Kelly Antilles wrote:Here's what you SHOULD have said....
"Behind the preposition 'from', ya bitch."
Sorry, ending sentences in prepositions is one of my pet peeves.
Winston Churchill wrote:This is the sort of bloody nonsense up with which I will not put.
You...you...bastard! I saw Kelly's post and the exact same thing popped into my head, but then I scrolled down a little to find...GRAAAH! *bites Robert Treder*
xianseeker wrote:With the exception of the post-modernists, most philosophers have excellent definitions of theory, hold to occam's razor, and never assert absolute certaintly, such as saying a law is a proven theory.
Most of the traditional philosophers are fine (William of Ockham, even Descartes). They may not always have conclusively proven their points, but they at least tried to work within the framework of scientific reasoning as understood in their time. Kant just irritates me, though, with his whole "we can never understand how the universe really is."
Just found a joke I like (though I doubt it'll go over well) about engineers, physicists, and philosophers:
An engineer, an experimental physicist, a theoretical physicist, and a philosopher were hiking through the hills of Scotland. Cresting the top of one hill, they see, on top of the next, a black sheep. The engineer says: "What do you know, the sheep in Scotland are black." "Well, *some* of the sheep in Scotland are black," replies the experimental physicist. The theoretical physicist considers this for a moment and says "Well, at least one of the sheep in Scotland is black." "Well," the philosopher responds, "on one side, anyway."
Stanley Hauerwas wrote:[W]hy is it that no one is angry at the inequality of income in this country? I mean, the inequality of income is unbelievable. Unbelievable. Why isn’t that ever an issue of politics? Because you don’t live in a democracy. You live in a plutocracy. Money rules.
An accountant, a lawyer and a physicist are discussing the merits of having a wife over simply having a mistress.
The lawyer says that it's better to have the mistress; that way if things go sour, you can avoid a messy divorce suit.
The accountant says that having the wife is better, as you can get the tax breaks that come with marriage.
The physicist says that he'd rather have them both. When the accountant and lawyer ask him why, he tells them, "That way, if you're not with either of them, they'll both think you're with the other one, so you can go to the lab and get some work done."
Damien Sorresso
"Ever see what them computa bitchez do to numbas? It ain't natural. Numbas ain't supposed to be code, they supposed to quantify shit."
- The Onion
xianseeker wrote:With the exception of the post-modernists, most philosophers have excellent definitions of theory, hold to occam's razor, and never assert absolute certaintly, such as saying a law is a proven theory.
Most of the traditional philosophers are fine (William of Ockham, even Descartes). They may not always have conclusively proven their points, but they at least tried to work within the framework of scientific reasoning as understood in their time. Kant just irritates me, though, with his whole "we can never understand how the universe really is."
Descartes failed miserably in his attempt to banish skepticism from philosophy. That wouldn't have been a problem if he didn't bring skepticism into philosophy in the first place (though the mind-body problem, the root of skepticism, is in some ways Platonic). The ultimate conclusion a reader of Descartes is forced to accept (if you limit yourself to Descartes) is that the mind and body are two separate, entirely unconnected things and that there can be no relationship between them - thus, the material world may not correspond with the senses or even exist. Berkeley took this and ran with it, denying that the material world (body) exists at all. Similarly, Malebranche denies that the material world can have any activity; it is inert.
All of this is due to legitimate problems in Descartes recognized by his contemporaries and in the modern day. That's why most philosophers have abandoned substance dualism as a serious metaphysical position.
Kant was attempting to banish this problem from philosophy, and to a certain extent he succeeded; he showed that at the very least we can know certain synthetic a priori propositions (such as those about how the brain structures incoming sense data). The problem of skepticism has no easy solution, and Kant did a better job than most others in dealing with it.
Anyway, I still prefer Kant's moral philosophy. I stick with contemporary philosophers for my metaphysics (Searle in particular).
Last edited by Frank_Scenario on 2003-02-09 07:31pm, edited 1 time in total.
Ah, serious philosophical discussion. I thought everyone here had a kneejerk reaction against philosophers.
I actually am pretty convinced by Kant's argument that we cannot know objects "in and of themselves." That's why I think that scientific knowledge is necessarily underdetermined and, ultimately, unverifiable.
Kant, in my opinion, was a self important ass trying to boost his own position with his nonsense, but he, by reason or luck, did hit an important fact. We can't know things totally, if only because we only have so much brain space and such inaccurate tools. I still think Kant was an ass, but he is the reminder why we call them scientific theories.
Manic Progressive: A liberal who violently swings from anger at politicos to despondency over them.
Out Of Context theatre: Ron Paul has repeatedly said he's not a racist. - Destructinator XIII on why Ron Paul isn't racist.
I'm a little rusty on my Kantian metaphysics, and I don't have the Critique of Pure Reason handy to check up on it, so this will be a bit short. Basically, though, Kant is attempting to banish skepticism from philosophy. However, he is taking as a given a form of substance dualism - that is, you have a mind and a body, and the two are in some way separate. He ends up concluding that a. you can't 'get at' the noumena; b. most metaphysics is for this reason a waste of time.
However, I reject his basic premise - that there is a discrete mind and a similarly discrete body. When we look at the world, we are, in fact, seeing what is really there (in Searle's terms, it's ontologically objective). In rejecting his substance dualism, you get rid of the need for his solution to the problem of skepticism.
And yes, most people here are opposed to philosophy. There's a good reason for it - a lot of philosophy (and philosophers) is a waste of time. Most of the people in philosophy classes don't know what they're doing, and they ruin the philosophical process for college students. I'm lucky enough to be at a school with a good philosophy department and, more importantly, a number of active, intelligent philosophy majors who make sure the courses are worthwhile.
Speaking of philosophy, could anyone point me to someone GOOD info on Friedrich Nietzsche and his works? I have a hard time finding a good site on him anywhere.
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Well, I won't try to highjack this thread and try to turn it into a philosophy debate. But I will say that no matter your ontology, your perceptions are only perceptions.
And yes, most people here are opposed to philosophy. There's a good reason for it - a lot of philosophy (and philosophers) is a waste of time. Most of the people in philosophy classes don't know what they're doing, and they ruin the philosophical process for college students. I'm lucky enough to be at a school with a good philosophy department and, more importantly, a number of active, intelligent philosophy majors who make sure the courses are worthwhile.
I don't think that's a good reason to dislike philosophy. In my introductory philosophy classes that was true, but in the 300+ level classes all the hackers were weeded out. It is unfortunate that most students don't have the time to take other classes outside their major.
One of the problems with common university education is the lack of cross-specialization contact. The head of the philosophy at my school regularly does senior seminars for science majors.
xianseeker wrote:Ah, serious philosophical discussion. I thought everyone here had a kneejerk reaction against philosophers.
I actually am pretty convinced by Kant's argument that we cannot know objects "in and of themselves." That's why I think that scientific knowledge is necessarily underdetermined and, ultimately, unverifiable.
I would be interested in your response to Kant.
I know that Utsanomiko's reaction would be that both you and Kant are uneducated, anti-science idiots who shouldn't open your mouths.
I believe in a sign of Zeta.
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"And besides, who cares if a monster destroys Australia?"
Spanky The Dolphin wrote:I know that Utsanomiko's reaction would be that both you and Kant are uneducated, anti-science idiots who shouldn't open your mouths.
