Why Study Philosophy? The Top Ten Reasons I Could Think Of!

#10. There was room in this class

Course Section # Enrolled Waitlist

PHILO 10 77402 60 13

PHILO 10 77403 68 14

PHILO 10 77404 67 13

PHILO 10H 77663 32 0

PHILO 12 77405 66 13

PHILO 14 77406 67 11

PHILO 4 77408 65 15

PHILO 4 77409 68 15

PHILO 4 77410 69 15

PHILO 49 77411 28 11

PHILO 49 77412 30 13

PHILO 49 77413 27 9

PHILO 49 77414 26 8

PHILO 6 77664 46 12

PHILO 9 77416 67 15

#9. Philosophy offers 3 units of transferable credit

==== Philosophy ====

PHILO 4 Introduction to Philosophy 3 IGETC: 3B CSU GE: C2 PHILO 6 History of Philosophy 3 IGETC: 3B CSU GE: C2 PHILO 7 History of Philosophy: Modern 3 IGETC: 3B CSU GE: C2 PHILO 8 Philosophy of Religion 3 IGETC: 3B CSU GE: C2 PHILO 9 Philosophy of Mind 3 IGETC: 3B CSU GE: C2 PHILO 10 Ethics 3 IGETC: 3B CSU GE: C2 PHILO 10H Honors Ethics 3 IGETC: 3B CSU GE: C2 PHILO 12 Introduction to Logic 3 CSU GE: A3 PHILO 14 Non-Western Philosophical Traditions 3 IGETC: 3B CSU GE: C2 PHILO 15 Patterns in Comparative Religions 3 IGETC: 3B CSU GE: C2 PHILO 16 Contemporary Moral Issues 3 IGETC: 3B CSU GE: C2 PHILO 39AZ Philosophical Studies 1-3 PHILO 49 Introduction to Critical Thinking 3 IGETC: 1B CSU GE: A3

#8. Lots of people you’ve heard of have degrees in Philosophy

Government, Politics, Law and Religion:

Thomas Jefferson (U.S. President), Jane Addams (first woman to receive Nobel Peace Prize),

David Souter (Supreme Court Justice), William Bennett (Secretary of Education and best-selling author),Patrick Buchanan (presidential candidate and political columnist),

Fred Thompson (former Senator and presidential candidate)

Jerry Brown (former governor of California and presidential candidate),

Raisa Gorbachev (former first lady of the Soviet Union),

Pope John Paul II, Martin Luther King, Jr., Madelyn Murray O’Hair (famous atheist).

Business:

J. Paul Getty, Carl Icahn (CEO, TWA Airlines), Gerald Levin (CEO, Time Warner, Inc.),

George Soros (financier),

Lachlan Murdoch (son of Rupert Murdoch, media magnate),

Carly Fiorina (CEO Hewlett-Packard)

Peter Thiel, co-founder PayPal

Contemporary Writers, Performers and Broadcasters:

T. S. Eliot, Christopher Hitchens, James Michener, Iris Murdoch, Alexander Solzhenitsin,

Umberto Eco, M. Scott Peck, Ken Follett, Susan Sontag, Sam Harris, David Foster Wallace,

Ayn Rand, Elie Wiesel.

Harrison Ford, Susan Sarandon, Woody Allen, Richard Gere, Steve Martin, John Cleese (of the Monty Python Troup)

George Carlin, Jay Leno, Dennis Miller, Kim Thayill (Soundgarden), Stone Phillips,

John Chancellor, Alex Trebek, Gene Siskel, Willard Scott, Jimmy Kimmel, Dessa (a.k.a. Margret Wander, Hip Hop Artist)

Ricky Gervais (creator of The Office), Wes Anderson, Ethan Coen (of the Coen Brothers – Filmmakers).

Sports:

(Bruce Lee, Phil Jackson, Michael McKaskey (Owner, Chicago Bears), Aaron Talylor (OT, Notre Dame and the Green Bay Packers

(Source:http://staff.kings.edu/wtirwin/pages/courses/major.htm)

#7. Philosophers love wisdom

The word "philosophy" comes from the Greek φιλοσοφία (philosophia), which literally means "love of wisdom".

[Philosophia, Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, ''A Greek-English Lexicon'', at Perseus". Perseus.tufts.edu. http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/ptext?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.04.0057%3Aentry%3D%23111487.]

#6. Philosophy is universally practical: It provides the “ultimate transferable work skill.”

"In the US, where the number of philosophy graduates has increased by 5 per cent a year during the 1990's, only a very few go on to become philosophers. Their employability, at 98.9 per cent, is impressive by any standard....Philosophy is, in commercial jargon, the ultimate 'transferable work skill'." ["Philosophy: A Quintessentially Modern Discipline", London Times]

"'So many people think philosophy isn't practical,' says Shoener, who also is studying biomathematics for a double major and plans to be a women's health advocate. 'It's the most practical thing I've ever done'." ["Top Students Commit to Using Their Knowledge", USA TODAY]

#5. Philosophy students score higher on LSAT, GRE and GMAT exams

"A recent comprehensive study of college students' scores on major tests used for admission to graduate and professional schools shows that students majoring in Philosophy received scores substantially higher than the average on each of the tests studied. Philosophy majors' scores on the verbal portion of the GRE were higher than in any other major, even English; and although several science majors showed higher averages in the quantitative portion of the test, philosophy majors scored substantially higher than all other humanities majors and were alone among humanities majors in scoring above the overall average. Philosophy majors received higher scores on the LSAT than students in all other humanities areas, higher scores than all social and natural science majors except economics and mathematics, and higher scores than all applied majors. Moreover, the differences are in most cases substantial: for example, philosophy majors scored 10% better than political science majors on the LSAT. On the GMAT philosophy majors outperformed business majors by a margin of 15%, and outperformed every other undergraduate major except mathematics." ["Philosophy Students Score High on LSAT, GMAT & GRE", Andreas Teuber]

#4. Philosophy majors can make a good living

PayScale.com’s current data on 'Best Undergrad College Degrees By Salary' (www.payscale.com/2008-best-colleges/degrees.asp) lists starting median salary and mid-career (15.5 years after graduation) median salary for 50 different university majors. Of the fifty, the philosophy major ranks sixteenth in mid-career median salary. Seven of the majors ranking above philosophy are various engineering fields. Of particular interest is the comparison with Business Management. The starting median salary for Business Management majors is $43,000, while the starting median salary for Philosophy majors is $39,900. By mid-career, the median salary for Business Management majors has risen to $72,100, while the median salary for Philosophy majors has jumped to $81,200." [American Philosophical Association]

#3. Philosophy promotes great leadership

"Philosophers have always come in handy in the workplace with their grounding in analytical thinking. Why, only now, are they so prized by employers?...Lucy Adams, human resources director of Serco, a services business and a consultancy firm, says: 'Philosophy lies at the heart of our approach to recruiting and developing our leadership, and our leaders. We need people who have the ability to look for different approaches and take an open mind to issues. These skills are promoted by philosophical approaches.'" ["I Think, Therefore I Earn", Guardian UK]

#2. Philosophy is the “mother ship” of all the sciences

....'If I were to start again as an undergraduate, I would major in philosophy', said Matthew Goldstein, the CUNY chancellor, who majored in mathematics and statistics. 'I think that subject is really at the core of just about everything we do. If you study humanities or political systems or sciences in general, philosophy is really the mother ship from which all of these disciplines grow'." ["In a New Generation of College Students, Many Opt for the Life Examined", New York Times]

#1. Philosophy is about the art of questioning; It opens one up to possibilities of the universe "Philosophy is to be studied, not for the sake of any

definite answers to its questions since no definite answers can, as a rule, be known to be true, but rather for the sake of the questions themselves; because these questions enlarge our conception of what is possible, enrich our intellectual imagination and diminish the dogmatic assurance which closes the mind against speculation; but above all because, through the greatness of the universe which philosophy contemplates, the mind also is rendered great, and becomes capable of that union with the universe which constitutes its highest good." ["The Problems of Philosophy", Bertrand Russell]

A Caveat: Philosophy will probably not make your life simpler…