Philosophy as a public service • Hacker News Board

Re: Philosophy as a public service

#91

Post by merpnderp » Fri, Jan 03, 2020, 2:58 PM UTC

bittercynic wrote: post #87

merpnderp wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But it is in our very DNA to war for status and prestige. Every animal does it, there's a pecking order for every species. No brain surgeon will happily get stuck taking out the trash because a philosopher says we all need to get along and stop striving for position. Philosophy should be telling us that hierarchies are natural and playing the game is healthy, as even if you're on the low end there's still plenty of g…

I don't think it is universal or unavoidable to have to play games to establish yourself in a pecking order. In many situations it seems like we work together with our fellow humans towards some common goal, or just enjoy each other's company. This is just one middle-aged mid-status dude's perspective, though, seems your perspective is in conflict with mine.

Hierarchies don't have to be vicious. A group of friends will develop the funny guy, the guy who leads the discussions, someone who figures out where to meet up next.

The biggest question philosophy should be answering is how can we ensure that everyone wins after we've self-sorted into our natural hierarchies.

Re: Philosophy as a public service

#92

Post by bananamerica » Fri, Jan 03, 2020, 3:23 PM UTC

rhizome wrote: post #36

bananamerica wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Another approach is reading a few articles from https://www.iep.utm.edu/ and http://plato.stanford.edu/ But IMHO the best course of action would be to acquire logic proficiency first. And no, I'm not talking about the logic programmers usually know, but rather formal and informal philosophical logic. Proficiency in logic is to philosophy like reading sheet music is to music. You can get by without it, but it will hel…

"A few articles?" This is what discoverability looks like on both of those sites: https://plato.stanford.edu/contents.html . Just start at "A"? I think non-academic people like me are served perfectly well by reading Spinoza's Ethics. Googling for more from there will cover almost all of post-dualism Western phil.

That is fair.

The Book of Bad Arguments[1] is a great way for a total beginner to get familiar with informal fallacies.

After that, I recommend jumping to basic symbolic logic. I tried several books on the subject, and found an excellent free resource that is not well know: Introduction to Logic[2], by professor Gary Hardegree. I was so grateful for this material that I even sent him an email to thank him for it. I cannot recommend it highly enough.

Now you'll have acquired have a firmer grasp of how arguments work, and will also be able to understand at least some of the logical notation used in the SEP, Wikipedia, etc. Unless you wish to acquire comprehensive philosophical knowledge (something that takes many years of continuous effort), browsing IEP[3] and SEP[4] for subjects you're interested in can be a rewarding experience. SEPs search feature may not be Google, but it's pretty good. I tend to use IEP or Wikipedia to get an overview, and only go to SEP if I'm feeling fancy.

Here's an opinionated list of articles in semi-random order that might be adequate for a beginner (logic training will help, but it's frequently possible to get some understanding even without it):

- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_logic

- https://www.iep.utm.edu/modal-lo/

- https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/logic-modal-origins/

- https://www.iep.utm.edu/socrates/

- https://www.iep.utm.edu/plato/

- https://www.iep.utm.edu/aristotl/

- https://www.iep.utm.edu/aris-log/

- https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/aristotle-rhetoric/

- https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/pseudo-science/

- https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/computer-science/

- https://www.iep.utm.edu/epistemo/

- https://www.iep.utm.edu/analytic/

- https://www.iep.utm.edu/lang-phi/

- https://www.iep.utm.edu/ord-lang/

- https://www.iep.utm.edu/frege/i

- https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/russell/

- https://www.iep.utm.edu/russ-log/

- https://www.iep.utm.edu/wittgens/

- https://www.iep.utm.edu/consciou/

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[1] https://bookofbadarguments.com/

[2] https://courses.umass.edu/phil110-gmh/MAIN/IHome-5.htm

[3] https://www.iep.utm.edu/

[4] https://plato.stanford.edu/

Re: Philosophy as a public service

#93

Post by simmanian » Fri, Jan 03, 2020, 7:01 PM UTC

merpnderp wrote: post #84

simmanian wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the crisis of meaning is happening because existing philosophies do not provide enough value anymore in today's world. I believe a non-reductionist and non-dualistic worldview can be the solution. We must see that the world is not a "war of all men against all men" as Hobbes describes in the Leviathan, and realize we are all interdependent beings that exist as expressions of relationships, which we form toget…

But it is in our very DNA to war for status and prestige. Every animal does it, there's a pecking order for every species. No brain surgeon will happily get stuck taking out the trash because a philosopher says we all need to get along and stop striving for position. Philosophy should be telling us that hierarchies are natural and playing the game is healthy, as even if you're on the low end there's still plenty of g…

It is in our blood to war for resources, but it is also in our blood to share, cooperate, commiserate, empathize, and have compassion. I posit that greed and avarice are (once effective) survival tactics that have been obsoleted by us becoming social animals. It may be hard to imagine it now, but once more people start considering the idea that the notion of self and individual could be a cognitive illusion, that the world is not made up of individuals destined to war each other for more, we may see the end of the current crisis.

Re: Philosophy as a public service

#94

Post by gowld » Fri, Jan 03, 2020, 8:55 PM UTC

bscphil wrote: post #54

nathias wrote: post #4

I don't see how this has anything to do with philosophy, thought experiments as such arent't philosophical, some philosophy (mostly anglosphere) just uses them to draw conclusions from common sense intuitions. This kind of 'philosophy' has been a public service for as long as art exists which often draws from concepts of science and philosophy and presents it in a easily digestible form to common sense.

I have a degree in philosophy, and I agree with you. I don't see what this article has to do with philosophy as it's understood academically, and I'm also pretty unsure what the (rather self-aggrandizing) title (the site uses the title Philosophy Is a Public Service) has to do with the contents, since there's very little there to defend that claim or even talking about philosophy's role in the public sphere at all. A…

The artist has a degree in philospophy, so he calls his art philosophy.

Is putting a ring on a tree to measure its growth (and highlight the lack thereof) any more "art" than "philosophy"?

Re: Philosophy as a public service

#95

Post by gowld » Fri, Jan 03, 2020, 8:57 PM UTC

tyri_kai_psomi wrote: post #10

idoubtit wrote: post #5

In this case, philosophy clearly is an art. Creating artistic sculptures, imagining a long-term future, playing with the notion of time, inducing debates… all of this is relevant of arts. From my experience, this is not specific to this philosopher: modern philosophy is the art of playing with words and concepts. Philosophy is indeed a public service, even if it's rather a niche one. People have a large access to man…

Everything is an art. Science is an art. Even "pure mathematics" can be artful and beautiful. There is beauty in all the miracle of the application of human creation, thought, and skill. There is beauty in process, in discovery, of discovery, etc. And this is all so beautifully meta as well, because this too, is a philosophical statement.

"art" just means anything whose purpose is not purely pragmatic.

Re: Philosophy as a public service

#96

Post by philwelch » Sat, Jan 04, 2020, 5:27 AM UTC

GauntletWizard wrote: post #73

philwelch wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You’d think that, but we pedants managed to rescue the word “ironic” at one point.

But you've figuratively lost "literally".

That's just highly advanced irony; using the word "literally" non-literally.

Re: Philosophy as a public service

#97

Post by Fezzik » Sat, Jan 04, 2020, 7:41 AM UTC

It is tangential, but I’ll take this opportunity to plug one of the best* podcasts ever: The History of Philosophy Without Any Gaps. If you want thought provoking summaries of philosophical thought, spanning the history of philosophy, this podcast is for you. I have no affiliation with it, I just enjoy it: https://historyofphilosophy.net/

* subjectively, from a person with a BA in Philosophy and a JD, FWIW.

Re: Philosophy as a public service

#98

Post by Fezzik » Sat, Jan 04, 2020, 7:50 AM UTC

elfexec wrote: post #89

empath75 wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Philosophy from the very beginning concerned itself with exactly those questions. Some of that was subsumed into religion and science at some point but they are all very much in the realm of philosophy, classically and currently. I’m not religious, and I think I have fairly conclusive answers to those questions drawn from philosophy — there’s no soul or life after death and no inherent meaning to life. If you’re goin…

> If you’re going to argue that’s exclusively the realm of religion, then what were nietzche and Plato and Sartre doing? I'm arguing that certainty is the realm of religion. "Religion provides certainty. Philosophy is more honest and does not." When it comes to the meaning of life, good and evil, soul or the abyss, heaven or hell, religion provides certainty. There are 10 commandments and accept Christ. You have the…

I think you’re confusing certainty with authority. None of the things you mentioned are proved (certain) by religion, they are simply stated by authority as being true (though they are not) and accepted by some as being so. Saying with great conviction that Russel’s teapot orbits the sun, though no one can see it no matter how hard they try, or how powerful a telescope they have, does not make it true.

Re: Philosophy as a public service

#99

Post by fatbird » Thu, Jan 09, 2020, 4:45 PM UTC

dr_dshiv wrote: post #90

fatbird wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my program, we had a saying that lowbrow philosophers end every argument with "Plato said it first"; middlebrows say "Kant said it first"; highbrows say "Wittgenstein said it first." Modern philosophy hasn't "obviated" Plato, per se, but any competent philosopher today can discuss what Plato thought generally and how/why we think differently today. The philosophical method of analysis and argument remains, but no…

It seems to me quite a tall order to say that "any competent philosopher today can discuss what Plato thought generally and how/why we think differently today." Do you have a summary or link to one?

When I say "any competent philosopher", I'm being specific to the Western philosophical tradition. Up through the 19th century, any education in philosophy, classics, or the humanities was virtually certain to include reading Plato; since then, more organized philosophy degrees in university always have some ancient philosophy requirement that includes Plato/Aristotle. Additionally, Plato is frequently used as introductory material in philosophy classes to demonstrate how it works via the Socratic method. Within the confines of "professional" philosophy today, it's almost impossible not to have a basic grasp of Plato.

As for how and why we think differently today: any study of the history of philosophy is partly the study of refuting earlier philosophers. If you're aware of Plato, you're aware of criticisms of Plato and how that formed the basis of other ideas.