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The revenge of the philosophy majors

nytimes.com

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Re: The revenge of the philosophy majors

#101

Post by FranzFerdiNaN »

dlcarrier wrote: post #89
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…

That reminds me of a survey that found that in the entire field of Social Psychology, there was something like eight people that indicated they would vote for Romney over Obama.

Well yeah rightwing people are not the kind of people to take up psychology. I also don’t think you will find many Marxists in corporate law .

Re: The revenge of the philosophy majors

#102

Post by applicative »

jipl104 wrote: post #18

"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"... There's about 20 philosophers employed by AI labs worldwide , vs 1000s of software engineers, product managers, designers, etc. There's probably more economists working in these labs than philosophers...

I would have thought so too, a priori, but at this point three former colleagues are working for Anthropic; the most extraordinary case, one of the brainiest people I have known, was announced this week.

Re: The revenge of the philosophy majors

#104

Post by pragmatic »

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…

CS degree? Employable?

Re: The revenge of the philosophy majors

#105

Post by applicative »

datakan wrote: post #38
jipl104 wrote: post #18

"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"... There's about 20 philosophers employed by AI labs worldwide , vs 1000s of software engineers, product managers, designers, etc. There's probably more economists working in these labs than philosophers...

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

It’s actually pretty bad at it. I think there just isn’t enough literature to get a good effect from the LLM approach. Good luck with verifiable rewards when the target discourse is effectively pure self-criticism. Maybe ‘disputable rewards’ …

I have found that with proper framing I can get good help from Claude and ChatGPT on questions of translation of haute German philosophy and, to my amazement, Ancient Greek. An immediate ‘translate this passage’ request is a cataclysmic disaster. The nexus of sentences differs from other forms of discourse.

Re: The revenge of the philosophy majors

#106

Post by beastman82 »

mrhottakes wrote: post #74
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…

> This article seems high on vibes, low on metrics. That's the in-house style for the WSJ

Not sure if it changed but this is written by NYTimes.

FWIW I think the WSJ is the best news source available and does not match this description.

Re: The revenge of the philosophy majors

#107

Post by burningChrome »

cmrdporcupine wrote: post #96
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 i…

>> 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.

Anecdotal evidence to support your point.

Have a degree in Anthropology. Took copious amounts of philosophy classes as part of my major. Took some CS classes just to stay on top of the stuff happening in tech.

I wasn't able do what I wanted in Anthropology, so I took the same route and ended up in SWE. To a degree, I have monetized my degree because everything I learned while obtaining my degree I use almost every day in SWE. I was jaded by the toxic politics of academia and it finally pushed me out as well.

Re: The revenge of the philosophy majors

#108

Post by atleastoptimal »

Hilarious that the article is framed as a humanities vs sciences thing even though the caliber of philosophers who can get these jobs at labs are the top 0.1% in their field, and wouldn't have trouble finding a job elsewhere, whereas you could get a good-paying job as an engineer at a relatively lower percentile.

Re: The revenge of the philosophy majors

#109

Post by jnwatson »

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 graduated a long time ago with a degrees in CS and philosophy.

I've never understand the hate for philosophy; I think more about my philosophy classes now than my CS classes.

Re: The revenge of the philosophy majors

#110

Post by UncleOxidant »

FranzFerdiNaN wrote: post #101
dlcarrier wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That reminds me of a survey that found that in the entire field of Social Psychology, there was something like eight people that indicated they would vote for Romney over Obama.

Well yeah rightwing people are not the kind of people to take up psychology. I also don’t think you will find many Marxists in corporate law .

At this point I wouldn't consider Romney "rightwing", more of a centrist by current standards. Heck, the president probably thinks Romney is a socialist.
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