It is perfectly obvious how the professionalization of empirical disciplines advances them, as those require tremendous resources to make progress, halting and uncertain as that progress may be. It is not obvious, not to me anyway, that the same model has been well applied to the arts or to philosophy. — Srap Tasmaner

The question is whether philosophical thought is advanced by increased rigor, which would require one be intimately familiar with the underlying issues, the prior objections raised by prior philosophers, and what those responses have been. If I have the opportunity to speak with Person A who has read the pertinent literature and has taken course work and written papers with regard to Issue X or Person B who has only generally considered Issue X, but has read next to nothing and has taken no coursework and not written on the Issue, I'd choose Person A for the more meaningful response.

That is what professional philosophy is for.

In terms of empirical research, it really depends upon the particular field of philosophy. I would expect someone speaking on the philosophy of science to be knowledgeable of the history of scientific progress, for example. The same would be true of various other fields, often requiring some knowledge of neurology, evolution, or whatever the focus may be.

If we accept the notion that we're all on equal footing just by virtue of our natural intelligence and worldly wisdom such that any of us would do just as well as the other teaching our personal philosophy (as all philosophy is as subjectively valid as the next), then one must wonder why we're even here in this forum. Why listen to me and why listen to you? If we admit we may gain from one another, then we've contradicted our premise of the valuelessness of rigor. That is, if you can gain from listening to me, then it's time to dust off Kant's Critique of Pure Reason because we just might gain from reading that as well.

If rigorous analysis of the topic can be accepted as offering value, then rigor is what we need. I can think of fewer more rigorous approaches than hiring professionals who have committed their lives to their craft if one wishes to advance that craft.

Where it becomes nonsense is if you'd start arguing that you're just as a good a tennis player as the professionals, but you just play by a different set of rules, and who's to say which rules are the ones we ought to follow. — Hanover

But is this not the true nature of philosophy at its core? To question the rules, the benefit, the efficiency, not to dismiss or belittle the gold standard but to explore it with the hopes of finding paths yet unseen to unlock the true future of a better tomorrow. Sure sometimes we'll fail, and we should expect to be criticized when we do, especially with such elevated and perhaps even omniscient sounding sentiments like we may perceive from the OP. But as iron sharpens iron only by making mistakes, I'm reminded of Thomas Edison. Great guy. Never met him but I use his stuff everyday. One of his better known quotes, that weren't womanizing and self-centered was "I have not failed. I have only discovered 10,000 ways that won't work". And he was right. Imagine the first person who discovered or rather invented the candle. He literally lit up the houses and lives as well as the hearts and minds of an entire generation. But what if we failed to stop questioning and criticizing then? The candle was perfect, flawless, it addressed every need that was once left unanswered. Yet we continued to criticize what was established, what worked, and what solved problems beyond sufficiency. This was not arrogance, or perhaps it was. But dang it through this negativity or perhaps simple failure to be placated by what already solved our needs we discovered that which was truly great and in my view vindicated any arrogance or ignorance in the process. For philosophy truly is the love of wisdom, and love is an open ended action that never ceases. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to run around my house and turn all my lights on and off in rapid succession like it was my first time discovering electricity.

Kudos, OP. I can honestly say and feel TPF is a better place for you having posted this thread. Cheers. Keep up the good work. Don't ever let them get you down, kid.

I just have to add in OP's defense. Who influenced the influencers? Sure, other influencers. But somewhere up the line... there was nobody. Or was there? This singularity in philosophy and knowledge through generations and studies will not go away. OP offers an answer to this singularity by embracing what all great men do. Being open to possibility, even if that possibility is your own. For is that not the essence of what freedom is? I'll be the first to admit the OP leaves much to be desired, blindly following the sentiments of the OP will likely lead to not only ignorance but a life unlived. But at least in my view, the OP is redeemed because it has the spark of true wisdom and philosophy that, if nurtured and exposed to the right intellectual catalyst will grow into a raging inferno of enlightenment and with any luck, happiness. A spark that is smothered when we fail to ask a simple question, that one almost futile-sounding one word protest to all that is reprehensible and undesirable in this world that is "Why?"

I think birds of a feather will flock together. It can be a little disconcerting to have an interloper but the cow bird ain't dumb.

When I was teaching an introductory level course in philosophy it was evident that many of the students were not reading the texts at all, or were reading without sufficient attention, or in some cases without sufficient skill.

One semester I decided to depart from my usual approach of reading a few select primary texts and taught a section without any books. Students were required to identify some issue or problem of philosophical importance, present it to the class, and defend their position.

Many were of the assumption that philosophy is simply a matter of having an opinion, that one's "philosophy" is one's opinion. In Socratic fashion, I moved the discussion from stating to defending a particular opinion, to an inquiry into the unstated premises and assumptions that extended beyond the specifics of the topic to more general assumptions about opinions and truth.

Out of a class of thirty, twenty declared philosophy as their major. The truth is, it was not an unqualified success and I did not repeat it. I think there is something to be learned from the philosophers that was missing. I don't know if anyone went on to study philosophy due to this approach or would have gone on to study philosophy based on a more traditional approach. It may be that this is not even a good measure by which to gauge success.

In my opinion, knowing that this philosopher said one thing and another something else is of limited importance. What is important is knowing how to think along with and evaluate what is said. But by doing the former one may increase her ability to do the latter. That others have thought about these things, and often with more insight than we have is not a resource that should be ignored.

I'll be the first to admit the OP leaves much to be desired, blindly following the sentiments of the OP will likely lead to not only ignorance but a life unlived. But at least in my view, the OP is redeemed because it has the spark of true wisdom and philosophy that, if nurtured and exposed to the right intellectual catalyst will grow into a raging inferno of enlightenment and with any luck, happiness. — Outlander

Disagree. I think the OP is essentially asking about what matters. Does "building little intellectual kingdoms out of the sand" really matter, or really lead to happiness? It certainly has the potential to lead to wisdom, at least wisdom in the Western sense.

Blindly following the sentiments leads to anti-intellectualism and poor reasoning, in my experience. In the zen community, people can become very accomplished meditators, with "a raging inferno of enlightenment", but often tend to be poor thinkers. A case of use it or lose it, I suppose, or that one's focus determines one's reality.

Not always? — Alkis Piskas

Ok. Here's my spiel, which I have explicated many times here on the forum. Physicalism (or materialism, pragmatism, relativism, realism, idealism, and on and on...) is a metaphysical position. As such, it is neither true nor false, only more or less useful in different situations, or as Janus put it, a matter of taste. I use physicalism when I'm doing my engineering act - F = ma. Perhaps idealism when I do math....

Contrary to the thrust of this thread, I do have a philosophical source I've found helpful - "Essay on Metaphysics" by R.G. Collingwood.

Na, just came to mind as something roughly reasonable. — Manuel

Well, I like the list. It represents my attitude towards knowledge in general.

Which is itself, just daydreaming. Even if not often done, it is done nonetheless, and serves as a reference and fundamental ground for philosophy itself. — Mww

Yes. I strongly agree with this. I appreciate your comment.

there’s no crying in metaphysics. — Mww

But a lot of whining.

You offered T Clark one of the standards for being a professional academic philosopher, but there's clearly room for doubt that this is the sort of standard he was asking for, and what Cornel West suggests here might be closer to the mark, something that might be pursued by academic institutions but that, West says here categorically, is not. — Srap Tasmaner

...Yes, I think. I like the idea of soul-forming education.

This whole discussion might have benefited from distinguishing two issues: T Clark's regularly avowed discomfort with the Western philosophical tradition, and the professionalization of philosophy in academic institutions. — Srap Tasmaner

Good point.

Mathematics may not require expensive research facilities (no large hadron colliders needed) or hordes of grad students to do the grunt work of research, but to do original work requires a tremendous amount of quite specialized education. Is the same true of philosophy? — Srap Tasmaner

I don't think so, at least once you get past logic.

I like that. Like you, I won't pretend to know how effective it was, but I like it.

It brings up another issue: It seems to me that virtually every single endeavor of man (way beyond philosophy . . . I'm thinking Special Operations but it includes everything) has a hazing process, or a vetting process built in to it. It's a gate keeper thing. I'm sure it has a beneficial winnowing effect. I'm not questioning that. I get that. Wait, just in case someone missed that, let me repeat it: I GET THAT. Please, let's not circle back around to the "why" of why that is done. I GET THAT.

My point is, there is a fine line. You can make yourself feel superior by scaring kids away, leaving a balance of geniuses, sycophants, or those who think they can suck your dick for a good grade. You can close the gate because you feel threatened, proprietary, jealous of turf. Or you can entice them in with promises of intellectual curiosity, community, exploration, growth, mastery. You know; what they paid for. You know; what should excite you.

But for fucks sake, it should be grounded in the respective disciplines, and if you want to find out if a kid "has what it takes" to push through the difficult to get to the difficult, then you might reconsider starting with something less difficult. You don't dump Hegel on him and say you want a book report in the morning. "And no Cliff notes!"

I was given "The Last Days Of Socrates" and, while it did not propel me into a degree in Philosophy, it did show me how I think teaching should be done. You don't walk a kid into a corner with his own answers and make him slap himself in front of the whole class. You ask your questions with your own genuine sense of intellectual curiosity, and let the conversation go from there. After all, if you're the professor, you shouldn't be intimidated by some knuckle dragger who thinks he is just there for the grade. If and when the corner arrives, there is no humiliation in it, but, rather, light bulbs going off and maybe some laughter.

I remember professors in law school who used the Socratic Method for good, and others for ill. Yeah, life is tough out there. We know. We don't need some cloistered proff with patches on his elbows trying to show us how mean the world or some judge can be.

Here's another angle. I think you've said a couple of times that you're seeking the insights of people here who you respect. So why not seek the insights of the people who have dedicated their lives to thinking things through? — jamalrob

As much as my snarky tone may have covered it up, this gets to the heart of my OP. I have been diddling around with reading more pragmatism - James, Dewey, Pierce. I'll push myself a bit harder.

This thread has been fun, educational, and a bit humbling. Here are some things I got from it:

• I clarified my understanding of the relationship between awareness and rationality. For me, awareness comes first.
• I was surprised at how passionate people are about this. If I'd thought about it more, I hope I would have been more diplomatic.
• I realized how much my way of seeing things is probably an outlier on the normal distribution of philosophical thought.
• I've resolved to more mature and less smarty-pants in my posts. Ha, ha, ha... Just kidding.

I appreciate everyone's input.

I've thought of a couple of other things I've gotten from this discussion:

• It helped me realize how deeply pragmatic my philosophy is. How much I use it in my daily life.
• Related to that, it made me realize how much my understanding of philosophy is influenced by my 30 years as an engineer.

The question is whether philosophical thought is advanced by increased rigor, which would require one be intimately familiar with the underlying issues, the prior objections raised by prior philosophers, and what those responses have been. — Hanover

No. Leaving aside "underlying" --- because I don't know exactly what it's doing there --- this is like arguing that the only way to get from your house to the Waffle House is by studying all the routes people have taken from their house when in search of a Waffle House.

You may learn 10,000 ways of not making a lightbulb before you make one, but 100 would have done as well. There may be other things to learn from those other 9,900 ways not to make a lightbulb, some of those 'failures' may provide unique opportunities for insight, but there are always a vast number of ways to fail so you can't define success as trying all of the wrong ways. The last part of your sentence is just not so intimately connected to the idea of rigor as you seem to think it is.

Understanding the issue you want to address, yes, of course, and otherwise you're not addressing it. Knowing what everyone has said about it, no, not even what everyone thinks are the important things that have been said about it. That makes you an expert on what people have said about it, and that is not the same thing as rigor.

It is confusing that so much of the academic practice of philosophy, from coursework to publishing, is actually the history of philosophy, but that doesn't make them the same thing. In the sciences, from mathematics to physics to medicine, history is not the central focus of study as it is in academic philosophy. If that's our model, why don't we follow it?

If I have the opportunity to speak with Person A who has read the pertinent literature and has taken course work and written papers with regard to Issue X or Person B who has only generally considered Issue X, but has read next to nothing and has taken no coursework and not written on the Issue, I'd choose Person A for the more meaningful response. — Hanover

You'll get a response that is more comprehensive, more informed of the current state of the academic study of philosophy, certainly. Whether it will be more "meaningful", whether it will be "better", is unclear. This is just "looking where the light is best", isn't it?

If we accept the notion that we're all on equal footing just by virtue of our natural intelligence and worldly wisdom — Hanover

I'm saying it's possible to disagree with @T Clark's view without mistaking the current academic practice of philosophy for philosophy.

I like the idea of soul-forming education. — T Clark

Cornel West does claim that there is benefit to studying the great minds of the past, and makes that claim exactly in the context of a critique of the current state of academia.

In my opinion, knowing that this philosopher said one thing and another something else is of limited importance. What is important is knowing how to think along with and evaluate what is said. But by doing the former one may increase her ability to do the latter. That others have thought about these things, and often with more insight than we have is not a resource that should be ignored. — Fooloso4

Reading a great work of philosophy is not only of value for improving your own thinking, it is also a pleasure. Like all pleasures, a matter of temperament, even taste, but also one for which nothing else can substitute.

The sentence that I've bolded here: maybe you can see that it's mistaken, if you think about the difference between, on one hand, being unknowingly influenced, and on the other hand, reading the influential thinkers to understand how you and others are being influenced — jamalrob

That makes sense.

I suggest you read the short opinion piece by West that I quoted above — jamalrob

I will.

He implies that what might appear as the "decolonizing" of education has more to do with a utilitarian anti-intellectualism in the wider society. I think it's fair to say that there is more than a hint of this in your OP. — jamalrob

I don't think I'm anti-intellectual at all. I live in my intellect. Everything good I've ever written on the forum comes from my intellect, reason, resting on a foundation of experience and awareness. I think there's a good case to be made that western philosophy is founded on distrust of experience and awareness.

This is just "looking where the light is best", isn't it? — Srap Tasmaner

I like this. Good, catchy, rhetoric. I will keep it for future use.

Cornel West does claim that there is benefit to studying the great minds of the past, and makes that claim exactly in the context of a critique of the current state of academia. — Srap Tasmaner

I will read West's article.

I don't think I'm anti-intellectual at all. — T Clark

An intellectual is a person who "engages in critical thinking, research, and reflection to advance discussions of academic subjects."

So, you are in part anti-intellectual, because you reject the need for research. You do fulfill the rest of the criteria to a certain degree.

"Intellectual", that's quite a funny word. Can be used as praise, as an insult or even neutral sounding.

As far as I can see everybody is an intellectual, literally. Unless they're in a coma.

An intellectual is a person who "engages in critical thinking, research, and reflection to advance discussions of academic subjects."

So, you are in part anti-intellectual, because you reject the need for research. You do fulfill the rest of the criteria to a certain degree. — Artemis

Hmmm... ok. Maybe... Actually, I don't reject the need for research. I've just done my research in non-philosophical-standard places. I think my 30 years as an engineer and my life-long interest in science are a big part of the foundation of my philosophical understanding.

It's like saying we're all scientists because we can boil a pot of water to make tea. Stretching the term beyond it's intended use isn't very helpful.

I partially appreciate where you're coming from, but still find that your valuation of engineering and the expertise that comes with it is at odds with your devaluation of academic philosophy and formal training in that regard. It doesn't add up.

You need a degree to employ the scientific method?

"Intellectual", that's quite a funny word. Can be used as praise, as an insult or even neutral sounding.

As far as I can see everybody is an intellectual, literally. Unless they're in a coma. — Manuel

When I called myself an intellectual, I gave a specific definition of what I meant by that to avoid any confusion. As I noted, calling myself an intellectual "doesn't mean I'm smart, it means that my primary way of dealing the world is through my intellect, by thinking about it, talking about it. I am also a recreational thinker. It's fun. It's a game. It's what I'm best at."

No, but it helps.

I don't think I'm anti-intellectual at all. I live in my intellect. Everything good I've ever written on the forum comes from my intellect, reason, resting on a foundation of experience and awareness. — T Clark

Fair enough. Maybe I'm still reacting to the tone of the OP.

I think there's a good case to be made that western philosophy is founded on distrust of experience and awareness. — T Clark

There's some truth in that. Particularly a distrust of earthly, bodily experience. But here we are engaging with the tradition, and some philosophers within the tradition have addressed it.

The part of that post I feel bad about is its reliance on the word "great", as in "great minds", "great works". I think West has a way to gloss that, and I might if I tried. As it stands, I'm only saying that we can derive value from studying the sorts of works value can be derived from, which blows.

Can't solve every problem in every post.

As I wrote before, this has been a really helpful, interesting, and eye-opening discussion for me.

Can't solve every problem in every post. — Srap Tasmaner

Thanks for your input.

As I wrote before, this has been a really helpful, interesting, and eye-opening discussion for me. — T Clark

:up:

The Critique of Pure Reason reading group starts tomorrow. See you there!

I think that's true in many cases, not here.

Why is the car mechanic who can fix a car engine that no Nobel Prize winning Physicist could not considered an intellectual?

Or a nurse that can help treat a patient who would die in the hands of much respected Journalist? That's not intellectual, being to able to know how to treat wounds and save lives?

On the other hand, many so called "intellectuals", specifically certain journalists, are the biggest frauds and liars of all. Aren't these the very same people who every time there's just even half of a chance to bomb a country in the Middle East, salivate and give all sorts of reasons as to why killing people is good for democracy?

So the word can be quite misleading...

When I called myself an intellectual, I gave a specific definition of what I meant by that to avoid any confusion. As I noted, calling myself an intellectual "doesn't mean I'm smart, it means that my primary way of dealing the world is through my intellect, by thinking about it, talking about it. I am also a recreational thinker. It's fun. It's a game. It's what I'm best at." — T Clark

I agree. It's a fine use of the word.

I wouldn't be too serious about the label, not that you are. It's a legitimate use of the word.