Hi I’m new here on these boards and I was wondering how much formal philosophy have you guys (or girls) had and why you’ve gotten so? By formal I mean any kind of post secondary eduction, whether it would be an elective philosophy class in college or a Masters in the subject, I’m curious to know the level of formal education people on these boards have.
By the way, I’m a second year Philosophy undergrad, still have much to learn but I think I have the basics down pretty well. I went into the subject because I’m fascinated by it and feel a strong connection to it.
Well I’ve always been more fond of observation rather than making controlled experiments to draw information in life. But sometimes, like this one, I’m forced to ask if I want an answer so
Well, in that case, I hope all the active members respond.
To potentially save you the time, however, I would argue this board functions at roughly the same capacity as a first-year graduate course: better than undergrad, but still a far reach from “professional.”
Ah good to know I’m not the only one on this boat. I’ve gone to some boards where I find some profs talking in their own insanities which reminded me of my lectures in uni more than philosophy lol, so hopefully I won’t have much of that and i’ll get to see some fun discussions
Currently in the final year of my philosophy and maths undergrad. I’m doing a postgrad course in philosophy, either next year, or the one after, depending upon finances. I’m pretty well up on 17-18th century philosophy, and contemporary ethics stuff. I know a bit about science-type stuff, and I’m interested in Nietzsche and stuff like that. I really need to read more on philosophy of language.
Graduating undergrad this spring with my double BA in Philosophy and English Lit.
Just got accepted into some grad schools - I’m leaning toward SUNY: Stony Brook for Continental Phil.
Why? I enjoy what it and I think about it all day. Many of my friends are driving in rush-hour to work in the morning and coming home miserable to their big-screen TV’s. They are 23-26 most of them and psychologically they are aging fast! I’m not interested in a high standard of life or comfort - to me thats a form of suicide! I’m most interested in reading books and meeting people, and spending most of my time at Universities.
I know that if I live to be 70, I will still be asking the same questions I am asking now. But, its about the activity, not the accumulation of knowledge. A good philosopher can really rewire your brain and make you see the world differently, even if it is for just a moment.
Could this be because “philosophy” is a glorious waste of time and misuse of language? Certainly. Perhaps philosophers are clueless because they are asking questions that are not real questions.
I wouldn’t call them easy, but I would call them real questions.
Ahh yes. Like Ayer said, ethical questions are not real questions, just expressions of power and emotion. You sound like a logical positivist. Whether these questions are “real” or not, we use them everyday to conduct our lives and the way we think about the world. The people who don’t do philosophy, just blindly follow the answers others have provided for them.
So if philosophy is just language games, it is perhaps one of the most important games we’ve ever played.
I’ve noticed that it is the case that analytic philosophers often have “science envy”. They wish philosophy to be so much like a science and they get tangled up so much in precise language, that they forget the whole point. The older analytic philosophers I know just seem defeated, wishing they had been a scientist.
Philosophy for me is more a poetry and rhetoric than a science. But this is not to say it doesn’t have huge dangers and importance.
“Philosophers” like to think they are excluded from other people who ask “ordinary” questions. But these people are doing the same thing philosophers are doing- only the questions aren’t technical and specialized. In the end, there is no difference in accepting Plato’s theory of “forms”, and “blindly following those answers”, and accepting Dr. Phil’s theory on trailer-trash, and “blindly following those answers.”
The difference between the method of philosophy and the method of science is that the scientific method is objective and universal…where the philosophical method is contingent to what nonsense a person has been conditioned to believe.
So you see the philosopher is no different than the ordinary person. He only has a larger vocabulary.
Heidegger is a perfect example of what happens when 2,000 years of nonsense goes unchecked by science.
As Wittgenstein said in the Tractatus “The limits of my language, are the limits of my world.”
There are many who thought that philosophy had ended or that they had killed philosophy. But the questions always come back. Science identifies cause-effect relationships through neutral language. It cannot substitute for trying to find meaning or purpose.
Heidegger is one of the most profound thinkers who ever lived. His influence stretches in many many areas, from literary theory, to theology, to linguistics, and even computer science. Many people can’t understand him, and they get frustrated with him. And I don’t think this is because they are unintelligent, but you need an open kind of mind to be able to digest him. But, I can sincerely say that Heidegger literally changed my life.
I don’t mean to make an ad-hominem attack, but let me ask you, Manic, if this is what you believe about philosophy, why do you do it? Why do you spend your time on this board? To try to make people quit philosophy?
