The whole thrust of FR is recognizing the "rot" that comes out of many people's mouths. You can't do that by simply learning air-conditioning. In that case you are driven to and fro by one demagogue after another.
Excellent point. I brought up the air conditioning just because I'd rather be able to fix my neighbor's ac for her right now than discuss the novels of Isabel Allende.
The analysis skills that we develop and practice on FR can be learned in a high school/college setting, if one has the right instructors and program. On the other hand, sometimes all a college graduate has is the ability to repeat drivel. It depends on the student, what they were taught, by whom, and so on.
And even then ... I thought I was pretty sharp, before FR, but in my first six months or so, I got a lot of responses to my posts on the order of, "That was really dumb!" There's nothing like the interaction of thousands of interested and informed people to really make a person think, check his sources, consider his biases, re-evaluate his logic, and know his homophones.