How is philosophy useful? Examining the practical, impactful, real-life benefits of getting a degree in philosophy

Question

It is often asked, "What is the practical use of philosophy?" or "How will learning about philosophy impact real-life?"

It is easy to see why there is such mystery surrounding the topic. Most schools up through high school may only offer 1 or 2 courses on it, if any. It is also often talked about in general conversation as a "wishy-washy" subject, often negatively, as though it contains no answers but only raises an endless series of questions.

To add to this, those who hear of the subject but know very little of it may be surprised to see it offered at their university as a major. It is clear to most why some people would want to major in Computer science, Mathematics, or Physics. But what would a degree in philosophy get you?

Answer 1

The Practical Use of Anything

It is difficult to talk about the "practical use" of almost any piece of knowledge out of context. In fact, I can conceive of no single piece of knowledge is universally beneficial. For example, on the face of it you might think that mathematics is a more practical area of study than philosophy, but can you honestly say that you've actually ever used the formula for the volume of a cylinder in real-life? Did you ever whip out the quadratic formula on a napkin in a restaurant to help calculate the tip? Most knowledge in every discipline is helpful only in specific contexts, so we must be careful when we talk about the "practical use" of any field of study. The only relevant distinction here is which pieces of knowledge are more helpful in everyday life vs. those which are less so. From this perspective, both mathematics and physics—which are in some senses seen as the foundational/core sciences—are probably among the least practical. Ranking up there would be psychology and sociology if you interact with other humans on any regular basis, biology if you want to know how your own body works, heck, maybe your understanding can be used to save people's lives. As you can probably see this is somewhat of a subjective judgement, but if you were to ask me I would hold that there is one field that rises above them all, and that is philosophy.

What in the world does philosophy teach you that could possibly be so useful, you wonder. That's a good question, and I will elaborate below, but there is another important distinction to remember:

Skills vs. Facts

I think it's important to remember—as it is also true in many other fields—that learning in philosophy can be distinguished between skill knowledge and factual knowledge. That is, there is a big difference between philosophy as in critical thinking skills and reasoning ability, versus philosophy as in facts regarding the history of philosophy and conceptual ideas. Virtually all philosophy courses address both sides of this coin (they encourage and help develop good reasoning in the context of popular concepts or the history of philosophy), but where I think philosophy is most useful (when it comes to real life) is the former notion. As a college graduate who has taken multiple courses in a wide range of disciplines, one of the skills that philosophy seems to emphasize most is critical thinking. Of course, I can only speak from the perspective of one university (others may not emphasize this as much), but I would wager that many people who have studied philosophy at the college level would concur with this statement. And having this ability to think critically is of immense benefit for a number of real-life situations such that it's not even reasonable to begin listing them all, because it would otherwise be disingenuous to the entire scope of benefits. At any moment in life where you have to make a decision about something, that decision will always depend on your reasoning abilities. In this way, being a good thinker can help you become a better manager, a better consumer, a better writer, a better reader, a better voter, a better leader, a better father or mother, brother or sister, a better friend...

Outside of the critical thinking skills you learn in philosophy, you have the history of philosophy. Knowing that René Descartes was born on March 31st or the definition of determinism is as equally useful and domain specific as just about any other piece of knowledge. I can honestly say that I have never needed to know that the American Revolutionary War went from 1775–1783 after learning it in 11th grade AP US History. Lots of random pieces of knowledge like this don't often present any particular use in our daily lives, but that's to be expected. When you decide that you want to learn something, you have to ask yourself why you want to learn. Is it for a job? Is it to increase your knowledge about the world? It is these questions which help you decide what to learn. You have to figure out your goals before you can decide what to learn and how useful it will be for you.

Uses of a Philosophy Degree

These days, typically the only people who get advanced degrees in philosophy are those who want to teach philosophy (become professors). I'm sorry if this comes as bad news to some people, but alas, there aren't very many jobs available for those of us who would like to just sit around and philosophize. If you have no plans on becoming a philosophy professor, I would not recommend making philosophy your sole major (either double major or take philosophy as a minor). That said, I know many people who solely have a degree in philosophy. This is not the end of the world by any means, and many great jobs require no specific degree, and that's assuming you don't plan on going back to school.

In terms of graduate school, a lot of people who plan on going into law start with philosophy degrees, and many schools will offer a philosophy of law program in addition to the standard philosophy track. People with philosophy degrees also seem to have no trouble getting into business or journalism programs.

In the end, you should learn what interests you, but it's appropriate to keep your future in mind as well. If you are concerned, consider double-majoring so you can keep your options open. Double-majoring wasn't hard as I had to take many electives/humanities anyways, and philosophy courses often filled those gaps. With decent planning you should be able to finish a double major for two Bachelor's degrees in the normal time frame (4 years) without taking too many more extra courses at most schools (I completed a double-major and a minor in 4 years with no summer or winter classes).

Further Reading:

Why study philosophy?

A very good overall guide for why philosophy can help you in everyday life, and what you can do with a philosophy degree.

Philosophy majors outperform all other majors

A great collection of articles and statistics which show the benefit of studying philosophy.

"In the US, where the number of philosophy graduates has increased by 5 per cent a year during the 1990's, only a very few go on to become philosophers. Their employability, at 98.9 per cent, is impressive by any standard....Philosophy is, in commercial jargon, the ultimate 'transferable work skill'."

The Philosophy Major's Career Book

The aim of this handbook is to help you think about the relation between your degree in philosophy and getting a job or planning a career (or life) after graduation, and to help you to prepare intelligently for it.

USA Today: What can you do with a philosophy degree?

"So many people think philosophy isn't practical," says Shoener, who also is studying biomathematics for a double major and plans to be a women's health advocate. "It's the most practical thing I've ever done."

Answer 2

Gilles Deleuze's thoughts on this, from Nietzsche and Philosophy (my emphasis):

When someone asks “what’s the use of philosophy?” the reply must be aggressive, since the question tries to be ironic and caustic. Philosophy does not serve the State or the Church, who have other concerns. It serves no established power. The use of philosophy is to sadden. A philosophy that saddens no one, that annoys no one, is not a philosophy. It is useful for harming stupidity, for turning stupidity into something shameful. Its only use is the exposure of all forms of baseness of thought. Is there any discipline apart from philosophy that sets out to criticise all mystifications, whatever their source and aim, to expose all the fictions without which reactive forces would not prevail? Exposing as a mystification the mixture of baseness and stupidity that creates the astonishing complicity of both victims and perpetrators. Finally, turning thought into something aggressive, active and affirmative. Creating free men, that is to say men who do not confuse the aims of culture with the benefit of the State, morality or religion. Fighting the ressentiment and bad conscience, which have replaced thought for us. Conquering the negative and its false glamour. Who has an interest in all this but philosophy? Philosophy is at its most positive as critique, as an enterprise of demystification.

Answer 3

The practical use of philosophy of ethics:

To provide a new reference frame for the negotiation of basic values in a society where "because God wants it" or "because it is unnatural" or "because we have always done it this way" is not convincing to many people.

The practical use of philosophy of science:

Most scientists don't want to waste too much of their precious research time on philosophical issues which leads to many scientists practicing a different point of view than they preach. Having philosophers exploring the discrepancies can lead to scientists who are actually aware of what they do which will improve their science overall.

It is similar for other branches for philosophy. And just as in other domains, the practical use does not turn up by focussing on the practical use, but by focussing on what is interesting.

Answer 4

I have only taken a few philosophy classes and the reason I took them was to learn more about the subject of philosophy and about their current areas of expertise and especially about famous classical writers of philosophy--Ayn Rand, Nietzsche, Engels, Friedman, Aquinas, Hobbes, Musashi, Michael Ruse (recently about Biology). Many of the well-known philosophers were/are influential during their lives or afterward. Most of them have made their name by writing specifically about a question and the possible answers that may arise.

Philosophy is quite a bit like mathematics or computer science except the questions addressed are not as easily formed as in those subjects. For mathematics and computer science, set theory and proofs rely on definitions of objects and the applicability of operations on those sets. One can easily examine mathematical and computing objects and operations and determine the truth or falseness of the statements.

In my work in computing, test theories, processes and procedures relied heavily on examining a set of objects, determining the operations that were applied to them, and providing a set of data that would examine each operation for any possible situation.

One of the most complicated cases of test occurred in the avionics "fly-by-wire" modules. These "black boxes" were safety critical features that were regulated by government bodies and potential sources of future liability suits (law). Many black boxes on government projects were sealed after being certified as a specific tested release of a requirements traceable functionality governed by a contractual agreement. Testing these items had to examine the code, the assumptions, the requirements, the given configuration, who certified it.

Customer Service Engineering, (as a different field), likewise, had to write test procedures for any item on an airplane that could fail and would require replacement.

As you can see from my examples, everything I said was subject to interpretation, not all of it subject to computer programs, computer systems, or mathematical logic. This is where philosophy comes in, especially in areas like the law. Sets of words can be tested for their legality and past decisions. Failures can cross organizations, systems, contracts, and ethics, cost lives, cost millions of dollars.

The ability to uncoil a nested set of all of these things is the realm of rational thinking and philosophy.

Philosophical thinking often deals with human beings and how they think rather than man made objects--now we're off on biological subjects too, and psychological.

Innovations often relies on philosophical thinking because most innovations involves the ability to step outside of a closed system and ask, "could anything else be considered?"

When humans get stuck -- think war, think unknown phenomena like ghosts or the Higgs particle, think global warming, or hunger, or poverty, or applicability of religion, or biased reactions, rational thinking and philosophy can offer the mental rigor to propose different, unconsidered solutions.

Philosophical questions are addressed relating to education, economics, political science, psychology, medicine, physics, biology, organizational behavior, military strategy, etc. Wisdom is the realm of philosophy--the fabled double-edge sword of the seers that offered advice came from the many interpretations that advice could potentially offer. Like the solution set, the problem set often has hidden, unexamined states that need to be considered.

Answer 5

My answer to "What is Philosophy?" hints at some practical ideas philosopher have been able to discover (or if you prefer: invent). The list of names barely touches the first layer of philosophers and yet the mathematical discoveries made be these few men would likely keep students busy for a hundred years. Now you might think that these mathematicians would have made even greater advances but for their dabbling in esoteric, i.e. impractical, ideas. Perhaps you are correct, but you've not given us any reason to believe you. My gut says that if these men focused only on the immediately practical, they would not have discovered as much.

Another claim you've made is that all the interesting bits of philosophy have been pealed off and moved to practical departments, such as math and science. My answer tends to agree with the idea, but I find no evidence that we've run out of potential new applications of philosophy. In fact, the field of Computer Science owes much of its foundation to philosophy. The true geniuses of our field (Donald Knuth, Larry Wall, Richard Stallman, etc.) seem insistent on thinking impractical thoughts. But they seem more insistent on claiming their philosophical thoughts are important to their work. Why should we argue.

Reading into your question a little bit, I think you are asking why should we continue to study the impractical bits of philosophy. The answer, I think, is similar to why I'm currently reading The Aeneid and a really low-brow thriller: I like reading books. It's sort of pointless to ask why I don't focus on the classics or on practical non-fiction. That's like asking why I have sex with my wife on days we can't get pregnant! Maybe philosophy is as uninteresting to you as professional wrestling is to me. But like me, you have a choice: steer clear of what you don't care for.

But you just watch: the impractical thoughts of philosophy today will become the foundations for some practical field of study tomorrow.

Answer 6

There is no need in philosophy, if you don't apply it in your everyday life.

Philosophy is like lenses through which we can look at the world around us, judge them, and make decisions about our future actions. We can use other lenses like - "other people", "rules", "myths" or "religion" - but philosophy is often more beneficial to its user than all alternatives.

Answer 7

Cicero's Hortensius, though effectively lost to us, appears to have been an answer to this very question. Hortensius was a contemporary of Cicero who suggested that Philosophy was useless because it had no practical value. Cicero's reply? From what we know, he argued (in only a slightly tongue-in-cheek manner):

In order to determine whether philosophy (or anything) has practical value, one must use philosophy.

Seriously. Just look at stoicfury's answer and tell me there's no philosophy (read: critical thinking and rational analysis) in it. It is futile to argue that philosophy has no practical use, because to do so you'd have to use philosophy (and in the process contradict yourself, proving that you just used philosophy for a practical purpose).

So, the next time someone says that philosophy (or anything) is useless, ask them this: How do you know?

You'll have them using philosophy in an instant.

Answer 8

I would be interested in reading your thoughts on philosophical counseling.

Here's a quote from a book review I quickly googled, and that shows a small example http://www.mentalhelp.net/poc/view_doc.php?id=119&type=book&cn=91

"Larry and Carol were married for twenty five years, had brought up two children, and both had successful careers. After the children had left home, Larry found that he no longer had much in common with his wife, and wondered whether to leave the relationship. Carol refused to even to talk with him about their relationship. Larry had no interest in meeting with a psychotherapist or psychiatrist, so Carol suggested he try a philosophical counselor. Larry met with Marinoff to discuss his quandary, and as a result of their conversations, Larry and his wife decided to end their marriage. Marinoff characterizes Larry’s problem as essentially philosophical: he was unsure what value to place upon his marriage vows, what value he should place upon his now unrewarding marriage, and how to balance those with his desire for fulfillment in life. For most of his clients, Marinoff does not assign readings. Instead he simply explains to them in lay terms some of the philosophical ideas relevant to their problems. Marinoff judges that Larry is a very logical sort of thinker, and so he explains the Kantian theory of perfect and imperfect duties, which he judges is closer to Larry’s implicit moral approach. He explains that it is possible to have duties to oneself as well as to others, and thus it may be morally permissible, or indeed morally required, now that his children are grown, for Larry to foster his own emotional growth by leaving the marriage."

Answer 9

Our greatest asset

For comparison, basically, human and animal have similar purpose in life, those are, survival and enjoyment. One of them by maintaining their environment to support their life.

The different between human and animal is on the fact that animal has less awareness about widening awareness than human.

As mentioned before, the most significant differentiation between human and animal is that human has capability to widen their awareness on its own desire (more aware, more feelings, more control including more experience in the future).

Compared with animal, we have a strictly boundary called "wider awareness than animal". Generally what we can do, animal also has capability to do as what we do but with less care, less awareness than human.

That's why human capable to control animal widely, because human's awareness (generally) did this (widening awareness).

Further by widening our awareness, human could understand something beyond their selves. That's why human capable to control their environment (for better and worse).

Even more, human could widen awareness not only beyond their selves but ability to widen awareness beyond their environment (usually it could be provided through meditation).

What would a degree in philosophy get you?

Our greatest asset is ability to widen awareness (if we intend to). it must relate us to awareness that philosophy must lead us to:

• Do wider survival, wider enjoyment and further wider domination than any beings that unable to widen awareness.

• Widen awareness beyond humanity, and it leads human to understand about something outside humanity and beyond universe that has usefulness to understand our places on life for better fairness.

The points are:

• Philosophy leads us to gradually critical thinking that leads to deepening our knowledge
• Further, our critical thinking & deepening knowledge leads us to reach better (wider) survival, better (wider) enjoyment and better (wider) domination
• Whether we have different ability to philosophize, but in the end, philosophy should be considerations that lead us to the real acts that ultimately brings us to better (wider) survival, better (wider) enjoyment and better (wider) domination. It's the practical aspect of critical thinking typical of philosophy. It's for personal matters or not. It's more than just anthropocentric. It includes widening awareness, spirituality and more, (scientifically speaking) which is in line with activation and the use of the left and the right sides of our brain. It's practical usefulness on philosophizing.

For relevant understanding, please refer to these links philosophy 1 & 2

Answer 10

Science can teach you how to do something.

Philosophy can teach you what to do and help you find good reasons why to bother.

The most valuable perspective I ever heard on Philosophy is that it is the love of wisdom. Wisdom being defined as 'the coordination of desires in the light of all experience'.

Science is a good source of experience since it is repeated and well tested experience, but as long as you are alive you have to decide what and whose desires you try to fulfill day to day, to what degree and your reasons for doing so, this is the practical use of philosophy.