Before I went to college, I read a lot of philosophy, and I thought I was learning a lot. But there's a huge difference between reading Plato or Nietzche or Ra

Before I went to college, I read a lot of philosophy, and I thought I was learning a lot. But there's a huge difference between reading Plato or Nietzche or Rawls or whatever else you like and having to write papers that critically analyze said works. For all its reputation as a haven for people who bullshit a lot, I've never had a paper more savagely ripped apart than by an analytic philosophy TA. It's an experience I never got in other departments, and it's something that everyone, especially know-it-all-type high school students, can really benefit from. Learning how to be wrong is an important life skill, and reading books just doesn't teach you that.