[FOM] "Progress" in philosophy

[Charles Silver]

> On 3/9/07 12:02 PM, "Neil Tennant" <neilt at mercutio.cohums.ohio- 
> state.edu>
> wrote:
>
>> To continue in the same depressing vein: you should not omit,  
>> either, to
>> note that one standard technique for ensuring one's longevity in
>> philosophical citations, after some initial original work, is to  
>> become an
>> obscurantist, so that an industry can develop, hopefully within  
>> your own
>> lifetime, of neophytes' attempts to interpret what you really  
>> might have
>> meant by your unclear (hence, surely, profound?) prose.

	I completely agree with Neil.  I could add more negative features,  
but I won't.

Harvey writes:

>
> I have been reading the various FOM postings on this topic (the  
> subject
> line), and I still feel that, objectively speaking (smile), the  
> view of
> philosophy that I take in my
>
> http://www.cs.nyu.edu/pipermail/fom/2007-March/011421.html
>
> and also the related view of Einstein that Steel quoted in his
>
> http://www.cs.nyu.edu/pipermail/fom/2007-March/011419.html
>
> are by far the most attractive. Specifically, philosophy should -  
> and, in
> fact is - judged by the general intellectual community in terms of  
> what use
> is made of the associated philosophical thinking in the emergence  
> of, the
> development of, the refinement of, the clarification of, and the  
> exposition
> of, those great intellectual structures which constitute our  
> vehicles for
> systematic knowledge. Thus on this view, philosophy is properly  
> viewed as a
> way of thinking, rather than a subject.

	This is confused.   The point is not what philosophy "should be" or  
"could be," but what it *happens* to be, what it ***really*** is.    
If Harvey or anyone else could change the direction of philosophy  
from what it really is right now to what it could ascend to,  
"properly viewed" of course, I'd be very grateful to see such a  
change take place.

	On a more personal note--and I apologize in advance if this seems  
like an Ad Hominem, I do not mean it that way--I in philosophy had to  
struggle along, reading all kinds of philosophical junk.   Harvey, as  
we all know, distinguished himself very, very early as a fine  
*mathematician*.   He did not have to read the junk I had to read in  
order to get his degree.   And I'm guessing that he is not at all  
conversant with what now passes for philosophy in the hot-shot  
journals these days.   It seems to me, Harvey has created a kind of  
ideal, Platonic image of philosophy, one I definitely approve of, but  
it just ain't the way philosophy *is*.
	
	(For many, many years I've known that Harvey has very deep  
philosophical leanings.  I wish he'd write a book weaving together  
his philosophical views and his mathematical work.   That would  
improve philosophy.  It surely needs it.)

> I found the Einstein quote so interesting and remarkable, that I  
> repeat it
> here:

	Right!  It's wonderful.  Thanks to John Steel for providing it!   
It's interesting to me that persons (like Einstein) outside the field  
of philosophy have such interesting views of what it is.   And,  
there's a point to that, it seems to me.   When I write about  
"philosophers," I mean those in philosophy departments (doing  
analytic philosophy in America).   And, obviously I don't think those  
"philosophers" do very good "philosophy".  However, *real* philosophy  
or *good* philosophy can be done by anyone anywhere.   Pressures to  
publish, pressures in grad school, peer pressure, and so forth have  
made philosophy in departments into something ludicrous, in my  
view...   But I  don't want to continue in such a negative way....

	On the positive side, how about if "we" *define* what we mean by  
philosophy.   (I'd like Harvey to tell us what he means by it.)    
Given a definition, or something loosely approximating one, we might  
be able to build on it and perhaps that could ultimately lead to some  
progress in philosophy.   A long time ago, Harvey and Steve wrote  
about--what was that acronym, was it--GII, General Intellectual  
Interest (I think this is wrong, but I cannot remember the  
acronym).   Anyway, the idea seemed like a good start: what could be  
done, say, in set theory that would be of GII?   The problem is that  
GII was overly general.   I think that in defining philosophy,  
something more specific (but not too specific) needs to be said.

	Anyway, I think it would be very interesting and productive for  
people on this list to offer their "definitions" (or just their  
ideas) of what philosophy ideally is.

	Harvey has already weighed in with:

> Specifically, philosophy should - and, in
> fact is - judged by the general intellectual community in terms of  
> what use
> is made of the associated philosophical thinking in the emergence  
> of, the
> development of, the refinement of, the clarification of, and the  
> exposition
> of, those great intellectual structures which constitute our  
> vehicles for
> systematic knowledge. Thus on this view, philosophy is properly  
> viewed as a
> way of thinking, rather than a subject.

	In my view, the above is a start, but has lots of problems.  First,  
it begins with what philosophy "should be", then, using dashes, the  
allegation is made that it already *is* something or other, the  
"something or other" (SOO) is not explained, but whatever SOO is,  
it's judged by some intellectual community--whoever those people are-- 
in terms of "use".   Then, there's a lot of prose that's hard, at  
least for me, to make much sense of.   But in the end, philosophy  
emerges as "a way of thinking".   But, what "way of thinking" is it?   
I believe this needs to be clarified.


Charlie Silver