Interesting statistics about academic philosophy

[bennyboy]

My former philosophy professor sent me an interesting survey from '09 about what philosophers at the university level believe on a variety of topics. To summarize, I'll just quote the text from his email:

However, if the much-talked-about survey of philosophers done in '09 is to be believed, almost 15% of the most reputable philosophers consider themselves theists. This certainly surprised me when I saw it at the time. Further, it seems the further back you go, education-wise, the more theists there are (undergrad phil majors are over 20% theist). Now, that could mean a few things, and hopefully it means that the more educated one is, the less likely it is that one is a theist. However, it could also mean that the next generation of professional philosophers will be more theistic...

By the way, that survey, if you're unfamiliar with it, has some other interesting results. The higher one goes, education-wise, the more likely it is that one:

is a Platonist about abstract objects
subscribes to compatibilism
accepts that a priori knowledge is possible
accepts the analytic/synthetic distinction
is a non-skeptical realist about the external world
is a moral realist
is a physicalist about the mind
is a scientific realist
subscribes to the correspondence theory of truth

You can check out the poll results yourself here: 
http://philpapers.org/surveys/results.pl...ain=coarse

I was particularly surprised about the popularity of Platonism, and worried about the possible rise of theism in our upcoming generation of philosophers.

I don't know, man, I'd read between the lines a little, because I see in her the mark of the establishment.  The truth is that to more easily gain access toward higher positions, you are going to have to agree with your seniors and to tow the party line as it were.  Unless you are capable as an undergrad of writing a paper so startlingly unique that it gains a lot of notice, you are stuck sucking your way up to the top like everyone else.  The elders of philosophy have clearly sided with compatibilism to the point that it's "obvious," and will crow "show me the evidence" in response to idealism or other views, ignoring the deeper philosophical issues.