From: Nick Bostrom (nick@nickbostrom.com)
Date: Wed Dec 20 2000 - 18:33:10 MST
Zeb Haradon wrote:
>Slightly off topic, but it's useless to major in something like philosophy
>and/or psychology. I'm not talking about the tired (but true) argument
>that they are not profitable later in life.
At the London School of Economics, where I was before, the faculty was fond
of pointing out to profit-oriented masters students that George Soros once
studied there for Karl Popper. So now you know why he became a billionaire!
Behind every rich man, there's gotta be a philosopher lurking somewhere.
You see, it's not that we don't know how to make tons of money; we just
can't be bothered. ;-)
> I just mean that these are things you do not really need formal
> instruction in to learn. Someone who devotes 4 years to studying
> philosophy, or psychology (or art history, etc.) is going to be better
> off then someone with a major in it.
Learning philosophy is mainly about learning careful, critical thinking,
and the interactive element is critical for that. Learning art history is
to a large extent to learn to identify, interpret and put into context
various art-historical artifacts, and the good way of doing that is by
walking around in museums etc. in a small group with your teacher and
discuss what you see. - You need feedback on your performance in order to
learn well, and it is easier to get feedback during self-study when you do
something like math or physics (where the correct answers are often
provided at the end of the book) than when you study one of the humanities.
Dr. Nick Bostrom
Department of Philosophy
Yale University
Homepage: http://www.nickbostrom.com
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