B.S. in Physics, PhD in Philosophy?

Geremia

Has anyone here majored in physics as an undergrad and switched to philosophy as a graduate student? Thanks

eri

Has anyone? Yes. Has anyone here? Unlikely. What are you planning to do with a PhD in philosophy? There are far more people with PhDs in philosophy who want to teach college than there are jobs for them.

Geremia

I would like to teach and write.Yes, but what if one wants to stick with academia? Then the same could be said about physics PhDs, too. No?

G01

If you consider only academic jobs, then yes. People do say this about Physics PhDs as well. However, the academic job situation is far far worse for people outside scientific disciplines. People from both scientific and liberal arts disciplines will agree on this.

eri

There are a lot of jobs outside academia for physics PhDs. There's really nothing you can do with a PhD in philosophy besides teach and write, and there are far more people with PhDs in philosophy than there are faculty jobs. Any other job you get with that degree really wouldn't be utilizing the degree.

cmos

Check out the first "area of study" on this page: http://philosophy.ucsd.edu/graduate/areasofstudy.html
There's also this one, but I'm not sure if they have a graduate program: http://www.ox.ac.uk/admissions/under...ics_and_3.html

Also, I think there was a recent conference at the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics where half of the attendees/speakers were "modern philosophers."

Phyisab****

If you're dead set on working hard pondering unanswerable questions so you can live in poverty then yes, I'd say philosophy is the way to go.

G037H3

Real philosophers develop interesting worldviews and write them down. They don't get a degree in philosophy and suddenly become insightful.

rhombusjr

I don't think you should have too much trouble doing philosophy after physics. The reason I think this is that my school offers a dual BS in physics and philosophy, so I would think that it wouldn't be too hard to get into a philosophy program with a physics BS, especially if you look for a program in philosophy of science like the ones cmos found.

Geremia

Yes, this is true. Look at Heisenberg or Pierre Duhem; they were physicists who wrote some awesome philosophy of physics.