[musgravepeter]

To me the key point is "no clear answers" in philosophy.

In math you learn to follow a series of developments, building structure that leads to statements that are true. These are the foundation for more bricks in the wall and even bigger constructions. e.g. The proof of Fermat's last theorem.

My sense of philosophy - after reading maybe a dozen of the classics, was there was little that was accepted as true. Yes, there are self-consistent chains of reasoning but the foundation blocks are more a matter of "taste", and the amount of rigor in the chains varied - complicated by the fact that human language is inherently not very precise.

[tremon]

True, but that is because philosophy doesn't deal with answers. It deals with a more fundamental question, the question of truth itself. Instead of providing a framework for finding singular answers to exact formulations like mathematics does, philosophy ultimately provides a framework for exploring and expanding the limits of certainty.

Please remember that the entire STEM field grew out of the questions of those philosophers you dismiss as "no clear answers": our entire scientific process (empirical theory-building) is based on the previous explorations of philosophers on truth and knowing. Similarly, both capitalism and Marxism grew out of the questions of philosophers about the structure of society.

You need questions before you can answer them. Philosophy deals with the questions. Our answers to those questions have become the main pillars of modern society.

[smelterdemon]

Mathematics is also based on foundations which are in some sense a matter of taste e.g. Euclidean vs non-Euclidean geometries. IMO at a certain level of abstraction mathematics and philosophy are the same thing.