<p>Hello everyone,</p>
<p>I was recently accepted as a transfer student to UCLA, CAL, and UCSD. I am curious for information from philosophy majors and those that know philosophy majors about how the program is etc. I know it is one of the top Phil programs in the country. I even emailed Brian Leiter and asked him his advice about which school to attend from my three choices and he said "UC Berkeley or UCLA".</p>
<p>Any help or random info would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.</p>
<p>Look at all 3 universities faculty, their research, and the courses that they teach. </p>
<p>I would recommend Berkeley’s Philosophy Department over UCLA’s because Berkeley has a lot more breadth than UCLA. Berkeley carries all of UCLA’s courses, plus more. My main issue that I have with UCLA is that they don’t have any faculty (and therefore courses) on Continental Philosophy. At UCLA, they bluntly say that they are an analytic department and don’t offer courses on Nietzsche, Heidegger, Foucault, etc…One must go to the German and French Departments to take those courses. And even at that, it’s pretty rare that you’ll find a Heidegger (perhaps Nietzsche) course available at UCLA in the Department of German.</p>
<p>Overall, if your only philosophical interests are in analytic philosophy and logic, then UCLA (although, Berkeley does offer (almost) the same analytic material). If you want to study both analytic and continental philosophy, Berkeley - hands down. </p>
<p>I don’t know anything about UCSD’s Philosophy program. </p>
<p>If you have anymore questions, feel free to PM me! Best of luck!</p>
<p>I would select Cal philosophy as well because majors that help you do well in the LSAT are better in Cal than UCLA.</p>
<p>For a pre-health/med concentration, fine arts, theater, performance, UCLA is better than Cal. </p>
<p>I have a friend who works at Cal and he told me this yesterday.</p>
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That’s not true. It’s not just about ‘courses’ but about program specialties. While both UCLA and Cal suck for metaphysics, Cal sucks more (isn’t even ranked iirc)</p>
<p>UCLA’s also well renowned for philosophy of language since MANY famous phil. of Lang and logic people have come here, or have been associated with the university. </p>
<p>Both universities have their strengths. Just because they’re ranked equally doesn’t mean they offer the same things. I don’t believe for a second that Cal has any courses similar to David Kaplan’s Series on Phil of Lang. 127A, B, C, and 172 (Frege, Russel, Kripke, and Quine respectively; and i doubt there’s an equivalent to the Kripke class since kaplan created that himself) that being said, Berkeley’s Phil. Of Mind classes are probably considerably better than UCLAs.</p>
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<p>And so what? continental philosophy is a small minority in the U.S. where analytic philosophy DOMINATES. It’s been the tradition here for the last 150 years, if you don’t like it, go to europe. (it’s also important to note that both UCLA AND Cal aren’t ranked for continental philosophy) Sure, i’d like to take Hubert Dryfuss’ class on Heidegger, but it is in no way necessary for anything i’d encompass in my graduate studies. And if one wasn’t going to go to graduate studies, then again, continental philosophy wouldn’t be helpful. In fact, from what i’ve seen, most analytic philosophers view Continental Philosophy as a joke.</p>
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again, depends on the subject.</p>
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As i said earlier, continental phil. is just a small minority in western philosophy. The same argument can be made for asian phil (but i don’t see anyone ever make it)</p>
<p>UCLA’s department is much more prestigious than berkeley’s, but both are ranked equally. Pick whichever one you think you’ll enjoy more.</p>
<p>The fact of the matter is that it really won’t make a difference whether you pick UCLA or Berkeley for undergrad. Look at the course offerings(that are actually offered on a regular basis) and see which school offers classes that interest you the most.</p>