Philosophy

Chair of philosophy John MacFarlane says no one is quite sure why philosophy has become so popular at UC Berkeley, a campus whose namesake is philosopher George Berkeley. However, in a recent review for The Atlantic of the book “Plato at the Googleplex: Why Philosophy Won't Go Away,” philosophy professor Clancy Martin wrote: "Philosophy is making the kind of comeback that leaves a Hermann Hesse groupie glad to have headed for graduate school and ended up with tenure."

The myth that studying the humanities doesn't pay was recently exploded by the Association of American Colleges and Universities and the National Center for Higher Education Management Systems. So…it turns out that studying the humanities is not such a bad career move. But its real value lies elsewhere.

Philosophers eager to write for popular audiences are finding readers who want answers science can't offer.

If you go into a mathematics class of any university, it's unlikely that you will find students reading Euclid. If you go into any physics class, it's unlikely you'll find students reading Newton. If you go into any economics class, you probably won't find students reading Keynes. But if you go a philosophy class, it is not unusual to find students reading Plato, Kant, or Wittgenstein. Why?

Perhaps some humanities disciplines really have become less relevant to the exciting and fast-changing world in which we live, but philosophy is not one of them, says Peter Singer.

In the case of manumission, women's rights, children's rights, gay rights, criminals' rights, animal rights, the abolition of cruel and unusual punishment, the conduct of war—in fact, almost every progressive movement one can name—it was reasoned argument that first laid out the incoherence, demonstrating that the same logic underlying reasons to which we were already committed applied in a wider context. … This kind of progress, unlike scientific progress, tends to erase its own tracks as it is integrated into our manifest image and so becomes subsumed in the framework by which we conceive of ourselves. We no longer see the argumentative work it took for this advance in morality to be achieved.

Liberal arts and the humanities aren't just for the elite.

Most business-school students are gunning for jobs in banking, consulting or technology. So what are they doing reading Plato? Short answer: to think beyond the bottom line.

Philosopher and author, Rebecca Goldstein, explains how philosophy makes progress — and why its stunning contributions to the world as we know it are so hard to see.

Philosopher and Health Coach, Kelly Rogers Victor talks about raising ethical kids using insights from Plato and Aristotle.

A degree in philosophy doesn't mean you're relegated to academia. Jon Dahl, founder of Zencoder proves that Aristotle has a lot to teach tech businesses today.

Philosophers get a bad rap - they're written off as too academic, too detached from daily life. But we're seeing a philosophy revival, from philosophy cafes to philosophers as therapists. From the Stoics to Spinoza, an argument for why philosophy still matters. Guests: Mark Rowlands, Rebecca Goldstein, Jules Evans, Steve Nadler, Eric Jarosinski, Nikiko Masumoto.

What use could the humanities be in a digital age? Skeptics may see philosophy as the most irrelevant..., but the way I understand the world is shaped by three philosophers in particular.... So let me push back at the idea that the humanities are obscure, arcane and irrelevant. These three philosophers influence the way I think about politics, immigration, inequality; they even affect what I eat...

Ethics are increasingly a part of the school curriculum, and practical introductory classes in applied ethics are part of the training that nurses, scientists and soldiers undergo. Ethical education is ubiquitous, even though it may not always involve complicated theoretical debates – but should it include a dose of philosophy? There are powerful reasons for looking to moral philosophy to learn about real-world ethical action – and of course, there are risks too.

The School of Life has the answers.