As facts stand, philosophers have all but forgotten the original question (what is the good life?). They're now only interested in topics auxiliary to the main one viz., to reiterate, the good life. — Agent Smith
Are philosophers missing the forest for the trees? — Agent Smith
I agree. I would even say: the objective in philosophers’ mind was not “to discover how to live the good life”, but “to live the good life”. — Angelo Cannata
Have you asked philosophers what their opinion of the good life is? It sounds like you think philosophers generally don't have an opinion on this. How do you know the topics they cover are auxiliary to what they consider "the good life"? — Philosophim
Elementary my dear Watson! — Sherlock Holmes
Agent Smith! My man! Exactly! They study the meaning of the roots, how the bark looks in UV light, if a tree can be reduced to parts, if it makes a sound in the wind if we're not there to hear, if the tree has a function, the meaning of the word "tree", our knowledge of trees, the tree as an -ism, the tree as pleasure, the evolution of a tree, the tree in the light of God, etcetera etcetera, without knowing what a tree is. Likewise for a forrest. — EugeneW
Have you asked philosophers what their opinion of the good life is? It sounds like you think philosophers generally don't have an opinion on this. How do you know the topics they cover are auxiliary to what they consider "the good life"?
— Philosophim
Elementary my dear Watson!
— Sherlock Holmes
Deduction! — Agent Smith
As it has been noted over the years by many, sometimes when Sherlock Holmes claims to use deduction, it is actually "Induction". You're doing that now Agent — Philosophim
It's no different than saying, "Why do all firefighters hate the color blue?", then giving no examples. You're making broad assumptions about a profession based on...what? Have you asked a statistically significant number of firefighters? Have you asked even one? Are you just assuming they don't like the color blue based on how they act? — Philosophim
Why don't you ask some philosophers about the good life? What does it mean to them, and is it their primary motivation? Painting people with a broad brush of opinionated water while pretending it is factual colored oil may leave an image in your head that you want, but creates no tangible painting that others can see. — Philosophim
TIMTOWTDI (There is more than one way to do it) BSCINABTE (But sometimes consistency is not a bad ..) — EugeneW
You're making broad assumptions about a profession based on...what? — Philosophim
Philosophy is simply a way of looking at things and if you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change!
To consider something as being GOOD or BAD, is a product of being judgemental and I suppose we are ALL judgemental to some degree, however I disagree that the the object of philosophy is to live the good life.
We are alive right now because NOW is the only time where all life finds itself. Although we may prefer that things be different then what they are here and now, the truth may only be found in what IS, not in what might be. — Present awareness
Whether the world is finite or infinite, limited or unlimited, the problem of your liberation remains the same. — The Buddha
Philosophy began with one objective in mind - to discover how to live the good life. — Agent Smith
To answer this seemingly simple query, philosophers needed to deal with other matters like truth & knowledge (epistemology), reason (logic), good and bad (ethics), gods, free will (metaphysics), beauty (aesthetics), so on and so forth. In short, as far as I can tell, all the various branches of philosophy are subgoals that we need to attain just so that we can finally answer the question "what is the good life?"
Philosophers soon realized the complexity and profundity of the problem. Each subdiscipline of philosophy turned out to be a tough nut to crack that required entire lifetimes of study.
As facts stand, philosophers have all but forgotten the original question (what is the good life?). They're now only interested in topics auxiliary to the main one viz., to reiterate, the good life.
Are philosophers missing the forest for the trees?
Can you back this up with some reference? — baker
If the original goal of philosophy really was "the good life", then, after all those complex and lengthy excursions into epistemology, ontology, etc. etc., that original goal began to appear too pedestrian to be taken seriously any longer.
I was once at a lecture on virtue epistemology by Duncan Pritchard. He also spoke about "living the good life". It struck me as too superficial to take seriously. Talking about Gettier problems for an hour and then about the "good life" -- how does one put those two together? — baker
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