I don't have any formal thoughts on this, which is why I hope you all do. The question arises as I sit on Wikipedia, halfway through my attempt to learn the entirety of Macedonian history in one evening to make up for a semester of watching sports on my laptop in class. I can't help but wonder why exactly I attended (save for the practical reasons). The professor was an interesting guy, a good lecturer, but the St. Louis Cardinals are just a bit more important to me. And in the back of my mind all semester: The hell with it, Wikipedia will have my back before the final. And it's true. It does. I'm going to get an A, based completely on the reading I'm doing right now. (Side note: this stuff is better than A Song of Ice and Fire, because it's real.)
So I don't know. Obviously the process wouldn't be so easy if, for example, I hadn't paid attention in accounting all year. (Fortunately I did.) There are some things you can teach yourself, and some that are much more difficult to even begin learning. But the prevalence of Wikipedia only exacerbates what I see as a huge problem with higher education now, an even bigger problem than its cost. It's fucking pointless. My thoughts are occurring to me as I type them at this point, so I have no great insights to share, just -- is it all some great farce? (Don't answer that.) All the students I know understand and take for granted that they will self-educate at a convenient time instead of bothering much with class, but all the professors and deans (I think) believe that they are teaching and upholding a solemn tradition. Are they delusional? No. They're profiting. But also, on some level -- yes, they have to be. If you stop and look at the state of things, it's insane. An English literature degree? First you learn how to read, then you either enjoy reading or you don't, end scene.
I'm rambling. Hopefully no one is still reading, or at the very least hopefully Perdiccas has gone ahead and died so Antipater can turn around and get back to his real business, which is looking after Greece for another six months before he gets ill and dies as well. Or is murdered. Every illness is a potential poisoning in Macedon. Again, even better than Game of Thrones.
Anyway, not sure what the point of this post was. hubski, do you agree? I know mine is a tired, oft-repeated argument, but isn't it also so self-evident that its oft-repeatedness should have inspired some sort of new efficiency by now? I know the simple answer is that the people in charge benefit from the current system. However, the vast majority aren't in charge and don't benefit. And since I'm in media res tonight I'm sort of pissed off.
Editing in some follow-up questions to make this look legitimate: how soon does the public wake up and change the higher education system completely? And how? Is the future Khan Academy? We used to pay exorbitant fees for private tutors (well, if you were male, white, landed, etc.), then we moved on to paying crazy amounts to sit in 500-person lecture halls. Is $39.99 a month to partake in Coursera the next step? If so, how does that help anything? If not, why are we bothering?