Philosophy is redundant

[eFestivals]

In a philosophical sense, it helps me understand that we are limited in what we can understand by the language we have

The philosophical view is that that's an absolute.

Reality shows that as wrong. Philosophy itself could not have come to exist if that were true.

So the standard philosophical view is clearly incorrect, as shown by the evidence. Scientific discovery requires thought beyond language, via which language is able to be formed.

A philosophical world ends up as the goldfish in a bowl, swimming round and round and forgetting every five seconds all that it learnt in the previous five seconds. A scientific world doesn't forget, and builds knowledge on top of knowledge to get us to where we are.

[eFestivals]

brilliant!

you're aguing with him even when he's not here...

Oh do f**k off.

It wasn't me that brought it up.

Hawkings also has a history of changing his mind, doesn't he?

Yep. But far less than philosophy does.

[RABun]

Not if time itself started at the big bang.

The problem is the human mind can't grasp nothingness. Its impossible as whenever we think of it we always think of something, even we think of something dark and empty that's still something, and not nothing.

[eFestivals]

I don't understand the idea that all philosphers come together and end up with one singular viewpoint.

Surely, the very nature of it means that there'd be an almost infinite number of possibilities

Like all academic disciplines, there's a formal view of what it is. It's via that that anything gains its power.

[jonbob]

But when science already tells us that what they know they already know to be wrong,

[Ed209]

Its not just nothingness we can't comprehend its the absence of causality that we cant work out. I can't grasp that the big bang came out of nothing. If you send protons around a giant ring at 99.99% the speed of light and smack them into to each other you might see what happened a split second after the big bang - i.e. cause and effect, one of the great laws. Did our universe expand from another universe? Where did that universe come from? Its enough to drive anyone loony!

[llcoolphil]

I suggest you re-read the words you've written there, and I reckon you'll spot your error.

Edited September 9, 2010 by llcoolphil

[llcoolphil]

They have lots and lots of extrapolated evidence that is saying to them that 'it is', not that 'it might be'. The point of the LHC is to prove in reality what they have proven in theory.

[Pogues Mcgogues]

What if the world is realy just a test? A test to seperate the good from the bad? And at the end of it, the good go to a better place and the bad are damned for eternity?

[llcoolphil]

What if the world is realy just a test? A test to seperate the good from the bad? And at the end of it, the good go to a better place and the bad are damned for eternity?

[eFestivals]

The world of science isn't united on what the LHC might or might not find. There are a bunch of scientists with extrapolated evidence saying one thing and there are other bunches of scientists with extrapolated evidence saying other things. They've all got an 'it might be' but the chances are only one of them is going to be right.

The world of anything is rarely united.

All the same, there's big enough scientific consensus about the ideas behind the LHC for those scientists to be able to raise the billions for the LHC to be constructed. It might be that they're wrong, but the history of such things gets to show that it's unlikely that they will be.

They're not working from an "it might be" idea, but an idea they're convinced is correct from having approached the idea from more than one angle and where each angle confirms that view. The only way to find out for certain is by doing it. Because they're scientists, they want all the possible proof they can have.

Compare and contrast that with some philosophical lines of enquiry - they're not bothered with absolute proof, an idea that hangs together for them is enough, and they'll shy away from testing of the idea, claiming irrelevance when they're not in a position to know what is irrelevant. A quick look as philosophy's claims for language is all a half-smart brain or better needs to realise that so much of modern philosophy is cack.

[jonbob]

Our current understanding of why we have mass is wrong because when you extrapolate the maths about why we have mass the sums dont work and it comes back to zero.

[eFestivals]

Aren't there a wealth of subjects that 'we' can philosophical about that have little to do with science? Like "why are we here?". That seems more philosphical than scientific to me

Exactly. There's a distinct split between the two as we understand them today, so the fact that what is now science grew out of what was considered philosophy ceases to be of much meaning in today's world.

If you want to know how, say, a TV works you ask a scientist not a philosopher. It's only the dumb philosophers who believe themselves qualified to address that question.

As for "why are we here" itself, even the smart philosophers should shy away from that nowadays. They should be able to realise that it's not a question they can get near to answering - ultimately they can't get any nearer than a 5 year old can via their own speculations.

It doesn't stop them tho. Because of course stopping and admitting that they have no answers and never will only confirms their own irrelevance. No body of people which has had its grip on power gives it up willingly.

Philosophy has in reality been long ago surpassed by science. Theoretical naval gazing has been rightly recognised as a pointless exercise that informs us of nothing new and certainly not useful. In fact it tries to drag us back into the dark ages by crediting the mythical with an undeserved relevance, such as via the recognition that a rock might not always fall because it's in the list of possibilities of what an object might do; without there being a real-life relevance to such things they can be as good as ignored, it tells us nothing.

Edited September 9, 2010 by eFestivals

[llcoolphil]

All that is missing from the equation is the mass of the Higgs boson itself.

Edited September 9, 2010 by llcoolphil

[eFestivals]

but I have my own philosophical take on things, and life in general. I'm not being arrogant or anything, I wouldn't call myself a 'philosopher' as such. I just thought that's the way it works

for me at least...

Oh, I'm not saying they're questions that can't be considered and a personal answer arrived at.

What I was getting at is (from your example) that it's not a question that's ever going to have definitive and absolutely correct answer other than the basic and rather boring "to further the species", that it's not a question that modern philosophy is ever going to give us a greater insight into. And it's worth noting that the best answer we currently have came from scientific investigation and not philosophy.

But, to address your wider point, it's what we all do some of the time, and as you recognise, without the need the need to label that sort of navel gazing as something special by considering ourselves as having special skills as someone who calls themselves a philosopher does. The very fact that you can do it and arrive at no less of a good answer than someone who considers themselves a philosopher gets to show that philosophy IS dead, at least it is as any special skill. We all have education enough nowadays for our thought processes to do that.

[feral chile]

The theory is unprovable perhaps, but the effect isn't.

Philosophy is merely ideas - effect isn't ever a part of it.

They are not the same. Everything is not equal.

[feral chile]

Oh, I'm not saying they're questions that can't be considered and a personal answer arrived at.

What I was getting at is (from your example) that it's not a question that's ever going to have definitive and absolutely correct answer other than the basic and rather boring "to further the species", that it's not a question that modern philosophy is ever going to give us a greater insight into. And it's worth noting that the best answer we currently have came from scientific investigation and not philosophy.

But, to address your wider point, it's what we all do some of the time, and as you recognise, without the need the need to label that sort of navel gazing as something special by considering ourselves as having special skills as someone who calls themselves a philosopher does. The very fact that you can do it and arrive at no less of a good answer than someone who considers themselves a philosopher gets to show that philosophy IS dead, at least it is as any special skill. We all have education enough nowadays for our thought processes to do that.

Edited September 11, 2010 by feral chile

[eFestivals]

and cause and effect are not ideas?

yes, cause and effect are ideas. Science concentrates on JUST those ideas, while philosophy looks at all ideas and gives any idea that holds up a basis - while science doesn't.

As an easy example: philosophy says that because it's a possibility that a rock I hold in my hand might not fall to the ground when released, it's a credible idea that it might not fall. Science says that because a rock has never been seen not to fall it's not a credible idea, and that until such time there's evidence that it might not fall that it's not a part of the consideration of what might happen with the rock.

If we work science from a purely philosophical perspective, then we become the goldfish in the bowl - forgetting everything that we've previously learnt by continually revisiting ideas which we've previously ruled out due to lack of evidence.

Do you not think that science needs a rigorous definition of its principles in oeder to function effectively?

Yep. And it's been done.

So it's now the case that it no longer needs to be done.

Edited September 13, 2010 by eFestivals

[Ed209]

Also - If Hawking now suggests that Intelligent Design is nonsense, how did he come up with it evidentially in the first place.?

Edited September 13, 2010 by Ed209

[llcoolphil]

This was published in the Guardian on Saturday

http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2010/sep/11/science-stephen-hawking-brian-cox

In summary ... His famous "know the mind of God" quote from Brief History of Time has been misinterpreted. He meant God to be a short hand for the laws of physics and probably regrets his choice of words now. I don't think he was ever a subscriber to intelligent design.

edit: A rather unfortunate shortening of the link

[eFestivals]

There are philosophical scientists, and scientific philosophers, and everything in between.

Yep, there's also waste-of-spacers. Do those you mention above fall outside of that category?

[eFestivals]

well, for a start, it'd be your concept of what a waste-of-spacer is..

Neither science or philosophy has a value if it doesn't lead to anything which is valued. And there's an awful lot of that from both.

maybe it's just me, but I have this idea that people are different from each other

Yep. But the good ideas still win thru.

[eFestivals]

the 'good' ideas....?

like religion, and capitalism, and wars, and errmm....

where shall I stop?

lol.

Taking religion as an example, it possibly was a good idea when it was first an idea. But sooner or later it's possible that another idea will come along and surpass it - and it has. Scientific investigation.

But just because another, better, idea has come along doesn't mean that the original idea will be given up by all people in an instant. Religion is entrenched in society, so it's going to take a bit of shifting. It is being shifted, but it's taking a while and will take a while longer because of how deeply it is entrenched.

But it is being rejected however slowly, and eventually it'll be regarded much as other beliefs are such as paganism, a throwback to the past that few in society will take seriously.

[feral chile]

yes, cause and effect are ideas. Science concentrates on JUST those ideas, while philosophy looks at all ideas and gives any idea that holds up a basis - while science doesn't.

As an easy example: philosophy says that because it's a possibility that a rock I hold in my hand might not fall to the ground when released, it's a credible idea that it might not fall. Science says that because a rock has never been seen not to fall it's not a credible idea, and that until such time there's evidence that it might not fall that it's not a part of the consideration of what might happen with the rock.

If we work science from a purely philosophical perspective, then we become the goldfish in the bowl - forgetting everything that we've previously learnt by continually revisiting ideas which we've previously ruled out due to lack of evidence.

Yep. And it's been done.

So it's now the case that it no longer needs to be done.

Edited September 13, 2010 by feral chile

[eFestivals]

I used to get beside myself with my philosophy lecturer when he'd expect me to take seriously some half-baked assertion about the world at large that was patently not true (especially the stuff about human nature) and he'd tell me off for being 'too empirical' by finding counter examples in the real world.

So there you go then, it's what I've been saying.

Philosophy doesn't do reality, and via that it ceases to be relevant.