06.09.09
Repost: experimental philosophy
Comments are closed on posts over two weeks old (for spam reasons), so I have on request reposted the post below with one comment for someone who wishes to further comment (???)
The New New Philosophy
It could be that this will lead to something, but the suspicious must be that philosophy in decline wishes to ape scientism. What it should be doing is exposing it.
It’s part of a recent movement known as experimental philosophy, which has rudely challenged the way professional philosophers like to think of themselves. Not only are philosophers unaccustomed to gathering data; many have also come to define themselves by their disinclination to do so. The professional bailiwick we’ve staked out is the empyrean of pure thought. Colleagues in biology have P.C.R. machines to run and microscope slides to dye; political scientists have demographic trends to crunch; psychologists have their rats and mazes. We philosophers wave them on with kindly looks. We know the experimental sciences are terribly important, but the role we prefer is that of the Catholic priest presiding at a wedding, confident that his support for the practice carries all the more weight for being entirely theoretical. Philosophers don’t observe; we don’t experiment; we don’t measure; and we don’t count. We reflect. We love nothing more than our “thought experiments,†but the key word there is thought. As the president of one of philosophy’s more illustrious professional associations, the Aristotelian Society, said a few years ago, “If anything can be pursued in an armchair, philosophy can.
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1 Comment
Alf Janszoon said,
May 15, 2008 at 1:28 pm · Edit
The question is: do philosophers need to be scientists (specialists) beside being philosophers? Can philosophers follow the example of Aristotle one of the first empirical scientists cum philosophers? Pierre Teilhard de Chardin was philosopher and paleoanthropologist. Philosophers don’t need to be empirical scientists although it would help. They can use (with the appropriate amount of gratitude) the work of the scientists. For example: Ortega y Gasset used to speculate about the difference between man and monkeys he observed in the Retirio. Nowadays philosophers can use the results of comparative cognitivists, neurologists etc. If Ortega had lived today he would have studied “From Monkey Brain To Human Brain : A Fyssen Foundation Symposium†for example. The task of the philosopher is confronting reality in the form of scientific results, not in producing empty abstractions.
mariana said,
June 9, 2009 at 6:27 pm
“II. of the conception and the necessity of a metaphysic of ethics.
(14) It has been shown elsewhere that for physical science which has to do with the objects of the external senses we must have à priori principles; and that it is possible—nay, even necessary—to prefix a system of these principles under the name of metaphysical principles of natural philosophy to physics, which is natural philosophy applied to special phenomena of experience. The latter, however (at least when the question is to guard its propositions from error), may assume many principles as universal on the testimony of experience, although the former, if it is to be in the strict sense universal, must be deduced from à priori grounds; just as Newton adopted the principle of the equality of action and reaction as based on experience, and yet extended it to all material nature. The chemists go still further, and base their most universal laws of combination and dissociation of substances by their own forces entirely on experience, and yet they have such confidence in their universality and necessity that, in the experiments they make with them, they have no apprehension of error.” Kant – from The Metaphysics Of Morals.
Those a-priori principles of physics we never see directly. they always underlie our perceptions of reality, this is their source of universality. We cannot envision phenomenon to be otherwise then essentially connected with those a-priori principles. What he says is that we can assume certain principles to be absolute, as in the example given of the equality of action and reaction, based on experience. But experience gives us a mere testimony for our assumption about the absoluteness of those principles, it does not explicate their origin, why are we to extend them to all imagined phenomenon and even cannot envision reality to be otherwise then subordinate to those principles. To inquire into the question of what is the source and nature of such apodictic assumptions we *cannot* do based on experience, on empirical data. Is the source for it to be found in the nature of the universe or the nature of our mind?
A very good question, don’t you think Kwame Anthony Appiah? What is the ground therefore for the inquiry into this question, which probably takes us into the domain of our mind and its way of operation? Unfortunately, to trample your feet in the laboratory and filling your hands with materials for field-experiments is not going to do you any good here, sorry. Learn to acknowledge the merits of the armchair! And grow up, will you!
compassion said,
June 10, 2009 at 12:43 pm
after everything ended, the meaning of life revealed before my eyes and all chances far over the horizon are.
sitting with myself in my home. life are happy. playing the piano some incredible music by myself. nothing special – alone. going to shopping – once in a time – to get some nourishing groceries. life are happy. to make sandwiches and eat. important. no? reading few articles before sleeping. but why on earth am i asleep with the lights on and the music running, and clothes, and shoes? of course – it’s because i FORGOT. !!… to take off my shoes and all. know that my life are rich – i (used to) work, i live all alone in my private apartment with the music, i have enough money to spent, … life are fun. but even i cannot deny that something is gnawing at my heart.
i been spoted to be all by myself – (Yes AALLL) – when she was one nicey-shiny, one brighty day, took all of her belongings and left me, driving for ever and ever and ever away and far from me as it possibly could, not to come back for one more time ever again – (NO) – having me endure with my isolation this fire’s suffering for her without needing to be bothered about it enough at all. FiReS consumed i from within, (why not?) corroding un-endingly the flesh of my essence with stupendous’s purity gnawing me incessantly, (life are happy) and no human around to share it with dearest astarkina. i touched the peak of the mountain with my bare hands becoming happy for the first time, and for the last time as well (you following?), and then found myself at once surrounded by nothing, all alone, by myself, with nothing at all having left, left around, left within.
yea god brought her to me didn’t figured out as yet then god took her away from me (thanks so…), and no word fell between us ever about our love for each other, or about anything other in addition. nothing ever happened besides what was meant to happen – the impossible – that we shall have such unique love – perhaps the uniquest love – and yet somehow miss it as if it was something ordinary that passed us around, like a cat striding on a street. and that’s how she drove away from me. she went like a cat striding on the street, so she stride on her way to airport and flew in a manner i wouldn’t to reach her despite my all talents and efforts.
i awoke in the next morning and strode to work, with bare hands this time, with no reason, and the day after, and the day following … each day that passed i noticed my palms are more and more empty handed then the day before. but i persisted to get up again and up again and again and went to work until, finally, …
^\#-|^_/
Tears I. ,
Life are happy,…
Yes.
THE END
***
No remembrance.
James said,
June 10, 2009 at 3:21 pm
Philosophy in decline? We have to speak in the past tense here. Disregarding all of the praise for Quine, Kripke, Wittgenstein, etc., has the 20th century-present produced one philosopher who can be mentioned in the same breath as Kant?