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To be honest, that sounds to me like playing in the gaps because that's what's left, and those gaps are likely to be filled one by one.

by M_Grey 10y ago

goatlover 10y ago
Depends on whether you think science can answer all the metaphysical questions. Is there a real world, independent of our minds? If so, what is it made of, independent of our models? Can we know? Scientists themselves have stated their own positions on these kinds of questions from anti-realist to idealist to instrumentalist, to various varieties of realism, to math as what's fundamentally real, the universe is computing itself, we live inside a simulation, etc. Ethics, politics, art, and values are judgements we make as humans. Science can inform our values, but it cannot tell us which values to adopt, or what system of government or economics we should want. You might think that equality and justice for all are the right sort of values, but other groups and societies have (and still do) thought otherwise. For some pleasure is the highest (and only true good). For others, it's a cause, it's family, it's power, it's money, etc.
Erik816 10y ago
Science is unlikely to fill in gaps of subjective experience and values, because it explicitly rules out subjective experience as part of its method. Which it should do. But then it can't very well claim that subjective experience has no value simply because it has no scientific value.
- goatlover 10y ago
  Agreed, but some philosophers, notably of the analytic tradition who closely align their views with science, have tried to eliminate subjective experience so that science can explain everything about the mind.
- M_Grey 10y ago
  It's more likely that there are objective ways to measure subjective experiences, and that in the next century of progress in fields such as neuroscience, that's just what will happen. Again, playing in the gaps isn't as impressive when those gaps are slowly, yet inevitably closing. That's the story of the last 150 years, and the slow fall of philosophy.

To be honest, that sounds to me like playing in the gaps because that's what's left, and those gaps are likely to be filled one by one.

by M_Grey 10y ago

To be honest, that sounds to me like playing in the gaps because that's what's left, and those gaps are likely to be filled one by one.

goatlover 10y ago

Depends on whether you think science can answer all the metaphysical questions. Is there a real world, independent of our minds? If so, what is it made of, independent of our models? Can we know? Scientists themselves have stated their own positions on these kinds of questions from anti-realist to idealist to instrumentalist, to various varieties of realism, to math as what's fundamentally real, the universe is computing itself, we live inside a simulation, etc. Ethics, politics, art, and values are judgements we make as humans. Science can inform our values, but it cannot tell us which values to adopt, or what system of government or economics we should want. You might think that equality and justice for all are the right sort of values, but other groups and societies have (and still do) thought otherwise. For some pleasure is the highest (and only true good). For others, it's a cause, it's family, it's power, it's money, etc.

Erik816 10y ago

Science is unlikely to fill in gaps of subjective experience and values, because it explicitly rules out subjective experience as part of its method. Which it should do. But then it can't very well claim that subjective experience has no value simply because it has no scientific value.

goatlover 10y ago
Agreed, but some philosophers, notably of the analytic tradition who closely align their views with science, have tried to eliminate subjective experience so that science can explain everything about the mind.
M_Grey 10y ago
It's more likely that there are objective ways to measure subjective experiences, and that in the next century of progress in fields such as neuroscience, that's just what will happen. Again, playing in the gaps isn't as impressive when those gaps are slowly, yet inevitably closing. That's the story of the last 150 years, and the slow fall of philosophy.