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History or Philosophy+Ethics for PPE

I already have decided my 3 a level choices, and the sixth form I will be going to requires you to do 4 a levels up to A2 and I was wondering which would be the better 4th option.

I am really interested in studying PPE at university and was wondering which a level would be better suited to this specific course.

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They are both useful. What are your other choices?
Reply 2
Original post by kanyenot
They are both useful. What are your other choices?


Maths+Physics+Economics
(edited 7 years ago)
Original post by julia_aaa
I already have decided my 3 a level choices, and the sixth form I will be going to requires you to do 4 a levels up to A2 and I was wondering which would be the better 4th option.

I am really interested in studying PPE at university and was wondering which a level would be better suited to this specific course.


Do you plan to go to a Russel Group uni lie Uni of Birmingham, Oxbridge, etc?

If so, I would pick History of PE as PE is Religious Studies really and History is stronger over RS.

If you're not planning on apply to a RG, I would go with RS as I couldn't of imagined studying Philosophy at uni without RS.

Philosophy is very difficult and if you don't expose yourself to Philosophical concepts prior to Philo at uni, you'd struggle.

History will be less useful in the long run anyway in terms of content. But skills will be useful.
Reply 4
Original post by The Empire Odyssey
Do you plan to go to a Russel Group uni lie Uni of Birmingham, Oxbridge, etc?

If so, I would pick History of PE as PE is Religious Studies really and History is stronger over RS.

If you're not planning on apply to a RG, I would go with RS as I couldn't of imagined studying Philosophy at uni without RS.

Philosophy is very difficult and if you don't expose yourself to Philosophical concepts prior to Philo at uni, you'd struggle.

History will be less useful in the long run anyway in terms of content. But skills will be useful.


okay, i was thinking more Russel Group, so i was leaning more towards history. but since i'm taking four, i felt it would be better to go for philosophy as it is considered a 'soft subject'. do you think that one is more difficult than the other?
Original post by julia_aaa
okay, i was thinking more Russel Group, so i was leaning more towards history. but since i'm taking four, i felt it would be better to go for philosophy as it is considered a 'soft subject'. do you think that one is more difficult than the other?


Well if you want to apply to a RG, then History is your best bet.

Philosophy A-level isn't considered a soft subject or a hard subject. Religious Studies is considered a soft subject.

Anyway, I would pick History. But make sure whatever is on the syllabus is worth studying for. If your school mainly focuses on Early Modern history but you're only interested in Modern History (C20th) then there's no point in taking it. So if something similar happens, take RS.

PS: I forget if you want to take RS or Philosophy?
Reply 6
Original post by The Empire Odyssey
Well if you want to apply to a RG, then History is your best bet.

Philosophy A-level isn't considered a soft subject or a hard subject. Religious Studies is considered a soft subject.

Anyway, I would pick History. But make sure whatever is on the syllabus is worth studying for. If your school mainly focuses on Early Modern history but you're only interested in Modern History (C20th) then there's no point in taking it. So if something similar happens, take RS.

PS: I forget if you want to take RS or Philosophy?


my school calls it: "Philosophy, Theology & Ethics"
Reply 7
I wanted to study PPE at uni too until very recently, so I can help:

History is admired by Russell Group unis, and depending on what topics you study it can actually be really helpful for politics as well (my course had Russian and Chinese history, for example, which meant that I had to understand Marxism). Some of the PPE personal statements that I've seen on the TSR thread have said things like "My interest in Politics deepened by looking at eg: feature X about the Soviet Union" and gone from there.

It's entirely possible to read around on philosophy in your own time alongside studying - from what I've heard Blackburn's "Think" and/or Nagel's "Introduction to Philosophy" are good intros that are easy to read and look good on PPE personal statements. You can also be interested in one particular philosopher and read more on that if you wish, especially if the philosopher is controversial which can help :smile:
Original post by julia_aaa
my school calls it: "Philosophy, Theology & Ethics"


Ok.

So its still RS but you might be either doing the biblical study unit or a different religion like Buddhism or Hinduism for the Theology part.
Reply 9
Original post by Hildi
I wanted to study PPE at uni too until very recently, so I can help:

History is admired by Russell Group unis, and depending on what topics you study it can actually be really helpful for politics as well (my course had Russian and Chinese history, for example, which meant that I had to understand Marxism). Some of the PPE personal statements that I've seen on the TSR thread have said things like "My interest in Politics deepened by looking at eg: feature X about the Soviet Union" and gone from there.

It's entirely possible to read around on philosophy in your own time alongside studying - from what I've heard Blackburn's "Think" and/or Nagel's "Introduction to Philosophy" are good intros that are easy to read and look good on PPE personal statements. You can also be interested in one particular philosopher and read more on that if you wish, especially if the philosopher is controversial which can help :smile:


okay thanks :smile: do you feel like history would be more of a challenge than Philosophy, Theology & Ethics ?
Original post by julia_aaa
I already have decided my 3 a level choices, and the sixth form I will be going to requires you to do 4 a levels up to A2 and I was wondering which would be the better 4th option.

I am really interested in studying PPE at university and was wondering which a level would be better suited to this specific course.


If you're thinking of Oxford then RS would be good for your philosophy interviews. History would be amazing for politics. I'd say history is better overall. But if your maths is strong, then doing History, RS, Economics and Maths would work well too if you're more of an essay person. Maths and History in the mix is all you need really.
Reply 11
Original post by OriginalLifelin
If you're thinking of Oxford then RS would be good for your philosophy interviews. History would be amazing for politics. I'd say history is better overall. But if your maths is strong, then doing History, RS, Economics and Maths would work well too if you're more of an essay person. Maths and History in the mix is all you need really.
Seconding all of that, History is really political anyway :smile: .
Original post by julia_aaa
okay thanks :smile: do you feel like history would be more of a challenge than Philosophy, Theology & Ethics ?
No worries :smile: History is one of the "facilitating" subjects (and Philosophy, Theology and Ethics is not, though I honestly think it deserves to be) and, from what I have heard, has a good reputation among unis for being traditional and rigorous. From my personal experience, I'd say they're both hard but History is slightly harder, though that could have been caused by my History teacher (who was a massive perfectionist and made us use a really complicated essay structure).

I studied RE AS (and the Philosophy of Religion and Ethics section) in Yr 11 and took it at the same time as my GCSEs, which was very difficult, and I've studied AS History on the new Edexcel spec this year (Year 12). Both have a lot to memorise, and there's a lot of subjectivity and complex arguments by different people. With RE, as long as I knew all the arguments, philosophers and counterarguments (though they were often very hard) and could evaluate them, I could write the essays using the PEE structure. With History, I had to memorise historiography alongside a lot of complicated events (including statistics,events, dates, what happened and what caused what) and do background reading on top to find out what other historians thought. I also had to evaluate sources - but that's been revamped to make it much harder than GCSE. And I could know everything and still find it really hard to write the essays, as I did in the exam (as my teacher made us write our essays in a different structure to the PEE one).

In all honesty, your other subjects look really good so I would pick the subject that you like the most. I love History, but it was by far the hardest of my subjects and I'd only go for it if you like to study it. A lot of my friends want to drop it b/c it's hard, but I love it tbh :smile:
Reply 12
I do philosophy and ethics and I actually found it really interesting and it's also not that hard whereas with history loads of people have said there's way too much to remember
History > Philosophy
Reply 14
Original post by Hildi
I wanted to study PPE at uni too until very recently, so I can help:

History is admired by Russell Group unis, and depending on what topics you study it can actually be really helpful for politics as well (my course had Russian and Chinese history, for example, which meant that I had to understand Marxism). Some of the PPE personal statements that I've seen on the TSR thread have said things like "My interest in Politics deepened by looking at eg: feature X about the Soviet Union" and gone from there.

It's entirely possible to read around on philosophy in your own time alongside studying - from what I've heard Blackburn's "Think" and/or Nagel's "Introduction to Philosophy" are good intros that are easy to read and look good on PPE personal statements. You can also be interested in one particular philosopher and read more on that if you wish, especially if the philosopher is controversial which can help :smile:


thanks, this is really helpful :smile:
Reply 15
Original post by julia_aaa
I already have decided my 3 a level choices, and the sixth form I will be going to requires you to do 4 a levels up to A2 and I was wondering which would be the better 4th option.

I am really interested in studying PPE at university and was wondering which a level would be better suited to this specific course.


History has more prestige however Philo is more directly linked. Honestly id say do whatever you enjoy more and your better at because an A in philosophy is going to look better than a C in history and vice versa
Reply 16
I did Maths, History, Economics, Geography and RS at A2 and did PPE and then an econ masters. Don't see why you're doing physics tbh, it won't help one bit and is quite a tough A level.
Reply 17
Original post by 41b
I did Maths, History, Economics, Geography and RS at A2 and did PPE and then an econ masters. Don't see why you're doing physics tbh, it won't help one bit and is quite a tough A level.


lol because i'm good at it. did geo help at all???
Reply 18
Original post by julia_aaa
lol because i'm good at it. did geo help at all???


You're good at GCSE Physics. A level physics is much harder.

Ye it's half human and half physical geography. As a Man who used PPE as an education rather than as a stepping stone into a career, knowledge that improved my general skills was very useful for me, and that included geography.

Many PPE grads go into finance or consultancy or other make work corporate work, but I started my own company and I'm going to go into farming, so geography was much more useful for me than it would be for most people.
Original post by 41b
You're good at GCSE Physics. A level physics is much harder.

Ye it's half human and half physical geography. As a Man who used PPE as an education rather than as a stepping stone into a career, knowledge that improved my general skills was very useful for me, and that included geography.

Many PPE grads go into finance or consultancy or other make work corporate work, but I started my own company and I'm going to go into farming, so geography was much more useful for me than it would be for most people.


Can I ask where you did your undergrad degree and masters?

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