Two years ago, however, I hired a Philosophy major. As it turns out, it could not have worked out better. Our resident Philosophy major was no stranger to hard work and analytical rigor.

… elaborated at http://bit.ly/d5lSR8

While I agree with your general contention that Samidh generalizes about what skills philosophers have, I think you are unnecessarily hard on him. Moreover, I think you commit another logical error which in technical terms I think is called “jumping to conclusion,” (forgot the Latin on that).

Without getting into detail, Samidh doesn’t make an argument at all, nor arrive at any conclusions. He simply says that he’s noticed in his experience, that entrepreneurs that he has met have tended to have philosophy backgrounds rather than technical ones. This is a fact not in dispute. Nowhere does he then claim that all entrepreneurs are philosophy students, nor that philosophy students necessarily make good entrepreneurs (though some of them might, at least somewhat owing to the relatively non-controversial skills that Samidh claims philosophers have). He simply asks why so many tech entrepreneurs (in the sample size of people that he has met), were originally philosophers?

He then offers some possible hypotheses (calling them hypotheses is an admission that they are simply educated guesses, not substantiated claims). For what? Not to claim why all philosophers make good entrepreneurs, but to show “how philosophy training makes entrepreneurs like these so formidable.” In other words, on why these particular people, who are already entrepreneurs (and for a variety of other reasons, including randomness), also have this set of skills that may contribute to being successful (though these skills/tools are by no means, nor are claimed to be, necessary or sufficient to be a successful entrepreneur, they are simply things shared amongst this set of people).

Then looking at this set of skills/tools, I’d say they are pretty uncontroversial, with one minor exception (i.e. “philosophers aren’t afraid of risk” – Kant never leaving his hometown might demonstrate otherwise – though certainly philosophers must take risks in their critical thinking).

Samidh actually does not imply that all philosophers would make good entrepreneurs.

Of course, if Samidh had been claiming just that, you would be perfectly correct, and I do appreciate your commitment to precision in logic, it is a deep problem that is responsible for many errors in our thinking that then become too subtle to notice.