The Future of Philosophy in Society

[urangutan]

Aedes, you are like Jack the Ripper and Hannibal Lecter all tied up into one. I do like your bedside manner. Nice one and nice work, although, it could be argued on your last point, that the roll of the dice can be dealt by a philosopher, even though they didn't make the dice. Ever felt as though you have satisfied ones curiosity just by being there.

[boagie]

Aedes,

I think your a little biased here, are you saying philosophy does not generate new influential ideas, what about Gandhi being influenced by Thoreau on civil disobedience? Dawin though quite distanced the idea seems to have been introduced in the golden age of Greece. What about social Dawinism. In fact is not science itself the child of philosophy. John Lock had no influence upon the politics of nations? I have not reseached this but ideas seem to be the bread and butter of politics in general, and if politicans do not get their ideas from philosophy where indeed do they get them, are they generated in the market place?

[midas77]

Originally Posted by Aedes

Philosophy doesn't change society. It simply comments about society. Never (at least in modernity) has a biologist or physicist changed a line of inquiry because of a philosopher's suggestion. Never has the human mind changed its conception of good and bad because of a philosopher. It's always the other way around -- what science suggests provokes philosophical interest, and what humans consider good and bad provokes philosophical interest.

So insofar as society will always be dynamic, there will always be things to philosophize about.

Confucious' teaching dominates Chinese Society for centuries.

Constitutional Government is based on the Social Contact Theory. The Division of Government power into executive, legislative and Judiciary sprouts from Lockes' Idea.

[Zetetic11235]

Aedes, I don't know why I put John Stuart Mill I was indeed thinking of John Locke. While the reference to Locke's ideology was prompted by practical need, it still shaped the methods of government used to form this country, and don't think the founding fathers were not all very well read in philosophy and do not think that the writings of philosophers did not shape their worldview.

Also, do you really think Lenin was only paying lip sevice to marx? He seemed pretty sincere about his belief in the marxist doctrines. I think you might have him confused with stalin, who indeed twisted the doctrine to his likeing. Lenin, however, had a pretty short reign and seems to me quite the opposite of Joseph Stalin, observe a short speech against anti-semitism from lenin:
"The Tsarist police, in alliance with the landowners and the capitalists, organized pogroms against the Jews. The landowners and capitalists tried to divert the hatred of the workers and peasants who were tortured by want against the Jews. … Only the most ignorant and downtrodden people can believe the lies and slander that are spread about the Jews. … It is not the Jews who are the enemies of the working people. The enemies of the workers are the capitalists of all countries. Among the Jews there are working people, and they form the majority. They are our brothers, who, like us, are oppressed by capital; they are our comrades in the struggle for socialism. Among the Jews there are kulaks, exploiters and capitalists, just as there are among the Russians, and among people of all nations… Rich Jews, like rich Russians, and the rich in all countries, are in alliance to oppress, crush, rob and disunite the workers… Shame on accursed Tsarism which tortured and persecuted the Jews. Shame on those who foment hatred towards the Jews, who foment hatred towards other nations.["

Lenin was responsible for the revolution, Stalin was responsible for its bastardization.

Also, does not the Christian philosophy influence western society at its very core? Did not aristotle, plato, Socrates change the course of human tohught and progress to some extent at least?

Did you forget that Descartes had as much influence on the enlightenment as Newton?

You clearly forget that einstein often claimed philosophy to be integral to any sucessful scientist and often credits his romance with philosophy for the way of thinking that allowed him to discover what he did. I think you might not know much about Einstein to say that he saw 'mathematical problems with current physics' he didn't even invent the mathematics he used Poincare was responsible for E=MC^2 and Maxwell and Lagrange and Lorentz for most of the rest. He simply brought it all together in a rather philosophically coherent framework. Read this Einstein's Philosophy of Science (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy) and tell me einstein was not a philosopher.

I also take exception to the idea that he mathematically proved his theories. Clearly they are till theories, not laws, and there are indeed no physical 'laws' perse except for that misnomer applied to newton's discoveries. There are mathematical laws, but these do not prove physical laws, they are applied to observation. Einsten provided a more accurate and complete framework, but it is a grave misunderstanding of physics to say that he proved anything. You cannot prove what is based on observation with what is not. Physics is simply an adaptive framework that more and more closely approximates the relational nature of physical reality.

[Fido]

Originally Posted by Zetetic11235

Aedes, I don't know why I put John Stuart Mill I was indeed thinking of John Locke. While the reference to Locke's ideology was prompted by practical need, it still shaped the methods of government used to form this country, and don't think the founding fathers were not all very well read in philosophy and do not think that the writings of philosophers did not shape their worldview.

Also, do you really think Lenin was only paying lip sevice to marx? He seemed pretty sincere about his belief in the marxist doctrines. I think you might have him confused with stalin, who indeed twisted the doctrine to his likeing. Lenin, however, had a pretty short reign and seems to me quite the opposite of Joseph Stalin, observe a short speech against anti-semitism from lenin:
"The Tsarist police, in alliance with the landowners and the capitalists, organized pogroms against the Jews. The landowners and capitalists tried to divert the hatred of the workers and peasants who were tortured by want against the Jews. … Only the most ignorant and downtrodden people can believe the lies and slander that are spread about the Jews. … It is not the Jews who are the enemies of the working people. The enemies of the workers are the capitalists of all countries. Among the Jews there are working people, and they form the majority. They are our brothers, who, like us, are oppressed by capital; they are our comrades in the struggle for socialism. Among the Jews there are kulaks, exploiters and capitalists, just as there are among the Russians, and among people of all nations… Rich Jews, like rich Russians, and the rich in all countries, are in alliance to oppress, crush, rob and disunite the workers… Shame on accursed Tsarism which tortured and persecuted the Jews. Shame on those who foment hatred towards the Jews, who foment hatred towards other nations.["

Lenin was responsible for the revolution, Stalin was responsible for its bastardization.

Also, does not the Christian philosophy influence western society at its very core? Did not aristotle, plato, Socrates change the course of human tohught and progress to some extent at least?

Did you forget that Descartes had as much influence on the enlightenment as Newton?

You clearly forget that einstein often claimed philosophy to be integral to any sucessful scientist and often credits his romance with philosophy for the way of thinking that allowed him to discover what he did. I think you might not know much about Einstein to say that he saw 'mathematical problems with current physics' he didn't even invent the mathematics he used Poincare was responsible for E=MC^2 and Maxwell and Lagrange and Lorentz for most of the rest. He simply brought it all together in a rather philosophically coherent framework. Read this Einstein's Philosophy of Science (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy) and tell me einstein was not a philosopher.

I also take exception to the idea that he mathematically proved his theories. Clearly they are till theories, not laws, and there are indeed no physical 'laws' perse except for that misnomer applied to newton's discoveries. There are mathematical laws, but these do not prove physical laws, they are applied to observation. Einsten provided a more accurate and complete framework, but it is a grave misunderstanding of physics to say that he proved anything. You cannot prove what is based on observation with what is not. Physics is simply an adaptive framework that more and more closely approximates the relational nature of physical reality.

Metaphysics and a theory of forms are both well represented in the Declaration of Independence. For that reason I often refer to it.

It was Hasenohrl who had already pointedout that radiation enclosed in a cavity had a seemingly inert mass, m, proportional to the energy of the system, m being proportional E divided by CsQ, were C is the velocity of light. But he failed to compute the prortionality factor correctly. A guess is that in solving for mass, he was solving for what everyone knew, and in solving for E, Einstein was solving for what everyone wanted. I think, you should rephrase your statement about relational nature. Physics is a form of relationship. Just as the form of matter is put in relations to the form, Energy; all people who deal with these forms and try to grasp their meaning are all in a personal relationship with the others. It is just like us talking here. It allows an exchange of values, of meanings, a relationship. It may not be much, and many relationships are not much, but it is how the world is held together. It is not just strong, weak, and gravity and el/mag. For us it is people, and ideas.


I can't get enough of your post. You must be something. I'd like to hear more of your take on Russia. Do you think we are going to kick their butts in Georgia?

You know, the first philosopher I ever read was Marx, and the first anthropolgist I read was Morgan, something of a testimony to Marxism. But Idealism is an enemy of the people. It is not that what is said of Capitalism is not entirely valid. Capitalism does not work as a form or as an economy. No form works as a form. A form is like a snail's shell. It may protect the life of the snail or it may not. It is not the life of the snail, and yet it is. We have forms, and we build forms for a perfectly good reason, and while they may be motivated by ideals, they should never be thought of as ideal. Our view of the American constitution and government as ideal, and as the best humanity can manage has halted our progress in the past. We could do better, but we are trapped by the form, which contols our relationship, but also our view of all other forms.

I am sure, you know from personal experience that the formal relationships that you have had with teachers, preachers, or police have been less rewarding that your more informal relationships with friends. If we are guided to some extent by our forms, and it is true that humanity has always had its forms and progressed by way of forms, still, it is the relationships that are the life of the form. Rather than building an ideal society, try only to build a society, not perfect, but conducive to the relationships within.

Humans in my estimation should be like those crabs that are forever changing shells to admit growth. Our mental growth is governed by formal understanding, and as we gain new ideas to explain and express physical reality we also gain in intellectual development. But, Our social forms, which are built of moral forms, ideas beyond measurement, and given only to hyperbolic expression are the least easy to manage, and they create the greatest of suffering out of many confused definitions. Look at it for a moment as I. We cannot build the perfect society by building a perfect form, and perfection is the enemy of people who are never, ever perfect. Rather, look into morality, because you are dealing with moral forms; and look into relationships, and what works, and why works when works. Our forms of government and economy and religion are not working. These gears of life are galled and raw, and they howl like thepeople who must endure them. Find out what works because tomorrow we might have to full fill the promise of liberty and justice for all, and we had better know our stuff. Thanks, and best to you.

[Fido]

Originally Posted by midas77

Confucious' teaching dominates Chinese Society for centuries.

Constitutional Government is based on the Social Contact Theory. The Division of Government power into executive, legislative and Judiciary sprouts from Lockes' Idea.

What, the Roman Republic did not have these institutions. That is what gets me about this country. All the founders knew some history, but they gave us for a new government a government of the Roman's, past its prime and on the point of failure. It did not work for them. It isolated power and profit in the same hands, and it empoverished and made volitile the whole of the citizens. It was not justice that flowed from the hands of the injured. They all just passed the general injustice they suffered to every other nation, and in the end they still suffered it. They were like a disease that flooded out of Rome until it killed so many it could no longer defend itself. What an exercise in futility. What a dumasss kind of government; born with its tombstone hung around its neck..

[Fido]

Originally Posted by boagie

Aedes,

I think your a little biased here, are you saying philosophy does not generate new influential ideas, what about Gandhi being influenced by Thoreau on civil disobedience? Dawin though quite distanced the idea seems to have been introduced in the golden age of Greece. What about social Dawinism. In fact is not science itself the child of philosophy. John Lock had no influence upon the politics of nations? I have not reseached this but ideas seem to be the bread and butter of politics in general, and if politicans do not get their ideas from philosophy where indeed do they get them, are they generated in the market place?

The problem is not where government gets their ideas. They hire people to generate ideas for them; but they have little reference to reality. Usually they are just played out has been was been ideas. It is not ideas they need. When government does not work at delivering the goods, it is not little tweaky ideas that need to change; but a whole form of human relations. A more essential quality for govenment to find is morality. Ideas are ends that inevitably justify a lot of suffering to reach. Morality considers the cost of every step, in human suffering, and even does what no form or idea can on its own. Morality can tell if a formal relationship is not working. If morality looks around and sees people scattered by the wayside, killed and maimed because the form is not working, but is spitting out people and eating the seed corn; then it can raise an alarm. Every society should nurture its own. One part of society should not make meat of the other part.
I hate to say it; but philosophy has not generated new ideas. I think this is because philosophy is an institutionalized genius. Before the philosopher reaches the point where he is free to think he is already hamstrung by method, and history, and predicate. The institution cuts their wings and says: now fly! Not one of us is in every sense free of our forms. Forms cage our minds as birds are caged. The cage becomes our reference point for all other forms, and our insights are all blindsights. If our bodies are earth bound by the bars of our forms we need flighy imaginations not so much to tell us what is, but what we may make possible. Thanks

[boagie]

Fido,


I am not talking about spin men, I am talking about the ideas that parties are founded upon, the ideas people should be voting for instead of the personalities of the candidates.I remember a friend being actually shocked when I said it was not the parties that are important, it is the ideas that they hold and promise to affect, no we are not talking about image makers here, When you speak of forms needing change, though the term forms can mean any number of things, I take to mean to get back to the basic principles through the original ideas that constituted the formation of the party in the first place.



It is difficult to institutionalize compassion, which is the source of all morality, but it is not entirely impossiable, surely even morality must be communicated through ideas and concepts, and thus the functionaries of these institutions might then recognize when a vilolation has occured.



I disagree as well that philosophy has no positive effect it is I believe an academic blind spot for some people. As I stated earlier I believe science itself is the child of philosophy.I am told by some Christians that there bible is a philosophy, such as it is it would seem even bad philosophy can be most powerful. Look what in the Whitehouse!!!

[Didymos Thomas]

And I would argue that they didn't shape a thing, they just encapsulated the intellectual movements of the time. Hume and Berkeley didn't create the enlightenment, but the enlightenment philosophers were sure influenced by Newton. Machiavelli didn't create the brutally practical political state. Sartre and Camus didn't create the idea that life is meaningless. Nietzsche didn't create the idea that we're irrational.

I agree with you for the most part. However, I do think philosophers have 'shaped' the modern world.

Consider the literary influence of Nietzsche, for example. His own work, as you say, 'encapsulated the intellectual movements of the time' more than anything else, but there is something else to consider. Didn't Nietzsche help shape, for example, Jack London's work?

That is what gets me about this country. All the founders knew some history, but they gave us for a new government a government of the Roman's, past its prime and on the point of failure.

The US government is hardly a recreation of Roman government. Having similarities is not the same as being the same.

I think we would agree that certain flaws are shared by the US Federal government and the Roman government. But the Framers also avoided many of the Roman flaws - as you say, they knew some history. Enough to avoid at least some of the old mistakes.

I am told by some Christians that there bible is a philosophy, such as it is it would seem even bad philosophy can be most powerful. Look what in the Whitehouse!!!

Yep. Unfortunately, that man in the White House is too isolated and poorly educated to understand any of the philosophy in the Bible. Instead, he relies on the advice of his daddy's most vicious friends, ie, Karl Rove.

I actually feel bad for the President. Even early in the administration, top officials quit saying Bush was simply too "unintelligent" to work under. But what else can we expect when people take their political philosophy from televangelists? Having listened to vicious, violent scum, they vote for vicious violent scum - or at least the scum's stooge.

[Zetetic11235]

The people don't even really get much of a choice. We get both sides of mediocre to choose from, and they are all in bed with each other. All ivy league distant cousins like Bush and Kerry. Not to mention this kind of stuff CFR Presidential Candidates .

It seems to me we are living in an oligarchy, where only the rich hand picked stooges can even run.

Frankly, I think philosophy though often oversteps its place, and I have begun to take a more pragmatic view point lately. There are fields popping up such as Meta-ontology(what is ontology and its scope) and metametaphysics(what is metaphysics do mathematical statements exist ect) indicating an absurd bloating of the field. I would say that even concerns of mind matter dualism/monism and ontology tend to over step what they can sensibly hope to achieve.