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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

#61

Post by whimsicalism »

kritiko wrote: post #52
whimsicalism wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think there is a difference between having cultural values and believing in a deity. We can expand the definition of religion to include those sets of cultural values, but then I worry that: a. the word religion loses meaning b. someone who was raised in the Islamic world and comes to the States and converts to Judaism can never stop being a Muslim? Even if they weren't one to start with? That seems absurd to me.

I'd suggest you look at Bellah's Civil Religion in America (1967), which suggests that certain ritual practices, e.g. rising for the national anthem before a sporting event, are religious in nature. And not that it's particularly definitive, but I'd note that cult and culture share the same Latin etymology. "Just as Thanksgiving Day, which incidentally was securely institutionalized as an annual national holiday only…

> Bellah's Civil Religion in America (1967),

I've already read it. I agree that there are implicit religious values, perhaps even pseudo-religious, I disagree that it is an actual "religion" as such.

Nor do I particularly subscribe to American civil religion itself.

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

#62

Post by sharadov »

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Humboldt were well versed in philosophy and religion, whereas today the “public intellectuals” often say philosophy is outdated or usel…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 agree it is relevant, but not many people spend time exploring it or asking the fundamental questions and ruminating on them. If they did, you would have lesser visits to the shrink later in life, and far less inner-strife. I believe philosophy should be introduced earlier in school. There could be courses in Easterrn and Western Philosophy.

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

#63

Post by brlewis »

NikolaNovak wrote: post #55
randlet wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone who would deny having a religion, can you clarify what you mean by that?

My personal, perhaps cynical perspective: religious people expanding definition of "religion" into meaninglessness. In most languages, "religion" will imply an ordered belief in a supernatural entity and set of accompanying practices. It is NOT a synonym for all belief, philosophy, ethical framework, world paradigms, etc. If it does become a synonym, then we'll simply need a NEW word to distinguish between "belief in…

>In most languages, "religion" will imply an ordered belief in a supernatural entity and set of accompanying practices

Buddhism is considered a religion and does not fit that description.

Your emphatic capslock notwithstanding, there's no single defining element. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religion

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

#65

Post by cat199 »

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.

... anyone trying to impose their form of pseudo-scientific anthropological thought as normative would (not) beg to differ...

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

#66

Post by FabHK »

ashika wrote: post #16

if someone is looking for a book where ancient philosophical ideas are critically applied to modern institutions and ideas, look elsewhere. this appears to be aimed at undergrad teaching, perhaps for an intro course, but despite the promising title, a quick read leaves me underwhelmed. the main premise, forcing plato to engage with the modern world a la bill and ted, doesnt have to be bad. but this dramatization come…

I found the book underwhelming as well, and tedious to read. I cannot remember much from the part I managed (first quarter, approximately), except the idea that philosophy has made progress, revealed through the rhetoric device of having ordinary modern people teach and enlighten Plato himself on aspects of philosophy (eg morality of slavery).

Seems to me though that one could make that point directly just as memorably, without the entire narrative artifice.

Not as gripping and informative as the books of (her husband) Steve Pinker, IMHO.

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

#67

Post by keiferski »

NikolaNovak wrote: post #55
randlet wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone who would deny having a religion, can you clarify what you mean by that?

My personal, perhaps cynical perspective: religious people expanding definition of "religion" into meaninglessness. In most languages, "religion" will imply an ordered belief in a supernatural entity and set of accompanying practices. It is NOT a synonym for all belief, philosophy, ethical framework, world paradigms, etc. If it does become a synonym, then we'll simply need a NEW word to distinguish between "belief in…

> In most languages, "religion" will imply an ordered belief in a supernatural entity and set of accompanying practices.

That is simply not true.

"Religion is a modern Western concept.[12] Parallel concepts are not found in many current and past cultures; there is no equivalent term for religion in many languages."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Definition_of_religion

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

#68

Post by FabHK »

gowld wrote: post #54

Clickbait book title. It has little to do with Plato and even less to do with Googleplex.

It's about the relevance of ancient philosophical ideas to modern society's dilemmata, and progress in philosophy over the ages, in a fictionalised setting where Plato visits Google. I think "clickbait" is a bit harsh here.

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

#69

Post by trhway »

peterwwillis wrote: post #13

Meanwhile, you mention ethical philosophy in the context of a mail security extension and get downvoted to hell. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25119305 Philosophy is doing a bad job of explaining its importance to the world. Philosophy nerds care about it, but everyone else thinks it's stupid.

> everyone else thinks it's stupid.

As far as i see the philosophy fails to correctly abstract and incorporate modern advances in scientific knowledge and technological development. While such abstraction and incorporation naturally would take time and make philosophy lagging behind, the majority of philosophy don't even bother to do it and dismisses the reality outright, a very stupid thing to do.

The philosophy's role of being a guiding science on the bleeding edge of scientific exploration of the world have been lost by the "philosophers" as the hard work of understanding of scientific reality was replaced by pseudo-scientific hand-waiving. That hand-waiving is easily noticeable even by casual observer and results in total loss of respect.

More than 30 years ago a freshman at University i had a great interest in philosophy, the new market capitalism in USSR resulted in great availability of books, including philosophical one, and we had a blast. With years as my knowledge grew, i started to see the philosophy's failure to provide both - a well build abstraction as well as exploration guidance - and started to see it only just as temporary mind crutches, a band-aid for the lack of knowledge, like those Ancient Greeks' myths.

And Plato today would have got Deep NN PhD and would be sitting at Google as a senior manager or director pulling $5M+ a year.

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

#70

Post by vcxy »

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…

So, you seem to have only met a certain kind of atheist. I don't really want to say more about that in particular because it feels like I will be accused of proselytizing. What I will say is that I think you're reading too much into what not believing in deities may or may imply about someone.

Edit: I should also ask, from your edit, what do you mean by "deity" and "universe" when you say that atheism holds that the universe is a deity?

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