[knightoffaith]

>who do not also enjoy engaging in philosophical debates.

Philosophical debates as in talking with other random people about philosophy? Sure, I'm sure most people who have read these books enjoy that. But that's not doing philosophy---such conversations are usually going to be riddled with errors and just not up to par for academic philosophical discussion.

I think we've gone so far down the rabbit hole about why the discipline of philosophy isn't justified that I've nearly forgotten why this current discussion is that relevant. Plenty of people enjoy philosophy, and it's something that humans have been discussing in a rigorous way for thousands of years. Somehow this isn't good enough? I really just don't see why music somehow meets the bar as being enjoyable enough for enough people, but philosophy doesn't. You don't have to be a musician to enjoy musician, and you don't have to be a philosopher to enjoy philosophy. "Oh, well, the people who do enjoy philosophy probably enjoy philosophical debates, so they're basically philosophers!" I mean, isn't this like me saying, "The people who enjoy music probably enjoy humming or singing tunes, so they're basically musicians!" The distinction seems to be getting continually more and more contrived.

[lisper]

> something that humans have been discussing in a rigorous way for thousands of years

That's my point: most philosophy is not rigorous. It might have a veneer of rigor but most of it is nonsense because it starts with false premises. Garbage in, garbage out.

[knightoffaith]

I don't think you'll change your mind on that regardless of what I say, so I'll refrain from engaging that particular point.

What do you think is the relevant difference between philosophy and music that makes it silly to study the former formally but not the latter?

[lisper]

I don't think it's silly to study either one. What I think is silly is the idea that philosophy is an intellectually rigorous field, that its practitioners generally deserve to be held in high regard, that it makes sense to have departments of philosophy in universities. This was not always true, I think it has become true gradually over the course of the last 100 years or so. I think that science has subsumed philosophy in exactly the same way that chemistry subsumed alchemy and astronomy subsumed astrology.

[knightoffaith]

We were originally talking about how many people who weren't philosophers enjoyed philosophy---what happened to that?

But whatever, we can set that aside if you'd like, I'm kind of curious to hear - what do you think was lost in the last 100 years ago? I'm a bit surprised to hear that, I would have thought you would say that we got more rather than less rigorous post-Frege. What do you think of philosophers today who specialize in studying the history of philosophy today, or philosophers who specialize in specific periods of pre-20th century philosophy (ancient philosophy, medieval philosophy, etc.)? Or specific pre-20th century philosophy?

And I have to ask, since you're a big fan of Popper---what do you think about Kuhn and Feyerabend? Quine (particularly the Duhem-Quine thesis)? Post-Popperian philosophy of science in general? All just nonsense?

(You don't have to address every question if you'd rather not take the time.)

[lisper]

> how many people who weren't philosophers enjoyed philosophy

No, we were talking about (or at least I was talking about) how many people get value out of philosophy who don't practice it, at least as amateurs. Is philosophy like music or is it like yoga? I'm on team yoga.

> what do you think was lost in the last 100 years ago?

It's not what was lost, it's what was gained. And what was gained is major breakthroughs in areas of science that allows science to answer questions that were traditionally the purview of philosophy. These include evolution, molecular biology, the theory of computation, quantum mechanics, and neuroscience.

> what do you think about Kuhn and Feyerabend?

I don't know much about Kuhn. I read "Against Method" a long time ago and it seemed like total nonsense to me at the time, one of the things that convinced me that philosophy as an area of intellectual inquiry was bankrupt.

> Duhem-Quine thesis

Yes, I think this is pretty self-evidently true. A finite amount of data, which is all we can ever have, will always be consistent with an infinite number of theories.

> (You don't have to address every question if you'd rather not take the time.)

I'm actually finding our exchange very interesting and worthwhile. You're keeping me on my toes.

[knightoffaith]

>No, we were talking about (or at least I was talking about) how many people get value out of philosophy who don't practice it, at least as amateurs. Is philosophy like music or is it like yoga? I'm on team yoga.

Well, I've said that there are plenty of people who don't practice philosophy who enjoy books of philosophy taken seriously by philosophers. You responded that these people enjoy discussing philosophy, the implication being that these people are practicing philosophy. And I responded in turn that these people are no more practicing philosophers than people humming tunes are practicing musicians---so it's not clear what the relevant distinction between music and philosophy is supposed to be with respect to its enjoyability beyond practitioners of the discipline.

>It's not what was lost, it's what was gained. And what was gained is major breakthroughs in areas of science that allows science to answer questions that were traditionally the purview of philosophy. These include evolution, molecular biology, the theory of computation, quantum mechanics, and neuroscience.

How much of Plato's dialogues do you think were about these things? I don't deny that what used to be called natural philosophy is now just science, but it's rather extreme to say that the sciences have conquered everything philosophers were in the business of doing. And Plato isn't just some random exceptional example; I'm sure you're familiar with Whitehead's "footnotes to Plato" quote.

>I read "Against Method" a long time ago and it seemed like total nonsense to me at the time, one of the things that convinced me that philosophy as an area of intellectual inquiry was bankrupt.

Feyerabend is rather extreme, but I'm curious why you think it was totally nonsense.

>Yes, I think this is pretty self-evidently true.

And do you see the problem this poses for Popperian falsificationism? More generally, philosophy of science, beyond just Popper, is a good example of meaningful work done in philosophy.