Philosophy and science

Lots of posts here discussing Platonism and ontology and other pursuits. Then when people see that this is not all that related to science or is 'navel gazing', they write off all (or most) of philosophy.EpistemologyShould be obvious but isn't to many. Naively taking things at 'face value' was a method used to find conclusions. But that didn't work out because two people might come to two different conclusions at 'face value'. Logic is an method that philosophers came upon to answer some questions with definitive unambiguous answers. But the limits of logic had to be established. Some wondered if one could use logic to determine what 'Fire' is.The answer is no. One needs to examine fire in more detail.But just empiricism doesn't work: Our eyes can be fooled - our memory can be in error, our biases can blind us etc. And this applies to other people to!Through lots of philosophical work finding compromises: Empiricism + Logic eventually leads to The Scientific Method (which is really a suite of methods).EthicsScientists don't always require ethics (studying, for example, what height birds drop nuts doesn't generally have ethical considerations). But medical ethics, psychology and numerous other areas all require philosophical discussions on ethics.PoliticsThings that are true (or false) about the real world can have an impact on how we arrange society and relate to one another. You don't need to know the social ramifications of learning the first time neural connections are made in a human embryo, but it is certainly useful for a scientist to realize when they are working on certain (especially potentially controversial) ideas that have political ramifications.Not only that but science itself might be used and abused to gain political points and scientists that are ignorant or uncaring of this fact may end up being pawns in someone elses media game.And finally - some scientists study political things more directly. What are the effects of prison sentences on society? Is the death penalty effective? Is a jury of twelve random people a reliable method for determining facts? And philosophy/political philosophy come into the frame here.NeuroscienceA lot of the problem with trying to develop a theory of human consciousness - is understanding what such a theory should look like. There are many philosophers involved in this area at this time - feeding backwards and forwards with the scientists studying it (or sometimes they are also the scientists studying it).

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I've kept it short and simple - but anyone that thinks philosophy is all "Is this table really a table? When is a table a table?" stuff isn't the kind of philosophy that many actual philosophers really care about these days. It's kind of limited to first year philosophy students and ancient Greeks

Yeah kind of a general post really. Just kept reading the thread and wanting to say something but not having the time. Eventually I cracked and made some time. Well that's trivially true. Detection can be a completely passive activity.If all you wanted to say was "I am presently having an experience that involves a table.", that's not really going to require philosophy.However - if you want to say "I know there is a table in front of me", you require philosophy. If you want to say "This table objectively exists", you need philosophy. Most people won't consider naive empiricism to be philosophy - but that's by the by.Not very interesting philosophy, but it is philosophy nevertheless. What do you mean by 'know'? How does one come to 'know' something as opposed to believing it or being deluded about it or being in simple error (eg turns out it is a picture of a table)? True - my camera can detect things without philosophy. But it doesn't know anything On the other hand: Understanding something seems to invoke philosophy - but that depends on what we mean by 'understand' - and answering that is definitely philosophy!

To believe something is to have the state of mind that a thing is true.To know something is a bit more difficult to describe. As Bikerman's diagram shows the simplest thing to say is that you know something when your belief is correct - but that's massively too simple.For instance, if you pull a random card out of a pack and you say "It's a Jack" I might believe you - but does it make sense for me to say that I now know that it is a Jack even if it turns out it is? For instance you look at the card and you know it is a Jack so you know my belief is true. But can you say that Mod knows what rank of card you have?So in short - to say you know something implies you have a criteria for knowledge. The criteria for belief is itself.As for imagining - it is just holding a concept in one's mind while not necessarily holding the belief that it is true (though sometimes acting as if it were, for fun). It's EvC Forum that drove me to philosophy - trying to find the things that underpin the discussion themselves so that they can be addressed directly.

If I press my fingers against my eyeballs I 'detect' sparkly lights. But they aren't objectively real in the sense most people mean.I might 'detect' a table, but actually be looking at a coffin. Etc. Epistemeology is the preferred term One presumes you have the criteria that if you detect something and others also detect something which seems to have the same characteristics then there is a pretty good chance that you are detecting something that is independent of your minds. As far as anyone cares about tables - you can say you know it if your preferred criteria of knowledge are met (and if they aren't - there's probably something very wrong with your criteria). I don't like either.How about: "A reasoned examination of the fundamental or core issues of any given subject." Of course - when you start discussing something like ontology - it has a very strong chance of ending up sounding stupid. Depends what you mean by 'understand'. They can certainly comprehend that there is a table there now - but we know they have difficulty with assigning the property of persistence to objects so they might somewhat surprised that it is still there later or when the table cloth is removed. Do they understand the bonds, cellulose (or alluminium)? No. Do they understand that the table was built in a factory? No.So what do you mean by understand? Is it a table if the only person looking at it has suffered a stroke and cannot identify it as a table? I say it is.

The general pattern humans have used is to argue loudly about it, publish books - poo-poo each other's works - write more books, have a duel or two - maybe even a whole feud, then die.Is that the best way? I have no idea. But yeah - different arguments are raised against or for various Criteria of Truth - and you get to pick which ones seem to be the most solid. This was one of the sticking points for the logical postivists and verificationism. Verificationism holds that a sentence is meaningless if it cannot be verified (essentially, unless it is representational of something that can be said to be true) or is not a tautology. But this principle is unverifiable... Yep. All great questions. The method employed by most modern philosophers is Analytic Philosophy - which stresses a clear simple 'common sense' approach which still relentlessly digs at fundamental questions.Edited by Modulous, : No reason given.