I agree. Getting old, it is decrepitude and its many indignities that are the live issue. Death becomes a solution more than a threat. — apokrisis

Right. I think that's where certain authors are right about 'existential' time. It is directed and finite. Gold won't buy it back. And even the usual lifespan is not guaranteed.

The biological perspective is my thing. So I really like the idea that life is like riding a bicycle, or the tilt of the sprinter.

We hang together on the edge of falling apart by flinging ourselves constantly forward. The beauty of living lies in this constant mastery over a sustaining instability. We stay in motion to keep upright. Then eventually we slow and it all falls apart.

So there is a self-making pattern. Individuals come and go, but the pattern always renews. And it is the possibility of the material instability that is the basis for the possibility of the formal control. Life is falling apart given a sustaining direction for a while. — apokrisis

Very well put.

Scientific theories require no justification nor foundation, as if any such thing were possible. They are the last idea standing after they have withstood all the criticism we are capable of subjecting them to. — tom

What I have in mind as an unacknowledged-by-some foundation is the know-how of everyday life. We understand an ordinary language (a meta-language for science). We know how to exist socially, to form relationships. We don't doubt our senses. We know how read the instruments. We have a basic understanding of the counting numbers, which can lead us to the rational numbers, etc. We don't question and test everything. We don't doubt that others are really there, even if we can't experience their emotion-sensation-consciousness in the same way they do. We don't bite our tongue when we chew our food. We stand a certain distance in conversations so as not to freak people out. And so on.

In short, there is a dim foundation of shared, trusted half- or non-conscious assumptions that set the stage for science. The base of the pyramid is sunk in the sand. So scientific theories have been left standing after all the criticism that seemed relevant in terms of human purposes. Even that is perhaps an approximation. Among other things, it assumes that the institutions of science function perfectly --that valid criticisms weren't repressed or ignored. That individual scientists in power aren't emotionally attached to this or that experiment.

To be clear, I like science. But I find the tendency to think of science as a replacement for philosophy more or less absurd.

Not sure what that means, but I have a vague inkling that no one really does that. — tom

It happens all the time, though maybe I'm exaggerating for rhetorical effect. Look around. The sceintific vision of objective reality is taken wholesale out of its context as a disavowed (unquestioned) metaphysics. Space is the space of physics. Time is the time of physics. Humans are the animals of biology. If none of this is objectionable to you, then you may be missing out on some good philosophy.

I can't speak for you. But I think of science largely as a tool. It gives us comfort and free time to do things that are better or higher than science. For some (and even for me when it comes to particular slivers of science), research itself is one of the deepest pleasures. I get that. But humans (and philosophy) have more things to do than (only) obsess over epistemology and sing the glory of science.

The 'problem' is a focus on the public and objective that leaves our personal, mortal situation more or less unthought. Human time is finite. The future and the past mingle in some non-mathematical present. The now isn't a real number. It's a non-repeatable moment and a baby-step toward the grave. Space is the space of a two-footed body and of human eyesight, of obstacles and the object to be reached. Then of course there's the fact of being a distinct person --exactly the distinct person obliterated in the abstract interchangeable observer of science. This forum is a zoo of distinct and stubborn personalities. Where are all the unbiased people hiding? It's a role we play in a lab coat, which is not to say that no one plays it well. The point is that science is a particular ideal, a purification in one direction of this mess we're in.

Philosophy deals with the broadest, most general categories and ideas, so it actually has the biggest influence on us of all the intellectual disciplines, because it "sets the tone" for all thought that's more concrete; but that influence is diffuse and long-term. [Insert the famous Keynes quote here]

I tend to think of philosophy in the original sense, as the pursuit of wisdom, so for example to me science really is natural philosophy, which is part of the general philosophical project of seeing how things hang together, which has the practical purpose of helping us orient ourselves in the world.

To me, academic philosophy as we know it (conceptual analysis, say) is just a specialist subset of philosophy - but scientists, natural philosophers, also have to be philosophers even in this narrow sense, at times.

The pursuit of wisdom also involves guarding against rhetoric/hypnotism (hence the "therapeutic" aspect). And it also involves a certain amount of creativity in the realm of those biggest, most abstract ideas (hence the more "continental" approach).

On their deathbed, most people regret not spending more quality time with family, friends and passions. A life devoted to striving and achievement seems unbalanced in retrospect. — apokrisis

I think that is true to a large extent, though I think some are merely bitter or defiant. Also, it must surely be true that many people who have strived and achieved, especially highly, will not regret their striving,

Anyway, regarding the "regretters" - is their actual internal focus on lost time or the feeling that they have not been adequate to the task of having lived a more fulfilled, engaging/loving life I wonder? It is easy to blame lost time, but in life it seems quite hard to thrive - to "self-actualise"; to come out of our shells.

I have particularly enjoyed your writing on this thread BTW.

I don't think 'science' even tries to answer the most profound questions. — ff0

Another way of saying this is that science doesn't try to answer questions that don't make sense, or aren't falsifiable. What makes any answer to any question that isn't falsifiable better than any other answer that isn't falsifiable?

Moreover, I don't see how science can provide its own foundation. Engineering and medicine earn our trust more or less by giving us what we want. But the idea of eternal, universal truth sounds pretty theological to me. In short, its foundation looks to be largely pragmatic or 'irrational.' We keep doing what scratches the itch. By putting philosopher in quotes, you are (as I see it) linking the heroic 'payload' of the words science and philosophy in an ideological way --as if the 'deepest' kind of talk humans are capable of is the defense/worship of science. — ff0

What is an eternal, universal truth as opposed to just the truth? What is the 'deepest' kind of talk, as opposed to just talking about the way things are?

The pursuit of wisdom also involves guarding against rhetoric/hypnotism (hence the "therapeutic" aspect). — gurugeorge

Good point. For me the word 'shrewd' comes to mind. I feel shrewd for not being seduced by this or that formulation of formulaic wisdom. But I do sometimes envy the formulaic. They enjoy the sense of knowing it all. I only get what might be called the narcissistic pleasure of understanding myself as less seduced. I don't get to be the prophet. I am boring common sense, slightly purified.

Another way of saying this is that science doesn't try to answer questions that don't make sense, or aren't falsifiable. What makes any answer to any question that isn't falsifiable better than any other answer that isn't falsifiable? — Harry Hindu

I'm a student of science (engineering path), and I must say that I don't see how science can tell me who I should be. On the other hand, the philosophers don't necessarily convince me either. I chose science because I've never been able to shake the sense that philosophy was basically opinion-mongering.

Nevertheless, the way good friends talk about 'life' around a campfire as they share a bottle bourbon seems 'deeper' than science to me. They talk about the total situation of life. Love, career, death, religion, art, etc. And they do it in a shared language that as far as I know has never been formulated or processed by philosophy or science. I think the wise-man fantasy involves getting behind life and language with a formula that sums the total situation up once and for all. In my experience the most believable philosophers are those who point at the gap between systems and what they'd like to conquer --being alive as a particular human in all of its complexity. (Unfortunately, even some of these 'existential' philosophers tend to impose some lingo and get themselves talked about formulaically. )

The 'problem' is a focus on the public and objective that leaves our personal, mortal situation more or less unthought. — ff0

Right. Religion at least tackles the stuff we care about most, but it doesn't necessarily convince. So for me, I suppose, 'philosophy' is a kind of bourbon-around-the-fire conversation about life for those without religion --including the religion of being scientific with a kind of ideological purity. There's a spirit of not-knowing, I'd say. But I must confess that this skeptical position (the thought that religion and science aren't enough) is also a form of belief. It too has its stubbornness and commitment --to the 'obvious' perhaps.

If we don't know what the hell it is all about, we usually do know that we don't want it all to fall apart in the next month. So we play along. We do what one does. We react. — ff0

I relate to this. I have my dreams, etc. But I find that I largely have to react to life. I try to lean on wise abstract words. I reason that death itself won't hurt. That a certain amount of risk in unavoidable if one wants to live a life worth living. Life bumps us into an anxious abstract mode at times. It forces us to reason about trauma. We make certain adjustments (if we can manage it), and then we settle back down. We get re-absorbed in the relatively smooth patterns of our lives.

But as you say, we largely avoid the disaster that threatens us next month. The closer the disaster is to us in the future, the more we prioritize it, as a general rule. The vague, unavoidable disaster of aging and death waits for the most part behind all the smaller disasters that threaten to fuck us up without ending us. It's a quiet evil laughter that accompanies our otherwise successful disaster-dodging. But it's also the one true cure for the hustle and hassle of this jumping and sliding.

This vision makes me feel large and small at the same time. I can participate and assent to this vast machine I've been thrown into. — ff0

I also relate to this large and small, which I hinted at in your Hegel thread. I am small because I see that I am 'naked' (theoryless, godless) in this world that eats me. But I am 'large' in my disbelief that anyone else is in on some secret. I know what it feels like to have the secret. But it passes as the pain sets in. I don't mean despair (though sometimes something like that.) I mean bodily pain. Maybe just annoying boils on the face. It only takes so much bodily malfunction to shut down the mood that knows the secret. In short, I can see that someone really believes in their secret and remain unseduced. For the most part, they seem wisest who just do the usual things with grace. Even talking about this stuff is a little stiff and earnest. I guess it scratches a certain itch. I thought I'd give online philosophy a try, having read not much but having talked quite a bit about life. ('Philosophy' has an academic smell.)

hy live free? Why die well? Because it feels right. Because it sounds right. For me that's the truth behind the epistemological 'posturing. ' Even this posturing feels right at the time for those invested in a certain notion of responsible, thorough 'rationality.' — ff0

Yeah. That's what my sciency peers don't get. Go truth. Go atheism. Go agnosticism. But it's pretty obvious that the guts are set one way or another. There's a limit to what we can sincerely question or doubt. There's something fixed about personality. Some arguments will never go anywhere. Things just 'sound right' and 'feel right' differently to different people. All the objectivity talk in the world doesn't cancel the objective fact (ding ding) of endless disagreement. This idea that we are tossed into a role doesn't gel well with the idea of us being perfectly free, perfectly rational beings. It seems to be that we have some decisions open to us and others closed. 'I can't turn off what turns me on.'

Nevertheless, the way good friends talk about 'life' around a campfire as they share a bottle bourbon seems 'deeper' than science to me. They talk about the total situation of life. Love, career, death, religion, art, etc. And they do it in a shared language that as far as I know has never been formulated or processed by philosophy or science. I think the wise-man fantasy involves getting behind life and language with a formula that sums the total situation up once and for all. In my experience the most believable philosophers are those who point at the gap between systems and what they'd like to conquer --being alive as a particular human in all of its complexity. (Unfortunately, even some of these 'existential' philosophers tend to impose some lingo and get themselves talked about formulaically. ) — tEd

You're the second person to talk about philosophical conversations being "deeper" than scientific ones.

Talk of Love, career, death Etc is really talking about the cultural influences in our lives. Really we are just talking about the icing on the cake. Science gets that the cake itself and its ingredients including the ingredients of the icing.

It seems to be that those conversations aren't deep at all but are rather shallow compared to talking about how those things even exist in the first place and why we even experience them and talk about them.