For Wednesday, read chapter 1 (pp. 3-11). What is the function of a university education? --it makes people more well rounded --it is a good in itself --it helps people to make better decisions in their personal, professional, and public lives --it trains people for the workforce

This is a public university. Does that have any special importance? Two kinds of Democracy: Mob-rules: each person decides what is best for him or herself and votes accordingly Jeffersonian: Each person decides what is best for the country overall and votes accordingly

Jeffersonian Democracy expands the ruling class. Each citizen plays the role of an individual ruler; by aggregating the decisions of each of many rulers, we increase the chance of arriving at wise policies. Public education further increases the chance that the rulers will make wise decisions. Where does logic fit in? --helps you to reason effectively with the information you get --helps you to recognize deceptive reasoning

Many people in our society benefit when their audience cannot think critically: advertisers, politicians, religious leaders, professors, sales-people. Often, deceptive reasoning works by an appeal to irrational aspects of human psychology (for example, wishful thinking). But logic is blind in the way justice is supposed to be.