Philosophy-- Who's Interested?

[Legend]

Right. I swear that this isn't a philosophical debate thread or anything like that.

It's more of a point of curiousity. The Philosophy department at my school is incredibly small. The few teachers and classes we have are pretty good, but there really isn't much love for Philosophy itself. We don't even have a Philosophy Club (yet! We're working on that) and it's generally grouped in with Sociology.

I was just curious. Is there really that much of a lack of interest? I'm having -so- much fun in my Philosophy classes. I can imagine how people might not be as impressed with the basic level courses (especially at our school, as Dr. Wiedmann tries to scare them all off and often succeeds, but who needs freshman anyhow? ^_-) but there is a lot of -really- interesting philosophy out there. It might seem a little complicated, but isn't every subject, in the end?

[FawkesFyre]

I probably would have a stronger interest in it if it had not been shoved down our throats by a professor that I couldn't stand. Rhetoric +Socrates= mass snoring.

I personally prefer Mythology..Greek, specifically.

[Legend]

Greek Mythology is teh fun. <3 I'm very much enjoying that class. I like Chinese mythology too, particularly as a lot of the early Chinese teachings are rephrased ancient Greek Philosophy taken in new directions. xD

But yeah, having sucky teachers throw stuff at you is not cool. But Philosophy in general is lots of fun. You should try some non-Greek philosophers if that's what you hate. Hume, Paley, Kant, they're all lots of fun. ^^

[Ming]

I minored in philosophy at school.

[ScrumYummy]

I'm not in philosophy yet, but Max is right now. He says his professor is one of the good ones

Me personally, I'm very interested in existentialism and existential phenomenology. I am also a buddho-taoist. So if anybody feels like discussing these topics, I'm all in =)

[Jaena]

I'm not nearly as interested in what people thought as WHY they thought that, on teh psychological side. How nature and upbringing caused them to develop certain views

(things like language astound me, like if a child was taught from teh start that a tree was called a "dog", and that was all that trees were called around them, then they would indeed grow up not knowing that trees are in fact called trees)

Somehow I get a sneaking suspiscion that was off topic.... oops


No, I don't particularly like philosophy.

[Therin]

Well, let me start with the core question every college student asks him- or herself while signing up for classes in that all-powerful first semester. (And I say every student because if they don't ask themselves, someone will ask it of them.):

Does philosophy, as a profession or career, offer you the ability to make money?

That is the star, the sixty-four million dollar question, the grand prize, the end-all be-all of how things work; because, let's face it, we live in America, and capitalism, like everything else, has its ups and downs. This is one of its downs. The number of people likely to sign up for a given subject is directly proportionate to the percieved ease of getting rich in said subject. I mean, don't get me wrong, there are plenty of other factors; the fact that Georgia has quite a high population stubborn right-wingers, to whom "philosophy" and "witchcraft" mean basically the same thing, might have some play in the matter.

But in the end, it's ninety percent money.







For the record, I have no real beef with conservatism. It's just a different paradigm.

[Ming]

[Silver Adept]

Philosophy has been put forward in popular culture as "a bunch of dead Greek/European guys talking about stuff with no practical application". It's not something to make lots of drachma off of, and many more people prefer to get their morals from religion rather than derive their own by studying and thinking philosophically.

I took lots of Eastern philosophy and religion courses in my undergraduate, and they were great. I also took a swing at Plato's Republic in a literature class, but it was understandable to me.

It still comes back to the popular perception, though. Philosophy is still considered one of the useless enterprises. That's why you don't see so many people taking it as a major/minor in undergraduate.

[Ming]