RE: How worthless is Philosophy?
February 14, 2024 at 9:46 am
(This post was last modified: February 14, 2024 at 9:48 am by neil.)
The way I see it, when one has decided to go to college, they've decided to advance their knowledge and education beyond that which is achieved upon graduating from high school in a way that's different from going to a trade school. When someone goes to a trade school, they don't need to learn philosophy; they're doing so to get a day job that generally involves working with their hands - skilled manual or blue-collar labor.
The white-collar profession is associated with a college degree, but I'd say that college in that sense is the formal education approach to achieve this. I think it's possible to enter into a white-collar profession without going to college, since there are very few professions that require going to college, such as licensed and practicing lawyers, doctors, dentists, and nurses. Theoretically, in other cases you can just pick up some textbooks and become skilled enough to be useful or capable in functioning in the role of a white-collar professional.
I also don't see college as a pathway for a professional career per se, despite the fact that this is what it's mainly used for in practice; what I mean by this is that unlike a trade school - where the expectation or assumption is that once someone completes a trade school program, they proceed to fill out job applications to work in the trade that they trained in - an individual who graduates from college isn't necessarily someone who's going to automatically be looking for jobs to fill.
One example would be someone who comes from a wealthy family and doesn't need a career or job, yet are still interested in pursuing an advanced level of knowledge.
Another example would be someone who already has a job or perhaps they own a small business, and they want to go to college so they can write a book on a topic that demands or requires academic credentials.
Yet another example could be that they want to run for public office, and getting a college degree seems like an ideal pathway for this.
Maybe someone who doesn't need the money from a day job to make ends meet might be interested in learning about and exploring different places to travel to, or different cultures to understand or interact with.
One could argue that those who have the luxury of not having to work a day job and go to college do so in order to maintain their wealth status, such as by understanding how the economy, industry, and the stock market works, but there is a bit of a distinction between doing that and going to a trade school to get a career with a steady paycheck.
To me, philosophy is like a science as well as the foundation of science; it's the branch of knowledge that deals with knowledge. It seems odd to me to go to college and not be required to take some philosophy. Math and logic are tools based on axioms from philosophical principles, and all science relies on these tools.
At the very minimum, I agree that ethics and logic ought to be covered by anyone obtaining a college degree, but I think they should even be taught at the K-12 level. I think K-12 ought to cover things like the difference between statements/claims/assertions & arguments, what premises and conclusions are, what a sound argument is, how to determine whether or not an argument is valid, critical thinking skills & how to be skeptical, and the scientific method. At some point, children are too young to understand some of these concepts, and to some degree these concepts do get covered, but by the time they're halfway through high school, I think they ought to already have these skills mastered fairly well and competently.
There's a reason that society needs everyone to go through K-12 & it's not just to prepare for college, trade school, enlisting in the military, or entering the unskilled labor force; it's also for people to be able to pay their bills, taxes, manage their budget and income, and even make informed decisions. In most cases, this doesn't affect you and me, but there are exceptions, whether it's the goods or services that come to me from them directly or indirectly, or who they vote for in elections; when they make bad decisions in these cases, it can affect me in a negative & undesirable way. If fellow citizens don't have the logical and ethical skills to make the right decision when voting, by the time they're old enough to do so, that can have an adverse impact on both me and the rest of society.
The reason for a business major to take History 101 may not necessarily be to pick up on some particular historical event or occurrence that makes a day & night difference in their competency or success in running a business; the idea behind anyone working towards a college degree having to take a history course is to get the exposure to the field and concept. I suppose you could argue that we already got plenty & enough of history in K-12, in which case I would be willing to concede that perhaps there's no need for a business major to take History 101. I don't have a college business background, though, so I can't think of a rebuttal for such an argument, but someone else might be able to come along with one.
The white-collar profession is associated with a college degree, but I'd say that college in that sense is the formal education approach to achieve this. I think it's possible to enter into a white-collar profession without going to college, since there are very few professions that require going to college, such as licensed and practicing lawyers, doctors, dentists, and nurses. Theoretically, in other cases you can just pick up some textbooks and become skilled enough to be useful or capable in functioning in the role of a white-collar professional.
I also don't see college as a pathway for a professional career per se, despite the fact that this is what it's mainly used for in practice; what I mean by this is that unlike a trade school - where the expectation or assumption is that once someone completes a trade school program, they proceed to fill out job applications to work in the trade that they trained in - an individual who graduates from college isn't necessarily someone who's going to automatically be looking for jobs to fill.
One example would be someone who comes from a wealthy family and doesn't need a career or job, yet are still interested in pursuing an advanced level of knowledge.
Another example would be someone who already has a job or perhaps they own a small business, and they want to go to college so they can write a book on a topic that demands or requires academic credentials.
Yet another example could be that they want to run for public office, and getting a college degree seems like an ideal pathway for this.
Maybe someone who doesn't need the money from a day job to make ends meet might be interested in learning about and exploring different places to travel to, or different cultures to understand or interact with.
One could argue that those who have the luxury of not having to work a day job and go to college do so in order to maintain their wealth status, such as by understanding how the economy, industry, and the stock market works, but there is a bit of a distinction between doing that and going to a trade school to get a career with a steady paycheck.
To me, philosophy is like a science as well as the foundation of science; it's the branch of knowledge that deals with knowledge. It seems odd to me to go to college and not be required to take some philosophy. Math and logic are tools based on axioms from philosophical principles, and all science relies on these tools.
At the very minimum, I agree that ethics and logic ought to be covered by anyone obtaining a college degree, but I think they should even be taught at the K-12 level. I think K-12 ought to cover things like the difference between statements/claims/assertions & arguments, what premises and conclusions are, what a sound argument is, how to determine whether or not an argument is valid, critical thinking skills & how to be skeptical, and the scientific method. At some point, children are too young to understand some of these concepts, and to some degree these concepts do get covered, but by the time they're halfway through high school, I think they ought to already have these skills mastered fairly well and competently.
There's a reason that society needs everyone to go through K-12 & it's not just to prepare for college, trade school, enlisting in the military, or entering the unskilled labor force; it's also for people to be able to pay their bills, taxes, manage their budget and income, and even make informed decisions. In most cases, this doesn't affect you and me, but there are exceptions, whether it's the goods or services that come to me from them directly or indirectly, or who they vote for in elections; when they make bad decisions in these cases, it can affect me in a negative & undesirable way. If fellow citizens don't have the logical and ethical skills to make the right decision when voting, by the time they're old enough to do so, that can have an adverse impact on both me and the rest of society.
The reason for a business major to take History 101 may not necessarily be to pick up on some particular historical event or occurrence that makes a day & night difference in their competency or success in running a business; the idea behind anyone working towards a college degree having to take a history course is to get the exposure to the field and concept. I suppose you could argue that we already got plenty & enough of history in K-12, in which case I would be willing to concede that perhaps there's no need for a business major to take History 101. I don't have a college business background, though, so I can't think of a rebuttal for such an argument, but someone else might be able to come along with one.
