Sophistry and speculation: Adam Smith’s scathing critique of higher ed

“In the university of Oxford, the greater part of the public professors have, for these many years, given up altogether even the pretence of teaching.” (WN, V.i.f.8)

If Adam Smith were alive today, what would he have to say about academic tenure, i.e. the practice in higher ed by which a small group of privileged professors are provided lifetime appointments, protecting them from being fired without just cause? Is tenure a necessary evil to promote academic freedom, or is it just another protectionist pretext to limit free competition and inflate consumer prices?

We now turn to Articles 2 & 3 of Part 3 of Chapter 1 of Book V of The Wealth of Nations (WN, V.i.f-g). By way of background, all three subsections of this part of Smith’s magnum opus are devoted to the third duty of government — public works and institutions — but Article 2 deals with the education of youth, while Article 3 explores the education of adults. More importantly, it is here — in both Articles 2 & 3 of Part 3 of Chapter 1 of Book V — that Adam Smith reveals himself to be not only a champion and a critic of education but also a populist of sorts, for he includes “the education of the common people” as one of the three duties of government. (WN, V.i.f.52) [1] But before we explore Smith’s populist side, I want to single out five passages in particular from the first 50 paragraphs in Article 2:

1. In praise of competition. What motivates men to accomplish great things? Smith begins this section with a general observation about the incentive effects of competition:

“In every profession, the exertion of the greater part of those who exercise it is always in proportion to the necessity they are under of making that exertion. This necessity is greatest with those to whom the emoluments of their profession are the only source from which they expect their fortune, or even their ordinary revenue and subsistence. In order to acquire this fortune, or even to get this subsistence, they must, in the course of a year, execute a certain quantity of work of a known value; and, where the competition is free, the rivalship of competitors, who are all endeavouring to justle one another out of employment, obliges every man to endeavour to execute his work with a certain degree of exactness. The greatness of the objects which are to be acquired by success in some particular professions may, no doubt, sometimes animate the exertion of a few men of extraordinary spirit and ambition. Great objects, however, are evidently not necessary in order to occasion the greatest exertions. Rivalship and emulation render excellency, even in mean professions, an object of ambition, and frequently occasion the very greatest exertions. Great objects, on the contrary, alone and unsupported by the necessity of application, have seldom been sufficient to occasion any considerable exertion. In England, success in the profession of the law leads to some very great objects of ambition; and yet how few men, born to easy fortunes, have ever in this country been eminent in that profession!” (WN, V.i.f.4)

Before proceeding, notice the punctuation at the end of this crucial paragraph. It one of only nine exclamation points in Smith’s entire magnum opus.

2. Sophistry and speculation. Smith compares and contrasts the wisdom and sophism of the ancients: “The ancient Greek philosophy was divided into three great branches; [A] physics, or natural philosophy; [B] ethics, or moral philosophy; and [C] logic.” (WN, V.i.f.23) But at the same time, although “[t]his general division seems perfectly agreeable to the nature of things” (ibid.), Smith also notes how no less than two of these three branches of ancient education — natural and moral philosophy — are consist mostly of gross sophistry and unfounded speculation:

“Different authors gave different systems both of natural and moral philosophy. But the arguments by which they supported those different systems, for from being always demonstrations, were frequently at best but very slender probabilities, and sometimes mere sophisms, which had no other foundation but the inaccuracy and ambiguity of common language. Speculative systems have in all ages of the world been adopted for reasons too frivolous to have determined the judgment of any man of common sense in a matter of the smallest pecuniary interest. Gross sophistry has scarce ever had any influence upon the opinions of mankind, except in matters of philosophy and speculation; and in these it has frequently had the greatest….” (WN, V.i.f.26)

3. Higher ed is overrated. After explaining why sophistry reigns supreme in natural and moral philosophy (see #2 above), Smith explains why the leading universities of his day have become “sanctuaries” of sophistry and speculaton:

“The improvements which, in modern times, have been made in several different branches of philosophy have not, the greater part of them, been made in universities, though some no doubt have. The greater part of universities have not even been very forward to adopt those improvements after they were made; and several of those learned societies have chosen to remain, for a long time, the sanctuaries in which exploded systems and obsolete prejudices found shelter and protection after they had been hunted out of every other corner of the world. In general, the richest and best endowed universities have been the slowest in adopting those improvements, and the most averse to permit any considerable change in the established plan of education. Those improvements were more easily introduced into some of the poorer universities, in which the teachers, depending upon their reputation for the greater part of their subsistence, were obliged to pay more attention to the current opinions of the world.” (WN, V.i.f.34)

4. Education of women. Next, Smith compares and contrasts the education of boys and girls:

“There are no public institutions for the education of women, and there is accordingly nothing useless, absurd, or fantastical in the common course of their education. They are taught what their parents or guardians judge it necessary or useful for them to learn, and they are taught nothing else. Every part of their education tends evidently to some useful purpose; either to improve the natural attractions of their person, or to form their mind to reserve, to modesty, to chastity, and to economy; to render them both likely to become the mistresses of a family, and to behave properly when they have become such. In every part of her life a woman feels some conveniency or advantage from every part of her education. It seldom happens that a man, in any part of his life, derives any conveniency or advantage from some of the most laborious and troublesome parts of his education.” (WN, V.i.f.47)

5. The division of labour has a dark side. Last but not least, Smith explores the dark side of the division of labor:

“In the progress of the division of labour, the employment of the far greater part of those who live by labour, that is, of the great body of the people, comes to be confined to a few very simple operations, frequently to one or two. But the understandings of the greater part of men are necessarily formed by their ordinary employments. The man whose whole life is spent in performing a few simple operations, of which the effects are perhaps always the same, or very nearly the same, has no occasion to exert his understanding or to exercise his invention in finding out expedients for removing difficulties which never occur. He naturally loses, therefore, the habit of such exertion, and generally becomes as stupid and ignorant as it is possible for a human creature to become. The torpor of his mind renders him not only incapable of relishing or bearing a part in any rational conversation, but of conceiving any generous, noble, or tender sentiment, and consequently of forming any just judgment concerning many even of the ordinary duties of private life. Of the great and extensive interests of his country he is altogether incapable of judging, and unless very particular pains have been taken to render him otherwise, he is equally incapable of defending his country in war. The uniformity of his stationary life naturally corrupts the courage of his mind, and makes him regard with abhorrence the irregular, uncertain, and adventurous life of a soldier. It corrupts even the activity of his body, and renders him incapable of exerting his strength with vigour and perseverance in any other employment than that to which he has been bred. His dexterity at his own particular trade seems, in this manner, to be acquired at the expense of his intellectual, social, and martial virtues. But in every improved and civilised society this is the state into which the labouring poor, that is, the great body of the people, must necessarily fall, unless government takes some pains to prevent it.” (WN, V.i.f.50)

This observation about the dark side of the division of labor creates a crucial inflection point in Smith’s work, for it sets the stage for one of the most populist and revolutionary parts of Smith’s pro-liberty and pro-consumer agenda in The Wealth of Nations: his call for the public education of all children, rich and poor alike!

Nota bene: I will pick up where we have left off (the rest of Article 2 as well as Art. 3 of Part 3 of Ch. 1 of Book V) in my next post. In the meantime, let’s return to the question I posed up top: what would Adam Smith say about academic tenure? Isn’t the answer now obvious?