Peeking Out of the Ivory Tower
10 Aug 2025Praise, condemnation, questions, and comments can be sent via email
I recently received an unorthodox request from a friend. He had been reading something or other related to philosophy, and asked me to help him fill in some of the philosophical context. This friend isn’t a philosopher, and so he asked someone with philosophical expertise to help out. What struck me about this request wasn’t anything about the content of the request or the sort of philosophy he’s reading, but rather the very fact that I found the request unorthodox.
I regularly solicit opinions from friends who are experts in economics, finance, political science, health sciences, and computer science. Moreover, these friends are used to receiving requests for their input on various topics. Since I started grad school, I’ve received more requests for philosophical expertise than when I was in undergrad, but still not many. I don’t think anyone in the field expects philosophical queries from their non-philosopher friends, certainly not in the same way someone working in banking might expect their opinion to be solicited on stock choices or interest rates.
I could take the condescending path, and blame the unwashed masses for their own ignorance in philosophical matters. I will not take this path. Instead, I see the lack of interest in philosophical topics as an indictment of philosophers and the way that we go about doing philosophy. I include myself in the category “philosopher”, I do not level these criticisms from pulpit but rather from among the congregation.
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Le Penseur, Stanislas Torrents
Philosophers are happy to lock themselves in the ivory tower, generally preferring the method of “think really hard about it” to the method of “go out and engage with it”. Any paper which suggests that philosophy should integrate some empirical methods unfailingly causes a stir, in which philosophers lament the trampling of legitimate philosophical inquiry by overly zealous science types.
I should be clear: I do not think that philosophy should be a more empirical discipline; I am doubtful that it should be empirical at all. But the tension between philosophers and empiricists is illustrative. Philosophers are very content to be alone with their thoughts. I think this introverted disposition has led philosophers to largely shun engagement with the public. I don’t necessarily think there is any real enmity towards the public among professional philosophers, but there does seem to be a sense that the work we do is highly technical, deeply nuanced, and difficult to meaningfully transmit to non-academics.
This, I think, can lead to a certain perception of philosophers as esoteric, elitist, and even as societal parasites. Philosophers can be construed as working on problems that are unimportant or trivial, our work can be seen as frivolous or ridiculous. None of these critiques are new, even Socrates was lampooned in the play The Clouds by the Greek playwright Aristophanes, portrayed as being a specious thinker who pollutes the minds of the youth.
Scientists are much better about going out and engaging the public. In the last half-century, Bill Nye, Neil DeGrasse Tyson, and John Green have all built their careers on science communication. Influential scientists are often featured in news segments or even, a la Carl Sagan, given their own television shows. Science, I think, gets a large reputation boost from this. There are still people who are skeptical of scientists or scientific research, but I think the problem would be much worse were it not for the work of science communicators.
Philosophical communication is not so straightforward, philosophy is in near constant and often radical flux, and the field doesn’t make progress in the same way that science does. It wouldn’t make sense for news outlets to cover fresh papers from leading thinkers in the way that new science can make the front page. Peter Singer has notably broken through into the mainstream, at least among Silicon Valley types, with his ideas on effective altruism. But the popularity of Singer is only the transmission of one philosopher’s conclusions to a popular audience, the broader philosophical context and debates around Singer’s work is largely confined to the academy.
Overpeinzing, Jozef Israëls
A major obstacle in actualizing public philosophy is that there doesn’t seem to be any real motivation among philosophers to communicate the importance and substance of ongoing work in the field. Philosophical careers are not built on public philosophy, they are built on philosophy that is written for philosophers. If I were to enter the job market for a tenure track position with my only publications being written for a general audience, I think I would have a tough time getting any interviews.
Public debates between philosophers might be an interesting way to bring some consciousness of contemporary philosophical work to the public’s eye. Especially debates that break down key points without getting bogged down in trade jargon. Perhaps more books published on new philosophical developments, written with a public audience in mind, would be helpful. One of my colleagues at Rochester suggested that anyone getting a Ph.D. (in any field) should have to spend 3-5 years post-Ph.D. teaching in primary or secondary education before being eligible for post-secondary roles.
Any proposed changes could not be confined to a few well-meaning graduate students and professors in one or two departments. The change would have to happen systematically, across the whole field. Most likely, the change would have to occur within hiring committees, so that the next generations of graduate students would be deeply concerned with their ability to communicate the nuances of philosophy to a popular audience.
I don’t (yet) have the clout and the name recognition to effectuate this change. Maybe in 20-30 years. For now, I hope to find ways to do more public philosophy while I’m in graduate school. I have some ideas, but I have nothing to announce at this point.
I will offer my readers this. If you have a philosophical question, give it to me. I will (1) help you refine the question, (2) research the question, surrounding debate, philosophical context, etc. and (3) give you the best answer that I can, including the contemporary debates around the subject (to the extent there are any). Freelance philosophy, at your service. It’s not the wide scale change that I think the field needs, but it’s a start.
If you’re a philosopher reading this, I ask that you take the call to popularize and communicate the work in our field seriously. In the next 5-10 years things are only going to get worse for academic philosophers, and the more the public sees the value in our work, the better.
Please let me know your thoughts! Send me your philosophical problems! Thanks for reading!