Good question Frex (wierd?? Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! )and very good answer Soulcry! Lmao @ Machaon. Very good post zwings! I would judge philosophers individual actions and behaviour slightly differently though. You talk of conformity however what would be most relevant to know is whether the 'wierd' philosopher is deliberately going against societys' values and crossing it's boundaries, or whether the philosopher is merely the sum total of the different systems, and parts of life, it has experienced.
proteus42... If you really think about it, getting a Phd. is about authority. It is a license. It is hard to get viewed as a expert in any field without one and of course no one is going to hire you to be a professor without one. Our society is a limitation based society. If everyone who could teach a course in linguistics were able to, then there would be way too many professors. Do you really need all of the info. they stuff in your head on your way to professorship to teach a class? Probably not! That doesn't say it is bad, I think it is good if it is not glut that merely serves to brainwash you in the preconfigured way of thinking. But I am not saying that becoming a professor is a bad thing to do, and most professors probably know tons more than what the average person knows about their subject. My real point in saying that is that I don't personally bow to experts, everything I hear I think through on my own and I have had great teachers, but I don't necessarily think they were necessary. At any time, any person can decide they want to think on their own and create their own philosophy say even on time, we all have enough experience with what time means to us, we don't have to take a course in physics to say some interesting things on time. Sometimes filling our head with too much bullshit is the worse thing to do when trying to think for yourself. You are biased in what you are saying. Of course you are going to say people have to take a course in this and this before they can speak about time or language. This way people will have to take your class. If you don't perpetuate the "myth" or "illusion" that you have to go to school to learn about a topic, then people might stop taking your classes, and you would be out of business. My point is that it is great to talk with professors, they usually love their subject and have studied it deeply. On the other hand, every since I graduated from college I have been reading and teaching myself without the help of any fancy men of learning and to be honest, it is more effective and efficient in many ways. sincerely, fredx oh also...although I agree that all of these philosophers at one point or another took langauge into consideration, it only shows a failure in their own way of thinking. I can tell you that I am a big fan of Plato but not Aristotle, because I see the latter as the forefather of rational science. I don't think that langauge is the important thing when thinking, although I do concede that having a big vocabulary does facilitate better expression. I think that a common joe off the street can do just as valid thinking as a professor about life, nature, the universe and the way things work, it just won't happen because he doesn't have the love for it. He also will not have the ability to express things with the same accuracy and beauty but he will still be able to confer the basic point. Langauge is overrated, as is anything that merely comes out of of us, it is what is on the outside that is the cause of wonder or is the birth of true philosophy.
Charles Fleming... I think that an important point is that even if you don't choose to do something, you still have made a choice although its is a really tough question that you have proposed here. A professor friend of mine woud answer you that a true artist defies convention. I would say that there is an aspect of the accidental or incidental here and that is true with most of life. I don't think I do what I do to defy convention or commonly accepted morals or maybe I do. I think it is important to test the boundaries because people typically only think in a predescribed way and never seek to go beyond that, whether it is harmful for them or not. Therefore in putting conventions and morals to the test, we can do some valuable learning. Still, I feel there might be a danger inherent in challenging or ripping down what is there, so one has to weigh the risks before one decides to act. An good example may be Nietzsche, he said many shocking things which rattled the foundation of our ways of thinking, i.e. one of his basic premises "god is dead". Now I can be sure he said that at least partially because he had a problem with Christianity and he wanted to rip it down, but he also probably felt compelled to express what he thought to be the truth, which he thought would turn the world in a better direction or the direction he thought it should go in. My professor (this was years ago) also asked us if we thought that Kurt Cobain was a genuine artist who defied convention. Today, thinking back on it I could definitely see why he brought up Cobain. Cobain and Nirvana definitely brought indie-punk/rock to pop with buzzing guitar sounds, catchy hooks and screeching, excited lyrics and at the same time created his own philosophy of depression and angst, that really hooked into the way that many people felt at the time and still do and in the process they really came up with something new or at least refreshing and ten or so more years later we still hear their influence in music perhaps more than any other band.
Fred, I completely and wholely disagree with you. You know, there's a kooky reason for that. It's called knowledge. My dog doesn't have enough background in philosophy to teach a course on Logical Analysis of Language, so they wouldn't let her teach it. It doesn't matter how "insightful" or whatever you want to say my dog is, it's a matter of how much knowledge she does not have. Let me put it to you this way: Surgeon's have to go through medical school. Medical school is taught by those with Ph.D.'s. Would you trust a surgeon who hadn't gone through University? Let's pretend you have a life or death situation on hand here, and a doctor walks in and says "We're going to have Dr. Johnson operate on you. Sure, he never went to medical school, but we're pretty confident he knows what he's talking about!" You feel very safe? I don't think so. Philosophy is absolutely no different. To those who actually haven't explored philosophy, it could very well seem that philosophy, because it is based on thought and theory, is hugely different. But it really isn't. I've said this many times before; people blame the teachers for making students have certain ways of thinking. If a student is too stupid to think for himself, that's his problem. Probably? Think more like millions upon millions of times more. I can say something interesting about taking a shit in the artic circle. I have no insight whatsoever on the subject, but I can say something interesting. However, like someone with no physics of philosophy background commenting on the nature of time, my theories on artic shitting will be pretty much useless. All knowledge, fred, is based on previous knowledge. You're saying that Philosophy background is not necessary to be a philosopher? Allow me to liken that to a scenario for you: Pretend 'Z' is a mathematical symbol. If I said: 1 Z 1 -- could you tell me what symbol 'Z' is for certain? Nope. However, if I gave you the information: 2 Z 2 = 4 -- could you now tell me the answer? Nope. But if I said 1 Z 3 = 4 could you now? Yuuuuup. Do you know what this shows? That all knowledge is based on former knowledge. Calling oneself a philosopher of any value what so ever without any background in the subject is like telling me you knew with certainty what Z was in the first two questions. Yes, Fred, school is all a giant conspiracyPlease Register or Log in to view the hidden image!. Tell me, Fred, do you believe that any of the following are among the greatest philosophers of all time: Plato, Descartes, Spinoza, Nietzsche, Kierkegaard, Hume, Wittgenstein, Russell, Ayer, Popper, Davidson...? No, it shows a failure into your way of thinking. I take it you have absolutely zero background in linguistic or mind philosophy. Language and mind philosophy have nothing to do with having a big vocabulary. They are about understand how humans learn, how humans understand, what it is to know, what it is to communicate, how we communicate, what it is to reference and almost everything else that has to do with the human mind (hence the title Mind Philosophy). To say that considering these things is a failure in a way of thinking is to say that philosophy's point is to ignore humans. So then you promote the idea that knowledge is not based on former knowledge? I suggest you write a paper on this, fred, as almost every philosopher and linguist I have read (if not every one of them) has disagreed wholely with you. Ha. No point in Mind or Language Philosophy is simple. Not one of them! A final point, Fred, on why you're completely missing the boat on academic philosophy. There are two ways one learns: introspective and teaching, and debate and arguement. If one does not engage in debate, one will never truly advance in thought. And, from someone who has debated thousands of times with friends and far less with professor's of the subject, I can tell you that my own ideas progressed far further through the few conversations I've had with professor's than the hours and hours I've spent with those around me. Do you know why? Because, like proteus said, you need to talk to someone who has a clue what they're talking about to get anywhere. I will not ask my father about Verdi's Requiem, and I will not ask my mother about the stock market - because neither's answer on those topics would do me any good.
oh...my god...there are legions of them... Okay, I know that I am going to face one know it all after another. So lets do an experiment in Plato's dialectic (or shall we say Socrate's dialectic). Point A: Society is in conspiracy against the individual, which you would have a hard time arguing against these days when times just keep getting tougher, i.e. there are probably more people than jobs people actually want. Point B: Some of you are being real tight asses. Point C: The only person a con-man gets over on is a tight ass. Point D: knowledge=all of the bullshit you have collected in your head, nonetheless it has its price. Point E: Espousing your point of view on the meaning of life is alot different than cutting someone open on the operating table. Point F: Debate: verbal fighting and competing to win a argument, is nothing compared to the good feeling you get when you have a constructive conversation with a group of people to build on each others ideas and find a consensus of opinion.
Re: proteus42... Originally posted by fredx If you really think about it, getting a Phd. is about authority. It is a license. It is hard to get viewed as a expert in any field without one and of course no one is going to hire you to be a professor without one. Our society is a limitation based society. If everyone who could teach a course in linguistics were able to, then there would be way too many professors. Do you really need all of the info. they stuff in your head on your way to professorship to teach a class? Probably not! That doesn't say it is bad, I think it is good if it is not glut that merely serves to brainwash you in the preconfigured way of thinking. But I am not saying that becoming a professor is a bad thing to do, and most professors probably know tons more than what the average person knows about their subject. I cannot agree with you more. But whether you are brainwashed after the process of getting a PhD or not is grossly dependant on your personality. There are people who do get brainwashed but then their personality is such that it can happen to them. It is not necessary that one should be an idiot to try to get a PhD, in other words (though some idiots do get a degree). My real point in saying that is that I don't personally bow to experts, everything I hear I think through on my own and I have had great teachers, but I don't necessarily think they were necessary. At any time, any person can decide they want to think on their own and create their own philosophy say even on time, we all have enough experience with what time means to us, we don't have to take a course in physics to say some interesting things on time. Sometimes filling our head with too much bullshit is the worse thing to do when trying to think for yourself. You are biased in what you are saying. Of course you are going to say people have to take a course in this and this before they can speak about time or language. This way people will have to take your class. If you don't perpetuate the "myth" or "illusion" that you have to go to school to learn about a topic, then people might stop taking your classes, and you would be out of business. My point is that it is great to talk with professors, they usually love their subject and have studied it deeply. On the other hand, every since I graduated from college I have been reading and teaching myself without the help of any fancy men of learning and to be honest, it is more effective and efficient in many ways. Fredx, if you re-read my posts you'll see I repeatedly said that people are welcome to find out things for themselves. That's not the issue, let me stress again. I've agreed with it since the very start. If you happen to like algebra, you'll have enormous joy in solving hard equations. And that's OK. But even if you have some theory about prime numbers or differential equations, you won't be a mathematician. Or a physicist. Why do you think it is so different with philosophy? That's the real question for you, as far as I can see. oh also...although I agree that all of these philosophers at one point or another took langauge into consideration, it only shows a failure in their own way of thinking. I can tell you that I am a big fan of Plato but not Aristotle, because I see the latter as the forefather of rational science. If this is the case, then you know very well that Plato in his State prescribed very strict education for those who were to be philosophers. He wrote on the gate of his Academy that nobody bad at geometry should ever enter. Besides, as far as I can remember the minimum age for philosophers was something like 30 or 35? If somebody, then Plato was indeed an elitist. If you think about it, Socrates was given the hemlock exactly because he was seen as a disturber of the peace, because he would walk up to complete strangers in the street and proved they were completely stupid. I don't think that langauge is the important thing when thinking, although I do concede that having a big vocabulary does facilitate better expression. ... Langauge is overrated, as is anything that merely comes out of of us, it is what is on the outside that is the cause of wonder or is the birth of true philosophy. The importance of language is that it has a definite shape whereas thoughts (whatever they are) are much more elusive. In contemporary philosophy it is a presupposition that cognitive content is expressed in linguistic form. This doesn't mean there are no mystical experiences that can't be put in words (I'm personally convinced that there are) but they are beyond our intellectual reach. Maybe religion is the right place for them. I think that a common joe off the street can do just as valid thinking as a professor about life, nature, the universe and the way things work, it just won't happen because he doesn't have the love for it. He also will not have the ability to express things with the same accuracy and beauty but he will still be able to confer the basic point. I do not think Common Joe is completely deluded (though Socrates did think something like that, I think). The average man can have fundamental insights about life, nature, etc. even though he can't put them in words. But somebody who has learnt philosophy for years can see things the man of the street is not likely to see. That's not elitism: a medical doctor is trained to recognize and predict diseases by symptoms that mean absolutely nothing to me. He simply knows more about this things and his world is different from mine in that he sees order where I only see chaos. Why would that be different with philosophy? Best Proteus
okay, you are putting me to sleep here... but you did spark one thing of interest to me. What do we really mean when we say somebody is smart? The same professor that I spoke about before once said told a girl that she was "intellectual" but not "smart". By smart he meant "having common sense", the not so common ability these days to see what is right in front of your face. The opposite of smart would than be stupid, i.e. not seeing whats right in front of your face. If you are smart than you are more often than not practical. My brother, who is not necessarily that "intellectual" is often quite "smart" and comes up with thoughts and observations which would hardly ever come out of the mouths of alot you "intellectuals" out there in sciforum land. By "intellectual" I mean a person who is more often than not concerned with thinking and the things of the mind and has the mental ability to do so. Also, not to nitpick, but just for clarification purposes, I think "idiot" refers not to a lack of smartness but a lack of intellect, therefore very few professors are "idiots". That is why calling someone a stupid idiot is a double-whammy and not an oxymoron.
Interesting sentiment from a man who's done little but antagonize other members with his boorishness. Keep your answers on topic, please.
A post is like a conversation... its not always easy to keep it to a specific topic, but on a whole you are right, this one went way off. Boorish, I am not. I simply call it like it is. Some people, you included, choose not to see the other side of me, the good and nice side, because you are too busy being the "enemy of the gospel".
Actually, I'm the "Owl of Confusion" now. Jesus fuck, keep up. Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! Alright, now I'm going to have to delete my own post for off-topic-ness.
So your saying that Cobain intentionally created his public persona? I'm sure you know that Cobain could have just been one of these angst ridden, depressed children who was caught by the limelight. The fact that he was in a band says that he did intend to step forwards in some way but maybe he knew nothing else! This doesn't mean that he created the movement either. While some will have jumped onto the band-wagon, most likely teenagers, and 'bought' his style, but there must have been want for Nirvana, otherwise they wouldn't have been so successful. It is true though that it would only have taken one record label producer to give the band to a bigger audience, but this these people probably do have a knowledge of what people like and want. It may not be the case that Cobain was a single spokesperson that was pushed forward by an entire generation, but it could be that there has always been a part of everyone that was, or wanted there to be, someone like Cobain. Maybe Cobains demise has killed this person inside of us, and will never be wanted again, but maybe there will always be a want for a Cobain by all people. This will be shown by forthcoming generations however their parents' prejudices and discriminations, through their upbringing, with their knowledge of Cobain, may interfere with the results. I disagree about your reasoning for expresison but I agree that expression is the important thing. When we all die, in five thousand years how will anyone even know you were alive?! If you leave something, anything, then that may at some time be of use to someone. We only have the knowledge that we have today because there were records left by people.
dude...I would reply to you about this... but I would be in the wrong. If you look at the topic, we are far off it right now. You made some interesting points but if you want to here where I disagree with you, you will have to start a new post about the things you are talking about, and from a common sense consensus point of view this isn't the place for it, i.e maybe free thoughts or arts and culture. Sincerely, Fredx
I don't want to start a thread on it, you brought it up. On with the thread then. Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
Alright, it seems to me that the majority of you are saying that you don't know any philosopher and are not philosophers yourself. I am a 3rd year philosophy major. I have a couple of philosophy friends and tend to hang out with my philosophy doctor at a local coffee shop. Philosophers are generally strange people. Ever heard of Dretske? He used to shake from fits of anger. You go out and try to find the truths of the universe only to be opposed by stubborn unfounded religious fanatics. It's incredibly angering. The work is hard, it takes a lot of abstract thinking. Most days I come home with a near migraine. All I do most days is think think think think. I've been accused to thinking too much and over-analyzing everything. Just trust me when I say, IT"S DAMN HARD WORK!
Yeah, I guess that's why Dretske shook from anger. One of the most remarkable philosophers ever. One of the only ever to actually make significant advancements in philosophy. He quite apparantly thought it was hard work. So yeah, me thinking it's hard doesn't say a damn thing about how proficient I am.
Now that I've oficially made myself look like an ass by posting while very tired, I have used the wrong name, and for that no one should probably have taken me very seriously. Fred Dreske is a very important current philosopher. I believe he is currently at either Standford or Duke. Whichever he's not at, he was at priorly. Dretske has written a number of highly enlightening book which I suggest all of you read, but only of course if you're not overly rivited to your current patterns of thought. Who I meant to draw attention to was Wittgenstein. Hopefully more of you will know who he is. Very jittery party-crashing fellow. Wittgenstein actually threatened a fellow philosopher with a fire poker. So you see the stress philsophy inflicts.
I see your problem...that Dretske stuff is... really complicated and abstract. That is the plague of modern thinking, what are you going to do, these intellectuals think they are smarter than everybody else, they are too afraid to actually say something "common sensical" about the world they live in, because it would show you just how little they really know. X is the Y realities in the P perimeters of the visual sense perception field, ....etc. What the f' are they really talking about. Deal with reality you intellectual snobs, thats what I would tell them, become truly wise not pseudo-intellectuals who create their own langauge to seem like they are above the common man. I can see if the terms they coin are genuine, but mostly they are clever, like their thinking, like their philosophy. Wittgenstein poisoned the apple with his hot poker, Popper should have picked the poker up and chased after that little baby or should I say, little Nazi.
