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The revenge of the philosophy majors

nytimes.com

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Re: The revenge of the philosophy majors

#91

Post by doctor235 »

samrus wrote: post #71
b450 wrote: post #66

Philosophy students tend to be understandably insecure about the value and prestige of their field, and study often ends up indirectly training students to defend philosophy. Impressive-sounding pontificating, problematizing, cranking out arguments and fallacies and refutations, deploying jargon and historical references. There's a whole toolkit used to dazzle, bewilder, and cow the untrained. Not to mention outright…

> The value of philosophy outside a self-referential intellectual game is extremely dubious I wouldnt go that far. I think your clutching at straws a little bit. Its a real stretch from philosohers are insecure to they are useless. This is the sort of thing confident ignorance gets you, when you dont know how philophy impacts mpdern life so you assume it doesnt because you think you know everything

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Re: The revenge of the philosophy majors

#92

Post by lapcat »

throw4847285 wrote: post #90
lapcat wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you make of quotes such as the following? The work of the philosopher consists in assembling reminders for a particular purpose. A philosophical problem has the form: “I don’t know my way about”. The problems, are solved, not by giving new information, but by arranging what we have always known. Philosophy is a battle against the bewitchment of our intelligence by means of language. For the clarity that we ar…

"Philosophy is a battle against the bewitchment of our intelligence by means of language." If you view the story of Wittgenstein and Rorty as primarily one of leaving academia, I believe you are telling on yourself.

> "Philosophy is a battle against the bewitchment of our intelligence by means of language."

I'm not sure why you're quoting the quote that I just quoted. I was hoping for an analysis.

> If you view the story of Wittgenstein and Rorty as primarily one of leaving academia, I believe you are telling on yourself.

I said that they left academic philosophy. Rorty didn't leave academia entirely. But yes, I left academic philosophy too, so in a sense I am telling on myself, though I don't accept the negative connotation.

Re: The revenge of the philosophy majors

#93

Post by tavavex »

genxy wrote: post #65
datakan wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the AI is digesting all the philosophy material ever published then why do they need philosophers?

That is not what AI is. AI is a powerful tool, a semiautonomous set of wood working tools that still need a master craftsperson to use. You need the tool+genius to drive it. Everyone wants to shoot down AI but they think AI will do everything. Being proud of a creation where someone did style transfer between spongebob and Rembrandt and they think they made art. About as responsible for actual art as just downloading…

I'm not seeing any evidence of this. Precision tools raise the ceiling. AI mostly just raises the floor. Ease of use is a focus point for all AI labs and it's what they're constantly trying to improve. Yes, an expert can juice these models for all they've got, but an average Joe today is probably getting better results than the best power users had a year ago. Extrapolate this a bit and ask yourself if businesses will ever want to pay your geniuses and craftspeople a professional's wage if they could get 'good enough' results from any desperate minimum wage worker, or even by doing the work themselves.

Re: The revenge of the philosophy majors

#94

Post by fellowniusmonk »

keiferski wrote: post #9

I studied analytic philosophy, which is basically an education in how to clarify your thoughts, say what you mean in precise terms, and make clear arguments. IMO there is no better preparation for any sort of writing-and-thinking job than studying analytic philosophy, although of course I am biased. Not sure I’d recommend doing only a philosophy degree, but I highly recommend pairing it with something else more emplo…

I have one area of my education that I highly value but its very hard to explain without people importing a lot of assumptions.

I like to call it critical listening but also its textual evaluation.

In addition to some didactic instruction my Father gave me a short book on the principles of hermeneutics around 13. We went to different churches over the years growing up but I would bring my bible, take notes, and on the drive home from service he would ask me if anything unsubstantiated by the text was snuck in, anything against the text, etc.

In the hundreds of sermons I took notes on over the years there were only 3 without obvious butchering of the text, statements directly contradicting the very text being examined, nightmarish hermenutical implications, outright fabrications, etc.

The shear volume of evaluation I did against a static text was interesting.

It helped me understand how to parse language, how to do evaluation, just a lot of stuff in a way that was more dynamic than something like debate club.

It also helped me understand how self servingly imprecise people can be and the ways in which deceptive and misleading language is used.

Re: The revenge of the philosophy majors

#95

Post by cmrdporcupine »

antonvs wrote: post #64
keiferski wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Aha, continental philosophy is definitely worth learning as well. I don’t share the disdain many analytic people have for continentals. However I don’t think it’ll make you better at writing clearly, unfortunately…

It is only within the horizon of a presumed transparency - already inscribed by the metaphysics of immediacy - that the demand for “clarity” emerges as an unquestioned norm. Thus the Continental philosopher, precisely insofar as they decline this foreclosure of meaning, demonstrates beyond ambiguity that they are entirely capable of writing clearly, choosing instead, with impeccable lucidity, not to.

Insufficient semicolons, sentences too short.

Re: The revenge of the philosophy majors

#96

Post by cmrdporcupine »

cgyvbunji wrote: post #27

In summary, AI has tricked a bunch of philosophy majors into not only thinking it's more than linear algebra but changing their entire life trajectories because of their confusion. AI seems to be a very alluring tar pit for the non-technical. The sad part is how this negative externality of AI is being actively encouraged for political ends.

The reality is it would be a very small % of philosophy majors or the philosophically interested who would be able to shape their approach or personal opinions to match what the AI labs are looking for anyways.

Only particular schools / kinds of philosophy need apply.

I'm a (dropout) philosophy major, but for 30 years (last month!) have been doing SWE instead. The tar pit of being able to use my brain to make money instead of navigating politics inside academia... happened for most of us a long time before AI.

Re: The revenge of the philosophy majors

#97

Post by casey2 »

OtherShrezzing wrote: post #62
appreciatorBus wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If service to others and to society mean anything to you, working in Starbucks or any fast food job will teach you more about humanity and human society than most college grads learn from a humanities degree.

It’s difficult to articulate the tedium and monotony of a Starbucks gig. There’s so little intellectual stimulation available in that setting. If you managed to learn more from your fast food than your humanities degree, then I think that’s on you for not paying attention at college (perhaps because you were exhausted from your job?).

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Re: The revenge of the philosophy majors

#98

Post by lapcat »

Avicebron wrote: post #86
julianeon wrote: post #80

I've noticed that many famous billionaires want to be viewed as philosophers: Thiel obviously, Musk arguably. For this they do need ideological coherency and the ability to order their arguments logically, ideally as part of a larger program. Since it is such a popular destination late in life, you'd think it would be a good choice for a major too.

Look up "Philosopher-King" from Plato. It explains a hell of a lot.

I don't think it does explain anything. I've seen no evidence that Thiel takes any particular inspiration from Plato. Rather, Thiel seems to be much more focused on Christianity and libertarianism, and those would be the sources of Thiel's anti-democratic predilections, not Plato's Republic. I think philosopher-king is more of a label that other people are trying to pin on Thiel. The Republic actually said that the philosopher-kings should have no private property, and children should be raised by the community.

Moreover, I've seen no evidence whatsoever that Elon Musk is looking to be considered a philosopher. He writes short meme tweets, not treatises.

Re: The revenge of the philosophy majors

#99

Post by calf »

keiferski wrote: post #9

I studied analytic philosophy, which is basically an education in how to clarify your thoughts, say what you mean in precise terms, and make clear arguments. IMO there is no better preparation for any sort of writing-and-thinking job than studying analytic philosophy, although of course I am biased. Not sure I’d recommend doing only a philosophy degree, but I highly recommend pairing it with something else more emplo…

But then how is analytic philosophy a philosophy.

Re: The revenge of the philosophy majors

#100

Post by gregates »

em500 wrote: post #19

This article seems high on vibes, low on metrics. > While a plain-vanilla philosophy degree remains as hard to monetize as ever, David Chalmers, a prominent philosopher of consciousness at N.Y.U., observes: “I think the demand for philosophers with A.I. training is, if anything, outstripping the supply right now. It’s an area I encourage students to go into. I think these issues with A.I. will be front and center for…

What you're missing is that this is approximately at least a half-dozen more jobs than open tenure-track positions at research universities.
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