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Comment by xethos | Hacker News Reader

Regardless of whether we classify it as humanities or political science (as neither seems to be looked at as terribly useful in the states), a population without some grasp of civics does not lend itself to a healthy democracy

Not everyone must be a plumber or electrician, but we're well-served by having some basic knowledge, and an ability to find answers to the questions that arise as we do basic handywork, such as changing a lightswitch or replacing a faucet. Similarly, we are well-served as a society when we can answer basic questions about our democracy past the age of 18; IE, shortly after testing ends, and typically before it actually matters - when voting.

Not everyone needs to become a licensed electrician, or have a deeper-than-average understanding of civics. But knowing someone you can trust with an answer that isn't purely to line their own pocket is still important.

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I usually don't like to get into these subjects on HN, but I'll expand just a little bit on what I mean.

All political systems (all of them) have "holes" in that they're more or less dependent on individual virtue to function in a long-term fashion - some of them having holes so large they can only work as naïve thought experiments with perfect civically-minded (thus imaginary) people - and not academic knowledge, which is completely orthogonal to said virtue.

That "grasp of civics" you're talking about is the same, it's not about knowing but being willing to make some real thankless efforts; the culprits in the proverbial "Tragedy of the commons" aren't ignorant.

i like your framing of "holes" in political systems. one way to put it is that a political system has "holes" if the ideal/desired outcome is not a Nash equilibrium.

however, my understanding (though i can't speak for the other commenters) is that the reasoning behind "humanities-educated people make better democracies" is NOT that humanities-educated people are more virtuous, and thus will willingly not degrade the commons (the reasoning you seem to be criticizing). rather, it's that humanities-educated people cannot be manipulated as easily by a demagogue (and other similar things).

the usually cited problem with democracy is that it gives the people the power to choose, but it does not automatically makes them capable to make good choices. that's where the education comes in.

clearly many questions require technical/domain knowledge to be answered and are not simply a matter of preference. for example, fixing your car, or building a bridge. and even running a business or cooking an elaborate meal. with technical knowledge, you are able to make better decisions whatever your preferences are. humanities education is then implied to be the "technical knowledge" for participating in society.

of course, in that case, we can discuss what should be the content of the "humanities education", but that's another discussion...

> rather, it's that humanities-educated people cannot be manipulated as easily by a demagogue (and other similar things).

I can see where your reasoning is coming from but I mostly disagree. I can see two factors that could prevent manipulation: 1. The rare case of wisdom (that I define as being strong willed enough to think independently and not fall for self-deception/wishful thinking + intelligent enough to think correctly) which doesn't apply here since education doesn't influence this and 2. Manipulation going too much against the previous indoctrination, which does apply here but kinda defeats the point.

In fact, I'm mostly distrustful of intellectuals (!= intelligent people). That misattributed Thucydides quote about scholars ("The society that separates its scholars from its warriors will have its thinking done by cowards and its fighting done by fools.") further illustrated by Uncle Ted ("Though they like to fancy themselves independent thinkers, the intellectuals are (allowing for individual exceptions) the most oversocialized, the most conformist, the tamest and most domesticated, the most pampered, dependent, and spineless group in America today.") summarize my position.

Where I do agree is that practical/technical knowledge allowing individuals to be more independent and less reliant on specialized technicians to change a light bulb is highly important. Sadly, the Western world I (we?) belong to has almost finished removing teaching of DIY and even the individual ability to do so (cf modern cars, appliances or operating systems). I suspect that this isn't a coincidence considering the aforementioned ramifications...

i agree that wisdom / an independent thinking spirit is an important factor to prevent manipulation and that it's not something easily taught.

but i also believe that in fact knowledge is another very important factor in resisting manipulation (absent from your list), and more generally, being part of a functioning democracy. i mean here knowledge of lofty things like history, economics, sociology, which can then serve as a base to know and understand more practical things, like laws, regulations, taxes, government subsidies, or how roads, schools, or health insurance is funded -- otherwise how could anyone make any decision regarding these topics? and all of these things can be taught.

independent thinking is important but with zero knowledge you could maybe be convinced to join a cult or something, for example. like, for ancient peasants the king was effectively a god anyway.

of course, all of this is highly idealized. i agree with you and Uncle Ted. academia, in practice, often is not a place that champions these ideals. but maybe it could be.

> Sadly, the Western world I (we?) belong to has almost finished removing teaching of DIY and even the individual ability to do so

yeah, i fear these developments

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