[Serious] Generally speaking, is philosophy a worthwhile subject of study?

[Belacqua]

Some people consider philosophy a weak science. I just consider it weak sans the science affiliation. It can be a fun and interesting study if not taken too seriously.

One of the oldest themes in philosophy is: What is a good life? 

Currently there are many intelligent, highly paid people churning out capitalist propaganda every day to tell you what kind of life you should want. According to them, the life you should want is the life that makes them the most money.

Two independent research groups concluded that Facebook's algorithms make people more angry and more extreme in their views. They make us less happy, but they make money for Facebook. When told the results of these studies, Zuckerberg said that's fine, we'll continue. He wants the money. 

Whenever we think about what a good life is, we are doing philosophy. We may be doing it well or badly. If we don't think about it seriously, however, we will certainly be accepting the propaganda that is being fed to us all the time, since we were old enough to be conscious. 

Barthes, Baudrillard, and many other philosophers have identified how the propaganda exists as subtext in every commercial production there is -- TV, movies, pop fiction, etc. It's all working to shape our views. 

Should serious discussion of what constitutes a good life be taken seriously? If people don't want to take seriously the only method we have of thinking independently, and working against commercial brainwashing, then their thoughts will be determined for them.

[Belacqua]

Philosophy is wonderful to discuss with friends over drinks (Symposium, anyone?) but is rather useless as a source of knowledge.

[...]

Sometimes, you don't need to do anything but show up to the bar in order to philosophize. But other times, you need to do six and a half hours of reading and try really hard to understand something before the discussion can transpire. Treating the whole of philosophy like some quaint "night out for drinks" is inaccurate.

At the beginning of Plato's Symposium they decide they're not going to drink any alcohol that night. 

People should read the books they think they know about.

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

[...]

Sometimes, you don't need to do anything but show up to the bar in order to philosophize. But other times, you need to do six and a half hours of reading and try really hard to understand something before the discussion can transpire. Treating the whole of philosophy like some quaint "night out for drinks" is inaccurate.

At the beginning of Plato's Symposium they decide they're not going to drink any alcohol that night. 

People should read the books they think they know about.

(bold mine)

Clearly they should, since at the end of the Symposium, the banquet/debate devolves into a drunken revel (Alcibiades was the instigator).

Boru

[Belacqua]

People seem to have a strange image of what philosophy is.

It's just an attempt to think really clearly about certain subjects. Things that can't be demonstrated by science. When we attempt to think about those things, we are doing philosophy, whether we like it or not.

Thinking clearly is good.

Standard American anti-intellectualism maybe recoils from this. An idea that things have to have some immediate practical aim is just a hold-over from the Protestant morality that dominated America for a long time -- as would be obvious to people if they studied the genealogy of their beliefs.

Since we don't conduct scientific experiments on this forum, much of what we do is philosophy. When you say that philosophy is not worthwhile you are doing philosophy.

Doing it well is not easy, and we are right to respect those few people who manage it.

[polymath257]

Philosophy is wonderful to discuss with friends over drinks (Symposium, anyone?) but is rather useless as a source of knowledge.

I don't think philosophy is a very good source of knowledge either. It's a pretty good "source of theories" though. It's a decent source of good questions too. (If you value good questions.)

Where are these philosophical dogmatists you keep referring to? What philosopher says you need to believe something "because they say so"? William Lane Craig? I mean, there's more to philosophy than Craig.

Sometimes, you don't need to do anything but show up to the bar in order to philosophize. But other times, you need to do six and a half hours of reading and try really hard to understand something before the discussion can transpire. Treating the whole of philosophy like some quaint "night out for drinks" is inaccurate.

Well, I can point to Kant who said that Euclidean geometry is synthetic a priori knowledge. Then non-Euclidean geometry came along.

Or Aristotle who claimed that any type of 'motion' (which , in his context meant any change) required a force or a cause. Then Newtonian physics came along where uniform motion is natural and needs no cause.

Or I can point to Aquinas, who spent an inordinate amount of time trying to figure out how angels can move based on Aristotelian physics.

Most of the scholastics saw Aristotelian physics as 'self-evident' even when they were looking at the edges where it failed. Their insistence that Christianity and Aristotle needed to be merged was very productive, but also fundamentally wrong.

I don't even think Craig deserves  to be called a philosopher. He is an apologist and a pretty poor one at that.

I'm not even sure I agree that philosophy is a good source of theories any longer. it was until the rise of science, I agree, but for the last 200 years or so, I have seen no philosophers add to the list of testable theories. Kant's proposal of an 'island universe' (which we know of as our galaxy) was perhaps the last good contribution from a philosopher. Certainly there has been nothing offered since the rise of modern science that has actually impacted science at all.

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[...]

Sometimes, you don't need to do anything but show up to the bar in order to philosophize. But other times, you need to do six and a half hours of reading and try really hard to understand something before the discussion can transpire. Treating the whole of philosophy like some quaint "night out for drinks" is inaccurate.

At the beginning of Plato's Symposium they decide they're not going to drink any alcohol that night. 

People should read the books they think they know about.

I'll have to go back and check, but I recall a discussion of how much water and how much wine to mix. The decision was not to 'drink heavily' since many had done that the night before, but to allow each to drink as they were inclined (no forced drinking). So, it was NOT a choice of 'no alcohol', but rather a choice to not drink in excess.

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People seem to have a strange image of what philosophy is.

It's just an attempt to think really clearly about certain subjects. Things that can't be demonstrated by science. When we attempt to think about those things, we are doing philosophy, whether we like it or not.

Thinking clearly is good.

Standard American anti-intellectualism maybe recoils from this. An idea that things have to have some immediate practical aim is just a hold-over from the Protestant morality that dominated America for a long time -- as would be obvious to people if they studied the genealogy of their beliefs.

Since we don't conduct scientific experiments on this forum, much of what we do is philosophy. When you say that philosophy is not worthwhile you are doing philosophy.

Doing it well is not easy, and we are right to respect those few people who manage it.

Clarity of thought is a good thing, but it is frequently disrupted by starting out under the wrong assumptions. It is possible to think logically based on false premises, but all that does is lead to more falsehoods.

Not all thinking is philosophy. And not all thinking about philosophical subjects is clear, or even attempting to be clear. And not all attempts to be clear actually manage clarity of thought.

I agree that America has a nasty tradition of anti-intellectualism. In what other country would a political party proudly be labeled the 'Know Nothing' party?

But part of being intellectual is the willingness to question the assumptions made in the past to see where they are wrong and how they need to be modified. Philosophy, from what I have seen, has not yet adjusted to the rise of Newtonian physics, let alone the rise of modern science. All too often it is stuck in a metaphysics defined by Aristotle and elaborated by Aquinas. Such views no longer match what we KNOW from actually studying the real world. Aristotle himself would have adjusted his views in the face of the new evidence, I believe. A good hint is that any use of the terms 'substance, necessity, accident', or 'natural motion' is likely to be severely outdated.

[vulcanlogician]

Well, I can point to Kant who said that Euclidean geometry is synthetic a priori knowledge. Then non-Euclidean geometry came along.

Or Aristotle who claimed that any type of 'motion' (which , in his context meant any change) required a force or a cause. Then Newtonian physics came along where uniform motion is natural and needs no cause.

Or I can point to Aquinas, who spent an inordinate amount of time trying to figure out how angels can move based on Aristotelian physics.

Good criticisms of Kant, Aristotle and Aquinas. But weren't we trying to criticize philosophy in general?

I'm not even sure I agree that philosophy is a good source of theories any longer. it was until the rise of science, I agree, but for the last 200 years or so, I have seen no philosophers add to the list of testable theories. Kant's proposal of an 'island universe' (which we know of as our galaxy) was perhaps the last good contribution from a philosopher. Certainly there has been nothing offered since the rise of modern science that has actually impacted science at all.

In philosophy, we have theories like logical positivism that express the things you are saying. If you want to defend logical positivism, you can do so within philosophy. I'm not saying that's what you ought to do; maybe that's not your cup of tea, polymath-- and that's fine. But if you thought a good defense for logical positivism or radical empiricism could be made, and you felt like making one, philosophers are the ones who are interested in what you have to say. If you're correct in your assumptions and logic, we're the ones who care that you're correct.

Logical positivism and radical empiricism are supported by strong arguments. IMO, they survive the kitchen sink test. Great theories. Very solid positions. Most contemporary philosophers acknowledge this. Even detractors are careful to say how strong and reliable empirical observation is. If someone is an ardent Aristotelian, that's not philosophy's problem. That's their problem. Philosophy is just as determined as you are to refute Aristotelianism, perhaps even more so.

You can't just say philosophy is always wrong, citing "those damned Aristotelians," without also acknowledging how many philosophers agree with your assessment of Aristotle. "Aristotle is wrong" is quite a good way to begin a philosophy paper nowadays.

[Belacqua]

a good way to begin a philosophy paper nowadays.

It's frustrating to me how "polymath" always makes claims that are replete with philosophy, in order to criticize philosophy. He doesn't seem to realize he's doing the very thing he says has little value.

There are so many assumptions going unexamined there. For example, he thinks that philosophy would be good if it were a source of theories that could be tested by empirical science. This is a value judgment which of course isn't itself testable by science. It's his philosophy. 

His untestable philosophy is that testable things are good. And he thinks this philosophy is good.

If all the philosophers gave up and became scientists, this would probably make him happy. And then all of his unexamined philosophical assumptions could go completely unchallenged by anyone. 

It tries a person's patience.

[Silver]

So philosophers want people to accept theories on the same faith employed by theists to believe in god?

Interesting.

[Belacqua]

So philosophers want people to accept theories on the same faith employed by theists to believe in god?

Interesting.

No, no one has ever said that at all.

Exactly the opposite.

[polymath257]

a good way to begin a philosophy paper nowadays.

It's frustrating to me how "polymath" always makes claims that are replete with philosophy, in order to criticize philosophy. He doesn't seem to realize he's doing the very thing he says has little value.

There are so many assumptions going unexamined there. For example, he thinks that philosophy would be good if it were a source of theories that could be tested by empirical science. This is a value judgment which of course isn't itself testable by science. It's his philosophy. 

His untestable philosophy is that testable things are good. And he thinks this philosophy is good.

If all the philosophers gave up and became scientists, this would probably make him happy. And then all of his unexamined philosophical assumptions could go completely unchallenged by anyone. 

It tries a person's patience.

Once again, I *like* doing philosophy. it is very fun as an amusement between friends over drinks. My criticism is that it takes itself too seriously and seems to think it manages to find knowledge.

And, once again, philosophy is best when it is investigating assumptions and asking questions and worst when it thinks it has answers.

I am very interested in the history of ideas. The question of how we got to the (admittedly limited) understanding we have today is fascinating to me. Philosophy was a central part of that development for ages. it was exploring the different possibilities as it saw them at the time and that advanced our ability to analyze the world around us.

But I think we need to acknowledge that the metaphysics that has been handed down for the last 2500 years is fundamentally wrong. Again, looking at alternatives would be a very good job for philosophers, but they seldom seem to understand enough of what *physics* is saying to realize its impact on *metaphysics*. In the mean time, physics makes advances, simply bypassing what philosophers say because they don't say anything relevant.

This is quite different than what was the case not all that long ago. Then, philosophers understood the current scientific notions and adjusted their metaphysics to align with what had actually been discovered. 'Keeping the appearances' was seen as important to philosophy. That seldom seems to be the case these days.

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Well, I can point to Kant who said that Euclidean geometry is synthetic a priori knowledge. Then non-Euclidean geometry came along.

Or Aristotle who claimed that any type of 'motion' (which , in his context meant any change) required a force or a cause. Then Newtonian physics came along where uniform motion is natural and needs no cause.

Or I can point to Aquinas, who spent an inordinate amount of time trying to figure out how angels can move based on Aristotelian physics.

Good criticisms of Kant, Aristotle and Aquinas. But weren't we trying to criticize philosophy in general?

I'm not even sure I agree that philosophy is a good source of theories any longer. it was until the rise of science, I agree, but for the last 200 years or so, I have seen no philosophers add to the list of testable theories. Kant's proposal of an 'island universe' (which we know of as our galaxy) was perhaps the last good contribution from a philosopher. Certainly there has been nothing offered since the rise of modern science that has actually impacted science at all.

In philosophy, we have theories like logical positivism that express the things you are saying. If you want to defend logical positivism, you can do so within philosophy. I'm not saying that's what you ought to do; maybe that's not your cup of tea, polymath-- and that's fine. But if you thought a good defense for logical positivism or radical empiricism could be made, and you felt like making one, philosophers are the ones who are interested in what you have to say.  If you're correct in your assumptions and logic, we're the ones who care that you're correct.

Logical positivism and radical empiricism are supported by strong arguments. IMO, they survive the kitchen sink test. Great theories. Very solid positions. Most contemporary philosophers acknowledge this. Even detractors are careful to say how strong and reliable empirical observation is. If someone is an ardent Aristotelian, that's not philosophy's problem. That's their problem. Philosophy is just as determined as you are to refute Aristotelianism, perhaps even more so.

You can't just say philosophy is always wrong, citing "those damned Aristotelians," without also acknowledging how many philosophers agree with your assessment of Aristotle. "Aristotle is wrong" is quite a good way to begin a philosophy paper nowadays.

The logical positivists had a lot of good things to say, but they tended to devolve into a metaphysics that was mostly linguistic. it is more denial than actually grappling with the issues.

And yes, I understand that many philosophers have gone beyond Ari and Aqui. But I find it interesting that whenever metaphysics comes up, those are the positions most often taken (or fairly small variants).

Also, I do not claim that philosophy is always wrong. But I do think that the times it is right are mostly accidental. I don't see any philosopher today making deep observations that really bring out the nature of things in a way that is useful for, say, physicists. Compare to Lucretius, who essentially noted Brownian motion as evidence of the atomic theory (an observation that was later used by Einstein to prove the modern atomic theory).

Even the scholastics managed to do more than today's philosophers. At the very least they managed to introduce the notion of inertia, which had some major implications to later physics.

What substantial idea has philosophy (as done by a philosopher, not a specialist in the area of study) given in the last 200 years that has actually played a role in physics? or chemistry? or biology? or geology?