The Existential Angst of Modern Philosophy - As observed by a NYT article.
mobile.nytimes.com/blogs/opinionator/2016/01/...
mobile.nytimes.comPosted Jan 11, 2016, 5:11 PM UTC
13031
mobile.nytimes.comIf you didn't catch it, Peter Singer responded in the comments section:
It’s very strange that an article like this can ignore the impact philosophy is having on the contemporary world through the teaching of practical or applied ethics. To mention just the two areas in which I have been most involved, philosophers have played crucial roles in the rise of the modern movement to raise the moral status of nonhuman animals, as well as on the emerging movement of effective altruism. Every semester, I see the courses I teach change the lives of my students, who will in turn change the lives of others – and I know that among those who teach practical ethics, this is a common experience. Philosophers may, with few exceptions, have positions in universities, but through those positions, they have influenced, directly and indirectly, the lives of millions of people, and billions of animals.
17
[removed]
-2†
[removed]
0
[removed]
1
[removed]
1
Don't shitpost in this sub. 3 day ban.
1
I take comfort knowing Socrates would approve of my subscription to this subreddit.
6
[deleted]
6
a discipline almost entirely fashioned for and by white European men.
A discipline for white men? How so? I can point to so many things in contemporary analytic philosophy - arguments about the composition of objects, or the interpretation of mathematical statements, or the existence of ethical properties - that seemingly have nothing to do with gender or race. Nor does being of a certain gender or race seem to give one a special perspective on these topics. If the author only meant to refer to the sociological and institutional aspects of philosophy, rather than the content of philosophy itself, it would have been nice to clarify that.
5
I agree that philosophical topics themselves have nothing to do with gender or race, but I think it is a fair argument to say that white European men shaped and defined a large part of what modern philosophy is, especially the philosophy that is taught in universities. Clarification isn't necessary because the entire article is discussing the institutionalization of philosophical knowledge.
2
I'm rather new to studying philosophy, and have never done so in a formal setting, so perhaps I'm mistaken here, however I almost always see the divide of western and eastern philosophy. I mean, would western philosophy not imply Europeans, and eastern philosophy, Asians?
Of course this does ignore the continents of Africa and the Americas, who I'm sure had some great philosophical thinkers.
1
Written by 2 academics promoting a book. Crisis indeed.
3†
would you rather they just screamed it from the hill tops? Participation in the economy doesn't discredit what they have to say.
13
I know the phrase is a bit overused, but I agree that this attack is a bit on the Ad Hominem side.
5
Despite that the article is very well written and thought provoking. I'm a scientist and it certainly resonated with me. Might go out and do something moral and contribute outside my field.
10
Analytic philosophy is the offender in chief. "If it isn't unambiguously defined and referring to an empirically verifiable condition then it is nonsense." This mentality is bullshit. Propositional logic is important as a pedagogical tool but natural language is related to the mind in subtle ways that the stilted language of analytic philosophy struggles to capture. Derek Parfit, Reason and Persons, this is bullshit. This is the product of academic philosophy and not philosophy per se.
2
agreed, very unpopular opinion though
1
Some of us dont have a subscription, thank you very much.
1†
if you're suggesting the website has a paywall maybe check again, I didn't experience any difficulty.
5
I like this article.
1
Not an article, its somewhere between a blog and essay.
I think it is trying to argue from a historical set of circumstances which were better for philosophy than the current set, that the field should change. Which doesn't fill me with hope for the actual strength of the argument. Hopefully their book can get into a suitable level of detail to actually prove this point.
Because while there were many roles where philosophers worked, being a monk and/or a professor at a university was common for most of the medieval period up until the early moderns. Aquinas spent his life in a monastery, Occam went around a few universities.
It is actually a striking fact that the early moderns we now know and love all did operate outside, and normally in opposition to, the normally Church run or influenced, typically Aristotelian universities where the philosophy professors worked.
This only really changed around the time of Mill, the last notable I can think of who really operated entirely outside the university structure, and with a day job, and Nietzsche who was an incredibly young professor and even more incredibly young pensioner when he wrote.
1
[removed]
1
I don't really think this article is suggesting that philosophy should not exist as a discipline--merely that philosophers should do other things besides philosophy, and learn about other disciplines to help them better understand their work. Which quite a few of them already do. Also, ethics falls within the purview of every single sentient being, so it's hard to see how philosophers should have a monopoly on it as a discipline.
1
Most of the world has already accepted the (old fashoned white man) view of atheism+scienticism as pure truth.
Philosophy upsets that view quite a bit even just lose arm chair stuff, and so most people interpret this as existential angst; like hey man why you gotta shit on my parade i'm just trying to live and let Bill Nye tell me whats real
1
My favorite line is "People stopped listening as philosophers focused on debates among themselves."
I think that says it all.
I posted a longer article called the Philosophy of the Universe, just now, and that is my attempt at helping solve the problem.
1
Great observation, but apparently, it missed one or two major things in philosophy. See Singer's comment found in one of the comments here.
Anyway, what saddens me when it comes to the current state of philosophy is the growing intellectual elitism that most of our colleagues develop. Some say it is the next stage of human class struggle: the stupid and the intelligent dichotomy.
And, I hate class struggle.
1
[deleted]
1
[removed]
0
Does anyone really consider philosophy anymore in their daily lives?
Do you really think the general public considered philosophy in their daily lives more often in times past; when free time was even more scarce and education much less common?
3
There may have been more cause/affect promoted thinking on philosophy, if it was warranted. This question of if philosophy doesn't promote good, what is it for, may be true. I can only date people's thoughts from about 1915 forward, from long lived adults I knew and spoke with through the 1980's who were born just after the turn of the century. Those people heard a lot about the Civil War, lived as children through WWI, and in most cases had to live hard lives. My Father told me, truthfully, if his Dad, who died in a mining accident, didn't have such a good reputation, he would have been an Outlaw. That's a choice! Also, all that group saw the flight of the first Airplane, and the Landing On The Moon! You don't think that provoked a lot of thought, balancing all that against the Christian teachings across all those years.
So, for my family, I would say yes. And, I would say for a good percentage of the people, also contemplated their thoughts too...... I really considered my parents old fogies, but they made it clear, that they lived all the sex, sin, murders, shootings, bootlegging, bank robberies, drinking, sinning ways and venues that I just read about. I bet they had a lot on their minds.... There is becoming an accepted finding that from about 10,000 years back, and forward, every man then had the brain capacity for innovation, science, and art that we do -- only more limited capacity to express it.. Making a bow work properly, to keep the bear cats off you at night, or cleaning a drinking water source, probably took precedence though. They may have been so strongly conditioned that both of those events, were like us making sure our cars start, and stopping and picking up a latte at Starbucks.... think what they could have done with philosophy if this is how they really were.
1
Free time was more scarce? Got any evidence or are you just going by the "everything was hell before" hypothesis?
1
Well are we talking about industrial or pre-industrial conditions? For industrial conditions the average work week was around 60-70 hours a week in the U.S. up until around the turn of the century when it gradually started to decrease with popular labour movements. Also for instance the average annual hours of labour for U.K. workers in 1840 was 3,000+ hours compared to 1,850 hours in 1987.
There is evidence that there was a lot more free time for peasants pre-industrial revolution, however a lot of that hypothesis seems to be measuring labour for the benefit of someone else. In reality in the off hours they would be subsistence farmers which takes up an incredible amount of time.
All that being said, what do you have against the "everything was hell before" hypothesis? I'd rather be a bored cubicle drone with a chance to experience the world than an abused peasant with a 30 year life expectancy.
1
subsistence farmers
Yeah I don't think you can count this as 100% toil and labor, you're talking about a way of life. During feudal times peasants were kickin it, you got a visit from tax man every once in a while, no real laws but communal ones.
Very hard to say what was comparable to the kind of almost forced subsistence+ labor we do now. I mean there are modern movements today built around escaping labor to become subsistence laborers and artisans so that they can ultimately have more leisure, tiny house movement comes to mind.
1
Call me cliche, but I actually like this article. The "philosophy of" fields have always seemed "realest" to me, since they philosophize about things in-the-world.
This is an unpopular opinion in professional philosophy, but I couldn't agree more. Philip Kitcher wrote an excellent paper called "Philosophy Inside Out" a few years back expanding on this idea, which I highly recommend.