jobs for philosopher

It did, but I wasn't a fan of Law School and I ended up only practicing for 3 years (it was not for me). It do data analysis now, and it is actually useful there, as often I am creating queries where it's questions of either/or, or I am trying to test software and so there is a need to set up what are essentially tautologies in order to see whether they fail.

Ha! That makes sense. I wonder how many lawyers we have on A2K besides Joe from Chicago?

Debra Law, Ticomaya, OmSigDAVID come to mind right away. There are probably others.

A school-mate of mine at Boston U. also did his undergrad work for a B.A. in philosophy before going on to Harvard Law. I minored in phil., majored in lingua literasque anglicorum, as they put it on the sheepskin.

Sounds like a rich program. I regret that today the principal--indeed sometimes the only--criterion for evaluating majors is how much income they will generate.
At least as important--if not much more important--is the education that makes the scholar and his or her life more interesting and worth living.

Unfortunately, or fortunately (depending on your perspective), a BA in Philosophy doesn't act as a catapult into any particular career.

Of course, you can pursue a post-graduate degree in philosophy, but even the successful completion of a Ph.D. is no guarantee of a secure position in the small, competitive world of academia. A bachelors in philosophy also offers the opportunity to enter both law and (at least at one time, i have no idea if this is still true) medical school, but the obstacles to entry into those institutions will prove very challenging depending upon the applicant's broader studies.

JLN's first comment is generally good:


When i graduated college, a "communications degree" was maybe a step ahead of a Φ degree, although maybe only because employers were even more in the dark as to what such a degree entailed.

i'm not sure if your original question was meant to provoke, or if it was an expression of genuine curiosity; but i can at least offer the testimony of one person with a BA (and nothing else) in Φ: When i graduated, i chose not to pursue a post-grad student career; only because i no longer wanted to feel like a financial dependent (which i had, in one way or another, been up till then.) As my diploma guaranteed nothing, i went on to work a variety of jobs -- of the sort that generally falls to the unskilled. i worked on assembly lines, as a custodian, a warehouse laborer, a file clerk, a retail associate and manager, until i finally amassed enough experience and connections to land my current job as the inventory manager and senior buyer for an online retailer. (A job i love, by the way, due to both the environment and owner/manager-engagement). i'm now a home-owner and a "lifer" at my current job, with both a healthy salary and a robust 401k. (Granted, this all took about nine years to transpire; but what is nine years in the history of philosophy?)

My work history may not seem immediately connected with my degree, and it is not. But many of the skills that i learned as a Φ student are at the root of my, admittedly limited, success. As the product of an undergrad Φ program i learned to seek creative solutions to everyday problems, both develop and accept constructive criticism, think in the long term, distinguish between the "visionary" and pragmatic aspects of different projects, and how to adjust the two to the benefit of both, and how to reconcile each to all.

How to make money out of "official" philosophy? Impossible to predict. Is studying philosophy worth it? i still think so.

Of course, just to undermine all of the statements made above, acquiring a basic Φ background does not necessitate the pursuit of a Φ degree. Some come by it naturally, some with a mere gloss of the basics, and some (like myself) require a real going over. i became obsessed with the history of philosophy (and the philosophy of history, too) -- were someone else to find themselves subject to the same obsession, i find it hard to believe that they would regret following that time, ie college-hour, -consuming fascination to its fullest degree-bequeathing limits. If one is so motivated, then future earnings are of secondary interest. (Which is terrifying, i well understand...) Philosophy is not a field to be engaged in the pursuit of wealth.



i'd like to provide two quotes to establish a context for the following remarks (perhaps a poor rhetorical move in this case):

"Those who don't know history are destined to repeat it." Edmund Burke

"To err is human, to forgive, divine." Alexander Pope

You said:


griffitj has stated: "The overwhelmingly vast majority of important philosophers were educated in philosophy or by other philosophers. " I'd like to one-up that statement and say that there is no historical evidence of any important philosopher that has not been exposed to philosophical ideas and an education in light of them.

i'm sorry if some of your Φ arguments have been deflated by others as a consequence of their knowledge of past arguments, arguments similar to your own, but knowledge of past philosophical movements is not innately hostile to new thoughts. If anything, when properly used, the history of philosophy is a filter that allows the most viable thoughts to pass into present concern and thus promote innovation. Imagine Φ history as a rehearsal for current speculations, speculations made in the light of current social and scientific events.

As a Φ student, i've "learned" not to trust the not -so-much-Φ-educated, because they often mistake fervently-held opinion to be the same as, or equal to, or canceling out a position of which they are ignorant -- simply because their ignorance seems to them to bestow authority (ignorance as experience). Nonetheless, i continue to engage most people with a seemingly relevant held belief in order to further refine my ideas or positions. An historian (even of ideas) describes change, it is the opinionated that resist that element.



Um, no offense, but this is patently false. Plato was a student of Socrates, as directly indicated in the Crito dialogue, etc.

no at the death of socrates plato writings became existing, the student position was just for socrates existence as philosopher but at the death of socrates plato set the truth of it as the existing fact, philosopher is out of existence freedom that has never anything to do or to share with else, even if else is objective reality or relative existence whole
bc philosopher is the exclusive relation left with truth so individual existence absolute constant individually with absolute constancy that also exist

Hmmm...where does a philosophical career begin? Surely it doesn't hinge upon being published? If it did then Socrates can't be considered a philosopher, because he didn't write anything down --or if he did, none of it has survived.

From a certain perspective, a philosopher's status, as such, might be viewed as being wholly owed to his relationship with "truth". But the philosopher, as a person, is not restricted from having other relationships, like that of teacher and pupil.

While Plato may not have written his dialogues until after his teacher's death, this does not prevent his initiation into the study of philosophy from occurring within the mentor-ship of an older, wiser person ("wiser", at least, at the time of that exchange.)

If anything, philosophers are always students in pursuit of "truth" -- they are never messiahs with an absolute connection to "it".

i disagree fundamentally, where truth is concerned then there cant b else

messiah is an invention to mean smthg that dont exist could b for liars business as we see it now clearly, or for figure creation use in means of restart when absolute darkness is clearly the existence fact so when evil is the rule of absolute existence as also we witness it now, how rights are the target to kill from up by enslavin them to dirty superiority life dirty from what it is by powers and force
what is truly superior has no power on else as it affect others by increasin their free true sense
what is truly superior dont need any force as it is always free while being always real too with any else
while superiority wills are always what is the source of forms n facts constance that horrify sights and senses bc it invest such energy to impose a focus on creatin inferiority as existing and in the principal mean that there can b else to truth, existing, which prove ur allegation belongin to evil living that u might b essentially

positively to prove what i said being true, anyone relation with absolute constant truth is different in all terms when absolute constant truth is freedom dimension and the relation is also free and the philosopher sense of being true is about its true free sense too

it shows how u mean truth concept as one thing, there wont b philosophy and philosophers then but fools which i guess that it is what u preconise like nietzche type so god would look superior

If my major interest in higher education had been based on the question of how much money it'd enable me to make, I would have opted to go to a trade school, not a university. Money is most definitely not what an academic education is supposed to be about.

A philosopher is mostly an observer and rarely a doer and when a doer no longer a philosopher... naturally hardly such activity can land you a good job at least as jobs are conceived and perceived in our present current time...the cheaper washed down version of a Philosopher is the politician precisely because the politician is factly more concerned with showing off and being visible then with observing...still is true good politicians have the rare quality of being good observers all the while entangled and mingled in the rhythms of producing and being scrutinized, but normally even the best of them lack the quietness and the distance that the activity of Philosophy requires to produce something precisely by doing nothing other then closely look time and again...

philosopher never observe anything, philosopher find smthg to say bc he is free constant so the reason is its constant fact not its present fact
philosopher dont refer to anything while have to refer to reference to mean existing possibly since constant free out of all existence
that is why it would mean very ideal values as a relation with the idea of existence that cant b wrong, like liberty superior fact or metaphysical value or infinite superiority being existence reality

philosophers always aim to prove how absolute values are related to what conscious know and struggle to push that perspective in possibly provin any look being a positive value

that is why philosophy is the eternal question realisation as the only right answer meant, as if any mind is what question and a mind is a thing valuable since the only thing that a philosopher work through while all his aims is that being constant is a value of infinite value which is the truth

that is how it doesnt disturb u that nietzche was crazy and the way he died when u believe him true

being objective is bein u, not that anything u would say would b objectively true