the human head weighs eight pounds. so my mom thought i was a psychology major. last week she was like, "wait, you're a philosophy major? what does that do?" i could see her panic levels rising. philosophy for her means nothing. psychology at least seems applicable and useful towards that next phase of my life, a job. for her, a major leads directly to a related job. econ equals business, psychology equals hope, philosophy equals confusion. i swear i've told her philosophy many a time. but for some reason she must have blocked it off in her mind and just assumed psychology. i bet she's asking her friends right now what hopes there are for a philosophy major. it takes all i have in me to try to explain that the major really doesn't matter at all in this post-apocalyptic world. unless you do computers or engineering or medicine. she doesn't believe me. surprise.



off the umich philosophy website. "you can put a concentration in philosophy to a very wide range of uses. some majors go on to do graduate work in philosophy, with a view to teaching philosophy in a college or university. but more go on to other careers: in law, public service, journalism, business, computer science, medicine, religion and the arts. there is strong statistical evidence that philosophy majors do very well on the admissions tests required for graduate work in other areas."



this is kind of a shame since i don't think i want to go into any of these careers. but hey. furthermore "the study of philosophy helps its students to develop their ability to analyze and clarify ideas, to think logically, and to present their ideas and arguments effectively, both orally and in writing. because philosophers have historically focused on the most difficult and abstract questions, they have cultivated a standard of expository clarity and rigor rarely stressed so emphatically elsewhere."



the key word there is obviously "historically." presently we philosophers focus on annoying and disappointing our parents.



i think me being a "philosphy" major is a big piece of bunk. when i say that i'm a philosophy major, people go "oh, that's interesting" or "that's hard." but let me tell you. not really. it's like history class. learning about what other people think. some of the stuff is much more interesting than that but i've decided most humanities classes are the same thing anyway. the differences between political science, sociology, philosophy, art history, whatever, isn't that great. or maybe this is because i'm the crappiest philosophy major ever. going to class probably woulda helped. but because philosophy majors are rare it seems more interesting than saying one of the more run of the mill majors. at least i can pretend to be interesting for a split second. before i'm exposed for the philosophy fraud that i am. i think i need to meet more philosophy majors so i can compare and contrast. once again, going to class regularly probably woulda helped.



however i do agree with the definitions of philosophy: (1) love and pursuit of wisdom by intellectual means and moral self-discipline (2) investigation of the nature, causes, or principles of reality, knowledge, or values, based on logical reasoning rather than empirical methods (3) the critical analysis of fundamental assumptions or beliefs. and i do think that a philosopher (a person who lives and thinks according to a particular philosophy, a person who is calm and rational under any circumstances) is something i would aspire to be. or possibly could say, am.



and isn't it funny how all the books and the studying you had to do for class is so boring when it's school but suddenly takes on a whole new light after the classes are over? with most of my philosophy books, i read them just to get them done and to slide on by for exams. but now i've saved them and want to read them in depth. way after the fact. why not just learn them right the first time? i dunno. i'm awfully inefficient like that.