True, the lack of infrastructure may have been a valid argument against attempting to make everyone literate.
In general, people who want any subject “X” taught in schools will argue against arguments of the form “X will only be usefull for a small fraction of students; therefore, we should teach less X” by saying that the benefits of a society in which a large fraction of people understand “X” outweigh the apparent lack of utility of “X” to most individuals. The less practical use “X” has, the more strongly “X”-proponents tend to argue this. Let’s call this the anti-utilitarian heuristic.
Let me carefully distinguish between calculus as (1) “laborious integration or differentiation by hands using various techniques that are usually memorized instead of understood” as opposed to (2) “actually understanding the concept of integration and differentiation”. Almost no one would deny that (2) has a large amount of practical use, and that, alas, a large amount of people lack even that. I think that a basic understanding of calculus, i.e. (2), is sufficiently useful (to individuals and to society), that we should take the anti-utilitarian heuristic seriousely.
Religion, right?
True, the lack of infrastructure may have been a valid argument against attempting to make everyone literate.
In general, people who want any subject “X” taught in schools will argue against arguments of the form “X will only be usefull for a small fraction of students; therefore, we should teach less X” by saying that the benefits of a society in which a large fraction of people understand “X” outweigh the apparent lack of utility of “X” to most individuals. The less practical use “X” has, the more strongly “X”-proponents tend to argue this. Let’s call this the anti-utilitarian heuristic.
Let me carefully distinguish between calculus as (1) “laborious integration or differentiation by hands using various techniques that are usually memorized instead of understood” as opposed to (2) “actually understanding the concept of integration and differentiation”. Almost no one would deny that (2) has a large amount of practical use, and that, alas, a large amount of people lack even that. I think that a basic understanding of calculus, i.e. (2), is sufficiently useful (to individuals and to society), that we should take the anti-utilitarian heuristic seriousely.