<p>Well, quid-pro-quo…what does a philosophy major gain that someone else couldn’t get from just reading on their own? </p>
<p>If you want “specialized knowledge”, you can get as basic or as technical as you like. If i asked you to perform an asset search of a public property, would you know how to do that independently?</p>
<p>Could you conduct a political poll? Do you know how a “gist” report is formulated? Do you know how to formulate data that is submitted into federal courts, depositions, and surveys on your own?</p>
<p>If so, more power to ya. Get out there and figure out away to draft your resume to draft “independent study of american politics” and see how it goes…I certainly won’t stop you. </p>
<p>The fact that you don’t even know what quantitative methods are, shows that you really don’t have a clue. Research is a big deal in Poli Sci, it’s basically what the major is designed around. Most 0132, 1801, 1802, even 1811 jobs ask for candidates to have a Poli Sci degree (or related major like IR, Government) as a basic qualification (1811 being the major exception, being it accepts any skill or major combination).</p>
<p>But hey…I’m certainly not stopping you, if you think you can do my job…have at it. Go apply with DHS (or whoever) and go get it homeboy. Just don’t be upset when they tell you that philosophy doesn’t satisfy their entry-level requirements or makes you competitive.</p>
<p>May I ask what it is you want to do with your philosophy major? Do you want to become a professional philosopher? Open a philosophy store? Sell philosophy products? Be a philosophy consultant?</p>
<p>As i said, Poli Sci is a narrow careerfield and definitly not the best choice, but it does provide a good basis for governmetn work, because that’s all you really study - government. So for me it worked well, but i dont recommend it for everyone.</p>
<p>Most information regarding analyst work will be “vague” because 99% of analyst have some sort of clearance, which if violated would result in a termination of employment.</p>
<p>If you look up quantitative methods it gives a pretty accurate description of how data is compiled, sorted, reported and disseminated.</p>
<p>If the poster decides to become a professional philosopher and goes on to graduate school, provides enough dedication and a decent level of intelligence, he will be making mid 5 figure salary at age 30, and 6 figure at age 40 at a University with a job, philosophy professor, that he can hold for the rest of his life. </p>
<p>We have ideas because of these people who want to major in something other than business, engineering, or politics. All the research methods,all the ideologies, and all ways of conducting businesses are not magical acts that somehow pop out of a constant repetitions, but intensive research that has little to no reward. This is precisely what philosophy, science, and humanities provide. Due to its lack of practical reward, these researching posts are seen as pointless, and viewed with intense suspicions by career minded individuals. But I just want to say that without these philosophy majors, we won’t have economics, we won’t have Noam Chomsky, we won’t have Harold Bloom, and we won’t have America. </p>
<p>If you want to major in philosophy, you need to be content about the way of life philosophy provides. Not everybody finds happiness in cranking out 6 figure out of college.</p>
<p>Our country would be much better if Noam Chomsky majored in basket weaving - perhaps his socialist views wouldn’t have been given a podium.</p>
<p>Anyways, as I stated a number of times - if you want to teach philosophy, great! Major in it, then go on to grad school, phd, ect. Teach others to teach others, to teach others to teach philosophy.</p>
<p>However, other than academia there isn’t a real application for it in the business/private sector world - or even government for that matter.</p>
<p>I would also caution anyone “banking” on a career in academia at this point. Fulltime professorships in the Liberal Arts/Humanities are drying up and many schools are utilizing adjunct staff at an increasing pace.</p>
<p>I can’t imagine universities are hiring philosophy professors hand over fist, compared to a robust field like engineering, IT or nursing.</p>
<p>Philosophical texts are really difficult to read and understand. It’d take a lot of time and dedication to get the same stuff out of those texts as in self-study. Plus, you get to go to lectures with professors who’ve spent their lives analyzing these ideas and texts and can listen to their ideas and opinions, which often can’t be found in texts. It’s the complete opposite of reading Sports Illustrated.</p>
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<p>This sounds like a skill that you’d learn on the job. In a political science class do you actually go through the process of doing an asset search of a public property and learn how to do all of the procedural stuff associated with that?</p>
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<p>Again, I have a basic concept of what these things require, and probably could look up how to do these things at a mediocre level, but these sound like things that you’d learn on the job. I seriously doubt that in poli sci classes you learn all of intricate details of formatting reports in the the US govt. document formats.</p>
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<p>I’m asking what sorts of mathematics do you need to know to do these quantitative methods. This question has a non-vague answer.</p>
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<p>Lol i don’t give a crap about the ‘classified data’ (haha sure) that you analyze. I’m interested in what mathematics you need to know to be able to do this.</p>
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<p>I don’t study philosophy. Yes, philosophy provides no immediate job training. You aren’t opening anybody’s eyes in this thread by saying that.</p>
<p>The math skills you are asking about is basic statistics, usually.</p>
<p>It’s not about the math know-how, which could be obtained anywhere, it’s about the application of hard data. </p>
<p>Remember, Poli Sci deals with factual data (not open ended ideas like philosopy). Things like voter demographics, polling, statistical data, economic conditions (unemployment rates, tax base, ect).</p>
<p>Alot of Poli Sci is just technical writing - reported data, not essay format such as a philosophy paper; although most Poli Sci degrees have a theory component.</p>
<p>I think you’re getting the wrong idea, I’m not saying a philosophy major couldn’t do my job or any other government job (non-technical), because lots of the knowledge is obtained via training. However, a philosophy degree just doesn’t open the door like Poli Sci/IR/Economics. For example, I was just browsing jobs online today and looked through a few Foreign Affairs Specialist and International Relations specialist openings. Broadly speaking, you could take any bright individual and train them to do those jobs - like most non-technical jobs, but the job posting lists “minimum qualifications” for education. Those were a BA in Poli Sci, Government, Economics, International Relations. So for those kinds of jobs, a philosophy wouldn’t allow you to qualify - or at least be competitive.</p>
<p>Intelligence Specialists and Analysts typically come from Poli Sci backgrounds, depending on the subject they study (economics is another major one, or a background in a specific region of the world, issue, or topic) which is why I picked the major. If you wanted to do that sort of work and majored in philosophy you’d be putting yourself in a hole.</p>
<p>My upper level coursework was all concentrated in research and policy, so I was very well prepared for analytic work, but even still - I didn’t walk right into it. I started as an Investigative Analyst doing things like due dilligence, compliance, litigation support and government affairs support. It was boring, but hands on experience with responsibility and accountability. </p>
<p>This is just my situation. As I’ve said several times, I picked this major because I knew what I wanted to do with my life and this was the best pathway for ME.</p>
<p>BIGeastBEAST, no one here cares what your major is… or mine, or anybody else’s on some internet forum. </p>
<p>Philosophy is a major that opens up so many pathways to the future that jobs and grad schools seek out in abundance. It is just like any other liberal arts major and IMO better and more practical than most liberal arts majors apart from maybe economics. If you claim that philosophy is useless, then you should go on and disregard other majors such as English, Classics and History as useless too.</p>
<p>The skills you learn by being a Philosophy major can be learnt in other ways, but having Philosophy as your major will greatly increase the speed of what you are learning. These skills include critical thinking, quantitative reasoning, logical thinking, critical reading, strong writing skills, and more rhetorical prowess. There are so many concentrations in philosophy that you can discuss almost anything in philosophical terms, because that is basically what philosophy is: It is a dialogue between you and the interlocutor (whatever that may be… it could be a book, a professor, or a whole other group of people) in which people of different opinions form arguments supporting theses to come to the most reliable and concrete answer. </p>
<p>Other people think philosophers are crazy or weird because we spend so much time thinking about existential issues that may never be solved, but the fact that we can actually make arguments that are logical and have bearing on such issues shows how smart we can be. Career representatives understand this, at my school there was a career fair. ESPN was one of the represented businesses, all the business majors in my school went there but at the end of the day the representative asked the head of my school where all the English and Philosophy majors were. The reasons are obvious.</p>
<p>Philosophers discuss anything and everything in critical terms such as politics, law, ethics, maths/logic, religion, economics, and this is why they are sought out. With a philosophy major you have armed yourself with tools and skills that will cross many disciplines. Philosophy majors move on to become writers, politicians, businessmen, lawyers, government workers, consultants, psychologists, public speakers, and many other professions. </p>
<p>Anyone can be a philosopher, and a philosopher could be anyone.</p>
<p>I think while a good start, this line of reasoning is incomplete. A lot of what a polisci major who wants to work in the government has to do is get practical experience, which they’ll often beg for by volunteering to do it for free.</p>
<p>I can easily see a philosophy major with some key extra [rigorous] classes in other things and actual job experience being more qualified. A philosophy major says you can reason with subtlety, but it doesn’t mean you have practical skills. But a polisci major doesn’t get you those skills much - it does better, but even those I have talked to majoring in it don’t think it gets you so far. Taking a few courses in it is fine, but there’s no reason to major in it instead of majoring in philosophy if you like philosophy better. The focus should be on practical involvement. To get these jobs, what you need is some other practical courses on your transcript and a good GPA [which is often asked for in low level beginning positions]…possibly with previous job experience, though understandably everyone has to have a first time at some point.</p>
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<p>Honestly, most polisci majors I’ve seen are incompetent with dealing with basic quantitative skills anyway to the point where it would not matter…my polisci major friends say it’s a lot of political THEORY. You may not be incompetent at these skills yourself, but that’s besides the point. I think 2-3 courses in polisci is fine, but one should focus on taking a few statistics courses, and things like that, which bring you upto competence in real practical skills.</p>
<p>On a much more general scale, I think some of the best things someone wanting a practical job can do are</p>
<p>a) build the resume to get into a great law school</p>
<p>b) learn some programming - even if you’re not going to be doing a Comp. engineering job, it’s really useful for many other positions</p>
<p>c) be familiar with numerical analysis</p>
<p>d) possibly just major in engineering or environmental science or something…maybe get an MBA later to work upto management</p>
<p>e) major in economics while taking statistics courses and get into the financial market</p>
<p>f) major in whatever the hell you want, but make sure you can do statistics reasonably and know how to program properly…if you want to work for the government, throw some polisci classes in</p>
<p>g) major in math, and get a Masters in Financial Math </p>
<p>h) major in math and learn CS enough so Google hires you</p>
<p>If none of these options appeal, then one might be destined to go into academia. I may have missed a few things, but these are a lot of the common practical paths.</p>
<p>If you’re saying tacking on a practical major helps, that’s probably true. I’d put it differently - tack on a practical MINOR to your philosophy major, and in fact tack on something very broadly applicable like CS or statistics. I think discouraging a phil. major with the example of governmental jobs that require econ/polisci degrees is a little narrow, and having solid practical quantitative skills gets you somewhere much more surely. Think about it - the world doesn’t need people who know political theory, but a lot of junk runs on numbers. I’m not saying this because I like the number crunching - I’m into pure math myself. But I know the reality too.</p>
<p>Wow, this Big Beast guy is a ■■■■■■. Poli Sci and IR barely open up any doors because they’re overloaded with CNN fanboys who think they can all get jobs at the UN. They’re hardly more practical than philosophy. And your insights really aren’t all that revolutionary. People know that if all they care about is financial stability, they can go study engineering or finance. Some people have other goals. So get over yourself you pretentious prick. I’m pretty sure if you conducted a poll and analyzed the hard data everyone would agree. Thank god you learned how.</p>
<p>A Philosophy major is a hole you throw money into…</p>
<p>In the real world it’s considered a useless and nearly laughable degree. I’m sure your philosophy professors say differently, but that is just because they want to feel relevant. </p>
<p>The only reason anyone should major in philosophy is if they want to teach philosophy. It’s good for law school prep, but there are lots of other majors that are good for law school prep too and also provide you with marketable skills (unlike philosophy).</p>
<p>I never said Poli Sci was some fast track to riches, I wanted a career in government and the Poli Sci degree helped me get one. The only reason I suggested it as an alternative is because it has some philosophy curriculum blended into it (political theory), but it also can give you marketable skills like data analysis and applied statistics, which are useful for some jobs.</p>
<p>“If you claim that philosophy is useless, then you should go on and disregard other majors such as English, Classics and History as useless too.” ~ Xptboy</p>
<p>Yeah, those are all pretty useless majors too, unless you want to teach those subjects. English can be used to get into corporate/technical writing, so it has some transferable skills, but there’s no guarantee. Some luck out and find an opportunity, others don’t…I wouldn’t want to gamble on my career like that.</p>
<p>History would be OK if you wanted to go into the military, or be a teacher…that’s about all I can think of.</p>
<p>I can’t find any practical use for Classics other than just being a teacher/academic career.</p>
<p>You clearly need to think about the larger issues. Look at academic journals and facts before judging without any research or ‘‘word of mouth’’. </p>
<p>Other than that, all majors have their uses, good on you for being a political science major and congratulations on knowing what you want. However, I sure hope you never get any political position of significant importance because you are clearly an egotistic and sociocentric thinker Thankfully, unless you change your attitude and stereotypical prejudgments, I’m rather confident that that will never happen.</p>
<p>PS. I mentioned English, History and Classics, but I didn’t mention Political Science for a reason. :P</p>
<p>Being a “philosopher” might sound good now when you’re young, and the idea of reading interesting texts make you feel enriched and intelligent, but someday you’re going to grow up…leave college, and enter the workforce.</p>
<p>Factor in 2 kids and a mortgage, you’re sure gonna regret majoring in philosophy when you are going into job interviews and competing next to people with degrees in finance, IT, engineering (lots of engineering majors do the business side too), sciences, math disciplines, ect. Like it or not - those majors provide you with a skill, philosophy doesn’t.</p>
<p>Don’t think that your critical thinking is a skill, it’s not…at least not one hard to come by. The truth is, all majors provide critical thinking and problem solving. Philosophy just forces you think about problems that 1) can’t be solved, or 2) Aren’t related to the workforce, while these other majors do!</p>
<p>You may have thought long and hard about socio issues, but if you’re trying to go into business - they aint gonna care about that stuff. They want the engineer who can design their sewage system, the accountant to balance their books, the IT specialists to implement their payroll software, the business major to make their sales, ect.</p>
<p>Like I said, if you want to be a philosophy professor, and grow up to teach other people to teach other people to teach philosophy - go for it. Otherwise, pick a different major. You’ll be happy you made the decision when life starts slappin you in the face.</p>
<p>If you enjoy it, pick it up as a minor or take philosophy electives. </p>
<p>Xptboy, I don’t read academic journals and neither do other people in the real world. We are to busy working and gaining knowledge in our own field - academic journals are for just that, academics.</p>
<p>LOL! This pretty much proves how much you know about anything.</p>
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<p>Again… You really don’t know what philosophy teaches do you? The fields of philosophy include logic and philosophy of maths, philosophy of politics and law, ethics, philosophy of science, regligion, and existential philosophy (this is the’‘useless field where you can’t solve anything’’ field that you talked about). Do you really think all philosophers sit on a tree trunk all day and think about the meaning of life?</p>
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<p>As you might have guessed, I’m a philosophy major, and I chose it after debating many options mainly because it is the most practical major for what I want to do, and no I do not want to become a philosophy professor or anything like that lol (and yes, I do plan on making a decent sum of money although at this point I can’t really make an accurate prediction of how much). Philosophy is just one of the many topics that I find interesting, which is fitting I guess.</p>
<p>In the business world, philosophers do not get specialized positions, only the specialized majors get them. Obviously the engineering majors become engineers and the CS degrees get jobs in that field, but in business Philosophers have many jobs available to them too. They become the managers who decide how the company is run, or the sales representatives. Also, if they choose to get a business minor or get some internships with corporations, then they can also get jobs in finance or insurance.</p>
<p>It’s no wonder that companies like Goldman Sachs recruit primarily from 1) top UG schools, and 2) top liberal arts school. The liberal arts schools do not offer business majors, they have people with English, History, Classics,and Philosophy degrees, and for some reason, these people go off to work in the biggest businesses in the country. </p>
<p>Look, nobody ever said that it’s the most practical major. The most practical majors are quite obviously the more specific sciences or engineering degrees. But it’s not like philosophy won’t get you a job.
[Best</a> Undergrad College Degrees By Salary](<a href=“http://www.payscale.com/best-colleges/degrees.asp]Best”>Common Jobs for Majors - College Salary Report)
That chart pretty much shows that, apart from the engineering majors and a few mathematical majors, almost any major is about as good as another in monetary, so the moral of the story is: Major in what you want, because what you want to major in will be in demand by prospective employers, and you’ll be all the happier for it.</p>
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<p>Well, it’s pretty obvious that you find it hard to think critically . . .</p>
<p>If you want a job in sales, why not go for business, marketing, or communications?</p>
<p>Take a look at job postings for sales positions…those are the degrees they have listed as requirements.</p>
<p>Honestly, I’ve never see a job posting asking for philosophy majors and I think your argument that all these top companies recruit philosophy majors is complete BS. I’ve been on the other side of hiring panels and interviewing, and I’ve never heard philosophy mentioned in a positive light. The few times I’ve heard it mentioned it was followed by laughs and eye rolls.</p>
<p>BTW, what do you think you will do at Goldman? If you want to work there, go get a degree in finance or business, math or statistics. </p>
<p>Also, your statement that Liberal Arts schools don’t have Business majors is ridiculous. Most liberal arts schools have business majors, if not all. They just don’t have as good as programs compared to larger state universities and other colleges.</p>
<p>Also, your lil comments about how business works is laughable. Which, isn’t a bad thing because you 1) Have no experience in business because you are too young, and 2) Don’t go to school for business. Managers just arent hired to “to make decisions concerning the company”, managers are either promoted or hired externally after an established track record in a division (sales, business development, marketing, ect). I worked for an energy company and the majority of the managers and executives were engineer majors, operating the business functions. This is very common, the gain the hard skill then move into management. This same template can be seen in pharma (chemists) and software companies (engineers/IT/development).</p>
<p>At the energy company I was the black sheep, because 90% were engineers or environmental scientists. The only reason I was around is because I was working with the government/regulatory affairs doing policy. The other 10% were business or marketing majors.</p>
<p>P.S. Honestly, who reads academic journals other than people who work in academics? I’ve been in the workforce, both private and public for a few years now and there isn’t a single person who pays the slightest attention to something as insignificant as an academic journal. Lots of people (including myself) suscribe to journals that are related to our own profession, but the onlypeople who would read an academic journal are people in academics.</p>
<p>Schools (at least Universities and College) are NOT vocational schools. The purpose of attending these schools is to grow as a person, which includes developing ways of thinking.</p>
<p>Bottom Line: Just like a Marketing degree allows certain advantages in the work force, a Philosophy degree does as well.</p>