Besides, most LWers know that a lot of Western philosophy is hopelessly garbled and should be reanalyzed from scratch if it is to be practically useful.
I don’t think most people here think that. I’m pretty sure that you’ll find the following two opinions much more prevalent:
Western philosophy is to some extent useful and to that extent it should be taken at face value
Western philosophy is to some extent hopelessly garbled and to that extent it should be thrown out entirely, not “reanalyzed”.
False dichotomy. But that’s par for the course for Aristotelian philosophers.
Besides, throwing out Western moral philosophy entirely without further comment would not be making it “practically useful”. And it would be distinctly unhelpful to its current practitioners, many of whom have a legitimate interest in the questions it seeks to address.
Besides, throwing out Western moral philosophy entirely without further comment would not be making it “practically useful”.
Indeed. I see no profit in making something hopelessly garbled into something practically useful, rather than inventing something new to serve that purpose. For similar reasons we’re mostly atheists, rather than saying we’re Christians and then redefining “God” and various metaphysical ‘beliefs’ to mean something coherent.
For similar reasons we’re mostly atheists, rather than saying we’re Christians and then redefining “God” and various metaphysical ‘beliefs’ to mean something coherent.
And yet we mostly recognize the usefulness of various formsof religion. So, perhaps we should describe ourselves as “religious” as much as Confucians do, or at least as following some moral code and practicing a form of ethics.
I don’t think most people here think that. I’m pretty sure that you’ll find the following two opinions much more prevalent:
Western philosophy is to some extent useful and to that extent it should be taken at face value
Western philosophy is to some extent hopelessly garbled and to that extent it should be thrown out entirely, not “reanalyzed”.
False dichotomy. But that’s par for the course for Aristotelian philosophers.
Besides, throwing out Western moral philosophy entirely without further comment would not be making it “practically useful”. And it would be distinctly unhelpful to its current practitioners, many of whom have a legitimate interest in the questions it seeks to address.
Indeed. I see no profit in making something hopelessly garbled into something practically useful, rather than inventing something new to serve that purpose. For similar reasons we’re mostly atheists, rather than saying we’re Christians and then redefining “God” and various metaphysical ‘beliefs’ to mean something coherent.
And yet we mostly recognize the usefulness of various forms of religion. So, perhaps we should describe ourselves as “religious” as much as Confucians do, or at least as following some moral code and practicing a form of ethics.