<p>Just out of curiosity, are there any Phil majors who already graduated with their BA(or whatever you have) and already working in the field?</p>
<p>There’s not a lot you can do in the field of philosophy without an advanced degree. I know someone who got a philosophy-related scifi story published at the end of his senior year, but most graduated philosophy majors I know are either working in different fields or going to grad/law school.</p>
<p>What is philosophy most useful for? Where is the insight it offers most valuable?</p>
<p>Is it a good idea to major in Phil then minor in economics? I’m considering either law school or business school for grad school. Well any ideas or input would be great:)</p>
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<p>I personally know so many engineers with interest in literature, history, etc, that this is just perfectly ridiculous; those I know tend to write better than even a lot of their humanities major counterparts, both according to me and according to their instructors. </p>
<p>If you want to tell me that you were talking about the ‘general’ case, you can hardly blame other posters for generalizing about philosophy majors.</p>
<p>My problem with all this stuff about engineers not being able to communicate well is that you can learn that in high school. In college, you mature, and you can learn to analyze writing more deeply if you work at it. But almost nobody I’ve known in the workforce doing a multitude of things has needed very deep writing skills. There have been exceptions, yes, and that’s for specific career paths.</p>
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<p>I beg to differ. Most engineers choke at math beyond the first stuff people take in college. Offensively unobvious, I say. </p>
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<p>What this poster said.</p>
<p>I personally get really turned off by continental philosophy, but maybe that’s because I’m majoring in mathematics.</p>
<p>^^ thanks. that really answered my question lol</p>
<p>to any current or past phil majors: Do you ever get to do debates in class? Im in highschool and I do LD debate(philosophy debate) and I was wondering if you do them in class? Also how does grading work in phil classes? What types of things do you do in a typical class day?</p>
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All the time. That’s mostly what in-class time is: a student debate guided by the professor - at the upper-div level anyway. Lower-div is more history orientated since they may be considered core or gen ed classes for non-majors, but even then they have debates on certain topics periodically.</p>
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I guess this may differ by professor, but typically a day is like so:
- Go to class, a topic/lesson is introduced and the class is in a guided discussion/debate about it.
- At the end of class the professor assigns a required reading relating to that discussion or the discussion for the next class.
- At the end of the week (or two weeks or quarter/semester) a paper is due that the student had been assigned to work on throughout the term (or shorter designated time limit) that should have to incorporate and support it’s thesis or points by prior readings.</p>
<p>Rinse and repeat for almost every upper-div phil class - in-class discussion, assigned reading, write paper. Phil majors can be some of the best logical thinkers and writers because of that cycle.</p>
<p>This thread got me interested in philosophy:) though, I have to ask - what are the ‘drawbacks’ of other humanities majors?</p>
<p>Re engineering, I was actually surprised how little math was required for an engineering degree at my u. As in, 3 200 level classes (beginner linear algebra lol) and that’s it - nothing compared to an economics, physics, or even CS major! I think people harp on about engineering because it’s rigorous in the sense that it requires a lot of tedious work, like a studio art major, except that’s seen as completely unemployable, because people are crazy. Especially at LACs you will find engineers that double majored in the humanities (it’s required by the curriculum) and they certainly can write - though what college student can’t? but I think they go into engineering for reasons other than it being superior to everything else.</p>
<p>Idk you can’t expect for something else to determine your success in the real world - including your major.</p>
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<p>See: <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/other-college-majors/1317004-philosophy.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/other-college-majors/1317004-philosophy.html</a></p>
<p>I guess a ‘drawback’ to other majors is that they won’t be as heavy in the things described in post #8?</p>