Quantitative subjects are progressive and new discoveries or technological advancements make past theories obsolete; on the contrary, old philosophy aims at studying the world we are all in from different perspectives and with different methods or goals, so that it is cumulative indeed: past theories go out of fashion never becoming obsolete, still being re-usable in need, at different times or epochs.
Why read old philosophy?
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Re: Why read old philosophy?
#12> An old work of philosophy does not describe the thing you are meant to be learning about. It was created by the thing you are meant to be learning about, much like watching a video from skater-Aristotle’s GoPro. And the value proposition is that with this high resolution Aristotle’s-eye-view, you can infer the motions. tldr; read old philosophy to learn how to reason, read new physics to learn the results of reason…
So, in a metaphorical way, reading old philosophy isn't about reading a legacy code base. It's about reading the git history and project documentation.
Hmm, I'd say more like reading the (original) source code of git itself to learn about Linus and his coding"philosophy" [0] vs reading a modern tutorial about how to use git.
[0] I haven't done this so not putting any value prop on this specific example.
Re: Why read old philosophy?
#13Old philosophy is fun in the same way old science is fun. Watching someone from thousands of years ago use a process to determine a more accurate or valuable way of thinking about the world, with rudimentary tools, should inspire us to go use the tools we have now better.
Re: Why read old philosophy?
#14> And if philosophy is about having certain experiences, like poetry, but then it would seem to be a kind of entertainment rather than a project to gain knowledge, which is at least not what most philosophers would tell you. I think all this trouble comes from the perverse desire to make Philosophy "valuable" in the way that sciences are perceived to be, rather than recognizing that it is indeed like poetry. Not poet…
Islam has the ultimate answer to all these personal journey questions. No need for greek philosophy.
Re: Why read old philosophy?
#15Well, what's your goal?
Get your feet wet into Philosophy? See what Philosophy is all about? Do you enjoy Philosophy?
If so, you already know the answer (hint: YES). Otherwise Philosophy is not for you and George Pólya is a more suitable reading.
Re: Why read old philosophy?
#16I'm not sure that I can agree with her even about reading physics. I've found that the earliest works on scientific topics, as well as in math and philosophy, explain things in a way that is comprehensible to someone with no prior knowledge of the subject. That's probably because nobody had prior knowledge when the work was written. I find I'm very often able to learn topics from the originators' writings that I foun…
Philosophy is a cumulative field just like programming. If you're only involved with the most modern framework, there is a lot of magic happening underneath the surface. Most of the value to me seems to be in understanding an idea and then reading and understanding someone refute it later. That's basically my whole experience in reading philosophy "chronologically".
Re: Why read old philosophy?
#17> And if philosophy is about having certain experiences, like poetry, but then it would seem to be a kind of entertainment rather than a project to gain knowledge, which is at least not what most philosophers would tell you. I think all this trouble comes from the perverse desire to make Philosophy "valuable" in the way that sciences are perceived to be, rather than recognizing that it is indeed like poetry. Not poet…
Islam has the ultimate answer to all these personal journey questions. No need for greek philosophy.
What?
Re: Why read old philosophy?
#18Because too many people these days are the "school is overrated, vocational schools are all we need" types who don't understand the basic value of going through the old philosophers... the title is case in point. To me it seems so obvious that there are numerous reasons that it just seems click-baity.
You know what they teach at the elite schools (like Eton for example) that most others don't? The trivium and quadrivium. Together, they form the seven liberal arts, and are a vital parts of the preperation for reading the old philosophers. More than that though, they are vital parts of having a well rounded education where knowledge at a base level in areas almost always elevates your ability to think well in others.
It is also extremely important to be able to go back and see how the old philosophers were right and how they were wrong, but also just to see the amount of wisdom they had. I'm a constitutionalist myself, so reading Montesquieu for example is a great way to dig into the meat of the underpinnings of the checks and balances system, for example. I hardly see a modern textbook get half as deep as him on the subject...
There is still vast amounts of wisdom to be gleaned from the old philosophers, and I highly disagree with the assertion of the author about it being more like poetry than knowledge.
Re: Why read old philosophy?
#19> And if philosophy is about having certain experiences, like poetry, but then it would seem to be a kind of entertainment rather than a project to gain knowledge, which is at least not what most philosophers would tell you. I think all this trouble comes from the perverse desire to make Philosophy "valuable" in the way that sciences are perceived to be, rather than recognizing that it is indeed like poetry. Not poet…
Islam has the ultimate answer to all these personal journey questions. No need for greek philosophy.
If I asked you to furnish me with the reasons why Islam has the ultimate answer (rather than Buddhism, or Christianity, or ultimately Philosophy) you would immediately find yourself in the terrain of the philosopher. Sorry.
The only way in which religious thought survives the 21st century is a set of once sacred truths rendered palatable for the secular world. The past belonged to you, the present and future belongs to us.