I seem to have missed the part of university where we were learning things <i>not yet in published books</i>. If you think that undergraduates are reaching the cutting edge of research as part of their reguarly scheduled syllabus, I don&#x27;t know what to say to correct this impression.<p>You seem to forget that not every university is Stanford, where there are true leading experts that students can engage with <i>beyond the context of class</i>. There is no global <i>university level</i>. The trope of students conducting cutting edge research as undergrads is based on a few outliers who are widely publisied. The experience for the vast majority of us down in the trenches however is limited to the simplified model of physics that is safe for undergrads. Basing your expectations for a university education on the behavior of the top %0.001 of students is like expeciting your minivan to handle as well as a Grand-Prix racecar.<p>My question to you is then &quot;Why the hell did society decide to co-opt researches into passing on the information, rather than create a new class of specialists like society has done for every other field of human endevor?&quot;