An Economist's Perspective on Technology and the Liberal Arts
41 Pages Posted: 3 Nov 2005
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An Economist's Perspective on Technology and the Liberal Arts
An Economist's Perspective on Technology and the Liberal Arts
Date Written: October 2005
Abstract
A question of considerable significance that confronts our nation's universities in general and our institutes of technology in particular is the apposite role of the liberal arts in an institute of technology. As such, the purpose of this paper is to provide an economist's perspective on the nexuses between the liberal arts and technology. We begin with a set of questions that are interdisciplinary in nature but also have a substantial economic content to them. We then discuss a subset of these questions expansively. In particular, we point to the ways in which a liberal education enhances our understanding of all aspects of this subset of questions. Our basic point is that these and most other momentous questions of the day are inherently interdisciplinary in nature. Therefore, they can only be addressed meaningfully by combining a liberal education with solid training in at least one discipline.
Keywords: Higher Education, Liberal Arts, Technology
JEL Classification: A12, B40, O33
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation