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Update/r/science meets /r/philosophy (self.SubredditsMeet)

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Topic:

  • Discuss the misconceptions between science and philosophy.

  • How they both can work together without feeling like philosophy is obsolete in the modern day world.

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ベストトップ論争中古い順Q&A

[–]Beelzebubs-Barrister [スコア非表示]  (0子コメント)

Everything started as Philosophy, but once people become sure of the answer it becomes a Science. Zeno's Paradox is philosophy, but infinitesimals are calculus. The indivisibility of matter's building blocks is philosophy, atomic theory is chemistry.

[–]spfccmt42 -5ポイント-4ポイント  (2子コメント)

I think I understand now, scientists need to understand philosophy, so they can refute philosophers who want to take credit for everything under the sun.

[–]drunkentune 1ポイント2ポイント  (0子コメント)

Please turn down the hyperbole and stop misrepresenting what others say. It's clear that no one has said that in this thread.

[–]paretoslaw 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

Only people who read philosophers, philosophers tend not do that.

[–]ThePandasWatch/r/philosophy 1ポイント2ポイント  (0子コメント)

Glad to see this has progressed well. With the initial comments I was fearful that not a great deal would amount

[–]mostoriginalname2 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

Philosophy can be helpful in figuring out the best directions to go in with all this new knowledge. Creating and solving need to go hand in hand with wondering and observing. A utopian world will need more than better technology, it will need open minded, ethical, and ambitious citizens.

[–]itsBritanica 3ポイント4ポイント  (1子コメント)

I think that philosophy is more relevant than ever before to compliment rapid scientific advances. It is probably more accurate to juxtapose theology as increasingly obsolete in the modern world when presented with science. Theology is a vast, longstanding aspect of philosophy that is frequently put at odds with scientific facts and theories as old world beliefs are confronted with modern era evidence. But to reduce philosophy to that subset of theories is to reduce its value unnecessarily.

[–]ThePandasWatch/r/philosophy 4ポイント5ポイント  (0子コメント)

Theology =\= philosophy of religion. Theology is a discipline that stands within a given religious tradition. it's concerned with conceptual development and systematization of the key beliefs and doctrines of that faith orientation. It typically appeals to such sources as holy writings as well as accredited teachings.

Philosophy of religion is a bona fide academic field that's as objective, rigorous and systematical as possible. It also holds true that certain religious traditions nurture and support the life of mind in general and philosophical investigation of the teaching carried out in particular out of recognition that such intellectual activity is necessary for faith to thrive. There are no dogmatic ideals here, nor any parochial ideals either but rather seeks to follow the best approaches to study dialogue about religious beliefs an how they influence the world. It takes legitimate place seeking intellectual engagement with religion in broad arena of ideas. It happens to be that one of these ideas happens to involved with the inter-relation between science and faith/theism. If you're interested, you could take a look at 'Science and religion: where the conflict really lies' (I would strongly disagree that topics related to theism are becoming obsolete with science)

[–]PowderB 6ポイント7ポイント  (43子コメント)

This is a reply to a comment that was deleted,
"People are beginning to grasp that science provides the ultimate answers in that the answers provided by science remain physical constants regardless of what philosophers think about their meaning to human mental categories like virtue or beauty. Only more empirical research can disprove scientific facts, while philosophers can only manipulate abstract strategies on how we should orient ourselves towards them intellectually. The hierarchy has changed. Science is no longer perceived as the little cousin of philosophy but quite the other way round. It is empirical science, not philosophy, that is opening our minds to reality. The only thing philosophers can do in this situation is to claim that all intellectual activity, including science, is "ultimately" philosophy. Our great advances have been made by people who actually did the work, albeit using philosophical methods, sometimes. If philosophy did not exist, we would still be where we are today, if science did not exist we would be living in caves"

I spend a couple minutes writing it, so I'll post it anyway

Virtue and beauty answer Ethical and Aesthetic questions, which while belonging to the domain of two related fields of philosophy, by no means are an accurate representation of the majority of contemporary analytic philosophical study.

You say "Only more empirical research can disprove scientific facts." This is a philosophical doctrine, its called empiricism. Dogmatic empiricism is now somewhat antiquated, and for good post-cartesian reasons(see the comment below). Empirical study relies on inference, the nature of which is formulated by philosophical methods.

Practice follows theory. Abstract Physics, the theory that allows for advances in in understanding of the universe and production of technical feats, is written is the language of logic.

The detailed nature of logic and of knowledge will never cease to be pertinent to scientific inquiry. Likewise, the nature of the mind will permanently be pertinent to psychology, rational choice to economics, etc.

If philosophy did not exist, I'm sure Aristotle's detailed biological observations would be fascinating, but without his logic I'd imagine reaching any conclusions from them would be much more difficult.

[–]shaim2 1ポイント2ポイント  (42子コメント)

Yes, Philosophy gave us logic. But what have you done for us lately?!

I'm a research scientist (in quantum physics). 99% of the scientists I know have not studied, nor do they care about, philosophy. Most of them haven't even read Popper.

One could perhaps argue that philosophy has laid the groundwork for science (*), but the current position of philosophers regarding science is akin to geologists claiming all architects are doing geology, since buildings are positioned on the ground.

(*) One could also argue that scientific effort (say Copernicus and onward) pre-dated for formalizing of logic and the scientific method. And philosophers only came in later and labelled everything.

[–]paretoslaw 1ポイント2ポイント  (6子コメント)

Yeah, what you said is about right* and it in no way shakes my interest in philosophy.

I'm interested in philosophy because it answers questions I care about: what is math and what is its relation to truth?, how can someone be using a word rightly or wrongly when people create words?, does the success of science imply that the entities posited by science and only those entities exist?, and many many more.

Now you make think these are boring questions (which I can totally understand) or you may think these questions have obvious answers. All I'll say is that the more time I spend learning the less sure I am of what were my obvious answers when I started.

*there are exceptions some being moral psychology, AI, set theory (if you want to call math science), and semantics where philosophers are involved in many of the same conferences with the same papers

[–]shaim2 -2ポイント-1ポイント  (5子コメント)

my interest [in] philosophy

I'm interested in making beer. It's great fun. But I don't claim it is useful to the world.

IMHO, most of philosophy is mental masturbation. Enjoyable - no doubt. And I may do it often for that reason. But I have no delusions it is important or useful.

[–]paretoslaw 3ポイント4ポイント  (0子コメント)

If you want give me that philosophy is as important as brewing beer, I might disagree on the details but I'll take it. People spend their whole lives brewing, bottling, and perfecting beer and that sounds pretty useful to me.

If you're point is scientists do more than that, well maybe, but does the value a lay person gets from learning science beat the value from learning the intricacies of beer? Probably not.

[–]oneguy2008/r/philosophy 3ポイント4ポイント  (0子コメント)

Wait ... beer isn't useful to the world?

[–]TotesMessenger 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

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[–]drunkentune 4ポイント5ポイント  (0子コメント)

IMHO, most of philosophy is mental masturbation.

What familiarity do you have with philosophy?

[–]gangstacompgod 4ポイント5ポイント  (0子コメント)

I dare you to justify that claim without doing philosophy.

[–]ADefiniteDescription/r/philosophy 2ポイント3ポイント  (4子コメント)

99% of the scientists I know have not studied, nor do they care about, philosophy. Most of them haven't even read Popper.

Just because scientists don't study philosophy doesn't mean that it wouldn't be of any use to them, or that they shouldn't study it.

but the current position of philosophers regarding science is akin to geologists claiming all architects are doing geology,

I don't know any philosophers who want to make the claim that science just is part of philosophy. That's something commonly claimed on the internet, but thoroughly rejected amongst philosophers.

[–]spfccmt42 -1ポイント0ポイント  (0子コメント)

Just because scientists don't study philosophy doesn't mean that it wouldn't be of any use to them, or that they shouldn't study it.

ironically, that is an appeal to ignorance.

[–]shaim2 0ポイント1ポイント  (2子コメント)

Just because scientists don't study philosophy doesn't mean that it wouldn't be of any use to them, or that they shouldn't study it.

Agreed. But one would be very hard pressed to argue the most useful thing for a scientist to learn is philosophy. There is always x100 as many papers and textbooks to read as there is time available.

I don't know any philosophers who want to make the claim

Good to know. The Internet has been known to be unreliable at times ;-)

[–]ADefiniteDescription/r/philosophy 2ポイント3ポイント  (1子コメント)

Agreed. But one would be very hard pressed to argue the most useful thing for a scientist to learn is philosophy. There is always x100 as many papers and textbooks to read as there is time available.

I just don't think anyone makes this claim, so it strikes me as a bit of a strawman. I think a much weaker claim -- that ceteris paribus philosophy is useful for scientists to learn -- is however very plausible. But this isn't a perfect world, and as you note not everyone has the time.

[–]shaim2 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

My claim is stronger: virtually nobody has time, and virtually nobody does.

[–]drunkentune 2ポイント3ポイント  (4子コメント)

... Popper's experiment (the precursor thought-experiment to EPR), the influence of Mach's work in logical positivism on Einstein's development of the special and general theories of relativity, the influence of logical positivism on the Copenhagen interpretation, the Duhem problem, the Duhem-Quine problem, Kripke's work on Wittgenstein's problem of rule-following, Goodman's new riddle of induction, David Lewis' work on possible worlds, Donald Campbell and Popper and Lorenz's work on evolutionary epistemology, Piaget's work on genetic epistemology, Quine's work on naturalised epistemology, everything ever written by Marx, pragmatics, pragma-dialectics, ...

[–]shaim2 -3ポイント-2ポイント  (3子コメント)

You do realize that virtually all physicists (myself included) have never hear about any of this.

Are you sure these are not fairy-tales old Philosophy professors tell their young trainees to make them feel special?

[–]drunkentune 3ポイント4ポイント  (2子コメント)

You do realize that virtually all physicists (myself included) have never hear about any of this.

If true, that's a shame. I'm also sure virtually all physicists have never read anything from Ptolemy to Mach, or really any work in the sciences that developed before the 70's or so, so I'm not sure what you're trying to show other than that virtually all physicists are ignorant of their history. Luckily, historians of science do that work for them. Maybe we should listen to historians of science more often?

I'm also sure virtually all physicists know literally nothing about the social pressures on the scientific workplace or the dynamics of groups, but thankfully sociologists of science do that work for them. Maybe we should listen to sociologists of science more often?

I hope you see where I'm going with this. If literally every single scientist is a blinkered worker bee that knows nothing of their history, how they operate, or the work of their intellectual forebears, it would matter naught for the contributions philosophy has given to science.

Are you sure these are not fairy-tales old Philosophy professors tell their young trainees to make them feel special?

I'm sure.

[–]shaim2 0ポイント1ポイント  (1子コメント)

The story told among scientists, is that we move things forward, and then mathematicians and philosophers tidy it all up, write it up nice etc.

The prime example is the delta function. Introduced by Paul Dirac. Very useful in physics. It took mathematicians a long while to properly build the theoretical reasoning behind it. But for us physics - hey it works. Good enough.

And the same with philosophy. We use probabilities. A couple of hundred years later philosophers and mathematicians declare they have the axiomatic foundations for it. Good for them. Not that interesting for us.

[–]drunkentune [スコア非表示]  (0子コメント)

The story told among scientists, is that we move things forward, and then mathematicians and philosophers tidy it all up, write it up nice etc.

Are you sure these are not fairy-tales old science professors tell their young trainees to make them feel special? What familiarity do you have with the history of science?

And the same with philosophy. We use probabilities. A couple of hundred years later philosophers and mathematicians declare they have the axiomatic foundations for it. Good for them. Not that interesting for us.

Pascal, Fermat, Laplace, Bernoulli, Peirce, Keynes, von Mises, Carnap, Popper and Shannon? They did nothing.

The only work ever done in probability theory was Kolmogorov, and it popped out fully-formed out of his head, like Athena out of Zeus.

And it never advanced beyond Kolmogorov's initial interpretation, either.

Not that interesting for us.

What do you think is interesting?

[–]drunkentune 7ポイント8ポイント  (16子コメント)

Philosophy gave us logic. But what have you done for us lately?!

Off the top of my head, I can think of the following: probability theory, interpretations of the probability calculus (logical, epistemic, frequentist, propensity, intersubjective), theories of reference (Frege and Russell's definite descriptions, Kripke's rigid designation, later work on two-dimensional semantics), modal logic, epistemic logic, intuitionist logic, developments in epistemology (post-Gettier work in reliabilism, virtue epistemology, knowledge-first epistemology, and so on), philosophy of physics, philosophy of biology, philosophy of science in general (Popper's metaphysical research programmes, Kuhn's paradigm model, Lakatos' scientific research programmes, Feyerabend's anarchic approach, and so on), advances in the realist/anti-realist debate in all fields (maths, ethics, science), the Frege-Geach problem, Tarski's semantic theory of truth, work done in the theory-laden nature of observation, Rawls' work on the veil of ignorance, Nozick's reply to Rawls, ...

[–]shaim2 -3ポイント-2ポイント  (15子コメント)

How is any of this useful to actual science?

[–]drunkentune 6ポイント7ポイント  (6子コメント)

Probability theory is useful--scientists use probability all the time. You also should know what interpretation of the probability calculus you're using, otherwise you can end up with significant problems. Theories of reference help clarify speech. Developments in logic help in physics (modal logic is used in interpretations of QM, for example). Developments in epistemology help us understand what qualifies as knowledge. Philosophers of physics often contribute to physics journals or provide conceptual clarity. Philosophers of biology often contribute to biology journals or provide conceptual clarity. Philosophy of science helps scientists understand what they do and how they can do it better, as well as show exactly why we should value science over other sorts of activities. The realist/anti-realist debate helps clarify what we can assert about unobservables. The Frege-Geach problem undermines anti-realist theories of ethics. Tarski's semantic theory of truth revolutionised the field, so we now have a better understanding of correspondence or deflationary theories of truth. We now know that since observation is forever theory-laden, we shouldn't fall into the trap of thinking that observations in science are direct, or unmediated, or not interpreted in light of our theories. Rawls and Nozick's work influence political institutions to this day.

[–]jjhgfjhgf 0ポイント1ポイント  (2子コメント)

Some of the things you list in these two comments are both philosophy and physics, some are both math and philosophy, some are both linguistics and philosophy, some are both economics and philosophy, etc. The practitioners in each of these fields consider them to belong to their own field and not to philosophy. The philosophers consider them to belong to philosophy. Neither is right or wrong, they just look at things differently.

When u/shaim2 asked "what have you done for us (science) lately?!", he probably meant some "pure" philosophy not informed by physics. For instance, physicists think it is just common sense that an experiment can be influenced by any number of factors. They don't consider not knowing philosophers call these "auxiliary hypothesis" and the observation part of "the Duhem-Quine thesis" as evidence that they don't know that fact. They consider it part of doing science, and are not filled with gratitude to philosophers for uncovering this fact.

You are absolutely right, science can't be done without philosophy. It's just that each field considers the relevant philosophy to belong to itself and not this unrelated thing "philosophy". Sometimes scientists take ideas from philosophers, sometimes philosophers take ideas from scientists. But the source is soon forgotten, and each group thinks of the ideas as belonging to itself. And neither group is wrong.

[–]drunkentune 3ポイント4ポイント  (0子コメント)

I have not said that science cannot be done without philosophy and I do not think that it is true.

I also mention more 'pure' philosophical work like the Duhem-Quine thesis in an additional comment.

[–]paretoslaw 1ポイント2ポイント  (0子コメント)

he probably meant some "pure" philosophy not informed by physics.

That's just the wrong question; philosophy is what philosopher's do.

edit: made more polite and clear

[–]shaim2 -1ポイント0ポイント  (1子コメント)

Probability theory is useful--scientists use probability all the time.

Of course we use probability. We've been using it way before philosophers started formalizing it.

You also should know what interpretation of the probability calculus you're using, otherwise you can end up with significant problems.

Example? 'cause I've been doing calculus and probabilities and I don't know what you're talking about.

modal logic is used in interpretations of QM

I know quite a bit about interpretations of QM and I haven't heard of modal logic. Could it be I know it by some other name?

Philosophers of physics often contribute to physics journals or provide conceptual clarity

Can you point me at anything of significance along these lines?

[–]drunkentune 4ポイント5ポイント  (0子コメント)

We've been using it way before philosophers started formalizing it.

Do you think information theory was possible before probability was formalised?

Example?

The worthlessness of P-values.

I know quite a bit about interpretations of QM and I haven't heard of modal logic. Could it be I know it by some other name?

Here's an introduction.

Can you point me at anything of significance along these lines?

I recommend reading some of David Z. Albert or Tim Maudlin's work to get an idea what they do.

[–]paretoslaw -1ポイント0ポイント  (7子コメント)

It isn't really, which is why philosophers should just admit philosophy is not for scientists.

[–]drunkentune 4ポイント5ポイント  (6子コメント)

Some of it is, as I explain above. Some of it, like Rawls' revolutionary work in political philosophy, isn't useful for scientists, because it's not applicable in the sciences.

[–]paretoslaw 0ポイント1ポイント  (5子コメント)

Dude, as someone who has studied philosophy and statistics it seems like a stretch to say that philosopher's interpretation of probability theory matters* to statisticians. It's really a stretch to say QM interpretations matter to scientists; all of the stuff I've seen on that is metaphysics than physics.

*that's not to the interpretation doesn't matter, just that when philosopher's talk about interpreting probability I take it David Lewis and other such folks are mostly talking foundations rather than the well-trodden ground of Frequentest vs Bayesian inhabited by statisticians.

[–]drunkentune 3ポイント4ポイント  (4子コメント)

I'm sure many statisticians follow a 'shut up and calculate' maxim, but that doesn't make contributions of philosophers to probability theory and interpretations of the probability calculus not valuable.

And modal logic is important to some interpretations of QM.

[–]paretoslaw -1ポイント0ポイント  (3子コメント)

I'm sure many statisticians follow a 'shut up and calculate' maxim

That's not at all what I'm saying, statisticians care a lot about method, that's what the footnote was about, they just don't care about... well foundations isn't quite the right word, but whatever the common thread is to what philosopher's of probability care about*.

And modal logic is important to some interpretations of QM.

Absolutely true and I think that stuff is great, it's just metaphysics not physics.

*No dig intended I love that stuff and some of it is useful just not for statisticians

[–]drunkentune 2ポイント3ポイント  (2子コメント)

Absolutely true and I think that stuff is great, it's just metaphysics not physics.

So every interpretation of QM is metaphysics?

[–]yourlycantbsrs 3ポイント4ポイント  (3子コメント)

You must be a bad scientist if you think your own personal experience is sufficiently good of a sample such that you can generalize justifiably.

[–]shaim2 1ポイント2ポイント  (2子コメント)

Of course personal experience is not proper evidence.

But since it is in-line with virtually everything I've seen and heard online, and since it's consistent between the several countries in which I worked - I think it's more than an anecdote.

[–]yourlycantbsrs 1ポイント2ポイント  (1子コメント)

Yeah I don't think you're justified in that belief. You're hastily generalizing.

[–]shaim2 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

Do you have any data to the contrary?

[–]TychoCelchuuu/r/philosophy 4ポイント5ポイント  (3子コメント)

Yes, Philosophy gave us logic. But what have you done for us lately?!

Computer science and game theory?

[–]clqrvy 2ポイント3ポイント  (1子コメント)

I don't really buy the narrative that these fields came out of philosophy. It seems to me that the closest that philosophy comes to having to do with the development of computer science is in the form of logicians like Boole, Church, Godel, Leibniz, Russell, Turing, etc.

Now, I'm not going to say that any of these people 'weren't philosophers'. I don't care what you call them. But the thing is that almost all of them were trained as and worked professionally as mathematicians or scientists (exceptions being Leibniz, who did everything, and Russell.) So if these are the people that we point to when asked, 'What has philosophy done for science lately?', then this doesn't speak well for philosophy as a separate academic discipline, since it's arguably the case that bright, philosophically-minded people in other fields can do it better than the 'professional' philosophers.

(An alternative is to say that many of these great mathematician-philosopher-logicians at least had their research directly inspired by questions raised by philosophers. Maybe this this true for Godel, whose incompleteness paper directly references Russell's Principia Mathematica. But other logicians like Turing and Church were probably responding to Hilbert, who was a (philosophically-minded) mathematician.

[–]ADefiniteDescription/r/philosophy [スコア非表示]  (0子コメント)

Wasn't Church primarily employed as a philosopher?

[–]spfccmt42 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

Computer science and game theory?

wat?

[–]5throwawayz/r/science 0ポイント1ポイント  (9子コメント)

People are beginning to grasp that science provides the ultimate answers in that the answers provided by science remain physical constants regardless of what philosophers think about their meaning to human mental categories like virtue or beauty. Only more empirical research can disprove scientific facts, while philosophers can only manipulate abstract strategies on how we should orient ourselves towards them intellectually.

The hierarchy has changed. Science is no longer perceived as the little cousin of philosophy but quite the other way round. It is empirical science, not philosophy, that is opening our minds to reality. The only thing philosophers can do in this situation is to claim that all intellectual activity, including science, is "ultimately" philosophy.

Our great advances have been made by people who actually did the work, albeit using philosophical methods, sometimes. If philosophy did not exist, we would still be where we are today, if science did not exist we would be living in caves.

Steven Weinberg (in his Dreams of a Final Theory): “The insights of philosophers have occasionally benefited physicists, but generally in a negative fashion—by protecting them from the preconceptions of other philosophers

[–]PmYourWittyAnecdote 2ポイント3ポイント  (0子コメント)

Not only is this woefully ignorant, but it's also woefully uninformed.

You say that without philosophy, it would have no impact on the world of Science, yet you do realise some of the greatest philosophers of all time are the founding fathers of science?

The scientific method, the entire basis for scientific enquiry, was invented by one of the most famous philosophers of all time, Aristotle.

Do you think Blaise Pascal, another hugely famous philosopher, would agree with your statement? I'm more inclined to believe him due to the fact he's the basis for what we know as pressure, as well as a host of other scientific discoveries.

[–]MusicIsPower/r/philosophy[🍰] 3ポイント4ポイント  (0子コメント)

This is a truly embarrassing conception of philosophy, both in contemporary practice, and throughout history.

[–]drunkentune 8ポイント9ポイント  (2子コメント)

People are beginning to grasp that science provides the ultimate answers in that the answers provided by science remain physical constants regardless of what philosophers think about their meaning to human mental categories like virtue or beauty.

If realist philosophical theories about ethics, aesthetics or epistemology are true, then these answers are 'ultimate' for much the same reasons: their truth-makers are mind-independent.

However, if scientific anti-realism, a particular theory in philosophy of science, is true, then your claim is false.

In fact, if scientific anti-realism is true, it provides an 'ultimate' answer as well! The ultimate answer is that the truth-makers of scientific theories are not 'ultimate', that is, the truth-makers of scientific theories are not mind-independent!

This very presupposition that you have that what differentiates science from philosophy is, as I hope you now see, false, since it assumes scientific realism--a philosophical thesis that the truth-makers of scientific theories are mind-independent--as an 'ultimate' answer, that is, as true in nature of some fact about the world, rather than the mind.

The only thing philosophers can do in this situation is to claim that all intellectual activity, including science, is "ultimately" philosophy.

Many philosophers, especially philosophers of science, claim nothing of the sort. Their interests lie in trying to unpack science as an activity. This is part of my interest, personally, in figuring out what scientists do, and why we value science. We might think of it as taking the scientific 'spirit' of inquiry and focusing it inward at science itself! That sounds interesting and worthwhile to me, and plenty of scientists have said they were indebted to philosophers of science in changing how they viewed science, and in some cases actively changed how they do science after reading some philosophers of science.

I often use these two examples, but I think they are helpful, so forgive me if I repeat myself: Peter Medawar and John Eccles are two Nobel laureates. Both of them claim to be indebted to one of the most famous philosophers of science of the 20th century: Sir Karl Popper. They say they actively changed how they did science after reading his work, and say their Nobel Prizes are due to a shift in their understanding of science. And that is one philosopher of science. There's been plenty of work done in understanding methodology since then, so who knows how much it could help!

If philosophy did not exist, we would still be where we are today, if science did not exist we would be living in caves.

I hate to be glib, but if philosophy had never developed, we would lack wonder or a desire to explain the world. I mean to say is, you have conflated science and technology, and technology, while very useful, is shortsighted, and focuses only at the task at hand, while science and philosophy have historically been wedded together ever since the Presocratic philosopher-poets. I recommend you look into their work, which is a fascinating combination of epistemology, metaphysics, fundamental ontology, theoretical physics and cosmology.

[–]spfccmt42 0ポイント1ポイント  (1子コメント)

Peter Medawar and John Eccles are two Nobel laureates. Both of them claim to be indebted to one of the most famous philosophers of science of the 20th century: Sir Karl Popper.

This is an appeal to authority.

[–]drunkentune 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

No, that is not an appeal to authority; it is an example of scientists saying they were indebted to a philosopher of science's work in scientific methodology.

[–]TychoCelchuuu/r/philosophy 7ポイント8ポイント  (0子コメント)

People are beginning to grasp that science provides the ultimate answers in that the answers provided by science remain physical constants regardless of what philosophers think about their meaning to human mental categories like virtue or beauty.

Do you have examples of philosophers who disagree with this? As /u/bootsybootsy points out, the arguments for believing this are philosophical arguments that have been articulated by philosophers. I'm not sure if you're trying to draw some kind of contrast between science and philosophy, in that science gives us answers that are solid that philosophy is powerless to overturn, but to the extent that this contrast can be drawn, drawing it is a philosophical enterprise.

Only more empirical research can disprove scientific facts, while philosophers can only manipulate abstract strategies on how we should orient ourselves towards them intellectually.

Again it's a little unclear to me what you think the relevance of this point is. Of course it takes empirical research to disprove "scientific facts," because "scientific facts" are simply those facts which we establish (or later overturn) via empirical research. If there are any facts which we don't establish or overturn via empirical research, they simply don't count as scientific. They are the realm of philosophy, for instance. There is a division of labor between science and philosophy and any time philosophy starts to figure out empirical questions, those questions get split off and become their own field. This is why many physics departments at universities are named "natural philosophy" departments - they started out as philosophy but were split off when they began to do sophisticated empirical research. More recently this has occurred with computer science and game theory.

It is empirical science, not philosophy, that is opening our minds to reality.

What do you mean by "opening our minds to reality?" If by that you mean "investigating empirical facts," then of course science is the thing that's doing this, rather than philosophy. Philosophy is just not a field that investigates empirical matters. If it were, it would be science! As far as I can tell you're saying things like "it is farmers, not plumbers, who grow food." I mean, yes, of course. If someone grows food, then by definition they're a farmer, not a plumber. If someone investigates empirical facts, they're a scientist, not a philosopher.

If by "opening our minds to reality" you mean something other than investigating empirical facts, it seems obvious to me that science is not the only field engaged in this mind-opening. Your post, for instance, is not an example of science - you hardly have any empirical evidence for your views apart from observations of what people are doing, and for those observations to count as evidence for your view, we must make all sorts of philosophical assumptions that themselves can't simply be verified empirically. Thus your post, at the very least, is an example of how philosophical inquiry might at least potentially add to our understanding of things in a way that science can't.

The only thing philosophers can do in this situation is to claim that all intellectual activity, including science, is "ultimately" philosophy.

This hardly seems like the only thing philosophers can do. Have you read a philosophy journal lately? They are filled with much more than this. In fact I don't think any philosophers claim that science is "ultimately" philosophy, because that would be a pretty empty and unhelpful claim. If everything is "ultimately" philosophy then philosophy isn't really anything special.

Our great advances have been made by people who actually did the work, albeit using philosophical methods, sometimes. If philosophy did not exist, we would still be where we are today, if science did not exist we would be living in caves.

This displays a pretty terrible understanding of the history of philosophical and scientific inquiry, and of intellectual inquiry generally. It's like saying "if primitive tools did not exist, we would still be where we are today, whereas if internal combustion engines did not exist we would be riding horses." I mean, in one sense, you're right: we no longer need primitive tools to hunt and cook and so on. But on the other hand it's ridiculous to imagine that we could ever have created the internal combustion engine without having first become tool users.

Maybe the idea is that nowadays because primitive tools are obsolete, philosophy is also obsolete. But that ignores the fact that philosophy still addresses some things science will never address, namely, the things that cannot be investigated empirically, which is a point you yourself have made.

[–]unpopulardutchy 2ポイント3ポイント  (0子コメント)

No part of this is substantiated with the facts you claim to have nor is half of this true. It is based on large assumptions that scientists take for granted, notably Naturalism. I think there are compelling arguments against naturalism that could undermine the evidence that scientists have received and they have nothing to do with virtue or beauty.

[–]bootsybootsy/r/philosophy 3ポイント4ポイント  (0子コメント)

Much of the above was argued very convincingly in the seventeenth and eighteenth century, and philosophy rightly adapted.

Also, on your point that the world would be the same without philosophy: see jurisprudence and political philosophy. You think that the political and legal systems we have in place would exist without philosophical concepts behind them?

[–]seacomet/r/philosophy 2ポイント3ポイント  (0子コメント)

This doesn't sound like a question.

[–]Liquidus_800 5ポイント6ポイント  (3子コメント)

Am I what I am or am I what I think?

[–]seacomet/r/philosophy 4ポイント5ポイント  (2子コメント)

You are what you have been and you will be what your actions will make you.

[–]CarLucSteeve 2ポイント3ポイント  (1子コメント)

So... Am I what I eat?

[–]seacomet/r/philosophy 1ポイント2ポイント  (0子コメント)

Someone from /r/science can explain how that happens I bet. Here's a good start

[–]Cardboard65/r/science 5ポイント6ポイント  (17子コメント)

Here is a topic of discussion: Do we have free will, or true consciousness?

Are our thoughts nothing more than a culmination of minor differences in genetic traits from our peers, plus our past experiences? Are we nothing more than a set of neurons firing due to biochemical reactions?

Or rather, is it just that science hasn't answered enough questions about the brain to understand, and we may truly decide our own fate?

This is something I talk about a lot with my peers and I'd like to hear what you guys think, this is a perfect combo of Subreddits. Thanks!

[–]shaim2 -1ポイント0ポイント  (4子コメント)

The Many World Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics holds the position that the Universe is deterministic.

If that is the case, then there cannot be any free will. Only the illusion of it.

[–]Friendly_Fire 1ポイント2ポイント  (2子コメント)

As Tycho said, determinism doesn't preclude freewill. I've debated this for (in support of compatibilism). Usually what it comes down to is an exact definition of free will. One way of defining it concludes free will is compatible with determinism, and the other concludes free will is impossible, determinism or not. My biased personal opinion is the first is what most people think of with free will.

We can discuss it more if you like.

[–]shaim2 0ポイント1ポイント  (1子コメント)

We can discuss it more if you like.

Very much so. Because my current research into the Many World Interpretation is leading me, against my will, into a world view of determinism and hence no free will. And if there is a loophole there, I'd love to know about it.

[–]Friendly_Fire 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

Consider a world with free will, and you are asked to make a choice. If I could somehow wind back time and repeatedly give you the choice, you'd always make the same decision, yes? After all, if everything is the same, why would your decision change?

Unless your decisions are random, they are pre-determined (in a deterministic world). No where does this violate the assumption of free will. An agent with free-will should always make the same decision given a specific situation. In a deterministic world the 'situations' given to them would be pre-determined, and thus so would their actions.

Note, by situation I mean not only the choices presented but someones nature (DNA) and nurture (life experiences) that obviously influence their choice.

The argument against this I've seen is that it's a 'weak free will'. In that your will is predetermined by your nature and nurture. Since you can't decide those, how can you say you have 'free' will? A clean way I heard it put was "A man is free to act on his will, but not free to will what he wills".

This leads to paradoxical concept of free will, separate from the question of determinism. Even if you could change your nature/nurture, and thus your will, how would you decide how to change it? By the 'will' you all ready have, which you did not choose. To satisfy this version of free will you'd have to be able to decide what you are before you exist. A silly idea.

To summarize, agents with free will put in a deterministic world would be deterministic themselves. Also, the idea that your will is only 'free' if it wasn't caused by your nature/nurture makes free will an impossibility, determinism or not.

I think most people just accept that determinism means no free will without thought. When you break it down, it doesn't make sense why they would exclude each other.

[–]TychoCelchuuu/r/philosophy 7ポイント8ポイント  (0子コメント)

This is false. Compatibilism, the most popular theory of free will, holds that free will is entirely compatible with determinism. (In fact that's why it's called "compatibilism.")

[–]CaptainMoonman 1ポイント2ポイント  (8子コメント)

I don't entirely know what I believe about free will, but I've given it a lot of thought.

Picture this scenario: you have a machine designed to flip coins in a closed environment, and you can account for all the physics in play when said coin is flipped. Knowing this information could be used to predict what side the coin will land on each time it's flipped.

While it may be a much larger scale, I would imagine the universe would operate on the same principles as this: it is a closed environment, governed by a set of physical laws which all have consequences that can be predicted, should one have the information required and the ability to process it. Therefore, the universe would become deterministic in nature, with only one possible chain of events, however intricate it may be. This, however is dependent upon true randomness not existing, as that would add a factor that can't be accounted for, making the previous argument null, but still not accounting for free will, just that events could not be predicted given all information, unless a similar factor was incorporated into the human brain, but one that could operate in such a way as to not be wholly affected by external stimuli.

I don't know what to think about I've said here, but it seems to me that the most likely situation is that we do not have free will, but our lack of knowledge on the future makes us appear to make our own actions.

I don't know if this has made sense, been disjointed, come off as inane ramblings, or completely reasonable, but I hope to have brought my thoughts across.

[–]TychoCelchuuu/r/philosophy 3ポイント4ポイント  (7子コメント)

The fact that you can predict someone's actions does not show that they have no free will. (In fact, if someone's actions were entirely unpredictable, we would be inclined to say that rather than choosing they were just acting without any will at all.) See compatibilism for the most popular philosophical theory of free will, which is also perfectly compatible with someone's actions being 100% predictable (in fact it's called "compatibilism" because it holds that predictability is compatible with free will).

[–]CaptainMoonman 0ポイント1ポイント  (6子コメント)

I don't see how it can still be considered free will if the outcome is determined, rather that free will merely appears to exist. Would you enlighten me on your viewpoint further?

[–]Friendly_Fire 1ポイント2ポイント  (1子コメント)

I'll try to give a brief explanation. Consider a world with free will, and you are asked to make a choice? If I could somehow wind back time and repeatedly give you the choice, you'd always make the same decision, yes? After all, if everything is the same, why would your decision change?

Unless your decisions are random, they are pre-determined. No where does this violate the assumption of free will. An agent with free-will should always make the same decision given a specific situation, and thus their actions are determined.

[–]CaptainMoonman 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

Interesting way of looking at it.

[–]TychoCelchuuu/r/philosophy 3ポイント4ポイント  (3子コメント)

I didn't say it's my viewpoint. I said it's the most popular philosophical theory of free will. Did the article I linked not provide enough information?

[–]CaptainMoonman 0ポイント1ポイント  (2子コメント)

I'll read it in a bit. I'm currently very sleep deprived, and don't have the energy to focus on that for the time required to read it in its entirety.

Also, what is your viewpoint on free will?

[–]TychoCelchuuu/r/philosophy 2ポイント3ポイント  (1子コメント)

I tend not to tell people my views on topics that I am helping them learn about, because I think people have a tendency to place too much weight on what other people believe as a way of saving them from having to think about the topic themselves. It's similar to trying to solve a math problem: if you're presented with a multiple choice list of answers and someone says "I think C is the right answer" then you're not going to work as carefully on the math problem as you would if you just had the problem and someone told you "figure out the answer."

[–]CaptainMoonman 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

The difference here is that we can't just figure out the answer, and have no real way of knowing what is or isn't close. I won't blindly accept your answer or blindly reject it. It's just as valid as anyone else's. If you still don't want to, that's okay, but i like hearing people's viewpoints on this subject.

Also, I do appreciate your view on giving answers. It's something many people don't understand is a bad thing to train people with. Though, in an open discussion setting like this, I don't think that applies.

[–]seacomet/r/philosophy 1ポイント2ポイント  (2子コメント)

The jury is still out on free will but the biggest contenders are determinism and compatibilism. The answer to "do we have free will" seems to lie somewhere between maybe and no.

Mind-body dualists will say the "mind" is made of different "stuff" than the body, so the consciousness we call the "self" is somehow not fully included in the tangle of neurons. That being said, there really isn't any good proof for mind-body dualism and most relevant philosophy agrees that the "self" is somewhere between your ears only.

In theory, we could understand the laws of the universe well to enough to predict every action that will ever happen. This is contingent on quantum randomness. If randomness exists in our universe then determinism (and most of our understanding of physics) is completely out the window and our universe is a terrifying unpredictable place. Conversely, we may someday understand the mechanism that produces a seemingly random output.

I can direct you to more information if you'd like

[–]TychoCelchuuu/r/philosophy 6ポイント7ポイント  (0子コメント)

The jury is still out on free will but the biggest contenders are determinism and compatibilism.

This is false. Compatibilism is the thesis that determinism and free will are compatible. (That is why it's called "compatibilism.") The big contenders in free will are compatibilism and incompatibilism (see also here), where incompatibilism includes theories of free will that rule out determinism and theories that say we have no free will.

[–]Cardboard65/r/science 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

Thanks for your response!

I would like more information on the "stuff" as you speak of it if you have any material. Also I definitely lean toward free will thinkers, but the article you posted about compatibility seems pretty good, I'll read it when I get home.

In theory, we could understand the laws of the universe well to enough to predict every action that will ever happen. This is contingent on quantum randomness.

It's interesting to note though, that even now our best computers are not very capable of truly generating a true random outcome (1). Not that we have the ability to use programs based quantum computing as of now or anything.

As for other information, philosopher Nick Bostrom of the University of Oxford has a large section of his thesis devoted to showing the probability that we have a free will in the form of an equation. He wrote the thesis on this idea " If there were a substantial chance that our civilization will ever get to the posthuman stage and run many ancestor-simulations, then how come you are not living in such a simulation?" (2)

I'd agree with him on the basis that we have substrate-independent minds, but as a Microbiologist I just want more substantial evidence. Thanks again!

(1) http://engineering.mit.edu/ask/can-computer-generate-truly-random-number

(2)http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/blogs/physics/2015/07/are-we-living-in-a-computer-simulation/

(2)http://www.simulation-argument.com/simulation.html

[–]ASDCoco 4ポイント5ポイント  (18子コメント)

This seems like a great place to ask/get an opinion on this

This year, I started both physics and philosophy major. What do you think about this double major? I am comfortable enough -economically- that I can be a full time student, and want to make the most out of it. Many people from physics tell me it's a waste of time, and that I'd be better off putting all of my efforts in just physics. Also, that philosophy has nothing to do with physics and whatnot.

Does it make sense to pursue this?

My main expectation is to learn to think, in general, as best I can. Even if I never land a job as a "philosopher", I think it will greatly impact me to have both "sets" of knowledge.

PS: I'm not thinking about doing it, I'm already finishing my first year and loving it.

[–]oneguy2008/r/philosophy 2ポイント3ポイント  (0子コメント)

If you're studying philosophy, particularly with an interest in metaphysics or philosophy of science, this is a very good combination. Also they're both really cool things to study and, let's be honest, that's why most of us pick our majors anyways.

[–]drunkentune 4ポイント5ポイント  (0子コメント)

Philosophy of physics is an incredibly important field in physics. I recommend reading some of David Z. Albert or Tim Maudlin's work to get a taste of what they work on, which is very exciting if you're interested in QM.

[–]ange1obear/r/philosophy 2ポイント3ポイント  (1子コメント)

I did this double major in undergrad. I spent some time working in particle physics, but decided that I preferred the philosophy side of things, so now I'm a grad student in philosophy, focusing on philosophy of physics. The only downside, I found, was that it prevented me from taking many classes that weren't physics or philosophy. I had to use extracurricular opportunities to study, e.g., math or a foreign language.

I think the other commenters basically covered what I would have said. I'd be happy to answer any questions you have about my experience doing this major, though. I generally found my studies in philosophy indispensable to my studies in physics.

[–]ASDCoco 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

Unfortunately, my college does not offer extracurricular opportunities, which negates for me that inconvenience.

Also, why did you choose philosophy? and what impact do you think having done both careers (instead of just philosophy) had on you?

[–]Phobos1393 1ポイント2ポイント  (2子コメント)

You're not going to find a lot of overlap until you get to a higher level in physics but it'll help you be a better writer and debater, important skills in physics. Also, there's surprisingly a lot of physicists (mostly people who only got their bachelor's degree in physics or people who work in extremely applied areas of physics) who think that philosophy doesn't matter. You can just ignore them, they're pretty incorrect. If you want to see an interesting article about this, check out Massimo Piglucci arguing with Neil Degrasse Tyson about the merits of philosophy.

[–]ASDCoco 1ポイント2ポイント  (1子コメント)

I think the article you point to dwells a lot on how science vs phillosophy advances on knowledge, in a pretty broad sense. Maybe it does, maybe it doesn't.

But I do think it clearly does help broaden knowledge on a more personal level. And that's what I mainly hope to get out of it, if nothing else.

[–]Phobos1393 1ポイント2ポイント  (0子コメント)

Sort of, yeah, he also touches on philosophy's general contributions to science and why it's important to the overall functionality of the scientific system we've put in place. But yeah, you're right, it does very much help broaden your personal knowledge. You'll certainly get that much out of it, at the very least.

[–]Pinkfish_411/r/philosophy 8ポイント9ポイント  (1子コメント)

It's an excellent double major if you're interested in the sorts of questions where the two disciplines overlap: causality and determinism, the nature of time, the nature of physical law, epistemological issues surrounding the scientific method, etc. If you ended up pursuing either discipline at the highest levels, then a solid knowledge of related work being done by the other discipline will only help you, not hurt you.

Always be wary of anybody who tells you that you should put all your energy into one discipline, whatever the discipline. That's a surefire recipe for disciplinary inbreeding, and it's never healthy. Disciplines need to be constantly challenged by one another, and having people with competence in more than one is the best way to make that happen.

Of course, if you don't pursue either discipline at the highest levels, then that's all the more reason not to put all your eggs in one basket. Study what you enjoy and what helps you be the better thinker you want to be. If that means you're studying a little less physics than the next guy, so what?

[–]ASDCoco 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

Of course, if you don't pursue either discipline at the highest levels, then that's all the more reason not to put all your eggs in one basket. Study what you enjoy and what helps you be the better thinker you want to be. If that means you're studying a little less physics than the next guy, so what?

This is a great piece of advice. I don't think I'm doing both majors just for the the "sorts of questions where the two disciplinces overlap" (though, that sounds great), I'm doing it mainly because I like them both, and think I will enjoy studying them. Also, to make myself as competent a person as I can. Not just good at something.

As far as the "eggs in one basket" thing, I don't really see myself working as a physicist or as a philosopher (whatever that means). I'm more focused in what I want to learn, and to make the most out of college.

[–]TychoCelchuuu/r/philosophy 4ポイント5ポイント  (2子コメント)

What do you think about this double major?

It's a good combination. Some sort of hard science is nice because it opens up some job opportunities that you wouldn't have with other sorts of bachelor's degrees, and philosophy is a great major for becoming a better writer and explainer, which is incredibly important.

Many people from physics tell me it's a waste of time, and that I'd be better off putting all of my efforts in just physics.

They do not know what they are talking about. Especially because:

Also, that philosophy has nothing to do with physics and whatnot.

This is wrong. As /u/Accipia points out, at the highest levels of theoretical physics, philosophy and physics come together. And even if it were true, having two majors that have nothing to do with each other is good, because it expands the scope of stuff you're learning and gives you a more varied skillset.

[–]shaim2 -3ポイント-2ポイント  (1子コメント)

at the highest levels of theoretical physics, philosophy and physics come together

No they don't. I work on fundamentals of quantum mechanics, and there is no real philosophy there. Logical organized thinking - sure (or at least preferably). But all information flows from physics. No data point has ever arrived from philosophy (beyond the basic tools of logic and the scientific method).

[–]TychoCelchuuu/r/philosophy 2ポイント3ポイント  (0子コメント)

I work on fundamentals of quantum mechanics, and there is no real philosophy there. Logical organized thinking - sure (or at least preferably). But all information flows from physics. No data point has ever arrived from philosophy (beyond the basic tools of logic and the scientific method).

Would you say that working on the fundamentals of quantum mechanics consists of nothing except producing "data points" and "information," or are there some things that people working on the fundamentals of quantum mechanics do aside from producing data points?

Or, alternatively, if philosophy does not intersect with theoretical physics, what do you make of these articles?

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/quantum-gravity/

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/qm/

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/qt-entangle/

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/qm-relational/

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/qm-decoherence/

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/qm-modal/

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/qm-copenhagen/

[–]Accipia 2ポイント3ポイント  (5子コメント)

Hey, I actually had the same two majors! Then I crashed and burned from overworking myself and ended up only finishing philosophy. Watch out for that.

It totally makes sense to pursue both degrees if you're interested in both! The areas of overlap are limited, though, in my experience. At high-level theoretical physics, they come back, but that's only at the very end of the ride. Still, nothing wrong with combining two things you're interested in.

[–]ASDCoco 1ポイント2ポイント  (4子コメント)

How long did you stay in physics? What made you choose philosophy over physics? (and what was your first choice. Did it change?)

[–]Accipia 1ポイント2ポイント  (3子コメント)

I did physics for two years, but I started to deteriorate quickly once I tried to do two majors so I never got very far. My choice for philosophy was pragmatic. I was further along with it (I'd picked up physics later), and philosophy was less demanding on me overall than physics.

I'm really happy I did at least a bit of both, I don't think I could have left the university satisfied without doing some physics and philosophy. Overall, I preferred the subject matter and the skills I could learn with physics, the knowledge gap there seemed endless and the mathematics I learned applicable to many more fields than just physics. With philosophy, I really liked it as well, but after a time I felt like I kind of had acquired many of the analytical skills, and I simply was less interested in learning exactly which philosopher said what on what date. Not to say there aren't fascinating philosophers with fascinating ideas, but after a while, physics started to draw me in more and more. But there, I really had to concede my limits; I just couldn't keep up.

[–]ASDCoco 1ポイント2ポイント  (2子コメント)

My main degree is physics (I started it one semester earlier) and I guess i would ditch philosophy if it came to it. Do you think it's that hard to manage? Even if it takes a while longer, isn't it worth it?

Note: My university is free (yes, completely free) so a longer degree does not cost more money.

[–]Accipia 1ポイント2ポイント  (1子コメント)

Some people are totally fine with it! I'm actually working with a friend right now who did a double major (not physics and philosophy though) and volunteered for the university on the side, he finished all of that very quickly, got his PhD on top of that and is doing very well now. On the flip side of that, I got into psychiatric care for the deep depression I partially helped work myself into, because I just didn't know my limits.

I'm not trying to scare you off doing this, I think it's great. I love both subjects, and I encourage you to take on both! But just don't be afraid to slow down if you feel like you can't do it all. Maybe you are the type that can do this! If you aren't, though, don't be afraid to admit that to yourself. I didn't, and it caused me a ton of heartache. As long as you don't make that mistake though, you should be fine. :) It's a lovely combination of majors that should leave you with intellectual skills to tackle almost any subject.

[–]ASDCoco 1ポイント2ポイント  (0子コメント)

Not afraid to slow down/drop one major if needed. As long as I'm happy I guess I'll stay on both!

[–]The1U 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

This is gonna get interesting.

[–]Son_of_Sophroniscus/r/philosophy 9ポイント10ポイント  (20子コメント)

Discuss the misconceptions between science and philosophy.

See below.

How they both can work together without feeling like philosophy is obsolete in the modern day world

I don't know anyone who has moderate familiarity with both philosophy and science who feels this way. In fact, there's a ton of science involved in some branches of philosophy like, say, oh... philosophy of science, for example.

Perhaps one of the misconceptions we've run into is the belief that philosophers and scientists cannot "work together without feeling like philosophy is obsolete."

edit: clarification

[–]Guan-yu/r/philosophy 4ポイント5ポイント  (3子コメント)

It's also now a popular view that's spread by people like Neil Degrasse Tyson who came out publicly against philosophy in the past. Not saying it's true, just that there is definitely a popular current for that opinion amongst laymen particularly because of public figures.

[–]Son_of_Sophroniscus/r/philosophy 5ポイント6ポイント  (0子コメント)

Yes, but professionals in their respective fields are the people who actually do work together. I doubt that many give much credence to the sort of "criticism" coming from Tyson et al.

[–]ThePandasWatch/r/philosophy 2ポイント3ポイント  (0子コメント)

Essentially this. Philosophy and science don't have to conflict, but many scientific figures (which include the likes of Tyson / Hawking) have spoke against philosophy in this sense. I'm not sure if this has directly led to many people feeling they're in conflict and can't work with each other, though from anecdotal evidence on the internet I've seen many people saying philosophy isn't anywhere near as useful for various reasons relating to what these figures have said.

Love the name btw.

[–]MmEeTtAa 2ポイント3ポイント  (1子コメント)

I checked the /r/everythingscience subreddit and couldn't find the invitation sent to their community. It has been removed by a(n) (auto)mod.

[–]Guan-yu/r/philosophy 2ポイント3ポイント  (0子コメント)

I took it upon myself to make a new one for them to see.
Here's the link

[–]oneguy2008/r/philosophy 1ポイント2ポイント  (1子コメント)

Have you guys thought sending a separate invite to /r/math? These guys are at least as relevant to the discussion as /r/science, since some of the most important crossovers are in math.

[–]Guan-yu/r/philosophy 1ポイント2ポイント  (0子コメント)

Definitely! That would be an awesome discussion :)
/u/SubredditsMeet would that be okay?

[–]oneguy2008/r/philosophy 14ポイント15ポイント  (2子コメント)

I'm always a bit confused when people are concerned that philosophy is obsolete. If this just means that certain forms of philosophical inquiry which were historically practiced have now been left off, since they constitute early-days armchair versions now mature social- and natural-sciences, it's saying something true. But every field has changed its topics and methods somewhat over the past few centuries, so that's not very interesting.

Maybe the concern is that philosophers don't know, and make use of, relevant scientific results. This is patently false. Large numbers of philosophers have degrees in mathematics, physics, linguistics, neuroscience, and other fields and bring this experience to bear on relevant philosophical issues. They days when philosophy of math could be done without a math degree, or philosophy of mind without engagement with neuroscience are long gone.

Maybe the concern is that the issues which philosophy studies are no longer relevant today. This would be worrying. If the worry is simply that science can solve all issues worth discussing, I hope we've moved past such worries by now. If there's a special worry about why the topics studied by philosophy (but not other non-science subjects) are becoming irrelevant, I'd like to hear it.

I have to admit to some doubts that a discussion of the question of whether philosophy is obsolete in the modern world is worthwhile.

[–]clqrvy 5ポイント6ポイント  (1子コメント)

As I've said in a few other places, I suspect (perhaps without much evidence) that when people say that philosophy is 'obsolete', they're not necessarily saying that we shouldn't bother thinking about foundational questions anymore, but that there isn't a need to have dedicated 'professional philosophers' who specialize in things like metaphysics, epistemology, etc., when instead we could just have philosophically- and theoretically-minded scientists who think about this stuff as part of their 'science' work. (I think this mainly applies to the kinds of philosophers you're talking about who aim to have their work informed by the sciences in some significant way.)

While I probably think this is wrong, I don't think it's that unreasonable for people to have this idea. After all, the whole philosophy/science split is relatively recent, and many of the great historical philosophers did resemble what we would consider philosopher-scientists, so rather than viewing this as an anti-philosophy attitude, we could charitably interpret it as an anti-philosophy-as-it's-currently-practiced-in-academic-philosophy-departments attitude. (And it's certainly not unheard of for philosophers themselves to have a negative attitude towards the way they see philosophy being practiced in their day).

Another reason I don't think this attitude is so unreasonable is because of the sheer proliferation and fragmentation of knowledge and scientific disciplines. I'm skeptical that philosophers can be 'informed by science' in a more-than-shallow way unless they get deeply involved with special problems that arise in particular sciences - even specific subfields in those sciences (like set theory in math, or statistical mechanics in physics, evolution in biology, formal semantics in linguistics, etc.) But at that point, once the philosopher is getting so steeped in a certain subfield of a science, someone might wonder if that person is just some kind of second-rate scientist who doesn't design his own experiments (this isn't what I think. I'm trying to capture the mindset of the 'philosophy is obsolete' person......okay, actually I do think this sometimes.)

[–]oneguy2008/r/philosophy 2ポイント3ポイント  (0子コメント)

This is interesting! If that's what they mean, I'm actually reasonably well-disposed in certain areas (philosophy of math, philosophy of physics, some philosophy of language, ... ) to this suggestion. And I guess we already have a few people (i.e. Hugh Woodin, some of the Carnegie-Mellon folks, ... ) who exemplify this to some extent. I still think we have a long ways to go before this becomes a reality (I take this to be what you think as well), but it's something to look forward to.

Thanks for pointing this out.

[–]TychoCelchuuu/r/philosophy 6ポイント7ポイント  (0子コメント)

Some philosophical topics scientists might be interested in:

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/measurement-science/

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/theoretical-terms-science/

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/science-theory-observation/

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/biology-philosophy/

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/chemistry/

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/neuroscience/

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/feminist-philosophy-biology/

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/einstein-philscience/

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/feminism-epistemology/

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/computer-science/

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/pseudo-science/

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/models-science/

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/scientific-unity/

Of course there's far more to philosophy than just philosophy of science, and many people find other parts far more interesting, including many scientists, but philosophy of science has "science" in the name so it's as good a place to start the conversation as any.

[–]TychoCelchuuu/r/philosophy 6ポイント7ポイント  (2子コメント)

How they both can work together without feeling like philosophy is obsolete in the modern day world.

Why is it philosophy that we would feel is obsolete? Why not neither, or why not science? The assumption packed into this question is one of the main things keeping them from working together without feeling like philosophy is obsolete, if indeed there's anything doing this (and I'm not sure there is).

[–]MaxNanasy 0ポイント1ポイント  (1子コメント)

Why not neither, or why not science?

I think one main reason why someone would want science and not philosophy is that it's obvious that science has enabled the production of technology that people find useful, whereas it's less obvious (at least to the layperson) that philosophy has directly produced anything as useful. I don't agree with this stance, but I can see why people would think this way.

[–]TychoCelchuuu/r/philosophy 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

I think you're probably right, but I was asking why people might think that philosophy is obsolete simply because it doesn't lead to the production of useful technology. People think all sorts of silly things, like "vaccines cause autism" or "global warming isn't real" or "humans were created 6,000 years ago and did not evolve." They also have reasons for thinking these things, but they're bad reasons. So just because people think that philosophy is obsolete, this doesn't mean they're good reasons. By asking "why is it that we would feel that philosophy is obsolete" I was hoping to prompt people to reflect on why they might think this.

[–]Z_huge 3ポイント4ポイント  (2子コメント)

The major conflict I see between science and philosophy is on matters of That Which Man Was Not Meant To Know. It is interesting to me to think about whether or not there are things that are better left unknown. I'm not talking about ethical scientific research, but rather whether there is knowledge which is inherently (at least potential) disastrous. Nuclear weapons spring to mind, for instance.

[–]TychoCelchuuu/r/philosophy 6ポイント7ポイント  (1子コメント)

A fine paper to read on this topic is David Koepsell's "On genies and bottles: scientists’ moral responsibility and dangerous technology R&D." in Science and Engineering Ethics 16.1 (2010): 119-133.

[–]Z_huge 1ポイント2ポイント  (0子コメント)

Thanks! I'm honestly not sure how I feel on the issue; I don't think anything we've come up with so far crosses the line for me, but I think about it a lot.

[–]UmamiSalami/r/philosophy 36ポイント37ポイント  (0子コメント)

Unless he objects I'm going to repost a great comment by /u/wokeupabug:

There is no modern science vs. philosophy conflict. It's a manufactured issue designed to sell books and get views.

I got into philosophy as a science student. Our program had a colloquium program where we had a different philosopher as an invited speaker every month or so. And in the lab where I worked, we all read philosophy and discussed it at lunch meetings and in the pub in the evening. While I'm currently doing "pure" philosophy, I have lots of colleagues involved in interdisciplinary work with psychologists, biologists, physicians, and physicists. This sort of work continues productively in the academy in spite of the obsession in the popular press with the idea of a new war of the faculties.

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