Talk:Philosophy/Archive 8

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Analytic philosophy

This paragraph should be deleted insomuch as it is about thirty or forty years out of date.

What underlies the analytic tradition is the view (originally defended by Ockham) that philosophical error arises from misunderstandings generated by language. We imagine that to every word (e.g. baldness, existence) there corresponds something in reality. According to analytic philosophers, the true meaning of ordinary sentences is "concealed by their grammatical form", and we must translate them into their true form (known as logical form) in order to clarify them. The difficulty, so far unresolved, is to determine what the correct logical form must be. Some philosophers (beginning with Frege and Bertrand Russell) have argued that first order logic shows us the true logical form of ordinary sentences.

Part's of it are so far out of date that it's not funny. "Logical form" stopped being a huge thing with ordinary language philosophy and the late Wittgenstein. I will delete this paragraph and replace it.

CONSENSUS

First off, I'd like to thank DBuckner, WhiteC, and Shaggorama for the support they've offered in favor of radical changes to the article. The article clearly needs radical changes, none of us will dispute that, but it is important to figure out what we should be changing it to. I think it's a major disappointment that some of us can't give complements on any good ideas prior to a radical change but can give criticisms (sometimes unduly harsh criticisms) only after a major edit has been made. Simonides, I'd like to thank you for your well thought out description of the challenges we face here as they have changed my thinking on how we can succeed at producing an article that we can all for the most part accept. RickNorwood, I'd like to thank you for your efforts, but I'd really prefer it if you'd take a step back from making major edits, especially since it seems to be making the article worse rather than better.

As I mentioned above, this article should NOT be about the word "philosophy". That is the purpose of wiktionary. If a simple definition were possible, we could start with that, but it isn't possible, so we shouldn't. I think we need to start this article with the qualification that philosophy is extremely hard to define, and then proceed rather quickly to showing what philosophy is. I propose sections with the following titles:

Domain of philosophy: this is where we show examples of the kinds of question that philosophers ask. We could mention the standard breakdown (and it is standard), and note briefly that the breakdown isn't rigid or uncontroversial. Presumably, this section would also be the area where we talk about the relationship between philosophy and science and the relationship between philosophy and religion.

Methods of philosophy: this is where we talk about what it is to do philosophy. Presumably, this would involve some discussion of different ways of attempting to answer the questions given in the first section. So here we might talk about things like the philosophical dialogue, the method of doubt, induction, deduction, transcendental arguments, the pragmatic approach, and the like. Clearly this will be the hardest section to write. Half of the Analytic/Continental debate might go here.

Goals of philosophy: this is where we talk about what philosophers are trying to achieve. One thing might be the TRUTH (whatever the hell that is). Another might be clear thought. Another might be increases in clarity of thought. Another might be a more just, fair, and productive society. Another might be (though I hope it isn't) grand philosophical treatises of monumental porportions. (The other half of the Analytic/Continental debate might go here.)

As near as I can tell, these are the major topics we should cover in this article, and we can debate about what further topics might be needed once we've got these important things in a reasonable state. So what do you all think about this approach? -- KSchutte 05:03, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

Speaking for myself, this seems like an overall good approach (certainly better than what we have). I'm not so sure we can back away from having some very basic definition of philosophy for the top, but this just goes to show the limits of my imagination. One question though — goals of philosophy? Is there such a thing? And if there is, is it just some laundry-list of various things philosophers have aimed at as goals? One more quick comment: you're right that there is a "standard" break-down of philosophy. Plenty of sources say that. They just also point to different things being the "standard" break down. But, as an overall plan, this looks pretty good. Ig0774 05:16, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

I don't know that I'm necessarily committed to no definition at all, I'm just sure that we need a quick and flippant one if any. (This is Anthony Quinton's approach in the OCP that I've mentioned before.) Presumably, philosophers are trying to do something. Maybe it's merely to educate. Maybe it is something more complicated like making new self-supportive sciences (this is the sort of thing I'm inclined to believe, the way we've "made" mechanics/physics, biology, and psychology). Even if the goals are unclear, I think we ought to talk about what they might be. Oh, and by the "standard breakdown", I meant the big five. It seems that any further breakdown of the branches ought to be in those five articles instead of this one. KSchutte 05:40, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

I regret that KSchutte dislikes my edits. At least I am going slowly, referencing every point, and accepting rewrites gladly. KSchutte says that "none of us" dispute that "radical changes" are needed. I dispute that. In fact, the article is in the bad shape it is now in because people made radical and unilateral changes, without pausing for reflection or comment.

I also disagree with KSchutte that we should not even attempt to say what philosophy is above the ToC. We also need to say that there are difficulties in defining philosophy. We need to mention some of the major questions. And we need to mention the goal of philosophy. The article does that, now. I fail to see KSchutte's problem. I would like to see us move on, and work on the History of Philosophy section, instead of continually rewriting the intro -- a process which seems to go into an infinite loop instead of getting anywhere. Rick Norwood 14:06, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

I actually think the article is in pretty good shape, short of some details. Much of the complaints made during the past few months have been of a territorial nature and haven't held up to reasoned scrutiny. I only want to insist that:

a) we go by Kshutte's organizational plan for characterizing philosophy, using the tripartite method, which is entirely conservative. This doesn't mean it has to be in the intro.

b) Etymology stays in the intro, as does some of the more unproblematic claims, i.e., about use of argument and reasoning. Abandoning any attempt at this minimal characterization in the intro will just confuse people. If you want to qualify that by saying "so-and-so is controversial", then fine. This "isn't wiktionary", true, but that means nothing; all articles must contain definitions if they want to proceed in informing the reader. Lucidish 17:15, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

"This isn't wiktionary" is relevant. Each Wiktionary entry defines a word, but each Wikipedia article describes the referent of the word mentioned in the article's title. Confusing the two is to make a use-mention distinction error. The focus, and especially the introduction, of this Wikipedia entry should not define the word philosophy, but rather should describe the referent of that word, i.e. the topic of philosophy. The Rod (☎ Smith) 18:06, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

Not really. You'll never be able to say anything about usage without first having an understanding of the meaning of the term. And leaving out that understanding, is just going to confuse people, as I said. In Strawsonian/Pragmatics jargon, you'll never be able to use a term correctly if you don't first make it clear what the instructions for usage are. Lucidish 23:07, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

Lucidish, no one is disputing that "you'll never be able to say anything about usage without first having an understanding of the term." The point is that wikipedia should not be reporting etymological facts. It should be reporting historical facts, anthropological facts, and sociological facts. Presumably, experts in philosophy (and presumably only experts should be editing this article) already know how the word "philosophy" is used, so they can use the term to talk about the anthropological facts about what philosophers do without stipulating some arbitrary and controversial definition. KSchutte 06:38, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

So you advocate diving right into encyclopedic material without first explaining the scope of what you're talking about. That's going to confuse readers. I oppose the practice of writing confusing articles. Hence I oppose your measure. Lucidish 20:13, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

(I would like to thank everyone for their contributions and effort, even when I disagree with them.) There is no great hurry to move beyond the introduction section--I would rather get a good introduction, than move past it quickly (justice should NOT be swift). Perhaps work on other parts of this article could continue simultaneously with work on the introduction, as long as the introduction is not seen as an outline of the article? I don't think the introduction is going to be an outline, so I don't see any major problems with this. WhiteC 19:06, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

Work on the introduction will continue, no doubt, as long as Wikipedia continues to exist. But I am not sure what changes the people who want change propose. The important thing, I think, is that all changes be referenced, not original research. There were and are many problems with the article's style, but the biggest problem is that so much of it is original research. Rick Norwood 19:52, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

Rick, I'm starting to wonder if you know what original research is. This article is certainly not going to be improved by throwing in a bunch of arbitrary references. As I explained to Lucidish above, this article ought to be reporting only the most basic, obvious anthropological facts about philosophers and what they do. Nothing in an article this broad should need a reference. Every single statement should be the kind of statement an expert in philosophy would assent to unequivocally. (And the statements should all be about philosophy, not about this or that arbitrary reference work.) I believe this ideal is obtainable. KSchutte 06:45, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

I propose that the article open with a description of philosophy instead of a definition of the word philosophy. Thus, I moved and modified the only into sentence that describes philosophy:

The term philosophy comes from the ancient Greek word.... Today, the word refers the study of ultimate reality and the most general causes and principles of reality.

I suggest this instead:

Philosophy is the study of ultimate reality and the most general causes and principles of reality.... The term philosophy comes from the ancient Greek word....

That reverted change would fix part of the use-mention problem of the intro. The Rod (☎ Smith) 21:46, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

While this change is hardly work making, and certainly not worth a lot of debate, I prefer to see the Greek up front. Rick Norwood 23:17, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

If by "this change is hardly work making" you mean it is "hardly worth making", I disagree. Wikipedia's guide to writing better articles notes that it is better to use the topic of the article in the introduction. When the article later mentions philosophy (e.g. for its etymology), it belongs italicized. Thus, I repeat my suggestion for the intro:

Philosophy is the study of....

The term philosophy comes from the ancient Greek word....

The Rod (☎ Smith) 01:32, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Agree with the change. However, I don't think it's worth much debate, since the proposal is merely stylistic, amounting to the addition of italics; and doesn't advocate the removal of the things that were object of concern here. Lucidish 17:08, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

There is some misunderstanding, because my suggestion is not merely sylistic. I am not merely proposing to add italics where the word philosophy is mentioned, but rather to make the focus of the introduction be a topic instead of a word. In order to accomplish that, I suggested opening the article with a sentence whose subject is the topic of philosophy, i.e. one with a form similar to the following:

Philosophy is the study of a diverse range of frameworks and essentially second-order cognitive activities, including aesthetics, epistemology, ethics, logic, and metaphysics. Various schools, traditions, and methodologies of philosophy hold differing areas of focus and views about the subject and nature of philosophy, some including the fields of politics, physics, and religion. The fundamental method of philosophy involves the systematic use of critical reasoning to evaluate arguments in defence of assertions of belief or opinion.

I am not committed to the specific claims of that description—it is merely a consolidation of other content already in the article. I also understand that several editors want to retain the etymology of the word philosophy near the beginning of the article. To accomodate that desire and still focus the introduction on the topic instead of the word, I only suggest that the description of philosophy come before the etymology. The Rod (☎ Smith) 21:03, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

I think KSchutte has made an excellent suggestion (although I think that "methods" may be better suited for an article in itself than a simple section in this article). Domain and goals are excellent topics for this article; I was actually going to suggest something similar based on the approach taken by the Science article. We need to be careful about how we write the goals section, or it could over time become a tedious list of "hard questions." Regardless, FIRST AND FOREMOST we need to decide where we want to focus our energy. As I'm sure you have all noticed, we have expended a great deal of time arguing over the finer points of the introduction and history sections, which it seems we don't all even agree should stay. Let's all step back, take a breather, and work on the article as a whole for a second. Before we get caught up in the details, we need to decide how we want this article to look.

Establish some general goals for this article
1. Discuss what we need to say about philosophy for this to be a successful article
2. Establish a "What this article isn't" guideline for future reference
Discuss what topics must be raised to accomplish these goals
Delegate goals to sections (create sections based on goals)

KSchutte is right. I do believe this article needs to be radically changed, mainly because I see the chaos that is this talk page as indicative of the fact that we don't really agree on what this article is supposed to be. I propose we focus on THAT and that alone before we even consider the wording of the introduction or how to present eastern philosophy. (by the way, have any of you seen this Ultimate reality article? it's total crap...I'd prefer if there was no link to it from this article at all. Besides, there are many schools of philosophy that don't accept the existence of an objective reality at all). Shaggorama 10:18, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

The article truth considers this question. If Ultimate reality is crap, we should fix it. I hope you don't mind if I move your five points to the bottom of the talk page, since this section is getting rather long. Rick Norwood 14:15, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Revised opening to remove obvious falsehoods. I don't care if a dictionary says so, even in ancient Greece philosophy *never* covered all knowledge. Philosophy didn't include knowledge of making shoes, even if Plato used craft analogies sometimes. And philosophy today still covers the divine--ever hear of Alvin Plantinga and the modal ontological argument, or current discussions of the Problem of Evil? Sheesh. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Tokeefe (talk • contribs) 2006-03-03 16:18:08 (UTC)

The order of the sections

Since the heading of the History of philosophy section references Eastern philosophy, I've moved that short section under History. I've also arranged the subjects in Eastern philosophy in roughly chronological order, and standardized the use of BCE and CE throughout.

Because the character of the writing changes dramatically with the beginning of Modern philosophy, I've taken that out from under the History heading, where the writing is telegraphic, and made it a heading in its own right.

I will pause for today, so that we can discuss whether or not these changes are an improvement. Rick Norwood 19:50, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

Shaggorama's five points

--imported from "CONSENSUS"--

Establish some general goals for this article
1. Discuss what we need to say about philosophy for this to be a successful article
2. Establish a "What this article isn't" guideline for future reference
Discuss what topics must be raised to accomplish these goals
Delegate goals to sections (create sections based on goals)

The most important goal is to stick to what can be referenced and avoid original research. Most "surveys" of philosophy take a dozen or so major philosophers and briefly explain their contribution. Can anyone think of a better approach?

What the article isn't is a textbook. The sections should be brief and not unnecessarily technical, with a link to a main article on each subtopic.

The first thing to do, then, is to list who we think the article must cover. Other names can be added later, of course. Off the top of my head: Plato, Aristotle, Confucius, Lao Tze, Buddha, the author of the 'Gita', Omar Kahyyam, Augustine, Thomas Aquinus, Machivelli, Averoes, Avicina, Descartes, Erasmus, Spinoza, Roger Bacon, Francis Bacon, Calvin, Hobbes, Locke, Hume, Russeau, William of Occam, Kant, Nietzsche, Marx, Freud, Darwin, Hegel, Pascal, Einstein, Gödel, Popper. That list is both too short (I've left out major philosophers) and too long (we can't cover that many in more than just a list). But it is a starting point. The only names that seem to me to be essential are Plato, Aristotle, Confucius, Spinoza, and Francis Bacon. But I would object to removing all of the a) orientals, b) Christians, or c) scientists. Rick Norwood 20:58, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

P.S. Another excellent edit by Ig0774. Rick Norwood 21:28, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Strategic Planning

As you may have noticed, I've come to the conclusion that our respective goals are unfocused, and this is coming out in our approach to the article. I have set-up a strategic planning forum on a sub-page of of my user page, and would like to invite you all to participate:User:Shaggorama/Philosophy Guidelines. Because it is not a talk page, we can present our opinions there in a more organized fashion (since we do not need to archive every sentence we write). I think my approach is adequate, but if you have any recomendations for the steps I have presented, please speak up. Shaggorama 23:48, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

I went over there and made some comments, but I didn't get how the comments were supposed to work so I messed up the numbering and stuff. Sorry about that. I like my approach, though, and I think maybe we ought to make up a line item list of things we might do, and assent/dissent/comment on them AfD-style. P.S., largely based on your comments a while ago, I realized that the problem with my other draft was that it was largely a rewrite in the framework of the article here. I'm working on a new draft, User:KSchutte/Philosophy, that rejects the framework here and favors something much more basic. Go have a look if you'd like. KSchutte 04:00, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

I really dislike splitting the discussion between two fora. It is too easy for the two separate discussions to arrive at different conclusions, resulting in a war between the reds and the greens. Rick Norwood 23:52, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

I agree with Rick Norwood. The whole purpose of this talk page is to discuss content to include in the article. When each content item achieves enough endorsement here, we move it to the article page. There seems to be no benefit to splitting the content discussion. Note: it is entirely permissible to refactor this page for clarity when the posting format become unwieldy. The Rod (☎ Smith) 00:27, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

A slightly different suggestion that wouldn't move the talk of the page, but which would move the "guidelines" to a place where it could be easily reference would be to create a sub-page of this talk page and provide a link at the top. However, the bulk of the discussion about how to structure this page / what content belongs here does belong on this talk page (at least until we work out some kind of consensus). Ig0774 01:52, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

All valid points. I simply don't really see us moving forward much, so it seemed reasonable to attempt consensus by a different method. If at first you don't succeed, try something different. I'd be more than happy to move my alternate forum to a subpage of this talk page, but I'd appreciate it if people would at least take a look at it to see the kinds of problems I'm trying to solve with it. By the way, I just had to brag: I just attended a lecture by Searle on "cognitive science as applied philosophy." Awesome. Shaggorama 02:05, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Searle is neato. (I don't agree with his treatment of metaphor, but... enh.)

His talk's name could just have dropped the 'cognitive' from the name and been equally as true. Plus, that would make applied science "applied applied philosophy", which if true would make philosophy a mere two degrees away from worldly relevance. In your face, naysayers! Lucidish 04:23, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Progress?

The problem with this article, as I've said many times before, is that it is being written by people who appear to have no qualifications or training in philosophy. No one who includes the following on the list below (taken from the list above) could possibly have had any formal training in the subject.

Buddha, the author of the 'Gita', Omar Kahyyam [sic], Erasmus, Calvin, Marx, Freud, Darwin, Einstein

I also question whether Russeau [sic] and Gödel really belong there. Gödel was a mathematical logician who wrote only one article that could vaguely count as philosophy. And very odd to omit Berkeley & Wittgenstein, Heidegger and Sartre. Dbuckner 12:26, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

The pictures do improve it somewhat. They detract from the words, for one thing. Dbuckner 12:26, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

We really need to get this quote from today's Slate into the article somewhere:

Marx and Engels once remarked that "philosophy stands in the same relation to the study of the actual world as masturbation to sexual love."

Maybe we need a criticism of philosophy section.

To Dbuckner, I apologize for my misspellings. I do not have a natural aptitude for spelling, but I do have a dictionary.

I did say that my list was both too long and too short. On the other hand, it is hard to imagine any grounds for dismissing the philosophy of Buddha, and I would bet that more philosophers (even if we limit that to Western philosophers) have read the 'Gita' than have read Wittgenstein. As for its influence, we need only consider Oppenheimer. "I am become death."

Would you claim, Dbuckner, that these are not philosophical ideas: "The cause of suffering is desire. To end suffering, end desire." I cannot think of any definition of philosophy that would exclude those ideas.

You also seem to favor philosophers whose work is only read by other philosophers, such as Wittgenstein. I, on the other hand, would suggest that our choice of ideas to write about in this article should focus on ideas that have had an impact on how people think. You dismiss Marx, Freud, and Darwin, whose answers to philosophical questions have changed the world. Rick Norwood 15:23, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Why is it that all of these extremely broad-scope philosophy artciles get bogged down in nonsensical debates and discussions about who is or is not a philosopher, a philospher of mind, a philosopher of science, a dualist, a property dualist, etc., etc., etc.. A similar problem was revolved, by ME, with respect to the article philosophy of mind. I just deleted all of the f+++ing lists and cited the exceptional Featured Article over on the German wikepidia as my justification for taking this action. The artcile is still in awful shape (I haven't had the time and energy to have a go at it yet) but there are no more dispute about who belongs on the lists or not. Lists are a sort of laziness and irresponsiblity and people ( even general readers) can see through that. It's a substitute for the admittedly exteremely difficult task of trying to characterize and explain something as vague and amorphous as philosophy. So, I would suggest that a good place to start in terms of reconcilaition here, is to eliminate the lists. I'm looking at a copy of the entry for Philosophy in the Encyclopedia Americana written by C.I. Lewis(it has numerous defects) but there are no lists and their absence is not felt.--Lacatosias 17:27, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

The main problem with this article in the past few months has been the talk page, which features idiosyncratic critiques by maudlin personalities. The article is mediocre, not woeful. Get it together, people. Lucidish 18:12, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Lacatosias is absolutely right about this. Dbuckner's claim that this article should be written by those who are experts or specialized in philosophy needs to be qualified with the addition that this article should only be written by those who are experts in teaching philosophy. This is because the goal of this article isn't to tell what philosophy is. The goal of this article is to show how to learn philosophy. This debate about who is a philosopher and who isn't commits the problem G. E. Moore was indicating with the Definist fallacy. It is inappropriate to say that one is a philosopher or isn't without a definition in mind, but it is not inappropriate to show how one can be more philosophical than another. The purpose of this article isn't to express some facts. The purpose of this article is to educate, to illustrate, to show how philosophers do things. See my new draft in progress here for an example of how this might be done. KSchutte 20:46, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

No, if you want to write a philosophy textbook, the place to do that is Wikibooks. Wikipedia is explicitly not a textbook, but an encyclopedia. It is written for the general reader, not the student. The purpose of this article, and all Wiki articles, according to long established Wiki policy, is exactly to "express some facts", to express them vigorously and clearly, in an organized way, and to be judicious in which facts to include and which to omit. Rick Norwood 20:52, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

I followed your link and you know what? Your version is a lot like the version that is already here! Only in place of prose, it uses bullet points, which are what textbooks use instead of well-constructed paragraphs. As all professors know, "well-written textbook" is an oxymoron. (Actually, I can think of a very small number of exceptions, but none that are introductory textbooks written in English.) I hope you do not think you can write the article over there and then dump it over here -- that is not the way Wikipedia works. It's a matter of give and take. Rick Norwood 21:00, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Actually, I have done exactly that with most (of not all of my articles). I did it with Jerry Fodor, eliminative materialism, type-identity theory, and dualism (philosophy of mind). Granted the first three were generally ignored or hda been left lying around for two years or soemthing. But the dualism article was a battleground somwhat similar to this situation. In fact, there were three articles dualism, Cartesian dualism and sustance dualism with an enourmous imbroglio over which should be merged with which. I just rewrote the entire thing from top to bottom, blanked the other two dualims (Cartesian and substance) and redirected them to the new version of dualism. There hasn't been a peep since. It hasnìt been touched in three weeks!! Stability has been attained. I'm currently doing the same with philosophy of mind and mind-body problem. Once I finish writing up my own version, I will dump it on the disastrous philosophy of mind page, merge the two and point them all to the my new version. I can promise you that I won't hear a peep out of anyone on this occasion either. In the particular case of this page, though, there are just too many people trying to get their two cents in. I haven't seen anything like it since the Adolf Hitler page. Everyone on earth seems to have an authorititive opinion on AH. Well, I realized I did not, so I left it to the professional historians to deal with. But that article is hopeless and I don't think there's much of a chance to make something decent out of this mishmash either. It's no one's fault in particular, you understand. It just seems to me that perhaps the anarchical Wikipedia project does not work in certain cases. But, then, I'm not very optimisitic about human nature in any case. Good luck!!--Lacatosias 14:37, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

I remember doing the same sort of write-and-dump thing for the Material conditional page. Sometimes, that's just what is needed. I think it is needed here. KSchutte 17:06, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Well, I posted a comment on your page basically saying that I don't know how to help out with this page because of the profound confusion that exists. All I can really gather from reading through the comments is that some people like the page approximately as it is and want to make slight adjustments; you have basically worked up an almost-complete alternative page which some people have supported (perhaps with some reservations here as well), and Shaggorama has created what is basically an alternative talk-page to decide what should and shouldn't be in some hypothetical article which would replace this one. In sum, I don't know what the heck is going on here and don't even know how to find out. Is there some attempt to coordinate efforts in some sort of groups. Based on what I'm reading here, even the "reds" versus the "greens" type of scenario would be an improvement over this chaos. --Lacatosias 17:30, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Sensing similar inclinations on the part of editors here, I have found myself patiently working on my own little draft not seeking advice or tips or recommendations or endorsement until I'm finished with it. (And I will seek it then.) I think many of the people editing here lack the creative vision to see what an article could be over what it currently is. KSchutte 17:54, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

The claim (1) 'teaching being related to the claims about "telling what" vs. "showing how"' is bizarre, since the process of "telling what" with respect to the methods of philosophy shall be an instance of "showing how" (though perhaps not the only instance of it). A false dichotomy. Also, it turns out that the use of reasoning is the core condition of philosophy that has been of some dispute here; and also, it so happens that use of reason is a method of philosophy. So this particular claim (1) is moot in theory and contentious in reality.

The "definist fallacy" would be interesting here if it were conjoined with an argument about how the criterion of, say, the use of reasoning, were purely contingent to the notion of a philosopher. You might (as Rick has tried to do) be able to show that a philosopher is not, by convention, someone who engages in x, y, or z; but a universal claim, either necessarily true by definition or contingently by intuition, does the job of clarifying things for a reader equally well; and I don't care one way or the next whether you call an essential clarification a "definition" or "synthetic universal claim" or whatever, so long as you lay the groundwork. As far as I'm concerned, unless you show a counterinstance, i.e. of a person who is largely agreed to be a philosopher, and yet who does not engage in (say) reasoning, the "definist fallacy" argument seems hollow, or at least misses the point.

Not only that, but the distinction and preferences when it comes to the goals of this article are, again, arbitrary and idiosyncratic, as Rick observes above. Show; tell; whatever you want to call an explanation, it's yours for the naming. Lucidish 04:19, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

History and Definitions

These sections are completely superfluous. There is an article called history of philosophy which, guess what ladies and gentlemen, deals (or is supposed to deal) entirely with the topic of the history of philosophy. Definitions: the author of the EA article, C.I. Lewis, deftly sidesteps this by providing a brief history of the the use of the term of philosophy and suggesting that the meaning of philosophy will come out through a careful characterization of the common elements of the five fundemnatal disciplenes of philosophy, by a discussion of its relationship with science and by its historical usages. --Lacatosias 17:45, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, I've already pointed out to everyone that there is major use-mention confusions here. This whole debate is pretty sloppy and any good educator can see the problem. The challenge here is to show these people that they are not good teachers of philosophy, and that they should keep their list of facts away from this article. Welcome to the debate here, it's a dirty one. KSchutte 20:52, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

I don't think there's been any "confusion" here. You've simply presented an emphasis which I disagreed with because it will make for a bad article. Understand? Lucidish 03:49, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

While there is no uniform style for major articles in Wikipedia, one common style is to give the reader a general idea of the subject matter above the ToC and a brief history just below the ToC, with a reference to the article on the history of the subject. What is the problem you see in this approach? Rick Norwood 20:48, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

True, but this doesn't have the significance that you seem to be indicating. The ability for us to interlink wikis is why we have the luxury of having specialized articles like History of Philosophy; but where it is salient to do so, it seems to be common practice to also provide short, scanty text in more generic articles (like this one) along with a wikilink to specialized offshoots. Lucidish 03:43, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Look, let me be really, really blunt here, since it seems to be the predominant style. Fundamentally, I agree with Dbuckner and Mel Etitis that this article seems to have been hijacked (as is usually the case with extremely broad topics regarding philosophy, the meaning of life, monism, dualism, etc..) by people who are not qualified to deal with the subject. I note that you are a mathematician, for example, Rick Norwood. I have some background in mathematics, and yet, for all that, I haven't touched (nor even considered touching the main article on mathematics). Now why is it that everyone on god's green earth thinks they know about philosophy just because they have read the Bhagavad Gita (a religious work) or Ommar Khayam (LOL!!)?? I think the answer to the question on defintions is clear and has already been stated fifteen billion times. As to the history section: as it stands this artcile IS a history of philosophy artcile. This is simply redundant, since there is already a HISTORY of PHILOSOPHY article which covers the exact same material. All the sources which I and others have cited, The Enycopledia American (generalist), The Oxford Companion to Philosophy (specialist) separate these matter into philosophy and history of philosophy successfully by having much longer sections devoted to the branches, the relationship with science, methods or what have you. Finally, my point about lists was somewhat misinterpreted: I don't mind lists in themselves, I just think that they do not belong in articles like this one. They replace the hard work of actually writing substantive and expository sentences and paragraphs. So, you will all excuse me if the first thing I do to this article is delete all the of the cock and bull at the bottom of the artcile.

There are billions of artciles on philosophy which need help, why don't some of you go and work on Jaegwon Kim or two-dimensional semantics?? Hmmm???--Lacatosias 08:37, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

More drama and posturing. Read/respond to posts already made on subject if you want to be sensible. Lucidish 16:17, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Please try to answer the questions I have posted above rather than engaging in cheap name-calling.--Lacatosias 18:22, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Excuse me, I didn't call any names. I made a summary of your post: dramatic posturing. This is to say nothing at all about you, and everything to say about the post.

I would be delighted to answer whatever questions you have. However, the only ones I have been able to identify from this section are:

. "Now why is it that everyone on god's green earth thinks they know about philosophy just because they have read the Bhagavad Gita (a religious work) or Ommar Khayam (LOL!!)??"
. "There are billions of artciles on philosophy which need help, why don't some of you go and work on Jaegwon Kim or two-dimensional semantics??"
. "Hmmm???"

I must confess, I have no idea how to answer any of them, because I don't know anything about the material you reference in (1) and (2), and don't know how to begin to answer (3). And still I must feign confusion, since they don't have anything to do with the issues of interlinking and small section summaries, which is the point of this section. Perhaps I missed something. Lucidish 19:31, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

This section, which I created, is about history and definitions. I suggest removing the vast majority of the history section and replacing it with a small section summary. Here is the fundamental structure that I propose for the article, FWIW:

Keep the intro basically as is or something very similar.
Definitions should be cut back somwhat and clarified in terms of the history of usage of the word philosophy as distinct from science, religion, literatire or what have you.
Relationship between science and modern philoposhy (philosophy as the the anaylsis of the conceptual foundations of all of the varous branches of science, etc.)
The distinctively normative charater of philosophy should have a separate section.
Branches should be expanded to clarify and provide detailed description of the five main brnches: metaphysics is divided into ontology (study of the natuer an types of being, reality, things, events), cosmology (the study of the processes of reality, determinsim vs. free will, cause and effect, the nature of space and time). Logic can be deductive, inductive, abductive, etc..
Done --Lacatosias 18:13, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

(1), (2), (5) are fine with me. I like the idea of turning the branches into their own sections. However, I'm worried about the science-philosophy point, (3). You may want to introduce the different perspectives upon that. Blackburn goes quite a bit further in saying that philosophy is seen as akin to the best practice in any particular field. Others, like Wittgenstein, would say it's mere language games with nothing to do with science. Others surely offer your point. And so on. Lucidish 17:28, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

That's a legitimate objection. The point your making is that such a section could open up a Pandora's box to millions of views and controversies, somewhat like what has happened with the History section. At any rate, I'll leave this up for discussion as my own option for a possible structure.--Lacatosias 18:13, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Hear hear. At last, someone who can write, and who knows what they are talking about. I recommend Lacatosias' article on Jerry Fodor to anyone who wants to see a good well written piece on philosophy. Dbuckner 13:52, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Indeed, an impressive wiki. And if you take a closer look at it, you'll note that one of its delightful features is that it engages in small section summaries and interlinking, contrary to the positions being made here. Lucidish 16:25, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Muhammad Iqbal

The picture of Muhammad Iqbal seems out of place. He is not mentioned in the text, and the text covers philosophers of a much earlier period. Is there any objection to its removal? Rick Norwood 22:48, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Rationalism and empiricism

The section begins:

"The Modern era of philosophy is commonly said to begin with Descartes, though evidence of the cultural change can be found in the Renaissance philosophy of thinkers like Niccolò Machiavelli and Francis Bacon."

This is an example of why the article needs a lot of work. Not only do we have the solecism "like" instead of "such as", but Francis Bacon was an older contemporary of Descartes while Machiavelli was dead before either of them was born. I will attempt a rewrite of that one section, and then stop for comment and correction. Rick Norwood 22:59, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Question: "Baruch Spinoza, Nicolas Malebranche, Gottfried Leibniz, and Christian Wolff." Are Malebranche and Wolff really important enough to be mentioned along with Spinoza and Leibniz? I don't know the answer. Rick Norwood 00:40, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

More names for your consideration: Thomas Hobbes, Isaac Newton, George Berkeley, and Francis Hutcheson. Blaise Pascal, Joseph Butler, and Jonathan Edwards. Other major writers, Giambattista Vico, Thomas Reid, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Gotthold Ephraim Lessing, and Edmund Burke.

My own opinion: Newton was a great scientist, but not a great philosopher. Of the names on the list, Hobbes, Pascal, Burke, and maybe Rousseau clearly belong. I have no opinion one way or the other about the rest. Are there any we should consider deleting? Rick Norwood 00:50, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Rick, that you're even asking these questions clearly indicates that you aren't the kind of expert this article needs. Newton clearly was a philosopher, everybody living then called him one, everybody who grasps the connection between philosophy and science knows he is one; he and Leibniz said pretty much the same things and to even suggest otherwise is ridiculous. That you've managed to pick out the "popular" notion of philosophy by suggesting Pascal and Rousseau as clear examples of major philosophers illustrates that you have absolutely no training in this field. KSchutte 02:39, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

I just took a class in the history of political philosophy where Rousseau was one of the main thinkers. Have you ever read his work? Lucidish 03:52, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sure where the force of your conceits stem from, here. Are you suggesting anything at all about the vocations of Rousseau or Pascal? I really can't tell; you'll have to be explicit about those reasonings that support the content of your claims. Lucidish 04:12, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

I am not claiming that these men were not philosophers. Let's not forget that I was the one who added their names to the article. All I am saying is that Newton is clearly a better paradigm of a philosopher than Rousseau or Pascal. KSchutte 08:38, 3 March 2006 (UTC)`

So what's the force behind your dismissals of another editor on the basis of philosophical competence? Lucidish 15:59, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

KSchutte -- You would evidently disqualify anyone who doesn't know everything. I do not know everything, but I do know something about Newton. Newton was considered a Natural Philosopher, in other words, a scientist. His contribution to science and mathematics ranks him as one of the greatest scientists and also as one of the greatest mathematicians of all time. His philosophical works, however, are primarily about arcane interpretations of the Book of Revelations, and are seldom read today. To say that Newton and Liebniz said "pretty much the same things" is to ignore the fact that Newton and Liebniz fought like two cats in a sack. Liebniz was a much more influential philosopher than Newton, a somewhat more influential mathematician (the fight over priority in calculus caused England to reject Europen notation, which led to a stagnation of English mathematics that lasted generations). Newton was by far the more influential scientist of the two. If you still maintain that Newton made major contributions to philosophy, as distinct from math and science, please name one. (Even Bishop Berkeley got the better of him in the philosophical debates of the time.)

I will continue to ask questions about what I do not know, even at the risk of being mocked by KSchutte. Rick Norwood 14:21, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Lucidish: I'm not saying that anybody on the list deserves to be there. I stated my preference and asked for more informed opinions. I have only read about Rousseau, so I am not qualified to offer an opinion about him. I put the "maybe" by his name in deference to DBuckner's doubt whether he belongs on the list. Rick Norwood 17:36, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for clarifying. But I wasn't responding to you there, I was addressing KS. Lucidish 15:56, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

KSchutte is being very dogmatic while saying some rather odd things. Aside from his misuse/misunderstanding of "paradigm", his claim that Newton is more clearly a philosopher than Rousseau doesn't, as he implies it does, reflect anthing but his own very narrow and non-standard notion of the nature of philosophy. As Rick Norwood has pointed out, he has also grossly oversimplified the relationship between Newton and Leibniz; their interests overlap in certain areas (and they mostly disagree in those areas). --Mel Etitis (Μελ Ετητης) 17:27, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Mel, don't bring your personal vendetta from Talk:Definist_fallacy over here. You were clearly wrong not to have an explanation in there, and you were clearly in violation of the wikipedia Assume good faith policy in reverting my edit rather than putting the example I included in "prettier language". That I pointed these things out should count in my favor rather than against me. KSchutte 17:36, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

??? --Mel Etitis (Μελ Ετητης) 18:40, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Furthermore, let's be clear on what I said. I said that Newton was a better paradigmatic example of a philosopher than Rousseau or Pascal. This does not entail that I believe he is a paradigmatic example of a good philosopher. Furthermore, it doesn't entail that I believe he was a better philosopher than those two. Rather, I believe that Rousseau is a paradigmatic example of a good political theorist, and Pascal is a paradigmatic example of a good religious philosopher, but of these three, Newton is clearly the best paradigmatic example of a philosopher. KSchutte 19:29, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

KS, you're essentially arguing about a prototypical philosopher. This can be pretty subjective unless you give your criteria for what you think qualifies a person as exceptionally and obviously a philosopher. I've given my own thoughts on what I think appropriate criteria to be above. But inevitably the discussion of a prototype will be open to dispute, because people will give their own criteria for it, weigh each criterion differently from the next one, and argue about the application of cases to the criteria. Lucidish 19:56, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

LOL!! Interesting exchange. This talk page is certainly entertaining, at any rate.--Lacatosias 18:19, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Not only does Kschutte's view not accord with any source that I've ever seen, he seems to be depending on a very narrow view of Rousseau's (and Pascal's) philosophical interests, while ignoring the narrowness of Newton's philosophical interests. As his argument is too confused for me to be sure what he's trying to say, though, that's as far as I can go. --Mel Etitis (Μελ Ετητης) 19:21, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

You're such a sweet guy, Mel. I could just hug you. KSchutte 22:19, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

AfD Voidism

I put up an AfD for Voidism. It was created today, and only has 852 google hits, so I assume it's non-notable. Please vote. -- infinity0 16:48, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Good job. The vandal immediately wikilinked it on two of our pages, which I have since removed. Anyone who spots any others, please take care of them. KSchutte 17:08, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

He's a newly registered account. You might want to go through his other edits. -- infinity0 17:17, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

I just went through his contributions and reverted the spamlinks. -- infinity0 17:23, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Kant and company

I've done a little work on the next section -- mainly to make it less dry and less just a list of names. The final paragraph of this section, on English idealism, seems to be about a minor branch of philosophy, not important enough for this brief survey. Is there any objection if I delete it?

The Kantian and Hegelian idealisms led to another popular school of idealism in the late nineteenth century, British Idealism, which left its influence in the work of F. H. Bradley, Bernard Bosanquet, and later R. G. Collingwood. British idealism was influenced by Hegelian philosophy, but British idealism tended to be more modest and largely returned to the Kantian style of idealism.

Given that British Idealism had a profound (though negative) effect on Russell, would we want to delete it? I agree we might want to delete it as it stands. Dbuckner 13:11, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

I enclose a link here [| here] that explains, for those who care to do a little research, the connection between idealism and Russell. Dbuckner 13:13, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

I will leave everything as it stands now until tomorrow. Rick Norwood 22:38, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Issues of what major goals we want to achieve with the article aside: that's kind of a crappy / uninformative paragraph. If it's of any use, imho, it would be to set the stage for Meinong, a Brit idealist who had a profound (negative) influence on Russell. Lucidish 03:08, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

In what sense was Meinong a 'Brit idealist'? Indeed, in what sense was Meinong an idealist? Dbuckner 13:07, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Meinong was NOT an idealist. That is an absolutely insane assertion, if everyone will excuse my language here. He was indeed quite the opposite: an extreme realist will regard to the reality of abstract objects, logical objects (Zalta's term) and many other entities that Frege and Russell rejected because they are (or seem) bizarre. He claimed, for example, that "The golden mountain" in the statement "The golden mountain is 100 meters high" must be an actual non-existent entity. Simplying very much, his way of resolving problems of reference like negative existentials and names without bearers was to give them some sort of real ontological status.

It follows that he did not influence Russell nor Frege, except indirectly as a proponent of the kind of excess that they wanted to avoid. In any case, I don't know how this can be interpreted as either "negative" or "positive" influence. Russel just went off in his own direction.--Lacatosias 14:03, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Any doctrine which espouses the notion that the mental or conceivable has an existence, whether logical or otherwise, is idealism. In this sense, he really was an idealist. Or, at least, this can be argued, along with a few waves of the word "psychologism"; I doubt that Meinong would agree with the critique, but the important question is whether Russell had that impression when he wrote his theory of definite descriptions.

He's not British or an idealist, sorry, that was a moment of confusion. Thanks for pointing it out.

He certainly was a negative influence on Russell, in the sense that Russell was reacting against his views. That is why Russell directly attacked him in his chapter on definite descriptions. Lucidish 17:36, 5 March 2006 (UTC) edited Lucidish 19:03, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Look, don't worry about it. I apologize for using the words "insane assertion". I don't even know what I meant by that nonsense. You made a mistake and have now learned something as a result. This does not obviously mean you are insane. Anyway, I DO NOT LIKE the tone that this discussion is taking on over the last day or two. Much too harsh and much too personal on all sides now. Everyone needs to cool off a little bit. Some of us need to learn to be a little more patient and remember that this is not the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, no matter how much we might want to think it is and some of us need to learn to be a little more respectful and willing to listen and learn from those with more experience in certain areas. At the very least, can we not try harder to keep the personal stuff out of this. --Lacatosias 19:53, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Totally my error. Don't sweat it. I must've heard or read in my study of early analytic philosophy that Russell was reacting to Meinong and British idealists and then said to myself, "therefore, Meinong was a British idealist". Oh well. I look forward to seeing good things from this article and to help in whatever way I can. Lucidish 02:41, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Indeed. Perhaps he was an Austrian Realist! But I fear you are wasting your time. Let us leave this article to the experts. Meanwhile, I am off to write a page on neurosurgery or quantum mechanics, having read a page or two in the bookshop this afternoon. Dbuckner 16:50, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

The difference between us appears to be that my confusions last but a moment while yours make up a career. I don't like engaging in these taunts, but: do I have to point out everywhere you've been mistaken on this talk page? Lucidish 17:56, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Lucidish, don't be too hard on yourself. Your confusion was an artifact of my writing the draft for the history section in a single day. Some misspeakings were bound to rise up, and that was one of them. Another is the influence of the Principia Mathematica on analytic philosophy; it wasn't such a big deal. It did attract Wittgenstein, and it was Wittgenstein who was a big influence on analytic philosophy. Mistakes like this are bound to come up in a draft with as little work put into it as mine. But when I changed the history section I thought that I was introducing a stop-gap measure to the article to avoid the Aristotle-Aquinas-Descartes-Husserl history section that had been there. I didn't think that we were actually going to keep that section for any substantial period of time. I still think it doesn't belong here. KSchutte 17:11, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Hearing no objection, the paragraph goes. Rick Norwood 13:52, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

My dear Dbuckner, hope you are enjoying your work on neurosurgery and quantum mechanics. Meanwhile, I remain here, happy to play the role of Mrs. Peel to your Mr. Steed. Rick Norwood 15:51, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

A gem

I just found this petit chef d'oeuvre in the dbuckner/logic directory:

"Beginning with Fibonacci (c. 1200), European mathematicians began once again to use logical arguments to prove new theorems. This use of logic produced a body of work much more internally consistent than that of the scholastics. Over the centuries, this mathematical logic became increasingly rigorous, departing from the rational argument of the philosophers. The combination of the deductive method of mathematics and the inductive method of observation and experiment proved spectacularly successful, leading eventually to the industrial revolution, which brought about major changes in the way people lived." (Rick Norwood)

Dbuckner 17:04, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

It's always nice to be appreciated. Rick Norwood 17:15, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Definition section

It seems to me that Blackburn's point about the relationship between philosophy and science deserves a mention along with Penguin. Lucidish 02:57, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Fine, as long as he has a source. If it is his original research -- not so fine. Rick Norwood 14:02, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

To be clear, I was referring to Simon Blackburn, the editor of the The Oxford Dictionary (of philosophy). I'm concerned that the section is giving a narrow view of what philosophy is about wrt science unless we include a quote from him. Lucidish 16:40, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

If you think it will add something, go ahead and cite him, just as long as its clearly attributed to Blackburn — he can certainly be regarded as an authoritative source on philosophy. Ig0774 16:46, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Something happened

I just reverted an edit by anon, and was typing the reason when I realized I had three reasons rather than two. So, I held down leftarrow to go back and change "two" to "three". But when the cursor reached the beginning of the line, it automatically saved the edit. Does that always happen?

BYW, the third reason for the revert is that there were not many academies in ancient Greece but only one, the Academy, after which all modern academies are named.

Rick Norwood 22:16, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

more names for your consideration

"This method was developed further in the work of Alexius Meinong, Martin Heidegger, and Maurice Merleau-Ponty.

"Heidegger expanded the study of phenomenology, but also drew on the works of Dilthey to elaborate a philosophical hermeneutics. Hermeneutics is a method of interpreting historical texts by considering what thoughts the authors must have been having given the kinds of influences they were likely to encounter at that time and in that environment. Heidegger stressed two new elements of philosophical hermeneutics, that the reader brings out the meaning of the text in the present, and that the tools of hermeneutics can be used to interpret more than just texts (e.g. "social text"). Contributions to philosophical hermeneutics later came from Hans-Georg Gadamer and Paul Ricoeur."

Of the names above, how many are important enough to include in this brief survey? Heidegger, of course, but which of the others should be kept. Please express an opinion if you want a name retained. Rick Norwood 22:36, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

I've also added a half dozen more references. Clearly, more are needed. Now would be a good time to reference your favorite philosopher. Rick Norwood 22:57, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Shaggorama, do you see how this is exactly the thing I suggested we try to avoid (over on your page)? We should make this page immune to "my favorite philosopher" edits, rather than encourage them. KSchutte 13:46, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Of the names mentioned above, Meinong and Dilthey can be removed. It would in fact improve the bit to remove them. Ig0774 23:18, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

This is not a history article

The present authors appear intent on making this an article about the history of philosophy, rather than about philosophy. This is odd, since the Wiki already has several articles about the history of philosophy.

Making it an article on the history of philosophy leads to a range of difficulties - arguments about who should be in and who should be out, for instance - that can be better dealt with in the main history articles.

Also, why has the analytic section been divided in two? And the Tractatus did not directly lead to ordinary language philosophy, as is implied. I haven't edited, because I think the best option is simply to merge the history section with History of Philosophy. Banno 09:53, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Amen, sir, amen. Our primary editor here is a mathematician (as evidenced by his usage of 'hypothesis' and 'conclusion'), and he thinks that support from a gang of undergraduates is sufficient to justify his changes. I'm working on a good draft, but these things take time if they are to be done well. KSchutte 13:40, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

An introduction to philosophy which does not discuss its history, even in passing, is what is odd. No argument has been presented by anyone so far which has even grappled with this essential point. Lucidish 01:06, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

Of course the article should discuss the history of philosophy; no one is proposing otherwise! But it is also true that no justification has been presented for it occupying half of the article. Given that there are several articles dealing with the history of philosophy, the history content here is no more than padding.Banno 11:04, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

Sure, I'd agree with that. But that entails something far different from merging the section with History of Philosophy, since mergers usually involve the deletion of content from page A in order to supplement that of page B. Lucidish 16:44, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

So would you agree to pruning back the "modern philosophy" section? Banno 17:41, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

Sure. Reduce it to three sections, Ancient-Medieval-Modern, with only the most mentionable icons kept. The bulk of the material is "modern" stuff, which can be addressed in Lac's proposal, where the big ideas of the main branches are put under the microscope. Lucidish 21:59, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

The article was flagged as badly needing a rewrite -- as it did. I've caught, for example, numerous changes in tense and disagreements of subject and verb. But I have not made major changes except in the introduction, everything in the article is now referenced (there were NO references in the old article!), and I have posted everything one section at a time for discussion. KSchutte evidently thinks that, by insulting other editors, he can rewrite the entire article by himself, and then plop it down here where we can like it or lump it. I do not think that is going to be acceptable -- certainly it is not the way Wikipedia works.

Every article on philosophy must make choices on what to put in and what to leave out -- obviously -- which renders the "favorite philosopher" criticism meaningless. Rick Norwood 17:23, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

Surly a man of your wit can write an article that is not a list of favourite philosophers? Banno 11:04, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

A man of my wit has better sense than to try to write this article single handed. Nobody knows everything.

I have, however, (as I say below) tried to make the article more about ideas. It would be nice if you would help. Rick Norwood 17:23, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

Rick, I'm not here to hinder. It might be a good idea if we focused more on the good will of all the editors. Banno 17:41, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

I have, as I worked on the article, tried to make it less a history of philosophy and more about ideas. Unfortunately, what the article was when I started was almost entirely a list of names. It would be nice if you gentlemen would help with the article, instead of threatening to erase the entire thing and substitute a solo effort. Rick Norwood 00:49, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

No offense to your wikiviews, but the way Wikipedia works is by consensus. If, when I have finished my draft, people decide they like it better than this crap, it will be plopped down here and the wiki will have been improved as a result. There can be no a priori justification for keeping this draft over mine. KSchutte 06:17, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

I hope your article is wonderful, and everyone accepts it. But saying nasty things about the current article is not the way to win praise for your article. You may still dislike the article, but it is certainly better, from a grammar standpoint if nothing else, the the way it looked before. My point, however, was that the current article is created by consensus, while your article is not. Rick Norwood 17:23, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

Agree that this article should not have such an extensive history section, and that the (excellent) material here should be moved to and merged with history of philosophy. — goethean ॐ 18:05, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

Move Induction (philosophy)

I listed Induction (philosophy) to be moved to Inductive reasoning, for consistent titles (cf deductive reasoning and abductive reasoning). Please discuss on the talk page of that article. Thanks. -- infinity0 23:22, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Archive me, please!

I'm much too long....

moved talk up to Feb 28 to /Archive 7. Poor Yorick 11:31, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

Thanks! Banno

Euclid and Plato

It seems to me that the reference to Euclid speaks to a weakness in Kant's method. And that the fact that "dialectic" goes back to Plato stresses the continuity of Western philosophy. Rick Norwood 14:16, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

Surely, non-Euclidean geometry is relevant to Kant, but it's not nearly relevant enough to be in this article, which is supposed to be our very most basic article on philosophy. This objection to Kant disturbs only a small portion of his philosophy, and there are some standard answers that are given to it. KSchutte 15:38, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

New category of lists proposal

Sorry to interrupt, but this message is just to inform that I will shortly be proposing the creation of the urgently-needed Category:Philosophasters. The first entry will be Ayn RanT. Any other ideas??--Lacatosias 17:50, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

Yeah — don't do it. As much as I personally would call Rand a pretender to philosophy, that's a POV. It's name-calling, and I'll nominate it for deletion if you create it. — goethean ॐ 18:02, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

Actually, it's not really POV. It it surely the overwhelming consensus view among professional philosophers and academic philosophers of every stripe. She basically doesn't exist anywhere outside of the English speaking world. Those so-called continental philosophers who have mentioned her work have universally trashed it (see Zizek). Among the analytic philosophers, I think we all know how she is (not!) considered to be a serious philosopher. In fact, she is simply not considered. Period!! Any stature that she has is based entirely on her notoriety as an eccentric writer of popular works of fiction which defend a utopian notion of unrestrained capitalism that appeals to cultureless yuppies and business administration students. She called herself a philosopher (pretensions to philosophy), but she is not accepted as a legitimate member of their community by professional philosophers,has puplished nothing of any significance in any peer-reviewed philosophical journals, is never cited or mentioned in any discussions in any current philosophy journals, anthologies, books, etc.. If that doesn't fit the definition of philosophaster, then the word should be abolished from the English langauge.--Lacatosias 08:44, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

I just added "Ayn Rand" to the "See also" section of Philosophaster. Is that OK? The list might be expanded further. -- infinity0 13:51, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

Excellent!! Although now that I think on't, this could become genuinely problematic: Rand is relatively non-controversial as a member of this category. It's more difficult to think of other names without trampling on someone's sensibilities. I can't think of any other famous, undeniable phonies in the field of philosophy. Hmmmm....It's much easier to come up with examples of pseudoscientists than philosophasters.--Lacatosias 14:27, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

How about Douglas Adams? He wrote quite a significant portion of philosophical nonsense in his HG2G. -- infinity0 14:30, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

You guys are asking for trouble (not from me). There is a boatload of Randian supporters who will defend her to the death if need be. In order to make their case in a previous debate, they created a list of publications of genuine philosophers taking her seriously (which you can find on the talk page of List of philosophers). I prefer to allow her into the "realm of the philosophers", but deny that she stacks up very well in comparison with anyone there, except maybe Schelling and Hegel. She was probably a better philosopher than they were. KSchutte 15:41, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

Bah. They're just jealous that Marx is taken seriously in the circle of philosophers. -- infinity0 15:55, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

As a very talented writer and friend of mind once put it (no names will be mentioned): to call Rand's characters cardboard would be an insult to boxes the world over. Face it, that's funny.--Lacatosias 17:33, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

This is all amusing, I guess, and the term is still open as a adjective for abuse. And I must confess, her arguments affected me to such an extent that she cemented in me an ideological conviction in modern liberalism, and against laissez-faire libertarianism.

But I do not see the necessity for slandering Rand here; she slanders herself with her work. Nor do I see any good reason presented here to exclude her from the label of "philosopher", since she addressed the appropriate subjects, and made arguments upon them, albeit bad ones.

The appeal to the trends of the philosophical community might work as a criterion if we were to define -- erroneously -- philosophy as "whatever it is that well-known philosophers do". Philosophers (and scientists, etc.) are people, and they make very human mistakes when it is in their interests to do so. The question that matters is whether or not the interests of the philosophical community have to do with political ideology in this case, or with a meta-philosophical ideology.

So in general, I would prefer goethean's approach. But I have one exception to the inclusion of her as philosopher: the very fact that she (and her followers) engage in slander and unreasoned dismissals of the arguments of others. This is a kind of anti-intellectualism which presumably even the idealized, stylized New Intellectual should find ignoble.

But there are problems with my worry. It seems to me that Neitzsche engaged in the same horseplay, for instance. The ejection of her from the category of "philosopher" on these grounds, unless I'm missing a crucial difference, would necessitate a similar ejection of Neitzsche, which is probably unpalatable. But at the very least, these are the sorts of considerations that people ought to make if they're serious about the issue. Lucidish 22:46, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

In all seriousness, it's not possible to get her excluded from the category of philosophers or epistemologists (I've already tried several times unsuccessfully) because consensus (tyranny of the majority) rules here on the 'pedia. This is, as most if you should know, the fundamental reason that Larry Sanger left this on-line phenonenom that he helped to create. I did succeed in getting her excluded from the category philosophers of mind, however. I worked to get here included in the category of cult leaders but was overwhelemed by opposition, in spite of the fact that there are several notable sources on the Ayn Rand page itself who have written entire books about the cultish character of her movement. There's not much more to be done, in these repects. It's simply another inherent failing of the Wikipedia, with all due respect. Consensus means essentially tyranny of the non-expert majority who have the most interest in protecting a particular person's biography, reputation, etc.. --Lacatosias 08:12, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

How about Wikipedia:Wikiproject Anti Ayn Rand? ;P -- infinity0 13:59, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

Humorless bastards!! You're about as dry as the relics in the catacombs of San Sebastiano.--Lacatosias 14:15, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

Oh. Um...ha ha. — goethean ॐ 21:17, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

Ayn Rand has committed the vilest crime in philosophy, that for which there is NO REDEMPTION. She has the guts to call her own POV "objective". -- infinity0 21:27, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

Is "philosophasters" supposed to be the female version of "philosophers"? Or am I missing something? -- infinity0 21:28, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

You guise are punnier than a barrel full of manqueys. Jon Awbrey 21:31, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

See: Robert Burton (scholar) Jon Awbrey 21:34, 10 March 2006 (UTC)
- Eh, the page says it's a satirical book. Do you have a more detailed explanation? ;p -- infinity0 21:39, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

JA: I have a copy around here somewhere &maddash; what did you need to know? Jon Awbrey 21:52, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

Hey I made a stub article. Philosophaster. — goethean ॐ 21:42, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

Hehe, thanks for clearing that up :) -- infinity0 21:49, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

"Objectivist" vs. "Objective"

JA: Ism't that a bit like the difference between a Deist and a Deity!? Jon Awbrey 21:54, 10 March 2006 (UTC)
Meh, it's the word that counts. She's associating the philosophy with objectivity. Bad. -- infinity0 21:59, 10 March 2006 (UTC)
JA: I see, then you side with the College of Cardinals that telescopes are bad!? Jon Awbrey 22:12, 10 March 2006 (UTC)
No, because objective lens are actually objective. -- infinity0 22:17, 10 March 2006 (UTC)
JA: Only in the sense that they are directed toward an object. Jon Awbrey 22:22, 10 March 2006 (UTC)
Nah, it seems to me that it's pretty objective in what it does. :P -- infinity0 22:32, 10 March 2006 (UTC)
JA: Then your view is tinged with a well-known abberation. Jon Awbrey 22:40, 10 March 2006 (UTC)
Perhaps. I just don't see why objectivism is so named. -- infinity0 22:45, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

The same reason why mixed-market state socialism in China is called Communist: for propaganda reasons. That's the difference between proper names and adjectives. Lucidish 23:03, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

Well, that was kind of what I was implying. Objectivism is in no way objective, yet that name implies it. -- infinity0 23:06, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

Yes Lucidish 00:41, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

That view is already mentioned in the article. Alienus 01:20, 11 March 2006 (UTC)`

Objectivist articles

Why do Objectivist metaphysics, Objectivist epistemology, Objectivist ethics and Objectivist politics exist? IE. Why are there separate articles for branches of such a fringe subject? All I can say is thank god Objectivist logic doesn't exist. -- infinity0 14:11, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

I have the strongest urge to start that article and redirect it to contradiction... -- infinity0 14:12, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

I guess I just don't mind those articles as much as you guys do. Well-known existing cults probably deserve legitimate articles. It's the cults not yet in existence that someone is trying to start that really bother me. (Cf. Extropianism, Integral theory, Prometheanism, Spin-Mediated Consciousness Theory, Decoherence hypothesis, Quantum immortality, et al.) KSchutte 15:28, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

Scary stuff indeed. Is there anything that can actually be done about any of this? Someone wants to speedily eliminate all reference to Paul Boghossian, who certainly is a serious and highly respected philosopher with two books behind him and many publications in serious peer-reviewed journals, from the Wiki. At the same time, we have the kind of crap enumerated above sprouting up all over the place with not a peep from the trigger-happy deletionists. There's something profoundly wrong, folks. I asked to have my stub on the little-known academic philosopher Sungsu Kim userfied so that I could attempt to transform it into a Buffy the Vampire Slayer episode and, hence, include it in the general Wikiproject Buffy which, as you all are undoubtedly aware, is thoroughly covered in ALL self-respecting general encylcopedias, such as Brittanica, Italiana and so on. Just so. Well, I don't even know where to begin to try to address this problem. --Lacatosias 16:04, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

Ahh hahh!! There's always a silver lining though. Thanks for the links. I found this lovely diadem to add to my collection of linguistic lordure:

Applying these ideas to the particular structures and dynamics of the brain, they theorize that human brain works as follows: Through action potential modulated nuclear spin interactions and paramagnetic O2/NO driven activations, the nuclear spins inside neural membranes and proteins form various entangled quantum states some of which survive decoherence through quantum Zeno effects or in decoherence-free subspaces and then collapse contextually via irreversible and non-computable means producing consciousness and, in turn, the collective spin dynamics associated with said collapses have effects through spin chemistry on classical neural activities thus influencing the neural networks of the brain.

I wonder what Mark Twain would have made of it.--Lacatosias 16:25, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

Guys, let's take a serious look at the field of philosophy before we single Rand out as a loser. To be frank, philosophy is full of losers, and some branches are actually dominated by them. In short, if we excluded all bad philosophy from the field, we wouldn't have much philosophy left.

Now, while this might be a reasonable approach for a peer-reviewed journal, allowing it to publish only the non-crap, it's not an option here. We have to document anyone who's relevant, even those some might consider philophasters. The best we can hope for is that the truth is told, so that people can make accurate judgements. Alienus 18:14, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

Ditto what Alienus said. Lacatosias, in response to your question "what are we to do?". the answer is that we give these people a dilemma: Either their prized articles get a neutrality warning right in everyone's face or they make something like the following a prominent part of the article:

This topic has largely failed to gather support from academic philosophers that are respected in their field.

This sort of problem is discussed in the policy article Wikipedia:Neutral point of view#Pseudoscience. KSchutte 20:57, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

Cool! When do we start? :D -- infinity0 21:20, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

I just wanted to point out that I really enjoy the quote, "To be frank, philosophy is full of losers". Lucidish 00:44, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

It's yours to do with as you will, just so long as all profits from its use go to the Foundation for Philosophical Losers. Alienus 08:20, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

Another thing you might consider doing is joining and trying to popularize Wikipedia:WikiProject Academics. At the moment it's a small group of people who understand that the wikipedia is supposed to be about the real world, not about fiction. As a result, they've put a good amount of time into fighting in these deletion debates, and into trying to establish some good criteria for inclusion with which everyone can agree. At the moment, it's a floundering project, but I'd like to see it revive. KSchutte 21:08, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

I'll take a look at it. I think your approach is the correct one though. If anything is to be accomplished here, it has to be done at the political/policy level. I'm not going to spend ten hours a day editing and monitoring Integral theory and all of its subpages to make sure that it maintains a balanced view on the matter. Let us start challenging such nonsense as the statement above by putting a verifiablity template on the page, asking knowledgable experts in quantum mechanics

to determine if there is any factual basis for such bizarre claims. As to Buffy and fiction, some such project as the one you are referring to needs to be kicked into gear. Well, one can at least try any way.--Lacatosias 09:37, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

Uhm, ok, but how will this help get every little minor character from Buffy the Vampire Slayer a full article of their own? Alienus 21:24, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

That's the harder question of how to influence wikipedia guidelines and recommendations. Frankly, I'm not sure it matters so much. The only way I've even imagined that we could win those kinds of battles is by making wikipedia a more expert-driven resource, and the only way to do that seems to be to create articles that experts would find useful. Sadly, this isn't exactly easy to do. KSchutte 22:28, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

I think influence is overrated. What I mean is that there are many groups that we will never convince of anything important, but their buy-in is not necessary. Instead, we have to focus on improving the articles -- doing the right thing -- but not sweat the politics. It's this approach that has allowed me to correct some of the worst POV violations in fan-centric articles (such as Ayn Rand) without being banned all that often. Alienus 22:39, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

Agreed, but I'm sure not going to put a lot of my energy into topics like her. KSchutte 22:51, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

That's your choice, of course, but I think there's a lot to be said for putting time and energy on such cases. The alternative is to allow some articles to be written entirely by their proponents. Rand is a particularly interesting case because so many people know were introduced to philosophy by her writings and have only the dimmest understand of the field as a whole. Alienus 08:20, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

Portal

Lacatosias and I have made the Portal semi-automatic. It now rotates the selected philosopher and selected articles once a week!

The latter only has 4 entries in it atm though, so someone needs to add a few extra philosophers onto the queue. Just copy and paste the code from one of the other entries and make the necessary adjustments. :) -- infinity0 21:59, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

Great! I can't wait to feature Ayn Rand. Alienus 22:08, 12 March 2006 (UTC)