The convenience sector of higher education in 2008 will claim to provide these skills economically, with no frills. Needless to say, no single department or program can single-handedly enable MSU credibly to make that claim in 2008. Every MSU department and every program will have to examine its curriculum and its pedagogical practices carefully to make sure that they are indeed effective in equipping students with the intellectual skills required for success in the knowledge economy. However, humanities programs in general and the Philosophy and Religion Department in particular have a special role to play in the development of those skills. Humanities disciplines focus on the interpretation and criticism of texts.
Language is their medium.
But knowledge work, let us note, is work executed in that medium. From this purely formal viewpoint, humanities disciplines are uniquely qualified to develop the linguistic skills that are absolutely essential for knowledge workers. Both philosophy and religious studies share a special status among humanities disciplines in this respect. The study of philosophy, with its strong emphasis on logic and argument, is ideally suited for the development of critical habits of thought. The study of religion, with its critical focus on sacred texts that believers normally do not submit to rigorous rational criticism, provides a powerful model for exercise of critical intellectual skills.