# I just earned a Doctorate in Philosophy **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [January 31, 2011, 4:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-just-earned-a-doctorate-in-philosophy/569656 "2011-01-31T16:11:19Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![etv78](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/d78d45/32.png) [@etv78](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/etv78)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2011, 1:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-just-earned-a-doctorate-in-philosophy/569656/41 "2011-02-01T01:33:54Z")
Congrats! (and, yes, I would like fries with that) 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Cisco](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ccd318/32.png) [@Cisco](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cisco)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2011, 2:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-just-earned-a-doctorate-in-philosophy/569656/42 "2011-02-01T02:36:18Z")
In the United States, you write a thesis for your masters degree. To get a PhD, you write a dissertation. Congratulations, Frylock. What are you going to do with it? (I assume teach, but pretty much any other answer would be super interesting :)). ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2011, 3:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-just-earned-a-doctorate-in-philosophy/569656/43 "2011-02-01T03:06:21Z")
> [@MeanOldLady](#): > > So maybe you can answer this question: How much wood would a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood? [Cecil’s answer](http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/411/how-much-wood-would-a-woodchuck-chuck-if-a-woodchuck-could-chuck-wood) isn’t good enough for you? ---
**Author:** ![capybara](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/capybara/32/202_2.png) [@capybara](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/capybara)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2011, 3:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-just-earned-a-doctorate-in-philosophy/569656/44 "2011-02-01T03:44:26Z")
Congratulations, Doctor in Philosophy! And you make this Doctor in Art History feel slightly less insane. Hard humanities represent! ---
**Author:** ![Savannah](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b3f665/32.png) [@Savannah](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Savannah)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2011, 4:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-just-earned-a-doctorate-in-philosophy/569656/45 "2011-02-01T04:13:59Z")
Wow! Congratulations! I fled with a measly BA, and can’t imagine having the discipline to go all the way… ---
**Author:** ![Isamu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/7c8e57/32.png) [@Isamu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Isamu)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2011, 4:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-just-earned-a-doctorate-in-philosophy/569656/46 "2011-02-01T04:15:58Z")
How can you be so sure? ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2011, 4:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-just-earned-a-doctorate-in-philosophy/569656/47 "2011-02-01T04:18:27Z")
Thanks for the congrats everyone. To answer some of your questions: > [@cromulent](#): > > Congrats! > Are you available to provide answers to deep philosophical and/or ethical questions? (For a reduced fee, I hope, as I don’t have philosophy insurance…) No, but I can help you think about them for free. If you feel confused, I’ll help you get clear. If you feel clear, I’ll help you get confused. Both are equally valuable services. 😉 There is in fact a growing movement of “Philosophical Practitioners” (it’s a pretty well established trend in Europe, just getting its real start in the US) and some Philosophical Practitioners do really sit the client down in a room, psychologist-style, and help them work through philosophical problems, or else help them work through life problems using philosophical techniques. I find this intriguing. > [@](#): > > I just noticed that you received a doctorate “in” not “of” philosophy. My post was not intended to be a jab at your degree. Congrats! No prob–I did think you were just talking about Philosophy majors, but I also thought you were making a sympathetic joke, seeing as how you called the lady “stupid.” > [@](#): > > Now … say something deep Well, right now the one-liner that goes through my head is “A mind is a body composed of representations.” Not very impressive, I know… 😉 > [@](#): > > What was your thesis on? There’s this idea going around called the Extended Mind Hypothesis that says many of our manipulations of the environment aren’t just the results of or aids to our cognitions–they’re actually part of our cognitions. Our minds literally extend beyond our bodies. This is something a lot of cognitive scientists (but nowhere near a majority) take seriously. In Philosophy, there’s the matter of Personal Identity. This is a complex of questions about what constitutes an individual’s identity, especially his identity over time. What makes me now the same person as the child who, twenty years ago, was destined to become me? My dissertation defends the Extended Mind Hypothesis, but only in order to establish it as an idea worth taking philosophically seriously (even if it’s truth isn’t firmly established). I then go on to argue that if it’s true, this suggests a “Parfitian” approach to personal identity. I also argue that “Psychological” approaches to personal identity, in general, are committed to the view that minds do extend using technologies currently in common use. A “Parfitian” approach to personal identity says that the child 20 years ago and the person I am now are _not_ identical. They are two different things. But they do share a relationship more like “ancestor” and “descendant,” and it is this relationship (not the relationship of identity) which we are concerned about when we wonder what would constitute our own survival or failure to survive. A “Psychological” approach to personal identity (a Parfitian one is a sub-class of this, though you have to be careful with your word choice here between “survival” and “identity”) is one which says that identity (or survival, depending on the particular view) is constituted not by bodily continuity but by psychological continuity instead. Along the way I address three topics as they become relevant: The Chinese Room (you can find reference to this on Wikipedia): I argue that nothing in the Chinese Room scenario is computationally equivalent to a computer programmed to understand Chinese. Because of this, it turns out that even if nothing in the Chinese Room scenario understands, nevertheless, the appropriately programmed computer _might_. (Most thinkers assume that either the Chinese Room or some part of it or extension of it understands Chinese, or else no computer could. I argue against this disjunction.) Derived and Non-Derived Intentional Content: A representation with “derived content” has that content only by virtue of the way it is treated by agents. A representation with “original content” has that content without regard to the way it’s treated by any agents. Many philosophers think that cognition involves original content in a special way. Many others think that all content is actually derived–there is no original content. To the contrary, I argue that both original and derived content exist, but most content turns out to be original. Even when I am reading a book (natively, with facility), I am using the content of the representations on the page as bearers of _original_ content, not derived as is usually assumed. Swampman: Swampman is physically identical to some human being, but was created purely by coincidence as a result of an explosion in a swamp. He has no evolutionary history. Many thinkers argue that Swampman has no biological functions or mental states, even though he is physically indistinguishable from a human being. I argue, instead, that he _does_ have biological functions and mental states, yet I also argue that any scientist actually encountering Swampman in the real world would have to treat Swampman _as though_ he had no biological functions or mental states. Biologists, in other words, have to follow a method which _assumes_ biological function is constituted by evolutionary history, but no one should draw from this any ontological conclusions about what biological functions are _really_ constituted by. What they’re really constituted by is the only thing anything can be constituted by–the present states and dispositions of physical systems. That was more than I intended to write but I’ll leave it up I think. > [@](#): > > I was about to ask what subject it was in, until I noticed the preposition. > > By “just earned”, do you mean that you’ve defended your thesis, that the paperwork has cleared with the college, or that you’ve had the hooding ceremony? I just defended it last Friday. It was approved by my committee. I have to make the manuscript all pretty (and I’ve noticed a few whoppers, like reference entries with question marks in place of year and publisher! Glad to see the committee has their priorities straight. 😉 )and submit it as a PDF and shortly thereafter they’ll send me something saying the degree is conferred. I won’t be participating in the hooding ceremony–I live in Indianapolis, my university’s in Irvine, it’s just too far away unfortunately. > [@](#): > > Yes, congratulations, but thesis titles are the kitten pictures of new Ph.D. threads. Unfortunately, my title is terrible: _Cognition, Function, Identity_. > [@](#): > > What are you going to do with it? (I assume teach, but pretty much any other answer would be super interesting ). I’m a University professor. Plan to teach and write until I die… Thinking about looking into that Philosophical Practitioner thing as well, though… Where I teach, I’m in the department of “Community Services” and many of my colleagues (Psychologists, Pastors, Gerontologists) are in the business of counseling, so it’s an interesting fit… ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2011, 4:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-just-earned-a-doctorate-in-philosophy/569656/48 "2011-02-01T04:24:16Z")
> [@Isamu](#): > > How can you be so sure? My quick insufficient answer to this kind of question: If I’m not sure of this, I can’t have any reasonable assurance of anything at all. If I can’t have any reasonable assurance of anything at all, I can have no basis for action. But I must act, and when I act, I must believe I have a basis. So I must believe I have a reasonable assurance of something or other. So I must be sure that I have earned a Doctorate in Philosophy–whether it’s true or not. ---
**Author:** ![Indian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/c0e974/32.png) [@Indian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Indian)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2011, 4:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-just-earned-a-doctorate-in-philosophy/569656/49 "2011-02-01T04:56:59Z")
> [@Frylock](#): > > Just sayin’ is all. Which is your favourite philosopher joke? Can you prove that you don’t exist? ---
**Author:** ![Isamu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/7c8e57/32.png) [@Isamu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Isamu)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2011, 5:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-just-earned-a-doctorate-in-philosophy/569656/50 "2011-02-01T05:01:06Z")
> [@Frylock](#): > > My quick insufficient answer to this kind of question: > > If I’m not sure of this, I can’t have any reasonable assurance of anything at all. If I can’t have any reasonable assurance of anything at all, I can have no basis for action. But I must act, and when I act, I must believe I have a basis. So I must believe I have a reasonable assurance of something or other. So I must be sure that I have earned a Doctorate in Philosophy–whether it’s true or not. Well… congrats for your belief! 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Autolycus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/22d042/32.png) [@Autolycus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Autolycus)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2011, 5:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-just-earned-a-doctorate-in-philosophy/569656/51 "2011-02-01T05:14:24Z")
Is it “I think therefore I am?” or “I doubt therefore I am?” Congratulations! ---
**Author:** ![BaneSidhe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/c5a1d2/32.png) [@BaneSidhe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BaneSidhe)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2011, 5:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-just-earned-a-doctorate-in-philosophy/569656/52 "2011-02-01T05:39:14Z")
Congratulations!! ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2011, 6:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-just-earned-a-doctorate-in-philosophy/569656/53 "2011-02-05T18:12:16Z")
Sorry, was checking some old emails and found that there was one response on this thread calling for a response that got no response. What’s my favorite philosopher joke? This: What do you tell the philosopher standing on your front porch? You tell him thanks for the pizza, and you give him a nice tip. Also: Philosophy is the practice of addressing questions fit for a child using tools fit for a lawyer. ---
**Author:** ![Boyo\_Jim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/87869e/32.png) [@Boyo\_Jim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boyo_Jim)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2011, 9:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-just-earned-a-doctorate-in-philosophy/569656/54 "2011-02-05T21:01:15Z")
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