warpus
Sommerswerd asked me to change this
"Is God?" is a far more appropriate question.
What is philosophy?
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I agree I was being sloppy.
Fifty
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
How come you struck-through some of my questions, bj? Are those ones you are confident to have solved yourself?
No, they are the ones I don't understand.
Perfection
The Great Head.
Philosophy has already answered the question about God.
Spoiler :
Philosophy has already answered the question about God.
Spoiler :
probably not, but they've been wrong before. 
I'm off to bed.
Perfection
The Great Head.
Yeah, but they ain't now.
That is an outdated concept of what philosophy is.
I'm sorry Fifty's precious quote went missing there, but the OP gives some valid definitions of philosophy, whereas Fifty insists on giving his own, then denying the logical implications. So this discussion, strictly speaking, isn't about philosophy, merely about the meaning of words (which in istelf is a a valid philosophy-related question), as several other posters seem intent on focusing on. As finding the ultimate definition of philosophy is similar to the quest to answering "What is religion?" (recently raised on Plotinus' Ask a theologian thread), I shall not discuss it further unless related to another issue.
Perhaps the real issue is not finding a definitive answer, but formulating a fundamental question. A part of philosophy is concerned with raising certain issues, which more often than not aren't addressed or are illogically addressed by other disciplines.
As I started out with the beginning of philosophy, I'll come back to this. (And if I seem to forget, feel free to remind me.)
I'd agree. The problem is that philosophy has long lost any primacy among science - that is, provided it ever had. Most sciences today have their own specific "philosophy of" subdisciplines. Also, pure science never is "useful"; there may be practical implications to certain discoveries, but that's not the object of pure science.
True, although not all philosophers would agree. Also, metaphysical questions are but a subdiscipline of philosophy, meaning not all philosophers venture there (though many have and do). As Wittgenstein said: "Of that which we know nothing, we must not speak." Beyond a certain point one tends to enter the realm of pure speculation - which kind of comes with the territory. Beyond
I'm sorry Fifty's precious quote went missing there, but the OP gives some valid definitions of philosophy, whereas Fifty insists on giving his own, then denying the logical implications. So this discussion, strictly speaking, isn't about philosophy, merely about the meaning of words (which in istelf is a a valid philosophy-related question), as several other posters seem intent on focusing on. As finding the ultimate definition of philosophy is similar to the quest to answering "What is religion?" (recently raised on Plotinus' Ask a theologian thread), I shall not discuss it further unless related to another issue.
It isn't, but I was trying to stay on topic and not drag other things into the thread like I often do. I don't think it needs to answer more questions than it asks, but some of the big ones would be nice.
Perhaps the real issue is not finding a definitive answer, but formulating a fundamental question. A part of philosophy is concerned with raising certain issues, which more often than not aren't addressed or are illogically addressed by other disciplines.
As I started out with the beginning of philosophy, I'll come back to this. (And if I seem to forget, feel free to remind me.)
I'd agree. The problem is that philosophy has long lost any primacy among science - that is, provided it ever had. Most sciences today have their own specific "philosophy of" subdisciplines. Also, pure science never is "useful"; there may be practical implications to certain discoveries, but that's not the object of pure science.
True, although not all philosophers would agree. Also, metaphysical questions are but a subdiscipline of philosophy, meaning not all philosophers venture there (though many have and do). As Wittgenstein said: "Of that which we know nothing, we must not speak." Beyond a certain point one tends to enter the realm of pure speculation - which kind of comes with the territory. Beyond
As the matter what philosophy is, seems to keep popping up, and the answer to that question has varied over the ages, here's a link to recent philosophy subject matter:
http://www.radicalacademy.com/adiphilrecent.htm
There are introductions, essays and further links for those who are interested.
http://www.radicalacademy.com/adiphilrecent.htm
There are introductions, essays and further links for those who are interested.
Angst
Rambling and inconsistent
The fun part of philosophy is to discuss
The "problem" with philosophy is that it is disucssion the said questions and not answering them; however, the reason we have the term philosophy is that most of these questions are unanswerable. I'm sad to say it, but philosophy won't disappear as of yet.
GoodGame
Red, White, & Blue, baby!
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Philosophy has already answered the question about God.
Spoiler :
You type that like Philosophy is a person. So which philosopher has your favorite answer on God?
The fun part of philosophy is to discuss
I quite agree.
I'd have to disagree: philosophy actually does provide answers (it's not all about questions), but, as previous posts show, it doesn't always provide uniform or definitive answers. That may indeed be because certain questions are unanswerable in this fashion.
Free will
------------
(By example.)
I want an apple. Why? I might be hungry, or specifically desire the taste that an apple provides. So hunger or desire makes me want an apple.
I can do this, I can do that. What shall I do? Something will make me decide what to do.
(Challenge: try to find free will.)
The will is an expression of something else. To have a free will would be like making a decision purely by chance. Or, if one had a free will, a decision would not be influenced by any factor.
Platonic
--------------
Inventions do not exist.
(What we call an invention, is actually the realization of a possibility that already existed - irrespective of the discovery of it. The invention of the paperclip for instance is, when we look at it closely, the d i s c o v - e r y of the paperclip. Or, to be more precise, the i d e a of the paperclip. The fact that paperclips did not exist before they were invented, does not matter. Similarly, the fact that the atomic bomb did not exist before, does not exclude the p o s s i b i l i t y of its existence - again, irrespective of the fact if someone had the idea to construct it. In other words, the fact that no one had the idea to invent something, has no bearing on the fact that the idea of something already exists. The idea simply has not come into reality yet. Once again: ideas can be as real as what they represent.)
Ayatollah So
the spoof'll set you free
Yeah, it's the expression of a person. And a person doesn't come from nowhere. Is there a problem here?
Non sequitur alert!
aelf
Ashen One
Will sucks, and the principle of sufficient reason is shallow.
Non sequitur alert!
Dennett puts it like this: What would make a particular decision "more free?" Take out emotional factors that cloud your rationality, perhaps, take out biological factors that predispose you to a certain pattern of behavior, take out situational factors that constrain your set of possible choices, take out anything else that is somehow influencing your decision, and it becomes sort of nonsensical; there never was an independent "will" there in the first place. If we want to have a free will, it can't be separate from all of these things that, at first glance, seem to be out of our control.
PlutonianEmpire
King of the Plutonian Empire
The first to discover philosophy gets to found Taoism. 
Philosophers rock! 
Following which argument?
Really? Read the next post.
Emotional factors "that cloud your rationality" may actually be expressions of what one likes, ergo expressions of the will; taking out all factors may result in loss of will, as what we want is an end result of (taking into account) all factors. Is exactly what I meant.
Anyway, I posted these fragments (written quite a while ago), as I'm not done yet with my article on Anaximander.
Following which argument?
Really? Read the next post.
Emotional factors "that cloud your rationality" may actually be expressions of what one likes, ergo expressions of the will; taking out all factors may result in loss of will, as what we want is an end result of (taking into account) all factors. Is exactly what I meant.
Anyway, I posted these fragments (written quite a while ago), as I'm not done yet with my article on Anaximander.
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