Richard Bedient, the William R. Kenan Professor of Mathematics, penned a letter to the editor that was published in The New York Times on Feb. 29 in response to an article titled A Rising Call to Promote STEM Education and Cut Liberal Arts Funding. In his submission, Bedient proposed that “what we really need are graduates who have a working knowledge of the way the physical world works, who understand the equally complex world of human endeavor, and who have the ability to transmit that knowledge in written, spoken and artistic form. That is what the liberal arts are really about.”
He observed that, "knowing what the second law of thermodynamics is about but not being able to explain it to someone else is like being a terrific writer who has nothing to say."
