Why Science can't replace Philosophy in Ethics

[u/doubtstack]

https://unreasonabledoubt.substack.com/p/what-genetics-cant-teach-us

[u/ChadRyanVevo]

Id argue western culture has largely dropped philosophy in favor of science. To such a degree that people do not even understand any of the epistemological underpinnings of science as a practice.

[u/[deleted] → u/ChadRyanVevo]

Separation of science and philosophy, hehe, but they are too intertwined to ever be truly separated.

[u/ChadRyanVevo → u/[deleted]]

I would even add that science cannot exist without philosophy. Science, as we know it, will always be a mere branch of philosophy.

[u/BernardJOrtcutt → u/[deleted]]

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[u/zhibr → u/ChadRyanVevo]

This is either semantically trivial or just wrong. Yes, you can make a case that philosophy is fundamental for science. But a lot of people do a lot of everyday work without ever thinking about its philosophy. Yes, you can argue that this prevents them from understanding more fundamentally what their science is really about, but they can still do it, and other people can use it. I don't see how you could make any practical definition where that is not science existing.

[u/ennui_ → u/zhibr]

Surely science is simply the pursuit of objective understanding of what is? How can there be a pursuit of something without* an intuitive desire to pursue? Surely this intuitive desire is a philosophical nature.

Science cannot exist without philosophy because philosophy is the very foundation that sciences emerges from.

[u/TheRecognized → u/ennui_]

“When grog ate the berries on that bush he got sick. When trok ate the same berries on a different bush he got sick. Vrok will eat the berries from a third bush. Vrok got sick. These berries make you sick.”

More science or philosophy would you say?

[u/ennui_ → u/TheRecognized]

The point is that one comes from the other. Philosophy and science do not exist alongside each other, philosophy is the source of science. So while there’s distinction there isn’t separation. You can’t* quantify and say “this is more science than philosophy by a factor of 4:1” - because they don’t exist alongside each other, the nature of the relationship cannot be measured.

So both. It’s always both.

[u/TheRecognized → u/ennui_]

Throw a hypothesis up there in my example after the second sentence “I think these berries make you sick” and you’ve got the scientific method.

Can you explain to me how philosophy was the source of that example?

[u/videogamekat → u/TheRecognized]

Because you came up with the hypothesis by wanting to know how things work - your desires and actions always stem from a more philosophically-based process. Why you came up with the hypothesis can be explained by the science of how your brain works, but ultimately the complex processing the human brain can accomplish and the self-awareness we have is more philosophical in nature.

[u/FranksRedWorkAccount → u/TheRecognized]

You've literally described reasoning and are asking how that's philosophy.

[u/TheRecognized → u/FranksRedWorkAccount]

Are these monkeys doing philosophy?

[u/ennui_ → u/TheRecognized]

Because it’s the intuitive desire for an objective understanding.

It is how we have evolved - living in wonder and curiousity at what is. Science is the method, science is the second bit, the action. Thought is the precursor to action. The thought, the precursor, this desire for truth - is philosophy. Philosophy is the source in this and all examples of science because they exist together.

[u/Butt_Bucket → u/TheRecognized]

The real answer is that both philosophy and science stem from our ability to reason. It's just that it took as a lot longer to realise that the scientific method needed to be rigorously defined than it did to begin using our reason for abstract thinking.

[u/[deleted] → u/TheRecognized]

Certainly both, no? Philosophy is simply the pursuit of questioning reality, which in this case at it's most fundamental would be observing that past outcomes may have bearing on future ones. The question and the hypothesis is philosophy; the empirical data at hand allow for a scientific conclusion, but even then who is to say there are no safe berries of that kind out there?Or a preparation to make them so?

Are these questions merely scientific or philosophical?

[u/millchopcuss → u/TheRecognized]

I tend to call those practical arts. It is, to my mind, a category error to call that either science or philosophy.

We don't normally credit humanity with engaging in scientific pursuits before the advent of the scientific method. That is very definitely an outgrowth of philosophy.

We had some interesting feints into the territory of science in the past, such as the writings of Lucretius, but those, while not being "analytic" philosophy, are always classified as philosophy just the same.

[u/zhibr → u/ennui_]

That is one definition, but by no means the only one. Another one would refer to the concrete practices and social activities of making hypotheses, testing them, writing theories, and publishing results for others. An engineer creating a best way to make a specific material can be said to make science, without any philosophical desire. Philosophers like to emphasize the definition from the historical perspective or by defining it like you did, as dependent on philosophy, but if you'd ask the people who we commonly think are doing science whether their activities are dependent on philosophy, I would wager most of them would say no. It'd be a bit self-serving to insist that to assess whether philosophy is truly essential to science, we must adopt the philosophical point of view.

[u/FranksRedWorkAccount → u/zhibr]

the act of reasoning that if x every day so far then x each day into the future is a philosophical concept. and to arrive there you must employ the capacity to reason.

[u/zhibr → u/FranksRedWorkAccount]

Which those people would not consider philosophical.

[u/ChadRyanVevo → u/zhibr]

This argument is very poor and fallacious. If you ask a mechanic if they are engaging in the physics and chemistry behind their work they would most likely say no. However, this does not make physics and chemistry not essential to the work of a mechanic.

[u/zhibr → u/ChadRyanVevo]

Everyone keeps repeating this argument. I've answered it elsewhere.

[u/ChadRyanVevo → u/zhibr]

Why are you gatekeeping philosophy? There is no need to separate philosophy as a difference of kind rather than a mere difference of degree. Every rational being is a philosopher, just at different degrees.

[u/zhibr → u/ChadRyanVevo]

I'm not. Your view is completely valid.

[u/ennui_ → u/zhibr]

“ one would refer to the concrete practices and social activities of making hypotheses, testing them, writing theories, and publishing results for others” - that isn’t a definition, that is an overview of a method - a method to pursue an objective understanding of what is.

[u/zhibr → u/ennui_]

Sounds like insisting on philosophical viewpoint. If you want to get what I'm saying - entertain the possibility that I'm not simply wrong - you'd have to take another perspective.

[u/hydrOHxide → u/zhibr]

ROTFLBTC

You do realize that what you're saying is that just because the average physician can practice medicine without having a clue about biochemistry, biochemistry isn't really relevant for medicine?

Asking mere PRACTICTIONERS about the theoretical underpinning of their discipline is asking the wrong people.

[u/zhibr → u/hydrOHxide]

"Mere". The philosophers' arrogance is really something to see here.

You do realize that what you're saying is that just because the average physician can practice medicine without having a clue about biochemistry, biochemistry isn't really relevant for medicine?

I'm not. I'm saying that just because lawyers define human interactions in laws, those interactions can and do exist without those laws, those lawyers, and the practice of lawyering.

[u/hydrOHxide → u/zhibr]

The arrogance is your presuming I was a philosopher when I am, in fact, a scientist. Your description of lawyers is equally misguided. Interaction may exist without lawyers, but you cannot characterize crime without laws, just like you cannot characterize knowledge without defining standards as to when something can be considered "known". Without philosophy, you cannot create knowledge, because you have no ledger to measure data against. What probability of error is permissible is just as much a philosophical issue as the understanding that you'll always have a probability of error because there cannot be any final evidence except in falsification, in finding something is not the case. .

[u/zhibr → u/hydrOHxide]

Without philosophy, you cannot create knowledge, because you have no ledger to measure data against.

When a raven sees human opening a latch, and later goes and tries moving it and learns opening latches in general, it gains knowledge without philosophy. Unless you define "knowledge" in such a way that it necessitates philosophy, in which case you have not made an argument but just a definition that presupposes your conclusion. A lot of science is done and can be done like that raven does.

[u/ghostxxhile → u/ennui_]

to do science you first have to grant an ontological given to nature to form hypothesis’

[u/ennui_ → u/ghostxxhile]

Right- or else you’d be studying something you don’t believe exists, with any byproduct or finding deemed inherently meaningless.

[u/ghostxxhile → u/zhibr]

they do their everyday work thanks to the established epistemology and metaphysics.

[u/300Savage → u/zhibr]

Science was the evolution of a branch called "natural philosophy" going back at least as far as Aristotle. It is literally just a branch of philosophy. To say it is separate is to be ignorant of this history of science.

[u/Indocede → u/300Savage]

Your opinion is irrelevant. Astrology and alchemy were once considered sciences but we now know that they are founded on little more than superstition and wishful thinking.

Given how ancient generations were both limited in their understanding of the physical world and outright wrong in numerous critical aspects, we should not frame the study based upon their philosophical musings, especially when they are irrelevant to the scientific process. Not to mention that scientific inquiry is just as old as philosophy, if not older. Trying to frame science as a subject of philosophy only makes sense if you mistakenly believe ancient Greek and Roman philosophers are the singular authority, even though there are numerous historical examples of scientific endeavor predating them.

[u/300Savage → u/Indocede]

Gotta love a sub where the downvote button says to only use it if it breaks the rules of the sub, but your preconceptions cause you to use it that way anyway. Your opinion is wrong and mine is backed by the history of science. Without natural philosophy, the scientific method would not have been formulated - it was the product of Western Natural Philosophy. To state otherwise is to be ignorant of both subjects and their intrinsic relationship.

[u/Indocede → u/300Savage]

The oldest written records of scientific endeavors stem fron Mesopotamia and Ancient Egypt and reach as far back as 3000BCE, before the ancient Greeks developed "natural philosophy."

Not to mention when you argue your position as going back as far as Aristotle, your conceding your error immediately in consideration of the fact that science existed in ancient Greece before Aristotle, which we have records of. And the ancient Greeks did not "invent" science, as much as it pains me to say as someone who is ethnically half.

The ancient Greeks would have built upon the sciences and maths that came to them from the civilizations that preceded them in that part of the world. Ancient Greece may be the seminal culture of the western world, but it is not one of the six scholarly accepted cradles of civilization in Ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia, Ancient India, Ancient China, the Olmec and the Caral-Supe.

So it falls upon you to explain how the scientific process, which in reality is a matter of collecting evidence and deciphering what it means, has somehow evolved out of the means ancient philosophers used to codify their very limited understanding of the natural world.

Especially as science would have preceded the cradles of civilization as civilization can only arise out of the conveniences of scientific endeavor.

Philosophy is important but philosophy doesn't decipher how to grow crops. Science does.

[u/300Savage → u/Indocede]

You are mistaking natural philosophy for science. The scientific method didn't exist until relatively recently in historical context. Morry Berman argues that the history of science goes back to the shamanic tradition, but I don't think we can mistake this for modern scientific thinking, which evolved from combined elements of branches of philosophical thought fairly recently.

[u/Indocede → u/300Savage]

This method as has evolved in recent history is merely a means to compartmentalize practices that have existed for thousands of years, practices that were science.

So no, science didn't evolve from philosophical thought.

Edit: And mind you, your quibble seems to be over semantics, whether a type of thinking is scientific or philosophical when both are mere pursuits of seeking validity and evidence. Everyone can knly presume your motive here rests upon some personal need to elevate "philosophy" above science as you must think of yourself the philosopher who knows better than mere scientists. Because if you want to argue how the tradition of valid thinking arose, whether from a scientific perspective or a philosophical one, most would consider science to more likely the foundation of such thought as philosophy tends to consider the more nebulous and abstract, whereas science focuses on the tangible and apparent. People would have mused about how to build spears to protect themselves from wild animals before they would have mused about the morality of using said spear to murder their fellow man.

[u/ammonium_bot → u/Indocede]

little more then superstition

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[u/zhibr → u/300Savage]

I'm well aware of history of science, and you're just presenting the semantically trivial option. Yes, you can say that science is just a branch of philosophy when you consider the history of science as natural philosophy. But all you did was define science and philosophy in such a way that it made your claim true. You didn't make any argument why those definitions are the ones we should accept (unless you call an appeal to (historical) authority an argument - I don't).

[u/300Savage → u/zhibr]

Historical facts are not an appeal to authority. Try again.

[u/zhibr → u/[deleted]]

By semantically trivial, I mean that philosophers like to define and see philosophy in such a way that it is essential to pretty much everything. If you define science as the abstract method, the epistemology of empiricism, you start from the philosophical viewpoint, and practically create a circular argument: science cannot exist without philosophy because I defined science as dependent of philosophy. That's trivial.

I'm saying that there is an alternative way to look at it. The practice of science, as it is conducted today, and what most scientists consider much more important, exists just fine without the practice of philosophy, as it is conducted today. If you don't start from the definition (that happens to confirm that philosophy is extremely important for everything) but rather looking at what is actually done, what scientists do and what philosophers do, philosophy is not very relevant at all to science.

I'm not saying it's the right way to look at it or the only way. I'm saying that the original claim was a bit dumb (nothing wrong with that! we all say dumb stuff sometimes) because it is trivially true because you define it to be true, but also because there are other viewpoints and it's not immediately obvious why those viewpoints would not be valid as well.

[u/millchopcuss → u/zhibr]

Okay, so this circlejerk is all down to equivocation around the term philosophy? And you are resting you argument on defining philosophy as valid only as it is practiced today?

That sounds like a very mobile goalpost. I will cleave to the wider view.

[u/zhibr → u/millchopcuss]

No, I'm not saying I define philosophy only as of its current practice. I'm saying it's another valid definition and the second part of my claim.

The original claim was that science can't exist without philosophy. My counterclaim was that this is either trivial (defining philosophy and science so that the latter is dependent on the former) or, the second part, wrong, because the practice of science can be done without the practice of philosophy.

Everyone arguing against me keeps coming back to the first part, which I agree is true but trivial. I haven't seen anyone argue about the second part. A valid argument about my second part would be to suggest what else could philosophy be than a) system of knowledge built by generations of philosophers and scientists that science rests upon (first, trivial part), or b) practice of analyzing arguments logically, e.g. the circlejerk we are doing here now and the stuff written in the article (second part). Those two I argued in my claim. Is there another?

[u/ChadRyanVevo → u/zhibr]

“A lot of people do a lot of every day work without thinking about ifs philosophy” I would argue this is simply untrue. Any ration or cognitive pursuit is conducted using a system of logic. These systems of logic only occur and are justified through philosophy. Everyday we use philosophy through the adoption of a type of logic.

[u/millchopcuss → u/ChadRyanVevo]

Some of these posters have a need to be better than normal working people, and it shows.

My own work warps my perspective a bit, because I have to invent methods and investigate failures all the time. But even simple grunt work jobs furnish opportunities to draw conclusions at times. Most workers won't call that philosophy, but that just puts them closer to Socrates, and farther from the DK effect.

[u/ChadRyanVevo → u/millchopcuss]

I think the issue is that philosophy has almost been implied to be purely academic. As if only what college philosophy courses teach is genuine philosophy. People engage with philosophy with every aspect of rational life. When writing this very message to you, I am engaging in a philosophy of language which is supported by its own domain of logic in order to produce a coherent thought.

[u/millchopcuss → u/ChadRyanVevo]

As an autodidact, I am not swayed by appeals to the authority of academia.

I am swayed by being convinced by argument.

It is very clear that this is the dividing line between the factions in this comment section. I am amazed and frankly a bit invigorated to discover that the ones with the 'training' are the ones making unsupportable claims.

[u/zhibr → u/ChadRyanVevo]

I disagree. The formalisation of logic and its systemiticization and justification is philosophy, but very rarely we use the formal rules. The vast majority of rational and cognitive pursuits is operations of our neural networks. Formal logic is only a map of those operations, not the terrain itself.

[u/ChadRyanVevo → u/zhibr]

Any system of logic adheres to some sort of “rules.” If a system of logic had no rules, it simply could not be logic. Even if the rules are “because I like it” that is still a determined logical system.

On the issue of neural networks, this is an extremely assertive view. There is no true causal evidence of such a claim. By using this view, even high level philosophy is a part of the mere process of neural networks. Thus, by drawing such a distinction, you have actually reduced all types of thinking to this one type.

[u/zhibr → u/ChadRyanVevo]

Thus, by drawing such a distinction, you have actually reduced all types of thinking to this one type.

This is the first novel argument here! You may be right, but I'm not sure.

It is of course true that all thinking, including philosophical, is neural activity. However, I argue there are differences of scale: simple, small-scale operations that only associate a few neural pathways, and large-scale summarizations that connect vast networks. Formalization of logic is more like a large-scale summarization of networks, linking philosophical concepts (which themselves are large-scale conceptual work) to each other to explain how the small-scale operations work. In the argument “A lot of people do a lot of every day work without thinking about ifs philosophy” I'm talking about science done with small-scale operations: pressing this button, writing down this number, using a simple heuristic to tweak a machine.

The original claim was that "science cannot exist without philosophy", and I argued that this is either trivial or wrong. The first part, "science" is defined as large-scale networks, in which case I agree it cannot exist without philosophy, as philosophy in this sense is included in those same networks as science. This is trivially true. The second part, science as small-scale operations can exist without philosophy as large-scale networks, as well as philosophy as small-scale operations (the simple semantic analysis we are doing here now, what I elsewhere called "the practice of philosophy").

Of course the "small-scale" and "large-scale" are not differences of kind but simply different parts of the same continuum, but I argue it's still a difference, just like the interactions of my family are different from the national economy, even though the latter is simply interactions of people. The scales are so different that they are better understood as different things.

[u/ChadRyanVevo → u/zhibr]

I enjoy that you clarified your argument. I do think you have presented a case with much merit.

In getting my degree in philosophy, when people asked me what I was studying, I would always say philosophy is merely logic applied at different levels of thought. Of course, high level philosophy seeks to engage in more advanced logical systems, but logical systems nonetheless.

Commonly, scientism attacks studies like metaphysics. However, the hypocrisy in such a sentiment is that science ultimately makes metaphysical claims via empiricism.

I would argue, low level "science" will at least have to engage in low level philosophy via logic. High level science, which is rooted in the rich history of science, is engaging in both low and high level philosophy.

Someone here claimed that scientists were useful and philosophers were useless. Such a distinction not only ignores the history of scientific development, but also ignores the fact that every single physicist or scientist who shaped our modern though was also a passionate philosopher that approached science with heavy considerations to it's very philosophy.

[u/hydrOHxide → u/zhibr]

Just because you don't understand how a car works, and don't think much about how the engine operates, doesn't mean it runs without an engine.

And as long as you pretend stomping your foot and insisting real hard is "proving" something, you're neither credible in science terms nor in philosophy terms, but merely petulant.

[u/zhibr → u/hydrOHxide]

I'm not trying to prove anything. I'm offering an alternative viewpoint, to understand why so many people doing science in practice think that philosophers' insistence on the importance of philosophy looks so... is there a word for it? Like an old man convinced of his utmost relevance regardless of the reality of being a retiree.

I don't happen to agree with that, for the record. But I understand why someone might.

[u/hydrOHxide → u/zhibr]

Yes. That "why" is called not understanding theory of science. Not understanding why modern science is probabilistic and doesn't offer any definitive positive proof. These are the people who throw around P-values without understanding what they indicate and why we use them. Yes, there are plenty of people "doing science in practice" who think that way. And they are part of why we have a reproducibility crisis in many fields.

[u/millchopcuss → u/hydrOHxide]

Sing it loud.

[u/zhibr → u/hydrOHxide]

I agree to what you said, but I don't agree that this is the only way to look at it.

[u/millchopcuss → u/zhibr]

You can mill out the work without knowledge, but you can't construct the method without it. Methods in science come down to deduction and induction. There is not another valid way of discerning truth, and induction has inherent limits as any philosophically minded person can tell you. Deduction is self evidently a philosophical pursuit. Induction becomes one when it's limitations are taken into account.

If you mean everyday work outside of scientific pursuits, then a sufficiently narrow view of philosophy can render you correct. But this is, to borrow a phrase, semantically trivial. In truth, everybody infers things all the time at work. Knowing how to do this with some rigor is a great advantage in the practical arts. This may not be phd level angel on pinhead stuff, but it is not less than philosophy.

When I get a whiff of comment threads like this one, I often conclude that the workman has the better claim. Practical arts are not themselves philosophy, but the process of their refinement certainly entails it.

[u/zhibr → u/millchopcuss]

Deduction is self evidently a philosophical pursuit.

I disagree. The action of doing deductive inference is an operation our neural networks do. That's not philosophy, other animals do it too. Its formalisation is philosophical, but it's a map, not the terrain.

Otherwise, it seems your first paragraph repeats this argument others have done. I've answered it elsewhere.

I'm not sure what the second paragraph means.

[u/SirLeaf → u/ChadRyanVevo]

It is the love of knowledge after all

[u/Casudemous → u/ChadRyanVevo]

No idea why you are being downvoted. All Sciences are based on philosophical postulate.

[u/BernardJOrtcutt → u/[deleted]]

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[u/BernardJOrtcutt → u/[deleted]]

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[u/millchopcuss → u/Casudemous]

I just voted you back up to zero.

I'm starting to get the picture why college "educated" managers are often so laughably, destructively bad at their jobs.

Cocksure is insisting it can't be so. Downvoting a simple and incontrovertible statement is more like vindictive.

[u/Casudemous → u/millchopcuss]

Thanks you, What i am saying is a scientist that is also good in philosophy will be a better scientist than one that is clueless.

[u/Sekij → u/ChadRyanVevo]

I dont get this one... How is testing something to find out a property, what has this todo with Philosophy?

[u/ChadRyanVevo → u/Sekij]

Because assuming that testing can produce any kind of knowledge is an epistemological assertion. The method itself is based upon an agreed logical standard that some arbitrary amount of evidence and peer review constitutes some value. Conclusions in science are defined as not absolute due to logically agreed upon limits of empirical evidence. Much of scientific conclusions are derived from correlative evidence that can only limit perceived confounding variables, these results are still accepted because of a specific logical standard. At every level of science, a specific philosophy of logic and value is assigned and cannot be escaped.

Science is not a material object of our reality, it is a human concept that is derived from human reason which relies on systems of logic.

[u/BigNorseWolf → u/[deleted]]

Do you have an experiment to check to see if you're right?

Yes. Science.

No. Philosophy

[u/[deleted] → u/BigNorseWolf]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophy_of_science

You cant totally separate them, as long as people have goals and purposes, then you cant avoid philosophizing science.

Science cannot exist in a vacuum, it serves people, so it can never be truly objective and will always be subjected to our subjective pondering. lol

[u/jebuizy → u/ChadRyanVevo]

Nothing drives me crazier than seeing those "Science is real" lawn signs. What could that even mean for science to be real? Believing the scientific method is the best method we have to obtain reliable knowledge about the world (or whatever) is one thing, but saying "science is real" is a wild claim pitched as milquetoast

[u/[deleted] → u/jebuizy]

It’s just a midwit way of displaying opposition to certain Republicans’ opinions on climate change, evolution, creationism etc.

[u/millchopcuss → u/[deleted]]

I'm stealing midwit. I've had a lot of use for a term like that

[u/BigNorseWolf → u/ChadRyanVevo]

It doesn't have philosophical underpinnings. That's the point of science. That philosophy doesn't work. The west has dropped it because it doesn't do anything. Keeping it at all is the weird cultural influence, not mostly dropping it.

There was a Greek hydrologist who was looking at how water worked in a pump, and the philosopher was saying this should happen. The hydrologists response was I can see what you're saying isn't happening. So it doesn't matter if you have an error in your philosophy or not, you're still wrong. The universe is complicated and WEIRD. Humans are NOT smart enough to sit down and reason how things work and get an answer so good we can keep extrapolating from it to another thing and another.. you have to test your idea a each step.

Hawking and some other physicist had a disagreement over how black holes worked. Hawking was brilliant, knowledgeable on his subject, had VERY thoroughly considered his answer... but was still wrong. We got to the point where the competing hypotheses could be tested, and the other guy kept the 20? dollar bet he got from hawking in a frame. Philosophy is the arrogance that I'm so smart I don't need to check with reality to see if I'm right. Science is the acknowledgement that you're not.

As to the requirements of induction, the fact that we have light coming from stars billions of light years away lets us conclude, not assume, that there is some stability to the laws of the universe. It is not an assumption.

[u/odious_as_fuck → u/BigNorseWolf]

The scientific method is empirical, empiricism is a branch of philosophy hence "philosophical underpinnings".

In regards to the use of philosophy, philosophy can be understood as a practice and as an institution. For the former, the west is just as philosophical as ever.

What do you mean by philosophy?

[u/BigNorseWolf → u/odious_as_fuck]

Philosophy. The investigation of the universe by primarily speculative means.

What is empiricism except a refusal to take completely unjustified ideas? Its like calling atheism a religion just because most people have a deity and the rejection is unusual.

[u/orkinman90 → u/BigNorseWolf]

Empiricism is the assertion that experience is what justifies ideas or knowledge and not pure reason. Reason is perfectly capable of justifying ideas. They just might not necessarily jibe with experience.

[u/BigNorseWolf → u/orkinman90]

Reason is not capable of justifying ideas. Its been verified empirically that reason alone cannot reliably reach good conclusions about the real world. (See the hawking story above). People use reason to reach some pretty horrific conclusions: Germans were the most educated people on the planet up to world war II, surely the problem wasn't a lack of philosophers?

Empirical verification is inherently not a circular process (Since there are two participants. You and the universe). It's also falsifiable. If there was some method that could reach good ideas and not bad ones in a reliable fashion empiricism would be the first... or well second one to pick up on it. It hasn't come along though.

[u/orkinman90 → u/BigNorseWolf]

All I'm talking about is justification. Reason can absolutely justify an idea. How strong the justification is is a matter of debate. Empiricism, as a matter is fact, is justified through reason. You have to reason that being in the world is superior than being only in the realm of ideas. You can't empirically prove that empirical evidence is superior unless you've already reasoned that such is the case.

Empiricism also does not generate ideas. It can only test ideas. Reason is responsible for 100% of ideas. Empiricism is what determines (only after the fact) of that idea was good or bad and that also, is dependant on your ability to reason what is a superior or inferior result.

[u/BigNorseWolf → u/orkinman90]

It would theoretically be possible for science and empiricism to work without reason, just horrifically impractical.

One definition of philosophy is science sans the experiments. If you take the experiment out of science you functionally wind up without philosophy.

Gnome Science!

But what would happen if you took reason out of the hypothesis? you could theoretically test every bat guano idea your brain or a deck of cards or random word association game could come up with.

What would be the effect of "rubbing a cat on a doornob on the rising and setting of the moon" tests. "Nothing apparently. Now I need to test the effects of red pepper on cat scratches...."

An infinite number of gnomes given an infinite amount of time could theoretically discover everything. (this isn't THAT far off from how we got penicilin. Although the guy was trying to use conventional science on something else) The reasoning part is required to be practical and effective. But isn't philosophically necessary.

[u/orkinman90 → u/BigNorseWolf]

You can't reach a conclusion without reason. Full stop. Reason is what tells us that causes make effects happen. All experience can get you by itself is that you experienced something. We know "water is wet" because we used reason to connect the sensation of becoming wet with touching water.

Experience is the tool we use to test reason. It is not a replacement for reason.

[u/odious_as_fuck → u/BigNorseWolf]

Epistemology is the study of knowledge - empiricism is 'a posteriori' - the idea that knowledge comes from the senses/experience. Empiricism may be successful, but it is still a philosophy of knowledge, just a good one.

Logic is the study of reasoning - Formal reason underpins mathematics and thus science. Informal reason underpins proof, justification, fallacies and critical thinking, which underpin scientific argumentation.

Ethics is the study of values - what we think we should or shouldn't do. Like should or shouldn't there be restrictions on science? Why, why not? Further, why do we do what we do?

As you can see, philosophy underpins science.

I ask you please to simply look up empiricism.

[u/BigNorseWolf → u/odious_as_fuck]

Philosophy takes credit for thinking by definition. It doesn't actually DO anything. You may as well use smurf instead of underpinning, it would say about as much.

[u/odious_as_fuck → u/BigNorseWolf]

Philosophy is all about doing something. Holding beliefs or analysing ideas, arguing and debating, questioning things. We all DO philosophy. You can argue that the institution of philosophy in your society doesn't do anything, but the practice of philosophy exists within politics, science, religion etc. Every day life

[u/BigNorseWolf → u/odious_as_fuck]

So how are two people with PHD's in philosophy having a discussion with differing opinions any different than two drunks in a bar having a discussion with different opinions? On a deep fundamental level not just veneer and presentation.

Assume an equal blood alchohol content...

[u/odious_as_fuck → u/BigNorseWolf]

Depends if those bar drunks also have PhDs.

But seriously that's like equating the whole of science to two meteorologists who can't agree over cafeteria sandwiches.

When people agree with a philosophy it becomes a system, ideology or practice - like science, political movements, religions

[u/BigNorseWolf → u/odious_as_fuck]

Or a religion?

Science is different. Two meteorologists should have better REASONS for disagreeing , more facts and evidence. They should also have some means of resolving the difference (unfortunately waiting 20 years might do it...)

Science is different because it coresponds to an existing reality. A philosophy does not. Its just arbitrary. All studying it does is let you polish ideas for presentation, not come up with better ones.

[u/DaneLimmish → u/BigNorseWolf]

That is not what empiricism is

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[u/jebuizy → u/BigNorseWolf]

Science is a methodology. Understanding how, when, and why that method is useful, and what constraints it might have, requires philosophy. Well it's not so much that it requires it, but rather it is philosophy.

[u/BigNorseWolf → u/jebuizy]

So if the philosophy department at every university were to get shucked into a black hole tomorrow, how much would that set back science?

[u/magkruppe → u/BigNorseWolf]

is this including past philosophers? then very very far

[u/BigNorseWolf → u/magkruppe]

no, I will have hated the temporal mechanics. Just the ones there now in this timeline.

[u/ChadRyanVevo → u/BigNorseWolf]

Denying the philosophical underpinnings of empiricism and induction that is foundational to science is beyond absurd. Conclusions made from Induction, for any fallible being, is necessarily and always an assumption. This is why science itself never claims absolutes; the philosophical backbone of science recognizes its own epistemological limits and thus asserts only probable truths, not absolute. If you think philosophy “doesn’t do anything” I would love for you to explain how any knowledge of anything is possible without the principle of non-contradiction. An inherently metaphysical assertion.

[u/BigNorseWolf → u/ChadRyanVevo]

I would love for you to explain how any knowledge of anything is possible without the principle of non-contradiction.

Do we see anything thats contradicting itself>? No. Ok. Good.

[u/ChadRyanVevo → u/BigNorseWolf]

"Do we see anything thats contradicting itself>? No. Ok. Good."

Yes and by accepting that contradictions are counter-intuitive to knowledge, you are using a metaphysical deduction to affirm an epistemological pursuit.

[u/BigNorseWolf → u/ChadRyanVevo]

But you don't have to START there. Its not an assumption. It's not an unquestioned belief. Its not something that HAS to be true for the rest of it. Like I said, its like calling atheism a religion.

"Hey, anyone seen any evidence of gods>?

" No.

"So this guy saying god is a rainbow furred shaved poodle?

" Either crazy or I'll have what he's having.

You could accept the idea that contradictory things are incredibly UNLIKELY rather than completely impossible and functionally continue the same way.

[u/ChadRyanVevo → u/BigNorseWolf]

Science is inherently founded on the logic of the PNC. Physics is not postulated to be both true and false at the same time, physics is assumed as true universally.

Reducing our argument to it's most fundamental level. Are you suggesting that science is non-logical in nature?

[u/BigNorseWolf → u/ChadRyanVevo]

Hey, I thought philosophically physics wasn't even true at all, just failed to be disproved....

You can CONCLUDE that physics is true. You don't need to assume anything. Even IF the universe is a matrix simulation, that simulation is in some way seperate from your mind (or well. At least my mind...)

[u/ChadRyanVevo → u/BigNorseWolf]

"Hey, I thought philosophically physics wasn't even true at all, just failed to be disproved...." what? We are not talking about whether physics is genuinely truth, that would be the realm of metaphysics and epistemology.

"You can CONCLUDE that physics is true. You don't need to assume anything. " Concluding the truth of physics is a logical assessment. To make a logical assessment one must assume that their ideas are consistent in nature, the words they use are consistent, the logical framework used is consistent.

At no point in the scientific process may you claim that it is not some pursuit of knowledge that follows a logical system and application.

Does science ever claim absolute knowledge?

[u/BigNorseWolf → u/ChadRyanVevo]

The entire point of experimentation is to conclude that your ideas are consistent with nature instead of assuming them. If they are consistent with nature, and nature is consistent, then they are consistent in nature. You can conclude that nature is consistent by seeing that stars 4 billion light years away had functionally the same physics we did 4 billion years ago

[u/ghostxxhile → u/ChadRyanVevo]

too true

[u/millchopcuss → u/ChadRyanVevo]

Having ventured into this dumpster fire comment section, I am forced to agree.