ABSTRACT
Professional opinion, it goes without saying, does not take kindly to such a thesis: it offends the amour propre of teachers and academics, who object that the industrial approach is insensitive to the existential problems which they are called upon to face, ultimately dehumanizing in its effects, and impractical anyway since no reliable method of assessing these services has yet been found. It remains to be seen why this unsympathetic attitude is fast becoming untenable, and why the principles of pedagogy which have given rise to it are as inadequate as, for example, the principles of philology have been found to be in modern linguistics. The gist of the ensuing argument is that educational thought and decision-making has, in general, been dominated by the supremacy of verbal reasoning and, in particular, by literary intellectuals whose brand of valuejudging has remained unaware of the extent to which it prejudges issues. This is a sweeping assertion, to be sure, and one which asks to be substantiated.
