Academic philosophy differs from science in that it seems to place much higher value on the personalities and the original works relative to the ideas. When I studied physics at university we didn’t learn physics from the original works or papers of the pioneering scientists. Newton is rightly recognized for his huge contribution to physics but no physics course will use the Principia to teach mechanics. The core ideas have been refined and are now presented in ways that are easier for students to grasp, without extraneous or incorrect extra detail present in the original works or problems of language.
When I studied philosophy at university however, great import was placed on reading the original texts from great philosophers. In many cases reading these works I was struck by the amount of confused and wrong ideas and the lack of clarity of presentation—Descartes is a prime example. It seemed to me at the time that if philosophy was the pursuit of truth in any sense then it would be better served by a model of instruction more like science: where the key ideas are presented in a refined and clarified modern text. My experience of academic philosophy was that it couldn’t quite decide if it wanted to be science or literary criticism.
It seemed to me at the time that if philosophy was the pursuit of truth in any sense then it would be better served by a model of instruction more like science
The fact that philosophy hasn’t adopted such a model strongly suggests that it’s not concerned with truth.
There are people who can do good philosophy—contrary to thomblake’s assertion, I’ve found that they’re virtually never people called ‘philosophers’. They’re usually scientists.
As a data point, it should be noted that in the past 3 or so discussions of this problem, I’ve used Dan Dennett as my sole example of a good contemporary philosopher that anyone’s heard of. If I’m going to keep talking about this, I really should find at least one or two more.
My guess would be that people aren’t aware of the discourse you’ve been involved in regarding “philosophy” vs “academic philosophy”. As stated, it seems like you’re expressing something contradictory. Compare:
“philosophy...[is] not concerned with truth” ″people who can do good philosophy...[are] usually scientists”
You seem to be equivocating. In the first sense, I think you mean “academic philosophy” (the institution), while in the second, you mean… well, philosophy (love of wisdom / pursuit of truith).
Though I’d be surprised if anyone actually thought it through that clearly before downvoting.
My downvote was because I consider this sentence to be noise and inflammatory:
The fact that philosophy hasn’t adopted such a model strongly suggests that it’s not concerned with truth.
… And this sentence is anecdotal and coming from what I judge to be a biased position:
There are people who can do good philosophy—contrary to thomblake’s assertion, I’ve found that they’re virtually never people called ‘philosophers’. They’re usually scientists.
I downvoted but did not comment because any direct response in the lines of argument seem likely to delve into semantics on the definitions of philosopher, philosophy, scientist, and science. Also, on a more personal note, I have yet to get any meaningful value from a conversation with you. For whatever reason, my fault or yours, it is not worth my time.
There’s an element of truth to this critique, and I have felt for a long time that what is usually taught as “Introduction to Philosophy” should be taught as “Introduction to the History of Philosophy”.
However it’s also totally off-base in that philosophy, when it’s not being a total waste of time, is the examination of problems which are important but which can’t be solved by science alone. As such philosophical conclusions aren’t “true” and there is no “truth” to pursue or teach.
There are competing views with no truth value, like deontological and utilitarian ethics, but neither is “true” or “false” and it’s a category error to try to put them into those boxes.
Done well it’s neither science nor literary criticism, but rather the search for mental constructs which are useful or internally consistent.
Academic philosophy differs from science in that it seems to place much higher value on the personalities and the original works relative to the ideas. When I studied physics at university we didn’t learn physics from the original works or papers of the pioneering scientists. Newton is rightly recognized for his huge contribution to physics but no physics course will use the Principia to teach mechanics. The core ideas have been refined and are now presented in ways that are easier for students to grasp, without extraneous or incorrect extra detail present in the original works or problems of language.
When I studied philosophy at university however, great import was placed on reading the original texts from great philosophers. In many cases reading these works I was struck by the amount of confused and wrong ideas and the lack of clarity of presentation—Descartes is a prime example. It seemed to me at the time that if philosophy was the pursuit of truth in any sense then it would be better served by a model of instruction more like science: where the key ideas are presented in a refined and clarified modern text. My experience of academic philosophy was that it couldn’t quite decide if it wanted to be science or literary criticism.
The fact that philosophy hasn’t adopted such a model strongly suggests that it’s not concerned with truth.
There are people who can do good philosophy—contrary to thomblake’s assertion, I’ve found that they’re virtually never people called ‘philosophers’. They’re usually scientists.
As a data point, it should be noted that in the past 3 or so discussions of this problem, I’ve used Dan Dennett as my sole example of a good contemporary philosopher that anyone’s heard of. If I’m going to keep talking about this, I really should find at least one or two more.
I would be fascinated to know why the above comment garnered two downvotes so quickly.
My guess would be that people aren’t aware of the discourse you’ve been involved in regarding “philosophy” vs “academic philosophy”. As stated, it seems like you’re expressing something contradictory. Compare:
“philosophy...[is] not concerned with truth”
″people who can do good philosophy...[are] usually scientists”
You seem to be equivocating. In the first sense, I think you mean “academic philosophy” (the institution), while in the second, you mean… well, philosophy (love of wisdom / pursuit of truith).
Though I’d be surprised if anyone actually thought it through that clearly before downvoting.
My downvote was because I consider this sentence to be noise and inflammatory:
… And this sentence is anecdotal and coming from what I judge to be a biased position:
I downvoted but did not comment because any direct response in the lines of argument seem likely to delve into semantics on the definitions of philosopher, philosophy, scientist, and science. Also, on a more personal note, I have yet to get any meaningful value from a conversation with you. For whatever reason, my fault or yours, it is not worth my time.
‘Inflammatory’ I could understand, although I submit that simple truth assertions ought not to be evaluated by looking at their social acceptability.
But calling it noise is just silly.
Then stop replying to me, please. And voting on my posts as well.
There’s an element of truth to this critique, and I have felt for a long time that what is usually taught as “Introduction to Philosophy” should be taught as “Introduction to the History of Philosophy”.
However it’s also totally off-base in that philosophy, when it’s not being a total waste of time, is the examination of problems which are important but which can’t be solved by science alone. As such philosophical conclusions aren’t “true” and there is no “truth” to pursue or teach.
There are competing views with no truth value, like deontological and utilitarian ethics, but neither is “true” or “false” and it’s a category error to try to put them into those boxes.
Done well it’s neither science nor literary criticism, but rather the search for mental constructs which are useful or internally consistent.