On The Philosophy of, well, Philosophy

The question is "whether truth is of any value or not, or is it sufficient to have something truthful enough to work with?" Well we use the little truths we find, the knowledge, in many ways. Because we know that the earth goes around the sun, we can calculate how to throw something and have it hit the intended target. That in turn lets us go out and determine the composition of comets and asteroids and those in turn tell us more about the earth we live on, maybe even ultimately about how we became we. What we do with all the "truthful realities" is use them as stepping stones to learn more about how things work, and learning how things work is the first step in learning how to make them work as we would like.Personally, I would say that one Josiah Wedgwood is worth 50 or 100 Platos.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Spoken like a true Aristotelian.All people who value knowledge are in the philosophy business.
Some know it, some don't.

Let's not pretend like the rigorous analytics of Dennet et al. represent any sort of consensus in philosophy, ok? It's not "certain parts"; it's just about the whole entire field.And since the field itself makes no particular distinction between conclusions arrived at by rigorous analysis and conclusions arrived at by non-rigorous means, the field as a whole has no rigor. Rigor is not rigor when its optional. Bully for you, but the reality is that philosophy is what philosophers do, what goes on in philosophy departments and in philosophy journals, and what goes on in those places completely lacks rigor. If it did not then surely one of you would have been able to demonstrate the rigor, by now. Nonsense. It could be required in the same way that the sciences require it - community enforcement.Philosophers simply choose not to. Thus, the field has no rigor. Completely wrong. It is because analytical philosophy is only a subset of philosophy, and not the whole of philosophy, that the universal set of philosophy is an unrigorous pursuit. A field where rigor is optional, where it's just one choice from a smorgasbord of equally-acceptable kinds of argumentation, is indistinguishable from no rigor at all.

I think a difference, if there is one, is on how much effect certain knowledge contributes to mankind as a whole. The difference between a Josiah Wedgwood and a Plato is that Josiah was able to replace the porous wood dishes and bowls poor folk were using with china that could be cleaned and sanitized easier. That in turn immediately reduced sickness and improved health for the very lowest levels of society.I think the value of knowledge is in whether or not it improves the standard of living for the general populus.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Now we know how we became we. Now what do we do with that? How is it that 'we would like' for them to work? Also, why is it that 'we would like' for them to work one way over the other? I mean, what reason is there for changing things?

Lots of reasons. Reduce pain, extend functioning, make things more available, make them less expensive, add additional functions.All small reasons, the best kind.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

A fine philosophical statement.I have no quarrel with your philosophy. Only with denial, if any exists, that it is one.To discuss 'the value of knowledge' is to do philosophy.

I really don't much care what label someone puts on it. Frankly, I find that a waste of time and talent. If someone what to stick some label on it then that is their wasted energy.Edited by jar, : No reason given.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

What makes you say that? Philosophers told you so, and you believed them?People were discerning truths about the natural world via observation long before philosophers. It was the philosophers who convinced them that their observations couldn't be trusted, and humanity has been paying the price for millenia. What does any of that matter? None of that changes observation. None of that changes experience. The questions you ask are just bullshit sophistry. It's just a game.Why bother playing? Maybe because it's irrelevant?

I'm fairly sure I wasn't saying that - however analytic philosophy does dominate the field at this time. See wikipedia:

quote:

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Analytic philosophy (sometimes, analytical philosophy) is a generic term for a style of philosophy that came to dominate English-speaking countries in the 20th century. In the United States the overwhelming majority of university philosophy departments self-identify as "analytic" departments.[1] (This situation is mirrored in the United Kingdom, Canada, and Australia.)...Insofar as broad generalizations can be made, analytic philosophy is defined by its emphasis on clarity and argument, often achieved via modern formal logic and analysis of language, and a respect for the natural sciences.

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Actually it does. Hence the criteria of truth. What exactly would 'demonstrate the rigor' in your view?Let me put it like this. Every rational person engages in empiricism, and I agree. Not everybody does so with suitable rigor - relying heavily on small amounts of experience to guide them, rather than a statistically significant amount of experience. Because some people that engage in empiricism (or empiricists) are not always rigorous, that doesn't mean empiricism is inherently pointless or useless or unrigorous what have you.I say again - it is impossible to control what people think. We cannot control what the ancient Greeks thought, we can just study it, try and understand it, critique it and observe that it was the beginning of certain ideas and thoughts. Just because the concept of 'rigour' was different then doesn't render the whole field unrigorous. They were trying to establish what makes something rigorous and what does not, and that has been ongoing for centuries. Today, because we have been taught it, we take this for granted - but how to tell one model is true and one is not has not been self-evident and had to be discovered.We have established some ways to increase our confidence in what is true and what is not, and we utilize these in our lives. Science being one of them. In that case, there is enforcement. Scientists don't arrest other scientists who create unfalsifiable theories, or theories that don't correlate with known facts. They don't point to previous theories that have since been falsified and abandoned, and try and excise them from 'science'. Often they discuss them, to give context on how we got to the current theory. When 'bad' hypotheses get published in the present, they point this out in critical papers. That's exactly what happens in philosophy.Any old yahoo can start a science journal up, and publish all sorts of nonsense, like ID or homeopathy, but this doesn't mean science is unrigorous. Any yahoo can start a philosophy journal up and publish all sorts of nonsense about the higher truths of chmess. Did you read the short article by Dennett I posted earlier? The one in which he observed that many young philosophers begin by finding a piece of work they can criticize and their first published papers are often critical in nature. Have you read any philosophy at all? It is almost defined by its critical nature. So much of it is critical of other philospher's works, why they do not adequately tell truth from fiction etc etc.In science, you cannot prove something is true or false - but you can give good argument as to why something is true or false. The best arguments (the ones that conform with the evidence the most) tend to get accepted. Just like in philosophy. You should probably study your set theory a bit more. That would be like saying that because red cars are only a subset of 'cars', that cars are not red. Surely it would more accurate to simply say 'most cars are not red, but some are'.If you'd like we can examine some recent publications in philosophy, I'm happy to do that. We can explore if the field is rigorous or not. We can see if certain areas are, but the majority isn't - or at least try. Let's limit ourselves to the past decade. Should be interesting, I think.

This is the first thing you've said that even comes close to making me doubt my position.Why the hell did it take you so long? Have I really been so unclear as to the reasons I don't find rigor in philosophy? Honestly?Now, I don't necessarily believe that one Wikipedia article comes close to establishing a truth about the philosophical community, and it seems abundantly obvious from my own dealings with philosophers that analytic views have not come to dominate, but when analytic philosophy becomes indistinguishable from philosophy as a whole, I'll have cause to revisit my conclusions. It's an optional criteria, though. The analytics hold it; it's not inherent to philosophy. Many philosophical positions are held that violate that criteria.That's why it's a field with no rigor. God, how many times do I have to explain it? A criteria of truth that all philosophers accept and adhere to, the way that scientific standards are universally held among the legitimate scientific community. Community enforcement of that criteria among the academic circles of philosophy. It's not impossible to control what people publish; it's done in the scientific community. The impossibility of thought control is no obstacle to enforcing rigor throughout an academic discipline, as the example of all sciences prove. No, of course not. It's just that all scientists essentially agree to disregard those theories, they fail peer-review, and as a result the proponents of crank science are marginalized. A consensus emerges against the crank positions.That doesn't happen in philosophy, as I've already proven. I've already proven why this isn't true. Perhaps you might go back and grapple with some of those arguments. Perhaps you should study your predicate logic. "Rigor", as I've repeatedly explained, is a property that is only true in the universal. Thus, if rigor is not universal throughout the field of philosophy - the way it is in the sciences - then philosophy cannot be said to have rigor.Seriously I've explained this like 50 times by now. If philosophy accepts these rigorous arguments from over here, but also accepts those non-rigorous arguments from other there, then the field does not have rigor - because it can't distinguish true models from false ones. More specifically it puts known true models on precisely the same level as models of unknown truth or falsity, and that's precisely the same thing as not knowing truth from fiction. Your own arguments have established that it is not. If you'd like to go back and contradict yourself on any specific point, be my guest, but the discussion is essentially over. If philosophy had rigor you would have been able to demonstrate it by now.Edited by crashfrog, : No reason given.

Honestly? Two reasons, sometimes I have been unclear as to the exact nature of your position, and other times I have been clear. The underlying truth is that I am not a philosopher so I found it tricky to relate what my understanding of the field was with some online information available to the both of us. I thought that the wording of the criteria of truths would show that the opinions of the various strengths of the proposed methods of truth discrimination would show some at least a broad consensus. Thus: revelation is written as not very good criteria of truth with little support. If someone bases their model on revelation, many philosophers would argue that it was a weak philosophical argument.The second attempt was the quote from modernphilosophy.com - but the next thing I had to establish was whether or not you might consider certain schools as being rigorous before trying to establish that those schools have predominated modern times (logical empiricism for example being the dominant school of the early 20th century). I agree - nothing is inherent to philosophy. Philosophy is just trying to figure reality out, various methods and ways of thinking have proven better as time has gone on - but politics and religion have made honest investigation into the matter difficult at times. The conclusion I think should be that philosophy itself isn't bunk, but it is certainly possible that a philosophical position is.Some people have argued that intuition is a good way of discovering truths about reality, but that line of thought has basically disappeared from critical thinking. Of course, some people still hold to a philosophy where revelation and intuition are thought to be valid ways of discovering truths about the world. We cannot prove them wrong, but we can argue why it isn't - which is a great deal of what we talk about here, why one way (empiricism as we've dubbed it) is superior to another.Many of the various criteria are included on that page, not just one criterion and their strengths and limitations are discussed also. Every philosophy has had at least one criterion of truth inherent to it as far as I am aware. If any do not, they probably don't accept the Primary Truths - and I'm not sure they can be said to be engaging in any philosophy if they don't.If, for example, your position doesn't live up to the Correspondence theory of truth, your going to get laughed at very hard. If you position is that is raining outside, and someone goes outside and says, "no it isn't" (ie the proposition doesn't correspond with experience), and you still say 'your experience is irrelevant, the rain measurer is irrelevant, the fact I feel dry is irrelevant - it's still raining' prepare to be laughed at. In science, the criteria of truths are held to varying degrees of importance, and that is where the philosophy of science comes into play. What is the role of induction? How much should there be? Does something have to be practically falsifiable or only falsifiable in principle to be acceptable? Those kinds of questions. Most scientists don't need to worry about it for day to day affairs, but it can have value in establishing the future of investigation. At least it has in the past - whether it will continue to do so, or if we have arrived at the optimum solution already remains to be seen. I think the contrary, as the Dennett post shows, views might cause a small sensation in philosophy - but they often end up going nowhere productive and the sensation goes away. If they hold up to peer review and look to be going somewhere productive, they stick around.A consensus does emerge against the crank positions, and the existence of cranks who insist that a certain positions are viable is found in both science and philosophy and should not count as a bad mark against either of them (only the cranks).I happily concede that because of the wide ranging nature (and attempts to peer into the future) of philosophy, it can often be difficult to determine if an idea is going to be productive without first exploring it. That's a problem stemming from our subjective nature, unfortunately. Not really. An individual journal can certainly refuse to publish an article they think is junk or does not advance scientific knowledge - but another journal might publish it anyway. Those journals might court controversy as a way of selling, and may end up having their reputation damaged as a result. The same holds in philosophy. Journals have their own standards, and one journal cannot control another's standards. Putting out work that philosopher's feel is interesting and productive will probably be the best strategy in the long run - but there is always a small niche for crazy philosophy - just like there is a niche for crazy science. I haven't seen arguments that prove this isn't true. The easiest challenge that we can both relate to is if you prove evolution to be true or that creation is false. Proof that is, not very strong argument in favour or against. I agree that philosophy as a whole cannot be said to have rigour. It cannot and should not have rigour. It is a field which attempts to show what rigour actually is what would be classed as rigorous etc. One cannot assume the conclusion. Each school is rigorous as it understands rigour, but since we cannot prove absolutely which rigour is the best way - we can only try and provide strong argumentation in favour of one over the other - refuting points, showing absurd consequences etc etc etc.But it cannot also be said that philosophy does not have rigour, since within philosophy, rigour exists. There is not way of doing anything that sits above philosophy and determines rigour. Science has the philosophy of science to justify its system of rigour, but there is no single 'philosophy of philosophy', since that itself would be a philosophy. It's an inherent limitation of being human.For instance, when asked to justify empiricism I think you appealed to the fact that it works. That would be Pragmatic Theory, a philosophical criterion of truth. But how would you justify the pragmatic theory? You could certainly argue why it should be employed, but it cannot be proven from first principles - but people accept it...though it should be noted that because something works doesn't mean its true - and does the fact that it works justify itself? Philosophical points of debate. Hopefully you understand my position now: Within philosophy there is rigour, but there is no philosophy above philosophy to determine what is and isn't rigour. We cannot assume that one philosophy is right (eg empiricism) in determining what definition of rigour is correct. If we try and justify rigour we engage in philosophy and immediately we find ourselves in a dilemma. This is the edge of reason as they say - the point where subjectivity of humanity rears its head.

It is simply a matter of calling things what they are. (And going with the topic.)You are debating philosophical questions and stating a personal philosophy. Anyone who knows what philosophy is can spot this.How much time and talent does it take to say the sky is blue? Not much. Is it a waste to say it? Not if the sky is blue, and someone needs to know.Philosophy is a wide-ranging and inevitable endeavour of the human intellect. Every person who values knowledge engages in it.Certainly every EvC participant I've met displays an interest in philosophical discussion. And quite a few show remarkable aptitude for it--yourself definitely included._________________Edited by Archer Opterix, : brev.Edited by Archer Opterix, : clarity.

And many others would argue the exact opposite.Who is right? Who can prove that they are right and settle the argument? In chess, for instance, both players agree that the game has come to an end when one player has no available moves that prevent the capture of his king. And a chess player, no matter how much he desires not to lose, must concede the game when he realizes that he's been checkmated. He accepts the loss, picks up his pieces, resolves to learn from his mistakes.He does this because the agreement to do so, contingent to his loss, is implicit in asking someone to play chess with you. Chess has a kind of rigor in that sense. To play chess is to agree, implicitly, that you will play by the rules and recognize your loss when and if you lose. (Losing at chess is something that I have a great deal of experience with, as it was the eventual outcome of every game of chess I've ever played.)In philosophy, though, there's no such agreement. Having the premises of your argument disproven, having even your logic found to be fallacious, creates absolutely no obligation in the mind of any philosopher to recognize that their argument is wrong. There's no rigor. The community does not enforce it. And that's why, as a field, it has no rigor. Without creating an inherent obligation to reject bad models, the field has no rigor.You've given away the game, Mod. You've been giving it away from the start. Does the lack of rigor mean that everybody should stop being philosophers? They're certainly not engaged in work that I can respect, and it's abundantly obvious that philosophy is held to a degree of significance far beyond what it deserves, but I'm not here to tell people what to do with their lives.If someone wants to spend their lives engaged in self-absorbed academic wankery, who am I to stop them? Except when they don't. How do you you explain the continuing support Idealism plays? The continuing enthusiasm philosophers continue to display for the various irrealist positions?Lamark and Lysenko are properly relegated to the dustbin of science, except in historical interest. Yet arguments are still put forth in support of Plato to this day. What's the deal with that, Mod? If philosophers enforce the rigor with ridicule, as you say, why do none of them laugh at Plato?* Then what are we still arguing about? All I've ever said was that I don't find philosophy to be a field that has rigor, and therefore, personally, I don't find it to be something I want to waste my time with.If you now agree that philosophy as a field lacks rigor, can we end the discussion? (I'm a little bit tired of repeating myself so much.) I'm certainly satisfied if we both agree that philosophy, as a field, lacks rigor.*"Laughing at Plato" would be a great title for a book.

And over time a consensus will emerge. It is unlikely to 100% consensus, as it rarely is, but such is life. The rules of chess are known because they have been defined. The rules of reality are not known, and cannot be known. We can argue that the rules of reality we think are true, are true. We cannot prove it. Not at all - my point isn't to dispute this point, but to dispute that this is a problem in the way you seem to be implying. Of course a problem exists, but that problem is the limitations of human knowledge about reality (subjective beings cannot know objective reality and know that they know it).The challenge remains: prove the theory of evolution is true. Prove creationism is false. Well, we arguing as to what that should mean, and if it presents some kind of reason to denigrate the field. If you want, but that wasn't my argument. My argument is that you are trying to define rigour as if you can be sure your rigour is the superior type of rigour. We cannot know that, we can provide reason and evidence for that position, but we cannot know it 100% totally. Thus, some of the division in philosophy is agreeing on what constitutes rigour. That shouldn't mean we shouldn't try to argue with other people and debate and try and show why one standard of rigour is the best one.Philosophy doesn't lack rigour per se...it's filled to the brim with it. What isn't known 100% is which rigour is the best rigour. One cannot use one definition of rigour to justify that same definition of rigour.Now, the idealists would argue that there exists an ideal rigour (though not a rigour that actually exists), which we try and divine through reason. I disagree with them. I do not believe in a meta-rigour by which we can judge other rigours. We just have to make do with bumbling our way through it, arguing and reasoning as to which method is superior. Undermining the opposing camp by showing that they accept Correspondence theory but their position does not correspond with some new facts that have emerged etc etc.So - when I say philosophy as a field has no rigour, I am referring to some meta-rigour sitting above the field. There is plenty of rigour within philosophy, just not universal agreement over which system of rigour is actually better. This is a problem of human's abilities and their subjective nature, not of philosophy itself.Hopefully that should help you understand my position a little better?