Have you done any better? lmao

Some things can still be valuable even if you never actually finish it.

You provide, what, five examples (a big number, five! wow!), and apparently this "disproves" the value of philosophy?

Skepticism hasn't won by being right, it's won by those practicing it being lazy. If there was a better way of getting answers we'd being doing it already. Unfortunately, there isn't, but some of us still find value in thinking about these sorts of things anyway to the scoffing dismay of our capitalist overlords.

The absolute failure of philosophy is a great example of how unaided human reasoning leads to nothing but absurdity. — lambda

Quite ironic how you use human reasoning to come to an absurd conclusion...

Um... those five items are of vital importance.

If you don't know whether your cognitive faculties are reliable, whether you're dreaming, whether the people around you are conscious, whether you are truly morally responsible for your actions, or whether the walls of your room continue to exist when you're not experiencing them, then you are in a state of total intellectual paralysis.

There's no 'value' that can come out of such a state.

Why does anyone still continue to study this nonsense? — lambda

Judging by what you say here:

- Philosophers are still unable to determine whether they're dreaming or not.

- Philosophers are still unable to provide a non-circular justification for the reliability of their cognitive faculties (senses, memory, reason, intuition, etc.)

- Philosophers still can't offer any reason to believe in free will.

- Philosophers still can't offer any reason to believe in the existence of other minds.

- Philosophers still can't offer any reason to believe in the existence of a mind-independent external world. — lambda

I'd say we need a lot more philosophy.

Why does anyone still continue to study this nonsense? — lambda

Because lamda was unable to prove any of lamda's claims about philosophy.

I will let Charles Sanders Peirce do the talking for me here.

Um... those five items are of vital importance. — lambda

"We must act in such [vital] matters; and the principle upon which we are willing to act is a belief ... matters of vital importance must be left to sentiment, that is, to instinct."

If you don't know ... then you are in a state of total intellectual paralysis. — lambda

"Let us not pretend to doubt in philosophy what we do not doubt in our hearts."

Why does anyone still continue to study this nonsense? — lambda

There's no 'value' that can come out of such a state. — lambda

Really? So, you would contend that the world would be no worse off intellectually or morally had no-one ever engaged in philosophy?

Yawn. The OP tells us about Lambda, not about philosophy.

Comments need a thumbs up button

Why does anyone still continue to study this nonsense? — lambda

Because they understand philosophy better than you do.

Can philosophers at least find the emotion to get successfully trolled? I mean some guy just said we're all a monumental waste of time and all he could elicit was a "Yeah? Prove it."

Can philosophers at least find the emotion to get successfully trolled? I mean some guy just said we're all a monumental waste of time and all he could elicit was a "Yeah? Prove it." — Hanover

Staring at the wall seemed like a better use of my energy.

- Philosophers are still unable to determine whether they're dreaming or not.

- Philosophers are still unable to provide a non-circular justification for the reliability of their cognitive faculties (senses, memory, reason, intuition, etc.)

- Philosophers still can't offer any reason to believe in free will.

- Philosophers still can't offer any reason to believe in the existence of other minds.

- Philosophers still can't offer any reason to believe in the existence of a mind-independent external world. — lambda

Philosophers do seem uninterested in progress, so much so that, when they have the solution they prefer to ignore it. I suspect that part of this is that they think that once they have the solution, they will have nothing to do. Scientists on the other hand, know that new knowledge always reveals new and interesting problems to solve!

Anyway, Critical Rationalism provides the solution to all the problems you cite.

Your statements that contain "any reason" are evidently false. Either you don't mean what you said or you are oblivious of those reasons. I suspect that it's the former, and that you actually mean something more like "proof".

All of your statements are arguably false. I'm not sure whether the weakest one is the one about dreaming or the one about other minds. I think that both are false. Not only are philosophers, like virtually everyone else, able to determine whether or not they're dreaming, it's actually easy. And there is no plausible alternative to the fact that there are other minds. What would these other people be if they are mindless? Illusions, A.I., p-zombies, figments of my imagination...? Yeah right. That's what you should be scoffing at.

Finally, you contradict yourself by exploring all of these philosophical topics, concluding that scepticism has the right answers, and then eschewing philosophy. That is philosophy! You're relying on philosophy to argue against philosophy. And doing so is doing philosophy. Without philosophy, you wouldn't have been able to reach this "revelation" of yours.

Philosophy isn't an absolute joke, but what you've said is much like a joke. Extreme scepticism is full of comedic material. If for any reason philosophy is an absolute joke, it is surely in no small part because of extreme scepticism.

If you tell people that you don't know whether or not you're dreaming, or whether or not there are any other minds, many of them will laugh. I think that that's a natural reaction to hearing something absurd.

Philosophy can help us to understand what we don't know and what we can say about what we do know. Thus achieving some balance and perspective on our predicament.

Where else would this occur?

We had them, but then we removed them.

In my view the point of philosophy isn't to come to conclusions so much as it's the process of looking at things philosophically, or "doing philosophy."

At that, I'd agree that a lot of philosophy, and particularly a lot of philosophers, have been a "joke."

Sometimes it seems like the history of the field consists largely of Aspie-like, highly-educated morons with a variety of OCD-ish obsessions and other neuroses who might otherwise wind up in a loony bin. On the other hand, that's also a large part of what makes philosophy so entertaining.

Some philosophy (perhaps most of modern one) has failed, but that doesn't mean that all philosophy has failed. And skepticism hasn't won at all.

- Philosophers are still unable to determine whether they're dreaming or not. — lambda

Yes they are, because they do know the origin of "to dream" and thus know its meaning. We get the meaning of dreaming from the experience of going to sleep, meeting with events and happenings which are somewhat disconnected from our daily life, and then waking up again to daily life. Hence, the meaning of "to dream" is tied to the context of daily life. Dreaming only exists IN RELATION to daily life. But if you cut this relation by saying that daily life is itself a dream, then dreaming itself doesn't make sense anymore - you have emptied it of meaning. If life is a dream, then you are also only dreaming that life is a dream - and thus your assertion is meaningless. As meaningless as dreaming that it is raining, while it is in fact raining - if you wake up at that point, you won't say "Oh I knew it was raining!", you'll say "I dreamed it is raining!"

- Philosophers still can't offer any reason to believe in the existence of other minds. — lambda

And can any reasons be offered for NOT believing in other minds? Is the mere logical possibility of something a reason to believe it? Absolutely not. Thus AT BEST for the Skeptic we ignore the question - we suspend judgement. At worst, we conclude it is more probable that there are other minds given the behaviour of all these other people which we don't control, and are not aware of at a distance. A priori you would expect, if there was only one mind - your mind - that you would be able to control a lot more aspects of reality than you currently do. Just like your mind can clearly control your body, so too you'd expect it to be able to control other people's behaviour as well. But it doesn't. Therefore, the scenario is unlikely. The behaviour shown indicates that other people are capable of intelligence - hence mind.

- Philosophers still can't offer any reason to believe in free will. — lambda

So? What's the big deal? You still feel yourself to be free no? That's what matters.

- Philosophers are still unable to provide a non-circular justification for the reliability of their cognitive faculties (senses, memory, reason, intuition, etc.) — lambda

Well what kind of justification would you expect? All justifications are within the framework created by the cognitive faculties. In fact, even the concept of reliability and unreliability comes from within this framework. Remove the framework, and you have removed the possibility for reliability or its opposite. For example - I only say that my eyes are unreliable, in relation to an experience when they were reliable. Truth is the standard for itself. For example, in normal conditions I see a stick as being straight. If I put it in water, I see it being Crooked - like Hillary. Therefore I conclude that in that particular situation - when the stick is in water - my eyes are deceiving me. But in relation to what are they deceiving me? In relation to me seeing the stick as straight when it's not in water. I take that experience as the standard of truth. Thus if I, like you, turn against my own cognitive framework, and start doubting it, then certainly I am also rendering the very act of doubting impossible - because the very act of doubt arises and exists only within and relative to that framework.

- Philosophers still can't offer any reason to believe in the existence of a mind-independent external world. — lambda

If the world wasn't "mind-independent" what difference would it make? I guess we'd expect to be able to control a lot more things - like when the sun rises, when it rains, etc. with the mere power of our thought. So the fact we can't control such things - that's all we mean when we say the world is mind-independent.

All of your statements are arguably false. I'm not sure whether the weakest one is the one about dreaming or the one about other minds. I think that both are false. Not only are philosophers, like virtually everyone else, able to determine whether or not they're dreaming, it's actually easy. — Sapientia

Yeah, too bad that most of you don't ever tell anyone and explain why it is easy... :-}

I find this despicable. He's bringing a fairly reasonable quandary with philosophy - and he's seeking for answers. So give him the answers. The problem philosophy has is that it hasn't collected all those answers against skepticism in the same place. So you have some in Kierkegaard, some in Spinoza, some in Wittgenstein, some in Schopenhauer/Kant, some in Plato/Aristotle - they're all over the place. And most philosophers don't even know the fucking answers themselves, that's what's really shameful.

Oh yeah, why don't you start with some definitions ;)

In my view the point of philosophy isn't to come to conclusions so much as it's the process of looking at things philosophically, or "doing philosophy." — Terrapin Station

I say it's both. It's a means to an end, and both the means and the end are important. The end, for me, is knowledge of the truth, or greater clarity or understanding, or wisdom, or even just entertainment. And the means or method of philosophy could be compared or contrasted, favourably or unfavourably, with religion or science, for example. There's a reason why I "do" philosophy rather than religion or science or something else.

I have done so. I have submitted over ten thousand posts over about six years. Pretty sure I've covered both of those subjects at some time or other.

I don't see that here, to this guy. You may have covered it some other place, but not here. I've covered it many times, pretty much rehashing what I've said in this thread, but that doesn't mean I'm an ass towards someone who brings a fair complaint. It is true, these answers are hard to find in philosophy, because they're all so scattered, as I have said, and not given the importance they deserve, so very few people know about their existence. But instead of using this thread to laugh at someone else's expense, why not pile it with arguments to the contrary? Maybe some of them will resonate with him/her.

Really some people, take Banno's comment, and even want to give it thumbs up. Is this for real? Like why should that deserve thumbs up? Is that a grand philosophical refutation or something? >:O Scoffing at those who disagree won't convince them otherwise. Neither will one-liners.

I find this despicable. — Agustino

Okay. I find that an overreaction.

He's bringing a fairly reasonable quandary with philosophy - and he's seeking for answers. So give him the answers. The problem philosophy has is that it hasn't collected all those answers against skepticism in the same place. So you have some in Kierkegaard, some in Spinoza, some in Wittgenstein, some in Schopenhauer/Kant, some in Plato/Aristotle - they're all over the place. And most philosophers don't even know the fucking answers themselves, that's what's really shameful. — Agustino

I agree that it's a valid issue. But he was making a general point about philosophy, and just using those points as examples, so when you say "give him the answers", I could of course elaborate, but one could dedicate an entire lengthy discussion on just one of those points, whereas I was responding to his brief general point in kind.

And how do you know that the views on this topic of some of the big names in philosophy haven't been collected in one place? There's a vast amount of philosophical literature out there, and this may well have already been done.

You might be right about philosophers not knowing the answer themselves, but that's more a problem with philosophers than a problem with people. Most people know when they're not dreaming. I ain't dreaming right now.

I say it's both. It's a means to an end, and both the means and the end are important. The end, for me, is knowledge of the truth, or greater clarity or understanding, or wisdom, or even just entertainment. And the means or method of philosophy could be compared or contrasted, favourably or unfavourably, with religion or science, for example. There's a reason why I "do" philosophy rather than religion or science or something else. — Sapientia

Yeah, I can see that--I meant more with respect to the discipline as a whole. I wouldn't say that it's not important to come to conclusions personally. It's just that the nature of the enterprise on a broader scale means that conclusions aren't going to wind up being cemented in the same way that, say, many scientific and mathematical "conclusions" are. The gist of philosophy as a discipline is to critically examine assumptions, to skeptically challenge views, etc. If we reach a conclusion that we all agree on and say, "Well, that's that--we're done with that bit now," we're not really doing philosophy (collectively).

Yeah, I can see that--I meant more with respect to the discipline as a whole. I wouldn't say that it's not important to come to conclusions personally. It's just that the nature of the enterprise on a broader scale means that conclusions aren't going to wind up being cemented in the same way that many, say, scientific and mathematical "conclusions" are. The gist of philosophy as a discipline is to critically examine assumptions, to skeptically challenge views, etc. If we reach a conclusion that we all agree on and say, "well, that's that--we're done with that bit now," we're not really doing philosophy (collectively). — Terrapin Station

Yeah, I agree.

And how do you know that the responses of some of the big names in philosophy haven't been collected in one place? There's a vast amount of philosophical literature out there, and this may well have already been done. — Sapientia

I say that because I, for one, haven't come across such a text. Or if I have, the text excluded exactly the most important pieces of the puzzle - as if the writers of it haven't even read the philosophers themselves. So sure, it might exist, I just haven't come across it, and I've been interested in these problems for quite some time.

Most people know when they're not dreaming. I ain't dreaming right now. — Sapientia

How do you know that you're not dreaming? And most people don't know they're not dreaming, the question doesn't pop up into their heads in the first place.

I mean some guy just said we're all a monumental waste of time and all he could elicit was a "Yeah? Prove it." — Hanover

Didn't Wittgenstein say the very same thing? But he wasted a lot more time saying it. I guess that's the point, "proving it" is a waste of time. I guess what lambda points to, is that proving something is itself an absurdity.

Let's not forget that philosophy gave rise to natural philosophy which gave rise to science. Also, mathematics and logic. Philosophy certainly hasn't failed.

I don't see that here, to this guy. You may have covered it some other place, but not here. — Agustino

Of course you don't see that here, to this guy. That's because my understanding, which I believe is correct, is that this guy didn't start a discussion on multiple issues, but was just using them as examples.

I've covered it many times, pretty much rehashing what I've said in this thread, but that doesn't mean I'm an ass towards someone who brings a fair complaint. — Agustino

So you're accusing me of being an ass towards him. I think that that's unfair. I've been no more of an ass than he has. I mirrored his own terminology and attitude.

And his complaint in its entirety isn't fair, hence my criticism. He merely raised some interesting and arguable points, but he didn't go into detail. Yet you seem to expect only me (and not him) to do so. The burden doesn't work like that.

It is true, these answers are hard to find in philosophy, because they're all so scattered, as I have said, and not given the importance they deserve, so very few people know about their existence. — Agustino

No, they're not hard to find. You must not have looked hard. Right of the cuff, G.E. Moore comes to mind, and there are plenty more realists and others who have made non-sceptical arguments along those lines.

But instead of using this thread to laugh at someone else's expense, why not pile it with arguments to the contrary? Maybe some of them will resonate with him/her. — Agustino

Laugh at their expense?! Don't try to twist this into something personal. It's about the position, not the person. Look at the title of this thread, for Christ's sake. He called philosophy an absolute joke, and said that scepticism has won, whereas I think that it's more the other way around.

He didn't pile me with arguments in favour, so I'm under no obligation to do all of the work, and as is clear, he was just using them as examples. If he wants to present an argument on one of his examples, he can so. Don't see why I should do all the work. It's his thread after all. I didn't raise the topic.

Really some people, take Banno's comment, and even want to give it thumbs up. Is this for real? Like why should that deserve thumbs up? — Agustino

Because it was a very good, very concise point. I completely agree with him.

Scoffing at those who disagree won't convince them otherwise. Neither will one-liners. — Agustino

Tell that to the original poster, who you're clearly biased in favour of.

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My definition of a philosopher: Someone who would rather ask the right question, and not be able to answer it, than give the right answer to the wrong question.