I think I find your overall conclusion plausible, but I think your argument for it in places was dubious:
But again, even if you assume I’m wrong, that still leave us with universities that struggle to optimize for 2, 3 and maybe 4, losing out on 5 in the process.
One could instead interpret the situation as: Universities are optimizing hard for 5, and as a result they are understandably losing out on 2, 3, and 4 in the process.
Indeed, I think there is something to be said for this. A few years ago I half-jokingly wrote a paper titled “Kallipolis, USA,” in which I argue that the present-day USA is in fact Plato’s ideal state.
A big part of my argument was the way in which the university system works. In particular, (in conjunction with the rest of society) it seems to be optimizing pretty hard to get people to “follow their passion,” and in particular by forcing everyone to go to college and take gen-ed requirements arguably the system is doing the best it can to scout and recruit people who are suited to the priesthood/academia.
I mean, I think the basic argument I would have here is:
If universities are optimizing for 5, and we can agree that 5 leads to research and that universities are one of the leaders in anything scientific-research related. Why is research slowing down ? And, respectively, why is so little of the interesting research coming out of university.
See points 1-2 and arguably 3⁄4 in the article.
I think there’s also some evidence universities didn’t optimize for 2&3 until recently, because until recently their appeal was much narrower and focused on the very intelligent and/or very well-off (i.e. people that usually want or even need self-actualization).
I think I find your overall conclusion plausible, but I think your argument for it in places was dubious:
One could instead interpret the situation as: Universities are optimizing hard for 5, and as a result they are understandably losing out on 2, 3, and 4 in the process.
Indeed, I think there is something to be said for this. A few years ago I half-jokingly wrote a paper titled “Kallipolis, USA,” in which I argue that the present-day USA is in fact Plato’s ideal state.
A big part of my argument was the way in which the university system works. In particular, (in conjunction with the rest of society) it seems to be optimizing pretty hard to get people to “follow their passion,” and in particular by forcing everyone to go to college and take gen-ed requirements arguably the system is doing the best it can to scout and recruit people who are suited to the priesthood/academia.
I mean, I think the basic argument I would have here is:
If universities are optimizing for 5, and we can agree that 5 leads to research and that universities are one of the leaders in anything scientific-research related. Why is research slowing down ? And, respectively, why is so little of the interesting research coming out of university.
See points 1-2 and arguably 3⁄4 in the article.
I think there’s also some evidence universities didn’t optimize for 2&3 until recently, because until recently their appeal was much narrower and focused on the very intelligent and/or very well-off (i.e. people that usually want or even need self-actualization).