I have a secret...

Here are my bona fides: I make my living by thinking.  I am an academic and a scholar.  I am a passionate and excellent cook with a deep love for food, and by necessity, a correspondingly deep love for exercise.  I am a student of art and a teacher of aesthetics.  I enjoy fine wine, classical music, opera (a new passion), and good literature.  I rarely watch TV, I don’t have cable, and it’s hard to sit all the way through a movie. 

But I have a secret.  I am a true-blooded, dyed in the wool, lowbrow lover of trashy things.  It’s a weakness.  I would never watch Survivor or take in a Twilight movie, but put on a season of South Park and I’m your guy.  Hook up the Dave Chappelle show, and I’m glued for hours.  I will be moved by the novels of Paul Auster or the quiet austerity of Dr. Glas, but put the latest Stephen King in my hands and watch rapture follow.  Action books, spy novels, science fiction and fantasy.  God, how I love me some head shots, castle-storming, and dragon riding.  Better than the Iliad and the Odyssey, better than Dante’s Inferno – unless you mean the video game version…butt-kicking through the circles of hell, oh yeah! 

Oh, I like fruit smoothies with farmer’s market raspberries or blueberries.  But I love them southern Moonpies.  And I might make a ceviche with fresh, tossed greens, but some weekends I’m in the kitchen making whoopie pies and homemade cinnamon rolls. 

And I’m a gamer.  A serious one.  Games of all kinds.  Brain teasers? Logic problems? Word plays?  Awesome.  But so is Bejeweled, Portal, and Halo.  Games of all kinds.  Board games, card games, any type of game.  Now, don’t get me wrong.  I’m a mean chess player and I’ve even won a few minor tournaments in my division.  I like the high brow games, too.  But throw on Gears of War or Ninja Gaiden and I’m in my own little version of heaven.  And when all of the reading is done, when the brain is just worn out from philosophizing, and in those few last quiet hours of the evening, you can hear the whir and hum of my game console and some seriously frantic button pushing.  Love it.  And I’m old enough now to appreciate how far gaming has come: I remember the early and cheap PC games.  I remember the Atari, I remember Pong, Pac-Man and Donkey Kong.  Hell, I even have a current playable version of Dragon’s Lair on my computer.  Nostalgia for the good old days.  And dontcha know I can still beat it on one quarter.  Just like old times. 

See, I sometimes think I shouldn’t like these things anymore.  I feel as though I should occupy a more rarefied strata of intellectual pursuits.  And those are fine.  Just fine.  But sometimes, well, a lot of the time, I’m right down in the dirt, so to speak, tracing a bead on a bad guy and trying to save the world from destruction.  And I wouldn’t trade it for anything.  I like my trashy ways.  I like my Moonpies and sci-fi novels, my shoot-em-ups and video games.  Maybe it’s nostalgia, maybe it’s a break from reality.  Maybe.

But I am beginning to think that maybe what it means is that it is never too late to have a happy childhood.  Maybe what it means is that intellectuals do not have to always move along intellectual paths.  Or maybe it means that the high and low brow can coexist.  That inside every wine drinking, opera-loving intellectual there’s a dedicated gamer with the latest John Grisham and a Dr. Pepper.

In the end, I just don’t think the distinction holds up.  Rarefied?  Trashy?  Highbrow?  Lowbrow?  It’s just life and experience and fun and passion.  I will always love my Heidegger and Husserl.  My Pavarotti and Paganini.  But I will also love Halo and Mass Effect, Stephen King and Robin Hobb.  And you will still find me in the kitchen cooking up some biscuits and gravy and then firing up the ole game console and whipping bad guys.  It’s just how I am. 

Impartiality

Each summer, I teach a one-week institute titled “The Philosophy of Love and Sex.”  It is quite successful, but quite intense – 8hrs/day over five days – and generally everyone is emotionally depleted by the time it is done.  More than a few relationships usually suffer from this course and people’s perceptions and ideas undergo dramatic, and sometimes traumatic, transformation. 

I like it, but it takes all of the skill that I have as an instructor to teach this course. 

We were talking during one of our sessions about homosexuality and gay marriage.  Tough topics for some, and the moment I say “let’s talk about two humans of the same sex getting married” everyone becomes immediately and emphatically neutral, or at least, they become doggedly “impartial” and “nonjudgmental”:

“Oh, well, lots of people in the world and what they do is their own business.”

“I dunno, don’t see why they can’t get married…free country.”

“I’m not really in favor of it, but I get it.” 

“Well, what do YOU think, professor?”

What do I think?  I think I have some harsh words about our views of “impartiality” and “nonjudgmental” thinking.  To some extent, I understand the impulse here.  There are conflicting forces in a class like this.  Students are worried about taking strong positions in front of their peers and in front of me.  They don’t know what my own position is and they’re worried that if they don’t “tow the company line,” as it were, I might retaliate with a low grade (for any students reading this, be at ease.  I do not do any such thing and you might be surprised how rarely this occurs.).  But there’s something else going on, too.  An intentional and studied refusal to take a stand on a major issue.  And this resistance to taking a stand masquerades as a kind of intellectual neutrality and “objective” impartiality. 

On my good days, I think that this “objectivity” is a well-meaning but misguided distaste for disagreement.  In an unreflective way, most people value free speech and the right to think (and sometimes do) whatever they wish.  Disagreement then looks like a sort of limit on our guaranteed right to express ourselves.  And indeed, when my students talk about why they’re reticent to take a stand, they talk about the value of not stifling opinions through calling some “right” and some “wrong,” and they regard disagreement as an insult or criticism, in short, as an attack.  I like this quality in people; I like to think that my students are wary of trampling free speech.  On my good days…

Nevermind that disagreement is healthy.  Nevermind that it is the contrast and opposition between positions that drives discourse, forces reflection, and makes people reevaluate their own position in light of new arguments.  Discourses where either everyone agrees or no one posits anything of substance are not discourses.  They’re more like pathologies of discourse.  Signs that something has gone wrong.  At the very least, disagreement is a check both on indifference and absolute claims.  In other words, very very necessary.

On my bad days, I notice that my students’ indifferently “objective” attitude disappears at the first sign someone disagrees with them, especially when the disagreement concerns something deeply valuable or meaningful in their lives.  Case in point: my students were happy to invoke neutrality with regards to gay marriage, but when I suggested instead that adults should be able to marry children this neutrality disappeared.  There were very strong feelings and no sign of their previous reticence towards disagreement. 

Strong identities were formed around the need to protect children, the intrinsic sense of wrongness in the relation, the importance of consent and autonomy, and a deep belief that something of the sanctity of marriage was violated when applied to children.  Adults marrying children looked to them more like servitude than love, more like abuse than mutual care.  Reticence evaporated and strong positions were established around these deeply powerful values. 

But gay marriage…eh.

At this point, intellectual neutrality and impartial “objectivity” look cruel.  If you check out on the issue of gay marriage, if you “see both sides,” your indifference is appalling.  How can you not take a stand – whatever it is – regarding the assertion that the sex of two people is an adequate basis to deny them legal rights of union?  I am not arguing that one should be for or against gay marriage.  I am also not arguing that one can hold both positions (see Dr. J’s excellent series of posts for the problem with this view).  I am arguing that the insistence of neutrality in the face of this issue looks nothing like neutrality.  It looks like a cruel and almost heartless indifference.  After all, the question is not simply an issue of homosexuality.  As I see it, a primary issue is the basis on which we grant or withhold legal rights of association.  And that is a deeply important and meaningful question for everyone who would claim rights in this society.  Gay partners without legal rights of union have no special rights to visitation in the hospital, have no protection in the custody and adoption of children, are not entitled to the many tax breaks and other basic advantages of being married, and on and on and on.  I simply do not understand indifference on this issue, whatever your position. 

When we suspend for a moment the values that attach to not taking a side (neutrality, objectivity, impartiality), the cruelty of this approach begins to stand out.  If you  just don’t care what happens to people of the same sex that want to marry, then your indifference says something about the lack of importance that you grant to their concerns simply because they are gay.  If you don’t see the problem and you think, “Fine, fine, whatever.  Let them marry if they want,” then once again, I wonder how you accept with blithe indifference the cultural, social, legal and ethical barriers put in place to keep people of the same sex from having legal rights of union.  You don’t have to go out and protest, but at least call it as it is. 

The issue is more than the recognition that not taking a side is in fact taking a side.  We live according to our passions, our commitments, our identities formed in powerful and often shared values.  I do not know what it means to be a human being in the world if I am not motivated by my senses of right and wrong, of sympathy and outrage, of connection and interconnection with cultural values, social mores, and all manner of things that provoke my thought, compel my action, and inspire my approbation or condemnation.  Suspending that looks to me like giving up a large portion of my humanity.  It looks unnatural and I cannot conceive of such “impartiality” as intellectually mature.  In fact, intellectual maturity means staking out a position but without the expectation that you are absolutely right.  It means living and thinking passionately in the awareness that others live in the same way.  It means holding on to values and ideas that you are willing to subject to public scrutiny, rational debate, and on occasion, ridicule.  Finally, intellectual maturity means that you do not locate impartiality in the withdrawal of our most human impulses, but rather you find impartiality in the encounter of differences with and among others as you stake claims within a multiply connected and extensive field of human relations. 

A Defense of Philosophy on Financial Grounds (Part 2)

As I mount my defense in favor of philosophy as a financially worthwhile discipline, I want to be clear about the benchmarks that I am using.  I have chosen measures that I think should be important to any discipline and any major when assessing financial value.  Moreover, they should be important both to college and university administrators as well as to students deciding on the best course of study as they consider future financial success.  In light of these considerations, I have chosen the following benchmarks:

(1) Job Potential: How likely is it that you will be able to find a job with a Philosophy degree?

(2) Job Growth:  How likely is it that the number of jobs in your field using your degree will grow at a rate favorable to continued employment?

(3) Job Security:  How resistant is your job to recessions, down-market events and slow economic times?  (I should think this would be essential as we consider our current economic crisis.)

(4) Earnings Potential: What is your starting salary likely to be?  What is your earnings potential throughout your career given your degree?

(5) Job Satisfaction: Are ya happy?  Do you like what you do? 

That about does it.  If any major succeeds well with most or all of these benchmarks, I would regard that major to be enormously successful, worth continued funding, and most importantly, worth a significant amount of institutional commitment, advertising, and resources. 

A few brief methodological notes.  As this is a blog, you will simply have to take my word that my information is thoroughly sourced.  I’ve spent the past six months slogging through databases and crunching numbers and getting help crunching numbers, then slogging through more databases, and I’m blogging…so I’ll show my work later!  I am happy to send the references and citations along to anyone who wishes, but here I will present only a summary of my evidence.  In addition to the article already being published, I am currently at work on a longer, more detailed version of these arguments and again, I will be happy to send draft copies when it is completed.  Finally, I am speaking primarily about Philosophy at the undergraduate level, not at the graduate level.  To my friends and colleagues with Ph.Ds, you already know how bad our job market is right now, and I do not see any real signs that this is changing as quickly as we might wish.

Job Potential:  There is the most solid evidence for this benchmark, and the most disbelief regarding it.  Philosophers find jobs.  Easily.  And the reason for this success turns out to be the very reason used against philosophy and against its viability as a major.  Philosophy as a major is not tied to any specific career path or vocational/technical orientation.  Business majors go into business.  Nursing majors become nurses.  Education majors…teachers.  Philosophy majors…well, not really any one thing.  Conventional wisdom asserts that this is a huge negative for students entering the job market.  But the numbers say the opposite.  It is true that rates of employment are lower after graduation for humanities majors generally as opposed to “career” majors.  But we would expect this; career majors usually have internships, etc., and it really is rather narrowly vocational, all things considered.  We should hope these “career-oriented” students are finding jobs or else something is seriously wrong.  After five years, however, this gap has decreased considerably.  After ten years, it’s gone entirely.  Why?  A few reasons.  First, humanities majors (and especially philosophy majors) pursue post-graduate work at a higher rate than “career” majors.  But when they get out of school, they get jobs.  When these post-grads enter the workforce, this balances that earlier, lower rate of employment.  Secondly, in a ten-year study by the NCES (National Center for Education Statistics, U.S. Dept. of Education), it was shown that rates of employment of “academic” vs. “career” majors were virtually identical after 10 years.  Why?  Because there is very little connection at that point between major and employment.  See, the idea that there is a linear path from major to career is false.  Or at least, it is true only in the most narrowly vocational fields.  For most fields, no such linear path exists.  Outside of highly narrow or highly technical degree programs (Business, Health Sciences, Engineering/IT), students are relying in their jobs on “core skills” and not specific job skills.  Technical expertise ranks less than critical expertise.  Can you write well? Think well? Reason creatively and critically? Argue well? Think outside the box?  Then you will get hired at rates far higher than those with merely technical skill.  And of course, philosophy majors excel all other liberal arts disciplines in teaching these skills.  And employers are realizing, at least according to the Association of American Colleges and Universities, that these core skills are not only highly practical, but highly valuable and marketable.  So, are there jobs for Philosophy majors?  Yep.  The number of jobs available for philosophy majors exceeds the qualified national average of annual openings, and moreover, there is high flexibility for Philosophy majors in the kinds of jobs they can choose. 

Job Growth: Annual job growth rate for Philosophy majors? 18.9%  Annual job growth rate nationally?  10.9%  What?  Nearly double the national average?  Yep!  And those are 2010 numbers.  Got that?  Almost twice the national average in the middle of a recession.  That’s better than nearly all (it may be all, but I don’t want to say that yet…) liberal arts majors and a majority of “career” majors, including Business, Marketing, and Accounting.  That’s not too bad.  It’s not the best, but it’s certainly not the worst, and it’s still very, very good.  Especially for 2010. 

Job Security: Now this is an interesting question.  What makes a major secure?  I am relying here on the careful research of others, and not my own.  And while I have questions about portions of their methodology, I can’t find fault with it, and neither can those I’ve turned to for help.  So, I’m confident enough about it, and sourcing available on request.  But the book, by JIST Publishing, is 50 Best College Majors for a Secure Future.  It is “popular research,” but it stands or falls on its methodology and as I said, no problems so far.  For the purposes of their report, a “secure” major was defined as one whose supported jobs (a) show strong projected job growth, (b) demonstrate low economic sensitivity to recession, and (c) are not easily “off-shored,” that is, handed off to a foreign country and thus considered reasonably insecure.  Jobs supported by each major were identified through the National Center for Development and the Occupational Network [O*NET] Database, and where a major supported both secure and insecure jobs, a percentage was used to gauge the security of the major overall.  Earnings potential and job growth figures are taken from the U.S. Census Bureau and the U.S. Department of Labor. 

Philosophy ranks 19^th overall.  This is better than all but two other academic majors and many “career” majors including, once again, Business and Marketing.  And we can, and probably will, argue about the numbers but they make sense to me for a number of reasons.  First, the skills learned in a Philosophy major are inherently portable.  You can take them to any job and you will stand out insofar as you possess them.  They are also skills that are in decline, unfortunately, in our higher education system.  Critical thinking, rational argument, writing and reading skills: these are important assessment measures for colleges and universities, but our graduates are not learning them as well or as deeply as they should.  Except in Philosophy.  And employers are taking notice.  Second, the skills learned with a Philosophy degree are valuable and marketable no matter what you do.  And they’re easily accessorized with a variety of majors and minors.  Third, flexible job skills are prized in a weak economy.  If you are trained for one narrow job and there aren’t any openings…you’re screwed.  If you have skills that are valuable and translate well into any job…you’re successful.  Is there greater insecurity knowing you do not have a definite career path?  No.  Not according to that 10-year study, and really, not any more than most other majors, even those with career paths.  Job insecurity is a feature for everyone, especially now, and given my earlier points I should think insecurity would be less for Philosophy majors than it would for other disciplines given the nature and intrinsic marketable value of the skills you learn.  Finally, Philosophy majors outperform nearly everyone else in qualifications for post-graduate work.  Not sure what to do for a career?  Get a Master’s, go to Law School, Med School.  After all, our majors take on all comers and win on those tests.  Job security?  Oh yeah.

Earnings Potential: This is a hard one for people to believe, that philosophy majors can make money.  But with the advent of Payscale, this argument has gotten much easier to make and many, many people are now aware of it.  While the starting salary will be lower for Philosophy majors than for most others, it still isn’t bad.  Around 35-40,000 to start.  But that’s not where the action is.  The real metric is 10-15 years in, the so-called “mid-career” point.  While a large number of majors are staying flat in earnings’ growth, philosophy majors are increasing their earnings.  At mid-career, our majors are outperforming all other liberal arts majors and many, many career oriented disciplines – Business, Nursing, etc.  Why? Because our skills are so valuable.  Take Nursing.  Excellent training, excellent job prospects, excellent starting salary, excellent job growth.  But 15 years in, the difference between a starting nurse and and an experienced nurse is relatively slight in terms of pay.  Experience outstrips compensation as wages hit a natural ceiling.  No matter how good a nurse you are, at some point your earnings are going to cap.  At that point, your experience increases, but not your pay-grade.  This doesn’t happen generally in the kinds of jobs that philosophers get.  As our knowledge increases and our skills pay off, we reap those benefits financially.  Again, our flexibility pays dividends.  In a tight market, sure, this effect is going to be less pronounced.  But in a bullish environment, we can go where our skills receive the most value.  We’re not limited to a single vocation with what amounts in the end to a wage cap.  Pretty nifty.  Moreover, I find repeatedly that these Payscale numbers are backed up by other studies (thank you, NCES!). 

Job Satisfaction: I included this metric because it is important to me, not necessarily to students.  I think there should be a reasonable expectation that you like what you do for a living.  This falls last on people’s list, usually, when they’re considering a career, but unfortunately, it comes back to haunt you later.  Career oriented majors tend to have the lowest rates of job satisfaction.  Regardless of stability and pay, they consistently rate their levels of satisfaction pretty low.  Humanities majors?  They’re the opposite.  They generally like what they do.  Or at least, more than their career counterparts.  To me, that’s important. 

So, why aren’t students flocking to their philosophy departments?  Why aren’t administrators flooding us with money?  That could be the subject of a bunch of new posts, but there is one thing I think it is important to say.  The numbers suggest a new argument as Philosophy departments and majors come under fire.  A college or university that (a) does not actively and materially support their Philosophy department, and (b) does not actively and materially work to recruit new students into the Philosophy department (regardless of degree intentions) is hurting itself financially and jeopardizing the future success of its students.  Too strong?  No, I don’t think so.  We have study after study showing that all students benefit – directly and financially – from the skills that we teach better than anyone else.  But more importantly, we have quite a few studies showing that new college students, first-generation students and students from disenfranchised populations all benefit in direct proportion to their exposure to a broad-based humanities education, i.e. the kind of thing philosophy provides in the highest degree.  What’s more, these students are the ones least likely to engage that sort of education and the ones most likely to focus on a career oriented education instead.  With quite a few colleges and universities, this means there has to be active recruitment of students towards the humanities and material support for those departments.  If the argument is too strong anywhere, it is too strong in its emphasis on philosophy.  I think the same argument can and should be made for all of our humanities departments, though I maintain a tribal pride and insistence in our ability to excel in the teaching of argument, critical thinking, rational discourse, and articulate communication.  Nothing wrong with that. 

If these arguments and numbers help, use them! I would rather help one philosophy (or humanities department) not lose funding than get an article credit or something silly like that.  Enjoy!

A Defense of Philosophy on Financial Grounds (Part 1)

It seems somehow appropriate that I should begin the first post of my first blog with a defense of philosophy.  To those of us who make our living as professional philosophers, there is little need to defend something whose worth, value, and intrinsic importance are without question.  The arguments in favor of philosophy (and in favor of it as a core discipline in higher education) are so numerous, obvious, and powerful that this would be a much, much longer post if I enumerated them all.  Of course, I’m happy to do this for anyone willing to listen, but I have begun to notice a strange divergence when it comes to defending philosophy and this divergence is one that I find intensely fascinating. 

First, the prompt for my defense: philosophy departments are closing or being cut at an alarming rate.  Middlesex is the most obvious and egregious example, but there are plenty of others.  The University of Louisiana at Lafayette has cut its Philosophy department, while Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and quite a few other states are debating the elimination of a philosophy major at some of their public universities.  As the recession continues and jobs of any kind are hard to come by, philosophy and other humanities disciplines are, I suspect, in for a severe beating when it comes to the allocation of funds.  All disciplines, as I understand it, are being asked in one way or another to defend their fiscal importance and economic viability.  Money is a driving factor, and tight budgets, state cuts, and decreased funding for higher education means schools have to save costs, cut corners, consolidate programs and drop “low-performing” majors and programs.  Often, these cuts and consolidations are indifferent to the intrinsic value and importance of what they cut.  “Traditional” majors and “core” programs mean less and less as financial concerns force colleges and universities to reevaluate their mission and goals.  At an increasing number of institutions, philosophy is suffering. 

Yet I notice that as philosophy departments and majors are being cut, there is an unambiguous awareness of the importance and value of philosophy.  I say “unambiguous” because all of the parties involved – from the Regents to the faculty – are deeply and even sympathetically aware of the worth of philosophy.  All recognize its preeminent place in the historical lineage of liberal arts and “humanities” education that shapes the origin of our colleges and universities.  And all seem to show an awareness of the necessity of asking big questions, interrogating the world beyond what is given, and learning to think critically and reflectively about important dimensions of life and experience.  Even as they eliminated the Philosophy major at UL Lafayette, the Board of Regents "...agreed with faculty members that the subject is “a traditional core program of a broad-based liberal arts and science institution.”" (NYTimes article, "Making College 'Relevant'," no link)

And in the midst of this unambiguous awareness and sympathy for philosophy, departments continue to be eliminated, reduced, cut or reorganized. 

As I think about a defense of philosophy in today’s climate, I come back again and again to this strange phenomenon: philosophy suffers even as the whole of the Academy recognizes its importance and moreover, is not indifferent to that importance.  Colleges and universities understand the value of philosophy even as they cut its programs and departments.  Very strange. 

I can think of many reasons for this: indifference to claims of traditional value and institutional “integrity” in the face of pressing financial concerns and “bottom-line” thinking; the prevailing view that philosophy has no practical use for students with real-world concerns and the economic necessity of finding a job; a deep distrust with “pure” intellectual pursuits; an increasing trend in colleges and universities to provide vocational training in which “useless” degrees have no place.  I could go on and on.  But what I am most interested in for this post is the divergence between what is said and what is done with regard to philosophy programs at colleges and universities.  Suppose I wanted to defend philosophy in the midst of this strange divergence between what academics and deans and provosts and presidents are saying about philosophy and what they are doing when they cut philosophy departments and majors.  What would I say?  After all, every one of the arguments I might marshal to my defense, they already agree with!  Arguments about historical importance, traditional value, institutional integrity (the so-far-unsuccessful “what is a university without a philosophy major?” argument) are not disputed by those closing philosophy departments.  Arguments about the importance of critical thinking, “big-picture” thinking, ethical awareness, and the draw of deep questions about our nature, origin and purpose – again, these arguments fall on sympathetic ears.  So how do you defend something that clearly is not in need of defense within the Academy and yet, even in spite of that sympathy, is still suffering?  This is the question I want to answer.

Suppose I assume – and I believe this to be true – that academic officials are acting in good faith when they agree to the importance and deep value of philosophy.  And suppose I assume – as I do – that in quite a few cases these cuts are motivated by an enforced need to attend to financial bottom-lines given the tightening budgets of nearly all colleges and universities.  In other words, if I grant reasonable good faith all around, what becomes clear is that there is an operative assumption that philosophy (and a philosophy major) cannot make money, cannot succeed financially, and is not a good investment of valuable education dollars all  things considered.  Happily, there are quite a few elements here that are empirical, and in many ways this is an empirical, not a conceptual, question.  If students are not enrolling in a philosophy major, is this a good investment of money, etc…

But I wonder: is there a financial defense of philosophy?  Suppose I assume all of the benchmarks of success that would make a major a worthwhile investment, both for colleges and for students: job potential, employability, earnings and earnings growth, and external measures of success and excellence…would a philosophy major succeed using these benchmarks?  If the concern is money, then why should we not ask whether there is money to be had in philosophy? 

I know, I know.  Certain dimensions of thinking and education are valuable beyond price.  The freedom and vitality of education should not be measured according to economic or vocational standards.  Philosophy transcends economic considerations in the value that it adds to our engagement with our lives, our cultures, and our communities.  Not only am I, as a professional philosopher, sympathetic to these claims, but so are those who are cutting philosophy programs.  So they’re off the table.  Granted as givens…but off the table. 

Is philosophy valuable?  Is it profitable when measured against financial benchmarks of success?  So far as I can see, no one has asked this question.  And I find that fascinating.  After all, even many philosophers accept the premise that philosophy cannot be profitable along economic lines, that as a major it asks colleges and students to invest in a long-term view of worth rather than short-term interests of employability and earnings potential.  I think that’s a lot to ask.  And I don’t think the premise has to be granted that philosophy is not financially feasible. 

So I decided to prove it. 

Stay tuned.  Part two will put forth the evidence I have in favor of the financial success of philosophy as a major.  But while you wait, I wrote an article, shortly to be published, where I make this argument as best I can.  If any would like a copy, let me know in the comments.  I’ll happily send it along.