In this presentation, I argue that the history of universities is entirely germane to assessing what their role should be at the outset of the twenty-first century. Challenged as we are on all sides by cataclysmic changes in technology and economic demands that increasingly pressure us to become institutions aimed solely at variable utilitarian ends, we need to remember the ‘philosophical’ aspect of a university, as opposed to a technical education, and emphasize the importance of education in perfecting human intellects in our deliberations about the future of universities
