Malonzo

Robert Malonzo
Professor Johnson
English 1A
Sept 17, 2014

The Idea of a University: Final Draft

In John Newmans essay, The Idea of a University, he argues that
knowledge is its own end and that all fields of education are created by
god and are therefore interconnected. Newman also explains one property
of this connection to observe an object by itself is to yield a different
outcome when observing the same object with respect to its
surroundings. Adding to such property, Newman states that to focus on
one field of education is to be unfair to the others and therefore disrupts
the balance between the fields. As a solution, he proposes that students
should surround themselves with enlightened individuals to create a
balanced educational atmosphere. Newman explains that this solution is
preferable since requiring every student to learn every other field of
education is impractical and would surely prove to be quite a daunting
task. After thoroughly analyzing Newmans thought process, I have
convinced myself that Newmans idea of a university is irrelevant because
of two main things: his arguments foundations are invalid and his method
of achieving his goal of an educational atmosphere isnt the best way.

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Newmans very idea that the fields of education are interconnected

because they share a common creator already raises red flags. He bases
this idea from a belief that a creator exists. I could write a long list of
reasons why I think theres no such thing as creator but thats not the
point here. Lets just assume that there is a creator, for the sake of
putting my ideas in the same page as Newmans. If there was a creator,
wouldnt the creator create everything? If so, then everything is related to
everything, no matter what. His idea that English is related to History is as
valid as the idea that trees are related to computers. This comes to show
that there is room for error in the argument right away. Deriving an idea
from another idea that isnt proven to be true is a recipe for disaster and
its safe to say that Newman has already started setting himself up for
failure the moment he included divinity in his argument, but I cant say I
blame him. People didnt really know any better back in the 1850s. My
main point is that deriving an idea from an unproven belief is already a
foolproof way of distinguishing the holes of an argument. If he based his
argument on an unstable foundation, it can only mean that what is to
come will be more unstable than the one before. Therefore, I can conclude
that Newmans very first foundation of idea is invalid.
Consequentially, my first point paves the way for a second point in my
argument not all fields of education are connected. If Newman is so
confident as to state such a bold argument, surely, it should work for any
given instance. It should be like a mathematical formula where it should

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always work for any variable because the formula itself would
compromise between the variables to output the corresponding right
answer(s) depending on the given variables. So if Newmans argument
doesnt work for even one example, then he made the mistake of
including the word all in his argument, or his formula so to speak. One
counter-example is that there is no concrete connection between English
and Biology. I believe this is correct because the way the human body
works is independent of any given language. Changing grammar rules for
a given language means nothing to Biology and therefore, no balance is
disrupted. The same principle applies to Physics and Chemistry. The way
the world works and chemicals bond is independent of any language
because languages are invented by humans whereas the Sciences have
always been around, always been true, and always been created by no
one. Therefore, Newmans idea that all fields of education are intertwined
is invalid.
Although it is true that treating knowledge as its own end has its own
perks, I believe that the modern world itself has evolved to make students
see knowledge as a means to an end. In this case, the common end of
students is success. Newman writes about many benefits of being an
educated individual such as having ones own view of opinions and
judgment or a truth in developing them (54). Newmans list goes on
and on. I agree that these sound quite beneficial to have, but I also
remembered that this was written during the 1850s, meaning that the

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way of life back then was not compatible with a modern students
lifestyle. I also developed an idea that these benefits would prove to be
useful to have, but thats all they are benefits. Im a firm believer that
there is a fine line between needs and wants, and the word benefit
sure sounds like it would fall under the wants category. Only individuals
who have the luxury of time can afford to be educated, following
Newmans definition. In this modern age, knowledge is a way to achieve
goals. It seems like yet another foundation of Newmans idea has been
proved invalid.
Because Newman brought up the idea of perspective in education, it
reminded me that Im also a firm believer of the idea of perspective and I
believe that the rules of perspective can be applied on itself. The flexibility
of the rules of perspective opens to complexities such as paradoxes. In
certain cases, there is a point of view where an individual would deduct
that the rules of perspective do not and should not apply on the said case.
But what the person doesnt realize is that what hes thinking is, in
essence, a perspective itself. Using analogy to explain this fact, one can
think that when a person does not want to make a choice, he is choosing
not to do anything, which is also a choice. Because of this, I believe there
shouldnt be perspective when trying to achieve absolute truths that
education paves way to. Keeping this in mind, my point of view is that
there shouldnt be the element of perspective in this special case of
education. Therefore, if a truth is absolute, it is the same from all

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perspectives, it is something that works for all, and it is a fact. Lets look
at a simple fact: a computer is electronic. There is no way to look at this
with respect of other educational fields that will change this fact, and
thats just the way it is. Some will disagree with this, Im sure, but what
they dont realize is that if they observe with respect to other fields, the
fact doesnt change, but instead gets added on to. Therefore, any
discrepancy between two ways of observing is considered as extension
and its absence will not cause the fact to have holes or missing pieces. In
other words, it is unnecessary, and it falls under the wants category.
Because of this, I can conclude yet again that Newmans idea using
perspective as a foundation is invalid.
Adding on, I do not believe that being educated in Newmans way will
yield the best results. In Mike Roses essay, Lives on the Boundary, he
claims that it is what taps our curiosity that educates us (91). I strongly
agree with this point because Ive been a learner all my life and I deem
this argument correct based on experience. Certainly, there are people
who are curious of everything, but there will always be one subject that
would call upon them stronger than any other subject. This is the reason
why some students develop boredom out of different subjects. I also
believe that education itself has a general meaning. In most cases, the
term education means academic education. I believe it holds different
meanings depending on the persons curiosity. Sometimes subjects hold
no value to some students. Sometimes academic education itself might

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not be for them in the first place. School isnt the only place to earn
education. For example, a person might quit school and work for the rest
of their life. In that case, that person is educated by life as a worker. A
person might quit school and join the military. In this case, he is curious
about war and battle. Because of his curiosity, he becomes educated in
the execution of battle strategies and the like. Also because of this, he is
educated in his own way. I can therefore conclude that being educated
has a meaning that varies from person to person whereas Newman only
bases his idea on the foundation that education only means academic
education.
To be clear, I have nothing against Newman. In fact, I do believe that
Newmans goal of an educational atmosphere is nothing but noble, but I
prefer to disagree with his reasoning and method of achieving it. In my
opinion, Newmans idea has been implemented long ago and the question
should be: is Newmans idea of education favorable? I realized that the
general education requirements that students face today are pretty much
what Newman would have wanted to see. And to answer that question, I
would have to say that its not effective because it slows down the entire
process for students all across the world. Arent high school courses
general education? Thus, requiring it in college is quite redundant. In
effect, the G.E. system is dreaded by students and I can say that on
behalf of all the learners in this world who still call themselves students.
Who wouldnt want to go straight to the courses that will extensively help

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in ones future career? But this doesnt mean Im disregarding the optimal
effect of Newmans idea: to build an educational atmosphere for students
to inhale knowledge. Like I said earlier, Im all for it. One thing is holding
me back, though. As an accomplished young member of the Math culture,
I have a solid belief that the same output can be acquired in infinitely
many different ways. Applying this idea, I believe that a different way of
developing a mixed atmosphere of education is to let students specialize.
I strongly believe that their presence in one place is more than enough to
satisfy Newman. In education, quality is better than quantity. A field of
education will be strongly represented by the different groups of students.
I can support this yet again with Roses point: education is about a
culture embracing another (92). In this case, different educational
backgrounds represent different cultures and different ways of looking at
life. As a student shares his ideas with another student, we see a culture
embracing another.
In conclusion, I dont think Newmans ideas of learning would be
significant to most students today because I think his ideas are invalid.
Newmans ideas are based on unstable foundations which made his
argument as unstable. His idea of connection between educational fields
has inconsistencies he couldnt afford to have. Because of this, I
concluded that only some fields are connected. Therefore, favoring one
subject over any other would not necessarily disrupt the entire chain.
About knowledge being its own end, that may have been the case back

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then, but the world evolved where all the industries people can work for
are detail-oriented, which then makes knowledge a means to success. I
also stated that the rules of perspective can be applied on itself, so I
developed a perspective that perspectives should not alter the truth,
which is the common end of every educational field. I used Roses
argument that it is what taps into our curiosity that educates us and
there couldnt possibly be anyone equally curious about every field. Also
from Rose is the idea that education is a culture embracing another.
Lastly, I used my opinion that education has categories, where academic
education is its own category and the only one where Newman presents
his idea.

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WORKS CITED
Newman, John Henry. The Idea of a University. The Presence of Others.
5th ed. Ed. Andres A. Lunsford and John J. Ruszkiewicz. Boston:
Bedford/St. Martins. 2008. 51-54.
Rose, Mike. Lives on the Boundary. The Presence of Others. 5th ed. Ed.
Andres A. Lunsford and John J. Ruszkiewicz. Boston: Bedford/St.
Martins. 2008. 91-102.