Philosophy Now Forum

Will Bouwman on how Thales, Anaximander, Pythagoras, Parmenides & Zeno established empiricism, maths & logic as dominant features of Western thinking.

https://philosophynow.org/issues/104/Ph ... d_Branches

One of ours makes it to the mag

Very good article, well written. I learned some things I hadn't known about the Pre-Socratics, despite having read quite a bit previously.

I just started reading Carnap's Introduction to the Philosophy of Science, which is apropos to your thesis that science doesn't need philosophy. I'll have to post about it soon and get your feedback.

Wyman wrote:Very good article, well written. I learned some things I hadn't known about the Pre-Socratics, despite having read quite a bit previously.

Thank you.

Wyman wrote:I just started reading Carnap's Introduction to the Philosophy of Science, which is apropos to your thesis that science doesn't need philosophy. I'll have to post about it soon and get your feedback.

I look forward to it; it's not one I've read. I had a nasty experience with Language, Truth and Logic and have generally avoided Logical Positivists, despite my professed empiricism.

science doesn't need philosophy.

I don't think that is right.

Science needs philosophy like capitalism needs democracy. Democracy helps keep capitalism transparent and accountable. Likewise, with its questions and deliberations, philosophy helps keep science transparent and accountable. Philosophy explains science's relevance to the rest of us.

spike wrote:

science doesn't need philosophy.

I don't think that is right.

Science needs philosophy like capitalism needs democracy. Democracy helps keep capitalism transparent and accountable. Likewise, with its questions and deliberations, philosophy helps keep science transparent and accountable. Philosophy explains science's relevance to the rest of us.

Well, what I say at the end of the article is: "Purely empirical science doesn’t need such stories – it doesn’t need philosophy. But we are storytellers, and what are facts without a context?" So I agree with you.

uwot

It's good to see an author of an article in PN discussing it on the forum. Thanks.

Storytelling is a function of philosophy. But I also think philosophy challenges disciplines like science so that they periodically question and examine themselves. It's like an unexamined life is not worth living. Similarly, an unexamined disciple is not worth having, and I might add, also dangerous.

Philosophy is the tool of examination.

swot wrote:... I had a nasty experience with Language, Truth and Logic and have generally avoided Logical Positivists, despite my professed empiricism.

What was the experience? As I found Freddie an interesting read and he may have addressed your issues in The Problem of Knowledge, another interesting read.

spike wrote:uwot

It's good to see an author of an article in PN discussing it on the forum. Thanks.

My pleasure.

spike wrote:Storytelling is a function of philosophy. But I also think philosophy challenges disciplines like science so that they periodically question and examine themselves. It's like an unexamined life is not worth living. Similarly, an unexamined disciple is not worth having, and I might add, also dangerous.

I wouldn't really argue with that; I was just reading Richard Baron's review of Truth by Analysis ( https://philosophynow.org/issues/104/Tr ... lin_McGinn ) in which he says: "A definition of philosophical activity wide enough to encompass Russell and Quine at one extreme and Nietzsche at the other looks as though it may be too broad to have useful content." There is 'a philosophy of' pretty well everything, but it isn't necessary to engage with the discussion of the philosophy of the discipline to do the discipline. Steven Weinberg, a Nobel laureate, hence an obviously brilliant physicist, has no time for philosophy, but even he admits that most practising physicists are 'rough and ready' realists. I think it is enough that a discipline has a philosophy. Practitioners who fall foul of it will soon know.

spike wrote:Philosophy is the tool of examination.

That's one of it's hats. One of the things I didn't have space to discuss in the article were the different cosmologies. Anaximander believed the sun was further away than the moon, which was further than the stars; I guess he deduced that empirically, by looking at a bonfire: the more vigorous the flames, the higher they leap. Pythagoras (or at least Philolaus) believed the universe, including the sun and the 'counterearth' orbit the 'central fire'. Parmenides as discussed, believed the universe was infinite and unmoving. Three different versions: one based on philosophising about empirical data, another based on philosophising about mathematics and a third based on philosophising about concepts. The first two are demonstrably untrue, but it is possible to believe that everything is illusory and have any philosophy at all. Personally, I think philosophy is much better served by being subject to the same checks and balances as science and (applied) maths.

Arising_uk wrote:

swot wrote:... I had a nasty experience with Language, Truth and Logic and have generally avoided Logical Positivists, despite my professed empiricism.

What was the experience? As I found Freddie an interesting read and he may have addressed your issues in The Problem of Knowledge, another interesting read.

I dare say. I presume I read it, it's still on my shelf. I didn't like the verification principle; that 'whereof we cannot speak' to paraphrase Wittgenstein, is meaningless, and I hated the idea that a philosopher's proper role was scientists' poodle.

uwot

Thanks for that!

Congrats Uwot!

artisticsolution wrote:Congrats Uwot!

Ta very much. Your Frida Kahlo is a thing of beauty. (Love the pine!)

swot wrote:I dare say. I presume I read it, it's still on my shelf. I didn't like the verification principle; that 'whereof we cannot speak' to paraphrase Wittgenstein, is meaningless, and I hated the idea that a philosopher's proper role was scientists' poodle.

And yet that's pretty much what Philosophy has become by and large?

I thought Freddie disliked Wittgenstein's 'private language' argument and Wittgenstein disliked the Logical Positivists?

With respect to the 'whereof we cannot speak' thought, my reading led me to think he just meant that we could point or act, as I think his other phrase, to paraphrase, 'if it can be said it can be said clearly' covers words very nicely.
p.s.
Not that I disagree with the idea that the 'verification principle' suffers from, in a sense, the same problem as Induction.
p.p.s
Still, liked your piece as it was one of the experiences of studying Philosophy to realise that many of the thoughts are still just variations upon the old themes set by the Greeks.

Arising_uk wrote:

swot wrote:I dare say. I presume I read it, it's still on my shelf. I didn't like the verification principle; that 'whereof we cannot speak' to paraphrase Wittgenstein, is meaningless, and I hated the idea that a philosopher's proper role was scientists' poodle.

And yet that's pretty much what Philosophy has become by and large?

Well, there's a lot more to philosophy than philosophy of science. It is true that you cannot do meaningful research into what the universe actually does at the very small scale, without access to some very sophisticated equipment. Nor can you tell what the universe looks like in anything like the detail that telescopes in space, or deep underground can achieve. All the most accurate data on what actually happens is provided by science; interpreting it is another matter.

Arising_uk wrote:I thought Freddie disliked Wittgenstein's 'private language' argument and Wittgenstein disliked the Logical Positivists?

As I was saying to WanderingHands, we all have our way of interpreting things, our own personal paradigm, which to a degree makes our language 'private'. Whether that is what Freddy and Wittgenstein disagreed about, I don't know and I readily concede that you covered those guys in more detail than I did.

Arising_uk wrote:With respect to the 'whereof we cannot speak' thought, my reading led me to think he just meant that we could point or act, as I think his other phrase, to paraphrase, 'if it can be said it can be said clearly' covers words very nicely.

I'm with Popper on this one: "It is impossible to speak in such a way that you cannot be misunderstood."

Arising_uk wrote:p.s.
Not that I disagree with the idea that the 'verification principle' suffers from, in a sense, the same problem as Induction.

Well the joke is that you can only 'prove' the verification principle inductively.

Arising_uk wrote:p.p.s
Still, liked your piece as it was one of the experiences of studying Philosophy to realise that many of the thoughts are still just variations upon the old themes set by the Greeks.

Thanks, Arising.