This course offers the opportunity to engage in depth with questions of metaphysics (about the fundamental nature of reality), epistemology (the theory of knowledge), ethics (theories of right and wrong), political philosophy (the nature of the just state), philosophy of religion (reasoning about God), philosophy of mind (questions about thought, language and reason) and various other areas.?

Our Department is small and student-friendly while offering a world-class programme in philosophy. We teach courses which have both systematic and historical emphases and in the higher years students can choose options and get to write a thesis on a topic of their own choice.?

Trinity Philosophy students have regularly won prizes at the International Undergraduate Awards competition and also have gone on to the major graduate programmes in the world. There is a lively student society, the Metafizz, which offers the opportunity of combining social activities with philosophy.

Graduate skills and career opportunities

In the recent past, graduates of Philosophy have worked in areas as diverse as accountancy, academic teaching, journalism, law, T.V. reporting and research, film making, banking, computing and advertising. Each year some graduates also opt to pursue a research career, beginning with postgraduate study in Ireland or abroad.

Research on graduate entry aptitude tests in the US (GRE) show that philosophy graduates outscore all other disciplines in two of the three main areas (verbal reasoning and analytical writing) and tend to do well in the third, quantitative reasoning. The kind of reasoning and analytical competencies acquired in studying philosophy are transferable to a multiplicity of careers.