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There's some evidence that philosophy majors score pretty high on the GMAT (for graduate admissions to business school) and on the LSAT (for law school), as wel

There's some evidence that philosophy majors score pretty high on the GMAT (for graduate admissions to business school) and on the LSAT (for law school), as well as pretty good on the GRE Verbal and GRE Analytical Writing tests. Less good at the GRE Quantitative Reasoning than all the science disciplines (and economics) but better than the rest of the arts and humanities subjects (and better than accounting, which is slightly worrying). See http://dailynous.com/value-of-philosophy/charts-and-graphs/ http://dailynous.com/value-of-philosophy/charts-and-graphs/ Also: https://www.salon.com/2013/07/01/be_employable_study_philosophy_partner/ https://www.salon.com/2013/07/01/be_employable_study_philoso... http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/why-philosophy-majors-rule_n_4891404 http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/why-philosophy-majors-... (I may be biased on this though: I have a BA and MA in Philosophy.)

sevenfive 9y ago
> There's some evidence that philosophy majors score pretty high on the GMAT (for graduate admissions to business school) and on the LSAT (for law school), as well as pretty good on the GRE Verbal and GRE Analytical Writing test As a philosophy major you should be the first to point out this doesn't imply causation.
- vlunkr 9y ago
  This is the real problem. Philosophers can’t prove their own existence to themselves, how can they be expected to prove anything else?
  - klez 9y ago
    Descartes would like to have a word with you :)
    - jandrese 9y ago
      The guy who in the end just said "Fuck it, a Wizard (God) did it."? It's really interesting to see the logical hole he digs for himself in the book but then cops out in the end with a "Well, God is good so he wouldn't let something bad happen to us so we must exist."
      - sekh60 9y ago
        He ended with that about non-first-person existants. His argument works for proving oneself exists to oneself.
        jandrese 9y ago
        He basically defined existence as thinking, then turned it into a tautology. And then it blew up in his face when he realized that he couldn't prove anything else was thinking. And in fact even if there wasn't some devil tricking him (ala brain in a box hooked to the Matrix), things like rocks and water could never exist. His entire philosophy was flawed right from the start. But it usually is. That's why so many philosophy texts take the first chapter (or volume) refuting philosophers who came before them.
      - vlunkr 9y ago
        https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trademark_argument https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trademark_argument. You kind of have it backwards, he first concluded that he existed (I think therefore I am). Then because of that (and other arguments), he believed god exists and is good, so he wouldn’t deceive his senses.
  - wsy 9y ago
    They know that they know nothing, so the question of proofs is somewhat moot.
    - klez 9y ago
      Not really. That was just Socrates being Socrates and being all humble about his knowledge. Apart from him I don't remember any othe philosopher adopting that stance.
      - tommorris 9y ago
        > I don't remember any othe philosopher adopting that stance. Peter Unger's book "Ignorance" (Oxford University Press, 1975) is probably the best modern defence of extreme skepticism. Also, Unger is pretty fun to read.
  - Nomentatus 9y ago
    "This is the real problem. Philosophers can’t prove their own existence to themselves, how can they be expected to prove anything else?" Whereas the rest of us are easily able to prove to our full satisfaction that atoms didn't exist, asbestos was safe, white flour no different than brown... etc, etc. It's not just possible for there to be too much certainty in the world, it's common - which is what that Billionaire knew thanks to courses in Philosophy, and exploited to earn his stash 'o cash. Incidentally Buddhists think that any proof of individuality is false or tainted, too. Best lump them in there too. (Descartes had to please the church, we can't know his private opinion, just his published works with necessary nods to the church.)
- tommorris 9y ago
  > you should be the first to point out this doesn't imply causation Nah, I'd rather just go nuclear on causation, with the assistance of Hume... "...experience only teaches us, how one event constantly follows another; without instructing us in the secret connexion, which binds them together, and renders them inseparable... It is allowed on all hands that there is no known connexion between the sensible qualities and the secret powers; and consequently, that the mind is not led to form such a conclusion concerning their constant and regular conjunction, by anything which it knows of their nature."
  - visarga 9y ago
    Why doesn't Hume believe in human mind grasping causal reasoning? Even in non-scientific settings, causal reasoning is fundamental for humans.
    - wsy 9y ago
      Humes point is that we can't perceive causal relationships, even if we think we do. We can only perceive events, and then our mind constructs causal relationships on top of them. But these relationships are not inherent to the world, they are only in our minds.
      - trendia 9y ago
        Judea Pearl wrote a whole book about proving causality (and when it can't be proven). A rough summary is available as a YouTube video: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=HUti6vGctQM https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=HUti6vGctQM
        wsy 9y ago
        Hume's point is much more fundamental: you can't know if the world is indeed governed by 'natural laws'. Maybe the sun will just not rise tomorrow, ignoring all of the causal relationships we think we 'discovered'. There is no way to prove it will. Or in more modern terms: we didn't discover anything inherent in nature, we invented models for prediction. Which are very useful, but don't tell anything about how the world 'really is'. And, to be very explicit: this includes probability theory. You can prove that a series of observations from the past follows some pattern that matches the definition of probabilistic causality. But you can't prove that the events in the future will continue to fit that same pattern. So again you cannot prove anything about how the world 'really is'.
nopinsight 9y ago
To show that studying philosophy causes improvement, at least we need to compare them with a control group whose average SAT scores before going to college are similar to philosophy majors. Otherwise, it could just be a selection bias (i.e., those who choose philosophy tend to score high on those measures like Verbal and Analytical Writing). Any such studies?
Kevin_S 9y ago
Just took the GMAT as an accountant and did substantially better on Verbal than Quant. The idea that accountants are good at math is nonsense. Accountants aren't taught any more math than marketing majors.

sevenfive 9y ago

> There's some evidence that philosophy majors score pretty high on the GMAT (for graduate admissions to business school) and on the LSAT (for law school), as well as pretty good on the GRE Verbal and GRE Analytical Writing test As a philosophy major you should be the first to point out this doesn't imply causation.

vlunkr 9y ago
This is the real problem. Philosophers can’t prove their own existence to themselves, how can they be expected to prove anything else?
- klez 9y ago
  Descartes would like to have a word with you :)
  - jandrese 9y ago
    The guy who in the end just said "Fuck it, a Wizard (God) did it."? It's really interesting to see the logical hole he digs for himself in the book but then cops out in the end with a "Well, God is good so he wouldn't let something bad happen to us so we must exist."
    - sekh60 9y ago
      He ended with that about non-first-person existants. His argument works for proving oneself exists to oneself.
      - jandrese 9y ago
        He basically defined existence as thinking, then turned it into a tautology. And then it blew up in his face when he realized that he couldn't prove anything else was thinking. And in fact even if there wasn't some devil tricking him (ala brain in a box hooked to the Matrix), things like rocks and water could never exist. His entire philosophy was flawed right from the start. But it usually is. That's why so many philosophy texts take the first chapter (or volume) refuting philosophers who came before them.
    - vlunkr 9y ago
      https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trademark_argument https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trademark_argument. You kind of have it backwards, he first concluded that he existed (I think therefore I am). Then because of that (and other arguments), he believed god exists and is good, so he wouldn’t deceive his senses.
- wsy 9y ago
  They know that they know nothing, so the question of proofs is somewhat moot.
  - klez 9y ago
    Not really. That was just Socrates being Socrates and being all humble about his knowledge. Apart from him I don't remember any othe philosopher adopting that stance.
    - tommorris 9y ago
      > I don't remember any othe philosopher adopting that stance. Peter Unger's book "Ignorance" (Oxford University Press, 1975) is probably the best modern defence of extreme skepticism. Also, Unger is pretty fun to read.
- Nomentatus 9y ago
  "This is the real problem. Philosophers can’t prove their own existence to themselves, how can they be expected to prove anything else?" Whereas the rest of us are easily able to prove to our full satisfaction that atoms didn't exist, asbestos was safe, white flour no different than brown... etc, etc. It's not just possible for there to be too much certainty in the world, it's common - which is what that Billionaire knew thanks to courses in Philosophy, and exploited to earn his stash 'o cash. Incidentally Buddhists think that any proof of individuality is false or tainted, too. Best lump them in there too. (Descartes had to please the church, we can't know his private opinion, just his published works with necessary nods to the church.)
tommorris 9y ago
> you should be the first to point out this doesn't imply causation Nah, I'd rather just go nuclear on causation, with the assistance of Hume... "...experience only teaches us, how one event constantly follows another; without instructing us in the secret connexion, which binds them together, and renders them inseparable... It is allowed on all hands that there is no known connexion between the sensible qualities and the secret powers; and consequently, that the mind is not led to form such a conclusion concerning their constant and regular conjunction, by anything which it knows of their nature."
- visarga 9y ago
  Why doesn't Hume believe in human mind grasping causal reasoning? Even in non-scientific settings, causal reasoning is fundamental for humans.
  - wsy 9y ago
    Humes point is that we can't perceive causal relationships, even if we think we do. We can only perceive events, and then our mind constructs causal relationships on top of them. But these relationships are not inherent to the world, they are only in our minds.
    - trendia 9y ago
      Judea Pearl wrote a whole book about proving causality (and when it can't be proven). A rough summary is available as a YouTube video: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=HUti6vGctQM https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=HUti6vGctQM
      - wsy 9y ago
        Hume's point is much more fundamental: you can't know if the world is indeed governed by 'natural laws'. Maybe the sun will just not rise tomorrow, ignoring all of the causal relationships we think we 'discovered'. There is no way to prove it will. Or in more modern terms: we didn't discover anything inherent in nature, we invented models for prediction. Which are very useful, but don't tell anything about how the world 'really is'. And, to be very explicit: this includes probability theory. You can prove that a series of observations from the past follows some pattern that matches the definition of probabilistic causality. But you can't prove that the events in the future will continue to fit that same pattern. So again you cannot prove anything about how the world 'really is'.

nopinsight 9y ago

To show that studying philosophy causes improvement, at least we need to compare them with a control group whose average SAT scores before going to college are similar to philosophy majors. Otherwise, it could just be a selection bias (i.e., those who choose philosophy tend to score high on those measures like Verbal and Analytical Writing). Any such studies?

Kevin_S 9y ago

Just took the GMAT as an accountant and did substantially better on Verbal than Quant. The idea that accountants are good at math is nonsense. Accountants aren't taught any more math than marketing majors.