91–100 of 219 posts
It's the difference between common people education, and really reach people education: common people need to learn things that will help them make a living, like programming; reach people already have the money so they get the best education, the one that really opens your mind, like philosophy, history, arts etc., plus some to help them keep power. It's just how things are.
Reach == rich?
Dime store philosophy. Some just want to be seen as philosophers and regurgitate what others told them about anothers work. I always had a passion for philosophy, I read massive amounts before even going to college. I would read the ancient greek books that had english on one page greek on the other then use a concordance to basically teach myself ancient greek while making sure I had the context correct and not miss…
Many of those secondary sources contain valuable information. That you read some stuff in the original doesn't make you more of a philosopher! Probably that appellation should be reserved for those who have made an original contribution.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The rules of logic should be applied in philosophy as in physics. If you don't do that, or there is no competent judge (e.g. teacher) things tend to get out of hand, especially with people studying philosophy because they "can't do math".
I thought people do programming because they "can't do math"?
Dime store philosophy. Some just want to be seen as philosophers and regurgitate what others told them about anothers work. I always had a passion for philosophy, I read massive amounts before even going to college. I would read the ancient greek books that had english on one page greek on the other then use a concordance to basically teach myself ancient greek while making sure I had the context correct and not miss…
I'd say philosophers study philosophers... Not sure when that wasn't true? Aristotle being the most famous academic philosopher ... The thing that annoyed me was the number of philosophers that don't study anything else but proceed to talk about it. Stuff that hinges on politics or psychology for example where philosophers just assume that something is human or social nature . Or when we assume that justice is someho…
Oddly enough I find aristotle a bore, he was too myopic and clinical when philosophy is no such thing. He was firmly rooted in the shadow cast on the wall and not what was casting the shadow for my taste.
I would fall in the same camp as you and be annoyed by the "philosophers" that dont study anything else and proceed talk about it. I find most "philosophers" to not even be philosophers, they just like to be considered so.
if a private individual wants to spend some time developing as a human being, reading classic texts, admiring thinkers of past ages and polishing his rhetoric and is willing to pay. then i say that's a good choice and power to him.
if a government pays for someone to train in something which serves no economic purpose, then the government is wasting its money.
i do like philosophy. i love a good argument. i read 'philosophy magazine'. but i don't think the garbageman should have to pay for my habit.
Most of the criticism i have regarding the humanities and philosophy in particular does not apply to the american situation as people there pay for their own education. if a private individual wants to spend some time developing as a human being, reading classic texts, admiring thinkers of past ages and polishing his rhetoric and is willing to pay. then i say that's a good choice and power to him. if a government pay…
usually it's some combination of parents and government backed loans or grants
even when people pay for their own education in the form of future loans, they're doing so with highly imperfect information about what it will mean to pay them back
(which I don't think is necessarily an argument against studying philosophy, learning to think rigorously can be highly practical)
Dime store philosophy. Some just want to be seen as philosophers and regurgitate what others told them about anothers work. I always had a passion for philosophy, I read massive amounts before even going to college. I would read the ancient greek books that had english on one page greek on the other then use a concordance to basically teach myself ancient greek while making sure I had the context correct and not miss…
I suppose that is a good reason to wear a rough cloak and hide the jade in your heart.
I love this bit: "I prefer to spend my college years searching, exploring, and wondering, as opposed to training to become an "asset" in the file cabinet of a "human resource" department. Rock on fellow baristas, rock on." Translation: "I'll come out of university with no transferrable skills whatsoever. Dreadfully unintellectual dead-end jobs are where I'll be able to keep pursuing my love of knowledge". Dude. The a…
> Full disclosure: I myself studied philosophy at university. I'm proud of it, but I'd never boast about how poorly it prepared me for the job market. You would in another society, that doesn't prioritize monetary success and the job market above all things.
But I do like Yeats's line in the poem prefixed to Responsibilities: "Only the wasteful virtues earn the sun."
(Full disclosure: yes, I too was a philosophy major.)
[edit: for spelling]
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Full disclosure: I myself studied philosophy at university. I'm proud of it, but I'd never boast about how poorly it prepared me for the job market. You would in another society, that doesn't prioritize monetary success and the job market above all things.
Yup, I'd be the Philosopher King in Plato's Republic. First thing I'd do is ban JavaScript programming.
Such a capriciously specific command makes it sound like you'd be more of a run-of-the-mill tyrant à la Creon.
I studied some philosophy in college, and found the experience pretty disappointing. The field addresses some really fascinating problems, but I'm not too impressed with their answers. A typical assignment in philosophy consists of thinking about a really hard problem with no good solutions, picking one, and arguing for it. And since there are so few fixed points, almost anything is arguable. Really, it's a debater's…
The rules of logic should be applied in philosophy as in physics. If you don't do that, or there is no competent judge (e.g. teacher) things tend to get out of hand, especially with people studying philosophy because they "can't do math".