… or, in the words of the Cheshire Cat, “we’re all mad here”.

It’s the ones that take themselves to be fully, absolutely, infallibly sane that you have to watch out for. They’re mad too, just differently (one can tell by their mad reactions to being informed of this).

While I’m quoting form Lewis Carrol …

Mad Hatter: "Have I gone mad?"
Alice: "I'm afraid so. You're entirely bonkers. But I'll tell you a secret. All the best people are.”

Also

Mad Hatter: “Everyone wants some magical solution to their problems and everyone refuses to believe in magic.”

To be less lighthearted in my reply, philosophy takes time. And, if its goal is the gaining of wisdom, it is then a never-ending endeavor. No wisdom is ever perfect. As to repetition expecting different results, is “if at first you don’t succeed, try and try again” to be shunned as something only lunatics do? A mostly rhetorical question, given that the attempts are made in different ways. (just noticed beat me to this :razz: )

@Coben

Sure, you can go off into a cave and avoid all this....now. But you carry with you the thoughts and tools and heurististics of other minds. — Coben

I'm sorry, it is just not that simple. If a mind seeks to transmit what it thinks to a second mind, this requires communication. Now, perhaps you are thinking that communication serves as some type of preservation chamber in which thought can be housed so that it remains identical to itself as it exits one mind and enters another. But this is not the case, otherwise we would see people agreeing much more with each other.

Communication is dialectic in that there occurs two qualitative turns. The first is the transmogrification of private thought into a communicable medium that can be apprehended by another. The second is when the communication apprehended is appropriated in the other's mind by its abstraction back into (private) thought.

Unfortunately in ordinary everyday communication (the means by which individuals are conditioned by the generation), it is impossible to verify whether a communication accurately expresses a thought, or whether a thought correctly reflects what has been communicated, yet we generally take it for granted that thought and communication have very conducive relation, and we proceed quite confidently with loads of dispute. If such a disconnect in communication separates individual minds that drastically, I can only wonder what gaping divide it might cause between generations.

And yet, you are correct - there are innumerable clones out there comparing and copying each other. As I said: I suspect that there are very few individuals out there. In my opinion, this is insanity. Need evidence, just look at this lame coronavirus hysteria. If philosophy, and being a philosopher can assist me in becoming more of an individual and standing apart from my retarded generation by even the tiniest degree, I would call this sanity, or at least less insane.

I'm sorry, it is just not that simple. — Merkwurdichliebe

I don't think it's simple, at all. But none of what you write changes the fact that ideas have been pouring into you for years from others. That you modify, translate, falsely interpret these ideas, reconfigure them, misunderstand them, in addition to taking in reasonably close approximations doesn't change the fact that your mind has been constructed with tremendous input from other minds and this is still going on if you are not isolated from communicating with the others. And the language we get also carries with it all sorts of implicit and explicit ideas and makes it harder to have certain ideas and models of reality. Then all the things that one DOES to achieve various goals, which we learn through imitating others - often forced to use these heuristics - also imply a lot about reality, what other people are and how they are motivated, what 'works' in the world.

It doesn't matter at all if communication is not some perfect transfer of a thought, it does however lead to, in the growing person the creation of all sorts of thoughts in that mind. One of our advantages as an animal is that unlike other animals a huge amount of information can be transferred to us about all sorts of things, and these make us competent navigators, including speakers, in our cultures. There is a downside to this, of course. And side in the full spectrum between the good and bad sides of this.

This is why when we learn languages quite different from our native one, have powerful non-verbal experiences - psychoactive drugs, ritual extremes etc. -, enter and master life in a very different culture, have long term complicated interactions with animals, preferably not ones that are commonly domesticated at least also, we realize all sorts of assumptions we have been making. And we did not choose to make these assumptions. Those assumptions entered us via the culture.

Even what you criticize in your post - the idea that ideas are put in language and perfectly transferred to another person - which is simillar to REddy's critiques of the metaphors around language, see The Conduit Metaphor - is a widespread assumption about language that children learn from the metaphors people use around them. IOW while criticizing a position of mine I don't really have, your argument points out a common cultural assumption that gets passed on to us via communication and is extremely widespread that people do not come up with on their own. They come up with it because it is built into the language. Language made before they were born. And while is changing this language, the dominance of that metaphor keeps being passed on so far.

https://msu.edu/~orourk51/800-Phil/Handouts/Readings/Linguistics/Reddy-TheConduitMetaphor-1979.pdf

But all this is a long way from 'insanity'. — Coben

If insanity is defined as above, then repeatedly using the same philosophical methods that have failed so many times before, and expecting them to succeed would fit that definition.

Further I think some of the big questions can be resolved for individual thinkers. — Coben

This doesn’t make sense. If the issue is truly resolved, then there would be no disputing it.

IOW they can find a position that makes their life work better for them in the context of their values. Beyond that once they choose certain axioms, philosophy can help them draw conclusions and develop positions that work for them. — Coben

I agree, but individually we could all be wrong. Simply being convinced that what you believe is true is different than it being true. This is why it’s silly to think that everyone could have their own beliefs about science that just works for them individually.

I can't convince everyone else what they should believe, but perhaps that is not possible or necessary. — Coben

If it’s not possible, it is because the issue has not been resolved. If it isn’t necessary, it means that true knowledge/wisdom isn’t the purpose of using philosophical methods.

We cannot resolve conflicts around big issues so doing philosophy is insane. — Coben

I would add “if you expect to find solutions to the big questions.”

To me it seems like some humbler goals and a sense of a spectrum of possible use is a healthier attitude about philosophy. — Coben

Any suggestions? Personally, I view philosophy as a hobby that people take seriously. IOW, we do philosophy because it’s enjoyable. The possibility of discovery is exciting, the sense of pride (and arrogance) that comes with believing you have the answers to some of life’s most enduring questions is pleasurable. It is the challenge of pushing the rock back up the hill again that is inviting. But I try not to deceive myself that it is anything more than just a hobby.

Insane relative to the everyman, yes.

Insane according to the definition I provided?

No, Insane as uncommon mentally.

Relative to the everyman, with your definition, they might actually be some of the most sane people to ever exist.

thanks for the reply, and for the link

But none of what you write changes the fact that ideas have been pouring into you for years from others. That you modify, translate, falsely interpret these ideas, reconfigure them, misunderstand them, in addition to taking in reasonably close approximations doesn't change the fact that your mind has been constructed with tremendous input from other minds and this is still going on if you are not isolated from communicating with the others. — Coben

I believe your analysis nails it perfectly on the head in explaining the non-individual.

However, the individual does not need to remove oneself from society, nor avoid human contact in order to isolate, or enter the cave. Don't forget that ideas can be ignored, doubted, rejected or disposed of, and without the least notice of another.

The ideas which I have treated as such (ignored, doubted, rejected or disposed of) stand as the heaviest influence upon my individuality because of my negative relation to them, they effectively imbue me with the ability of resignation - to stand dialectically opposed to the very thing that defines me. Needless to say, it is comfortingly paradoxical, and only something that can be derived from from the philosophical wheel (which is freely available to all), which in turn, I have applied uniquely to myself... And regardless of whether my thoughts are derived externally, my appropriation of these ideas form an intricate complex of internal thought qualities that make up my unique individuality.

we realize all sorts of assumptions we have been making. And we did not choose to make these assumptions. Those assumptions entered us via the culture. — Coben

Once a person discerns the culture (what I prefer to call the generation) from himself, he awakens to individuality. He needs no ideas that originate internally, rather, ideas derived externally through his unique relation to the generation are enough. Through appropriation of thought communications that are universally available to all, he makes them unique to himself, and whether he becomes more or less of an individual is only a matter of how far he cultivates his uniqueness in himself, which is directly related to how capable he is of resigning from the generation.

while criticizing a position of mine I don't really have, — Coben

No offense meant. I was simply being facetious in implying you held that position, I didn't really think you held it. Consider it a bad attempt at a bad joke.

However, the individual does not need to remove oneself from society, nor avoid human contact in order to isolate, or enter the cave — Merkwurdichliebe

I agree, and the fact that you came up with something like REddy's critique of how language works means that you managed to get around a cultural bias. One can use other people, books, movies, great art often undercuts assumptions, science, meditation, relationships with people from other cultures, relationships with animals and so on to undermine biases and also, first, to make them visible. I am not saying we cannot change.

No offense meant. I was simply being facetious in implying you held that position, I didn't really think you held it. Consider it a bad attempt at a bad joke. — Merkwurdichliebe

Ah, ok, no worries, thanks for explaining.

I agree, and the fact that you came up with something like REddy's critique of how language works means that you managed to get around a cultural bias. One can use other people, books, movies, great art often undercuts assumptions, science, meditation, relationships with people from other cultures, relationships with animals and so on to undermine biases and also, first, to make them visible. I am not saying we cannot change. — Coben

I don't think we have much disagreement here. I do recognize that the generation has an immense impact on the development of people - latent individuals who have not yet taken ahold of themselves as individuals. My prescription is philosophy.

I do think philosophy can help, I think active relationship type experiences are even more important. Cross cultural experience, learning other languages, altered states of consciousness, travel, cross class experiences, cross species experiences, really intense and respectful long term encounters with the opposite sex where one really tries to be open to what the other person is experiencing and saying, interactions with people with odd and unique minds, therapy, phenomenlogy of language (which might never come up in philosophy, though it's a part of it, contemplation, time in nature not as a tourist but immersive, long study of interpersonal dynamics including feedback from those people and experts, anthropology....you also need to get to a place where you can tolerate a lot of cognitive dissonence and further to be able to accept the most ego-dystonic stuff imaginable in yourself. Without that one's introspection will have such a powerful confirmation bias that one simply cannot see what one is assuming and why one is assuming it. One will buy one's own pr. I think we vastly overestimate the power of thinking about things with words. We can notice in interactions with others how seldom people change their minds because someone else made a compelling argument around deep beliefs. Life experience, especially radically new life experience, however often leads to change. And active interaction with feedback (or perhaps a better word would be 'response' from that 'other'), rather than simply passively experiencing something, can be even more valuable.

Yes, I agree. No problems here. :smile:

:smile:

I thank you for your assistance.

Insanity is an ill-defined notion anyway.
Anyway here is an interesting sentence to be amused.

Every genius is necessarily insane, but not every insane person is a genius.

MathematicalPhysicist
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↪Pinprick Insanity is an ill-defined notion anyway.
Anyway here is an interesting sentence to be amused.

Every genius is necessarily insane, but not every insane person is a genius. — MathematicalPhysicist

I like Albert Einstein's take on the question:

"The difference between genius and stupidity is that there are limits to genius."

That's a stupid thing to say.
:-D

:rofl:

I do not believe the purpose of philosophy is or was to get everything right. The discipline is purely intellectual which implies that the problems are purely intellectual, which is to say that philosophy is concerned with coming to solutions for internal convictions or beliefs. The arguments are then formed from opposing beliefs, using the methods of philosophy to justify one's position, and what is true is that which is not contradictory or the argument doesn't contradict itself. Does this mean that philosophers are insane? Well, only if they speak incoherently and believe unintelligible things.

There's no way to get everything right when the ultimate truth is ineffable.