College Should Be Way More Fun
The article discusses the importance of maintaining the joy of intellectual exploration in college education. It contrasts the slow, messy conversations that foster deep thinking with the quick, definitive answers provided by AI. The author argues that education should not solely focus on job preparation but also embrace the pleasure of learning and wrestling with ambiguity.
- ▪A class discussion on Henry James's The Turn of the Screw highlighted the value of engaging with ambiguity.
- ▪Artificial intelligence provides quick answers but lacks the ability to foster deep, meaningful conversations.
- ▪The author emphasizes that education should prioritize the joy of learning alongside preparing students for future challenges.
Opening excerpt (first ~120 words) tap to expand
IdeasCollege Should Be Way More FunI’m not talking about keg stands. I’m talking about the joyous mysteries of intellectual life.By Michael A. ElliottJared NangleMay 23, 2026, 7 AM ET ShareSave One afternoon last fall, a class full of Amherst seniors forgot I was there. In the 19th-century octagonal room where I taught my course on fiction, they were deep in an argument about the tempestuous ending of Henry James’s The Turn of the Screw—about whether the ghosts haunting two children in a gothic country house are real, about whether they exist only in the deteriorating mind of their governess, about why one of the children dies at the novel’s conclusion, about whether he even dies at all.
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Excerpt limited to ~120 words for fair-use compliance. The full article is at The Atlantic.
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