It IS important to do a case for the humanities in these dark times. Imagine if tech-heavy schools that these Tolkienesque characters had stressed a more balanced STEM/liberal arts education.
But the Trivium is Rhetoric, Grammar, and Logic, not the wider realm of the 7 Muses. He and his crew don’t do as well with the preponderance of life that does not parse, isn’t fungible, and can’t be bought.
It IS important to do a case for the humanities in these dark times. Imagine if tech-heavy schools that these Tolkienesque characters had stressed a more balanced STEM/liberal arts education.
Interestingly, Peter Thiel as a young man was a well-grounded practitioner of the classical Trivium:
- Co-founder and first editor-in-chief, Stanford Review, 1987
- B.A. in Philosophy, Stanford, 1989
- J.D., Stanford, 1992
One of his first jobs post-law-school was as a speech writer for William Bennett (months to years)
And he was a securities lawyer, too.
So he’s been writerly and indeed a professional writer since college.
He’s not an engineer, though as a high school student he was very good at mathematics.
He is very articulate and learned in certain corners of religion, history and political science - see his conversation with Tyler Cowen a year ago:
https://youtu.be/vfbndRTlsg4
But the Trivium is Rhetoric, Grammar, and Logic, not the wider realm of the 7 Muses. He and his crew don’t do as well with the preponderance of life that does not parse, isn’t fungible, and can’t be bought.