What is the point of philosophy? — Oliver Purvis
What practical advantage does it give us as a species? — Oliver Purvis
Very few people seem to really try to understand the big philosophical issues beyond a superficial level and those that do seem to get drawn to different viewpoints depending on how they approach the problems. — Oliver Purvis
I wonder whether we will ever make real progress, actually solving some of the big issues so that certain schools of though can be laid to rest permanently. — Oliver Purvis
Thanks for your thoughts. I agree with you. I guess I was trying to express a kind of frustration, a sense that - occasionally - I find myself haunted by the possible pointlessness of existence. Very often I am intrigued and excited by many ideas, but now and then - after much reading, discussion and deep thought - I feel as though I am no further forward than before. Sure, I have a much better appreciation of the problems, but no concrete answers.
Maybe there are none. Perhaps it's the way philosophy is often phrased as a question - it suggests that maybe there are definite answers to be had. Without these answers, or the genuine possibility of one day finding them, we are left with the word games you mentioned.
Most of the time I find philosophy helpful and spiritually uplifting as you suggested. I guess I'm asking where you turn on the occasions when even philosophy feels empty! — Oliver Purvis
What is the point of philosophy?
I find myself haunted by the possible pointlessness of existence. — Oliver Purvis
I agree with you. I guess I was trying to express a kind of frustration, a sense that - occasionally - I find myself haunted by the possible pointlessness of existence. Very often I am intrigued and excited by many ideas, but now and then - after much reading, discussion and deep thought - I feel as though I am no further forward than before. Sure, I have a much better appreciation of the problems, but no concrete answers. — Oliver Purvis
At its core, philosophy is the rational manifestation of humanity's religious nature. We want to know why we're here and where we're going, how we know what we know and the limits of this knowledge, whether there is a God and what happens after we die. Most crucially, we want and need to know how to live, because life is an eternal ambiguity with no simple algorithm. It is this latter observation that leads me to believe that philosophy is born from a certain helplessness, an anxiety in the face of moral ambiguity and spiritual discouragement. Hence why when we approach deep philosophical questions we usually do so in silence or with trepidation. And this is exactly what you see inside temples and churches, cathedrals and mosques, a deafening, breath-taking silence. — darthbarracuda
Yet the abstract mind can see the ultimate futility of all plans. There is no future, or (apparently) no stable and ultimate future. So our best laid plans are haunted by absurdity. — ff0
Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher, vanity of vanities! All is vanity.
What does man gain by all the toil at which he toils under the sun? — Ecclesiastes
ff0, I like your brain! — Oliver Purvis
or so many years I have been fascinated by philosophical approaches to all manner of questions and on the whole this has enriched my intellectual life, provoked long and meaningful conversation with friends and helped me to tackle the trials and tribulations of everyday existence.
My question, I suppose, was more to do with where we find ourselves when the philosophy runs out. — Oliver Purvis
I must stress I don't get to this state often, yet it does happen periodically and I must accept my feelings during these times. Can it be written of as merely a hormonal imbalance or something similar? At the time, as bleak as it may sound, there is a striking sense of intlectual and philosophical clarity.
Of course, eventually it passes and the wheel keeps spinning. — Oliver Purvis
Large this life that buries me.
Large this grave for dreams.
What is the point of philosophy? — Oliver Purvis
To ask questions, just as it is the point of science to answer them. There are many "philosophers" that simply don't like the answers science provides. And yes, that is their argument they make (I don't like that answer, or that answer makes me feel less important, or less meaningful that what I delude myself into believing, etc.) against many of the answers science provides. As a result, they keep looking to philosophy to solve the questions, when philosophy hasn't solved anything as it creates the problems science has to solve, (or not solve in the case of those improper questions that are often asked in philosophy) or look to religion when religion has been trying to answer questions for thousands of years, most of which science has overturned.What is the point of philosophy? — Oliver Purvis
Whoa. It’s getting feely. — Brianna Whitney
scientism and recognizing itself to be ideology alongside other cultural products — Joshs
I dunno. I think it can do a damn good job of it in the hands of a self-proclaimed scientist like Nietzsche, or via the emprico-scientific syntheses of Merleau-Ponty. Science itself, shorn of scientism and recognizing itself to be ideology alongside other cultural products, can return to its original task as a branch of philosophy as it was for the Greeks. — Joshs
I'll grant that philosophy begat science, but I will not grant that science is an ideology. — Bitter Crank
There are many "philosophers" that simply don't like the answers science provides. — Harry Hindu
My question, I suppose, was more to do with where we find ourselves when the philosophy runs out. — Oliver Purvis
What may be usefully found in a philosophy text, though... — ff0
Perhaps 'actual' science is not an ideology. But the word 'science' is IMV massively entangled in ideology. See the quote below. — ff0
Hah. Philosophy in a nutshell - the act of productive disagreement. Everything said becomes the departure point of its own possible contradictions. :)
Whereas living a life as a social creature is mostly about productive agreements.... — apokrisis
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