mine is best tho 
Yep, we need more true acience and true inspiration to lead to more real discovery of which progress our species. No money games, but resources that science needs.
It’s because A names are the best.
I voted no as I understood the question to mean “is knowing every branch of science an ‘ought’ for any given philosopher?” I don’t see that the majority of philosophy is improved by knowledge of bivalve reproduction or karst formation.
If you meant something along the lines of “should every branch of science have interested philosophers who know about it?”, then I think yes.
If you think that philosophers are less prone to guarding religious edifices of dogma, which you seem to accuse scientists of, I would disagree. There are precisely the same motivations and mechanisms at work in all fields.
Does anyone know a branch of science? OK, I am being fussy, but it seemed rather yes/no without gradations. It would be strange, I think, if a philosopher did not also find some interest in science, likely a couple of fields. Biology and physics come to mind as ones with easy connections to many philosophical issues. I am not sure it is a necessary condition for being a good philosopher, but I would guess that any philosopher who did not get curious about some of the sciences would like not have the necessary attributes to be a philosopher. Just as it would be strange if they never read any literature or had no interest in psychology.
I have to say I am more concerned about scientists having no knowledge of philosophy, which actually seems more likely given specialization and how philosophy is viewed.
And the first. 
I meant both, but especially the first one: “is knowing every branch of science an ‘ought’ for any given philosopher?”.
In all fields, yes, I agree to that.
These fields are subordinated, they obey politics, which obeys the process of culture, and culture can be used as a “clock”, because all other fields are subordinated, they obey culture, whereas culture obeys only nature.
Indeed, that would be strange.
Yes, that’s right, but scientists and philosophers do not differ much from each other when it comes to culture (including politics - of course), which they obey. Compare my last post.
When the culture has great times (whatever “great” means in this relation), then science and arts follow and get great times too, often when culture already starts having less great times.
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I would think that it would be useful for most philosophers to have delved into the philosophy and history of science. To do this well, they would need to have some sense of specifics. OH mentions a couple of specifics and I agree with him, in the sense that a philosopher needs not, for example, have an in depth knowledge of all or even on butterfly species and its ecology. But to understand general issues, it would be good, I would think, if he or she read about some specifics, got into one or more scientific fields, as an amateur, enough to be able to read professional papers on specific species and get the gist. Or some parallel exposure to specifics in some other science. Otherwise epistemology and methodologies and models are too abstract. It would be too easy to think you understood what science was about, getting all in some dry an airy way.
But then I don’t know how much a philosopher focusing on ethics or political science would need this.
In all fields, yes, I agree to that.
These fields are subordinated, they obey politics, which obseys the process of culture, and culture can be used as a “clock”, because all other fields are subordinated, they obey culture, whereas culture obeys only nature.
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I would think that philosophers would draw conclusions, just as much as scientists along dogma lines, BUT they would be less likely to simply scoff at alternate positions. The scientists I have known are more likely to simply say something is fluff or BS and think that is a good endpoint to the discussion. The philosophers I have known generally will explore, especially if you do it well. At the end of the day they end up back where they started, but the interaction is much more useful and respectful. My sense is also that they become skilled at smelling at least one type of lies or better put the lies of one political party, one paradigmatic ontology, etc. Whereas scientists often are really quite limited. They have opinions and can be rational, so to speak, but I am not sure how good they are at spotting the problems with the more polished advocates of any position. Whereas from philosophers you can get nice lines of argument about at least those groups they tend to oppose.
I think also that if you replaced scientists with philosophers - and somehow they could do the scientists jobs - they might, for example, have a harder time just aligning with Monsanto, say. They would notice issues where the scientists would not. They would be more suceptible to outside criticism. Perhaps this would merely be a phase before they hardened up and ratinoalized away whatever dissonence the criticism created, but it seems to me they would have to, by temperment and training, engage the critics at least in their own minds. Scientists are trained to dismiss, to treat ontology as a no longer controversial subject, etc.
Not quite sure what to make of that ‘chart’. Is the moon landing a great thing? I mean, I can see it as an incredible achievement, but not even good. Though in the image it would correspond to fashion that might not seem great, so perhaps it isn’t.
Somewhere underlying much of my response to this is the takeover of the technocrats coupled with modern versions of capitalism. If there is no problem there is no product so find a problem or make one then design a product for it. Make sure solutions are technological and never reduce overall energy consumption or product consumption. Downplay non-technological solutions. Downplay political solutions where we can find a way to sell a technological one. Try to get as much of the world conceived of as mechanism, because mechanisms require repair, upgrades, liscences and corporate dependence. Anything that does not view things as mechanisms should be downplayed.
Very few people take this position at this level of abstraction, yet it is the most powerful position out there today and it is worming its way into everything.
To a scientist it need not be a given, but it does tie in with their culture and also with their epistemology.
A philosopher’s culture does not head them in this direction - though the rest of the culture does.
Agreed.
I think that it is not good that, according to the English language, the word “science” mainly refers to “natural science”, thus all other branches are not mainly regarded as scientific branches, but at least they are sometimes called “human sciences” or “moral sciences”, otherwise: “arts” or “humanities”.
Where is philosophy here? Should it be there?
I mean: Philosophy is somehow science too. All scientific theory is somehow philosophy.
Valuing this depends on your philosophical character, whether you are a more weeping philosopher like Heraklitos (Heraclitus) or a more laughing philosopher like Demokritos (Democritus). I am neutral. 
Do you think that a philosopher is more harmless than a scientist?
But that stuff is just made up!!! It’s entertainment!!! Or guesswork!!! (wry)
yes, and if you tell most scientists that they will say that science is not dependent on philosophy and that the latter is speculation. They have the axioms they trust and are running with it. And this works, in many ways, but not others.
To damn them with faint praise, I suppose. There are scientists who simply explore the world and are not directly caught up in various organizations that I think are pernicious. I see the greatest threat now to everything I love and could love to be coming from technocratic forces. Thus scientists are at the very least being used or their work is being used and I hear little outrcry from the mainstream portion of the science community. Philosophers today are mostly fine tuning various philosophical positions and have little effect on anything. I wish they would turn their minds onto the dominant assumptions out there. They don’t need to draw conclusions that are alternative, but if they could attack the rhetoric and models and arguments of the dominant patterns first, then work their way down to alternative ones, it could be great. But they seem to have little interest in this.
IOW they need not believe what I do, but could function as skeptics, demanding justification for what has the most power out there, even if they agree with it. I mean if they agree with it, then they should assume it can have excellent justification.
When someone say E=MC2,
PHILOsopher might not be good in knowing how it derived.
still, good in knowing what 3-d world means.
there are lot many who know the derivation of the above formula .yet , you see them believing in meta and also claim to be stand by einstein side.
they don’t know what they are.
What is “just made up”? And by whom?
Philosophers should know better.
When I was a student and a research assistant at the university, I hoped to simply explore the world too, but then I noticed that science is more a dependent institution of mercenary competitors or warriors than a free market of research.
Yes, but many philosophers are used and misused too, and they allow their moneygivers to use and misuse them too.
That was me playing outraged that the humanities or psychology etc, could be referred to as sciences.
Yes, though today I think most take a wide range of issues for granted. It is as Jesus said render unto science that which is sciences and render unto modern neocapitalism that which is neocapitalism’s. This leaves not so much to discuss in ontology and epistemology, and then in politics either.
I think many of us had the image of the 1800s amateur polymath naturalist, out there pursuing interests, making drawings, sending long letters to colleagues, collecting, having brandy thursday evenings and discussing the latest ideas from the continent before wandering off again alone into higher math or the Amazon.
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I think shame is a powerful force. To question certain things, in a serious way, can lead one to being shunned and/or shamed. Seen as silly, dismissed. Yes, the organized religions have tremendous power in much of the world, but the shaming of anyone going against the mainstream is enormous and powerful. You will be mocked. Your kids going to school will have friends who show you being mocked by some expert or other. Your department colleagues will look at you as if you are strange. It may of course affect your funding and direct power moves are always present. But after more than a decade in the education system, where one might presumably exploring, one has been trained that taking certain ideas seriously or questioning other ideas means you are a fool, deluded, insane, damaging young minds, immoral. It is one thing to read about what, say, Dawkins says in the newpaper about someone else, but to have local shamers and bashers come after you is really unpleasant. The indirect emotional controls in Western society are very powerful.
Aha.
How many ILP members are really interested in philosophy? What do you think?
A) About 100%.
B) About 80%.
C) About 60%.
D) About 40%.
E) About 20%
F) About 0%.
Maybe I was or am (?) one of the examples loving the polymath naturalist of the last third of the 18th and of the first two thirds of the 19th century. One of my class teacher called me „Humboldt“, because he thought I could become a polymath naturalist. Well, I think that my class teacher did not know everything about me ( 
) or about F. Wilhelm C. C. F. von Humboldt (1767-1835) and his brother F. W. H Alexander von Humboldt (1769-1859).
Yes, of course. By the way: Dawkins is a good example for those who can say as much nonsense as they want and will nonetheless be taken seriously.
I would be charitable and say, vaguely, most. They do want to discuss ideas that are discussed by philosophers.
The category of poster I am least charitable with is the ‘voice of reason and science’ poster who doesn’t really know any philosophy, certainly not any epistemology or philosophy of science, has little idea of how one justifies an assertion, is content with fallacies strewn in their own posts as they deride whomever they consider barbarians, such as Chrisitans, New Agers, alternative medicine people, conspiracy theorists, spiritual people. Dawkins is a famous example of the type.
What didn’t your teacher know about you? them?
Yes.
Well, he did perhaps not know for example what kind of life I prefered to lead at that time. If he had known that, then he would not have called me „Humboldt“, or he would not have known the lifestyle of the noble (aristocratic) von Humboldt brothers.