Philosophy and linguistics are the realms best qualified to assess ethics, and source and inferential soundness for whatever is passing as "AI" this week. Philosophers are not lavishly paid, and train for skepticism and rigor.
I think science does a better job of teaching that. It deals in what we can directly observe and measure, which is called empiricism. Regardless, the argument you're presenting isn't an argument in favor of majoring in philosophy, rather it's an argument in favor of critical thinking, which is what universities used to teach by at least presenting the dissenting view, even if it didn't make any sense. Sometimes, every now and then, the dissenting view has merit. And sometimes, the dissenting view ultimately prevails.
Take me for example. For a long time, and in many cases when it came up, I was the lone person here presenting the view that GMO is a good thing. I still remember the biggest arguments here "GMO is bad because Monsanto!" "GMO is bad because patents!" "The EU banned GMO so it must be bad!" people on this site can't think critically. They can't even cross-examine their own arguments, and routinely make logical errors. Perhaps the worst one is when they argue against the source instead of the arguments presented by the source, or present their own source as infallible. And practically all of these guys will sit here and tell me how necessary philosophy is when they can't even think critically.
Philosophers are not lavishly paid, and train for skepticism and rigor. I trust their perspective on issues of ethics and soundness, more than I would trust that of anyone engulfed in the hype, cash, and gigawatt tsunami.
I don't because I've experienced otherwise all too often. I still remember the last time I spoke to an actual philosophy major, he literally argued to me that what separates animals from humans is our ability to empathize. Too bad we've already got empirical evidence that proves that non-human animals also empathize, which has been known for a long time now. If he was a man of science instead of a man of arguments (which is what philosophy is at the end of the day, because loving wisdom should mean you want to have wisdom first, which should mean you should at least double-check that your argument is up-to-date before you make a treatise about it.)
If you want to argue that I myself am making a philosophical argument (which would be correct) then remember: I didn't major in it. I didn't need to.
I worked for a poorly funded MA Phil. years ago, who believed that corporations should have a philosopher on staff for guidance in ethics.
Or maybe he just wants job security. Either way, it sounds as though he thinks that just because somebody holds a degree in philosophy makes them think they're somehow ethical by default. If you're a skeptic at all, that should set off a bullshit alarm in your head. Why does this guy think he or any of his colleagues deserves to be placed on some kind of ethics pedestal? At the end of the day, it sounds like he just wants somebody there to make arguments just for the sake of making arguments, which it seems to me is what philosophy majors are all about. It's not as if none of them have ever broken their own ethical standards before.
Besides, well paid philosophers do exist, they just didn't need a degree for it, and they're not in the business of making arguments. They're called comedians.
