bar_scene_gambler

I don't think it has to do with the economy. The reason I say that is because, were it just the economy, I don't think we would see much of a rise in philosophy admissions. When people lose their jobs due to a poor economy, what do they do? They go back to college to make themselves more employable. Philosophy, as a general rule, is not a program of study employers look for. My guess is that dramatic rises in applications due to the economy occur in fields like computer science, engineering, and other STEM fields, not philosophy. Sure, there may be some who find their calling and give up on employability, but I doubt very much that the dramatic rise in applications is to people finding their passion. I think the rise in applications is due to a shrinking environment in philosophy. Many smaller departments, especially small state-funding departments, are closing shop or being merged with other departments like Religion Studies (a travesty if there ever was one). The big-names and well respected departments are generally safe, but even then that's not universally true. So, what you're left with is the same, or maybe even a smaller, number of applicants applying for a gradually shrinking number of positions. Year after year, those denied will apply to a greater number of departments, or perhaps they will apply to other departments, or perhaps better departments looking for placement. Thus, it will show a rise in applications, even with a growing economy. This is all purely speculative of course, but I think it accounts for the general trend in applications, despite the improving economy.

I think it's a double-edged blade. On the one hand, it's a symptom of the professionalization of the humanities, something which I am absolutely against. And yet, given what I've seen of the typical education in philosophy, I can't say that I'm surprised. You're right that it disenfranchises poor applicants. Actually, it's much worse than that. It makes philosophy a rich-man's field again, as only some select MA programs have the money to fund their students' education. As such, those programs become the "place to be" if you're a good student of philosophy, and you see the field narrowing to only the best of the best. This may seem like a great thing, but it isn't. Consider the MA programs that don't fund. Only people with the means are going to be able to attend MA programs which don't fund, meaning that admissions will inevitably be decided by who has the money. Those without means will simply not attend, and, although there will inevitably be "good philosophers" with means, many will simply be buying their way into philosophy. This means a leveling of both the quality and perspective of applicants. It also means "training" for would-be philosophers. I am absolutely opposed to the concept of "here is model x, and this is what philosophers should try to work towards". I think that MA programs will inevitably become training programs, programs which teach you the importance of "professional" work in philosophy. This means education in the importance of journals and conferences, pedagogy, etc. These things are all valuable in their own way, but be trained to be a model of a philosopher also levels creativity. In a sense, being trained to do philosophy, as opposed to being educated (and there is a difference), is the death of philosophical ingenuity. On the other hand, as I have attended conferences and spoken with other undergraduates, I have come to notice that education at the BA level is generally quite poor, especially at the state schools I have been to. I'm not going to make too many generalizations save this, if the quality of philosophical education does not improve at the undergraduate level, then MA programs will be necessary just to make PhD applications worth looking at. I am not going to pretend what the real cause of the problem is, but there are some general trends that I find rather disturbing, such as focus on secondary texts to the point of not reading the primary text at all, too many survey courses and not enough intensive study of singular texts, and educators either not spending enough time with, or not spending any time at all with, their majors. I have had the privilege of studying at an institution where all of these are not issues, and I have benefited from it, but I've noticed that many other undergraduates have not had the same opportunities. So I think, on the whole, the popularization of MA programs is harmful to the field, but it may also be unavoidable given the poor quality of many philosophy programs.

Haha, I did. I just finished a rather drab 30ish pages detailing the connection between Hume's psychology and ethics. I spent the semester reading his corpus (minus some essays) as a part of an independent study. His grasp of human psychology was fascinating, but the little he has on aesthetics left a bad taste in my mouth.

If you think that's bad, listen to this. U Warwick messed up all of my recommendation request emails. Normally that wouldn't be so bad, except that they refuse to resend them. So my professors have to email them and send hard copies to the UK. When they sent in their emails, my professor were told that they don't accept emailed recommendations, so I had to fight it out with the department and the graduate school to get them to accept the emailed recommendations. It's been a real nightmare.

Ah! An early modern guy/gal. Welcome. I actually just finished a rather awful paper on Hume's ethics, but I've developed a bit of a philosophical crush as a result. I'm sure glad I won't be competing with you.

I haven't even submitted all of my apps yet. I've been trying to space them out. They're completed, but I didn't want to drop all the money on them at once. I've just resigned myself to reading as much as I can over break and losing myself in coursework next semester.

Oh, I see what you mean. I think your reaction just now that there's nothing to it is probably correct. We have no idea how many applicants post results here, or what quality they are, which is to say that a larger portion of higher quality applicants visiting this site would skew the postings towards upper-tier departments and vice versa.

zizeksucks is right. The postings are next to useless, as you can't tell where the applicant comes from, what their writing sample was like, whether they were good students etc. All you get is GRE scores (if you're lucky) and maybe some info on whether or not they were funded.

I'm just leaving my transcripts the way they are. No point in updating them. I've had my third 4.0 semester in a row, but it does little to change my GPA at this point.

To be honest, anyone who says that because Nietzsche had mental health issues and therefore wasn't a proper philosopher doesn't know anything about Nietzsche. His health issues prior to his mental breakdown were mostly physical ailments, and any depression he may have experienced is not anything abnormal to philosophers and certainly isn't of the caliber of mental issues that I suspect dfindley suffers from. And let's be honest, what philosopher worth his salt will deny at least the influence Nietzsche has had on philosophy in the last 150 years? As for your second point, that's just blatantly not true. Yes, he may not have had a cult following like Wittgenstein, but he was (and remains) the youngest academic chair in the history of the German university system. If that isn't enough to establish the fact that his work was respected, I don't know what is. And Dr. Mustache...really?

I actually found him irritating before the realization that he probably has some kind of mental health problem. Now it's pretty easy to ignore him. I think zizeksucks just finds it amusing, which isn't so bad in my opinion. And he keeps asking dfindley to seek professional help.

Hey, can I get in on this upvote party? I've been exasperated by dfindley from the beginning.

I know what you mean. It's difficult pigeon-holing oneself like one must in order to talk about one's interests.

That's a broad AOI. And it looks like we're competing for position in over half of your school choices...lovely.

That sucks. I feel like one of my apps had a similar word limit. Penn State maybe? I can't remember. Anyway, I doubt it will impact your application too much.

No, I'm not having any issues now. It looks like the info is all there.

I'm applying to fund an MA in Continental Philosophy at U Warwick in the UK, but I have no idea regarding whether or not it affects one's chance of acceptance.

So, my first official deadline was yesterday. It was for U Chicago's Committee on Social Thought. I nearly had a heart attack because one of my recommenders waited until 8 pm to submit his recommendation, but it's finally in. One down, eleven to go.

I'm sorry you guys. I didn't apply, but that must be disheartening.

Yep. Looks like someone deleted the whole thing. What a mess.

What can I say? Lady luck has been on my side so far. 2 of my letters come close to earth-shattering praise, which is great, but the third was lackluster. I spoke with him and he said he'd spiff it up.

Woah. Tons of new people. Good to talk to you all. My weakest points are either pedigree or GRE. My school has no PhD program and is unknown in Philosophy (though Top 40 US News) and my GRE scores were pretty average.

The good ones spoke at length about the type of work I did, mentioning that most of my courses were upper-level courses. They spoke about my qualities as a potential philosopher, and as an educator (I co-taught a course with one of my recommendation writers). Beyond that, they both spoke about personal qualities of mine (apparently I'm unfailingly polite and enthusiastic) and one even went so far as to say that more people of my qualities are needed in academia, which I think is really putting her reputation on the line and putting something of a burden on myself to live up to her high praise. But no, they didn't compare me to other students. I think it's because they don't want to trash their reputation as a department more than anything else.

Lucky for me I'm not applying to too many highly ranked programs. Hopefully you get in somewhere this time around kant.

Spreadsheet is here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AsJrSSHnssqFdHNPell4VVZwWDgtWUpQcTVVeWM0bWc&usp=sharing#gid=1