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I tried to see what it offered. For instance, those "A very short introduction" series of books. Tried out Philosophy of Science. I see things like "what does '

I tried to see what it offered. For instance, those "A very short introduction" series of books. Tried out Philosophy of Science. I see things like "what does 'alive' really mean" as something that is what Philosophy of Biology would deal with. That seems... rather useless? Arguing over definitions and going round in circles without contributing, today, to anything? (Everyone used to be called a philosopher, so in years past I'm sure "philosophy" has done plenty.) Looked at Philosophy of CompSci on the Stanford Plato site. Read a lot of ... words... that were just fascinated they could work "duality" into computer programs. Cause a program is source right? But it can also be object code. Ooooh. And what about interpreted scripts, what does all this really mean? ... This would appear to have no redeeming quality. Perhaps I'm wrong I've just yet to see how this could be useful or even really intriguing. Then there's even top scientists like Feynman making mocking comments about philsci. So given even top scientists are unconvinced there's value, I start to think OK maybe I'm not missing out on much.

astazangasta 11y ago
We could easily pull up dozens of examples of spurious, dull or absurd results and claims from science. There are interesting things to be learned from philosophy even if some of it is dumb. It's especially important to address the claims of science to be a perfect method of knowledge; in the absence of religious justifications for human activity science has been set up as a valid replacement and its important to examine its right to the throne. We have a long history of attempts at scientific decision making that claims an objectivity it ought not to have (see: forced sterilizations, eugenics, mass medication and medicalization of human behavior) and tremendous consequence resulting from this sort of claim (environmental catastrophe, for example). If science is going to intrude on the domain of politics, of deciding what is human and who should be considered human, we seriously need to challenge the assumption of objective knowledge and think about science's fundamental dependence on metaphysical constructs. Easy to ignore if you are Feynman at the top of this pyramid, but scientific authority is just authority; it has to be accountable to something or it is going to produce monsters. As the article states, this exploration can only occur from outside science; we can't answer claims about its validity or access to truth from within science.
- MichaelGG 11y ago
  I didn't go to look up bad examples. I tried, honestly, to see what PhilSci was about, how it could help. Hence reading the Very Short Intro book. Stanford's Plato is often held up on HN as this awesome site. And since I understand CompSci a bit, I figured PhilCompSci should be something I can understand (whereas I might not be equipped to judge other areas so well). In every case, I've not found any good arguments, just pontificating. The closest I've heard similar to what you're saying is stepping outside of Science-the-process to determine what things are true using Bayesian probability. For instance, Einstein stating that his theory was correct, even if the first test didn't agree. I thought this was pretty well accepted. Other than that, what kind of outside-science thought systems are we talking about? And more usefully, where is a short intro that doesn't come with spurious, dull, or absurd statements?

astazangasta 11y ago

We could easily pull up dozens of examples of spurious, dull or absurd results and claims from science. There are interesting things to be learned from philosophy even if some of it is dumb. It's especially important to address the claims of science to be a perfect method of knowledge; in the absence of religious justifications for human activity science has been set up as a valid replacement and its important to examine its right to the throne. We have a long history of attempts at scientific decision making that claims an objectivity it ought not to have (see: forced sterilizations, eugenics, mass medication and medicalization of human behavior) and tremendous consequence resulting from this sort of claim (environmental catastrophe, for example). If science is going to intrude on the domain of politics, of deciding what is human and who should be considered human, we seriously need to challenge the assumption of objective knowledge and think about science's fundamental dependence on metaphysical constructs. Easy to ignore if you are Feynman at the top of this pyramid, but scientific authority is just authority; it has to be accountable to something or it is going to produce monsters. As the article states, this exploration can only occur from outside science; we can't answer claims about its validity or access to truth from within science.

MichaelGG 11y ago
I didn't go to look up bad examples. I tried, honestly, to see what PhilSci was about, how it could help. Hence reading the Very Short Intro book. Stanford's Plato is often held up on HN as this awesome site. And since I understand CompSci a bit, I figured PhilCompSci should be something I can understand (whereas I might not be equipped to judge other areas so well). In every case, I've not found any good arguments, just pontificating. The closest I've heard similar to what you're saying is stepping outside of Science-the-process to determine what things are true using Bayesian probability. For instance, Einstein stating that his theory was correct, even if the first test didn't agree. I thought this was pretty well accepted. Other than that, what kind of outside-science thought systems are we talking about? And more usefully, where is a short intro that doesn't come with spurious, dull, or absurd statements?