Innovation and Revolutionary Ideas

obscurelaunting

The first part of my post is how uninspired this generation is. The state of the matter that has become increasingly more prominent upon my reflection time is how there have been few, if any, revolutionary ideas for the past century. It is the ideas taken from our forefather's that are taught in schools today and even then, the great think-jar has seemed to come to a halt. In saying that, why has this come to a halt? Perhaps if we want to get to the root of this we should discuss what virtue caused the uproar in great philosopher's.

I am bothered by that certain itch to discuss with our fellow philosophers in hopes of having that mind-bending piece of information that has "sealed a deal" with something we were once conflicted by. This would happen frequently when I was new to philosophy as every idea was something I had never come across before. While I am now no novice to the ideas of philosophy, philosophical inquiry and discussion that I witness today seems unfulfilled as it focusses merely on ideas written by famous past philosophers. The version of that 'light-bulb' moment has become taking what philosophers have wrote, quoting it to each other, and ultimately orbiting near of what that philosopher said with a slight 'spin' on it from a different angle that we think is innovative when it is only saying the same thing in other words.

Therefore, this has posed to me that the actual problem is that past philosopher's conclusions were only conclusions made for their particular subset of concepts, when in actuality, it is these concepts that need to be narrowed into their smallest properties as they are ill-defined. For example, a conceptual framework of 'nothing' and 'everything' is based on our awareness on the absence and presence of life and these concepts are only created from our observation of what is around us. Who says these are even credible concepts? So yes, re-defining observation and HOW we observe is what I believe is the key. I believe we need to be able to come up with completely new concepts that could have never been fathomed before, of course however, our language is limiting and our thoughts are like glue to the world around us, but what if we observed the world through breaking it down further and if gaps between those micorscopic concepts were also looked at?

I am expressing this idea and I am looking for people who are ready to jump of this train of practice or people who have thought about this as well and whom have any insight into how this can be expanded.

Joshs

I am expressing this idea and I am looking for people who are ready to jump of this train of practice or people who have thought about this as well and whom have any insight into how this can be expanded. — obscurelaunting

Could you give a small list of the philosophers who you think represent the leading edge of ideas? This would provide a sense of when and where you think the innovation stalled.

TheMadMan

what if we observed the world through breaking it down further and if gaps between those micorscopic concepts were also looked at? — obscurelaunting

What if this approach to the smaller and smaller is the problem of modernity with the advent of science and technology?
What if our alienation with the creative comes because we have sacrificed the holistic approach?

Joshs

↪TheMadMan

What if this approach to the smaller and smaller is the problem of modernity with the advent of science and technology?
What if our alienation with the creative comes because we have sacrificed the holistic approach? — TheMadMan

By this do you mean we sacrifice innovation in philosophy to innovation in science and technology, or that progress in science and technology also suffer?

TheMadMan

By this do you mean we sacrifice innovation in philosophy to innovation in science and technology, or that progress in science and technology also suffer? — Joshs

Its not about either or. They all suffer in one direction and "progress" in another.
Philosophy became more and more analytical, the original meaning was lost.
Science and technology became servant to money and forgot its original purpose.

Joshs

↪TheMadMan

Science and technology became servant to money and forgot its original purpose. — TheMadMan

I was just curious if you thought that the pace of progress in science has slowed, apart from its relation to business.

TheMadMan

I was just curious if you thought that the pace of progress in science has slowed — Joshs

Obviously the progress of science and technology is going forward. I'm simply adding that its primary focus is not on general human needs but the needs of the market.

Joshs

↪TheMadMan

Obviously the progress of science and technology is going forward. I'm simply adding that its primary focus is not on general human needs but the needs of the market. — TheMadMan

It’s not so obvious.

“We should be living in a golden age of creativity in science and technology. We know more about the universe and ourselves than we did in any other period in history, and with easy access to superior research tools, our pace of discovery should be accelerating. But, as I wrote in the first edition of this newsletter, America is running out of new ideas.”

https://www.theatlantic.com/newsletters/archive/2023/01/academia-research-scientific-papers-progress/672694/

TheMadMan

↪Joshs

This quote is saying the same thing as I am.
The author is as disappointed with the progress of science and technology as me.
The only difference is that I'm being more tolerant and considering the bullshit innovation that are today "progress" nonetheless whereas the author is denying that they should be called so.
A sentiment that I sympathise with.

T Clark

I believe we need to be able to come up with completely new concepts that could have never been fathomed before, — obscurelaunting

I don't think we, or at least I, need new philosophical concepts to describe the reality I see all around me. I have the language I need to talk about it and understand it. Philosophy has more to do with how we interact with the world than it does with the details of the world itself. The human ways of interacting with reality haven't really changed that much in the last 3,000 years. Technology has changed, but not human nature.

Joshs

↪T Clark

Philosophy has more to do with how we interact with the world than it does with the details of the world itself. The human ways of interacting with reality haven't really changed that much in the last 3,000 years. Technology has changed, but not human nature. — T Clark

If technology has evolved, it is because our sciences have evolved. If our sciences have evolved, it’s because our philosophies have evolved. None of these fields
of endeavor ( and that includes the arts, literature, music , politics) can be disentangled from the others in terms of reciprocal influence and dependence.

The nature of human nature is to endlessly overcome itself, so in this sense human nature has not changed.

T Clark

If our sciences have evolved, it’s because our philosophies have evolved. — Joshs

I don't see that. I think the argument could be made it's the other way around, i.e. changes in scientific knowledge lead to change in philosophies. I'm not sure where I come down on that.

Joshs

↪T Clark

If our sciences have evolved, it’s because our philosophies have evolved.
— Joshs

I don't see that. I think the argument could be made it's the other way around, i.e. changes in scientific knowledge lead to change in philosophies. I'm not sure where I come down on that. — T Clark

The argument could be made, but I dont see a lot of evidence for it. Newton was the first scientist to express Cartesian ideas, but he came along 100 years after Descartes. One can find strong consonances between the groundbreaking work of Kant and scientific thought, but none of this appeared till many decades after Kant. The same is true of Hegel and the sciences. Today’s work in the cognitive sciences expresses many ideas consistent with the American Pragmatism and phenomenology. But it took them 100 years to catch up.

The problem in demonstrating this is that many don’t understand the history of philosophy , and the philosophical underpinnings of science, well enough to compare the two form of thought.

T Clark

The argument could be made, but I dont see a lot of evidence for it. Newton was the first scientist to express Cartesian ideas, but he came along 100 years after Descartes. One can find strong consonances between the groundbreaking work of Kant and scientific thought, but none of this appeared till many decades after Kant. — Joshs

I don't really have the knowledge to address this much more deeply. I do know that Descartes died in 1650 and Newton was born in 1642, so there was not 100 years between them. I've also read that Kant was heavily influenced by Newton.

I'll go out on a limb here, given my lack of detailed knowledge - It strikes me that philosophy was much more entangled with science back in the 17th century. It is less so now.

Joshs

↪T Clark

I'll go out on a limb here, given my lack of detailed knowledge - It strikes me that philosophy was much more entangled with science back in the 17th century. It is less so now. — T Clark

I would say that physics was much closer to the cutting edge of philosophy in the 17th century than it is now. Today’s philosophy is entangled with the social , and in particular , the psychological sciences, and more distantly related to physics.

180 Proof

↪T Clark

I more or less agree with you here (and disagree with @Joshs' position) if only because Western philosophy, by most accounts, began in the 6th c. BCE with Pre-Socratic proto-scientists who framed – grounded in reasoned-speculative observations of nature – the predominantly Platonic-Aristotlean tradition which followed. I read this empirical, or anti-supernaturalist, framing as happening again two millennia later in the 17th c. CE with the Cartesian-Newtonian disambiguation of natural philosophy from metaphysics-theology. Disputes nevertheless persist.

Some (A) prioritize the latter over (or at the expense of) the former; some (B) prioritize the former over (or at the expense of) the latter; and some (C) do not prioritize either treating them as "non-overlapping magisteria". I think one's preference – A, B, or C – mostly depends on how one mis/reads (the) history of science & history of philosophy.

Joshs

↪180 Proof

the Cartesian-Newtonian disambiguation of natural philosophy from metaphysics-theology. Disputes nevertheless persists.

Some (A) prioritize the latter over (or at the expense of) the former; some (B) prioritize the former over (or at the expense of) the latter; and some (C) do not prioritize either treating them as "non-overlapping magisteria". I think one's preference – A, B, or C – mostly depends on how one mis/reads (the) history of science & history of philosophy. — 180 Proof

You forgot option D- both natural philosophy and philosophy proper deal in metaphysical presuppositions, the former implicitly and the later explicitly, and in recent centuries neither is interested in the supernatural.

Tom Storm

I believe we need to be able to come up with completely new concepts that could have never been fathomed before, of course however, our language is limiting and our thoughts are like glue to the world around us, but what if we observed the world through breaking it down further and if gaps between those micorscopic concepts were also looked at? — obscurelaunting

In order to do what?

T Clark

I would say that physics was much closer to the cutting edge of philosophy in the 17th century than it is now. Today’s philosophy is entangled with the social , and in particular , the psychological sciences, and more distantly related to physics. — Joshs

I tend to make a pretty strict division between philosophy and science. If it depends on empirical epistemological methods, i.e. facts, it's science. If it doesn't, it's philosophy, or something else I guess. I think the distinction between metaphysics and physics is an important one that is often misunderstood.

T Clark

I more or less agree with you here (and disagree with Joshs' position) if only because Western philosophy, by most accounts, began in the 6th c. BCE with Pre-Socratic proto-scientists who framed – grounded in reasoned-speculative observations of nature – the predominantly Platonic-Aristotlean tradition which followed. I read this empirical, or anti-supernaturalist, framing as happening again two millennia later in the 17th c. CE with the Cartesian-Newtonian disambiguation of natural philosophy from metaphysics-theology. Disputes nevertheless persists. — 180 Proof

As I noted previously, my understanding of the history of ideas is not as good as yours.

Some (A) prioritize the latter over (or at the expense of) the former; some (B) prioritize the former over (or at the expense of) the latter; and some (C) do not prioritize either treating them as "non-overlapping magisteria". — 180 Proof

As I've said before, I love Stephen J Gould, but non-overlapping magisteria is a bunch of bologna. I go for D - I don't prioritize either and don't treat them as NOMA. Use what works.

180 Proof

↪Joshs

AB & C have "metaphysical presuppositions", so your "D" is redundant as far I can tell.

↪T Clark

I think (B) works best with metaphysics as the dependent-variable.

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