Philosophy: books and discussion

[WT Sharpe]

Originally Posted by FlorenceArt

In that view, the subject that has most of my attention lately is the subject of desire.

Common wisdom, in this early 21st Century, is that the way to be happy is to pursue the object of your desire until you achieve it, after which you will live happily ever after. This is a theory that is especially dear to the Hollywood school of thought.

I believe it's an extremely dangerous illusion.

In Seneca's Letters to Lucilius, there is a passage that I can no longer find but that I quoted somewhere in this thread. It says, in effect, that it is not the absence of means, but a surplus of desire, which constitutes poverty.

This was a widespread belief among philosophers at the time of Seneca, a belief that is shared by epicureans, stoics and others (Lucilius is an epicurean, and Seneca is trying to lure him to stoicism, and in the first letters he starts by emphasizing the common ground between the two schools, and he often cites Epicurus).

I think it's very true, although, not being a Roman, I cannot share the idea that if I just stare at my desires sternly for long enough I will conquer them and be happy. Or rather, I don't have the guts to try it for the rest of my life. It might work, but it would be a rather painful journey. My personal approach would be closer to Zen philosophy (what I know of it), and to practices such as meditation.

Someone who taught me a lot about desire is (again) René Girard, in his book "Things Hidden Since the Foundation of the World". And he also pointed me in the direction of Marcel Proust, who probably knew more than anyone about desire, its illusions and disillusions.

Epicureans have received a bad rap (although certainly not from you, my friend). While it's true that they advocated pleasure as the highest goal, it is not to not to be confused with the "If it feels good, do it," mentality of popular culture. They considered the pleasures of the mind to be the most rewarding, and in seeking those pleasures, they were no so far removed from the stoics. It was their belief that living an honorable life while seeking intellectual pursuits was the best way to achieve a fulfilling life and lasting pleasure. I agree with you that simply seeking the object of your desire until you achieve it in hopes that this will lead to happily-ever-after results is a dangerous delusion. We see it every day in those who have accrued all the physical possessions one could possibly desire but are but empty shells emotionally.

[recluse]

If I may:
I think I understand this. It is part of what I am trying to figure out for myself.
It seems that a certain dangerous school of thought has gained popularity of late. One I believe is summed up by Aleister Crowley "Do what thou wilt is the extent of the Law" ( close enough ).
To me, it is antiphilosophy, base impulse, not thought.
To be blunt: sociopathic thinking.
I am a little shocked that there is no real attention paid to this, I see the race to "tear down" religious institutions and moral codes as a symptom of this thinking and a harbinger of worse to come.

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by recluse

... I see the race to "tear down" religious institutions and moral codes as a symptom of this thinking and a harbinger of worse to come.

Hmmmm, very interesting....I'm all for tearing down religious institutions, but don't feel that is connected to the loss of moral codes. Now I know some people think morals only come from religion, but I disagree vehemently with that belief. Do you actually link the two or was that just an accident of statement?

[FlorenceArt]

You know, I thought I was starting a thread about philosophy. I wish we could move away from religion from time to time, but I suppose that's not going to happen.

Originally Posted by recluse

If I may:
I think I understand this. It is part of what I am trying to figure out for myself.
It seems that a certain dangerous school of thought has gained popularity of late. One I believe is summed up by Aleister Crowley "Do what thou wilt is the extent of the Law" ( close enough ).
To me, it is antiphilosophy, base impulse, not thought.
To be blunt: sociopathic thinking.
I am a little shocked that there is no real attention paid to this, I see the race to "tear down" religious institutions and moral codes as a symptom of this thinking and a harbinger of worse to come.

This is most emphatically not what I was talking about, but let me try to answer it.

I agree with Kenny, we don't need religion to have ethics. Religious institutions (like all human institutions I suppose) have had their share of horrors, and some of them continue to encourage criminal acts. Maybe part of the problem we have now, is that we cannot clearly separate ethics from religion, and as one becomes more fragmented and less powerful (in the sense that not one Church has the monopoly on salvation), we feel we have nothing to turn to to rule our social behavior.

But we do. For millenniums, we have been slowly building set of rules. They are called laws. They are no longer supposedly of divine origin, but they are what our democratically elected representatives agree should rule our lives. I can live with that. And I wish that we (in France at least) had a little more respect for them, even if we sometimes don't agree with them.

Have to go to work now. More about desire later I hope...

[recluse]

Forgive me.
Sometimes my thoughts get ahead of me and my words come out incorrectly.
I was asking about the philosophy of ethics and morals.
I was raised Catholic and sometimes can't escape the scars.
I believe humanity was meant to reach for something greater, a higher level of understanding. To evolve away from the beast within. I wanted to know if there is any thought given to the sociopathic thinking that is spreading today. Contemporary ethics. I am sorry for the misunderstanding.

[TimMason]

Intuition works, in my opinion, only for the mind prepared by facts. We may gain insights from dreams or eureka moments, but only if the gray cells been fed the information upon which to to work and seek connections, even if that work and those connections have been processed without out conscious awareness.

I'm not sure what your argument is here. It seems as if you are saying that knowledge is either scientific, accidental, or intuitive. Is that right? If it is your position, then I have to differ. The knowledge that the Australian desert dweller had of the land, of the seasons, of the animals (including humans) that lived upon it was rich, integrated, conceptualized quite as rigourously as scientific knowledge. It stood the test of time, and it was flexible enough to stand the tests that changing conditions demanded, even surviving the upheavals occasioned by the English invasion and occupation. Similar stories can be told about the San of southern Africa, or the peoples of the frozen North.

My arguments are close to those of Feyerabend, who argued that science was simply one way of knowing among many, and, moreover, that it should be a little more modest about its pretensions. I would not go that far: most of the scientists I have met have been quite modest men and women (far more so than, say, literary critics, or philsophers), and are mainly interested in their specific field of research. (Those who step outside their playground in their later careers are referred to, sardonically, as 'going emeritus', the feeling being that once they reach that stage, no-one should take any more notice of them than they do of any other duffer with a bee in the bonnet).

But some scientists - Richard Dawkins would be an example - seem to go emeritus prematurely, and are then apt to make claims for "the scientific method" that it simply was not designed to carry. For one thing, there is no single 'scientific method'; the sciences may, as Wittgenstein might have put it, bear a family resemblance to one another, but do not lend themselves to one overarching and constraining definition. Meterology is other than particle physics, and both are other than psychology, which, in turn, should not really be confused with evolutionary biology.

Similarly, the sciences may enter into competition with myth - over questions such as the age of the earth, for example. But it does not replace it, or fulfill the same functions. As Winch concluded, talking about the Azande, there are other ways of knowing, which cannot be measured in the lab.

[TimMason]

I wanted to know if there is any thought given to the sociopathic thinking that is spreading today.

Sociopathic thinking is hardly new. In fact, it has accompanied the history of our species virtually from the beginning, and, by some arguments, lies at the very roots of our civilizations. Have a look at Keith Otterbein's 'How War Began.' The historical sociologist, Michael Mann, sees it as one of our most crucial questions to work out how it was that history ceased to be the story of thugs and thieves, and that only very recently indeed.

Was it not one of the greatest minds the world has ever known, Mel Brooks, who defined a philosopher as "a bullshit artist"?

Probably true of many philosophers. But without philosophy, no science. Without science, no internet. And without internet, maybe I'd actually get something done.

[FlorenceArt]

Originally Posted by recluse

I believe humanity was meant to reach for something greater, a higher level of understanding. To evolve away from the beast within. I wanted to know if there is any thought given to the sociopathic thinking that is spreading today. Contemporary ethics. I am sorry for the misunderstanding.

I don't believe humanity is meant for anything, and I also don't believe in the beast within, as opposed to a higher state of humanity. We are animals. Social animals with a sense of ethics and a yearning for the spiritual. It is how we have evolved. I don't know if we will keep evolving biologically, I don't think it is very likely in the present circumstances. But we keep evolving culturally. The difference about cultural evolution is that it creates its own environment, instead of only adapting to it. I think that some of the mechanics of biological evolution also apply to cultural evolution, but the general dynamic seems more complex to me.

Sociopathic thinking? This seems a bit harsh. I do think we have gone too far in individualistic thinking, and in the frantic search for happiness. This creates a lot of tensions because it comes in conflict with two basic facts.

We are a social animal, everything we have and a lot of what we are is based on this. And sometimes the needs, real or perceived, of the individual conflict with the needs of society, or simply of other individuals. We cannot (and we don't, really, although there is a tendency toward this) put the individual before the collective at all costs and at all times, because if you follow this logic to its end, it is the end of humanity.

The second tension brings us back to desire, and the Hollywood school of thought, which would have us believe that we have a right to be happy, all the time. And maybe even a duty to be happy. Not being happy is not being normal. Obviously, this clashes very harshly with reality and creates terrible tensions. And this is where I believe a practice like meditation can help immensely.

Unfortunately I don't really feel qualified to say much more about this, but I would encourage you to try it for yourself. As I mentioned, I read a book called Meditation for dummies, which is not perfect but a very good start I believe.

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by TimMason

I'm not sure what your argument is here. It seems as if you are saying that knowledge is either scientific, accidental, or intuitive. .....


The knowledge that the Australian desert dweller had of the land, of the seasons, of the animals (including humans) that lived upon it was rich, integrated, conceptualized quite as rigourously as scientific knowledge. ....

My arguments are close to those of Feyerabend, who argued that science was simply one way of knowing among many.....

But some scientists - Richard Dawkins would be an example - seem to go emeritus prematurely, and are then apt to make claims for "the scientific method" that it simply was not designed to carry. For one thing, there is no single 'scientific method'; the sciences may, as Wittgenstein might have put it, bear a family resemblance to one another, but do not lend themselves to one overarching and constraining definition. Meterology is other than particle physics, and both are other than psychology, which, in turn, should not really be confused with evolutionary biology.

Similarly, the sciences may enter into competition with myth - over questions such as the age of the earth, for example. But it does not replace it, or fulfill the same functions. As Winch concluded, talking about the Azande, there are other ways of knowing, which cannot be measured in the lab.

Umm.....I'm pretty much in extreme disagreement with most of this.

First there are not "different kinds of knowledge." Maybe you are defining knowledge different than me.

From http://www.merriam-webster.com/netdict/knowledge :
"2 a (1) : the fact or condition of knowing something with familiarity gained through experience or association (2) : acquaintance with or understanding of a science, art, or technique b (1) : the fact or condition of being aware of something (2) : the range of one's information or understanding <answered to the best of my knowledge> c : the circumstance or condition of apprehending truth or fact through reasoning : cognition d : the fact or condition of having information or of being learned <a person of unusual knowledge>"


I come back to what appears to be your confusing knowledge with the method of obtaining it. They are different things.

The thing a primitive tribesman knows (his knowledge) are obtained very much through interaction with his environment in quite often a scientific manner. Because of the way our minds and bodies work we apply this method without even realizing it. We formulate a hypothesis, we test it and if it give the results we want then we catalog it as knowledge to be used for the future. If the test fails we go back and try something else. Even babies do this. This is the core of the scientific method, this is logic and reasoning.

I don't know Feyerabend but as above there are not multiple kinds of knowledge, there may be multiple ways of obtaining knowledge (or what we believe is knowledge) but knowledge is knowledge. It is something know that we (believe) will help us in interacting with our environment.

There is only ONE scientific method. Again you seem to be confusing practice with theory. The Scientific method goes thus:

1. Create a falsifiable hypothesis based on experience or existing knowledge
2. Design a repeatable, replicable experiment to test the hypothesis
3. If the hypothesis passes the test (and is repeatable and replicable) it is deemed to be true and is now a theory describing the particular behavior or activity etc.
If the hypothesis fails the test then it's back to step 1.

Science and myth are not in competition. Myth is not knowledge, it is fiction. There may be elements of science at the basis of myth or there may not be.
Myth may be a way of communicating, but it is not and should not be considered knowledge per se.

It is very important to separate truth - scientific truth from fiction. Myth is fiction, science is truth as best we know it based on logic and reason.

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by TimMason

... But without philosophy, no science. Without science, no internet. And without internet, maybe I'd actually get something done.

Damn philosophers, wasting my time on the interwebs!

[GeoffC]

oh blame someone !

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by GeoffC

oh blame someone !

[beppe]

Originally Posted by kennyc

There is only ONE scientific method. Again you seem to be confusing practice with theory. The Scientific method goes thus:

1. Create a falsifiable hypothesis based on experience or existing knowledge
2. Design a repeatable, replicable experiment to test the hypothesis
3. If the hypothesis passes the test (and is repeatable and replicable) it is deemed to be true and is now a theory describing the particular behavior or activity etc.
If the hypothesis fails the test then it's back to step 1.

Dear friend Kenny,
lets put some pepper into the discussion. (Vinegar?) Of the several objections that come to my mind I will choose step 3 in your very clear statement.

To perform the test one has to measure the discrepancies between the observations of the experiment and the consequences of the hypothesis.
(I use these 3 names so that I can address them simply. Their meaning should be obvious and undisputed, being contained in your statement).

A) To obtain the discrepancies you have to build some generalized comparing procedure, algorithm, call it whatever you want but you need it, and you need to define it very clearly. You see, comparing 3 with 1.7 is quite easy: the algebraic discrepancy is just the difference 3 - 1.7 = 1.3 But then somebody jumps up and say. Nah, I do not like algebraic discrepancies, positive and negative compensates. Use least squares. And other one objects, nahhh it is too smooth and it is fragile versus outliers. Use something more robust. and on and on. Of course the actual discrepancy you get it depends on how you build it. There goes objectivity. There enters black magic.
B) then you have to perform a measure of the discrepancies. That is reduce an entity that can be quite complicate to a number, a number that will be used in the test. Oh, here things start to get very complicated, and again quite open to any bending for devious purposes.
C) the test. Ah,Ah. Every head is own test. Parametric, non parametric,...

So maybe your spiel should not be taken literally, nor in a strict sense?
Aha!

This was nasty enough.

I have worst things to say about other points.

I am going to have my lunch.

[TGS]

Originally Posted by kennyc

Umm.....I'm pretty much in extreme disagreement with most of this.

First there are not "different kinds of knowledge." Maybe you are defining knowledge different than me.

Even within "scientific" psychology there is a distinction between declarative knowledge and procedural knowledge - "knowing that" as distinct from "knowing how". The common example is riding a bike. One might know a lot about physics and bodies in motion and that sort of thing without being able to ride a bike, on the other hand one may be able to ride a bike without knowing anything about physics.

It may be that most of out knowledge is procedural - certainly infants seem to know a lot but it is unlikely that they have much declarative knowledge. People who are very good at what would appear to be activities that seem almost entirely intellectual - based on declarative knowledge, chess experts and mathematicians for example - often report that they just "see" solutions and only later apply their declarative knowledge in order to explain what the have seen. Our language use is another example - it is perfectly possible to make well-formed English sentences without knowing anything about subjects, verbs and subject-verb agreement.

This may be apocryphal, but apparently cows know how to cure headaches - by drinking water near willow trees which contains salicylic acid - aspirin - it's unlikely though that they know anything declarative about willow trees, aspirin, or even headaches.

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by beppe

.

To perform the test one has to measure the discrepancies between the observations of the experiment and the consequences of the hypothesis.
.....
B) then you have to perform a measure of the discrepancies. ....


So maybe your spiel should not be taken literally, nor in a strict sense?
Aha!


I have worst things to say about other points.

Um, I guess I should have mentioned "measurable" certainly things must be measurable to make a determination of any kind.

An yes it is to be taken literally. Science is the basis of all truth we know. Anything else is speculation, imagination, fiction.

Please feel free to say worse things.

I can't always say things the best way, but I keep trying. The fact is that everything humanity has achieved is due to our rational scientific approach to interacting with our environment.