileged, there is this growing sense that developing a "meaningful philosophy of life" is simply purposeless. It's a product of utilitarianism, perhaps - the idea that your education is only worth anything if you get something back for it or do something "useful" with it. It's a product of rampant capitalism and consumerism, too. I read an article a little while ago lamenting the fact that so many college students are choosing "pre-professional" routes to prepare them for careers in business, law, medicine, social work, etc., etc., etc., instead of getting a good solid liberal arts education. It is very saddening, in my view. It reminds me of (and here comes a banal movie quote) what Mr. Keating in "Dead Poets Society" said: such careers are noble pursuits, noble ways to make a living, but they are not what we stay alive for. What do we stay alive for? Not simply to make money, I would hope! Jesus, at any rate, would take real issue with that.
It's so hard to articulate a non-utilitarian reason for why someone would want to spend time and money pursuing "scientia gratia scientiae." I could even say, "If we don't pursue a good classical liberal arts education, then we'll have a less moral, less literate, less thoughtful society, less principled society," and that would still be too utilitarian for my tastes. I don't study theology, at least primarily, in order to restructure society - and, in fact, if I thought that was my goal I think I'd be pretty discouraged. This is not to say that I don't think studying theology can change the world for good; it most certainly can. But that's certainly not my primary motive in studying. Nor is it purely selfish (although it is, I'll admit, at least partly selfish) - I'm not studying simply to "fulfill myself" or to "feel good about myself" - that would still be too utilitarian for my tastes. The only way to explain it, I suppose, is to speak in terms of the inherent value of TRUTH and of a human person's natural inclination towards seeking it.
It's about maintaining a balancing act that Catholics, for one, have always been good at. Take, for instance, the balance between enjoying "created goods" on the one hand, and the utter dependence on God to which Christ calls us on the other. The Church has always insisted that it is not dualist about this - it does not say, "Depend on God and hate all things material." But the Church does say that you can only genuinely enjoy created goods in the way they were meant to be enjoyed if you depend on God wholeheartedly and cultivate the virtue of temperance first. A similar pattern, I think, holds here: it's not that you can't use your education, for instance, to make money or fulfill yourself or reform society (and, in fact, we are morally obliged to seek to improve both ourselves and our societies to make them conform to divine law); but you will only do that properly if you first seek truth for the sake of truth, knowledge for the sake of knowledge.
In other words, I think ultimately this shift is not unrelated to what JPII would have called the "crisis of truth" in our society. If truth is relativistic, if every person can decide for themselves what they think is true, then what's the point of wasting time searching for wisdom, knowledge, truth?
Aaaaand speaking of subordinating the quest for a "meaningful philosophy of life" to the quest fora, I have to go do my hall monitoring duties.