Second, I manually classified the most commonly cited sources in the whole corpus (any cited ≥50 times), looking them up as necessary to confirm that they met the definition. The results were identical regardless of method.
Great question! I used 2 methods. First, an LLM counted the empirical sources cited (defined as sources that primarily report the results of scientific research or analyses of quantitative data). Its counts were highly consistent with mine in a random subset of cases.
I suspect this has to do with the demise of the "linguistic turn," which in my view was a deviation from the mainstream of philosophical tradition. But, whatever explains the historical trend, clearly these days philosophy is *not* a purely a priori discipline.
A graph showing the percentage of philosophy articles that cited empirical sources each year between 1970 and 2024. That proportion has increased from approximately 10% in the 1970s to over 50% in the 2020s.
Philosophy was mostly "armchair" in the mid-20th century—but it's not anymore! Philosophers have increasingly cited empirical sources and discussed empirical data and evidence. In fact, as of the 2020s, non-empirical philosophy has become the minority.
Lots of people think philosophy is an "armchair" discipline in which empirical evidence is largely irrelevant. But, humorously, this idea is contradicted by the empirical data. Looking at records from prestigous, generalist philosophy journals, I found something striking.
This IHE article discusses my recent work with @mvazquez.bsky.social about how students' politics change during college. Simply put, independently of political *beliefs* students seem to adopt an "educated liberal" *identity.*
Interesting point! But it sure seems like there's an important difference between writing in cursive, or doing math with a slide rule, and verbally articulating and conveying thoughts. If that's what an LLM automates, then it seems like it will deskill in a much more important way.
We think these results, now published in American Psychologist, highlight a need for more theorizing and tests of popular claims about how to cultivate this much-needed trait.
psycnet.apa.org/doiLanding?d...
@mvazquez.bsky.social and I tested this "collaborative dialogue hypothesis." But the results of quasi-experiments and a randomized experiment (and using self-reports, behavioral indicators, and text-analytic measures) consistently contradicted the hypothesis.
Intuitively, it seems like bringing people together to discuss complex ethical and political issues should help them to be more intellectually humble about those issues—at least if the conversations are rigorous yet respectful. But, empirically, doesn't seem to work that way.
That would be awesome! Though, could the effect of higher ed on such students be different from the effect on students with more options? E.g., the latter are probably stronger students, which could moderate the effect (consistent with our SAT findings).
Check out the full paper, coauthored with @mvazquez.bsky.social, now in JPSP! psycnet.apa.org/record/2027-...
Or on OSF: osf.io/preprints/ps...
That said, there are major differences in these within-person changes across majors (e.g., English & arts move most to the left, while business and engineering actually shift right), as well as demographics (e.g., women move leftward more than men), and other individual characteristics
Since around 2012, grads have increasingly identified as liberal, while non-grads remained steady. And this diploma divide in political ID emerges during college. In the mid-1990s, students did not change their ID during college, but they increasingly have done so since.
Does going to college make people more liberal? Probably yes, but it’s complicated… For decades, US adults with degrees have held more left-leaning views on social issues, but not on economic ones. And, until the 2010s, grads did not *identify* as more liberal than non-grads.
The GOAT of journal submission sites...
Indeed, we found situations affording opportunities for these virtues are unpleasant. But virtues seem to buffer these situational influences. Compassion, patience, and self-control all showed positive within- and between-person links with (especially eudaimonic aspects of) well-being.
Prior studies have found that kindness and generosity increase well-being. But other virtues seem less enjoyable. E.g., compassion is like kindness but involves awareness of suffering/misfortune. Patience requires barriers or frustrations. Self-control involves foregoing present desires.
Is virtue good for you? Or is it just good for others or society at large? Theories as old as Plato make opposing claims. My coauthors and I tested their predictions in two intensive, longitudinal studies (N = 43,164 obs. from 1,218 participants), focusing on 3 seemingly unpleasant virtues.
Hilarious! How about "God be with you"?
I've seen many criticisms of "silicon samples," but always thought it was a bogeyman—like, nobody actually thinks AI participants are a good idea. But now Qualtrics offers "synthetic samples," so at least some people must think this is a reasonable approach. What are the arguments in its favor?
I had a great chat about how studying philosophy can make people better thinkers with @mvazquez.bsky.social, @markalfano.bsky.social, Deborah Mower, and Heather Battaly. Thanks to @apaphilosophy.bsky.social for hosting and making the recording available!
www.apaonline.org/mpage/benefi...
Turns out studying philosophy is actually valuable. Philosophy majors don’t just argue well, they actually become better thinkers and do better on tests.
Data from 600k students shows they outscore every other major on reasoning, curiosity and open-mindedness.
I don't know of any, but that's a great question! There's tons of data on college students because institutions collect them. Maybe there's a philosophy for fun organization that could be persuaded to collect data? That would be awesome!
Experiments find effects on PEB on well-being too! They may reflect low impact behaviors, though. That's a nice contribution, consistent with other work on well-being (major life events matter less than daily lifestyle)
journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1...
onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...
Two figures showing growth in the percentage of philosophy articles citing empirical sources and the mean number of empirical sources cited per article
Two figures showing growth in the percentage of philosophy articles using "empirical" phrases and the mean number of occurrences of such phrases
I think you're right! Check it out! In "Leiterific" journals there's been really dramatic growth in citations of empirical sources and references to empirical data, evidence, research, etc. Also, articles citing more empirical sources receive more citations (i.e., are more influential).
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Thanks for the suggestions! I'll take a look at the Nisbett chapter. @mvazquez.bsky.social and I reviewed a bunch of older work (going back to the 70s) in another paper, but we may have missed some of this stuff.
