You do seem to view academe through some pretty rose colored glasses. Does the premise of "publish or perish" suggest a lot of this "knowledge" is also just product to be churned out? Having sifted through a fair amount in my 60 years, I find much of it to be trend following, than actually insightful.

If I was to point out a basic problem with the larger paradigm, it goes to what I call the long shadow of God.

Logically a spiritual absolute would be the essence of sentience, from which life rises, not an ideal of wisdom and judgement, from which we have fallen. More the light shining through the film, than the images on it. Consciousness seeking knowledge, than any form or brand of it.

The father figure lawgiver archtype was certainly useful in more primative societies, to instill some respect for the cultural ethos, but it conflates the ideal with the absolute. One is elemental, while the other is aspirational. Ask yourself, if a culture can assert its ideals to be absolutes, where does it stop? Wouldn't, couldn't everyone assume their ideals to be absolute?

Which pretty much goes to the problem of western civilization, since the effective fall of monarchism, that was the political expression of the monotheistic paradigm. "Divine right of kings." From the Terrors of the French Revolution, to the Stalinist purges, to our somewhat infantile woke cancel culture. Nuance is not allowed, if the ideal is at stake.

That is why eventually, the real sociopaths take over, as only fear steers the herd.

Yet one would think, with all their intellectual firepower, the schools of higher thought might question the logic of treating the ideal as absolute, but it seems beyond the purview of their brand of groupthink.