Stop reading, arguing, writing, building little intellectual kingdoms out of the sand of your benighted psyches.
— T Clark
I mean, the irony in this statement is dazzling. — StreetlightX
This idea of cloistered genius demiurging their way to brilliance is just neoliberal entrepreneurial values transposed into philosophy like a virus. Self-aggrandizing laziness arrogated to the status of virtue. — StreetlightX
That's within a context of a certain experience and understanding. Everybody has these, it's kind of impossible no to, as long as you are alive. — Manuel
But who is saying that a person just need to be alone in a room with zero stimulus or just go to the mountain hiking with no thoughts in mind? — Manuel
Of course this is Kafka's original thought not T Clark's. I wonder why Kafka thought that. Was he recommending avoidance of literature? Seeing is one thing; if you want to be good at communicating what you see, then obviously some familiarity with the ways other's have expressed their seeing will no doubt be helpful — Janus
I see two distinctions. The Scholar (those who study philosophers/philosophies with little to no bias in a dry and methodical manner) and the Thinker (those who just observe and play with their thoughts in regards to what is observed). — I like sushi
In regards to philosophy in general I genuinely think this is one area of human knowledge where we’d benefit if the field was more polarised between the two with fewer vying to claim hold of both ends. — I like sushi
All empirical philosophy in general and cognitive metaphysics in particular, is contained right there. If the world can do no other than present itself, the fundamental paid attention needs be only to oneself, by oneself, in the receipt of such presentation. The benighted psyches diminish, making intellectual sand kingdoms predicated on them less likely, by the quality of attention paid, and the world necessarily becomes unmasked in direct correspondence to it. — Mww
At the very least, even if only in humans, the agency that pays attention to itself can be supposed to contain the capacity to investigate itself, — Mww
The main issue, to my mind, is whether your definition of metaphysics is actually correct or if your using the word in an idiosyncratic manner. — Manuel
I've take the view that I take with so many other issues: I can't know it all, and while I will not surrender my right to critically and analytically consider something, I will often suspend it. As stated in another thread, doubt does not preclude action. I'll defer to those I deem experts, in my own arbitrary and subjective vetting process. I've no interest in knowing everything. — James Riley
Most of the controversy in philosophy is related to differences in metaphysics and the fact that most philosophers don’t recognize that ways of seeing reality are not right or wrong, they are just more or less useful ways of seeing things in a particular situation. — T Clark
The answer to that question is in your OP. :brow:Of course not, but that opens up an interesting question. Is my understanding that metaphysical questions are not matters of fact but of usefulness a metaphysical question? — T Clark
I don't understand. — T Clark
Ape sitting in room ruminating on air, almost certainly utterly moronic. — StreetlightX
The answer to that question is in your OP. :brow: — Wheatley
You don't have to read philosophy to be a philosopher, but you had damned well be deeply and thoroughly immersed in things which would otherwise require enourmous investments of time, problem solving, and engagement more generally...
The idea that one can sit in a room and have ideas sprout fourth like Athena from Zeus is naive at best, actively debilitating at worst. Genuine thought takes place under the pressure of constraints imposed by encounters that force problems upon us. Those encounters may not be philosophy, but they need to be encounters nontheless which are richly stifiling. — StreetlightX
In any case it strikes me as arrogant in the extreme to imagine that one can - or worse, should - disregard the accumulated knowledge and research that humanity has painstakingly cobbled together - again, not necessarily just in philosophy - in order to blank-slate oneself to ideas. If not philosophy then sociology, economics, anthropology, woodworking, social work, history, science, child-rearing, gardening, community-organizing, art making, or better yet, all of these together and more. Apes together strong. Ape sitting in room ruminating on air, almost certainly utterly moronic. — StreetlightX
They have a good understanding of the history of philosophy and the contributions of different philosophers. They usually show respect for the contributions even of philosophers whose ideas they don't agree with. The way they can pull ideas from other philosophers into discussions would be a really neat thing to be able to do. That's what makes me think I may be missing something. — T Clark
In any case it strikes me as arrogant in the extreme to imagine that one can - or worse, should - disregard the accumulated knowledge and research that humanity has painstakingly cobbled together - again, not necessarily just in philosophy - in order to blank-slate oneself to ideas. — StreetlightX
epistemology is what matters — T Clark
I think my "body of work," if I may laughingly call it that, shows I am not afraid to do my own thinking, for better or worse. — T Clark
Yes, and that's what I'm trying to get a handle on. Take Kant for instance. I think he is one of your insistent poets. I've tried reading him and haven't gotten very far. But people I respect keep saying his work is central to intellectual history and the scientific revolution. Again, I worry I am missing something. — T Clark
As I noted in my previous response to Manuel, I take Kafka seriously and, mostly, literally. I'm sure Kafka was well-read in philosophy, but in the end, is our own experience we have to understand and be aware of. — T Clark
I think attention, awareness, is at the heart of philosophy. — T Clark
That's from Verse 48 of the Tao Te Ching. Ellen Marie Chen's translation. There are lots of similar thoughts in Lao Tzu's work — T Clark
In any case it's telling that the defense of remaining stupid and ignorant is coupled with some woo woo religion and mysticism. Buddha included. All of this goes hand and hand. What better way to justify being dumb that indulging in some exoticizsed 'Eastern' Wisdom. — StreetlightX
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