This whole discussion seems needlessly beholden to an unjustified distinction between philosophy and science: that the difference between the two is a matter of kind not of degree. If we call the entire enterprise of mapping the territory ‘cartography’ then there is a spectrum from applied cartography- which involves mapping particular regions with known and justified methods (stamp collecting at the limit)- to theoretical cartography in which controversial methods are debated, the aim and nature of the enterprise clarified, meta-issues discussed and theories of utmost generality advanced. There are sociological facts about the scientific enterprise that result in the spectrum being divided in arbitrary ways—certain mapping techniques are only done in certain university buildings, for example. One of these divisions involves putting a large fraction of our most theoretical cartographers in the same building.
The result is your typical Less Wrong poster laughing “Oh you silly philosophers, proven wrong time and time again by experiment. What a worthless enterprise. Why don’t you just go out and see what is there?” But condemning philosophers in this way is, I think, a bit like condemning theoretical physicists for not being experimental physicists.
The difference that is usually given is that unlike theoretical physicists, philosophers often don’t make falsifiable predictions. But a) at the limit the falsifiability of a theoretical scientist’s prediction is a nebulous affair (see, string theory for example) and b) philosophers rarely make claims regarding the outcome of single experiments—the analog to falsification for a philosophy is something like ‘conceptual irrelevance’. A philosophy is ‘falsified’ when the going scientific paradigm ceases to cohere with the philosophy.
This is not to say the condition of contemporary analytic philosophy departments is a good one. But I think it is historically analogous to something like Tychonian astronomy—on the precipice of a paradigm shift. In particular the issue is that departments are still in large part filled with pre-Turing thinkers; people that have not internalized the deep changes the cybernetic revolution has made to scientific enterprise. When you see philosophers that do understand computers you routinely see very good work. And it certainly seems to me that that fraction of philosophers is growing. It is no surprise the some of the great, recent philosophical insights have come not from philosophy departments but from CS departments. But this community seems to (or at least be prepared to) arbitrarily accord respect to some thinkers over others merely because of what building they work in. See, for example how everyone here knows who Judea Pearl is but no one knows who James Woodward is. This overly negative, almost reactionary attitude toward ‘things labeled philosophy instead of cognitive science’ does not seem likely to speed up the paradigm shift. A more proactive attitude that encouraged promising currents within philosophy departments would be more productive.
But condemning philosophers in this way is, I think, a bit like condemning theoretical physicists for not being experimental physicists.
The difference that is usually given is that unlike theoretical physicists, philosophers often don’t make falsifiable predictions. But a) at the limit the falsifiability of a theoretical scientist’s prediction is a nebulous affair (see, string theory for example) and b) philosophers rarely make claims regarding the outcome of single experiments—the analog to falsification for a philosophy is something like ‘conceptual irrelevance’. A philosophy is ‘falsified’ when the going scientific paradigm ceases to cohere with the philosophy.
I don’t ask for falsifiable experiments, I ask for reasonably narrow group acknowledgement of which things are more likely than others.
Just as physics has a limited set of acceptable beliefs at each scale of matter, and old ideas have been dropped, I’d hope to see philosophy in the same state. I too don’t see a difference in kind, but philosophy seems to have great difficulty as a group saying oops and shedding bad ideas.
This overly negative, almost reactionary attitude toward ‘things labeled philosophy instead of cognitive science’ does not seem likely to speed up the paradigm shift. A more proactive attitude that encouraged promising currents within philosophy departments would be more productive.
This is a criticism of expressions, not thoughts or even attitudes.
This whole discussion seems needlessly beholden to an unjustified distinction between philosophy and science: that the difference between the two is a matter of kind not of degree. If we call the entire enterprise of mapping the territory ‘cartography’ then there is a spectrum from applied cartography- which involves mapping particular regions with known and justified methods (stamp collecting at the limit)- to theoretical cartography in which controversial methods are debated, the aim and nature of the enterprise clarified, meta-issues discussed and theories of utmost generality advanced. There are sociological facts about the scientific enterprise that result in the spectrum being divided in arbitrary ways—certain mapping techniques are only done in certain university buildings, for example. One of these divisions involves putting a large fraction of our most theoretical cartographers in the same building.
The result is your typical Less Wrong poster laughing “Oh you silly philosophers, proven wrong time and time again by experiment. What a worthless enterprise. Why don’t you just go out and see what is there?” But condemning philosophers in this way is, I think, a bit like condemning theoretical physicists for not being experimental physicists.
The difference that is usually given is that unlike theoretical physicists, philosophers often don’t make falsifiable predictions. But a) at the limit the falsifiability of a theoretical scientist’s prediction is a nebulous affair (see, string theory for example) and b) philosophers rarely make claims regarding the outcome of single experiments—the analog to falsification for a philosophy is something like ‘conceptual irrelevance’. A philosophy is ‘falsified’ when the going scientific paradigm ceases to cohere with the philosophy.
This is not to say the condition of contemporary analytic philosophy departments is a good one. But I think it is historically analogous to something like Tychonian astronomy—on the precipice of a paradigm shift. In particular the issue is that departments are still in large part filled with pre-Turing thinkers; people that have not internalized the deep changes the cybernetic revolution has made to scientific enterprise. When you see philosophers that do understand computers you routinely see very good work. And it certainly seems to me that that fraction of philosophers is growing. It is no surprise the some of the great, recent philosophical insights have come not from philosophy departments but from CS departments. But this community seems to (or at least be prepared to) arbitrarily accord respect to some thinkers over others merely because of what building they work in. See, for example how everyone here knows who Judea Pearl is but no one knows who James Woodward is. This overly negative, almost reactionary attitude toward ‘things labeled philosophy instead of cognitive science’ does not seem likely to speed up the paradigm shift. A more proactive attitude that encouraged promising currents within philosophy departments would be more productive.
I don’t ask for falsifiable experiments, I ask for reasonably narrow group acknowledgement of which things are more likely than others.
Just as physics has a limited set of acceptable beliefs at each scale of matter, and old ideas have been dropped, I’d hope to see philosophy in the same state. I too don’t see a difference in kind, but philosophy seems to have great difficulty as a group saying oops and shedding bad ideas.
This is a criticism of expressions, not thoughts or even attitudes.