As a philosophy major (or, rather, a hope-to-be philosophy major -- I won't
formally apply to the department until next year), I was interested by your
comments about philosophy. I think you may be under some serious
misapprehensions on some points.
>"Two comments. Your use of the term 'philosophical quagmire' appears to be a
>pejorative. Maybe you don't mean it that way though. Do you eschew all
>philosophical discussions?"
>
>No of course not. But philosphy excells when it deals with subjects that
>have no basis in physical reality.
Not necessarily. Philosophy may deal with physical reality. It simply is
not necessarily *limited* to it. Some philosophers -- metaphysical
naturalists -- actually deal exclusively with physical reality, and their
practices are very close to science. W.V.O. Quine, for example. And then
there's the fact that there is philosophy *of science*. Philosophy is not
to be seen as a type of inquiry which simply picks up where science leaves
off; it is the most general kind of inquiry, and in fact *encapsulates*
science.
>Remember the "pink elephant" syllogism?
>It goes:
>
>All elephants are pink;
>Nellie is an elephant,
>Therefore Nellie is pink.
>
>If you tell this to a philosopher, he would ask you to defend your premise
>that all elephants are pink. If you can do that, then he will accept it,
>even though there is no such thing as pink elephants.
What? Premise (1) is true if and only if all elephants are pink. If there
are no pink elephants, them premise (1) is untrue. This is no different
for the philosopher than it is for the scientist.
>If, however, if you
>tell this to a scientist, he would ask you to provide evidence that pink
>elephants exist.
As would a philosopher. This is what it means to "defend a premise". It's
worthwhile to remember that philosophers concern themselves with two
matters when examining arguments:
1) Logical form. Is the argument deductively valid, or inductively cogent?
Do its premises and conclusion relate to each other in the proper way?
2) Rationality. Are the premises themselves true, or likely to be true?
Ought we believe them?
Your pink elephant example does satisfy (1), since it is deductively valid
(i.e., it is such that, if all the premises are true, the conclusion would
be necessarily true). But it does not satisfy (2) unless the arguer could
present a convincing case that all elephants really were pink.
>If you can't, he won't accept it no matter how flawlessly
>logical your argument is; if you try to use philosophical arguments he will
>reject them.
Again, the flawlessness of the *logic* in an argument is not the only
concern for philosophers. Suppose we liken an argument to a building.
Logic is analogous to the form and design of the building; rationality is
analogous to the material the building is made of. Just as a building, in
order to remain standing, must have *both* proper design and the right
materials, a correct philosophical argument must be both logically
constructed *and* appeal to rational premises.
>The reason is very simple: pink elephants do not exist in
>reality. Science can only deal with what can be tested against physical,
>whereas philosophy routinely deals with what cannot be tested against
>physical reality.
Philosophy is still concerned with what really is the case. If pink
elephants do not exist, then your "pink elephant syllogism" is not
satisfactory for *either* a philosopher or a scientist. Why would you
think your pink elephant example *would* be satisfactory for philosophers?
Do you think philosophy is content with false arguments?
>As such, whenever philosophy tries to describe physical
>reality the results are often more comical then enlightening. The pink
>elephant syllogism is one example of this; so is Hegel's essay on planets.
I think you are simply wrong here. Philosophy can certainly describe
physical reality! The difference between science and philosophy is not
that science deals with only physical reality and philosophy deals with ony
nonphysical reality. The difference is in the methodology. Science is
methodological naturalism, where empirical theories are made based on
empirical data. Philosophy is more wide-ranging, allowing empirical
evidence, exercises in pure logic, etc. Science is (IMO, anyways) limited
to the natural realm; philosophy may inquire into the natural or
supernatural with equal validity.
Philosophical claims may even include scientific ones; for example, some
indeterminists use aspects of Quantum Theory in order to argue for their
claim. And science is most certainly based on philosophy. Without
philosophy, the results of science would be meaningless as regards truth.
For example, how would scientific observation be of any use, without the
philosophical premise that observation puts us in contact with an objective
external reality?
>In 1800, Hegel published a thesis that proved, in essence, that while the
>definition of planets has changed since ancient times, there still could
>only be philosophically seven planets. As Jacob Bronowski observed in his
>lecture "Knowledge or Certainty", Gauss (who detested Hegel) answered him in
>the same way that Shakespeare had a couple of hundred years before. In
>"King Lear", the Fool asks the King why there are only sevens planets. The
>King answers, "Because they are not eight." To which the Fool replied,
>"Yes, indeed, thou woulds't make a good fool." And so did Hegel, because
>January 1st, 1801, the discovery of Ceres as the eighth planet was
>announced. Of course, we now know that Ceres is an asteroid, but the later
>discovdery of Uranus, Neptune and Pluto would have shown Hegel to be a fool
>just as effectively.
How does this impact on the nature of philosophy in general? At one point
in the history of science, Lamarck thought that, if someone lost an arm,
that characteristic could be passed on to the next generation. Therefore,
the proper realm of science is to make silly claims. Surely you don't
agree with that conclusion; therefore, you can see why I don't agree with
your conclusion about philosophy.
Now, regarding Hegel specifically, I think you may actually be incorrect in
describing his views. The Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy has this to say:
". . . the false view that Hegel thought that he could prove *a priori*
that there are seven planets arises from misunderstanding the last chapter
of this work."
I haven't read *De Orbitis Planetarium* myself. But if you want to use
that example, you might want to give the issue a second look.
>As Bronowski pointed out, however, (he happily admitted sharing Gauss'
>loathing for Hegel) the real problem is philosophers who believe (like
>Hegel) that they have a road to knowledge more perfect than that of
>observation.
Absolutely, many philosophers do believe this. And there *is* potentially
a better road to knowledge than observation: pure logic. Now, it is
arguable whether exercises in pure logic can ever produce knowledge. For
example, I do not believe the Ontological Argument for God, in any of its
many variants, succeeds in establishing the existence of God as a purely
analytic truth.
Why is pure logic a potentially better road to truth than observation?
Because observation is necessarily *inductive* in nature. That is, no
matter how many times you can observe something, the most this can justify
is that it is *likely* to be true. You can observe light going at the same
speed a hundred times... a thousand... a million; but you cannot state with
deductive certainty that it always travels at the same speed. (This is not
to say that it is unreasonable to believe that light always travels at the
same speed. Of course it is a reasonable belief. But it is not a 100%
deductively-provable belief, nonetheless.)
>Most philosophers realize the sheer arrogance of this as well
>and stick to topics that do not require a test in physical reality.
Yes, many philosophers are skeptical of whether pure logic is ever
possible. But this does not make them "stick to topics that do not require
a test in physical reality". It simply means that they establish their
views about reality -- physical or otherwise -- with arguments which are
ultimately grounded in either evidence or irreducible epistemic foundations.
>But
>there are still those who believe that there is way to acquire perfect
>knowledge that bypasses science.
I would say that is a bit misleading. Science is best regarded not as
something wholly different from philosophical inquiry, but rather a very
specialized kind of philosophical inquiry: empirical & naturalistic
inquiry. Philosophy can, and often does, try to acquire knowledge by
*using* the results of science... just as science itself is ultimately
based on foundations of philosophy.
>This current discussion about abiogenesis
>reminds me of that attitude. Abiogenesis is a scientific concept, not a
>philosophical one. It is testable against physical reality.
Both science or philosophy may address abiogenesis. Science would address
it from the viewpoint of whether there is testable, falsifiable evidence
for it. Philosophy could examine it from that viewpoint, or others. For
example, philosophy might instead examine whether abiogenesis is a
logically consistent or meaningful concept.
>Therefore both
>historical abiogenesis (what you call abiogenesis(1)) and abiogenetic
>mechanisms (what you call abiogenesis(2)) will be verified or refuted by
>science, not philosophy. Your attempts to force this issue into a
>philosophical mold, while understandable (at least you had the courage to
>admit the truth) will succeed no better than Hegel's.
I think the problem is that you hold the layman's view of philosophy. For
many people -- and this often goes double for scientists -- philosophy is
seen as some loose, wishy-washy version of science, where strict testing
and theorization is replaced by a bunch of hippies in a field pontificating
about the meaning of daffodils. I cannot stress my disagreement with this
enough. It is important to remember that the things we now regard as
science are *offshoots of philosophy*. Physics, for example -- the
"hardest" of all sciences -- was originally deemed *natural philosophy*.
Newton deemed it such in the title of his famous work. To invalidate
philosophy is to invalidate the origins and epistemological foundations of
science as well.
It's worth restating: philosophy and science are not complete separate
disciplines. They intertwine, sometimes inextricably. This is precisely
why it is so difficult to find a precise demarcation between philosophy and
science.
Since you have the Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy, look up the definition
of "philosophy" itself. You will see there some of the things I've been
going on about.
Regards,
Mike Hardie
<hardie@globalserve.net>
http://www.globalserve.net/~hardie/dv/