A lot to dive into there, but the God results immediately jump out at me.
People who tend to be interested in philosophy and are theists probably tend to go into religion rather than philosophy.
What professional philosophers believe – Survey results
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Re: What professional philosophers believe – Survey results
#12The contrarian in me can't help but think that the least popular answer is the "right" one :-)
Re: What professional philosophers believe – Survey results
#13What should hackers expect regarding the subjectivity/objectivity of aesthetic value? Should we have expected that particular choice to have broken down into thirds? What does it mean that it did break down into thirds?
Even with a minor in philosophy & a degree in linguistics which involved a good deal of philosophies of language and mind, i'm not sure what to make of the results of this survey. Anyone have a better perspective on what the deal is here?
Re: What professional philosophers believe – Survey results
#14If you have a good understanding of consciousness / mind, you can derive the answer for most philosophical problems from that.
That is a big IF. If I had a million dollars, I could buy your love.
I think I have a relatively good understanding of consciousness:
* Content of consciousness is the only thing that we can be sure of. Let's say I'm scared. This fact is true no matter if I'm in a dream or hallucinating. (We could argue if "scared" is the correct label for the feeling but that's not the point.)
* It's impossible to define consciousness objectively. Subjective definition is simple: Consciousness is my current feelings, perceptions, thoughts, etc. There's no way to create a definition, that 1) is logically consistent 2) matches our intuitive understanding of consciousness 3) is objective: you can say whether some group of atoms (like brain) is conscious or not.
Re: What professional philosophers believe – Survey results
#15[deleted]
Re: What professional philosophers believe – Survey results
#16Zombies: inconceivable, conceivable but not metaphysically possible, or metaphysically possible? Accept or lean toward: [..] Accept or lean toward: metaphysically possible 217 / 931 (23.3%) Uhm.. ? :) What does "metaphysically" mean in this context?
In academic philosophy, a "zombie" is a person without a "soul" - it is physically indistinguishable from any other person, but lacks conscious experience. It simulates the outward appearance of conscious experience by virtue of having a fully functional brain.
Sadly, this question is not related to the possibility that chemical spills can cause the dead to rise and eat brains.
Re: What professional philosophers believe – Survey results
#17A lot to dive into there, but the God results immediately jump out at me.
Especially those that answered "Other"...
Re: What professional philosophers believe – Survey results
#18Zombies: inconceivable, conceivable but not metaphysically possible, or metaphysically possible? Accept or lean toward: [..] Accept or lean toward: metaphysically possible 217 / 931 (23.3%) Uhm.. ? :) What does "metaphysically" mean in this context?
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Re: What professional philosophers believe – Survey results
#19Zombies: inconceivable, conceivable but not metaphysically possible, or metaphysically possible? Accept or lean toward: [..] Accept or lean toward: metaphysically possible 217 / 931 (23.3%) Uhm.. ? :) What does "metaphysically" mean in this context?
Phil major here.
Imagine a being that acted exactly like a human, it spoke, laughed, etc. - everything that you'd imagine a human being to do. However, it does not actually feel or think.
For example, if you were to prick one of these "zombies," they would say "ouch," recoil, perhaps berate you, but the zombie does not actually feel pain - it's a purely mechanical process.
Metaphysics is concerned with the nature of being, properties, identity, etc. What one means by whether such zombies are metaphysically possible is really an answer to the question: are such zombies really any different than how we are?
Re: What professional philosophers believe – Survey results
#20A lot to dive into there, but the God results immediately jump out at me.
People who tend to be interested in philosophy and are theists probably tend to go into religion rather than philosophy.
That's one hypothesis. An alternative hypothesis would be to suggest that the more educated one becomes in philosophy the less that religion makes sense, and the clearer it becomes that there is no evidence for theism.
(Note, I'm not advocating for either of these hypotheses, but correlation is not causation.)