Philosophy Versus Science

[Belacqua]

In fact the values which you are arguing for in this thread -- that scientifically-tested knowledge is the only kind worth having -- comes from a set of beliefs which has its own history. The fact that you hold other kinds of knowledge to be unimportant is a value judgment with implications for politics, ethics, and other fields of human society. Philosophers work on these things, and ignoring them means that you won't be aware.

You were making good sense until this last bit.  

There are various kinds of knowledge which we would like to have, and in some cases even need, which nevertheless elude us.  Scientifically-tested knowledge may be the only reliable kind, but it is always limited.  

I think we humans are in more desperate straits than you might imagine.  Philosophy as a means to approach desired knowledge is highly questionable IMO.  This is a part of the reason why I am a variety of misanthrope.  I don't trust philosophical methods because we humans are unalterably imperfect and our perceptions are always impermanent and incomplete.  Scientists, at least, understand this problem and capture their knowledge in probabilities and statistics.  

This is why I think religious people can't use philosophy to prove science is biased against certain conclusions.  They are the people inclined to jumping to conclusions.

This is my justification for intellectual minimalism, at least.  I believe in human diversity about other areas of concern because no final answers are pending, except where science has slowly filled in the blanks.

OK, you don't want to know the things that non-scientists teach us about. That's up to you.

[Paleophyte]

OK, you don't want to know the things that non-scientists teach us about. That's up to you.

Not all non-scientists, just the ones that can't tell the difference between science and their peculiar pass times.

[Alan V]

OK, you don't want to know the things that non-scientists teach us about. That's up to you.

Don't get me wrong. At the age of 69, I have had my fill of being misled. I took several different philosophers, including religious philosophers, far too seriously in my lifetime. I'm sure I could have done better with smarter philosophers, but who knew?

In any case, for the remaining years of my life I want to be free of such confusions.

[Angrboda]

Philosophy majors rank higher than all other majors on verbal and logical reasoning, according to our new study published in the Journal of the American Philosophical Association. They also tend to display more intellectual virtues such as curiosity and open-mindedness.

Philosophers have long claimed that studying philosophy sharpens one’s mind. What sets philosophy apart from other fields is that it is not so much a body of knowledge as an activity – a form of inquiry. Doing philosophy involves trying to answer fundamental questions about humanity and the world we live in and subjecting proposed answers to critical scrutiny: constructing logical arguments, drawing subtle distinctions and following ideas to their ultimate – often surprising – conclusions.

It makes sense, then, that studying philosophy might make people better thinkers. But as philosophers ourselves, we wondered whether there is strong evidence for that claim.

Students who major in philosophy perform very well on tests such as the Graduate Record Examination and Law School Admission Test. Studies, including our own, have found that people who have studied philosophy are, on average, more reflective and more open-minded than those who haven’t. Yet this doesn’t necessarily show that studying philosophy makes people better thinkers. Philosophy may just attract good thinkers.

Our latest study aimed to address that problem by comparing students who majored in philosophy and those who didn’t at the end of their senior year, while adjusting for differences present at the start of their freshman year. For example, we examined students’ performance on the GRE, which they take toward the end of college, while controlling for scores on the SAT, which they take before college.

We did the same when analyzing survey data collected by the Higher Education Research Institute at the start and end of college. These surveys asked students to, for example, rate their abilities to engage with new ideas or have their own ideas challenged, and how often they explored topics raised in class on their own or evaluated the reliability of information.

All told, we looked at test and survey data from over 600,000 students. Our analysis found that philosophy majors scored higher than students in all other majors on standardized tests of verbal and logical reasoning, as well as on self-reports of good habits of mind, even after accounting for freshman-year differences. This suggests that their intellectual abilities and traits are due, in part, to what they learned in college.

Studying philosophy does make people better thinkers, according to new research on more than 600,000 college grads

[GrandizerII]

Philosophy majors rank higher than all other majors on verbal and logical reasoning, according to our new study published in the Journal of the American Philosophical Association. They also tend to display more intellectual virtues such as curiosity and open-mindedness.

Philosophers have long claimed that studying philosophy sharpens one’s mind. What sets philosophy apart from other fields is that it is not so much a body of knowledge as an activity – a form of inquiry. Doing philosophy involves trying to answer fundamental questions about humanity and the world we live in and subjecting proposed answers to critical scrutiny: constructing logical arguments, drawing subtle distinctions and following ideas to their ultimate – often surprising – conclusions.

It makes sense, then, that studying philosophy might make people better thinkers. But as philosophers ourselves, we wondered whether there is strong evidence for that claim.

Students who major in philosophy perform very well on tests such as the Graduate Record Examination and Law School Admission Test. Studies, including our own, have found that people who have studied philosophy are, on average, more reflective and more open-minded than those who haven’t. Yet this doesn’t necessarily show that studying philosophy makes people better thinkers. Philosophy may just attract good thinkers.

Our latest study aimed to address that problem by comparing students who majored in philosophy and those who didn’t at the end of their senior year, while adjusting for differences present at the start of their freshman year. For example, we examined students’ performance on the GRE, which they take toward the end of college, while controlling for scores on the SAT, which they take before college.

We did the same when analyzing survey data collected by the Higher Education Research Institute at the start and end of college. These surveys asked students to, for example, rate their abilities to engage with new ideas or have their own ideas challenged, and how often they explored topics raised in class on their own or evaluated the reliability of information.

All told, we looked at test and survey data from over 600,000 students. Our analysis found that philosophy majors scored higher than students in all other majors on standardized tests of verbal and logical reasoning, as well as on self-reports of good habits of mind, even after accounting for freshman-year differences. This suggests that their intellectual abilities and traits are due, in part, to what they learned in college.

Studying philosophy does make people better thinkers, according to new research on more than 600,000 college grads

Using science to show philosophy has its use. Interesting

[Sheldon]

[Happy Skeptic wrote:]
If the world included magic, science would be able to study it.  If it included miracles, science would be able to identify them and categorize under what conditions they happened, and create hypotheses about what might induce another "miracle" to happen.

[and you agreed:]

most of us are not philosophers at all [...] keep asking for evidence rather than one argument piled on top of another.

Here you show that although you are not a philosopher, you are still committed to metaphysical naturalism. 

Because when you ask for evidence, you are asking for the kind of thing that science would be able to study. And if it's something that science can't study, you don't consider it to be evidence.

You don't offer a criteria of what you think such evidence would be, that exists entirely outside of the remit of science or the natural realm I mean. Could you give me an example, so I can understand what you mean by "evidence" in that context?

One does not need to be committed (solely) to scientific naturalism, to recognise it is exponentially more successful at understanding reality than any other method. There is an important epistemological distinction between disbelief, and holding a contrary belief, as any philosopher should know.

FYI magic by definition is outside of the remit of science, but then so are all non-existent things of course.

[Belacqua]

You don't offer a criteria of what you think such evidence would be, that exists entirely outside of the remit of science or the natural realm I mean.

Here are you claiming that "science" and the "natural realm" are contiguous? That is, in your view anything in the "natural realm" is something science can have evidence for? 

I'm not sure if that's true or not. 

I wouldn't want to be in the position of begging the question: "everything that science has found is natural, therefore everything that's natural is found by science. Therefore only natural things exist." 

 Could you give me an example, so I can understand what you mean by "evidence" in that context?

Evidence is any observation (whether taken through scientific experiment or not), or subjective experience, or testimony, or tradition, which increases the credibility of a proposition. 

As I recall you insist on Objective Evidence. I have a broader view of what may increase the credibility of a proposition. 

One does not need to be committed (solely) to scientific naturalism, to recognise it is exponentially more successful at understanding reality than any other method. 

OK, here you've changed the subject. What we consider to be more successful is not necessarily the only type of evidence there is. Also, if you feel you know in advance what reality is, and then claim that scientific naturalism is the only thing that gives us evidence of that, then you're begging the question. 

"More successful" at what, exactly? For technology, sure. 

FYI magic by definition is outside of the remit of science, but then so are all non-existent things of course.

So you know for sure that magic is non-existent, because it is outside the remit of the kind of inquiry you approve of? More begging the question.

[Paleophyte]

So you know for sure that magic is non-existent, because it is outside the remit of the kind of inquiry you approve of? More begging the question.

^^^ When an apologist has no evidence and all that they can do is question the definition it's "begging the question."

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

I suggest a Mad Max-style cage match between philosophers and scientists to settle this once and for all.

Boru

[Sheldon]

You don't offer a criteria of what you think such evidence would be, that exists entirely outside of the remit of science or the natural realm I mean.

Here are you claiming that "science" and the "natural realm" are contiguous? That is, in your view anything in the "natural realm" is something science can have evidence for? 

I'm not sure if that's true or not. 

I wouldn't want to be in the position of begging the question: "everything that science has found is natural, therefore everything that's natural is found by science. Therefore only natural things exist." 

 Could you give me an example, so I can understand what you mean by "evidence" in that context?

Evidence is any observation (whether taken through scientific experiment or not), or subjective experience, or testimony, or tradition, which increases the credibility of a proposition. 

As I recall you insist on Objective Evidence. I have a broader view of what may increase the credibility of a proposition. 

One does not need to be committed (solely) to scientific naturalism, to recognise it is exponentially more successful at understanding reality than any other method. 

OK, here you've changed the subject. What we consider to be more successful is not necessarily the only type of evidence there is. Also, if you feel you know in advance what reality is, and then claim that scientific naturalism is the only thing that gives us evidence of that, then you're begging the question. 

"More successful" at what, exactly? For technology, sure. 

FYI magic by definition is outside of the remit of science, but then so are all non-existent things of course.

So you know for sure that magic is non-existent, because it is outside the remit of the kind of inquiry you approve of? More begging the question.

You haven't offered an example of evidence that is outside of the remit of science to investigate, only a string of straw man claims I neither made nor implied?

Belacqua Wrote:[url=https://atheistforums.org/post-2239262.html#pid2239262][/url]So you know for sure that magic is non-existent, because it is outside the remit of the kind of inquiry you approve of? More begging the question.

I made no such claim?

I don't believe magic exists obviously, but one doesn't need to be a philosopher to understand that this is not a claim it does not exist. 

You don't offer a criteria of what you think such evidence would be, that exists entirely outside of the remit of science or the natural realm I mean.

Belacqua Wrote: Here are you claiming that "science" and the "natural realm" are contiguous?

No, though they demonstrably are of course. 

Now can you offer a single example of evidence for anything outside of the remit of science or (note the word or) the natural realm?