When I asked my Professors (both as an undergrad and as a Masters student) for advice about graduate school I generally received one reaction and it usually had to do with the word “passion“. If I wasn’t passionate about philosophy, if I didn’t want to eat breakfast while reading philosophy, if I didn’t want to shower while reciting sound arguments, if I didn’t want to do battle over my favorite philosophy of language theory than I shouldn’t go to graduate school. The quip, “I live, eat and breathe philosophy”, was something I heard once. It left me with the impression that people who went to graduate school were people that wept at night because of the physiological impossibility of having sweet romantic intercourse with their books. What I’m trying to say is that I couldn’t find good advice and heard nothing less than people expressing how proud they were of their “passion.”

If there are people out there looking for some helpful advice there currently is a discussion at A Philosophy Job Market Blog that is helpful. Don’t forget to read the comments to these posts because there are people who disagree -

Advice points 1 and 2 can be found here.

Advice point 3 can be found here.

I don’t want to give people the impression that I don’t recite sound arguments while showering because not only do I recite, I sing.