What is a philosophy major good for?

And I'm just curious, has anyone in recent history been dumb enough to get one?

I’ll bet you didn’t know that Stephen Colbert, who has been host of The Tonight Show on CBS since 2015, was a philosophy major when he attended Hampden-Sydney College in Virginia (from 1982-84).

He’s not the only talk show host to major in philosophy. The former host of not one, but two, late-night talk shows, Conan O’Brien, was also a philosophy major when he attended Harvard University (from 1981-85).

Or what about Jodie Foster and Tilda Swinton, both award-winning actresses? Yup, both philosophy majors. Lots of people in the entertainment world, as it turns out, were philosophy majors: Directors and screenwriters Wes Anderson and Ethan Coen, composer Philip Glass, authors Iris Murdoch and Umberto Eco, and even movie critic Gene Siskel.

Former U.S. President Thomas Jefferson, U.S. Supreme Court Justice David Souter, and Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara were all, you guessed it, philosophy majors.

In the business world, George Soros, Carl Icahn, and Mark Cuban all majored in philosophy. In the sports world, Phil Jackson, who won 11 NBA championships as a head coach for the Chicago Bulls and Los Angeles Lakers, was not only the inventor of the triangle offense but, even more remarkably, a philosophy major.

And though I could list many others, here are just a few more names: Stokely Carmichael (civil rights leader), Pope John Paul II (religious leader), Steve Martin (comedian), Madelyn Murray O’Hare (well-known and often-despised atheist), Ayn Rand (Russian-American writer), Hannah Arendt (German-American historian and philosopher), Simone de Beauvoir (French philosopher, writer, and feminist), and Albert Schweitzer (physician, organist, theologian, and winner of the Nobel Peace Prize).

How do I know all of that? Well, to be honest, I looked it up. But, more accurately, I have found myself wondering lately about my own philosophy major.

When I started college in 1971 as a 17-year-old, I had vague thoughts about becoming a lawyer or maybe a journalist. I didn’t know any lawyers or journalists personally, but I had seen a few on TV and thought that life in one of those careers might be interesting. So, I started out pre-law with a major in poli sci. Impressive, right?

However, about the time that I had enough credits for a poli sci major, I realized that neither law nor journalism was a good fit for me.

What I could see as well as anyone was that my college had several outstanding faculty members in the philosophy department, teachers with growing national reputations, teachers who would one day be among the best in their fields. And so, mostly to get my money’s worth, I started taking classes from them. I’m glad I did.

By graduation, I had enough credits to claim a double major in poli sci and philosophy. (Looking back, I could probably have done without the required course in symbolic logic, but the rest of the courses were—how should I put this?—riveting. No, seriously. Even medieval philosophy. I think that one may even have been my favorite.)

Here’s the thing: I never once asked myself what I was going to do with my philosophy major. I gave little thought, at least until my senior year, about the future.I can see now that this was a matter of privilege. Getting out and getting a job were not serious concerns for me, as they are for many, if not most, students today. I simply took classes because I thought they looked interesting, because I could sense my intellectual world expanding in wonderful ways. It’s even possible that I told myself that these classes would help me with critical thinking, problem solving, and communication skills, which would be helpful in most jobs.

Today, students face economic pressures I did not face, including sometimes-crushing student loans, so classes in STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) seem to make more sense. Beyond that, many colleges and universities are cutting back their offerings in humanities and allocating more in STEM programs. Standardized testing these days also prioritizes math and science over humanities majors.

I am deeply concerned about all of this and am fearful of the long-term consequences. The change, as I see it, is short-sighted. And beyond that, it overlooks the evidence.

According to a recent World Economic Forum post, philosophy majors have a higher average salary potential than chemistry, marketing, business administration, history, and many other majors (with the biggest increase in earning power during the first ten years after graduation). I seemed to know that intuitively in 1975, when I graduated, but the data confirms it.

Mark Cuban recently claimed that a philosophy major will very soon be worth more than a computer science degree. He bases his prediction on the growing importance of AI. Getting a computer science degree just won’t be all that valuable in 10 years, while critical thinking, problem solving, and communication skills will always be needed for most careers.

When Robert E. Rubin, former Secretary of the Treasury, arrived at Harvard in 1965, he reports feeling overwhelmed academically, but he soon found his footing, of all places, in the university’s philosophy classes. Years later, having survived serious storms in both the business world and public service, he says that “the key was Professor Demos’ Greek philosophy course….” Raphael Demos was at the time Professor of Natural Religion, Moral Philosophy and Civil Policy at Harvard—not a teacher of computer science.

But I will stick with my conviction that a philosophy major is a worthwhile investment. Like those talk show hosts, movie directors, authors, business leaders, and others I mentioned at the beginning, a philosophy major—as well as other majors in the world of humanities—can sometimes prepare us for an astonishing life, even a life that makes a difference in the lives of others.

Photos: Stephen Colbert (top), Steve Martin, (second from top), Iris Murdoch (third), and finally (bottom) a T-shirt implies that philosophy majors end up working at fast-food restaurants.