New York Times: 'The revenge of the philosophy major'

"The Revenge of the Philosophy Major", published in The New York Times, drew wide comment in the philosophy community in July. Daily Nous picked it up and the argument continued from there.

The frame#

The main thread is familiar. For years humanities students were told to learn to code if they wanted work. The picture now looks reversed. As artificial intelligence takes over part of software production, the skills that hold their value shift: defining a problem correctly, testing assumptions, turning a vague demand into clear criteria, seeing whom a result will affect and how.

Those are the daily practices of a philosophy education.

The numbers#

According to the Philosophy Now figures reported here earlier, unemployment among philosophy graduates in the United States stood at 5.1 per cent in 2024, against 7 per cent for computer science graduates.

A cautious reading#

Some in the field treat such coverage warily, on two grounds:

1. Single data points are not trends. One year's employment figure says little about the long-term position of departments.
2. The headline and the institutional reality are diverging. In the same period the University of Dundee announced plans to withdraw its philosophy major; the petition against it gathered more than five thousand signatures.

The "value" of philosophy is rising while the budgets of philosophy departments move the other way.