I don’t think you’re being fair to a lot of philosophers. I think you’re being fair to some philosophers, the ones who are sowing confusion. But you can’t just wave away the sophists, the charlatans, with a magic wand. They are out there creating confusion and drawing people away from useful and promising lines of thought. There are other philosophers out there who are doing what they can to limit the damage.
It’s a bit like war. Think of yourself as a scientist who is trying to build a rocket that will take us to Mars. But in the meantime there is a war going on. You might say, “this war is not helpful, because a stray missile might blow up my rocket, damn those generals and their toys.” But the problem is, without the generals like Dennett who are protecting your territory, your positions, the enemy generals will overrun your project and strip your rocket for parts.
You may think that the philosophers don’t matter, that they are just arguing in obscurity among themselves, but I don’t think that’s the case. I think that there is a significant amount of leakage, that ideas born and nurtured in the academy frequently spread to the wider society and infect essentially everyone’s way of thinking.
I don’t think you’re being fair to a lot of philosophers. I think you’re being fair to some philosophers, the ones who are sowing confusion. But you can’t just wave away the sophists, the charlatans, with a magic wand. They are out there creating confusion and drawing people away from useful and promising lines of thought. There are other philosophers out there who are doing what they can to limit the damage.
It’s a bit like war. Think of yourself as a scientist who is trying to build a rocket that will take us to Mars. But in the meantime there is a war going on. You might say, “this war is not helpful, because a stray missile might blow up my rocket, damn those generals and their toys.” But the problem is, without the generals like Dennett who are protecting your territory, your positions, the enemy generals will overrun your project and strip your rocket for parts.
You may think that the philosophers don’t matter, that they are just arguing in obscurity among themselves, but I don’t think that’s the case. I think that there is a significant amount of leakage, that ideas born and nurtured in the academy frequently spread to the wider society and infect essentially everyone’s way of thinking.