Does anything exist?

[theprestige]

The first two are matters of values. Slavery didn't become wrong because someone found a new argument. It became wrong because more people felt it was wrong.

They didn't just feel it was wrong. They argued it was wrong according to some moral principle. They did philosophy.

 

[theprestige]

"Why can't philosophy do science on the stuff that science can't be done on?!"

We've now reached the point where people would rather pretend they're incapable of moral reasoning, than admit that philosophy plays a vitally important role in our epistemology and conceptual frameworks.

 

[Belz...]

Added for clarity.

Those are necessarily there. There is no such thing as an objective value, or an objective right or wrong.

 

[Belz...]

They didn't just feel it was wrong. They argued it was wrong according to some moral principle. They did philosophy.

A moral principle IS based on feelings, through and through. So yes, they might have made good arguments for it, but they only worked because people also felt the same.

 

[xjx388]

Science is objective; philosophy is subjective. Science provides answers that are true across all cultures and societies; philosophy provides answers that vary across cultures and societies. Science is solid: philosophy is squishy.

Does anything exist?

Science will say, “yes, absolutely and here are the properties of existing things that we have evidence for.”

Philosophy will have different answers depending on who is answering the question and the sociocultural milieu in which the question exists. “I think; therefore I am.” Is one such answer.

My philosophy is that science should be relied upon whenever we need objective answers and objective answers are possible. Philosophy should be relied upon for everything else. Indeed, that’s what we do right now, every one of us.

 

[ynot]

"Why can't philosophy do science on the stuff that science can't be done on?!"

Wrong! It's . . . "Why don't/can't philosophers that claim "Philosophy answers the questions that science can't answer" provide those answers?

Start by providing the philosophical answer to "Is property theft?". It's your claim that philosophy has "actually answered" this question, so let's have it.

. . .

 

[Belz...]

Wrong! It's . . . "Why don't/can't philosophers that claim "Philosophy answers the questions that science can't answer" provide those answers?

Start by providing the philosophical answer to "Is property theft?". It's your claim that philosophy has "actually answered" this question, so let's have it.

. . .

The thing is, no matter how hard and how correctly one "philosophises" about an issue like that, whatever answer they come up with will be subjective. You can convince a lot of people that your idea is right, but it won't become objective, and it will change over time.

...which is to say that it's indistinguishable from just regular thinking.

 

[ynot]

The thing is, no matter how hard and how correctly one "philosophises" about an issue like that, whatever answer they come up with will be subjective. You can convince a lot of people that your idea is right, but it won't become objective, and it will change over time.

...which is to say that it's indistinguishable from just regular thinking.

We agree. However, theprestige and some others disagree. I'm merely asking them to provide credible evidence to support their case.

Besides, "Philosophy answers the questions that science can't answer" is a merely an asserted claim, not an answer.

 

[Belz...]

We agree. However, theprestige and some others disagree. I'm merely asking them to provide credible evidence to support their case.

Yeah, good luck with that, my friend.

 

[theprestige]

philosophy is subjective.

Yes and no. Philosophy strives to reason objectively from axioms. The choice of axioms is necessarily subjective, but that doesn't mean we should abandon that entire field of inquiry. And we don't abandon it. We do philosophy all the time. Necessarily. Productively. I'm baffled that this fact causes so much brain freeze in so many intelligent people.

 

[xjx388]

Wrong! It's . . . "Why don't/can't philosophers that claim "Philosophy answers the questions that science can't answer" provide those answers?

Start by providing the philosophical answer to "Is property theft?". It's your claim that philosophy has "actually answered" this question, so let's have it.

. . .

Philosophy has indeed answered it and the answers vary based upon sociocultural factors and whether or not a particular philosophical argument wins the day. In every current society, the question “is property theft” has an answer that has been codified into the law. In the USA, for example, property is not theft.

 

[theprestige]

The thing is, no matter how hard and how correctly one "philosophises" about an issue like that, whatever answer they come up with will be subjective. You can convince a lot of people that your idea is right, but it won't become objective, and it will change over time.

...which is to say that it's indistinguishable from just regular thinking.

No.

"Regular thinking" can be ignorant of its axioms and inconsistent in its reasoning from them. But you can also be mindful of your axioms, and intentionally strive to reason consistently from them.

And yes, in this world, in the domain of human epistemology, there is always going to be a very large problem space where all of the issues are ultimately subjective. That doesn't mean they don't exist. It doesn't mean they can't be productively reasoned about. It doesn't mean that rational thinkers who agree on a set of axioms can't arrive at logical, internally-consistent conclusions from those axioms and apply them.

If I asked you to tell me why you think slavery is wrong, you'd start with some axiom, and then explain to me how your conclusion follows from that axiom. You wouldn't tell me the question is philosophical and meaningless. You wouldn't tell me can't answer the question because you have to start with a subjectively-chosen axiom.

Or I guess you might, if you subscribed to the philosophy that subjective axioms aren't real and can't be reasoned from. But even then you'd be reasoning from an axiom.

The irony of all of this is that you're using blatantly philosophical methodology to argue that philosophical methodology is useless. Not just arguing it, insisting on it. If your position is that your position is ultimately ephemeral and devoid of objective meaning, why is it so important to you to keep pressing it as the correct position? Of all the practical applications of philosophy, why is this the one you've committed to?

 

[xjx388]

Yes and no. Philosophy strives to reason objectively from axioms. The choice of axioms is necessarily subjective, but that doesn't mean we should abandon that entire field of inquiry. And we don't abandon it. We do philosophy all the time. Necessarily. Productively. I'm baffled that this fact causes so much brain freeze in so many intelligent people.

We do it all the time but we call it different things: politics, ethics, morality, etc. The idea that “science should inform policy,” is a philosophical stance, for instance.

There has never been a society that isn’t founded on philosophical axioms.

 

[Belz...]

Yes and no. Philosophy strives to reason objectively from axioms.

The only thing that's objective about philosophy is if its use of logic is valid and sound.

But that doesn't mean it has anything objective otherwise.

"Regular thinking" can be ignorant of its axioms and inconsistent in its reasoning from them.

So can philosophy. It's got no specific methodology or axioms or anything. It varies from philosopher to philosopher. In the end it comes down to how convincing the individual is.

And yes, in this world, in the domain of human epistemology, there is always going to be a very large problem space where all of the issues are ultimately subjective.

Indeed.

If I asked you to tell me why you think slavery is wrong, you'd start with some axiom, and then explain to me how your conclusion follows from that axiom.

And what would the axiom be? You're leaving that out, but the axiom would probably look something like "humans aren't property" or "human life is important" or somesuch. That's a value, based on emotion.

The irony of all of this is that you're using blatantly philosophical methodology to argue that philosophical methodology is useless.

And there we go again: philosophy is every type of thinking.

You just can't escape that. You can deny it all you want but as soon as you and others are pressed you go right back to claiming that whatever thinking is being done that's in any way effective, that's philosophy. Your error is that you forget to actually demonstrate it by defining what philosophy is exactly and what methodology it uses exactly.

It's all deliberately vague.

 

[theprestige]

We agree. However, theprestige and some others disagree. I'm merely asking them to provide credible evidence to support their case.

You already know your own answer to the question. What more credible evidence do you need?

 

[ynot]

You already know your own answer to the question. What more credible evidence do you need?

What a dishonest and pathetic attempt at a moving the goalposts dodge.

You claimed philosophy had "actually answered" the question, which at the very least implies there's an "actual answer". I asked for the "actual answer" philosophy has provided, not my own answer that I haven't even claimed to have.

Why am I not holding my breath? (rhetorical question)

 

[ynot]

The only thing that's objective about philosophy is if its use of logic is valid and sound.

But that doesn't mean it has anything objective otherwise.

So can philosophy. It's got no specific methodology or axioms or anything. It varies from philosopher to philosopher. In the end it comes down to how convincing the individual is.

Indeed.

And what would the axiom be? You're leaving that out, but the axiom would probably look something like "humans aren't property" or "human life is important" or somesuch. That's a value, based on emotion.

And there we go again: philosophy is every type of thinking.

You just can't escape that. You can deny it all you want but as soon as you and others are pressed you go right back to claiming that whatever thinking is being done that's in any way effective, that's philosophy. Your error is that you forget to actually demonstrate it by defining what philosophy is exactly and what methodology it uses exactly.

It's all deliberately vague.

Perhaps philosophy is merely the practice of being deliberately vague?

 

[IanS]

Science is objective; philosophy is subjective. Science provides answers that are true across all cultures and societies; philosophy provides answers that vary across cultures and societies. Science is solid: philosophy is squishy.

Does anything exist?

Science will say, “yes, absolutely and here are the properties of existing things that we have evidence for.”

Philosophy will have different answers depending on who is answering the question and the sociocultural milieu in which the question exists. “I think; therefore I am.” Is one such answer.

My philosophy is that science should be relied upon whenever we need objective answers and objective answers are possible. Philosophy should be relied upon for everything else. Indeed, that’s what we do right now, every one of us.

I'm not sure it helps to get into dictionary definitions of words like objective or subjective, does it?

But … “Objective” typically means "not unduly influenced by personal opinions, bias, or prejudice etc". And scientists certainly do try to take all of that into account when analysing their results, when drawing conclusions and when offering published explanations for what the results show … but scientists are also usually cautious enough to avoid claiming their work as unarguable fact.

“Subjective” generally means that the ideas, claims or beliefs, might quite easily be unduly influenced by personal opinions, bias, or prejudice etc.

It would surely be a very serious criticism of philosophy if we say that it is “subjective” in the sense that it's methodology & indeed it's practice, is more open to undue “opinion, bias, prejudice etc.”.

But although I've been quite critical of philosophy in this thread, even I would not say that philosophy is particularly flawed in that sense of being “subjective” … eg I think one of the main features of philosophy is that it surely does attempt to question all sorts of things where any of us (inc. scientists) might make the mistake of taking things for granted without thinking deeply enough about the possible problems.

IOW, afaik that does seem to be one of the main purposes of philosophy, ie to get us all to think carefully about our beliefs, eg to think about how we “know” anything.

But having said that ; if scientists do actually take care to be as objective as they reasonably can, and that is really forced by things like the peer review process, then do they need philosophers (whether they are subjective or objective) to tell them what to be wary of or cautious about in their published research? If they do, then the science literature should be full philosophers pointing out all sorts of problems with the logic, consistency, contradictions, lack of thoughtful care etc., … but of course the science research literature is not packed with any such corrections from philosophers, in fact afaik there is effectively no such corrective contribution from philosophers.

So IOW, as I've said here many times before - I don't think there is any evidence that scientists in fields such as quantum theory or Big Bang cosmology need advice from philosophers about what care they need to take in their published papers (ie the conclusions and explanations from experiments & from the maths). And in that respect I might guess that such caution partly follows from the fact that what we have now as “modern science” really began around the time of Galileo when more-&-more philosophers gradually began to move away from the earlier methods of more ancient philosophy, and moved instead into what became modern science … so in that historical sense I'm guessing that the earlier philosophical ideas of questioning everything, were carried over into what became science … and in fact, that type of care & caution has probably become far more evident and far more of a fundamental principle in current day science than it ever really was in historical/classical philosophy … another factor which might have increased that need for caution and humility amongst early scientists, was that they were often discovering things that seemed very surprising in so far as the discoveries were at odds with earlier beliefs (often beliefs that had been strongly influenced by religion) … and that caution and humility is probably even more pronounced and even more obvious in science today … so IoW, maybe that level of quite extreme caution in science is a legacy of the way science emerged from earlier philosophy circa.1600 onwards.

 

[Belz...]

Perhaps philosophy is merely the practice of being deliberately vague?

It sure is like that very often.

 

[The Man]

Sure thing, as soon as you show me those "interpretations" you keep babbling about.

No problem.

I also gave you an example of a macro world self-contradiction. Reflected waves out of phase canceling themselves. The waveform, in the media, must exist to cancel itself yet doesn't exist because it cancels itself. You can demonstrate this for yourself with some simple apparatus.

Nope, its a contradiction because the particle motions oppose each other. Now one could say that it is an example of a contradiction (A & ~A) that results in the original waveform being false (doesn't exist) as the energy of the original waveform would mostly be dissipated as heat. Though the philosophical term for something that fails reach a state of existence would be 'fails to obtain'. As in 'fails to obtain a state of existence'. Conversely 'obtain' would be the assertion of something that does reach a state of existence.

No it is not like the annihilation of electrons and positions. In the annihilation of of electrons and positions, much as you state, they meet, annihilate and that's it. For reflective destructive interference it is continuous, as long as the source is generating, the particle motions act against each other. The particles must always be in such motion just to be able to act against each other. Also, you can vary the phase between the original and reflected wave, changing the interference. Showing that both those particle motions do still exist.

Interpretations of quantum mechanics.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interpretations_of_quantum_mechanics#Comparisons


Your turn.