History major turned software engineer here. I think history gives its students two key skills: (1) You have to wade through a lot of complexity and nuance, tr

History major turned software engineer here. I think history gives its students two key skills: (1) You have to wade through a lot of complexity and nuance, try to find the signal in the noise, and then marshall some of that complexity to support your argument. After you've speedwalked through thousands of pages of archival documents and other scholars' arguments, it's comparatively easy to be thrown ~50 pages of framework or API documentation and quickly find what you need. (That's also why I'm excited that Common Core puts greater emphasis on reading non-fiction to learn skills, instead of every English class being about reading fiction for pleasure. It builds the same skills.) (2) You get used to the feeling that you know only a tiny fraction of what there is to know about the world. That intellectual humility leads you to ask good questions, try empathizing with perspectives and ideas that may seem strange at first glance, and only make careful assertions that are supported by strong evidence. And by no means do I think history is the only academic discipline teaching students these things. I just wish it got more respect!