Bill Miller
Who says Philosophy is boring?
Wall Street Investor Bill Miller, the man who famously beat the Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index for 15 consecutive years announced a gift of $75 million to the philosophy department of Johns Hopkins University.
The donation was formally announced on Tuesday and is the largest gift to a philosophy department anywhere in the world, ever! The funds will rename the Johns Hopkins Philosophy department after its benefactor and allow for a doubling of full time faculty to twenty two professors. The gift will also support graduate students, postdoctoral fellows and create new courses whose goal is to attract new students.
Many millionaires and billionaires have spawned fancy philosophy prizes, But Mr. Miller — a former Ph.D. student in the program – is transforming an academic institution and helping build a program in the process. His gift is a reaffirmation of his belief in philosophy as an academic pursuit in a time when philosophy and other humanities disciplines are coming under fire for being “outmoded” or “irrelevant” in today’s world.
Mr. Miller’s case is an interesting one considering he dropped out of his doctoral pursuits for the financial world. He often speaks of the importance of philosophy studies and the impact they have on his analytical and decision-making processes as an investor.
Now heavily invested in bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies, Mr. Miller often speaks of the ethical and financial ambiguities of the new trend in investing that saw his net worth climb over $2.5 Billion!
