1. IrvingSnodgrass - Feb. 19, 1999 - 8:34 AM PT
Time for a new Philosophy thread. So, all you Fray philosophers out there... tell us about the state of philosophy today.
2. bubbaette - Feb. 19, 1999 - 8:43 AM PT
Dead as a doornail.
3. ninlil - Feb. 19, 1999 - 9:05 AM PT
Everything in life has a philosophy behind it. There is politcal philosophy, religious philosophy,your philosophy on health care. You have your philosophy on child care, racial or cultural philosophies. Yes, philosophy is ingrained in our lives. We talk and think in that mode all through our lives but some do not recognize this at the time.
4. DanDillon - Feb. 19, 1999 - 10:20 AM PT
Perhaps it would be of some service to narrow the topic a bit.
An inquiry for consideration: A blind man, upon having his sight miraculously restored, is aksed to correctly identify a sphere and a cube without touching them. He handled each object when he was blind, but is he now able to discern which is which by sight alone?
5. TabouliJones - Feb. 19, 1999 - 10:23 AM PT
That's a trick question isn't it?
6. JaDeGoLd - Feb. 19, 1999 - 10:29 AM PT
Agree with ninlil.
Philosophy is all around us, today. Unfortunately, the vast majority of it is crap.
7. CoralReef - Feb. 19, 1999 - 10:35 AM PT
Well, the vast majority of almost everything is crap.
8. JaDeGoLd - Feb. 19, 1999 - 10:39 AM PT
What is crap? Is crap crap? If we did not what crap was, would crap exist?
9. DanDillon - Feb. 19, 1999 - 10:48 AM PT
If crap did not exist, we would have to invent it.
10. DanDillon - Feb. 19, 1999 - 10:51 AM PT
TJ Message #5,
No.
11. ProfEmeritus - Feb. 19, 1999 - 11:03 AM PT
I assumed the question referred to philosophy as an academic discipline. As such, philosophy is at least moribund. I majored in philosophy in college before I went off to service in WWII. When I returned I went to graduate school, intending to do graduate work and make a carreer in philosophy. There were few mentors left, and those available prevailed on me to switch to another field if I was not independently wealthy.
I took graduate courses in several fields, and finally settled on economics. I felt its methodology was in many ways related to that of economics.
It is sad that philosophy is no longer a thriving academic discipline. Its value lies in providing guidance on how to think logically and in offering much substance to understand ourselves, our culture and the world. Compared to philosophy, which was very helpful in approaching economics, the latter field is mere child"s play in my judgment.
12. TabouliJones - Feb. 19, 1999 - 11:08 AM PT
DanD,
I'll say no. Evan if he could learn to distinguish between the two objects by correlating his tactile sensibilities with his burgeoning ability to recognize visual stimuli, you couldn't say that he was able to "discern which was which by sight *alone." He would still have to make reference to his tactile experience to discern the distinction. Moreover, he would have to make a reference to this past experience in order to comprehend the task of discernment that was given him -- i.e. he couldn't answer the question w/o framing it in terms of his prior tactile experience.
You are probably going to say that I am wrong, but that is my guess.
13. DanDillon - Feb. 19, 1999 - 11:29 AM PT
"You are probably going to say that I am wrong..."
Absolutely not. If you can state and defend your answer clearly and persuasively, who am I to judge? I appreciate your response. But I *am* going to tell you that it's spelled "even."
14. TabouliJones - Feb. 19, 1999 - 11:35 AM PT
DanD,
When reading my posts, a good strategy would be to ignore my horrible spelling and poor punctuation.
I'm curious, how would you answer the question?
15. Pseudoerasmus - Feb. 19, 1999 - 11:39 AM PT
The question is not philosophical in character. It is an empirical question belonging to psychology.
16. DanDillon - Feb. 19, 1999 - 11:53 AM PT
The intensity of the need to answer the question apparently does not equal the intensity of the need to cast aspersions.
TJ,
I have struggled with the problem myself for some time now, and, without being very well versed in any scientific discourse (or having seen the new Val Kilmer movie), I would propose that the newly-sighted individual would indeed be able to discern between the two objects. I am unable to convey precisely why, but I believe that the tactile sense must transmit input stimuli to the brain in somewhat the same manner as the ocular, especially without the two senses working in concert.
17. Pseudoerasmus - Feb. 19, 1999 - 11:56 AM PT
Where is the aspersion?
18. jonesatlaw - Feb. 19, 1999 - 12:01 PM PT
I agree with ProfEmeritus and its a damned shame. We are merrily inventing technologies with amazing possibilities and with little or no guidance in whether the technologies should be persued, under what conditions and what should be done with the results.
A simple example. What does it mean to be a parent? Is the relationship biological, social, psychological? In the event of a conflict in these basis, which is to be pre-eminent? With current reproductive technology, courts are sometimes at a loss to resolve conflicts involving the children produced, or to control their production.
It would be very nice for some of the decision makers in real life to be able to lean on some previous debate and discourse from theoreticians before trying to solve these problems in real life.
19. jonesatlaw - Feb. 19, 1999 - 12:03 PM PT
I agree with ProfEmeritus and its a damned shame. We are merrily inventing technologies with amazing possibilities and with little or no guidance in whether the technologies should be persued, under what conditions and what should be done with the results.
A simple example. What does it mean to be a parent? Is the relationship biological, social, psychological? In the event of a conflict in these basis, which is to be pre-eminent? With current reproductive technology, courts are sometimes at a loss to resolve conflicts involving the children produced, or to control their production.
It would be very nice for some of the decision makers in more "applied" disciplines to be able to lean on some previous debate and discourse from theoreticians before trying to solve these problems in real life.
20. CoralReef - Feb. 19, 1999 - 12:05 PM PT
DanDillon, it isn't an aspersion. It's not a philosophical question.
21. Pseudoerasmus - Feb. 19, 1999 - 12:12 PM PT
Message #19
What is philosophical about that question?
22. Raskolnikov - Feb. 19, 1999 - 12:23 PM PT
I think the blind person could figure out the difference. A cube has edges, and a sphere is smooth. Presumably he was told second hand (or maybe he can just assume it) somewhere along the line that there is correlation between tactile and visual sensory input, and he will associate the edges he sees on the cube with the edges he felt.
23. jonesatlaw - Feb. 19, 1999 - 1:24 PM PT
Pseudoerasmus- What rights and or responsibilities should a society accord to persons on the basis of bonds of affinity to a child versus those based on biology?
That's not philosophical?
Please deign to enlighten us as to what a philosophical question is then.
24. DanDillon - Feb. 19, 1999 - 1:26 PM PT
Won't be the first time a thread didn't neatly follow its italicized blurb.
Rask,
Yes, but can a blind person know what an "edge" is?
25. cllrdr - Feb. 19, 1999 - 1:51 PM PT
Cellar Door's philosophy: I pursue 109 therefore I am.
Pseudo: If you did some of the Derrida reading TabouliJones and I suggested in the "Deconstructing Postmodernism" thread, this would be a good place to post your thoughts on it. Hmmm?
26. Raskolnikov - Feb. 19, 1999 - 2:01 PM PT
Dan: he knows what one feels like. My guess is that he could associate a tactile discontinuity with a visual discontinuity. The sphere was uniform on it s surface. No one part felt different than another. If he had to guess, I would think that he would guess that the sphere was the object where no part of the surface *looked* different from another.
The only assumption is that the blind person can assume or know that there is a correlation between tacticle and visual sensory data, and that he has the mental capacity to make associations.
27. Raskolnikov - Feb. 19, 1999 - 2:01 PM PT
assumptions, rather.
28. BTerry - Feb. 19, 1999 - 2:20 PM PT
The state of our philosophy is weak.
Philosophy once and still can serve a purpose. However, the prevailing sentiments of our population preclude any governing philosophy other than "I should be happy". Philosophy only gets in the way. "Live free or die", unless of course you can make sure I have a nice soft bed and cable TV. Then maybe I'll let you run my life a little. "Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" are our rights? Oh, tack on free healthcare, protection from anything that might harm us, and unearned wealth for all. "Let justice be done though the heavens may fall"? Well, not really. If it's too much of a hassle, don't worry about it. We can tolerate a little corruption.
As for the "deeper" philosophies? Forget it. That might give us existential angst.
29. Wombat - Feb. 19, 1999 - 2:33 PM PT
BTerry will be joining Paul Weyrich at Walden Pond.
30. Pseudoerasmus - Feb. 19, 1999 - 2:38 PM PT
Message #23
Very very low level philosophy. It could just as easily be discussed in the politics thread.
31. Pseudoerasmus - Feb. 19, 1999 - 2:39 PM PT
Message #25
Of course I didn't read any of the Derrida you people cited.
32. cllrdr - Feb. 19, 1999 - 3:49 PM PT
Well hop to it, man!
33. elliot803 - Feb. 19, 1999 - 3:56 PM PT
DanD:
"An inquiry for consideration: A blind man, upon having his sight miraculously restored, is aksed to correctly identify a sphere and a cube without touching them. He handled each object when he was blind, but is he now able to discern which is which by sight alone?"
My guess would be yes, at least some people would be able to do this by correlating discontinuities in his tactile perception of the cube's surface (the edges and corners) with discontinuities in his visual perception of it.
34. elliot803 - Feb. 19, 1999 - 3:57 PM PT
Ah, I see that Rask already said the same thing.
35. elliot803 - Feb. 19, 1999 - 4:30 PM PT
How do physical processes give rise to conscious experience?
36. cllrdr - Feb. 19, 1999 - 8:18 PM PT
Elliot -- For the answer to the question posed in #35, try Edmund Husserl's "The Phenomenology of Internal Time-Consciousness," (Indiana University Press, 1964)
37. pellenilsson - Feb. 20, 1999 - 2:10 AM PT
The question of whether philosophy is dead seems to depend on which side of the Atlantic you are. In Europe, also up here in the north, it is alive and well. The university courses are crammed. Here we distinguish between "theoretical" and "practical" philosophy. It is latter form, dealing with questions of ethics and moral that generates most of the interest.
38. jkuzmak - Feb. 20, 1999 - 11:03 AM PT
Speaking of practical philosophy, Pellenillson, are you familiar with Principia Cybernetica Web at the Open University of Brussels?
39. pellenilsson - Feb. 20, 1999 - 11:56 AM PT
jkuzmak
No. Please elaborate.
40. resonance - Feb. 20, 1999 - 12:05 PM PT
Capital P Philosophy is dying. And that, I think, is a genuine sadness -- no matter how antiauthoritarian and antitradition you are, you must admit that having a strong philosophical tradition is at least a good way to train minds in the same fashion that having a mandatory-attendance gymnasium is a good way to train the body. The primary argument against capital P philosophy is that it encourages certain forms of questions which construct as much reality as they describe -- i.e. Philosophy is more like putting on a VR helmet than it is like seeing the world around you. But I've always felt that good philosophy teaches a student to be conscious of the way one's mindset imposes barriers.
41. Jenerator - Feb. 20, 1999 - 12:08 PM PT
Speaking of philosophy, The Church of Resonance.
42. pellenilsson - Feb. 20, 1999 - 2:27 PM PT
resonance Message #40
"Capital P Philosophy is dying."
When was it in top form in your opinion?
43. stostosto - Feb. 20, 1999 - 3:00 PM PT
That question of what a blind person turned seeing can recognize visually *is* a philosophical question. It is a question of language, really. And of cognitive philosophy.
How would we find an answer to the question? First we'd have to find a blind man. Then cure him. But that's not sufficient. He would have to be able to tell us as a blind man what was a sphere, and what was a cube. Then, when seeing, he would have to tell us from visual experience alone which was which - if he could.
The medium of reference is the language - would he conceptualize a vision of a thing with the same words as he would use when it was only a tactile experience? There is no question that the experience of the objects has changed. So, are the words he uses referring to the nature of the objects or to his experience of the objects?
Children learn language starting from concrete objects. They can learn that a cup is a cup from seeing a cup, and being told "cup". But when they see another cup of a different colour and design, they will not necessarily perceive this different object as "a cup". That word was already assigned to a different object. They have to learn to see a given object as a representative of a group of objects to be able to assign the term "cup" to cups of any size and form and colour.
Another interesting question is perception of colours. We learn to assign words to colours. That is, we assign words to our *experience* of colours. But who can tell if what I perceive as red isn't perceived as blue by you? But you have learned to call that blue perception "red", and so we assume we are experiencing the same thing, but we really aren't.
By the way: I agree with Hr. Nilsson. Philosophy is all the rage in Europe. Or at least in several North European countries. A Norwegian popular introduction to philosophy, called "Sophie's world" was a recent bestseller not only in Skandinavien but also
44. Pseudoerasmus - Feb. 20, 1999 - 3:02 PM PT
What is capital P philosphy, as opposed to just philosophy?
"The primary argument against capital P philosophy is that it encourages certain forms of questions which construct as much reality as they describe..."
Examples, please.
44. Pseudoerasmus - Feb. 20, 1999 - 3:02 PM PT
What is capital P philosphy, as opposed to just philosophy?
"The primary argument against capital P philosophy is that it encourages certain forms of questions which construct as much reality as they describe..."
Examples, please.
45. Pseudoerasmus - Feb. 20, 1999 - 3:03 PM PT
Message #43 contains no philosophy. It's all psychology and psycholinguistics and the like.
46. jkuzmak - Feb. 20, 1999 - 3:08 PM PT
Pellenillson:
My son has just shown me how to insert a hyperlink. Consider yourself fortunate. http://pespnc1.vub.ac.be/INTRO.html - This is my first try.
I have failed. I am strictly a pencil and paper kind of guy. This was supposed to be a link to Principia Cybernetica Web at the Free University of Brussels.
47. stostosto - Feb. 20, 1999 - 3:09 PM PT
Sophie's world. A novel about the History of Philosophy.
It's a novel, alright. Alas, I haven't read it myself. It seems recommendable judging by the reviews. "Had I only had this when I did my philosophy course", etc.
48. CalGal - Feb. 20, 1999 - 3:15 PM PT
Kuzmak,
Try these instructions, or the ones in the "here" link right above the message window.
I tried checking out the URL you posted, but it doesn't work.
49. jkuzmak - Feb. 20, 1999 - 3:16 PM PT
I am going to take a hike around the Fray, and make a post here before I get off for the night.
50. darkviolet - Feb. 20, 1999 - 3:19 PM PT
pellenilsson -
Re: Message #37
This is good news! We have nearly hyper-employment of university graduates here that is making us all obsessed with mudane job issues. Too many employment options.
51. stostosto - Feb. 20, 1999 - 3:24 PM PT
Pseuder. You will have to give us a definition of philosophy. Or else we are going to discuss psycholocy and psycholinguistics all night. What distinguishes the one from the other? Might there be overlappings? Might there be competing definitions?
I am not trying to pick a fight with you, just asking. (And feel free to pick fights yourself, by all means).
52. Pseudoerasmus - Feb. 20, 1999 - 3:31 PM PT
I won't give you a definition, Stostosto, but I can tell you a sure way to know whether a question is philosophical in character. If a question must be addressed empirically -- either through experimentation or observation -- then it doesn't belong in the province of philosophy.
53. Pseudoerasmus - Feb. 20, 1999 - 3:34 PM PT
I don't find the popular penchant for low-level philosophy in continental Europe particularly commendable. I mean, the level of sophistication is not much higher than asking what is the meaning of life.
54. stostosto - Feb. 20, 1999 - 3:37 PM PT
Is philosophy dead?
I think definitely not. The conditions for its thriving are certainly there. In a world where religion is a matter of choice, as is everything else from the government to education to place of living to job to sexual partners, even whether to have kids, even what sex you are yourself, even your skin colour, breast size, diet, websites to visit, discussions to join, threads to lurk in... Well, who are you? What are you here for? What is it all about? Nobody tells you, you have to decide yourself.
That obviously doesn't turn everybody into philosophers. But it does add a reflexive dimension to modern life which was all but absent in most societies through history.
How to construe such a much-vaunted phenomenon as "business ethics"?
55. stostosto - Feb. 20, 1999 - 3:40 PM PT
"If a question must be addressed empirically -- either through experimentation or observation -- then it doesn't belong in the province of philosophy."
How would you empirically address the question of whether what I perceive as red is percived as blue to you?
56. stostosto - Feb. 20, 1999 - 3:49 PM PT
"the level of sophistication is not much higher than asking what is the meaning of life."
No, it's really philosophical limbo dancing: How low can you go?
I must tell you, I don't find the surging interest in philosophy particularly commendable myself. There are so many mediocraties who aspire to be "deep" by putting on a philosophical attitude. And they are getting almost unlimited leash in the media.
It's tiresome.
57. Pseudoerasmus - Feb. 20, 1999 - 4:01 PM PT
Message #55
Actually, in the language thread we once discussed this question ad nauseam -- whether the differences in the labels for certain colours between English and Indonesian reflected different divisions of the spectrum, or genuine differences in perception of colour.
All the same, you initially asked "But who can tell if what I perceive as red isn't perceived as blue by you?"
That's a testable question, at least if rephrased to ask a question about the consistency of colour perception. For example, suppose Sto calls the colour of a ripe banana peel "yellow" and Pelle "green". Are you two perceiving the same object differently, or is it just a semantic difference? We can check by asking what colour each of you would call the flesh of the pineapple. If the one still says "yellow" and the other says "green", this is evidence that your differences are not perceptual but semantic. Then we can elaborate. Sto could be shown an "orange" patch, a "red" patch, and two "blue" patches of different hues, further apart in wave length than the orange and the red, and be asked which two patches were more nearly the same colour. If Pelle's and Sto's answers are similar, then that's more evidence that the differences are semantic, not perceptual. And we can keep amassing evidence of consistency to buttress the hypothesis.
58. ProfEmeritus - Feb. 20, 1999 - 4:31 PM PT
Some of the discussion seems to suggest that there is more of a lingering interest in philosophy in Europe than in America. Two comments:
This may be true because philosophy has never really taken hold in this country; all of the great philosophers of the past and present have been non-American. Major American contribtions have been on the fringes and in particular areas related to acquisition of knowledge for practical applications: Pragmatism (Pierce and James),Santayana (Materialism), while 19th and 20th European philosophical thinkers have focussed more on fundamental issues of existence (Kierkegasrd, Sartre)and how knowledge is acquired (Russell, Hussert and Wittegenstein).
Since the advent of Pragmatism and Materialism, there is greater emphasis in the US on adapting education at all levels to the problems of living and to the pursuit of improving technology. Philosophy has little role to play in these overriding educational values.
59. jkuzmak - Feb. 20, 1999 - 4:47 PM PT
Link to Principia Cybernetica Web
60. jkuzmak - Feb. 20, 1999 - 4:48 PM PT
Cool, Cal Gal. Thanks alot.
61. stostosto - Feb. 20, 1999 - 4:52 PM PT
Pseudoerasmus
Message #57
Yes, if you rephrase the question into a completely different one, it is possible to test it empirically.
That we agree on calling one colour red, another one blue and a third one lily white only shows we have corresponding relative perceptions, as opposed so absolute ones.
Whether this has any practical implications is less sure...
62. Pseudoerasmus - Feb. 20, 1999 - 5:02 PM PT
Message #61
Just what on earth are you talking about? The question addressed in Message #57 was _exactly_ whether what one person perceives as X colour is perceived by another person as Y colour.
"That we agree on calling one colour red, another one blue and a third one lily white only shows we have corresponding relative perceptions, as opposed so absolute ones."
I have no idea what a "relative perception" or an "absolute perception" is. I have a feeling you don't either.
Colour labels are just arbitrary divisions in the colour spectrum. Is that what you're saying? Is that your idea of philosophy?
63. darkviolet - Feb. 20, 1999 - 5:21 PM PT
Re: Message #52
"If a question must be addressed empirically -- either through experimentation or observation -- then it doesn't belong in the province of philosophy."
Fascinating. I thought philosophy would first address empirical evidendce. What could be more important?
64. pellenilsson - Feb. 21, 1999 - 1:07 AM PT
Pseudoerasmus Message #53
"the level of sophistication is not much higher than asking what is the meaning of life."
Isn't that the most sophisticated question of all, partly because it cannot be answered?
65. resonance - Feb. 21, 1999 - 5:19 AM PT
Capital P philosophy -- the philosophical tradition. At least in America, it is being subsumed under the twin weights of anti-intellectualism and the demand for more immediately applicable knowledge, such as how to hyperlink.
66. RyckNelson - Feb. 21, 1999 - 7:18 AM PT
yeah, we want html, we want html
sorry
jkuzmak, what a link!!!!!!!
67. jkuzmak - Feb. 21, 1999 - 1:39 PM PT
I guess it is kind of mind blower isn't it? I consider myself to be atleast conversant in the language, in the mental universe, that is "described"
here
68. jkuzmak - Feb. 21, 1999 - 1:41 PM PT
Damn that old random element.
69. Mrtoner - Feb. 21, 1999 - 1:51 PM PT
I would appreciate it if someone knowledgeable in the area would provide references to (serious) writers who have posited and examined the idea that what is "good" or "evil" is wholly dependent on the circumstances in which a society finds itself.
(Is this the same thing as, or a broader examination of, what is known as "situational ethics?")
I'd like to do some reading along these lines and don't know where to begin.
70. stostosto - Feb. 22, 1999 - 6:08 AM PT
PE #62
"I have no idea what a "relative perception" or an "absolute perception" is. I have a feeling you don't either."
I have a crystal clear idea - and I wouldn't imagine it difficult to grasp. It has nothing to do with the colour spectrum.
We agree that your hair is purple and mine is yellow. Now, my perception of your purple hair may be that it is yellow, as seen with your eyes. But what I see as yellow, I have learned to call purple. And because I will never be able to check on your true perception, I might assume your perception is the same as mine. (However, having had numerous exchanges with you in this cyber soup, I rather assume it isn't. The point is *I will never be able to tell*).
My take on this is entirely home-grown but I know something like this has been the subject of philosophers. I once discussed it briefly with a friend of mine who majored in philosophy. If I am not mistaken, the German philosopher Immanuel Kant addressed this problem (one of many he addressed).
However, my knowledge of Kant is only infinitesimally greater than zero, so I will not be able to cite references. But I could check with my friend, of course...
71. Pseudoerasmus - Feb. 22, 1999 - 6:55 AM PT
Message #70
"We agree that your hair is purple and mine is yellow. Now, my perception of your purple hair may be that it is yellow, as seen with your eyes. But what I see as yellow, I have learned to call purple. And because I will never be able to check on your true perception, I might assume your perception is the same as mine."
Sigh. You're blithering. Your problem reduces merely to just semantics. As I said, we can check to see whether what you call yellow and what I call purple are consistent. Everything is consistency, and the rest is just labelling. This "true perception" is sheer nonsense, a non-problem created by slopping thinking and wording.
"If I am not mistaken, the German philosopher Immanuel Kant addressed this problem (one of many he addressed)."
I don't think Kant addressed this particular issue, but if he did, then he was being idiotic.
72. Pseudoerasmus - Feb. 22, 1999 - 6:55 AM PT
slopping = sloppy
thought it could be slopping too.
73. resonance - Feb. 22, 1999 - 7:00 AM PT
Well, there are also purely biological considerations here as well. We determine the color of light which we are seeing by the way in which three different sets of receptors are activated -- each is keyed to a particular range of wavelengths. The brain, assisted by some shorthand simplifications and reinforcements which happen automatically within the receptors and nervature of the eye, learns to assign a certain 'color' to a certain general wavelength of light (that is to say, a certain spectrum where one or two wavelengths are absent).
Needless to say, a difference in the way these receptors develop and differentiate would have an effect upon how one determines color. So the problem is even further divorced from philosophy.
74. stostosto - Feb. 22, 1999 - 7:16 AM PT
Pe, Res
You haven't convinced me.
75. Pseudoerasmus - Feb. 22, 1999 - 7:32 AM PT
Message #74
Lots of Christians aren't convinced by evolution, either.
76. cllrdr - Feb. 22, 1999 - 7:33 AM PT
"I don't think Kant addressed this particular issue, but if he did, then he was being idiotic."
Pseudo calls Kant an idiot. This thread is HOT!
77. DocBrown - Feb. 22, 1999 - 7:51 AM PT
As Empirical science expands the room for philosophical questions narrows. From my perspective it seems that the only room philosophy has left to ask its questons falls into two categories: The Human Mind (e.g. What is an idea? Do humans have free will?) and Human Social Interaction (e.g. What is justice? Can humans ever be free?).
Empirical science encroaches on the former a little bit more every day. And I personally don't think the latter is a subject deep enough to survive that encroachment.
78. DocBrown - Feb. 22, 1999 - 7:58 AM PT
ProfEmeritus said:
> . . . all of the great philosophers
> of the past and present have been
> non-American.
Hubert Dreyfuss is a classic example of an American who gives Philosophy a bad name in this country. What a jerk.
79. DocBrown - Feb. 22, 1999 - 8:05 AM PT
The newly sighted man identifying cubes and spheres is a useless philosophical question. It is certainly *possible* for such a man to identify these shapes correctly, even if he never had tactile experience of them. All he really needs is a knowledge of geometry, which does not require sight.
To answer that question we must take a data sample of many newly sighted people with similar experiences. I expect that most would answer correctly, but nothing compells me to believe that they *all* would get it right. So we would end up with a nice empirical answer like: "84.2% of newly sighted people can distinguish cubes from spheres."
No philosophy involved at all.
80. pellenilsson - Feb. 22, 1999 - 10:05 AM PT
DocBrown
I strongly suspect that newly sighted people would take years to develop an ability to handle a for them totally new input data channel. If you have other info, pls provide.
81. jkuzmak - Feb. 22, 1999 - 12:32 PM PT
This thread doesn't "sound" very philosophical to me.
82. DocBrown - Feb. 22, 1999 - 12:38 PM PT
pellenilsson - what do you mean by "handle?"
To even discuss this ridiculous question we need more specific information. How long does the newly sighted person have to distinguish spheres from cubes? 2 seconds? 10 seconds? An hour? A day?
It might be amusing to discuss this hypothetical experiment, but it is still not Philosophy.
83. pellenilsson - Feb. 22, 1999 - 12:41 PM PT
handle=process. But let's drop the subject. As you say it's not philosophy. Let me put a philosphical question
What is the meaning of life?
84. resonance - Feb. 22, 1999 - 12:50 PM PT
...The salmon mousse.
85. DocBrown - Feb. 22, 1999 - 12:53 PM PT
This is just another bullshit question about terms that are not well defined. Science tells us that life, like everything else, is a cause and effect process. It doesn't need to have a "meaning." Anyone who says it does is making up a definition for "life" or "meaning."
To me, a better philosophical question is: "What is the meaning of the word 'meaning'?"
Almost everything I know about Philosophy I learned at The Fray. And what I have learned is that Philosophy is nothing but a high level study in convoluted linguistics.
86. elliot803 - Feb. 22, 1999 - 1:04 PM PT
The Paradox of The Unexpected Hanging
A convicted murderer is called before a judge on a Monday morning for sentencing. The judge tells him that he will be hanged some time during the following six days, but that he won't be able to predict which day it will be until they come to take him to his execution.
The murderer then reasons that he cannot be hanged in accordance with the judge's conditions, as follows: he can't be hanged on the sixth day (Sunday) because if he survives through Saturday he'll know that he will be hanged some time on Sunday. He can't be hanged on Saturday, because if he survives through Friday, he'll know that he will be hanged some time on Saturday, since Sunday has already been ruled out. Following the same reasoning back through the week, he can't be hanged on any of the six days.
Lo and behold, on Wednesday afternoon, the jailors arrive to take him to the gallows. As the judge had told him, he wasn't able to predict the day of the hanging.
How can this be?
87. pellenilsson - Feb. 22, 1999 - 1:05 PM PT
Doc
Does your life have a meaning?
88. teewrecks - Feb. 22, 1999 - 10:01 PM PT
Philosophy, with the big P, is largely dead, subsumed by the sciences, both hard & soft. Questions of epistemology (a most Kantian preoccupation in his "Critique of Pure Reason") are now the subject of cognitive sciences (neuro-biology, psychology, linguistics, semiotics); questions of ontology are subjects of physics; metaphysics simply dried up & died on the vine. There are academics like Daniel Dennett ("Consciousness Explained") who have the credentials and call themselves philosophers, but who nonetheless spend their time collating data & research from the cognitive sciences, and would more appropriately be called scientists. Don't get me wrong, I'm a big fan of Dennett's; it's just not philosophy in the classical sense.
Of course, this leaves us with the topic & questions of Ethics, arguably the central concern of philosophy (and no mean feat in the virulent wake of Post-Modernism---perhaps a ripe topic for a different post). The last gasps of philosophy began with Bertrand Russell who, in partnership with Arthur Whitehead, endeavored to filter out all the ambiguities of common language, to come up with a system of logic and mathematics free of inconsistencies and transferable to a new language with which to better define and answer the eternal questions. A movement called "logical positivism" paralleled this ambition (though its roots can be traced throughout "The Enlightenment"). Logical Positivism sought a better society through, well..um.. logic. It seems perhaps naive to us today, but this was cutting edge stuff in the 1920's. Russell, Whitehead, Logical Positivists & others were dealt a fatal blow in 1931 by way of logician Kurt Godel's "incompleteness theorem", in which he proved that no self-consistent system of mathematics can ever be complete. Philosophy has never recovered.
89. teewrecks - Feb. 22, 1999 - 10:03 PM PT
Re: the blind man. Studies have shown that those blind from birth, when first regaining sight, might not be able to tell a triangle from a shpere. We take so much for granted when "seeing". The brain has to "learn" to see; the newly sighted brain cannot associate the chaos of color, light, & shadow with seemingly obvious notions of shape and angles.
I love this topic. I would love to share & debate more of this with those willing & would go on but this is my first post to the Fray & it seems I've gone one a bit long as it is. Thoughts anyone?
90. CalGal - Feb. 22, 1999 - 10:18 PM PT
You haven't gone on too long, if that's any help.
Welcome.
91. Pseudoerasmus - Feb. 22, 1999 - 10:43 PM PT
Message #88
Your first paragraph is nonsense. Only someone who has no idea what epistemology is could possibly claim that it is "now the subject of cognitive sciences (neuro-biology, psychology, linguistics, semiotics)..." These subjects _themselves_ require epistemological analysis. How is it a question of the cognitive sciences to ask about the nature of knowledge? For example, to ask whether physical theories are just prediction generating algorithms, or actual descriptions of reality? To ask whether all knowledge is axiomatic? These are all philosophical questions wholly unaddressed by any of the cognitive sciences. Quite the same thing can be said about metaphysics, ontology and the like.
92. CalGal - Feb. 22, 1999 - 10:51 PM PT
Tee,
PseudoErasmus is the reason I created the Takes No Prisoners profile. Don't be fussed. The worst has happened.
93. teewrecks - Feb. 23, 1999 - 12:19 AM PT
CalGal,
First, thank you for the welcome. Second, thank you for the warning. Fact is, I have been reading the Fray posts for a while and I know at least something of PseudoErasmus (PE,--If I may call you that--I take no offense; Yea, though I march into the valley of death, I shall fear no evil-- save some spelling and a misplaced comma here & there). I never meant my first post to be anything but a headline service of my thoughts; 2,000 words can't make an argument on so broad a subject; I meant to be provocative. Is seems I have succeeded.
PE, You critique of my claim that epistemology, as philosophy, has been subsumed by the sciences. You claim that the sciences of neuro-biology, psychology, linguistics, semiotics, etc. are themselves in need of epistemological analysis. I agree. By whom? Is this not an endless regression?
94. teewrecks - Feb. 23, 1999 - 8:03 AM PT
BTHW, PsuedoErasmus, I think---as least as much as concerns human thought & knowledge--our thoughts and knowledge are inevitably axiomatic. I don't see how it could be otherwise. Recognizing the axioms is the difficult trick (and the ambition of deconstructionism---though in terms of modern literary critisizism, an ambition run amuck. Yes, I know--I digress).
Tee
95. jkuzmak - Feb. 23, 1999 - 10:59 AM PT
Cal Gal:
I have the most experience with PE and have no trouble imagining him in the middle of a discussion with Yaweh, Jehovah, Mithra, and Zeus, telling them what they are permitted and not permitted to think and say.
96. jkuzmak - Feb. 23, 1999 - 11:00 AM PT
Welcome, teewrecks.
97. dhomer - Feb. 23, 1999 - 10:22 PM PT
Hume's wire brush needs to be taken to the both of you. Philosophy isn't dead. But professionalized academic philosopy, philosophy was badly damaged by the Baby Boom. The universities, which in America never much liked philosophers, loosed PhDs like clouds of silver herring that once fed in the clear cold waters of the outer banks. Most on to computers and other logic paths. Or else, gone to the hallucinarium of Academe. Too many Doctors, too many dissertations. Too many having to publish something. Wave after wave, of dreamwork from the vantage of Kojeve's Hegel (neither the giant Marx stuggled to best, nor anything dialectical, but wispyest pneumata) phenomenology and of course, Heidegger. The theory of descriptions in the act of describing discriptions. Endless weltanschaung. Freud called it Oceanic Feeling.
True philosophers argue human necessity, its modes of congruity, its frameworks for utterance, not as a linguistic phenomena adhering to unconscious, vestigial tribalism of morphology, but as a process for framing that about which something can be said (and agreed to by a community of peers) to be the case. Philosophy is play, like music, with an urgency of clarity, and the need to analyze the situational, the conditionality of the subject, the contingency and impedimenta of the temporal objective.
Philosophy isn't dead. It's not even asleep. But it wants teaching. And it wants examples, clear standards in its plurality in public disposition. Where's the next Chomsky? Has there ever been a time in America where so much wretched, fallacious thinking done out loud in public life and in our loftiest academic institutions as now? Isn't anyone embarrassed by this? Who reasons publicly? Who questions? Who punishes fools any more? Bad mysticism, superstition, quackery operate unchallenged everywhere. Votaire would know himself to be at home here. He laughs now, laughter that coughs and crackles with the mirth of centuries.
98. dhomer - Feb. 23, 1999 - 10:23 PM PT
Hume's wire brush needs to be taken to the both of you. Philosophy isn't dead. But professionalized academic philosopy, philosophy was badly damaged by the Baby Boom. The universities, which in America never much liked philosophers, loosed PhDs like clouds of silver herring that once fed in the clear cold waters of the outer banks. Most on to computers and other logic paths. Or else, gone to the hallucinarium of Academe. Too many Doctors, too many dissertations. Too many having to publish something. Wave after wave, of dreamwork from the vantage of Kojeve's Hegel (neither the giant Marx stuggled to best, nor anything dialectical, but wispyest pneumata) phenomenology and of course, Heidegger. The theory of descriptions in the act of describing discriptions. Endless weltanschaung. Freud called it Oceanic Feeling.
True philosophers argue human necessity, its modes of congruity, its frameworks for utterance, not as a linguistic phenomena adhering to unconscious, vestigial tribalism of morphology, but as a process for framing that about which something can be said (and agreed to by a community of peers) to be the case. Philosophy is play, like music, with an urgency of clarity, and the need to analyze the situational, the conditionality of the subject, the contingency and impedimenta of the temporal objective.
Philosophy isn't dead. It's not even asleep. But it wants teaching. And it wants examples, clear standards in its plurality in public disposition. Where's the next Chomsky? Has there ever been a time in America where so much wretched, fallacious thinking done out loud in public life and in our loftiest academic institutions as now? Isn't anyone embarrassed by this? Who reasons publicly? Who questions? Who punishes fools any more? Bad mysticism, superstition, quackery operate unchallenged everywhere. Votaire would know himself to be at home here. He laughs now, laughter that coughs and crackles with the mirth of centuries.
99. teewrecks - Feb. 24, 1999 - 1:13 AM PT
This is Mrs. TeeWrecks. I have just one small question (for now!). When we ask if philosophy is dead, and we when we argue about it in my household, I always end up wondering, do we really mean "Should philosophy departments be disbanded in our universities? Should we discourage the declaration of a 'Philosophy' major?" For clearly, leaving aside these quotidian issues, no one can seriously defend the position that the basic questions of philosophy are resolved. So, are we just yelling about academia here (and let me raise me voice loudly if so), or ?What?
100. pellenilsson - Feb. 24, 1999 - 2:59 AM PT
teewrecks
I'm strictly an amateur at this. I have dabbled some in the history of idéas but I sort of lost interest after Kant and then I read only what I had to read. But still.
"no one can seriously defend the position that the basic questions of philosophy are resolved"
Maybe so. But isn't the relevant question. "can they be resolved and, if so, how?" Please give one or two examples of what you consider unresolved basic questions.