Apart from entry-level texts, what discipline are you thinking of? Pretty much all my after-freshman-year undergrad texts contained debates.
And if I want to do something interesting I need the skills and knowledge which are learned at a college level.
Capitalism is not a new evil, you're absolutely right. It's just the system that, according to our current framework, came after feudalism, which came after something else.
the point is that actually seeing the changes in systems as consequences of massive technological change is likely directionally correct and it is not clear whether current capitalist logic survives the AI era.
The actual tasks being done have always been done even if the technologies used to do the work have changed and the work itself looks a little different. Our base needs have not changed. We are the same apes bound by dopamine. The functionality we require is pretty old. There is probably little we experience that is truly "new" compared to what one might experience in a classical civilization.
Capitalism is far more ancient than feudalism. Phoenicians were famous capitalists, likewise most any group of people involved in trade. Trade and accumulation of capital representing labor is ancient.
"Capitalism in its modern form emerged from agrarianism in England, as well as mercantilist practices by European countries between the 16th and 18th centuries. The Industrial Revolution of the 18th century established capitalism as a dominant mode of production, characterized by factory work, and a complex division of labor. "
"an economic system characterized by private or corporate ownership of capital goods, by investments that are determined by private decision, and by prices, production, and the distribution of goods that are determined mainly by competition in a free market"
This would satisfy the modern interpretation of capitalism as well as the ancient Phoenician traders engaging in real time free market price discovery when on trade voyages. Trade has been complex for a very long time. Consider the famous complaint tablet to Ea-nāṣir. These men were clearly capitalists little different than the commodity traders of today. They probably did not do their own fishing either, leaving that for the fishermen, focusing on copper and perhaps other commodities profiting off arbitrage and using that to pay for their survival.
Not really, you need cooperation with other people in this complex world to live. No necessarily a job. You could be self-employed or a member of a cooperative or an elected official.
But yeah, the capitalist default is to have a job, sure.
> And if I want to do something interesting I need the skills and knowledge which are learned at a college level.
Not really, no. You need the skills and knowledge and for some professions you do need the official certificate of education and for a subset of those that's actually warranted, because you cannot get your hands on the training other ways. Doctors kinda need the official system, self-taught appendectomy would not be ideal. English literature? Not so much.
Trades can pay very well and frequently require nothing more than on the job training.
You think you need college for the same reason you equate "job" with survival. These are not universal truths, not even in capitalist hellscape America. It might be harder but it is in no way a requirement. Anyone who tells you different is lying to you.
Ugh, capitalism.
a) This is about universities, not "college" b) The University teaches you critical thinking, not how to learn "textbook items". It's not vocational training for upper middle class. It's for building and developing citizens who can think critically.