Replies

...prime the pump and comment on a few observations you have about this article.

Well, I've been waiting for some comments on the main thing the article was about and haven't seen any, so I'm asking if any of you have any comments on the description and breakdown of philsophy, itself, as a discipline, formal or informal.

When he finally gets to it, I found the description of philosophy itself concise and accurate, yet more comprehesive than other overviews I've heard and read.

Hank

...so I'm asking if any of you have any comments on the description and breakdown of philsophy, itself, as a discipline, formal or informal.

No comment aside form it being a good article.

When he finally gets to it, I found the description of philosophy itself concise and accurate, yet more comprehesive than other overviews I've heard and read.

"Concise" and "accurate" are good descriptors,IMO. But what do I know, as I said, I'm not much into philosophy per se. Least wise not the study of it. Despite several people on this forum "accusing" me of having read Ayn Rand -- usually Atlas Shrugged -- which I haven't read any.

Philosophy {Gk. filosofia [philosophia]} Literally, love of wisdom. Hence, careful thought about the fundamental nature of the world, the grounds for human knowledge, and the evaluation of human conduct.

I might define philosophy as the study of what drives human decision making which is knowledge plus the system of values adopted by an individual.

Knowledge comes to us from a variety of sources, education, experience, perception, deduction, generalization, etc.

Values also come from a variety of sources: innate conscience, experience, social mores, etc.

It seems to me that the most valuable aspect of philosophy is not in the study of knowledge but of values for upon an individual's value base is their character developed. Both however are important, since the best value applied to faulty knowledge can lead to disaster.

And really, who wouldn't rather be in the company of less than average intelligent men of good character, than in the company of evil geniuses even though the latter might seem at times to be more interesting?

I found the description of philosophy itself concise and accurate, yet more comprehesive than other overviews I've heard and read.

The explanatory part is rather concise. His outline for the 'need' for Philosophy suffers from being overwrought.
In drawing out the REASON for Philosophy, he's succumbing to the same pedantic style so many writers of Philosophy suffer from. That, in and of itself, was enough to set the general tone toward the piece as negative.
Bad rhetorical positions are one thing. Poor linguistic flourishes are another.

Truth be told, having studied Philosophy I found that any time someone either tries to 1.)enumerate reasons why someone ought to be interested in Philosophy or 2.)outlines a general history of Philosophy, they fall short.
In the first case, people are often put off because they don't know how to think logically or rationally. In fact, and take my word on this, most people like to hang their hats on their idiosyncrasies and illogical beliefs. In their minds, Philosophy threatens their humanity and thus their existence.
As for a general history of Philosophy, you're attempting to present a tableau of historically significant and not entirely simple ideas in some sort of context. Even by outlining different schools of Philosophy, you have to put forth WHY they're different schools.

Anyway, I found it dry, even as a pro-Philosophy piece.
If you want to see something really neat along the lines of Philosophy, check out Plato's Allegory of the Cave from Chapter VII of the Republic and then watch The Matrix and see if you note any similarities. Far more interesting than this historical Philosophy. ;-)