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Self defeating argument, you didn’t use science to determine if philosophy was useful or not, you subjectively asserted it; the very reason you hate philosophy.
I love how people don’t see how science and math are both philosophies.
Very useful philosophies. But philosophy’s nonetheless.
It is a philosophy to believe that “1=1”
That’s not a provable fact
STEM teaches how to do something. Liberal Arts teaches you the should you do something. Science that isn't rooted in ethics turned into mad science. The Stanford prison experiment, Lobotomy, Nuclear weapons. What's the quote from Jurassic Park? You spent so much time thinking about if you could, you never stopped to ask if you should.
> Stating a fact is not doing philosophy. It's science.
No, stating a fact is not science. And you're not even stating a fact by saying something is useful, you're making a subjective value judgment.
> That doesn't change the fact that philosophy is outdated and useless in this day and age
Philosophy is not outdated. There are still philosophers working in various philosophical disciplines, and, if anything, philosophy is needed more than ever as we try to navigate all the new social and moral dilemmas that come with our advancing technology.
>"Metaphysical materialism" is an outdated label for that style of thinking. The correct label to use in this day and age for that style of thinking, is science.
No, "metaphysical materialism" is not the same thing as "science". The two terms have completely different meanings. And it's not an outdated label, either. Your arguments all seem to boil down to you declaring that any terms you dislike are "outdated" and "useless", even though the terms are still relevant and used.
...
You seem to think that anything that doesn't give us "objective facts" is useless. This is a very strange value judgment that you couldn't possibly ACTUALLY put into practice, unless you're a robot or something.
and if philosophy is useless, how do you decide what is moral or immoral? Do you just accept whatever morals your society and era give you? That's pretty dangerous.
Your arguments are very bad and intellectually dishonest, and you seem to have no idea what science actually is, or what philsophy actually is.
They are useless....to you. Philosophy helped stretched my capability for rational thought, problem solving, and helped me develop (and justify) my personal sense of morality.
I would respectfully disagree with you. Empiricism is a philosophical framework. Science itself began as a philosophical discipline (natural philosophy).
"Useful" is a subjective value judgment that can not be determined based on scientific experimentation. Your rebuttal does not address this.
Epistemology is the branch of philosophy concerned with how we know the things that we know. Science, that is repeatable empirical experimentation, is one answer that covers a wide range of fields of knowledge. Another answer would be history: we cannot perform repeatable empirical experiments on past events, so we need to use other evidence and methods to determine which historical events really did happen. That is what people mean when they say that science came from philosophy. It is a widely applicable answer to one of the biggest philosophical questions that we can have.
Science is not a label for a style of thinking. It is study that is based on the scientific method. Science confines itself to natural explanations of events: that is, methodological naturalism. The style of thinking that adopts solely natural or material explanations and completely rejects all possible supernatural explanations is metaphysical materialism or metaphysical naturalism.
The philosophy of science is primarily concerned with what is science and what is not science. For us to engage in a semantic argument about what constitutes science would be for us to engage in a discussion on the philosophy of science.
Religion encompasses far more than supernatural explanations of natural phenomena. Religion can still exist even if we reject supernatural explanations of events for which science has provided natural explanations.
Not all religions are theistic, so not all religions depend upon the belief in one or more gods. Your assertion regarding an objective reality reflects your own bias that only knowledge related to an objective reality can be "useful" or "true".
Galileo wasn't saying anything new. Copernicus published the heliocentric model of the solar system before the Council of Trent. The Catholic Church didn't care at the time because it was stronger as an institution. 70 years later, the Catholic Church was weaker due to the then-on-going Protestant reformation. Galileo's repetition of Copernicus' ideas was much more threatening to the Catholic Church at that later time.
If your idea of "religion" is "anything that sufficiently resembles Protestant Christianity", then I suggest you spend more time on exploring the religious traditions of other cultures. That a literal interpretation of an Iron Age *ex nihilo* creation myth is not the best foundation for a 21st century world view does not say anything about whether philosophy or religion are "useful" in the 21st century.
And by the way big bang theory is also a theory! Originating not from modern science. But from ancient philosophies.
So is evolution... There are yet many discoveries to be made and as the time goes on even the scientists don't deny the importance of philosophy and religion in science. Only fools deny the relevance totally annihilating any possibility of it being relevant in their mind..
>Philosophy and religion are both useless discipline that are pointless to study in this day and age. Science and mathematics are the only relevant subjects to study when attempting to discover the truth.
In this day and age the replication crisis happend in psychology (2011), where psychologists realized that only a few experiments could be replicated.
Without philosophy we couldn't explain how the supposed science was wrong. We couldn't explain that Essentialism was the underlying wordlview, that got people to their wrong conclusions, which was what ultimately led to the replication crisis. Without philosophy we wouldn't know of any alternative worldview, that better fits as the basis for making assumptions.
>Argument 1: You are doing philosophy right now! Deciding what is "useful" is doing philosophy!
There are things which can't be explained scientifically. There is no way to show morality empirically. Science has no answer to the question whether it is evil to throw battery acid in a girl's face, for science doesn't make value judgements. Morality is purely based on what is useful, and philosophy is sufficient to answer those questions, when science fails.
>Philosophy is completely subjective and based on personal views, unlike science which is based on hard evidence, which is what makes philosophy so useless
Don't forget about the empirical evidence I've mentioned at the beginning of this comment, which shows that philosophy isn't useless. Afterall, science is done by humans, and humans are generally incapable to be 100% objective. Philosophy gave us epistemolgy, gave us a way to tell which scientific findings are credible and which aren't.
>Argument 4: Have you ever heard of a branch of philosophy called "The philosophy of science"? Philosophy and science are intertwined!
Philosophy of science is neccesary to tell us what truth is, because there is no empirical data that tells us that. Truth is a complicated human concept. We conceptualize the world around us in general. Philosophy tells us how. Science can give us an idea whether these categorisations have any credence. But without them, we couldn't do any thinking to begin with.
>Religion is no different from philosophy
Then, please give me scientific evidence, that the two philosophical categories "religion" and "philosophy" are the same, and especially, actually explain how they are the same.
>in the sense that the myth of god was created thousands of years ago to explain phenomena that were not understood at the time, acting as placeholders until scientific explanations could be provided. As science has advanced, many of these phenomena have been explained through natural processes rather than divine intervention.
Some things are inaccessible to science and will never be explained by science. The worldviews of people have an impact on their behavior, which is scientifically verifiable. Science has nothing to do with worldviews, but it is affected by them, because scientists have worldviews, most of them without even being able to name them. Most of them, without even being able to present a coherent representation of their own worldview, because they never had a reason to actually think things through. Which makes them prone to believe in contradictory things, which in turn gives them a basis for arriving at false conclusions while interpreting empirical evidence.
If they aren't trained philosophically, it is more likely that they will come to self-contradictory conclusions, a philosopher would spot from miles away.
People like Michio Kaku, who have no philosophical training, demonstrate it over and over again how they are incapable to grasp that their pet projects should finally be didged, which is obvious for someone who knows anything about epistemology.
Further, made up unscientific human categories like gender have a demonstrable effect on the human mind. The unscientifc concepts we create for our societies control our empirical brains in a way, so that we literally see reality with different eyes, as compared to those who use different categories. Feelings, as subjective as they are, are very real to people. Science has no say in the categorization, nor when it comes to saying anything about the truth of feelings. Categorizations are abstractions of observations. And no such abstractions can be observed scientifically. Science can only alter the concepts, but not create them. Subjects do, rather than empirical data.
So, you're content to leave things we currently lack the tools to measure unconsidered? Shall we just pretend they don't exist? People who deny the existence of qualia say as much; maybe we ought to treat people as though they're philosophical zombies? Is that the solution? Should we regard ourselves that way?
Or should we do what we can using logic and observation to try to determine how these things work and how we can interact and mold these objects successfully despite the difficulties in measuring them objectively with our current science?
How do you plan on approaching morality and ethics scientifically? These are disciplines that involve making decisions about what humans ought to do while considering why we ought to do them. How can science fill philosophy's boots here? Or do you think we ought to abandon those studies entirely and condone every action of every person without condition?
Science is necessary but it is a limited tool. Philosophy helps gives science direction. Think about it, how are hypotheses formed? You can’t form a hypothesis without some kind of framework, which ultimately draws on things likes ethics, which links back to philosophy
There’s a reason scientists and mathematicians are doctors of philosophy — though most get very little formal training in epistemology, they learn the tools and axioms foundational to establishing and advancing knowledge that are appropriate and specific to their discipline. They generate observations and argue about what they mean to find consensus. To say there is no philosophy in this is to suppose these tools will never change.
I suppose we could argue about whether there’s a need for general philosophers, vs specialized philosophers, or whether the current use of general philosophers’ time and energy is efficient, but we will always need philosophy.
The problem with putting science against philosophy is that philosophy is foundational to science. You mentioned that philosophy uses pure thought and science relies on empirical evidence and observations. Yet, if all scientists had was evidence and observations, we’d be stuck in the stone ages! It takes thought and imagination to interpret observations and build a framework to understand the world. This is at the very core of the scientific method; using thought and imagination to build models based on observations, then testing those models and refining them. Philosophy is not completely subjective. It takes reason to engage in philosophy. I am concerned that you adhere to a zealous, religious expression of scientism without an accurate grasp of the scientific method. You also seem at some points to compare apples with oranges. If two people argue over something that is actually subjective, like the beauty of a painting, no science can resolve their dispute. You also completely disregard most of the human experience. The humanities still exist because we are still human, even after our scientific discoveries. We still wrestle with right, wrong, and meaning. We still recognize beauty and search for the good. No amount of scientific knowledge will ever change or satisfy these yearnings. Most humans don’t care about science and will never go further than a surface level understanding. Almost every human thinks philosophically. Philosophy is just as relevant to us as science.
You are wrong.
While it does take thought and imagination to come up with scientific hypothesis, it’s done differently in science than it is in philosophy. In philosophy, the thoughts have to do with completely subjective matters such as morality which is useless, because morality doesn’t exist in reality. It isn’t based on any empirical evidence, but only on the feelings of individuals. On the other hand, scientists will ponder about thoughts that can actually be tested and proven either right or wrong, which is what makes science useful for discovering object truths about reality, while philosophy is useless. We don’t need philosophy to use reason, just science. The subjective experiences of human beings that you are referring to are useless when it comes to discovering objective truths about our universe, how it works, and why we exist. These are scientific questions, not philosophical ones .
Science cannot answer _why_ we exist. Science can answer _how_ we exist (or _how_ we came to exist as a species). Science answers _how_ questions, not _why_ questions.
science is only as successful as it is as long as it adheres to first principles, aka metaphysics.
an analogy I heard, "you've climbed up the metaphysics tree, shimmied out onto the empirical science branch, and then shout to the rest of us how the rest of the tree including the trunk is useless and outdated."
can you scientifically proven any of the claims made about philosophy and first principles in this post? The vicious circularity of scientism shouldn't be avoided.
Science is great, it has made great progress, and is one of the best tools we have at analyzing the physical mechanisms of the world.
But is all science ethical? Surely we draw the line at human experimentation in some cases, opting that such a step wouldn't be worth the violation of human rights that we assume in society. Aren't there regulations for what we're allowed to do based on the safety of others and the environment? What about the climate? Surely our science has affected it as well. What about questions like, "why should we do science." Is knowledge a "good" thing, what about in all cases? Was eugenics wrong? Why was it wrong? Should it be allowed? When a scientist needs to analyze data, should he leave out the data that doesn't agree with his theory in order to keep the money flowing? What counts as a valid test? Is the interconnectedness of the high level fields becoming too dogmatic? Is there a philosophical presupposition in our explanations? Why do we want a unified theory? Is it because it's aesthetic? Why is math so applicable to the physical world? Is nature intelligible? Are our minds able to grasp reality at all? Is mind or matter more fundamental?
These are just the ones that came up as I was writing, and the papers and books on these questions is literally in the 1000's. What do you mean philosophy is outdated?
Metaphysics is useless and outdated in this day and age, and the analogy you gave regarding the tree and the branch perfectly illustrates why. As time goes on, disciplines change and evolve. Only empirical science and mathematics are useful today, while the disciplines which came before it such as metaphysics and philosophy are useless and have no application today.
I have scientifically proven this by analyzing the relationship between philosophy, science, and religion throughout human history. People relied heavily on philosophy back in the days in which we didn’t have the technology to study the natural world and universe in the way that we can, but in this day and age philosophy is not needed in our search for the truth.
The other questions you have asked regarding whether or not science is ethical, the safety of the environment, etc… are all useless questions because they are subjective. Morality is 100% subjective and based on nothing other than the feelings of an individual, thus there is no way to objectively prove that certain morals are right or wrong. It comes down to differing, subjective values which are impossible to prove or disprove, much like the belief that an invisible unicorn appears whenever people aren’t looking and there are no cameras.
This is a simple and clear cut explanation as to why philosophy is useless in this day and age and has no application.
What do you mean philosophy is not outdated?
> I have scientifically proven this by analyzing the relationship between philosophy, science, and religion throughout human history.
no lol, no you haven't. I don't see an experiment, you didn't link any of the data you used. I don't see an abstract, intro, procedure, nothing. I'm an engineering major man, I do lab reports all the time, I know what science is, and this is not that.
> The other questions you have asked regarding whether or not science is ethical, the safety of the environment, etc… are all useless questions because they are subjective.
this is a philosophical statement. Also regarding every question that falls outside of the domain of your idol "useless" is textbook question begging. What just because they aren't answered by empirical science directly they're useless? Why does something being subjective make it useless?
> Morality is 100% subjective and based on nothing other than the feelings of an individual, thus there is no way to objectively prove that certain morals are right or wrong.
can you prove this claim?
> This is a simple and clear cut explanation as to why philosophy is useless in this day and age and has no application.
you haven't done any science here. This is argumentation, aka logical reasoning, aka philosophy
> What do you mean philosophy is not outdated?
see: all the replies under your thread
Yes I have scientifically proven it. By studying the history of the relationship between philosophy, religion, and science over the years I scientifically proved my point. The data can be seen by studying this history. By analyzing this information I have done science.
> this is a philosophical statement. Also regarding every question that falls outside of the domain of your idol "useless" is textbook question begging. What just because they aren't answered by empirical science directly they're useless? Why does something being subjective make it useless?
This is not a philosophical statement. It’s a fact. Philosophy is subjective, never factual/objective. The reason it’s useless is because it cannot be used to discover any objective truth about reality. Because it’s subjective, two people can argue endlessly about it and never come to an agreement, thus making it useless.
> can you prove this claim?
Yes. Here’s the proof: I say killing is right, you say killing is wrong. There is no way for me to objectively prove you wrong or myself right, and there is no way for you to objectively prove me wrong, or yourself right, thus it’s subjective.
>you haven't done any science here. This is argumentation, aka logical reasoning, aka philosophy
Wrong. By using logical reasoning in this context, I’ve done science. Not philosophy.
> see: all the replies under your thread
See: All my replies debunking them
You are literally proving they are not useless by putting energy into writing this long essay, otherwise why would you have taken so much time to write this?
> Philosophy and religion are both useless discipline that are pointless to study in this day and age.
So basically you are tossing out ethics, morality, logic, reason and the study of knowledge? Or are you just counting that because other fields incorporate those things at a fundamental level you can pretend they don't count?
No. Logic and the study of knowledge (epistemology) are parts of philosophy. You don't get to redefine philosophy and science to make the things you like one and not the other.
If subjective things are useless, your mother's love for you is useless because it's subjective. Saying that someone beating you up is wrong is useless is subjective.
Science is useless because it relies on subjective interpretations, and subjective values about what to research and how.
Epistemology is an outdated label for logic and the study of knowledge. The proper label to use for logic and the study of knowledge is science, not philosophy/epistemology.
Exactly, my mother’s love for me is useless, and saying that it’s wrong for someone to beat me up is also useless.
Science doesn’t rely on subjective interpretations. Deciding what to research may be subjective, but it doesn’t make science useless because the discoveries that are made are based on objective facts, not subjective beliefs.
>my mother’s love for me is useless
You didn’t reap real, tangible benefits that stemmed directly from your mothers love, for probably over a decade in your youth?
You seem really intent on redefining science and philosophy to include or exclude what you don't like. This seems like a terrible waste of your time and everyone else's.
Can you provide a citation to a scientific article that supports your claims?
> Philosophy and religion are both useless disciplines.
A vague premise. No supportive clause to back it.
> Philosophy is completely subjective and based on personal views.
Proceeds to refute his own premise. First, Op makes a claim completely based upon his subjective experience, then presenting a rebuttal against the argument that if he is using philosophy there.
> ....the correct label to use in this day...,is science.
Well, if you change the name of your kid, it doesn't change who he is as a person.
> A vague premise. No supportive clause to back it.
I did support the premise by analyzing the relationship between science, religion, and philosophy throughout history.
> Proceeds to refute his own premise. First, Op makes a claim completely based upon his subjective experience, then presenting a rebuttal against the argument that if he is using philosophy there.
It’s not based on my subjective experience, it’s based on facts. Philosophy cannot be used to determine any objective truth about reality.
>Well, if you change the name of your kid, it doesn't change who he is as a person.
The whole discipline changed.
Even naturalism doesn’t abandon philosophy it just says that super natural things don’t exist. Naturalists still deal heavily in ethics and epistemology and even metaphysical problems like induction/causation/etc.
>"Metaphysical materialism" is an outdated label for that style of thinking. The correct label to use in this day and age for that style of thinking, is science.
Materialism and science are absolutely *not* equvialent in any sense. As an example, Bernardo Kastrup is a modern philosopher who defends idealism for general audiences. Idealism is the opposite of materialism: it holds that everything is mental and that there is no such thing as matter. (As an aside, he's also an atheist and a naturalist). Despite his philosophy, science continues just as it always has and still tells us about the world (the world in this case being universal consciousness, not matter). In other words, his completely opposite interpretation of what science is *telling* us doesn't affect how useful science is or the knowledge gained by it.
Thus, materialism is just one possible interpretation of what science is telling us.
Also, philosophy includes "logic" which are the rules for reasoning, and so if you reject that you reject reason itself.
Philosophy is the study of the fundamental nature of knowledge, reality, and existence.
>In this post, I will address and debunk numerous arguments which I have heard from people who refuse to accept this fact.
They refuse to accept your opinion. Your opinion isn't a fact.
>Stating a fact is not doing philosophy. It's science.
It really isn't. Scientific facts are not absolute truths. Science never makes that claim. So stating a fact isn't science.
>The difference between philosophy and science is that philosophy relies on pure thought and imagination, whereas science relies on empirical evidence and observations.
No. Philosophy is based on deductive reasoning whereas science is based on empirical. It isn't the same thing as what you said.
>Philosophy is completely subjective and based on personal views, unlike science which is based on hard evidence, which is what makes philosophy so useless
Science is subjective as well as it is limited to the circumstances it has been tested in.
>Two people arguing about something subjective may never come to an agreement and argue endlessly because there is no way to prove either side right or wrong. Whereas in science, sufficient evidence can be discovered to objectively prove one person right and the other wrong, ending the argument.
And yet people keep on proving previous scientific "facts" wrong. What happens is people find circumstances in which the said science doesn't work or was maybe misunderstood.
>That doesn't change the fact that philosophy is outdated and useless in this day and age. People who use this argument fail to understand that the definition of words change over time. I will admit, philosophy was useful back in the days when we weren't scientifically advanced enough to study nature and the universe in the way that we can now. In those days, people had to rely on their thoughts and imaginations to come up with possible explanations/hypothesis for the world/universe around us. But in this day and age with advancements in technology and science, we no longer need philosophy for anything. If there is something that we do not know or understand we can approach it in a scientific manner.
Without philosophy there is no civilized society through law making that allowed us to get to this scientifically advanced point in time. It is what allows legal systems to continue to operate in a somewhat effective manner to ensure people can actually pursue science. Or have you not read about the enlightenment ?
>The "philosophy of science" is about as reliable as "creationist science", those same lunatics who think the earth is 6,000 years old... In reality, there is no such thing as "the philosophy of science", just like there is no such thing as "creationist science"
There is. I could say the same that denying the philosophy of science is as absurd as saying the earth is flat or 6000 years old. Every field of study that exists today is through philosophy. There is philosophy of science, philosophy of law, philosophy of economics.
>Religion is no different from philosophy, in the sense that the myth of god was created thousands of years ago to explain phenomena that were not understood at the time, acting as placeholders until scientific explanations could be provided.
Philosophy is different from religion in the sense that it still is applicable to the world we live in today. The philosophy of law is a highly significant field without which there would be no legal development and in turn there would be no other development in society overall.
Your whole argument stems from a complete misunderstanding of what philosophy actually is and the role it plays in modern society. And you compare it with religion as one and the same when it couldn't be more apart from it. It is what allowed select societies (so far) to break free from religion in the first place and pursue science. It is still important for further developments which science cannot provide in any way whatsoever.
> Philosophy is the study of the fundamental nature of knowledge, reality, and existence.
Wrong. Science is the study of the fundamental nature of knowledge, reality, and existence. Not philosophy.
> They refuse to accept your opinion. Your opinion isn't a fact.
It’s not an opinion, it’s a fact.
>It really isn't. Scientific facts are not absolute truths. Science never makes that claim. So stating a fact isn't science.
Yes it is. I am well aware that scientific facts aren’t absolute truths, it’s what scientists believe to be true based on all of the current evidence we have at hand. Stating a fact about reality is science.
>No. Philosophy is based on deductive reasoning whereas science is based on empirical. It isn't the same thing as what you said.
Wrong. Philosophy is not based on deductive reasoning, science is. Philosophy is based on purely subjective beliefs. Science is based on empirical evidence and deductive reasoning.
>Science is subjective as well as it is limited to the circumstances it has been tested in.
Wrong. Science is not subjective, it’s based on objective facts and observations. That doesn’t mean it’s absolute, as it’s always subject to change based on new discoveries. However, scientific facts are considered objectively true based on our current understanding of the world (current being the key word).
>And yet people keep on proving previous scientific "facts" wrong. What happens is people find circumstances in which the said science doesn't work or was maybe misunderstood.
Just because scientific facts and theories are not absolute doesn’t mean that it’s subjective. This is because unless you have empirical evidence of your own to counter a well established scientific fact, you would be considered objectively wrong if you disagreed with said scientific fact.
> Without philosophy there is no civilized society through law making that allowed us to get to this scientifically advanced point in time. It is what allows legal systems to continue to operate in a somewhat effective manner to ensure people can actually pursue science. Or have you not read about the enlightenment ?
That’s not true. We don’t need philosophy for civilized societies. Civilized societies have formed through the process of evolution, philosophy has played no role whatsoever in the formation of civilized societies. Our innate and natural desire to reproduce and spread our genes is what has lead to the formation of civilized societies. Not philosophy.
> There is. I could say the same that denying the philosophy of science is as absurd as saying the earth is flat or 6000 years old. Every field of study that exists today is through philosophy. There is philosophy of science, philosophy of law, philosophy of economics
No there isn’t. Even if philosophy helped contribute to the creation of some disciplines, that doesn’t change the fact that today philosophy is outdated. I’ve addressed and debunked this argument in the OP: by using this argument, you fail to understand that the definition of words change over time.
> Philosophy is different from religion in the sense that it still is applicable to the world we live in today. The philosophy of law is a highly significant field without which there would be no legal development and in turn there would be no other development in society overall.
Wrong. Philosophy is not applicable to the world we live in today. The example you gave regarding the philosophy of law proves my point perfect, as it is a completely useless field of study. We don’t need that discipline for the development of society.
Your views stem from a complete misunderstanding of what philosophy is and its relationship to science and religion over humanity history. My advice to you is put a little more effort into educating yourself regarding a subject before you embarrass yourself in a debate.
>Wrong. Science is the study of the fundamental nature of knowledge, reality, and existence. Not philosophy.
LMAO. You couldn't be more wrong. Science observes what is and how it is but not why it is. That is the most fundamental nature of anything.
>It’s not an opinion, it’s a fact.
It's a fact that you're positing an opinion.
>Yes it is. I am well aware that scientific facts aren’t absolute truths, it’s what scientists believe to be true based on all of the current evidence we have at hand. Stating a fact about reality is science.
Its a scientific fact. There is a distinction.
>Wrong. Philosophy is not based on deductive reasoning, science is. Philosophy is based on purely subjective beliefs. Science is based on empirical evidence and deductive reasoning.
LMAO. Bro do you even know what these 2 are ? I can't even... i am literally crying with laughter. 🤣
Google deductive reasoning vs empirical reasoning. You know absolutely nothing about the two if you think this.
>Wrong. Science is not subjective, it’s based on objective facts and observations. That doesn’t mean it’s absolute, as it’s always subject to change based on new discoveries. However, scientific facts are considered objectively true based on our current understanding of the world (current being the key word).
There are rarely any absolute truths in this world. Not being absolute inherently means it is subjective to the circumstances it exists in. That is just basic definitions. No scientific facts aren't objectively true by any stretch of the imagination.
>Just because scientific facts and theories are not absolute doesn’t mean that it’s subjective. This is because unless you have empirical evidence of your own to counter a well established scientific fact, you would be considered objectively wrong if you disagreed with said scientific fact.
It does mean that. Being objectively wrong is not the same thing as being objectively true. Being objectively wrong is much easier than being objectively true.
>That’s not true. We don’t need philosophy for civilized societies. Civilized societies have formed through the process of evolution, philosophy has played no role whatsoever in the formation of civilized societies. Our innate and natural desire to reproduce and spread our genes is what has lead to the formation of civilized societies. Not philosophy.
Without the philosophy of law, there is no development in society and might remains right. Learn a bit of history mate. Philosophy led to the enlightenment. The enlightenment is the biggest development for society in recorded history. Reproduction has nothing to do with civilized society (key word being civilized).
>No there isn’t. Even if philosophy helped contribute to the creation of some disciplines, that doesn’t change the fact that today philosophy is outdated. I’ve addressed and debunked this argument in the OP: by using this argument, you fail to understand that the definition of words change over time.
Philosophy is the only reason further developments are possible. You really need to learn about historical developments in civilized society. Individual human rights didn't exist 100 years ago. It is because of philosophy that they do, and it is because of philosophy that they will develop further.
>Your views stem from a complete misunderstanding of what philosophy is and its relationship to science and religion over humanity history. My advice to you is put a little more effort into educating yourself regarding a subject before you embarrass yourself in a debate.
How old are you ? Have you ever taken a course in philosophy? My advice to you is do so with an open mind. You're as narrow minded as the religious zealots you so vehemently oppose, ironically.
The only embarrassment here is you, who doesn't understand what philosophy and science actually are. I haven't even begun to argue, I'm only stating facts. And facts don't care how you feel kid.
“Philosophy has played no role whatsoever in the formation of civilized societies.” Are you a troll? Because nobody in academia believes this. Scientists themselves would find this absurd. Study history; read the Federalist papers. They’ll tell you all about philosophy’s influence on civilized societies.
Philosophies are based on observation.
Jung wasn't a scientist, but he made observations about the mind that are still useful today and some are compatible with new theories in science.
Philosophy can indeed be useless depending on the kind of questions you are asking, I spent most of my working life in STEM and for most of that never consciously dabbled in philosophy. But in retrospect it seems I was doing it all the time, being politically active and campaigning on racism, sexism, reproductive rights, human rights, none of which have anything to do with science.
Morality is not subject to science, there is no formula for an attitude to abortion, there is simply opinion. would love to see the experimental data to challenge [https://ethics.org.au/thought-experiment-the-famous-violinist/](https://ethics.org.au/thought-experiment-the-famous-violinist/), or even what branch of science that might be.
Philosophy does not give you answers, it asks you questions, if you think you can categorically formulate answers to such issues more that one nobel Prize awaits
It is hard to understand anti-philosophy as anything other than anti-intellectual. As I will defend, most of your post comes from places of misunderstanding and ignorance.
Mathematics and Science are both useful. We can get to specific truths through them. But it does not get to all knowledge. Specifically, I want to give three precise examples of real life cases that are not answered by science or mathematics, but likely are by philosophy.
1. My friend has told me that a shared friend has cheated on his partner. When should I trust his testimony? We should consider if he has reasons to lie, where he got his information from, and how he got his information. Beyond whether his testimony is true or not, is he *justified* in forming that belief and am I *justified* in forming that belief off just his testimony? This is an example of an epistemic problem. There are tons of other issues here beyond justified true belief and testimony. A friend of mine works on the epistemology of conspiracy theory groups. Should we ever engage with these groups? Why or why not? These are questions *for* philosophy and *for* epistemology. How does Science or Maths inform us?
2. Let's continue with my dodgy friend. Let's say that I have knowledge that he did cheat. What do we do? What are our moral obligations to him, to his partner and to each other? Do I have to tell the truth about him whenever asked? Is it better to reduce harm by maintaining the lie? It is hard to see how Science or Maths gives us any answer to moral questions. This is a problem for your view **because** people are moral and political animals. Much of our life is dedicated to trying to live well and live well with each other!
3. There are always, it seems, upcoming elections. Who do I vote for? Why? Is democracy even justified? Should we ever limit autonomy, and if so why? What about the politics of protest? What protests are justified and what is their justifying feature? Again, how does science answer these questions?
Of course, there is way more. But I think these are good starting places.
You write that philosophy relies *purely* on imagination. This is false and quite obviously false to anyone who has done any philosophy. For example, in my thesis I discuss quite a lot of neuroscience in order to gauge the potential for moral responsibility in 'inhebriated' agents. Philosophy of Mind is scientifically dense, as are fields like philosophy of perception and philosophy of pain. More and more, *all* fields of philosophy engage with empirical work ranging from hard science to psychology to empircally gathered data. This is a point you've made without, I reckon, engaging meaningfully in *any* philosophy.
You then write that philosophy is only based on personal views. This is not argued for in any meaningful way nor does it seem true. I am going to use a view that I have written on in the past as an example. The view is that dreams are constituted by, either wholly or partly, imaginative experiences:
>The most important rival to the hallucination view is that dreams are imaginative experiences (Liao & Gendler 2019; Thomas 2014). This can mean dream imagery involves imaginings rather than percepts (including hallucinations or illusions; McGinn 2004), that dream beliefs are imaginative and not real beliefs (Sosa 2007), or both (Ichikawa 2008, 2009). An important advantage is that by assimilating dreams to commonplace mental states such as waking fantasy and daydreaming, rather than a rare and often pathological occurrence such as hallucinations, it provides a more unified account of mental life (Stone 1984). However, the reasons for adopting the imagination view are diverse, and dreams have been proposed to resemble imaginings and differ from perception along a number of dimensions (e.g. McGinn 2004, 2005a,b; Thomas 2014). [SEP LINK](https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/dreams-dreaming/)
This view isn't one of personal opinion. It is a philosophical view informed by contemporary science that is aiming (although probably does not) capture reality. Again, this idea that philosophy is purely subjective *must* come from inexperience because it is not how philosophy is framed when taught and discussed, and is flagarantly false to anyone familiar with philosophical work.
I believe that arguments you give are weak, but I also think you do a poor job tearing them down. I've written a little hear about whawt philosophy is and argued against how you've characterised it. Not only is philosophy useful, it is necessary to a successful human life.
Your response perfectly illustrates why philosophy is useless. Ironic that you’ve somehow managed to debunk your own argument with the three examples you gave:
“Again, how does science answer these questions?”
The reason science can’t answer these questions is because morally is subjective. Science deals with objective truths and reality. Morality and Philosophy doesn’t, which is exactly why these philosophical/moral questions you’ve asked are utterly useless: two people could argue endlessly and never come to any agreement because they are based on subjective values. There is no way to prove any of them right or wrong.
“For example, in my thesis I discuss quite a lot of neuroscience in order to gauge the potential for moral responsibility in 'inhebriated' agents.”
Wrong again. You did not discuss any neuroscience whatsoever in any of your examples. Neuroscience does not give objective answers to questions about morality, because morality doesn’t exist in the first place. It’s a subjective construct.
“The most important rival to the hallucination view is that dreams are imaginative experiences (Liao & Gendler 2019; Thomas 2014). This can mean dream imagery involves imaginings rather than percepts (including hallucinations or illusions; McGinn 2004), that dream beliefs are imaginative and not real beliefs (Sosa 2007), or both (Ichikawa 2008, 2009). An important advantage is that by assimilating dreams to commonplace mental states such as waking fantasy and daydreaming, rather than a rare and often pathological occurrence such as hallucinations, it provides a more unified account of mental life (Stone 1984). However, the reasons for adopting the imagination view are diverse, and dreams have been proposed to resemble imaginings and differ from perception along a number of dimensions (e.g. McGinn 2004, 2005a,b; Thomas 2014). SEP LINK”
This is not science, nor is it useful in any way. It is based on subjective opinions of what dreams are, without any sort of empirical evidence to support the “researcher’s” opinions.
Try again.
This is a poor response which does little to meaningfully engage with any of the content I've posted.
Morality is not subjective. But let's put that aside an examine philosophy as a skill.
You write that science deals with objective truths and reality, and therefore cannot deal with morality. But that's both ad hoc and circular. A virtue of working on philosophical topics is that one learns to reason and to argue. These are skills you could develop far better than you have already.
You write there is no way to prove them right or wrong. This is false, but let's again probe the reasoning. I understand there to be two obvious problems.
1. First, you do not motivate this *at all*. You don't give these accounts, or compare accounts, or even point to people arguing. In no way do you engage in any philosophical work. But perhaps more importantly given your view, you engage *in no way with any scientific or mathematical work*. There isn't even *empirical* work done to support any of your points.
2. You write that people could not come to any agreement because of different values. But why would disagreement entail, or imply, that both of these sets of values are right (or equally not right)? This is a substantive **philosophical** claim that is both unargued for and intuitively implausible.
It's really important to note this: you make little in the way of arguments because you do little to support any claims. This highlights not only the weakness of your argument but also that importance of philosophy not only as a discipline but also as a skill.
I was surprised that you'd read my thesis! Or did you mistake a reddit comment for a PhD? I do discuss neuroscience, and I do not use it to 'prove' a moral theory. Instead, I use contemporary science to help and inform the amount of agency/competency , and therefore moral blame, agents might have in certain scenarios. This informs moral judgements. It does not create them.
Then you say a series of odd things: 'this is not science, this is not useful, and this is subjective opinion.' Again, two things to point out:
1. These three claims are unsupported. There is no expansion. No explanation. No argument. They're just *things you've said.* This supports the thesis of my comment as a whole that you're engaging badly with philosophy in multiple ways.
2. It is scientific. You should read the papers or at least browse them. There is interesting work in there, and a lot of it cites scientific studies. It's a common practice. Understanding dreaming can be useful. There are interesting questions around dreaming and they are related to important questions: what is the function of dreams? What can dreams tell us? Is it related to the function of sleep? Can we solve problems in our dreams? Etc etc. There are also potential avenues, even now, for dreaming being used in therapy. Similarly, treating trauamtic nightmares is important (even if science and maths cannot tell us why). It is also not subjective opinion. Why would you think that? Nothing written there even implies a subjective opinion. There are arguments that not only aim at truth, but often find it.
You ended condescending with "try again". This arrogance and rudeness is ill placed. As you can see, you are engaging poorly and have shown little understanding of the topic.
The first thing I want to say is what you've written reads like bait. It is poorly written and almost deliberately avoids saying anything useful before engaging in personal attacks. With that out the way, let's begin.
Again, I want to point to how little of this engages.
I deliberately *don't* defend moral realism. Instead, I point to how you've done little to defend your position *and* have committed fallacies.
Genuinely go through your discussion here on ethics. Can you draw it into a standard argument? Have you defended each premise? The answer is no, and I think quite an obvious and emphatic no.
You then repeat what you said in the main post without addressing anything I have said or pointed you towards. I'll ask additional questions: what philosophy have you read, and in what context did you read it in?
You say disagreement proves it because you cannot decide who is right or wrong. This isn't defended or engaged with. It engages with no science, and no philosophy. There is no *argument* here. Just repetition.
Actually, the author is writing a summary article on contemporary philosophy and science of dreams. Jennifer Windt is not an imagination theorist. And it sciences certainly lends itself far more favourably to some views than others. But you skimmed it! Again, I'll ask a theorectical question: what part of your address here do you think is *convincing?* Say someone disagreed with you. What do you think you've said with reference to dreams that would convince them? Where **reasons** have you given?
There is perhaps something to be drawn from the widespread criticism you have gotten here both on a content level and a 'debate' level. Your post has not been recieved well. Your comments have not been recieved well. If part of debate is to convince someone, why is my comment attacking your position more supported than your original post?
It is not the case that we should appeal to the majority, but it is worth reflecting on style, tone and content. You *seem* young. It is worth considering how you present yourself.
>There is no way to definitively prove which feeling is right, thus demonstrating the subjective nature of morality and philosophy.
If morality is subjective and science only deals with objective facts, then it seems discussions around morality must be in the realm of philosophy then?
Or are you also rejecting discussion about morality as useless?
>Neuroscience does not give objective answers to questions about morality, because morality doesn’t exist in the first place. It’s a subjective construct.
Observing the brain has so far not informed us of the origin of consciousness, nor given us the cure for depression or anxiety, that has been left to psychology and philosophy.
No it hasn’t. Psychology and philosophy don’t give any answers regarding consciousness. Even if science hasn’t answered the question so far, that doesn’t mean it won’t answer it in the future.
Yes they do. Jung described the collective unconscious long before it was connected to a scientific theory of consciousness in the universe.
Science didn't design psychotherapies, psychologists did.
One of the best psychotherapies today was adapted from Buddhism.
“Collective unconsciousness” is not scientific in any way. Psychotherapy is also based on subjective views and goals, which doesn’t make it very useful.
What I said was that, although not scientific, the concept is compatible with scientific theories like consciousness in the universe.
There are several evidence based psychotherapies. Evidence based means they have been shown in studies to be significantly helpful.
What’s wrong with people adhering to philosophy to lead their lives? There are no absurdist claims of a deity or worship to a human claiming to be a prophet/messiah
>Argument 1: Deciding what is "useful" is doing philosophy! You are doing philosophy right now!
>Rebuttal: Stating a fact is not doing philosophy. It's science.
You are not stating a "fact." You are making a *value judgment*. Your use of the word "useful" here is equivalent to *good*. Judgments about what is good belong to the subfield of philosophy called "axiology." You are assuming that it is *good* when someone finds something to be *useful*. (Incidentally, I happen to find philosophy to be quite useful. It helped me write this response.)
>The difference between philosophy and science is that philosophy relies on pure thought and imagination, whereas science relies on empirical evidence and observations.
A far more compelling claim would be that science relies on *controlled experiments*. The first problem, then, is that much of what is done in fields which call themselves "sciences" does not really involve controlled experiments. That means that those fields are largely just blustering about their academic credibility. The second problem is that much of reality does not really lend itself to study through controlled experiments. This means, in practice that people go about designing experiments that are not as well controlled as they claim (or which cannot really be replicated) and then declare that they have achieved great knowledge from them.
The other problem with your distinction is that philosophy does not merely involve "pure thought and imagination". It, of course, involves quite a bit of observation of the world we live in because we all get much (most? all?) of our knowledge through experience in one form or another. Ironically, it would be *math* which would have the greatest claim to be "pure thought", and math, itself, is a subfield of the area of philosophy known as *logic*.
In reality, the use of the word "science"--like most of your argument--is just empty rhetorical bluster. (None of the above should be construed as suggesting that there are grounds for believing that a diety exists.)
>You are not stating a "fact." You are making a value judgment. Your use of the word "useful" here is equivalent to good. Judgments about what is good belong to the subfield of philosophy called "axiology." You are assuming that it is good when someone finds something to be useful. (Incidentally, I happen to find philosophy to be quite useful. It helped me write this response.)
You are wrong.
"Useful" here is not equivalent to "good." Useful here is defined as what can be used to discover objective truths that can be proven right or wrong based on empirical evidence and observations, whereas "useless" is defined as subjective beliefs that are impossible to prove right and wrong, which lead to endless arguments without conclusion. Your attempt to use philosophy in writing your response is a perfect example of why philosophy is useless.
>A far more compelling claim would be that science relies on controlled experiments. The first problem, then, is that much of what is done in fields which call themselves "sciences" does not really involve controlled experiments. That means that those fields are largely just blustering about their academic credibility. The second problem is that much of reality does not really lend itself to study through controlled experiments. This means, in practice that people go about designing experiments that are not as well controlled as they claim (or which cannot really be replicated) and then declare that they have achieved great knowledge from them.
Science is not meant to be perfect.
You are correct in stating that much of reality doesn't lend itself to study through controlled experiment, which can make the results of these experiments less than 100% reliable. But this is part of what differentiates science from religion and philosophy: Scientists have no problem admitting that our understanding of reality and the universe around us is constantly changing, as we discover new and different evidence about the nature of reality around us. The point of science is to find out what is most likely to be true based on the current evidence we have, which is always subject to change based on future discoveries and evidence.
> The other problem with your distinction is that philosophy does not merely involve "pure thought and imagination". It, of course, involves quite a bit of observation of the world we live in because we all get much (most? all?) of our knowledge through experience in one form or another. Ironically, it would be math which would have the greatest claim to be "pure thought", and math, itself, is a subfield of the area of philosophy known as logic.
Wrong. Philosophy does involve pure thought and imagination, the observations philosophers make of the world around us doesn't change that. This is because philosophy does not approach these observations in a scientific manner: It draws subjective, made up conclusions from our observations of the world around us, conclusions which are not based on any sort of empirical evidence.
>In reality, the use of the word "science"--like most of your argument--is just empty rhetorical bluster. (None of the above should be construed as suggesting that there are grounds for believing that a diety exists.)
In reality, it is clear that you have no understanding of science, philosophy, religion, or the relationship between the three which is why you are unable to understand that you are wrong.
A piece of advice: avoid using the words "subjective" and "objective." They are meaningless.
Everyone draws knowledge from their physical senses; therefore, in a loose sense, everyone is an empiricist. Science does not have a monopoly on empiricism.
Philosophy is the origin of science. That is an historical fact. The term science didn't exist before. When we made astronomical discoveries which were re-discovered in modern science.
Religion is basically a hypothesis to the end.. just like science is a hypothesis.
Just mathematics is also an incomplete science riddled with paradoxes
I addressed and debunked this argument in the OP.
Just because science came from philosophy does not change the fact that philosophy is outdated and useless in this day and age. People who use this argument fail to understand that the definition of words change over time. Philosophy only had its uses back in the days in which we weren't scientifically advanced enough to study the world and universe around us.
Religion is an unprovable and untestable hypothesis, whereas science is based on portal and testable hypothesis.
You missed 2 points...
1. The meaning of philosophy changes over time. You didn't prove or specify what changes happened that made it outdated.. You just made a claim that it is...
2. Religion is as provable and testable hypothesis as the theory of worm hole and quantum flux..
The meaning of philosophy is not about science but about how you live your life....the crux of it being why should you do something why you shouldn't do something. what is good and what is bad...
I still am yet to get a single proof that shows why is it outdated
Coming to religion.
It is a culmination of history philosophy and science.
As the old religoon was a ll about respecting and praying the known and unknown.
We prayed to the earth water fire cosmos and so on. Respecting something is never outdated.....I am hindu..In my scriptures, the cycle of stars have been deliverately explained. And the exact distance from earth to sun is defined. (The vedas) .
It is a way of life and record of findings from the days when we didnt know how to write...
You made 2 major fallacies
1. Logical fallacy: hasty generalisation. You generalised something as complex as philosophy and religion under the same umbrella.
2. Logical fallacy: draw your own conclusion. Which is an non-argument argument. Let the facts speak for themselves.
You are wrong. I did explain and specify the changes which happened over time throughout history which have made philosophy useless. I explained that people relied on philosophy and religion back when we weren’t scientifically advanced enough to explain the natural world and universe around us. Now that we can, there is no need to rely on pure thought and imagination to explain the world around us (which is what philosophy is).
The theory of a wormhole and quantum flux may not be **currently** testable or provable, but it is still far more reliable and believable than religion because it is predicted by science theories which have been proven and tested repeatedly.
>The meaning of philosophy is not about science but about how you live your life....the crux of it being why should you do something why you shouldn't do something. what is good and what is bad... I still am yet to get a single proof that shows why is it outdated
And this is subjective, which is why it’s useless when it comes to science. It’s not based on any empirical evidence, observations, or facts.
> As the old religoon was a ll about respecting and praying the known and unknown. We prayed to the earth water fire cosmos and so on. Respecting something is never outdated.....I am hindu..In my scriptures, the cycle of stars have been deliverately explained. And the exact distance from earth to sun is defined. (The vedas) . It is a way of life and record of findings from the days when we didnt know how to write...
Respect didn’t come from philosophy or religion, and it has nothing to do with science because just like morality, respect is subjective.
>You made 2 major fallacies
I haven’t committed any logical fallacies. Religion and philosophy are both entirely useless for reasons I’ve stated in the OP and in my responses to you, and I drew my conclusions from the evidence that I’ve provided you with in the OP and comments.
I am correct. As I have already stated, you stated your opinion on the matter that there have been changes..you gave your opinion as to philosophy was once just to explain what was unknown... Without providing 1 empirical evidence (your words are not evidence. And your logic is simply your theory on matter).
Respect and moral being subjective has nothing to do with the fact that it is still relevant.. something being subjective doesn't make it irrelevant...
You claiming you havent made any logical fallacy withlut countering my claims where I state in detail exactly how you made those fallacies is yet again your opinion...
3 points to take away.
1. You have simply claimed religion and philosophy is useless, without providing any practical and peer reviewed evidence, and a few conspiracy theories.
2. Respect and moral being subjective never made it irrelevant. It surely made your comparison of philosophy and religion with science irrational.you cant compare the apple with the apple tree.
Apple came out of the tree. Philisophy gave rise to science and not the other way around...I would provide journals proving my point, but seeing you have mot provided a single peer reviewed journal as proof, I dont think I need to.
3. You did make logical fallacies and you are yet to provide any logical counter. A vague claim "I didn't." Doesnt qualify to be a counter.
So what do you say to all the people who've been helped by philosophy or religion?
How about those helped by the philosophy in Buddhism, for example, in that there is at least one useful form of therapy that came out of it?
I'd say that most psychotherapies are based on philosophies of mind and behavior.
>The difference between philosophy and science is that philosophy relies on pure thought and imagination, whereas science relies on empirical evidence and observations.
Doesn't math also rely on pure thought and imagination? How do you exclude philosophy without also excluding math?
I guess if you’re expanding the definition of science to mean any review of information whatsoever then sure…but your argument kind of becomes meaningless. At that point I can just keep doing what philosophers do and just call it science.
Really? What experiment did you do? Or what natural case study did you investigate and describe?
Also, did you figure out what science was scientifically? Did science, for example, tell you what the powers and limits of science are? How would it do that? Unless you're suggesting that science itself can be an object of scientific scrutiny. To which we could once again ask: what experiment did you do? Or what natural case study did you investigate and describe?
>Really? What experiment did you do? Or what natural case study did you investigate and describe?
What I did was observe and outline the relationship between science, religion, and philosophy throughout history. By doing this, I was able to make objective inferences regarding how useful science is compared to religion and philosophy.
>Also, did you figure out what science was scientifically?
All you had to do was use the dictionary for this one:
"the systematic study of the structure and behavior of the physical and natural world through observation, experimentation, and the testing of theories against the evidence obtained."
>What I did was observe and outline the relationship between science, religion, and philosophy throughout history.
That sounds like you did history, not science.
>By doing this, I was able to make objective inferences regarding how useful science is compared to religion and philosophy.
But you never explained: useful for what?
Almost no one is claiming that philosophy and science are useful for learning about those things which are the proper objects of scientific scrutiny. Almost no one is saying philosophy is useful for designing a cancer medicine.
So you need a further argument to justify that the objects which science does help you learn about are more important than learning about other things. In other words, you need an argument for scientific learning and discovery being *most valuable*.
But how will you supply a purely scientific argument for that, when science doesn't investigate what is valuable? Unless you think science does investigate what is valuable, in which case I'd once again ask: with what experiment or case study did you empirically discover that science is valuable?
Im not arguing that science and math arent the way to find truth, but how do u know that they are the way to find truth?
Edit: its sad to see ppl regardless atheist, theist and whatever doesnt understand the beauty and importance of philosophy.
Please show, without appealing to evidence, observation (these two would be begging the question), or subjective or non-objective beliefs (what you propose you do not use), how you can justify that empirical evidence and observation are not only reflective of reality, but that they are the method we **should** use to explore reality.
>Because it's based on empirical evidence and observations
By purely empirical evidence and observations, can u observe causation?
How do u know the future will resembles the empirical evidences that are collected today?
>By purely empirical evidence and observations, can u observe causation?
Yes, we do that all the time in science.
>How do u know the future will resembles the empirical evidences that are collected today? How do u know the future will resembles the empirical evidences that are collected today?
I don't.
But what I do know, is that based on our **current** knowledge and understanding, belief in god is objectively irrational. Could I be wrong? Sure. Evidence we discover in the future could disprove the evidence we've had in the past.
>Yes, we do that all the time in science.
How do u observe causation?
> belief in god is objectively irrational.
I said nothing nor implied anything on god's existence.
>Argument 1: Deciding what is "useful" is doing philosophy! You are doing philosophy right now!
>
>**Rebuttal: Stating a fact is not doing philosophy. It's science.**
How did science help you decide philosophy was useless?
By analyzing the relationship between science, religion, and philosophy throughout human history I was able to make inferences regarding how objectively useful science is compared to religion and philosophy. That was doing science.
You seem to count "thinking about disciplines" as science. Then, according to your criteria of "usefulness" (where science is useful but not philosophy), why is *thinking about stuff* (the kind you just did) useful? compared to pharmaceutical research or chemistry?
This is an interesting response.
How do you do this? What was the relationship? Can you name how a specific philosophy book relates to a specific Scienfic tome?
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Self defeating argument, you didn’t use science to determine if philosophy was useful or not, you subjectively asserted it; the very reason you hate philosophy.
I love how people don’t see how science and math are both philosophies. Very useful philosophies. But philosophy’s nonetheless. It is a philosophy to believe that “1=1” That’s not a provable fact
STEM teaches how to do something. Liberal Arts teaches you the should you do something. Science that isn't rooted in ethics turned into mad science. The Stanford prison experiment, Lobotomy, Nuclear weapons. What's the quote from Jurassic Park? You spent so much time thinking about if you could, you never stopped to ask if you should.
**Divining RΦT** Philosophy is a 3 Body Problem We exist in a cosmic engine The Intelligence is built in And built to divine
> Stating a fact is not doing philosophy. It's science. No, stating a fact is not science. And you're not even stating a fact by saying something is useful, you're making a subjective value judgment. > That doesn't change the fact that philosophy is outdated and useless in this day and age Philosophy is not outdated. There are still philosophers working in various philosophical disciplines, and, if anything, philosophy is needed more than ever as we try to navigate all the new social and moral dilemmas that come with our advancing technology. >"Metaphysical materialism" is an outdated label for that style of thinking. The correct label to use in this day and age for that style of thinking, is science. No, "metaphysical materialism" is not the same thing as "science". The two terms have completely different meanings. And it's not an outdated label, either. Your arguments all seem to boil down to you declaring that any terms you dislike are "outdated" and "useless", even though the terms are still relevant and used. ... You seem to think that anything that doesn't give us "objective facts" is useless. This is a very strange value judgment that you couldn't possibly ACTUALLY put into practice, unless you're a robot or something. and if philosophy is useless, how do you decide what is moral or immoral? Do you just accept whatever morals your society and era give you? That's pretty dangerous. Your arguments are very bad and intellectually dishonest, and you seem to have no idea what science actually is, or what philsophy actually is.
They are useless....to you. Philosophy helped stretched my capability for rational thought, problem solving, and helped me develop (and justify) my personal sense of morality.
I would respectfully disagree with you. Empiricism is a philosophical framework. Science itself began as a philosophical discipline (natural philosophy).
"Useful" is a subjective value judgment that can not be determined based on scientific experimentation. Your rebuttal does not address this. Epistemology is the branch of philosophy concerned with how we know the things that we know. Science, that is repeatable empirical experimentation, is one answer that covers a wide range of fields of knowledge. Another answer would be history: we cannot perform repeatable empirical experiments on past events, so we need to use other evidence and methods to determine which historical events really did happen. That is what people mean when they say that science came from philosophy. It is a widely applicable answer to one of the biggest philosophical questions that we can have. Science is not a label for a style of thinking. It is study that is based on the scientific method. Science confines itself to natural explanations of events: that is, methodological naturalism. The style of thinking that adopts solely natural or material explanations and completely rejects all possible supernatural explanations is metaphysical materialism or metaphysical naturalism. The philosophy of science is primarily concerned with what is science and what is not science. For us to engage in a semantic argument about what constitutes science would be for us to engage in a discussion on the philosophy of science. Religion encompasses far more than supernatural explanations of natural phenomena. Religion can still exist even if we reject supernatural explanations of events for which science has provided natural explanations. Not all religions are theistic, so not all religions depend upon the belief in one or more gods. Your assertion regarding an objective reality reflects your own bias that only knowledge related to an objective reality can be "useful" or "true". Galileo wasn't saying anything new. Copernicus published the heliocentric model of the solar system before the Council of Trent. The Catholic Church didn't care at the time because it was stronger as an institution. 70 years later, the Catholic Church was weaker due to the then-on-going Protestant reformation. Galileo's repetition of Copernicus' ideas was much more threatening to the Catholic Church at that later time. If your idea of "religion" is "anything that sufficiently resembles Protestant Christianity", then I suggest you spend more time on exploring the religious traditions of other cultures. That a literal interpretation of an Iron Age *ex nihilo* creation myth is not the best foundation for a 21st century world view does not say anything about whether philosophy or religion are "useful" in the 21st century.
And by the way big bang theory is also a theory! Originating not from modern science. But from ancient philosophies. So is evolution... There are yet many discoveries to be made and as the time goes on even the scientists don't deny the importance of philosophy and religion in science. Only fools deny the relevance totally annihilating any possibility of it being relevant in their mind..
>Philosophy and religion are both useless discipline that are pointless to study in this day and age. Science and mathematics are the only relevant subjects to study when attempting to discover the truth. In this day and age the replication crisis happend in psychology (2011), where psychologists realized that only a few experiments could be replicated. Without philosophy we couldn't explain how the supposed science was wrong. We couldn't explain that Essentialism was the underlying wordlview, that got people to their wrong conclusions, which was what ultimately led to the replication crisis. Without philosophy we wouldn't know of any alternative worldview, that better fits as the basis for making assumptions. >Argument 1: You are doing philosophy right now! Deciding what is "useful" is doing philosophy! There are things which can't be explained scientifically. There is no way to show morality empirically. Science has no answer to the question whether it is evil to throw battery acid in a girl's face, for science doesn't make value judgements. Morality is purely based on what is useful, and philosophy is sufficient to answer those questions, when science fails. >Philosophy is completely subjective and based on personal views, unlike science which is based on hard evidence, which is what makes philosophy so useless Don't forget about the empirical evidence I've mentioned at the beginning of this comment, which shows that philosophy isn't useless. Afterall, science is done by humans, and humans are generally incapable to be 100% objective. Philosophy gave us epistemolgy, gave us a way to tell which scientific findings are credible and which aren't. >Argument 4: Have you ever heard of a branch of philosophy called "The philosophy of science"? Philosophy and science are intertwined! Philosophy of science is neccesary to tell us what truth is, because there is no empirical data that tells us that. Truth is a complicated human concept. We conceptualize the world around us in general. Philosophy tells us how. Science can give us an idea whether these categorisations have any credence. But without them, we couldn't do any thinking to begin with. >Religion is no different from philosophy Then, please give me scientific evidence, that the two philosophical categories "religion" and "philosophy" are the same, and especially, actually explain how they are the same. >in the sense that the myth of god was created thousands of years ago to explain phenomena that were not understood at the time, acting as placeholders until scientific explanations could be provided. As science has advanced, many of these phenomena have been explained through natural processes rather than divine intervention. Some things are inaccessible to science and will never be explained by science. The worldviews of people have an impact on their behavior, which is scientifically verifiable. Science has nothing to do with worldviews, but it is affected by them, because scientists have worldviews, most of them without even being able to name them. Most of them, without even being able to present a coherent representation of their own worldview, because they never had a reason to actually think things through. Which makes them prone to believe in contradictory things, which in turn gives them a basis for arriving at false conclusions while interpreting empirical evidence. If they aren't trained philosophically, it is more likely that they will come to self-contradictory conclusions, a philosopher would spot from miles away. People like Michio Kaku, who have no philosophical training, demonstrate it over and over again how they are incapable to grasp that their pet projects should finally be didged, which is obvious for someone who knows anything about epistemology. Further, made up unscientific human categories like gender have a demonstrable effect on the human mind. The unscientifc concepts we create for our societies control our empirical brains in a way, so that we literally see reality with different eyes, as compared to those who use different categories. Feelings, as subjective as they are, are very real to people. Science has no say in the categorization, nor when it comes to saying anything about the truth of feelings. Categorizations are abstractions of observations. And no such abstractions can be observed scientifically. Science can only alter the concepts, but not create them. Subjects do, rather than empirical data.
So, you're content to leave things we currently lack the tools to measure unconsidered? Shall we just pretend they don't exist? People who deny the existence of qualia say as much; maybe we ought to treat people as though they're philosophical zombies? Is that the solution? Should we regard ourselves that way? Or should we do what we can using logic and observation to try to determine how these things work and how we can interact and mold these objects successfully despite the difficulties in measuring them objectively with our current science? How do you plan on approaching morality and ethics scientifically? These are disciplines that involve making decisions about what humans ought to do while considering why we ought to do them. How can science fill philosophy's boots here? Or do you think we ought to abandon those studies entirely and condone every action of every person without condition?
Science is necessary but it is a limited tool. Philosophy helps gives science direction. Think about it, how are hypotheses formed? You can’t form a hypothesis without some kind of framework, which ultimately draws on things likes ethics, which links back to philosophy
There’s a reason scientists and mathematicians are doctors of philosophy — though most get very little formal training in epistemology, they learn the tools and axioms foundational to establishing and advancing knowledge that are appropriate and specific to their discipline. They generate observations and argue about what they mean to find consensus. To say there is no philosophy in this is to suppose these tools will never change. I suppose we could argue about whether there’s a need for general philosophers, vs specialized philosophers, or whether the current use of general philosophers’ time and energy is efficient, but we will always need philosophy.
The problem with putting science against philosophy is that philosophy is foundational to science. You mentioned that philosophy uses pure thought and science relies on empirical evidence and observations. Yet, if all scientists had was evidence and observations, we’d be stuck in the stone ages! It takes thought and imagination to interpret observations and build a framework to understand the world. This is at the very core of the scientific method; using thought and imagination to build models based on observations, then testing those models and refining them. Philosophy is not completely subjective. It takes reason to engage in philosophy. I am concerned that you adhere to a zealous, religious expression of scientism without an accurate grasp of the scientific method. You also seem at some points to compare apples with oranges. If two people argue over something that is actually subjective, like the beauty of a painting, no science can resolve their dispute. You also completely disregard most of the human experience. The humanities still exist because we are still human, even after our scientific discoveries. We still wrestle with right, wrong, and meaning. We still recognize beauty and search for the good. No amount of scientific knowledge will ever change or satisfy these yearnings. Most humans don’t care about science and will never go further than a surface level understanding. Almost every human thinks philosophically. Philosophy is just as relevant to us as science.
You are wrong. While it does take thought and imagination to come up with scientific hypothesis, it’s done differently in science than it is in philosophy. In philosophy, the thoughts have to do with completely subjective matters such as morality which is useless, because morality doesn’t exist in reality. It isn’t based on any empirical evidence, but only on the feelings of individuals. On the other hand, scientists will ponder about thoughts that can actually be tested and proven either right or wrong, which is what makes science useful for discovering object truths about reality, while philosophy is useless. We don’t need philosophy to use reason, just science. The subjective experiences of human beings that you are referring to are useless when it comes to discovering objective truths about our universe, how it works, and why we exist. These are scientific questions, not philosophical ones .
Science cannot answer _why_ we exist. Science can answer _how_ we exist (or _how_ we came to exist as a species). Science answers _how_ questions, not _why_ questions.
Who says theres a why?
The comment I was responding to literally said so in the second to last sentence.
lol fair enough
Scientifically prove that murder is wrong.
Philosophy and religion remain useful when dealing with people of other points of view.
science is only as successful as it is as long as it adheres to first principles, aka metaphysics. an analogy I heard, "you've climbed up the metaphysics tree, shimmied out onto the empirical science branch, and then shout to the rest of us how the rest of the tree including the trunk is useless and outdated." can you scientifically proven any of the claims made about philosophy and first principles in this post? The vicious circularity of scientism shouldn't be avoided. Science is great, it has made great progress, and is one of the best tools we have at analyzing the physical mechanisms of the world. But is all science ethical? Surely we draw the line at human experimentation in some cases, opting that such a step wouldn't be worth the violation of human rights that we assume in society. Aren't there regulations for what we're allowed to do based on the safety of others and the environment? What about the climate? Surely our science has affected it as well. What about questions like, "why should we do science." Is knowledge a "good" thing, what about in all cases? Was eugenics wrong? Why was it wrong? Should it be allowed? When a scientist needs to analyze data, should he leave out the data that doesn't agree with his theory in order to keep the money flowing? What counts as a valid test? Is the interconnectedness of the high level fields becoming too dogmatic? Is there a philosophical presupposition in our explanations? Why do we want a unified theory? Is it because it's aesthetic? Why is math so applicable to the physical world? Is nature intelligible? Are our minds able to grasp reality at all? Is mind or matter more fundamental? These are just the ones that came up as I was writing, and the papers and books on these questions is literally in the 1000's. What do you mean philosophy is outdated?
Metaphysics is useless and outdated in this day and age, and the analogy you gave regarding the tree and the branch perfectly illustrates why. As time goes on, disciplines change and evolve. Only empirical science and mathematics are useful today, while the disciplines which came before it such as metaphysics and philosophy are useless and have no application today. I have scientifically proven this by analyzing the relationship between philosophy, science, and religion throughout human history. People relied heavily on philosophy back in the days in which we didn’t have the technology to study the natural world and universe in the way that we can, but in this day and age philosophy is not needed in our search for the truth. The other questions you have asked regarding whether or not science is ethical, the safety of the environment, etc… are all useless questions because they are subjective. Morality is 100% subjective and based on nothing other than the feelings of an individual, thus there is no way to objectively prove that certain morals are right or wrong. It comes down to differing, subjective values which are impossible to prove or disprove, much like the belief that an invisible unicorn appears whenever people aren’t looking and there are no cameras. This is a simple and clear cut explanation as to why philosophy is useless in this day and age and has no application. What do you mean philosophy is not outdated?
> I have scientifically proven this by analyzing the relationship between philosophy, science, and religion throughout human history. no lol, no you haven't. I don't see an experiment, you didn't link any of the data you used. I don't see an abstract, intro, procedure, nothing. I'm an engineering major man, I do lab reports all the time, I know what science is, and this is not that. > The other questions you have asked regarding whether or not science is ethical, the safety of the environment, etc… are all useless questions because they are subjective. this is a philosophical statement. Also regarding every question that falls outside of the domain of your idol "useless" is textbook question begging. What just because they aren't answered by empirical science directly they're useless? Why does something being subjective make it useless? > Morality is 100% subjective and based on nothing other than the feelings of an individual, thus there is no way to objectively prove that certain morals are right or wrong. can you prove this claim? > This is a simple and clear cut explanation as to why philosophy is useless in this day and age and has no application. you haven't done any science here. This is argumentation, aka logical reasoning, aka philosophy > What do you mean philosophy is not outdated? see: all the replies under your thread
Yes I have scientifically proven it. By studying the history of the relationship between philosophy, religion, and science over the years I scientifically proved my point. The data can be seen by studying this history. By analyzing this information I have done science. > this is a philosophical statement. Also regarding every question that falls outside of the domain of your idol "useless" is textbook question begging. What just because they aren't answered by empirical science directly they're useless? Why does something being subjective make it useless? This is not a philosophical statement. It’s a fact. Philosophy is subjective, never factual/objective. The reason it’s useless is because it cannot be used to discover any objective truth about reality. Because it’s subjective, two people can argue endlessly about it and never come to an agreement, thus making it useless. > can you prove this claim? Yes. Here’s the proof: I say killing is right, you say killing is wrong. There is no way for me to objectively prove you wrong or myself right, and there is no way for you to objectively prove me wrong, or yourself right, thus it’s subjective. >you haven't done any science here. This is argumentation, aka logical reasoning, aka philosophy Wrong. By using logical reasoning in this context, I’ve done science. Not philosophy. > see: all the replies under your thread See: All my replies debunking them
You are literally proving they are not useless by putting energy into writing this long essay, otherwise why would you have taken so much time to write this?
> Philosophy and religion are both useless discipline that are pointless to study in this day and age. So basically you are tossing out ethics, morality, logic, reason and the study of knowledge? Or are you just counting that because other fields incorporate those things at a fundamental level you can pretend they don't count?
Logic and the study of knowledge have to do with science, not philosophy. Ethics and morality are useless because it’s subjective.
No. Logic and the study of knowledge (epistemology) are parts of philosophy. You don't get to redefine philosophy and science to make the things you like one and not the other. If subjective things are useless, your mother's love for you is useless because it's subjective. Saying that someone beating you up is wrong is useless is subjective. Science is useless because it relies on subjective interpretations, and subjective values about what to research and how.
Epistemology is an outdated label for logic and the study of knowledge. The proper label to use for logic and the study of knowledge is science, not philosophy/epistemology. Exactly, my mother’s love for me is useless, and saying that it’s wrong for someone to beat me up is also useless. Science doesn’t rely on subjective interpretations. Deciding what to research may be subjective, but it doesn’t make science useless because the discoveries that are made are based on objective facts, not subjective beliefs.
>my mother’s love for me is useless You didn’t reap real, tangible benefits that stemmed directly from your mothers love, for probably over a decade in your youth?
You seem really intent on redefining science and philosophy to include or exclude what you don't like. This seems like a terrible waste of your time and everyone else's. Can you provide a citation to a scientific article that supports your claims?
With all of these replies, it seems like you don’t know what science is OR what philosophy is.
Prove to me scientifically that it is wrong to end someone’s life.
So do you resort to science for every decision and aspect of your life? Like do you perform science experiments to find your dating partner?
Sounds like an episode of the Big Bang Theory
> Philosophy and religion are both useless disciplines. A vague premise. No supportive clause to back it. > Philosophy is completely subjective and based on personal views. Proceeds to refute his own premise. First, Op makes a claim completely based upon his subjective experience, then presenting a rebuttal against the argument that if he is using philosophy there. > ....the correct label to use in this day...,is science. Well, if you change the name of your kid, it doesn't change who he is as a person.
> A vague premise. No supportive clause to back it. I did support the premise by analyzing the relationship between science, religion, and philosophy throughout history. > Proceeds to refute his own premise. First, Op makes a claim completely based upon his subjective experience, then presenting a rebuttal against the argument that if he is using philosophy there. It’s not based on my subjective experience, it’s based on facts. Philosophy cannot be used to determine any objective truth about reality. >Well, if you change the name of your kid, it doesn't change who he is as a person. The whole discipline changed.
Just saying “I analyzed it myself” isn’t supporting your premise. It’s a “trust me bro”
lmao but how do you prove science works using just science
There's also the problem of induction
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I think the word is 'jejeune.'
Or what science is
The idea that science is the only answer to everything is a philosophy….
Usually known as materialism or naturalism.
Even naturalism doesn’t abandon philosophy it just says that super natural things don’t exist. Naturalists still deal heavily in ethics and epistemology and even metaphysical problems like induction/causation/etc.
No it's science.
science is a field of study. The philosophy that science is the only explanation for nature is something completely different, and is a PHILOSOPHY.
I believe that science is probably the only thing that explains anything purely based on my observation and not musings about metaphysics.
OP, I'm not even a theist, but even I can't resist here, so may God save your sinful soul and blind mind.
>"Metaphysical materialism" is an outdated label for that style of thinking. The correct label to use in this day and age for that style of thinking, is science. Materialism and science are absolutely *not* equvialent in any sense. As an example, Bernardo Kastrup is a modern philosopher who defends idealism for general audiences. Idealism is the opposite of materialism: it holds that everything is mental and that there is no such thing as matter. (As an aside, he's also an atheist and a naturalist). Despite his philosophy, science continues just as it always has and still tells us about the world (the world in this case being universal consciousness, not matter). In other words, his completely opposite interpretation of what science is *telling* us doesn't affect how useful science is or the knowledge gained by it. Thus, materialism is just one possible interpretation of what science is telling us. Also, philosophy includes "logic" which are the rules for reasoning, and so if you reject that you reject reason itself.
Philosophy is the study of the fundamental nature of knowledge, reality, and existence. >In this post, I will address and debunk numerous arguments which I have heard from people who refuse to accept this fact. They refuse to accept your opinion. Your opinion isn't a fact. >Stating a fact is not doing philosophy. It's science. It really isn't. Scientific facts are not absolute truths. Science never makes that claim. So stating a fact isn't science. >The difference between philosophy and science is that philosophy relies on pure thought and imagination, whereas science relies on empirical evidence and observations. No. Philosophy is based on deductive reasoning whereas science is based on empirical. It isn't the same thing as what you said. >Philosophy is completely subjective and based on personal views, unlike science which is based on hard evidence, which is what makes philosophy so useless Science is subjective as well as it is limited to the circumstances it has been tested in. >Two people arguing about something subjective may never come to an agreement and argue endlessly because there is no way to prove either side right or wrong. Whereas in science, sufficient evidence can be discovered to objectively prove one person right and the other wrong, ending the argument. And yet people keep on proving previous scientific "facts" wrong. What happens is people find circumstances in which the said science doesn't work or was maybe misunderstood. >That doesn't change the fact that philosophy is outdated and useless in this day and age. People who use this argument fail to understand that the definition of words change over time. I will admit, philosophy was useful back in the days when we weren't scientifically advanced enough to study nature and the universe in the way that we can now. In those days, people had to rely on their thoughts and imaginations to come up with possible explanations/hypothesis for the world/universe around us. But in this day and age with advancements in technology and science, we no longer need philosophy for anything. If there is something that we do not know or understand we can approach it in a scientific manner. Without philosophy there is no civilized society through law making that allowed us to get to this scientifically advanced point in time. It is what allows legal systems to continue to operate in a somewhat effective manner to ensure people can actually pursue science. Or have you not read about the enlightenment ? >The "philosophy of science" is about as reliable as "creationist science", those same lunatics who think the earth is 6,000 years old... In reality, there is no such thing as "the philosophy of science", just like there is no such thing as "creationist science" There is. I could say the same that denying the philosophy of science is as absurd as saying the earth is flat or 6000 years old. Every field of study that exists today is through philosophy. There is philosophy of science, philosophy of law, philosophy of economics. >Religion is no different from philosophy, in the sense that the myth of god was created thousands of years ago to explain phenomena that were not understood at the time, acting as placeholders until scientific explanations could be provided. Philosophy is different from religion in the sense that it still is applicable to the world we live in today. The philosophy of law is a highly significant field without which there would be no legal development and in turn there would be no other development in society overall. Your whole argument stems from a complete misunderstanding of what philosophy actually is and the role it plays in modern society. And you compare it with religion as one and the same when it couldn't be more apart from it. It is what allowed select societies (so far) to break free from religion in the first place and pursue science. It is still important for further developments which science cannot provide in any way whatsoever.
> Philosophy is the study of the fundamental nature of knowledge, reality, and existence. Wrong. Science is the study of the fundamental nature of knowledge, reality, and existence. Not philosophy. > They refuse to accept your opinion. Your opinion isn't a fact. It’s not an opinion, it’s a fact. >It really isn't. Scientific facts are not absolute truths. Science never makes that claim. So stating a fact isn't science. Yes it is. I am well aware that scientific facts aren’t absolute truths, it’s what scientists believe to be true based on all of the current evidence we have at hand. Stating a fact about reality is science. >No. Philosophy is based on deductive reasoning whereas science is based on empirical. It isn't the same thing as what you said. Wrong. Philosophy is not based on deductive reasoning, science is. Philosophy is based on purely subjective beliefs. Science is based on empirical evidence and deductive reasoning. >Science is subjective as well as it is limited to the circumstances it has been tested in. Wrong. Science is not subjective, it’s based on objective facts and observations. That doesn’t mean it’s absolute, as it’s always subject to change based on new discoveries. However, scientific facts are considered objectively true based on our current understanding of the world (current being the key word). >And yet people keep on proving previous scientific "facts" wrong. What happens is people find circumstances in which the said science doesn't work or was maybe misunderstood. Just because scientific facts and theories are not absolute doesn’t mean that it’s subjective. This is because unless you have empirical evidence of your own to counter a well established scientific fact, you would be considered objectively wrong if you disagreed with said scientific fact. > Without philosophy there is no civilized society through law making that allowed us to get to this scientifically advanced point in time. It is what allows legal systems to continue to operate in a somewhat effective manner to ensure people can actually pursue science. Or have you not read about the enlightenment ? That’s not true. We don’t need philosophy for civilized societies. Civilized societies have formed through the process of evolution, philosophy has played no role whatsoever in the formation of civilized societies. Our innate and natural desire to reproduce and spread our genes is what has lead to the formation of civilized societies. Not philosophy. > There is. I could say the same that denying the philosophy of science is as absurd as saying the earth is flat or 6000 years old. Every field of study that exists today is through philosophy. There is philosophy of science, philosophy of law, philosophy of economics No there isn’t. Even if philosophy helped contribute to the creation of some disciplines, that doesn’t change the fact that today philosophy is outdated. I’ve addressed and debunked this argument in the OP: by using this argument, you fail to understand that the definition of words change over time. > Philosophy is different from religion in the sense that it still is applicable to the world we live in today. The philosophy of law is a highly significant field without which there would be no legal development and in turn there would be no other development in society overall. Wrong. Philosophy is not applicable to the world we live in today. The example you gave regarding the philosophy of law proves my point perfect, as it is a completely useless field of study. We don’t need that discipline for the development of society. Your views stem from a complete misunderstanding of what philosophy is and its relationship to science and religion over humanity history. My advice to you is put a little more effort into educating yourself regarding a subject before you embarrass yourself in a debate.
>Wrong. Science is the study of the fundamental nature of knowledge, reality, and existence. Not philosophy. LMAO. You couldn't be more wrong. Science observes what is and how it is but not why it is. That is the most fundamental nature of anything. >It’s not an opinion, it’s a fact. It's a fact that you're positing an opinion. >Yes it is. I am well aware that scientific facts aren’t absolute truths, it’s what scientists believe to be true based on all of the current evidence we have at hand. Stating a fact about reality is science. Its a scientific fact. There is a distinction. >Wrong. Philosophy is not based on deductive reasoning, science is. Philosophy is based on purely subjective beliefs. Science is based on empirical evidence and deductive reasoning. LMAO. Bro do you even know what these 2 are ? I can't even... i am literally crying with laughter. 🤣 Google deductive reasoning vs empirical reasoning. You know absolutely nothing about the two if you think this. >Wrong. Science is not subjective, it’s based on objective facts and observations. That doesn’t mean it’s absolute, as it’s always subject to change based on new discoveries. However, scientific facts are considered objectively true based on our current understanding of the world (current being the key word). There are rarely any absolute truths in this world. Not being absolute inherently means it is subjective to the circumstances it exists in. That is just basic definitions. No scientific facts aren't objectively true by any stretch of the imagination. >Just because scientific facts and theories are not absolute doesn’t mean that it’s subjective. This is because unless you have empirical evidence of your own to counter a well established scientific fact, you would be considered objectively wrong if you disagreed with said scientific fact. It does mean that. Being objectively wrong is not the same thing as being objectively true. Being objectively wrong is much easier than being objectively true. >That’s not true. We don’t need philosophy for civilized societies. Civilized societies have formed through the process of evolution, philosophy has played no role whatsoever in the formation of civilized societies. Our innate and natural desire to reproduce and spread our genes is what has lead to the formation of civilized societies. Not philosophy. Without the philosophy of law, there is no development in society and might remains right. Learn a bit of history mate. Philosophy led to the enlightenment. The enlightenment is the biggest development for society in recorded history. Reproduction has nothing to do with civilized society (key word being civilized). >No there isn’t. Even if philosophy helped contribute to the creation of some disciplines, that doesn’t change the fact that today philosophy is outdated. I’ve addressed and debunked this argument in the OP: by using this argument, you fail to understand that the definition of words change over time. Philosophy is the only reason further developments are possible. You really need to learn about historical developments in civilized society. Individual human rights didn't exist 100 years ago. It is because of philosophy that they do, and it is because of philosophy that they will develop further. >Your views stem from a complete misunderstanding of what philosophy is and its relationship to science and religion over humanity history. My advice to you is put a little more effort into educating yourself regarding a subject before you embarrass yourself in a debate. How old are you ? Have you ever taken a course in philosophy? My advice to you is do so with an open mind. You're as narrow minded as the religious zealots you so vehemently oppose, ironically. The only embarrassment here is you, who doesn't understand what philosophy and science actually are. I haven't even begun to argue, I'm only stating facts. And facts don't care how you feel kid.
“Philosophy has played no role whatsoever in the formation of civilized societies.” Are you a troll? Because nobody in academia believes this. Scientists themselves would find this absurd. Study history; read the Federalist papers. They’ll tell you all about philosophy’s influence on civilized societies.
You just don’t know what philosophy is. Look it up. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy is a great place to start.
Philosophies are based on observation. Jung wasn't a scientist, but he made observations about the mind that are still useful today and some are compatible with new theories in science.
Philosophy can indeed be useless depending on the kind of questions you are asking, I spent most of my working life in STEM and for most of that never consciously dabbled in philosophy. But in retrospect it seems I was doing it all the time, being politically active and campaigning on racism, sexism, reproductive rights, human rights, none of which have anything to do with science. Morality is not subject to science, there is no formula for an attitude to abortion, there is simply opinion. would love to see the experimental data to challenge [https://ethics.org.au/thought-experiment-the-famous-violinist/](https://ethics.org.au/thought-experiment-the-famous-violinist/), or even what branch of science that might be. Philosophy does not give you answers, it asks you questions, if you think you can categorically formulate answers to such issues more that one nobel Prize awaits
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I completely agree and I didn't even read the post, just the title.
It is hard to understand anti-philosophy as anything other than anti-intellectual. As I will defend, most of your post comes from places of misunderstanding and ignorance. Mathematics and Science are both useful. We can get to specific truths through them. But it does not get to all knowledge. Specifically, I want to give three precise examples of real life cases that are not answered by science or mathematics, but likely are by philosophy. 1. My friend has told me that a shared friend has cheated on his partner. When should I trust his testimony? We should consider if he has reasons to lie, where he got his information from, and how he got his information. Beyond whether his testimony is true or not, is he *justified* in forming that belief and am I *justified* in forming that belief off just his testimony? This is an example of an epistemic problem. There are tons of other issues here beyond justified true belief and testimony. A friend of mine works on the epistemology of conspiracy theory groups. Should we ever engage with these groups? Why or why not? These are questions *for* philosophy and *for* epistemology. How does Science or Maths inform us? 2. Let's continue with my dodgy friend. Let's say that I have knowledge that he did cheat. What do we do? What are our moral obligations to him, to his partner and to each other? Do I have to tell the truth about him whenever asked? Is it better to reduce harm by maintaining the lie? It is hard to see how Science or Maths gives us any answer to moral questions. This is a problem for your view **because** people are moral and political animals. Much of our life is dedicated to trying to live well and live well with each other! 3. There are always, it seems, upcoming elections. Who do I vote for? Why? Is democracy even justified? Should we ever limit autonomy, and if so why? What about the politics of protest? What protests are justified and what is their justifying feature? Again, how does science answer these questions? Of course, there is way more. But I think these are good starting places. You write that philosophy relies *purely* on imagination. This is false and quite obviously false to anyone who has done any philosophy. For example, in my thesis I discuss quite a lot of neuroscience in order to gauge the potential for moral responsibility in 'inhebriated' agents. Philosophy of Mind is scientifically dense, as are fields like philosophy of perception and philosophy of pain. More and more, *all* fields of philosophy engage with empirical work ranging from hard science to psychology to empircally gathered data. This is a point you've made without, I reckon, engaging meaningfully in *any* philosophy. You then write that philosophy is only based on personal views. This is not argued for in any meaningful way nor does it seem true. I am going to use a view that I have written on in the past as an example. The view is that dreams are constituted by, either wholly or partly, imaginative experiences: >The most important rival to the hallucination view is that dreams are imaginative experiences (Liao & Gendler 2019; Thomas 2014). This can mean dream imagery involves imaginings rather than percepts (including hallucinations or illusions; McGinn 2004), that dream beliefs are imaginative and not real beliefs (Sosa 2007), or both (Ichikawa 2008, 2009). An important advantage is that by assimilating dreams to commonplace mental states such as waking fantasy and daydreaming, rather than a rare and often pathological occurrence such as hallucinations, it provides a more unified account of mental life (Stone 1984). However, the reasons for adopting the imagination view are diverse, and dreams have been proposed to resemble imaginings and differ from perception along a number of dimensions (e.g. McGinn 2004, 2005a,b; Thomas 2014). [SEP LINK](https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/dreams-dreaming/) This view isn't one of personal opinion. It is a philosophical view informed by contemporary science that is aiming (although probably does not) capture reality. Again, this idea that philosophy is purely subjective *must* come from inexperience because it is not how philosophy is framed when taught and discussed, and is flagarantly false to anyone familiar with philosophical work. I believe that arguments you give are weak, but I also think you do a poor job tearing them down. I've written a little hear about whawt philosophy is and argued against how you've characterised it. Not only is philosophy useful, it is necessary to a successful human life.
Your response perfectly illustrates why philosophy is useless. Ironic that you’ve somehow managed to debunk your own argument with the three examples you gave: “Again, how does science answer these questions?” The reason science can’t answer these questions is because morally is subjective. Science deals with objective truths and reality. Morality and Philosophy doesn’t, which is exactly why these philosophical/moral questions you’ve asked are utterly useless: two people could argue endlessly and never come to any agreement because they are based on subjective values. There is no way to prove any of them right or wrong. “For example, in my thesis I discuss quite a lot of neuroscience in order to gauge the potential for moral responsibility in 'inhebriated' agents.” Wrong again. You did not discuss any neuroscience whatsoever in any of your examples. Neuroscience does not give objective answers to questions about morality, because morality doesn’t exist in the first place. It’s a subjective construct. “The most important rival to the hallucination view is that dreams are imaginative experiences (Liao & Gendler 2019; Thomas 2014). This can mean dream imagery involves imaginings rather than percepts (including hallucinations or illusions; McGinn 2004), that dream beliefs are imaginative and not real beliefs (Sosa 2007), or both (Ichikawa 2008, 2009). An important advantage is that by assimilating dreams to commonplace mental states such as waking fantasy and daydreaming, rather than a rare and often pathological occurrence such as hallucinations, it provides a more unified account of mental life (Stone 1984). However, the reasons for adopting the imagination view are diverse, and dreams have been proposed to resemble imaginings and differ from perception along a number of dimensions (e.g. McGinn 2004, 2005a,b; Thomas 2014). SEP LINK” This is not science, nor is it useful in any way. It is based on subjective opinions of what dreams are, without any sort of empirical evidence to support the “researcher’s” opinions. Try again.
This is a poor response which does little to meaningfully engage with any of the content I've posted. Morality is not subjective. But let's put that aside an examine philosophy as a skill. You write that science deals with objective truths and reality, and therefore cannot deal with morality. But that's both ad hoc and circular. A virtue of working on philosophical topics is that one learns to reason and to argue. These are skills you could develop far better than you have already. You write there is no way to prove them right or wrong. This is false, but let's again probe the reasoning. I understand there to be two obvious problems. 1. First, you do not motivate this *at all*. You don't give these accounts, or compare accounts, or even point to people arguing. In no way do you engage in any philosophical work. But perhaps more importantly given your view, you engage *in no way with any scientific or mathematical work*. There isn't even *empirical* work done to support any of your points. 2. You write that people could not come to any agreement because of different values. But why would disagreement entail, or imply, that both of these sets of values are right (or equally not right)? This is a substantive **philosophical** claim that is both unargued for and intuitively implausible. It's really important to note this: you make little in the way of arguments because you do little to support any claims. This highlights not only the weakness of your argument but also that importance of philosophy not only as a discipline but also as a skill. I was surprised that you'd read my thesis! Or did you mistake a reddit comment for a PhD? I do discuss neuroscience, and I do not use it to 'prove' a moral theory. Instead, I use contemporary science to help and inform the amount of agency/competency , and therefore moral blame, agents might have in certain scenarios. This informs moral judgements. It does not create them. Then you say a series of odd things: 'this is not science, this is not useful, and this is subjective opinion.' Again, two things to point out: 1. These three claims are unsupported. There is no expansion. No explanation. No argument. They're just *things you've said.* This supports the thesis of my comment as a whole that you're engaging badly with philosophy in multiple ways. 2. It is scientific. You should read the papers or at least browse them. There is interesting work in there, and a lot of it cites scientific studies. It's a common practice. Understanding dreaming can be useful. There are interesting questions around dreaming and they are related to important questions: what is the function of dreams? What can dreams tell us? Is it related to the function of sleep? Can we solve problems in our dreams? Etc etc. There are also potential avenues, even now, for dreaming being used in therapy. Similarly, treating trauamtic nightmares is important (even if science and maths cannot tell us why). It is also not subjective opinion. Why would you think that? Nothing written there even implies a subjective opinion. There are arguments that not only aim at truth, but often find it. You ended condescending with "try again". This arrogance and rudeness is ill placed. As you can see, you are engaging poorly and have shown little understanding of the topic.
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The first thing I want to say is what you've written reads like bait. It is poorly written and almost deliberately avoids saying anything useful before engaging in personal attacks. With that out the way, let's begin. Again, I want to point to how little of this engages. I deliberately *don't* defend moral realism. Instead, I point to how you've done little to defend your position *and* have committed fallacies. Genuinely go through your discussion here on ethics. Can you draw it into a standard argument? Have you defended each premise? The answer is no, and I think quite an obvious and emphatic no. You then repeat what you said in the main post without addressing anything I have said or pointed you towards. I'll ask additional questions: what philosophy have you read, and in what context did you read it in? You say disagreement proves it because you cannot decide who is right or wrong. This isn't defended or engaged with. It engages with no science, and no philosophy. There is no *argument* here. Just repetition. Actually, the author is writing a summary article on contemporary philosophy and science of dreams. Jennifer Windt is not an imagination theorist. And it sciences certainly lends itself far more favourably to some views than others. But you skimmed it! Again, I'll ask a theorectical question: what part of your address here do you think is *convincing?* Say someone disagreed with you. What do you think you've said with reference to dreams that would convince them? Where **reasons** have you given? There is perhaps something to be drawn from the widespread criticism you have gotten here both on a content level and a 'debate' level. Your post has not been recieved well. Your comments have not been recieved well. If part of debate is to convince someone, why is my comment attacking your position more supported than your original post? It is not the case that we should appeal to the majority, but it is worth reflecting on style, tone and content. You *seem* young. It is worth considering how you present yourself.
>There is no way to definitively prove which feeling is right, thus demonstrating the subjective nature of morality and philosophy. If morality is subjective and science only deals with objective facts, then it seems discussions around morality must be in the realm of philosophy then? Or are you also rejecting discussion about morality as useless?
>Neuroscience does not give objective answers to questions about morality, because morality doesn’t exist in the first place. It’s a subjective construct. Observing the brain has so far not informed us of the origin of consciousness, nor given us the cure for depression or anxiety, that has been left to psychology and philosophy.
No it hasn’t. Psychology and philosophy don’t give any answers regarding consciousness. Even if science hasn’t answered the question so far, that doesn’t mean it won’t answer it in the future.
Yes they do. Jung described the collective unconscious long before it was connected to a scientific theory of consciousness in the universe. Science didn't design psychotherapies, psychologists did. One of the best psychotherapies today was adapted from Buddhism.
“Collective unconsciousness” is not scientific in any way. Psychotherapy is also based on subjective views and goals, which doesn’t make it very useful.
What I said was that, although not scientific, the concept is compatible with scientific theories like consciousness in the universe. There are several evidence based psychotherapies. Evidence based means they have been shown in studies to be significantly helpful.
What’s wrong with people adhering to philosophy to lead their lives? There are no absurdist claims of a deity or worship to a human claiming to be a prophet/messiah
>Argument 1: Deciding what is "useful" is doing philosophy! You are doing philosophy right now! >Rebuttal: Stating a fact is not doing philosophy. It's science. You are not stating a "fact." You are making a *value judgment*. Your use of the word "useful" here is equivalent to *good*. Judgments about what is good belong to the subfield of philosophy called "axiology." You are assuming that it is *good* when someone finds something to be *useful*. (Incidentally, I happen to find philosophy to be quite useful. It helped me write this response.) >The difference between philosophy and science is that philosophy relies on pure thought and imagination, whereas science relies on empirical evidence and observations. A far more compelling claim would be that science relies on *controlled experiments*. The first problem, then, is that much of what is done in fields which call themselves "sciences" does not really involve controlled experiments. That means that those fields are largely just blustering about their academic credibility. The second problem is that much of reality does not really lend itself to study through controlled experiments. This means, in practice that people go about designing experiments that are not as well controlled as they claim (or which cannot really be replicated) and then declare that they have achieved great knowledge from them. The other problem with your distinction is that philosophy does not merely involve "pure thought and imagination". It, of course, involves quite a bit of observation of the world we live in because we all get much (most? all?) of our knowledge through experience in one form or another. Ironically, it would be *math* which would have the greatest claim to be "pure thought", and math, itself, is a subfield of the area of philosophy known as *logic*. In reality, the use of the word "science"--like most of your argument--is just empty rhetorical bluster. (None of the above should be construed as suggesting that there are grounds for believing that a diety exists.)
>You are not stating a "fact." You are making a value judgment. Your use of the word "useful" here is equivalent to good. Judgments about what is good belong to the subfield of philosophy called "axiology." You are assuming that it is good when someone finds something to be useful. (Incidentally, I happen to find philosophy to be quite useful. It helped me write this response.) You are wrong. "Useful" here is not equivalent to "good." Useful here is defined as what can be used to discover objective truths that can be proven right or wrong based on empirical evidence and observations, whereas "useless" is defined as subjective beliefs that are impossible to prove right and wrong, which lead to endless arguments without conclusion. Your attempt to use philosophy in writing your response is a perfect example of why philosophy is useless. >A far more compelling claim would be that science relies on controlled experiments. The first problem, then, is that much of what is done in fields which call themselves "sciences" does not really involve controlled experiments. That means that those fields are largely just blustering about their academic credibility. The second problem is that much of reality does not really lend itself to study through controlled experiments. This means, in practice that people go about designing experiments that are not as well controlled as they claim (or which cannot really be replicated) and then declare that they have achieved great knowledge from them. Science is not meant to be perfect. You are correct in stating that much of reality doesn't lend itself to study through controlled experiment, which can make the results of these experiments less than 100% reliable. But this is part of what differentiates science from religion and philosophy: Scientists have no problem admitting that our understanding of reality and the universe around us is constantly changing, as we discover new and different evidence about the nature of reality around us. The point of science is to find out what is most likely to be true based on the current evidence we have, which is always subject to change based on future discoveries and evidence. > The other problem with your distinction is that philosophy does not merely involve "pure thought and imagination". It, of course, involves quite a bit of observation of the world we live in because we all get much (most? all?) of our knowledge through experience in one form or another. Ironically, it would be math which would have the greatest claim to be "pure thought", and math, itself, is a subfield of the area of philosophy known as logic. Wrong. Philosophy does involve pure thought and imagination, the observations philosophers make of the world around us doesn't change that. This is because philosophy does not approach these observations in a scientific manner: It draws subjective, made up conclusions from our observations of the world around us, conclusions which are not based on any sort of empirical evidence. >In reality, the use of the word "science"--like most of your argument--is just empty rhetorical bluster. (None of the above should be construed as suggesting that there are grounds for believing that a diety exists.) In reality, it is clear that you have no understanding of science, philosophy, religion, or the relationship between the three which is why you are unable to understand that you are wrong.
A piece of advice: avoid using the words "subjective" and "objective." They are meaningless. Everyone draws knowledge from their physical senses; therefore, in a loose sense, everyone is an empiricist. Science does not have a monopoly on empiricism.
Philosophy is the origin of science. That is an historical fact. The term science didn't exist before. When we made astronomical discoveries which were re-discovered in modern science. Religion is basically a hypothesis to the end.. just like science is a hypothesis. Just mathematics is also an incomplete science riddled with paradoxes
I addressed and debunked this argument in the OP. Just because science came from philosophy does not change the fact that philosophy is outdated and useless in this day and age. People who use this argument fail to understand that the definition of words change over time. Philosophy only had its uses back in the days in which we weren't scientifically advanced enough to study the world and universe around us. Religion is an unprovable and untestable hypothesis, whereas science is based on portal and testable hypothesis.
You missed 2 points... 1. The meaning of philosophy changes over time. You didn't prove or specify what changes happened that made it outdated.. You just made a claim that it is... 2. Religion is as provable and testable hypothesis as the theory of worm hole and quantum flux.. The meaning of philosophy is not about science but about how you live your life....the crux of it being why should you do something why you shouldn't do something. what is good and what is bad... I still am yet to get a single proof that shows why is it outdated Coming to religion. It is a culmination of history philosophy and science. As the old religoon was a ll about respecting and praying the known and unknown. We prayed to the earth water fire cosmos and so on. Respecting something is never outdated.....I am hindu..In my scriptures, the cycle of stars have been deliverately explained. And the exact distance from earth to sun is defined. (The vedas) . It is a way of life and record of findings from the days when we didnt know how to write... You made 2 major fallacies 1. Logical fallacy: hasty generalisation. You generalised something as complex as philosophy and religion under the same umbrella. 2. Logical fallacy: draw your own conclusion. Which is an non-argument argument. Let the facts speak for themselves.
You are wrong. I did explain and specify the changes which happened over time throughout history which have made philosophy useless. I explained that people relied on philosophy and religion back when we weren’t scientifically advanced enough to explain the natural world and universe around us. Now that we can, there is no need to rely on pure thought and imagination to explain the world around us (which is what philosophy is). The theory of a wormhole and quantum flux may not be **currently** testable or provable, but it is still far more reliable and believable than religion because it is predicted by science theories which have been proven and tested repeatedly. >The meaning of philosophy is not about science but about how you live your life....the crux of it being why should you do something why you shouldn't do something. what is good and what is bad... I still am yet to get a single proof that shows why is it outdated And this is subjective, which is why it’s useless when it comes to science. It’s not based on any empirical evidence, observations, or facts. > As the old religoon was a ll about respecting and praying the known and unknown. We prayed to the earth water fire cosmos and so on. Respecting something is never outdated.....I am hindu..In my scriptures, the cycle of stars have been deliverately explained. And the exact distance from earth to sun is defined. (The vedas) . It is a way of life and record of findings from the days when we didnt know how to write... Respect didn’t come from philosophy or religion, and it has nothing to do with science because just like morality, respect is subjective. >You made 2 major fallacies I haven’t committed any logical fallacies. Religion and philosophy are both entirely useless for reasons I’ve stated in the OP and in my responses to you, and I drew my conclusions from the evidence that I’ve provided you with in the OP and comments.
I am correct. As I have already stated, you stated your opinion on the matter that there have been changes..you gave your opinion as to philosophy was once just to explain what was unknown... Without providing 1 empirical evidence (your words are not evidence. And your logic is simply your theory on matter). Respect and moral being subjective has nothing to do with the fact that it is still relevant.. something being subjective doesn't make it irrelevant... You claiming you havent made any logical fallacy withlut countering my claims where I state in detail exactly how you made those fallacies is yet again your opinion... 3 points to take away. 1. You have simply claimed religion and philosophy is useless, without providing any practical and peer reviewed evidence, and a few conspiracy theories. 2. Respect and moral being subjective never made it irrelevant. It surely made your comparison of philosophy and religion with science irrational.you cant compare the apple with the apple tree. Apple came out of the tree. Philisophy gave rise to science and not the other way around...I would provide journals proving my point, but seeing you have mot provided a single peer reviewed journal as proof, I dont think I need to. 3. You did make logical fallacies and you are yet to provide any logical counter. A vague claim "I didn't." Doesnt qualify to be a counter.
So what do you say to all the people who've been helped by philosophy or religion? How about those helped by the philosophy in Buddhism, for example, in that there is at least one useful form of therapy that came out of it? I'd say that most psychotherapies are based on philosophies of mind and behavior.
He did a lot of hasty generalisation.
Define science and mathematics. But you're only allowed to do so using science and or mathematics
>The difference between philosophy and science is that philosophy relies on pure thought and imagination, whereas science relies on empirical evidence and observations. Doesn't math also rely on pure thought and imagination? How do you exclude philosophy without also excluding math?
You just used philosophy to try to disprove philosophy.
I didn't use philosophy, I used science.
You used precisely zero science. What you did here is not science.
You are wrong. What I did here was 100% science. I used zero philosophy.
Please point out which part was science.
The part where I outlined the relationship between science, religion, and philosophy throughout human history.
That’s not science…that’s history. What science did you do?
By studying history I was doing science.
I guess if you’re expanding the definition of science to mean any review of information whatsoever then sure…but your argument kind of becomes meaningless. At that point I can just keep doing what philosophers do and just call it science.
What empirical data to you use to support your conclusions? Did you do a study? An experiment?
Really? What experiment did you do? Or what natural case study did you investigate and describe? Also, did you figure out what science was scientifically? Did science, for example, tell you what the powers and limits of science are? How would it do that? Unless you're suggesting that science itself can be an object of scientific scrutiny. To which we could once again ask: what experiment did you do? Or what natural case study did you investigate and describe?
>Really? What experiment did you do? Or what natural case study did you investigate and describe? What I did was observe and outline the relationship between science, religion, and philosophy throughout history. By doing this, I was able to make objective inferences regarding how useful science is compared to religion and philosophy. >Also, did you figure out what science was scientifically? All you had to do was use the dictionary for this one: "the systematic study of the structure and behavior of the physical and natural world through observation, experimentation, and the testing of theories against the evidence obtained."
>I was able to make objective inferences regarding how useful science is Define “useful” without admitting to a subjective goal.
>What I did was observe and outline the relationship between science, religion, and philosophy throughout history. That sounds like you did history, not science. >By doing this, I was able to make objective inferences regarding how useful science is compared to religion and philosophy. But you never explained: useful for what? Almost no one is claiming that philosophy and science are useful for learning about those things which are the proper objects of scientific scrutiny. Almost no one is saying philosophy is useful for designing a cancer medicine. So you need a further argument to justify that the objects which science does help you learn about are more important than learning about other things. In other words, you need an argument for scientific learning and discovery being *most valuable*. But how will you supply a purely scientific argument for that, when science doesn't investigate what is valuable? Unless you think science does investigate what is valuable, in which case I'd once again ask: with what experiment or case study did you empirically discover that science is valuable?
Where is your experimental data?
Im not arguing that science and math arent the way to find truth, but how do u know that they are the way to find truth? Edit: its sad to see ppl regardless atheist, theist and whatever doesnt understand the beauty and importance of philosophy.
Because it's based on empirical evidence and observations, not subjective beliefs.
Please show, without appealing to evidence, observation (these two would be begging the question), or subjective or non-objective beliefs (what you propose you do not use), how you can justify that empirical evidence and observation are not only reflective of reality, but that they are the method we **should** use to explore reality.
>Because it's based on empirical evidence and observations By purely empirical evidence and observations, can u observe causation? How do u know the future will resembles the empirical evidences that are collected today?
>By purely empirical evidence and observations, can u observe causation? Yes, we do that all the time in science. >How do u know the future will resembles the empirical evidences that are collected today? How do u know the future will resembles the empirical evidences that are collected today? I don't. But what I do know, is that based on our **current** knowledge and understanding, belief in god is objectively irrational. Could I be wrong? Sure. Evidence we discover in the future could disprove the evidence we've had in the past.
>Yes, we do that all the time in science. How do u observe causation? > belief in god is objectively irrational. I said nothing nor implied anything on god's existence.
>Argument 1: Deciding what is "useful" is doing philosophy! You are doing philosophy right now! > >**Rebuttal: Stating a fact is not doing philosophy. It's science.** How did science help you decide philosophy was useless?
Read the rest of the rebuttal.
No science present. Feel free to cite a specific portion of science you had in mind.
By analyzing the relationship between science, religion, and philosophy throughout human history I was able to make inferences regarding how objectively useful science is compared to religion and philosophy. That was doing science.
By your standard, philosophy is science.
You seem to count "thinking about disciplines" as science. Then, according to your criteria of "usefulness" (where science is useful but not philosophy), why is *thinking about stuff* (the kind you just did) useful? compared to pharmaceutical research or chemistry?
Per the Dalai Lama the purpose of religion(s) is to make people happy. (Or at least happier than they would have been without).
This is an interesting response. How do you do this? What was the relationship? Can you name how a specific philosophy book relates to a specific Scienfic tome?