Philosophical training should begin with the latest and greatest formal methods....and the latest and greatest science
We certainly don’t start science students off with the latest and greatest science, because there’s a boatload of other science they have to study before it’ll do them any good. In practice,almost everything we teach undergrads in hard science fields is pre-1980, because of the amount of time it takes to get a student up to speed with where the frontier of the field had progressed to by 1980.
1) The science that lukeprog is concerned with comes from subfields that are substantially younger than most major fields in the hard sciences, e.g. the heuristics and biases program is much younger than Newtonian mechanics.
2) Old hard science at least has the benefit of working within a certain domain, e.g. Newtonian mechanics is valuable because it is still applicable to macroscopic objects moving slowly, and any future theory of physics is constrained by having to reduce to Newtonian mechanics in certain limits. The older results in the science that lukeprog is concerned with are misleading at best and dangerously wrong at worst.
In other words, I think what lukeprog is advocating is less analogous to teaching undergraduates about string theory before Newtonian mechanics now and more analogous to teaching undergraduates about thermodynamics before phlogiston theory in the 1800s (edit: and I see JoshuaZ made this point already).
I think what lukeprog is advocating is less analogous to teaching undergraduates about string theory before Newtonian mechanics now and more analogous to teaching undergraduates about thermodynamics before phlogiston theory in the 1800s
There is something inside your mind, called a “Propositional Attitude” which has a truth value regardless of the world around you. The truth value sits on your mind. /
Now for the primitive ones (these are extremely relaxed, and angry, descriptions/summaries):
Man is naturally good, but rich people made a contract which started a bad nature. Rousseau /
Man is naturally mean, but an abstract entity made itself as of the creation of a social contract (implicit or explicit) and that is what prevents evil from spreading. Hobbes. /
Angels are separated by 72 Kilometers each in the heavens. Aquinas. /
Brace yourselves for this one: That of which nothing greater can be thought is smaller than not that of which nothing greater can be thought, thus the latter can’t exist (don’t ask for what sense of smaller), because it can’t exist, there is one thing that is that of which nothing grater can be thought, and since its negation can’t be thought, all its properties must be positive, and it is God, because it is great and undeniable. Anselm. (ok, I grant that I forgot the bulk of his original since last reading it in 2007… but it is along these lines)
EDIT: Just to clarify before people read Robb below, I’ll put in my disclaimer about his response: RoBB Your philosophers descend from the anglophone tradition of philosophy, and were trained in analytic. The ones I mention descend from french tradition, are fond of structural readings, and do in fact state all those as fact.
Ever since Gettier’s 1963 paper, this has not been taught except as a useful extremely close approximation of the correct definition. Since philosophers (and some linguists) are the ones who have been criticizing this heuristic, and since their criticisms concern very special cases of ‘epistemic luck,’ this is a doubly misleading charge. The standards philosophers are adopting when they doubt that knowledge is justified true belief are actually, in most contexts and for most everyday purposes, unreasonably high; dictionaries and classrooms almost invariably define terms in more approximate, inexact, and exception-allowing ways than do philosophers. (Indeed, this is why philosophers are often criticized for being too precise and ‘nitpicky’ in their terminological distinctions.)
propositions
I agree philosophers take the reality of propositions too seriously. However, mathematicians do precisely the same thing. In both cases it’s not that the doctrine is “definitely known to be wrong;” it’s that there’s no good reason to affirm causally inert abstracta.
Man is naturally good, but rich people made a contract which started a bad nature. Rousseau
This is not Rousseau’s view, and is not generally taught as fact by philosophers.
Man is naturally mean, but an abstract entity made itself as of the creation of a social contract (implicit or explicit) and that is what prevents evil from spreading. Hobbes. /
This is not Hobbes’ view, and is not generally taught as fact by philosophers.
Angels are separated by 72 Kilometers each in the heavens. Aquinas. /
This is theology, not philosophy. And even if you deem it philosophy, it’s not generally taught as fact by philosophers. (Including Christian philosophers.)
That of which nothing greater can be thought is smaller …
That is not Anselm’s argument, and Anselm’s actual argument is not considered by philosophers (even Christian philosophers) to be sound, as originally formulated.
Quite
It is not clear that JTB is jut plumb wrong, post Gettier, and in case it is hardly a charge against philosophy, when philosophy noticed the problem. If Diego has a better answer , I would like to hear it. Science types like to announce that “knowledge is information”, but that is inferior to JTB, because the requirement for truth has gone missing.
I agree philosophers take the reality of propositions too seriously.
I don’t particularly. Think this could be a case of taking a /facon de parler/ as an ontological commitment, cf PWs.
That is not Anselm’s argument, and Anselm’s actual argument is not considered by philosophers (even Christian philosophers) to be sound, as originally formulated.
I believe Platinga has tried to revive it, but that is considered a novelty.
I don’t particularly. Think this could be a case of taking a /facon de parler/ as an ontological commitment, cf PWs.
It’s true that some people treat ‘possible worlds’ and/or ‘propositions’ as mere eliminable manners of speech. But a lot of prominent philosophers also treat one or the other as metaphysically deep and important, as a base for reducing other things to a unified foundation rather than as a thing to be reduced in its own right. Philosophy as a whole deserves at least some criticism for taking such views seriously, for the same reason mathematics deserves criticism for taking mathematical platonism seriously.
And to clarify, the target of my criticism isn’t modal realism; modal realism is a straw-man almost everywhere outside the pages of a David Lewis article. Modal realism is the doctrine that possibilia are concrete and real; I’m criticizing the doctrine that possibilia (or propositions, or mathematical entities...) are abstract and real.
I believe Platinga has tried to revive it, but that is considered a novelty.
Lots of people, from Descartes onward, have given variations on ‘ontological’ arguments. But that Anselm’s original argument is fallacious (specifically, equivocal) is beyond reasonable doubt.
There is something inside your mind, called a “Propositional Attitude” which has a truth value regardless of the world around you. The truth value sits on your mind.
You are muddling propositions and propositional attitudes.
Now for the primitive ones (these are extremely relaxed, and angry, descriptions/summaries): Man is naturally good, but rich people made a contract which started a bad nature. Rousseau
Man is naturally mean, but an abstract entity made itself as of the creation of a social contract (implicit or explicit) and that is what prevents evil from spreading. Hobbes.
Not taught as facts. More likely to be taught as compare-and-contrast.
Angels are separated by 72 Kilometers each in the heavens. Aquinas.
Absolutely definitley not taught as fact, and unlikely to be touched on outside of specialist mediaeval phil. courses.
Brace yourselves for this one: That of which nothing greater can be thought is smaller than not that of which nothing greater can be thought, thus the latter can’t exist (don’t ask for what sense of smaller), because it can’t exist, there is one thing that is that of which nothing grater can be thought, and since its negation can’t be thought, all its properties must be positive, and it is God, because it is great and undeniable. Anselm. (ok, I grant that I forgot the bulk of his original since last reading it in 2007… but it is along these lines
INVARIABLY taught as somethign that was trashed by subsequent philosophers. Couldn’t be wronger.
You do realize that you can try out multiple things in Markup by editing the same comment several times, rather than by making multiple comments, right?
MM, let us test this now this is the second line on another interpretation of what you meant this is already the fourth and here should be the third or fifth.
Got it, thanks
double enter
one space one enter
one space one enter one space
one enter double space and finally double space enter
We certainly don’t start science students off with the latest and greatest science, because there’s a boatload of other science they have to study before it’ll do them any good. In practice,almost everything we teach undergrads in hard science fields is pre-1980, because of the amount of time it takes to get a student up to speed with where the frontier of the field had progressed to by 1980.
Point, but:
1) The science that lukeprog is concerned with comes from subfields that are substantially younger than most major fields in the hard sciences, e.g. the heuristics and biases program is much younger than Newtonian mechanics.
2) Old hard science at least has the benefit of working within a certain domain, e.g. Newtonian mechanics is valuable because it is still applicable to macroscopic objects moving slowly, and any future theory of physics is constrained by having to reduce to Newtonian mechanics in certain limits. The older results in the science that lukeprog is concerned with are misleading at best and dangerously wrong at worst.
In other words, I think what lukeprog is advocating is less analogous to teaching undergraduates about string theory before Newtonian mechanics now and more analogous to teaching undergraduates about thermodynamics before phlogiston theory in the 1800s (edit: and I see JoshuaZ made this point already).
Correct.
Could I have some examples of things being taught on philoosphy courses which are definitely known to be wrong.
Knowledge is justified true belief. /
There is something inside your mind, called a “Propositional Attitude” which has a truth value regardless of the world around you. The truth value sits on your mind. /
Now for the primitive ones (these are extremely relaxed, and angry, descriptions/summaries): Man is naturally good, but rich people made a contract which started a bad nature. Rousseau /
Man is naturally mean, but an abstract entity made itself as of the creation of a social contract (implicit or explicit) and that is what prevents evil from spreading. Hobbes. /
Angels are separated by 72 Kilometers each in the heavens. Aquinas. /
Brace yourselves for this one: That of which nothing greater can be thought is smaller than not that of which nothing greater can be thought, thus the latter can’t exist (don’t ask for what sense of smaller), because it can’t exist, there is one thing that is that of which nothing grater can be thought, and since its negation can’t be thought, all its properties must be positive, and it is God, because it is great and undeniable. Anselm. (ok, I grant that I forgot the bulk of his original since last reading it in 2007… but it is along these lines)
EDIT: Just to clarify before people read Robb below, I’ll put in my disclaimer about his response: RoBB Your philosophers descend from the anglophone tradition of philosophy, and were trained in analytic. The ones I mention descend from french tradition, are fond of structural readings, and do in fact state all those as fact.
Ever since Gettier’s 1963 paper, this has not been taught except as a useful extremely close approximation of the correct definition. Since philosophers (and some linguists) are the ones who have been criticizing this heuristic, and since their criticisms concern very special cases of ‘epistemic luck,’ this is a doubly misleading charge. The standards philosophers are adopting when they doubt that knowledge is justified true belief are actually, in most contexts and for most everyday purposes, unreasonably high; dictionaries and classrooms almost invariably define terms in more approximate, inexact, and exception-allowing ways than do philosophers. (Indeed, this is why philosophers are often criticized for being too precise and ‘nitpicky’ in their terminological distinctions.)
I agree philosophers take the reality of propositions too seriously. However, mathematicians do precisely the same thing. In both cases it’s not that the doctrine is “definitely known to be wrong;” it’s that there’s no good reason to affirm causally inert abstracta.
This is not Rousseau’s view, and is not generally taught as fact by philosophers.
This is not Hobbes’ view, and is not generally taught as fact by philosophers.
This is theology, not philosophy. And even if you deem it philosophy, it’s not generally taught as fact by philosophers. (Including Christian philosophers.)
That is not Anselm’s argument, and Anselm’s actual argument is not considered by philosophers (even Christian philosophers) to be sound, as originally formulated.
Quite It is not clear that JTB is jut plumb wrong, post Gettier, and in case it is hardly a charge against philosophy, when philosophy noticed the problem. If Diego has a better answer , I would like to hear it. Science types like to announce that “knowledge is information”, but that is inferior to JTB, because the requirement for truth has gone missing.
I don’t particularly. Think this could be a case of taking a /facon de parler/ as an ontological commitment, cf PWs.
I believe Platinga has tried to revive it, but that is considered a novelty.
It’s true that some people treat ‘possible worlds’ and/or ‘propositions’ as mere eliminable manners of speech. But a lot of prominent philosophers also treat one or the other as metaphysically deep and important, as a base for reducing other things to a unified foundation rather than as a thing to be reduced in its own right. Philosophy as a whole deserves at least some criticism for taking such views seriously, for the same reason mathematics deserves criticism for taking mathematical platonism seriously.
And to clarify, the target of my criticism isn’t modal realism; modal realism is a straw-man almost everywhere outside the pages of a David Lewis article. Modal realism is the doctrine that possibilia are concrete and real; I’m criticizing the doctrine that possibilia (or propositions, or mathematical entities...) are abstract and real.
Lots of people, from Descartes onward, have given variations on ‘ontological’ arguments. But that Anselm’s original argument is fallacious (specifically, equivocal) is beyond reasonable doubt.
whats wrong with that?
You are muddling propositions and propositional attitudes.
Not taught as facts. More likely to be taught as compare-and-contrast.
Absolutely definitley not taught as fact, and unlikely to be touched on outside of specialist mediaeval phil. courses.
INVARIABLY taught as somethign that was trashed by subsequent philosophers. Couldn’t be wronger.
Meta: Testing the use of enter This should be in a separate line / So should this. Now with a period.
EDIT: Please downvote this until −3 so people don’t have to read it’s useless meta-children offtopic.
You do realize that you can try out multiple things in Markup by editing the same comment several times, rather than by making multiple comments, right?
You may be interested in the “show help” button to the bottom right of the text box.
Indeed am :)
Also it only shows when the text is being edited.
Use two spaces after the line
See?
MM, let us test this
now this is the second line on another interpretation of what you meant this is already the fourth
and here should be the third or fifth.
Got it, thanks
double enter one space one enter one space one enter one space one enter double space
and finally double space enter
both double enter and double space enter work.
META: now does shift enter work if it does this is the third line
Upvoted for noticing something particularly relevant, yet nearly invisible.