Wednesday, March 18, 2009
Education A Pitch for the Value of MTSU's Philosophy Program
Posted by Pete Kotz on Wed, Mar 18, 2009 at 5:13 AM
Comments (11)
Showing 1-11 of 11
"He said [of philosophy majors] that, "you can do anything anyone else can do. Only you can do it better."
Yeah right.
Let's see a philosophy major do a better job of desigining the next computer chip than an Intel engineer.
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Don't worry, Gilbert, the Board of Regents wants to get rid of MTSU's Physics Department, too.
I only took the intro course at MTSU, but I enjoyed it. I can still recall lectures about time, and the various awesomely-named arguments for and against the existence of God. This being a freshman Intro to Philosophy course at MTSU, you can imagine how enlightened some of those discussions were. I probably should have stuck with it. Lend me some books, Kotz.
To Mr. Martin
Hasty Generalization: Using insufficient evidence or an isolated example as the basis for a widely general conclusion.
I learned that in a Philosophy class.
Really?
Let's see some "sufficient" evidence that supports the good professor's "widely general conclusion" that philosopy majors can do anything better than anyone else can.
I won't hold my breath.
LOL
Giblets, having studied formal logic in undergrad philosophy helps me every day in designing UI flow for applications used every day in business environments. As usual, your tiny, paranoid mind has no idea what it's talking about.
Let's see some "sufficient" evidence that supports the good professor's "widely general conclusion" that philosopy majors can do anything better than anyone else can.
The evidence of your post and Tiffany's is sufficient to convince me that "philosopy majors" are better at spelling. Lest this be considered "hasty generalization," run a quick search on Gilbert's other posts.
The good professor was being humorous with his response, yet there is always an element of truth in humor. The idea in philosophy is not only to learn theory or practical applications of theory, but theories about the theories of theories ;)
Pinky , spelling don't mean diddly squat.
As for you DG, offering a blovating gas bag such as yourself up as evidence is entirely counterproductive to the good professor's thesis.
Tiffany,
Thank you for this articulate and impassioned plea. I agree with you completely. And while I don't disparage the need for computer chips, I also remember that Plato, Aristotle--and Shakespeare, for that matter--created their works of mind without computers, or even 3 by 5 cards. The point is, really, do these and other such works of mind matter? Are they worth studying, or should public universities become simply career-track factories and technical schools? Of course they shouldn't! Of course they should help students learn how to live and think better, not just how to make a living.
Keep writing and keep advocating! There is hope for such programs as long as students like you are welling to speak up and speak out.
