CT (Critical Thinking) is 'philosophy light'

[drkitten]

I think there's often a misperception, even among some scientists, that science and philosophy are competing methodologies for probing the same set of truths. They aren't at all. There might be some gray areas in highly theoretical fields of science that venture into speculations beyond the immediately available empirical evidence (I have been told by people more knowledgeable about such things than I that the science of cosmology arguably falls into this category), but generally speaking, (properly done) science and (properly done) philosophy involve the application of the same set of logical principles to very different kinds of questions.

To be fair, philosophy often presents itself as a competing methodology, so it's not surprising that a number of scientists believe it to be so.

There appear to be a number of people out there who, for whatever, reason, are anti-scientific. Some of them may be religious wingnuts who are trying to preserve the sanctity of their core beliefs from scientific disproof, some of them are political activists who are trying to find justification for their desired policies despite a total lack of factual grounding, and a lot are just dissatisfied (and jealous) "humanists" who are trying to establish some sort of intellectual superiority over the "priviledged" scientists.

And so they "compete" -- usually badly -- using more or less the only other methodology out there. Philosophy.

This is part of where philosophy gets its bad rep, I believe. You point out that "properly-done" philosophy should not and does not compete, but far too much philosophy, then, is demonstrably improperly done. And if someone looks at a group of "philosophers" and sees a large representation of the groups listed above, then it's hard to see philosophy as being a worthwhile endeavour.

 

[RandFan]

To be fair, philosophy often presents itself as a competing methodology, so it's not surprising that a number of scientists believe it to be so.

There appear to be a number of people out there who, for whatever, reason, are anti-scientific. Some of them may be religious wingnuts who are trying to preserve the sanctity of their core beliefs from scientific disproof, some of them are political activists who are trying to find justification for their desired policies despite a total lack of factual grounding, and a lot are just dissatisfied (and jealous) "humanists" who are trying to establish some sort of intellectual superiority over the "priviledged" scientists.

And so they "compete" -- usually badly -- using more or less the only other methodology out there. Philosophy.

This is part of where philosophy gets its bad rep, I believe. You point out that "properly-done" philosophy should not and does not compete, but far too much philosophy, then, is demonstrably improperly done. And if someone looks at a group of "philosophers" and sees a large representation of the groups listed above, then it's hard to see philosophy as being a worthwhile endeavour.

I had not thought of the issues in those terms. It makes sense. Thank you.

 

[Tricky]

Without taking a position on qualia, about which I know little more than what I read in some of Ian's long-winded posts in the past, I don't think it's quite true that all "real" things have physical characteristics. Do the rules of logic or mathematics exist physically? Does beauty or justice or morality?

In the sense that they have mental correlates, then yes they do exist physically. Thoughts, ideas, memories et. al. are stored as physical "things" in your brain. (Except for the rules of mathematics, which are stored in every object in the universe.) The way you "store" them is a little bit different from the way any other person stores them, which is why they are so slippery to define, but I believe it is theoretically possible to isolate the physical correlate to an individual thought, just as it is possible to isolate the physical sector(s) on a computer memory in which a file is stored. (Though admittedly, much more complex.) The fact that you can copy a file/thought from one computer/brain to another supports their physical nature, rather than the contrary. So if your have a file for "beauty" out there, then you may, by genetics, discussions or advertising, implant your concept of beauty on others, making it a physical part of their brain. With copying errors, of course.

I tend to think not, but one would be hard-pressed to deny that the study of these subjects is legitimately valuable.

Of course it is. And one need not know programming in order to make a brilliant PowerPoint presentation. But the programming is still part of it. Everything you are and everything you do requires your very physical brain. We may not know exactly how it works, but we know it is necessary, and any brief investigation will show that it works by physical processes.

Most areas of philosophy never come into contact with science at all, and while I think, for example, that Descartes's insight into the limits of empirical inquiry often provide fodder for all sorts of mystical nonsense (coughcoughlifegazercough*), there is some value, I think, in recognizing the fact that there are possibly true propositions pertaining to the universe about which empirical investigation can tell us nothing.

I disagree. I think it is potentially possible for empiricle investigation to tell us things about them. I think it already has in ways that only a few neuroscientists understand. Being a scientist, I never expect and never want all the mysteries of the universe to be unravelled. (Scientists need mysteries.) But I also don't see them as impossible to solve. Difficult, yes.

Without getting into any of the seemingly endless discussions (*coughcoughfreewillcough*) about the nature of things which are just "concepts", I will say that I believe there are physical, hence, empirically knowable underpinnings to these concepts, though we may never discover them.

I don't intend that as a legitimization of the sorts of unfounded and irresponsible speculations that often invoke Descartes's recognition that solipsism cannot be empirically falsified (which is abused in certain circles almost as much as the theory of quantum mechianics), but rather as a reminder that awareness of the limitations of our investigative tools (such as empirical science) is itself a valuable piece of knowledge.

I agree we are limited, and will always be limited. But I believe the limitations we see now are due to how little time we have had to work on the problem and the crudeness of our tools. I expect that barring the collapse of civilization/education, we will have a completely different set of limitations this time next century.