On Philosophy

[lovett]

Nope. I've seen them they aren't.

[...]

Fifty never said to "do" science, Fifty said to justify results.

Surely 'infitinite regress' implies that results, can never truly be justified without resort to unjustified assumptions, I.e, 'guessing'. Results in this sense including both empirical demonstration and conclusions resulting from logical trains of thought.

As such, since every field must ultimately base itself on implicit assumptions, to use this as a basis for criticising science (or even science 'fanboys') seems a bit.....petty.

 

[Perfection]

It's a legitimate criticism of science. It, of course, doesn't make it wrong, but it does help us understand the limiations of science. Science alone can't do everything and when and how to use science is an importnt philosophical question that does effect scientific results.

It also helps us define what science is and what differentiates "good science" from "bad science"

 

[Atticus]

What was that whole first section before the rant if not a decent supported argument?

Not sure where you are referring at, but yes, Fifty seems to be able sometimes to give decent arguments.

Because these "science fanboys" (the word I shall use to describe the people Fifty is refering to) don't understand logical nuanced arguments, the only recourse is mockery and scorn.

Ok, I've wseen and interacted with these "science fanboys" too, and know that it isn't always easy to talk with them, but what good will mock and scorn do in that situation? What good it will do in any situation? Also, it seems to me that Fifty labels everyone who doesn't agree with him as that kind of person. He doesn't wait to hear their arguments, and that kind of attitude might make him misidentify good arguments as the bad ones.

It's fun to be mean.
...
I've been cocky here for 6 years. Hasn't gotten to me yet!

Oh, the keyword is here, for some reason I assumed that you have balls enough to be cocky in real life too.

You know if meanness is fun to you, you should maybe think over reasons lying behind that. Is it fun because you can fell yourseld superior that way? Then why not invent some healthier way of feeling yourself adequate?

Fifty specifically said it doesn't. So I'm not sure how your getting that this implies to everyone.

No, I was exaggerating, I meant that it's influenced by the fact that he doesn't even try to understand the arguments of those "science fanboys"

Physics kinda came out of philosophy so, I'm not so sure that you're right here.

Well, I meant modern physics and philosophy. But anyhow, I don't think that science benefitted much from philosophy even before Newton &co.

EDIT:

I hope you didn't write that on my account.

It was more his rude behaviour to Warpus.

 

[DNK]

Personally, philosophy affects my everyday life by altering my perception of reality based on logical conclusions I come to about the nature of x,y, and z. Perhaps I'm just using philosophy as a catchall term to encompass any logical meditation, though, and would be better to use "linguistics", "ethics", "literary theory", "social science", "psychology", etc, instead.

Otherwise, I find it interesting. What's wrong with curiosity? I would think scientists would quite appreciate the feeling. Since when was science only about making nice things? It's more meaningful for me personally to understand and explore the world and theoretical world than to simply know and experience scientific facts and inventions. Leisurely pursuit sort of thing. Philosophical study gives me the logical tools to do so properly. I wouldn't want to cut a forest down with a Swiss Army knife, and the best ax store is in the Philosophy store, I think...

 

[Perfection]

Not sure where you are referring at, but yes, Fifty seems to be able sometimes to give decent arguments.

I was referencing Fifty's post before the Rant part, which was a good argument.

Ok, I've wseen and interacted with these "science fanboys" too, and know that it isn't always easy to talk with them, but what good will mock and scorn do in that situation? What good it will do in any situation?

It gets them to shut up often, so the adults can talk.

Also, it seems to me that Fifty labels everyone who doesn't agree with him as that kind of person. He doesn't wait to hear their arguments, and that kind of attitude might make him misidentify good arguments as the bad ones.

It seems you don't know Fifty well enough

Oh, the keyword is here, for some reason I assumed that you have balls enough to be cocky in real life too.

Well, this was completely in the context of the internet. MY real life cockiness is not at issue.

You know if meanness is fun to you, you should maybe think over reasons lying behind that. Is it fun because you can fell yourseld superior that way? Then why not invent some healthier way of feeling yourself adequate?

Already feel adequate, this allows me to feel superior. Superior is superior to adequate.

No, I was exaggerating, I meant that it's influenced by the fact that he doesn't even try to understand the arguments of those "science fanboys"

What's there to try and understand? They're just bad arguments!

Well, I meant modern physics and philosophy. But anyhow, I don't think that science benefitted much from philosophy even before Newton &co.

You'd be wrong there, modern physics has a lot of philosophical issues! Some of them are, determinism-nondeterminism, what can we know about what is outside our ability to measure (multiverse crap), and the role of asthetics (especially mathematical elegance) in physics.

 

[DNK]

Already feel adequate, this allows me to feel superior. Superior is superior to adequate.

Well, unless you think that the drive to feel superior is an inadequacy in itself, meaning the feeling of superiority is the manifestation of this drive as the payoff for the satisfaction of that need, and that the feeling of superiority may be incompatible with logical, ethical conclusions, and is therefore a tainting of the "superior" intellectual mind by the primitive ego, and the acceptance of adequacy will result in superiority by no longer requiring the satisfaction of the superiority drive and conforming to a logical ethical identity.

Something along the lines of "wise men don't think they're wise"...

Is that philosophy? I'm confused about the term now.

 

[lovett]

It's a legitimate criticism of science. It, of course, doesn't make it wrong, but it does help us understand the limiations of science. Science alone can't do everything and when and how to use science is an importnt philosophical question that does effect scientific results.

It also helps us define what science is and what differentiates "good science" from "bad science"

What im getting at is that its a legitimate criticism of everything. I see no special reason to single-out science, whilst ignoring the identical flaws in every other type of thinking.

 

[Perfection]

@DNK, I really shoulda put a "" smilie in there...

 

[Perfection]

What im getting at is that its a legitimate criticism of everything. I see no special reason to single-out science, whilst ignoring the identical flaws in every other type of thinking.

Well philosophy doesn't and Fifty never said it did. What I think is at issue is that you seem to think that philosophical criticism of science is bad for science or against science. This is not true, philosophy seeks to understand science and how it works. Having an understanding of how science works makes one better at science.

 

[warpus]

Fifty

Scientists have to make some assumptions in order to make predictions about the world. Otherwise they'd get nowhere at all.

There's no way to get around that!

And if these assumptions are false, then we're living in some sort of holo-deck, or the entire Universe is an illusion, or something equally crazy.. making everything irrelevant anyway.

 

[Perfection]

Of course, everyone knows that. The thing that's important here is that knowing which assumptions are good to make, and procedures to use falls squarely in the domain of philosophy.

 

[lovett]

Well philosophy doesn't and Fifty never said it did. What I think is at issue is that you seem to think that philosophical criticism of science is bad for science or against science. This is not true, philosophy seeks to understand science and how it works. Having an understanding of how science works makes one better at science.

Well Fifty said:

"it is the case that some substantive philosophical thesis lies hidden somewhere in the justificatory history of the claim"

This sounds like a criticism of science on the basis that science is inextricably 'dependendent' on philosophical theses, based on reasonable processes of logic. Without this underpinning, science would be based purely on asumptions. the implication being that this would debase it in some manner.

However, I'd argue that this was rather two-faced. If philosophy, in particular the philosophy underpinning science, is based on what are fundamentally assumptions, I fail to see how it is really relevant that science could be based on assumptions too. I.e, with or without philisophical underpinning, science will ultimately be based on unjustifiable claims.

And, no. I don't think that's the issue at all.

 

[Kozmos]

I could write several pages of philosophical crap and debate this with the rest of you....

or I could listen to some Megadeth while bombing brown people in BF2.

Decisions, decisions....yes I think I'll go Megadeth/BF2.

 

[Fifty]

First of all, have you noticed, that for a philosophy student your argumentation sucks. I don't mean it sucks as contrasted to other philosophy students, but with the ideal of philosophy. Instead of giving relevant statements and justifying them, you just start to bash the imagined opponent.

I'm not sure if you realized the scope and intent of my and Mr. CT's "discussion".

Anyways, I challenge you to give some concrete case, where philosophy has been needed to do science.

When did I say it was?

 

[Fifty]

Fifty labels everyone who doesn't agree with him as that kind of person. He doesn't wait to hear their arguments, and that kind of attitude might make him misidentify good arguments as the bad ones.
.

This is just false. There are lots of people, even on this forum, who I completely disagree with in matters philosophical (both in the answers to particular philosophical questions, and in the scope/limits/usefulness of philosophy), that I would not make fun of.

I spend more time, publicly, making fun of the idiots than I do conversing with the smart people. There are a few reasons for this. First of all, there aren't all that many smart people around here, and so its hard to do. Second, I do some of that via PM or in #fiftychat because attempts to have intelligent conversation on the issues in public on CFC always gets drowned out by the idiots. Why do you think Plotinus never participates in religion threads beyond Ask A Theologian? I bet its not because he fears the powerful criticisms of the anti- or pro- religion nutballs on the forum, but rather because its just not worth it to spend pages and pages and pages explaining stuff to people determined not to think.

And why should I adopt a more civil tone towards them? They're too wrapped up in their own confusions to realize they're wrong without wayyyyyy more explanation than I'm willing to give. So maybe you'd say, well, why not ignore them? For my answer I defer to Turgenev:

Argue even with a fool:
You will not gain glory
But sometimes it is fun.

Its fun making fun of idiots, and its fun to see how utterly convinced they are that they're right about everything, and its fun to point and laugh. Maybe all thats immature, but I don't give a hoot!

 

[LightFang]

I could write several pages of philosophical crap and debate this with the rest of you....

or I could listen to some Megadeth while bombing brown people in BF2.

Decisions, decisions....yes I think I'll go Megadeth/BF2.

If you don't want to participate in a valid discussion, then don't post in the thread.

 

[Mise]

Of course, everyone knows that. The thing that's important here is that knowing which assumptions are good to make, and procedures to use falls squarely in the domain of philosophy.

I don't think that's true at all... Philosophy provides another degree of intellectual rigour to the most basic assumptions used in science, but that doesn't mean that the assumptions, nor the procedures in arriving at those assumptions, falls under the domain of philosophy. Nor is there anything inherently "philosophical" about it. It was scientists who identified the need for scientific method. That's what's important here.

And I think Atticus has a point about Fifty's inclusion of "implicit usage". Those guys might have been using aspects of philosophy, with or without their knowledge. But when it's use stems from past inadequacies in science, is used by scientists, and used for the advancement of science, I think we can safely say that it is no longer an aspect of philosophy, but an aspect of science.

 

[holy king]

philosophy actually is the root of all science. (which probably has been said allready or misses the point, i just didnt bother to read the thread)

 

[Perfection]

And I think Atticus has a point about Fifty's inclusion of "implicit usage". Those guys might have been using aspects of philosophy, with or without their knowledge. But when it's use stems from past inadequacies in science, is used by scientists, and used for the advancement of science, I think we can safely say that it is no longer an aspect of philosophy, but an aspect of science.

Well, I'd say it's both.

 

[LightFang]

philosophy actually is the root of all science. (which probably has been said allready or misses the point, i just didnt bother to read the thread)

You're supposed to say how so.