In Japanese, there is a rather peculiar term “Senmon Baka” (literally translated as “expert idiot,” or in more common terms, “ignorant specialist” or “clueless expert”). This term refers to those who only know their narrow professional field and nothing else, especially regarding general cultural fields such as literature, art, history, philosophy, and so on.
Below is an interesting perspective and analysis by Professor Takashi Saito on whether becoming a good expert in a certain field requires reading books outside of one’s specialty or having a general cultural foundation. Reading this, let us reflect on current parents and teachers, many of whom only focus on pushing their children and students to master “specialized” subjects, or students and engineers who think that “reading and learning professional skills” is enough.
I will address this in the following part: Reading books creates “depth” in a person.
The “depth” I want to mention is not the depth of focusing exclusively on one thing. Even if one focuses on a professional field, if they are completely ignorant of other things, they will lose balance. Depth is something that belongs to the whole personality and is synthetic in nature.
I mentioned that university students do not read books, but in reality, I have the impression that even university lecturers do not read books to cultivate culture. In a university recruitment interview, I asked this question
“Can you tell me three books outside of your specialty that have shaped your own culture?”
The key point is “outside of the specialty,” as this is a question to confirm whether the interviewee is a person with broad culture.
However, many people suddenly became speechless. If they had said, “There are too many books to list,” it would have been understandable. I also hoped they would say, “If it’s limited to only three books, it’s too difficult; let me list ten!” Unfortunately, more and more people answered, “If it were professional books, I could list them immediately, but…”
I believe that being proficient in a professional field is a given, but one still needs general culture as a foundation. Doing science without knowing philosophy or researching economics without knowing literature is very dangerous.
That is why there is a cultural curriculum for first-year university students.
Người ta gọi nó là “Liberal art”.
The concept of “Liberal Arts” was born in ancient Greece.
Its origin is the educational principle of “the art of developing the whole person to become free.” There, it was believed that for humans to escape the constraints of prejudice and habit and to live according to their own will, they needed broad practical knowledge.
Later, in medieval Europe, it was inherited and defined as the “7 Liberal Arts”: Grammar, Logic, Rhetoric, Arithmetic, Geometry, Astronomy, and Music. And later, when specialized education such as Theology, Medicine, and Law was born, these became the subjects that had to be learned first.
Modern “Liberal Arts” absorbed that flow while becoming broader, including economics and natural sciences that developed in the modern era.
Recently, “Liberal Arts” has become highly valued because of a strong awareness that in the context of progressing globalization, social problems have become complex and require flexibility that transcends professional fields when solving problems.
Even if professional knowledge is abundant, applying that knowledge without a multi-dimensional perspective will lead to difficulties. For example, even if one learns and understands genetic engineering, handling the difficult problem of how to view it from the perspective of life ethics will require broad knowledge such as history, religion, and philosophy…
Therefore, in an era where culture is increasingly necessary, it happens that people do not read books.
Reflecting on the above points, I see that even if an individual is excellent and intelligent in science or technology, if they lack a good and rich cultural foundation—without the subconscious guidance of that foundation regarding aesthetics, thinking, and aspirations—that individual’s expertise will have limits and find it very difficult to flourish to the peak of genius or make great contributions to humanity. Looking back at history, great scientists were also philosophers, cultural figures, poets, writers, and thinkers…
On a broader scale, geniuses or great figures with significant creativity in science mostly appeared and grew up in nations and communities with a high cultural foundation (history, philosophy, art).
This means that if we want Vietnam to have top-tier scientists, we cannot simply take care of children learning Math, Physics, Chemistry, and English and think that is enough to play on the international stage.
Children need to be “immersed” in a cultural environment at home, in school, and in society to have the opportunity to submerge themselves in poetry, music, painting, philosophy, history, and more…
From there, geniuses are born.
It is impossible to have sky-piercing, shimmering towers on a weak foundation. The taller the tower, the broader and firmer the foundation must be.
Promoting reading and striving to develop a reading culture for every individual and family is an effective way to create that foundation.
– Author & Translator Nguyen Quoc Vuong –
