I disagree. Higher education is the process where young minds are tested by a breadth of study that is accompanied by the kind of depth that only lifelong students of a subject can provide. Here you have hundreds of subjects to study, and just as many people who have devoted their working lives to gaining a deep knowledge of each subject — ready to pass along their knowledge.

Do too many students specialize too quickly? Yes. Are many professors complicit? Sure. But as a concept, that’s not what higher education is, or even what it has become on the whole.