Philosophy Is No Joke

Last semester, two Daily Campus comic strips ("Ha Ha … Wait What?" and "Freshman 15") took unappreciated jabs at my major, philosophy. The former implied that being a philosophy major meant that one was both out of touch with reality and a habitual marijuana smoker, while the latter suggested that philosophy is an unacceptable educational path. Early this semester the comics' assault on philosophy resumed, as Larissa Treyster's aforementioned "Freshman 15" proclaimed that the difference between a philosophy major and the frivolous Segway Human Transporter is that a Segway is useful. Although I realize that these comics' remarks were only meant to be jokes - and that if anyone should be concerned with being taken seriously it should be a comic strip artist in a college paper - I believe that, as a philosophy major with a weekly space in The Daily Campus, I have an obligation to my peers and to the university community to clear up some misconceptions about philosophy (and philosophy majors) that have been propagated by this very newspaper.

Contrary to popular belief, philosophy isn't the art of hitting a bong, sitting on a bench by Mirror Lake and contemplating the trivialities of life. Rather, philosophy is a challenging discipline focused on resolving logical, metaphysical, epistemological and ethical questions. It is a field centered on intelligent debate, an avenue for attaining greater understanding and a means of learning to think more objectively, critically, precisely and analytically. In philosophy classes, one learns not mere facts with limited application, but new skills that last a lifetime - invaluable skills with universal application.

These skills reveal themselves in many ways, with the most obvious and quantifiable being standardized test performance. According to a recent study of college students' scores on major graduate school admissions tests, philosophy majors' performance on said tests well exceeds their peers' in other majors. On the LSAT, for example, philosophy majors averaged higher scores than all natural and social science majors (save economics and mathematics), had higher scores than all applied majors and scored 10 percent higher than political science majors. Further, on the GMAT, philosophy majors had an average score that was 15 percent higher than all business majors and average scores greater than all undergraduate majors except mathematics. Additionally, philosophy majors averaged the highest score on the verbal portion of the GRE, outperforming even English majors, and scored significantly higher than all humanities majors on the quantitative portion. In short, the test results show that the skills learned in philosophy classes have application far beyond analyses of Hume, Nietzsche, Sartre and Plato.

Despite the stellar test performance of philosophy majors, one might still wonder "what do you plan on doing after college?" It's a question I almost always receive after telling someone my major, and a question that's often delivered with dose of skepticism and a condescending tone of voice. Yet career options for philosophy majors are not as limited as you might think (e.g mopping floors or offering to supersize). Rather, there are a host of fields philosophy majors can enter after finishing their undergraduate work. The most obvious of these, of course, is to continue studying philosophy, become an academic and secure a teaching position at a university. Another possibility, one which I plan on pursuing, is to put one's debating abilities to use in the legal profession. Yet these two options only scratch the surface of career options, as philosophy majors (with the appropriate graduate school work) also go on to work in the business world, in politics, in computer fields, as entrepreneurs, in medicine, in journalism and even in religious fields.

Using sharpened thinking skills developed in the philosophy classroom, philosophy majors can achieve success in all of the above fields. This is evidenced by the accomplishments of prominent philosophy majors working outside of philosophy - a list that includes former President Bill Clinton, director Woody Allen, deceased film critic Gene Siskel (of Siskel and Ebert) and Pope John Paul II, among many others.

In short, philosophy is a worthwhile academic pursuit that's deserving of far more respect than it receives from those without any real understanding of it - particularly The Daily Campus' comic strip artists. Although an undergraduate philosophy degree may not be especially useful on its own - something that's true of a degree from virtually any other field in the Liberal Arts - the process of obtaining one is excellent preparation for graduate school and work outside of the classroom, and consistently provides intellectual stimulation. Accordingly, I encourage anyone with any interest in philosophy to take at least an introductory course (I recommend PHIL 104), and a 200-level course if at all possible (such as Dr. Luyster's PHIL 231, Dr. Bloomfield's PHIL 226 and, for you number-crunchers out there, PHIL 211Q, Symbolic Logic). If you approach the courses with enthusiasm, you'll certainly walk away with lasting lessons not found in HDFS 101 or ACCT 131 - and maybe even walk away a philosophy major.

In the spirit of philosophy, I'd like to conclude my defense of the field with a syllogism:

Premise: The word "philosophy" literally translates to "love of wisdom"

Premise: One cannot simultaneously mock a virtue of character and have it, too.

Conclusion: One that mocks philosophy lacks wisdom.