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What professional philosophers believe – Survey results

philpapers.org

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Re: What professional philosophers believe – Survey results

#41

Post by sramsay »

knowtheory wrote: post #20
jgesture wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.)

I seriously doubt that. Most "professional philosophers" these days are doing analytical philosophy, and it's been at least 500 years since a non-crazy person has been persuaded one way or the other about God by studying logic.

I suppose Georg Cantor might be an exception to this.

Re: What professional philosophers believe – Survey results

#42

Post by bornhuetter »

RivieraKid wrote: post #14
Evbn wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

What you have just said doesn't in any way help answer most of the questions on the survey.

Re: What professional philosophers believe – Survey results

#43

Post by jbattle »

jonhmchan wrote: post #19
gizzlon wrote: post #7

Zombies: 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…

Is this related to artificial intelligence? (strong vs weak AI)

Re: What professional philosophers believe – Survey results

#44

Post by maxisnow »

It's great to see numbers but the reality is to get exact answers from any professional Philosopher you would need to let them rewrite the question every time. Working with pro and academic Philosophers on symposiums taught me that even the folks in the same micro sub-field with each other have these chasms of interpretation that led to huge difference in expression.

Re: What professional philosophers believe – Survey results

#45

Post by loupeabody »

jonhmchan wrote: post #19
gizzlon wrote: post #7

Zombies: 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…

Thanks for the explanation! Now I'm way interested in reading more about these zombies.

Re: What professional philosophers believe – Survey results

#47

Post by RivieraKid »

pessimizer wrote: post #37
RivieraKid wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

>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. I admire your confidence.

Thanks :)

Re: What professional philosophers believe – Survey results

#48

Post by jamessun »

loboman wrote: post #27
jamessun wrote: post #12

The contrarian in me can't help but think that the least popular answer is the "right" one :-)

I get you are joking but... That's just as bad as thinking that the most popular answer is the right one. The best you can do is to decide which one is best by analyzing the contents, not the % values.

Agreed.

Re: What professional philosophers believe – Survey results

#50

Post by Zikes »

patdennis wrote: post #39

Here's one of my favorites. Glad to see the pros are evenly split, because this one really toasts my brain too. Teletransporter (new matter): survival or death? Accept or lean toward: survival 337 / 931 (36.2%) Other 304 / 931 (32.7%) Accept or lean toward: death 290 / 931 (31.1%)

What if it didn't destroy the old one? Would there be any doubt at all?
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