There was an article on HN a few weeks ago talking about the slowing pace of “innovation” in the modern world, the lack of an Einstein or a Bohr or a Feynman. I have no evidence of this and maybe the entire notion is unfounded in the first place but I think this framing:

- teaching marketable skills so people can get jobs

- teaching "how to think" and learning about art and culture

is part of the problem. When you go back and look at many of science and philosophy’s “greatest,” they were almost always deeply curious and inquisitive people and interested in many things, not just what they are known for now. They read other “greats” and were well-balanced intellectually.

I think a problem now is we are producing unbalanced minds, the equivalent of a bodybuilder who skips leg day, every day. Perhaps there is some something to be said about encouraging a diversity of thought, people who read poetry as you say. It is likely no coincidence that genuine genius is extremely divergent and radical in thought, likely not someone who learns physics and only physics with no other interests.