The Philosophers' Cocoon

A safe and supportive forum for philosophers.

Owned & Moderated by Marcus Arvan (University of Tampa)

Contact: marvan@ut.edu

Blog mission & moderation policy

IMPORTANT NOTE on how to ensure anonymity in commenting
Job-Market Reporting Thread (2026-27)
Job-Market Discussion Thread (2026-27)

recent posts

about

Reader query on doing philosophy while in another academic discipline

A reader wrote in today with the following query, encouraging me to share it on the Cocoon for discussion:

I hope you don't mind but I thought I'd ask you for some advice. I am a biologist, currently doing a postdoc on a marine biology subject. During my biology PhD I took a couple of extracurricular courses in epistemology, and fell in love with philosophy. Recently I found myself thinking more and more about philosophical themes, especially philosophy of biology, which kind of makes sense considering my background. This year I was very happy to have a paper published in this area. My postdoc advisor was somewhat surprised by the subject matter, but was pleased with the publication (since we are evaluated on the basis of productivity, a paper is a paper is a paper, I suppose). Although I fully intend to finish my postdoc and pursue further employment in biology, I would also like to try to publish an occasional philosophical paper. Do you think this is a reasonable goal? Or do you reckon it might hinder my employment prospects within biology? And in order for me to be able to make a contribution to the discipline, do you think I ought to get a proper qualification in philosophy? I only had philosophy in high school, plus those two epistemology courses I mentioned. I read a lot of philosophy, but I'm not sure that's enough. The problem is, there is no philosophy at the only university where I live now; my only option would be to do the online BA … but it requires a significant investment of time and money. I'm not sure I could do it on top of the postdoc. Also, is it a bit silly to get a BA in another subject after a PhD? I've never heard of anyone doing that.
Although I do not have much experience with this kind of situation, I shared some of my own tentative thoughts via email. Briefly, my thoughts are that the person should probably focus primarily on publishing in their primary discipline, at least if they are concerned about their career prospects in biology–as it is unclear to me whether future employers (e.g. department members, tenure and promotion committees, and administrators) are likely to look as favorably as this person's current postdoc advisor on publishing in other disciplines (some people, after all, can be rather parochial and closeminded!). I am also not sure, given the time, resources, and distraction from biology a degree in philosophy would involve, that it would be wise to pursue that route in the person's situation. However, given that the person has already published in philosophy of biology, and given that it is possible to self-teach philosophy by reading the current literature, I see little harm–and potential benefit, both for this person and for philosophy–in choosing to read, write, and continue to try to publish in philosophy in their spare time (indeed, I personally know one person in a very different academic discipline who manages to attend philosophy colloquia, present at philosophy conferences, and publish regularly in philosophy in very good journals).
 
But again, these are just my thoughts. What are yours?
 
Posted in

4 responses to “Reader query on doing philosophy while in another academic discipline”

  1. Steven French

    fwiw: my impression is that biologists are much more ‘open’ to engagement with philosophers and philosophy in general than others over on the science see of things. The journal Biology and Philosophy is an excellent forum in which both philosophers and philosophically inclined biologists publish and the occasional joint effort also shows up in BJPS, EJPS, PoS, Synthese and elsewhere. All of which is to say that one can make significant contributions to phil biol either on one’s own or together with a philosopher without having to take a phil degree as well. And I’m not even sure he/she would have to do this in their spare time – it obviously depends on their dept. but as I indicated above, many biologists see philosophical enquiry into the foundations of the field as perfectly legit. (of course if he/she is planning to publish in mainstream epistemology, say, that might be a different kettle of marine life!)
    cheers,
    Steven

    Reply
  2. Ulrich Stegmann

    I was in a somewhat similar situation to yours, though I eventually decided to switch to philosophy. I share Marcus’ point that if you want to continue in biology, search committees and funding agencies will look at your track record in biology itself. Nonetheless, my sense is that you could combine philosophical activity with continuing a career in biology. One way to do this is to apply philosophical insights and/or tools to the biological research questions you are concerned with anyway (e.g. if you work on marine biodiversity, draw on the philosophical literature on biodiversity). In principle, you could then publish the more specifically biological results in biology journals and the more philosophically relevant ones in philosophy journals. And you don’t need a formal qualification in philosophy in order to make a contribution to philosophy of biology, e.g. in order to get published or be accepted to conferences or be taken seriously more generally. That said, a period of training in philosophy could be very useful to learn some basics and how you might approach things (e.g. a 1-yr PG qualification taken part-time). Happy to correspond further about this off-list.

    Reply
  3. Tom

    While it’s currently closed, the academic cross-training fellowship program offered by Templeton could be worth looking into: https://www.templeton.org/actfellowship

    Reply
  4. Chris Stephens

    It is certainly possible to do philosophy of biology as practicing biologist – there are certainly some who have (Gould, Lewontin, etc.). So if you’re already finding publication success you may not need any “official” training. That said – if you continue on as a biologist you could certainly continue to get more training by hanging out with philosophers (auditing their courses) or spending sabbatical time with philosophers.
    Also, although Steven is probably right about many biologists being more open than other scientists to engagement with philosophy, there are still, I suspect, many who will think you’re wasting your time (or at least publishing less biology than you would otherwise). So you need to get a sense from other biologists whether they value this kind of work, especially if you’re keen to keep your career as a biologist. (How will it be viewed for tenure evaluation?, etc.)
    By the way – there are philosophers of biology who started out as biologists (PhD in biology) and then went back and got another BA degree in philosophy before then getting a second PhD in philosophy. Denis Walsh (at Toronto) is one such person who chose that route. You might email him and ask him about his experiences and whether it was worth it.
    If you really want to end up with a job in a philosophy department, then it might be necessary to get the official philosophy credentials. But you should keep in mind that the job market in philosophy is crappy (even worse that academic biology). Also, there are probably some programs – especially HPS programs, that would admit someone without a philosophy undergraduate degree if you had at least some background in philosophy.

    Reply

Leave a Reply

Discover more from The Philosophers' Cocoon

Subscribe now to keep reading and get access to the full archive.

Continue reading