I received a B.A. in History thirty years ago from a second-tier school. It included lots of coursework in history, of course, but also lots in philosophy, econ

I received a B.A. in History thirty years ago from a second-tier school. It included lots of coursework in history, of course, but also lots in philosophy, economics, literature, art, law, and archaeology. My favorite definition of history came from a professor: "History is the study of everything." It is not at all like a technical degree, and does not produce the same kind of thinking. It is aimed at developing the ability to reason, make cogent arguments, evaluate evidence and sources, and becoming aware of your own biases. (Edit: Yes, technical fields require many of the same skills, but the application of those skills is to different kinds of problems which develops habits of thought that are quite different from historical thinking.) (Anyone who says they are unbiased has clearly not made it that far in obtaining the historical mindset. It's not that becoming aware of your biases makes them go away; rather, you become more attuned to your own blind spots and so work to develop the ability to compensate for them, especially when evaluating historical evidence.) I have found that technical people frequently think they are highly skilled in critical thinking regarding the "liberal arts" subjects (history, literature, philosophy, the arts, etc.) but frankly their skills in logical thinking about "hard science" (programming, mathematics, physics, etc.) usually far exceeds their abilities in other areas and so they tend to rate themselves too high in those areas. I attribute this to the fact that while they have been challenged to defend their findings in a hard science field, most have not had to do so in the liberal arts, and particularly in history. (Other than in internet forums such as this, which is very weak tea compared to a class of people majoring in the subject and a professor with years in the field. It's a bit like the difference between being competent to comment on the comparison of BSD and Linux on the one hand, and being competent to submit a diff for the kernel on the list for OpenBSD or Linux where Theo or Linus is going to look at it and give feedback.)