“It is not, truly speaking, the labour that is divided, but the men: – divided into mere segments of men – broken into small fragments and crumbs of life; so that all the little piece of intelligence that is left in a man is not enough to make a pin, or a nail, but exhausts itself in the making the point of a pin or the head of a nail.”
— John Ruskin, The Stones of Venice (1853)
A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.
-Lazarus Long, Time Enough For Love
John Ruskin was an oaf.
A well rounded man encompasses all segments of the labor.
As is aptly put by Lazarus Long.
“All men, should be able to at least some degree do all things.”
Eric, “thoughts on point of a pin”…2011
It seems that the world tends towards specialization the way the universe tends towards chaos. It requires energy and work to be good at many things the same way it requires energy and work to bring order and organization to our lives. Spontinaiety and creativity spring from the synergism of a broad knowledge base. Humans are born with an infinite knowledge base, and if we’re lucky, we get to spend the rest of our lives discovering all the things we already know. It seems a waste to me to only discover one thing, even if I were able to know everything about it.
Jim
Indeed, we think of specialization as a recent problem, but Ruskin’s complaint was very well founded. Specialization makes much of our civilization possible, but when no one worker knows or understands what the finished product will be, then it’s gone too far. The end result is poorly-designed and poorly made products. Fortunately for us woodworkers, Ruskin’s advice was heeded by some, and we eventually got the Arts & Crafts movement (and Morris chairs) out of it. We also got the Victorian Gothic revival, but I suppose we can forgive him for that.
“The man whose whole life is spent in performing a few simple operations, of which the effects, too, are perhaps always the same, or very nearly the same, has no occasion to exert his understanding, or to exercise his invention. He naturally loses, therefore, the habit of such exertion and generally becomes as stupid and as ignorant as it is possible for a human creature to become. The torpor of his mind renders him not only incapable of relishing or bearing any part in rational conversation, but of conceiving any generous, noble or tender sentiment, and consequently of forming any just judgment concerning many even of the ordinary duties of private life. Of the great and extensive interests in his country he is altogether incapable of judging; and unless very particular pains have been taken to render him otherwise, he is equally incapable of defending his country in war. The uniformity of his life naturally corrupts the courage of his mind.
But in every improved and civilized society, this is the state into which the labouring poor, that is, the great body of the people, must necessarily fall, unless government takes some pains to prevent it.”
Adam Smith. The Wealth of Nations.
One of our local high schools recently cancelled their industrial arts (shop class) program so they could make space for an expansion of their computer lab. When I asked a member of the administration, whom I met at a social event, about the cancellation and its impact on students’ abilities to perform basic tasks with tools he thought it would be cute to quote Ruskin. He said to me, “You know, John Ruskin said ‘Education is the leading of human souls to what is best, and making what is best out of them’.”
I won’t repeat the short remainder of our conversation.
“The workman of today works every day in his life at the same tasks, and this fate is no less absurd. But it is tragic only at the rare moments when it becomes conscious. Sisyphus, proletarian of the gods, powerless and rebellious, knows the whole extent of his wretched condition: it is what he thinks of during his descent. The lucidity that was to constitute his torture at the same time crowns his victory.”
“I leave Sisyphus at the foot of the mountain! One always finds one’s burden again. But Sisyphus teaches the higher fidelity that negates the gods and raises rocks. He too concludes that all is well. This universe henceforth without a master seems to him neither sterile nor futile. Each atom of that stone, each mineral flake of that night-filled mountain, in itself forms a world. The struggle itself toward the heights is enough to fill a man’s heart. One must imagine Sisyphus happy.”
Albert Camus, The Myth of Sisyphus.