Have you heard? AI companies are hiring philosophers! Sort of. News about jobs for philosophers is the kind of thing you might expect to read about at Daily Nous—for example, here is a post about which philosophers are working for which AI-related firms and organizations—yet articles about the topic have been cropping up lately in a surprising number of mainstream media outlets. The picture such articles have tended to paint is that the development of artificial intelligence has brought with it a new career path for people trained in philosophy. But how accurate is that picture? In reality, things are more complicated and less clear, as Aaron Kagan explains in the following guest post. Kagan is the founder of GraspingAI, an AI research and strategy organization. He holds a PhD in philosophy and has worked at Google Search, X / Loon, Meta Reality Labs, and other technology firms. He is also co-author of An Introduction to Embodied Mind: Thinking Outside the Head and serves as Chair of the American Philosophical Association’s Committee on Non-Academic Careers. UPDATE: Dr. Kagan says that he used AI as an editorial aid during the drafting and revising of this post, but that “the argument, research, job-posting analysis, and conclusions are my own.” The Philosophy Job Market Deepfake by Aaron Kagan AI has produced a strange new fantasy about the humanities: maybe philosophy was the practical major all along. In the past few weeks, the story has been hard to miss. Wired told readers that to land a job in AI, they might try reading Kant. The Atlantic announced that someone finally wants to hire philosophers. Business Insider argued that AI is opening doors for philosophy majors. The Economist asked why big AI labs are hiring so many philosophers. International Business Times said AI companies were “recruiting philosophers.” And now The New York Times has given the story its biggest platform yet, under the headline “The Revenge of the Philosophy Majors.” The message is irresistible, especially at a moment when students, parents, universities, and laid-off workers are all trying to make sense of a brutal job market. AI may be destroying some jobs, but perhaps it is creating a new home for people trained to think about values, meaning,..

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