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Plato at the Googleplex: Why Philosophy Won't Go Away

3-16am.co.uk

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Re: Plato at the Googleplex: Why Philosophy Won't Go Away

#21

Post by keiferski »

randlet wrote: post #18
keiferski wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not the commenter you replied to, but I recommend the book A Secular Age by Charles Taylor as an 874-page answer to your question. The short version: modern secularity is really more like a new development, where new influences interact in a (still essentially) Christian, Western context, and not a mere subtraction of previous religious attitudes. Really fascinating book, I can't recommend it enough. https://en.wikip…

It's still not clear to me how that implies I have a religion. Being influenced, consciously or subconsciously does not mean I have a religion, but maybe I'm misunderstanding your point.

Well, it basically comes down to how you are defining religion. The idea being that defining it as inherently supernatural is impossible and simply a linguistic reshuffling, when it's really more like "you've simply started calling your belief system something else, but it's actually still just Christian." Keep in mind here that Christianity, like all religions, is a really big tent.

Put in other terms, the Western world in 2020 likes to act as if it reinvented itself afresh in the 1700-1800-1900s, but in reality, everything about "secular" knowledge has been formed in thousands of years of Christian culture. For example, the idea of universal human worth, human rights, and subsequently democracy (in the sense of every human being, not the Ancient Greek kind), is absolutely rooted in a Christian context. Had a different society had the industrial revolution first, things might be very different.

Or to ask a different question: if your values and actions indicate you as a group of X, but you vehemently deny (only with words) being a member of X, what does that mean? Is expressed spoken belief the final decider? Or does action factor in too?

This is a really long-winded way of saying that what "religion" is defined as is constantly changing. The book I recommended explains it much better than I can.

Re: Plato at the Googleplex: Why Philosophy Won't Go Away

#22

Post by leephillips »

keiferski wrote: post #2

Philosophy hasn’t stopped being relevant, if anything, it’s even more relevant today in a hyper-globalized world. What’s changed is that academics have become over-specialized, to the point where many outright deny the usefulness of entire academic fields. Scientists like Einstein or Humboldt were well versed in philosophy and religion, whereas today the “public intellectuals” often say philosophy is outdated or usel…

I can’t think of one serious “public intellectual” who says that “philosophy is outdated or useless” and I’d be curious to have a name or two.

Re: Plato at the Googleplex: Why Philosophy Won't Go Away

#23

Post by avs733 »

ARandomerDude wrote: post #3
keiferski wrote: post #2

Philosophy hasn’t stopped being relevant, if anything, it’s even more relevant today in a hyper-globalized world. What’s changed is that academics have become over-specialized, to the point where many outright deny the usefulness of entire academic fields. Scientists like Einstein or Humboldt were well versed in philosophy and religion, whereas today the “public intellectuals” often say philosophy is outdated or usel…

Agreed. Everyone already has a philosophy (and a religion), though many people don't know it, and some would deny it. The question isn't whether to have a philosophy but which philosophy to have. EDIT: since some have asked what I meant by "everyone already has...a religion," I meant that even something like atheism is a religion. It has a story of the origin of the universe, various accounts for why and how you shou…

“cannot claim to have no epistemology. Those who so claim have nothing but a bad epistemology” ~Bateson, 1991, Sacred unity : Further steps to an ecology of mind

Owen Barfield calls it 'the residue of unresolved positivism'

Re: Plato at the Googleplex: Why Philosophy Won't Go Away

#24

Post by kritiko »

randlet wrote: post #18
keiferski wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not the commenter you replied to, but I recommend the book A Secular Age by Charles Taylor as an 874-page answer to your question. The short version: modern secularity is really more like a new development, where new influences interact in a (still essentially) Christian, Western context, and not a mere subtraction of previous religious attitudes. Really fascinating book, I can't recommend it enough. https://en.wikip…

It's still not clear to me how that implies I have a religion. Being influenced, consciously or subconsciously does not mean I have a religion, but maybe I'm misunderstanding your point.

Your question reminded me of this quote from David Foster Wallace's This is Water:

Because here’s something else that’s weird but true: in the day-to-day trenches of adult life, there is actually no such thing as atheism. There is no such thing as not worshipping. Everybody worships. The only choice we get is what to worship. And the compelling reason for maybe choosing some sort of god or spiritual-type thing to worship–be it JC or Allah, be it YHWH or the Wiccan Mother Goddess, or the Four Noble Truths, or some inviolable set of ethical principles–is that pretty much anything else you worship will eat you alive. If you worship money and things, if they are where you tap real meaning in life, then you will never have enough, never feel you have enough. It’s the truth. Worship your body and beauty and sexual allure and you will always feel ugly. And when time and age start showing, you will die a million deaths before they finally grieve you. On one level, we all know this stuff already. It’s been codified as myths, proverbs, clichés, epigrams, parables; the skeleton of every great story. The whole trick is keeping the truth up front in daily consciousness.

Re: Plato at the Googleplex: Why Philosophy Won't Go Away

#25

Post by keiferski »

leephillips wrote: post #22
keiferski wrote: post #2

Philosophy hasn’t stopped being relevant, if anything, it’s even more relevant today in a hyper-globalized world. What’s changed is that academics have become over-specialized, to the point where many outright deny the usefulness of entire academic fields. Scientists like Einstein or Humboldt were well versed in philosophy and religion, whereas today the “public intellectuals” often say philosophy is outdated or usel…

I can’t think of one serious “public intellectual” who says that “philosophy is outdated or useless” and I’d be curious to have a name or two.

"Stephen Hawking recently fluttered the academic dovecotes by writing in his new book The Grand Design – and repeating to an eager company of interviewers and journalists – that philosophy as practised nowadays is a waste of time and philosophers a waste of space. More precisely, he wrote that philosophy is ‘dead’ since it hasn’t kept up with the latest developments in science, especially theoretical physics."

https://philosophynow.org/issues/82/Hawking_contra_Philosoph...

"Astrophysicist Neil DeGrasse Tyson has claimed philosophy is not “a productive contributor to our understanding of the natural world”;"

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/neil-degrasse-tyson-and-the-v...

Re: Plato at the Googleplex: Why Philosophy Won't Go Away

#26

Post by narraturgy »

randlet wrote: post #17
shoreofwonder wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every decision you make is made under a great deal of uncertainty. A person typically holds overarching beliefs that govern those decisions. For example, how much value do you put into close relationships versus distant ones? Is charity worthwhile if it helps someone who can't help you back? Maybe someone who doesn't even know you?

How does that imply I have a religion? Doesn't religion have some element of the supernatural by definition? edit: reworded.

No, it doesn't. While the discussion of the definition of religion would result in its own holy war, suffice to say that defining religion based of the involvement of the supernatural is cyclical logic used to discredit any opposing religion. "Pagans believe in the supernatural, the sun isn't a mythical being! Only belief in my God is grounded in reality" is not functionally different from "Theists believe in the supernatural, there is no mythical God! Only my belief in the lack of anything beyond my current understanding is grounded in reality."

Re: Plato at the Googleplex: Why Philosophy Won't Go Away

#27

Post by leephillips »

keiferski wrote: post #25
leephillips wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can’t think of one serious “public intellectual” who says that “philosophy is outdated or useless” and I’d be curious to have a name or two.

"Stephen Hawking recently fluttered the academic dovecotes by writing in his new book The Grand Design – and repeating to an eager company of interviewers and journalists – that philosophy as practised nowadays is a waste of time and philosophers a waste of space. More precisely, he wrote that philosophy is ‘dead’ since it hasn’t kept up with the latest developments in science, especially theoretical physics." https:…

Ah, I remember the Hawking thing now. Thank you.

Feynman was also frequently snarky about philosophy. But he is not of our times.

Re: Plato at the Googleplex: Why Philosophy Won't Go Away

#28

Post by boyobo »

keiferski wrote: post #25
leephillips wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can’t think of one serious “public intellectual” who says that “philosophy is outdated or useless” and I’d be curious to have a name or two.

"Stephen Hawking recently fluttered the academic dovecotes by writing in his new book The Grand Design – and repeating to an eager company of interviewers and journalists – that philosophy as practised nowadays is a waste of time and philosophers a waste of space. More precisely, he wrote that philosophy is ‘dead’ since it hasn’t kept up with the latest developments in science, especially theoretical physics." https:…

I don't know about the first quote, but the second quote is not saying that the study of philosophy is useless. Just that it's useless for science.

Re: Plato at the Googleplex: Why Philosophy Won't Go Away

#29

Post by [deleted] »

yboris wrote: post #6

Philosophy is arguably the most important thing in my life. I'd like to live a morally good life, and figuring out what makes such a life is a great journey. Thanks to my pursuit, I now give at least 10% of my income to the most cost-effective charities I can find (see GiveWell). Thousands of people do the same: https://www.givingwhatwecan.org/ Many philosophers are working on society's most pressing issues (see the…

[deleted]

Re: Plato at the Googleplex: Why Philosophy Won't Go Away

#30

Post by keiferski »

boyobo wrote: post #28
keiferski wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Stephen Hawking recently fluttered the academic dovecotes by writing in his new book The Grand Design – and repeating to an eager company of interviewers and journalists – that philosophy as practised nowadays is a waste of time and philosophers a waste of space. More precisely, he wrote that philosophy is ‘dead’ since it hasn’t kept up with the latest developments in science, especially theoretical physics." https:…

I don't know about the first quote, but the second quote is not saying that the study of philosophy is useless. Just that it's useless for science.

If you read the link, he's clearly attacking the study of philosophy as a whole.
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