Humanity needs the Humanities

This weekend, I had a discussion with someone about the value of the humanties in the college setting, meaning art, literature, music, philosophy, languages and history. I argued that the humanities are the most important things that one can study -- more so than the sciences. Now I understand that this is a pretty controversial idea, especially with the rate at which programs for the humanities have had their budgets cut, but let me explain.

First off, by studying the humanities, you are engaging in a rich tradition of human history. The essential soul of the human condition is encapsulated within art, with poetry, and through literature. The essential human question is "Who am I? Why am I here?" These are philosophical questions by nature. It's the humanities after all. Science gives us results. It's the humanities that make us pursue those results.

Secondly, without the humanities, it would be difficult to maintain a sense of morality within those very sciences. For example, without studying ethics or morality, where would science stop? Gene splicing, cloning, attempts at re-animation, along with the creation and utilization of nuclear weapons are all things that we have to be concerned about. I'm not saying everyone should pledge on the Holy Bible, I'm saying make college students studying biology read Frankenstein and government and politics majors read 1984. I guarantee that with more focus on the humanities in the colleges of today, we would have better educated, more morally-conscious leaders of tomorrow.

It's astonishing the amount of articles I've read from business flyers that contain mistakes. In fact, if you drive down Street Road right now, you will see at least three. I know that because I mentally correct the signs in my head every single day. We seem, as a culture, to have forgotten the importance of proper grammar, spelling and punctuation. But the world is run by first impressions and I know for a fact that I wouldn't want to consider doing business with an advertising agency that can't spell "publication" correctly. But it's not that I blame them, actually. With texting, e-mail, and tweeting, I'm surprised the whole language hasn't collapsed into an abbreviated, de-voweled mess. (u knw wht im tlkng bt)

I'm not saying that the other collegiate fields don't teach critical thinking, I'm saying that they don't teach it as well as the humanities. Humanities students are constantly being told to analyze, interpret, and defend the most outlandish of arguments (Swift's "A Modest Proposal," anyone?). While interpreting a food menu, last quarter's statistics, or chemistry instructions (please don't exercise your creativity in the chem lab, by the way), are all valid and interesting things, there lacks a certain amount of lateral thinking in those activities.

For my last point, I'd like to address the issue of logic and rhetoric. I consider these two incredibly important, if not the most important, skills to study. We are constantly being surrounded by logical fallacies and being able to recognize them is incredibly important. The rhetoric, or the study of argument, is important because you need to be able to defend your views intelligently and use language to challenge the views around you.

I'm far from being done with this topic, and soon enough, I'll cover more issues concerning philosophy, logic, and rhetoric.