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From: rjf@eagle.UUCP
Newsgroups: sci.philosophy.tech
Subject: Re: What is philosophy? (+ Science and aesthetics)
Message-ID: <3258@eagle.ukc.ac.uk>
Date: Fri, 14-Aug-87 12:50:11 EDT
Article-I.D.: eagle.3258
Posted: Fri Aug 14 12:50:11 1987
Date-Received: Sun, 16-Aug-87 08:45:01 EDT
References: <3219@eagle.ukc.ac.uk> <825@klipper.cs.vu.nl>
Reply-To: rjf@ukc.ac.uk (Robin Faichney)
Distribution: world
Organization: Computing Lab, University of Kent at Canterbury, UK.
Lines: 96

 <83@thirdi.UUCP> sarge@thirdi.UUCP (Sarge Gerbode) writes:
>
>I greatly admire your courage in offering a definition (it exceeds mine).  And
>I agree with you when, in article <3251@eagle.ukc.ac.uk> rjf@ukc.ac.uk you
>(Robin Faichney) write:
>
>>[..how a branch of philosophy becomes a science..]
>
>But when you say:
>
>>Philosophy is the activity of attempting to discover and/or propagate
>>conceptual truths
>>
>>[..etc..]
>
>we part company.  Surely this definition is a REdefinition..
>..when it used to be "love of wisdom".
>
>I agree with Biep when he says, "I like the part about concepts,"  But it seems
>that you are only describing the "linguistic analysis" form of philosophy.  I
>also agree with Biep when he says,
>
>>I think in this way you cut off the more fundamental parts of philosophy.
>>[..about truth, ethics, aesthetics..]
>
>Where would you classify what Biep is talking about, if not under philosophy?
>Mere fuzzy-headedness?

Certainly not. I'll admit to attempting a redefinition. But I don't want to
throw away everything which does not fit my description. Just to recategorise
it. Let me emphasise: I'm a big fan of beauty, I think ethics certainly
fascinating, and maybe indispensable in a civilised society, and I'm even
quite keen on theology. BUT: I think beauty is the subject of art and of
psychology, that ethics has aspects which are philosophical, but also others
which are sociological, psychological, etc., and theology is better understood
as a quasi- (or perhaps even pseudo-) philosophical subdivision of religion.

All of these things have connections and overlappings (?) with philosophy,
but that does not make them subdivisions of it. I would submit that those
aspects which do not fit quite happily within one of the other arts or
sciences, could be reduced to conceptual analysis. (Not sure this identical
to linguistic analysis. Haven't thought about that yet.) I suppose I am
trying to say that philosophy is not a subject area, but a method (I won't
tease Biep by saying a methodology) which is applied to various subject areas.

In article <2495@ames.arpa> yamo@orville.UUCP (Michael J. Yamasaki) writes:
>[..]
>All philosophy is not Western, nor is it logical, and certainly formal logic
>is not the paramount of philosophy.  Please explain in the context of logic
>the notion of no mind in Zen Buddhism or the Tao.  Are these not Philosophy?

Strangely enough, I was reading a book about Zen and Western Philosophy just
the other evening. Matsuo Abe (sp?). I'd say no, these are not philosophy,
they're religion. I believe that many have tried to make such things palatable
to modern western academics by emphasising the philosophic and de-emphasising
the religious content, but I think that is wrong. For the record - I
practice meditation myself, am convinced that the world needs a major
resurgence in interest in religion, and think that if it happens, it will
probably be something vaguely like Buddhism or even Zen. But I don't think
they're philosophy.

I must admit to being heavily influenced by Wittgenstein, as is a great deal
of modern British/American philosophy. But what's wrong with that? :-)
(I believe that Wittgenstein was a practicing Christian, though I'm not sure
about that.)

By the way, though the above-mentioned book claimed to elucidate the
philosophical foundations of Zen, it confirmed that the *practice* of
Zen (which, for me, must be the most important part) is about as far from
philosophy as you can get. If philosophical methods are used to examine
the *theory* of it, that is another matter.

>Truth is not necessarily deduced truth,

Absolutely.

>nor is it necessarily the result of causality.

Not sure what this means.

>Beauty is as good a criteria for Truth, as deduction and 
>experimentation is for truth. 

I'll go along with this for the sake of argument, but try telling it to
a (usual sort of) scientist!

>Science is a philosophy.  Philosophy encompasses science.  The bounds of
>Truth are not found in science.  Explain what Truth
>one can know from a singular unique event using science.
>Is this not Nothing?
>
>                                     -Yamo-

This a bit beyond me. Sorry.

Robin     rjf@ukc.ac.uk   ..mcvax!ukc!rjf