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I'm not convinced by the author's argument. The difference between philosophy and physics is that old philosophical arguments do not become less correct over t

I'm not convinced by the author's argument. The difference between philosophy and physics is that old philosophical arguments do not become less correct over time. In physics, later physicists build on the earlier body of knowledge and refine it, making it more correct. In philosophy, later philosophers may suggest a counterargument to the early philosopher, but as philosophy does not normally deal in absolutes it is impossible to say the later philosopher is now more correct and worth reading instead of the earlier philosopher. For example: a philosopher may argue that murder is morally wrong, and a later philosopher may argue that murder is morally right. Neither answer is factually wrong or right. We should therefore read the work of both philosophers to get the most value out of our studies and to form our own opinions. --- I'd also argue that it's not always worth reading the earlier philosopher's work if someone else can rewrite it in a better form. Personally I think Immanuel Kant's philosophy is interesting but poorly written, and you'd get more value out of reading a later text about his philosophy that his works himself. Other writers such as Plato have stood the test of time and are worth reading (assuming you have a good translation).

mjburgess 10y ago
There is an outstanding issue though: it really is the case that contemporary analysis of philosophical issues are far better than historical ones. Since the middle of the 20th C. every academic discipline, including philosophy, has devloped to the point where there are many new issues -- and of the old outstanding issues, these are presented much more clearly. There are a great number of mistakes in the history of philosophy which only became apparent after a systematic treatment. The reason I think, people read old philosophy is due to how academic contemporary research philosophy is. Research conducted on clearly identified and analysed problems exists in journals and in quite forboding books. Historical philosophy is part of a cultural discussion and is often presented in a simpler, smaller and more digestible way. As far as research goes, contemporary research philosophers in academic depts do not read the history of philosophy. Lay people do.
- paganel 10y ago
  > As far as research goes, contemporary research philosophers in academic depts do not read the history of philosophy. Lay people do. I'd say that is a very grave mistake, and I admit I'm a lay person. Just a week or so ago there was a philosopher that died and whose views on morals and life and death were shared on HN, and I have to say that they didn't seem more profound than what a high-school pupil would have written, I certainly learned more from skimming through the pre-Socratics than reading that philosopher's views on stuff. Maybe that is an issue with the US Analytical school of philosophy, which seems to me that it really tries to answer "serious" questions like what's the difference between right and wrong and other nonsense like that, like there is a "guaranteed" answer to these types of questions. It's a stupid positivist view on human understanding that I thought died in the early 1800s.
  - coldtea 10y ago
    I agree with you, I think it's the difference between the US (analytic etc) and continental philosophy approach. If anything a good grasp of the "history of philosophy" protects one from 100% of the crap that passes for deep thinking in politics, culture, current events analysis, self-help, etc.
  - mjburgess 10y ago
    Then as a lay person you've made a profound misreading of the situation. In meta-ethics there are a variety of positions. If moral realism happens to be popular among philosophers working in meta-ethics it would be because they have been extremeley well informed about a whole vareity of arguments in a systematic way that you're not informed about. And equally, the reverse. It will always be the case however, that contrary positions will receive a capable defence by some one. Lay people often come in with a scepticism that is often rooted in some intuition that ends up being quite unfounded when spelled out clearly. Analytic philosophy is not a school. Its just another word for "research philosophy" really, by which we mean a practice of being systematic about arguments, problems and how they interact. There is no deliberate conensus on the basis of some ideological agreement that makes them "a school". This is all historical, guid-hall style ideological grouping that has no place in modern academia. Of course, this is exactly what continental philosophy idealises.
hyperpape 10y ago
You're generally right, but I take issue with the claims: "philosophy does not normally deal in absolutes it is impossible to say the later philosopher is now more correct and worth reading instead of the earlier philosopher" and "Neither answer is factually wrong or right". I hope you and everyone else realizes that these are philosophical claims, and controversial ones at that! I would tenatively assert that the majority of philosophers now and in the past have believed the following two things: 1) moral statements like "murder is wrong" are objectively true or false. 2) philosophical statements are also objectively true or false. (Note that I say "objective", not "factual" as some people would make a distinction between the two, as in the fact-value distinction). Like any philosophical issue, there is a lot of debate. But when characterizing what philosophers think, how philosophers act, you have to make clear what's your own view, as opposed to settled fact. That said, I agree with you the central claim that the works of historical philosophers are often of equal or greater insight than contemporary work.
- Others 10y ago
  > moral statements like "murder is wrong" are objectively true or false That is an incredibly controversial statement... Moral relativism much?
  - hyperpape 10y ago
    I pretty clearly said it was controversial, so I'm not sure what you're trying to say. That said, moral relativism has a very low status in philosophy. Many philosophers think it is simply incoherent (the fifth paragraph here dances around one reason: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/moral-relativism/#MetMorRel https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/moral-relativism/#MetMorR...). It is much more common for philosophers to hold that there simply are no moral facts, or that moral statements are merely expressions of approval or disapproval, or some similar position (https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/moral-cognitivism/ https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/moral-cognitivism/).
  - VLM 10y ago
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just_war_theory https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just_war_theory The value of something like just war theory isn't so much to say the concept is right or wrong, or this historical war was right or wrong, although plenty of people love to derail the discussion to grind their own particular axe on those topics, but the real value is to define the right way to talk about the topic, and that doesn't change much with time. As a minimal example of a very small corner of the field today, look at the current Catholic dogma where they say the right way to talk about it is WRT the damage an aggressor or proposed victim is causing must be "lasting, grave, and certain". Arguably the order the arguments are discussed implies a certain priority to the issues. Hopefully I've managed to offend grand op by pointing out that as long as it takes PR to cause a war, then the philosophical subfield of just war theory will be living and growing continuously over time, while also offending great grand op by pointing out that just because you haven't read Saint Augustine on the topic of just war (or possibly anything else) doesn't prove he has nothing of value in 2017. Or my genealogy of posts might be inaccurate, but whatever.
miloshadzic 10y ago
Philosophies absolutely deal in absolutes. See for example -- Hegel.
Gimpei 10y ago
Not sure if I agree with the contention that old philosophical arguments don't get less correct over time. Look at logical positivism. I don't think anyone believes that there is a clean divide between positive and synthetic statements anymore.
n72 10y ago
If you think Plato is cool with the 'but that's just you're opinion' defense, I'd suggest a reread.
sedachv 10y ago
> In philosophy, later philosophers may suggest a counterargument to the early philosopher, but as philosophy does not normally deal in absolutes it is impossible to say the later philosopher is now more correct and worth reading instead of the earlier philosopher. Absolutely wrong. I have heard this on several occasions - where do people get this misconception from? The whole point of materialism (and especially new materialism, and even the "materialist Hegelianism" of Badiou and Zizek) is to show that idealism, whether in Greek or Eastern form, is wrong and misleading, and the negative effects it has had on people's every day lives in terms of religion, politics, and thinking about "the way the world works."

mjburgess 10y ago

There is an outstanding issue though: it really is the case that contemporary analysis of philosophical issues are far better than historical ones. Since the middle of the 20th C. every academic discipline, including philosophy, has devloped to the point where there are many new issues -- and of the old outstanding issues, these are presented much more clearly. There are a great number of mistakes in the history of philosophy which only became apparent after a systematic treatment. The reason I think, people read old philosophy is due to how academic contemporary research philosophy is. Research conducted on clearly identified and analysed problems exists in journals and in quite forboding books. Historical philosophy is part of a cultural discussion and is often presented in a simpler, smaller and more digestible way. As far as research goes, contemporary research philosophers in academic depts do not read the history of philosophy. Lay people do.

paganel 10y ago
> As far as research goes, contemporary research philosophers in academic depts do not read the history of philosophy. Lay people do. I'd say that is a very grave mistake, and I admit I'm a lay person. Just a week or so ago there was a philosopher that died and whose views on morals and life and death were shared on HN, and I have to say that they didn't seem more profound than what a high-school pupil would have written, I certainly learned more from skimming through the pre-Socratics than reading that philosopher's views on stuff. Maybe that is an issue with the US Analytical school of philosophy, which seems to me that it really tries to answer "serious" questions like what's the difference between right and wrong and other nonsense like that, like there is a "guaranteed" answer to these types of questions. It's a stupid positivist view on human understanding that I thought died in the early 1800s.
- coldtea 10y ago
  I agree with you, I think it's the difference between the US (analytic etc) and continental philosophy approach. If anything a good grasp of the "history of philosophy" protects one from 100% of the crap that passes for deep thinking in politics, culture, current events analysis, self-help, etc.
- mjburgess 10y ago
  Then as a lay person you've made a profound misreading of the situation. In meta-ethics there are a variety of positions. If moral realism happens to be popular among philosophers working in meta-ethics it would be because they have been extremeley well informed about a whole vareity of arguments in a systematic way that you're not informed about. And equally, the reverse. It will always be the case however, that contrary positions will receive a capable defence by some one. Lay people often come in with a scepticism that is often rooted in some intuition that ends up being quite unfounded when spelled out clearly. Analytic philosophy is not a school. Its just another word for "research philosophy" really, by which we mean a practice of being systematic about arguments, problems and how they interact. There is no deliberate conensus on the basis of some ideological agreement that makes them "a school". This is all historical, guid-hall style ideological grouping that has no place in modern academia. Of course, this is exactly what continental philosophy idealises.

hyperpape 10y ago

You're generally right, but I take issue with the claims: "philosophy does not normally deal in absolutes it is impossible to say the later philosopher is now more correct and worth reading instead of the earlier philosopher" and "Neither answer is factually wrong or right". I hope you and everyone else realizes that these are philosophical claims, and controversial ones at that! I would tenatively assert that the majority of philosophers now and in the past have believed the following two things: 1) moral statements like "murder is wrong" are objectively true or false. 2) philosophical statements are also objectively true or false. (Note that I say "objective", not "factual" as some people would make a distinction between the two, as in the fact-value distinction). Like any philosophical issue, there is a lot of debate. But when characterizing what philosophers think, how philosophers act, you have to make clear what's your own view, as opposed to settled fact. That said, I agree with you the central claim that the works of historical philosophers are often of equal or greater insight than contemporary work.

Others 10y ago
> moral statements like "murder is wrong" are objectively true or false That is an incredibly controversial statement... Moral relativism much?
- hyperpape 10y ago
  I pretty clearly said it was controversial, so I'm not sure what you're trying to say. That said, moral relativism has a very low status in philosophy. Many philosophers think it is simply incoherent (the fifth paragraph here dances around one reason: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/moral-relativism/#MetMorRel https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/moral-relativism/#MetMorR...). It is much more common for philosophers to hold that there simply are no moral facts, or that moral statements are merely expressions of approval or disapproval, or some similar position (https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/moral-cognitivism/ https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/moral-cognitivism/).
- VLM 10y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just_war_theory https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just_war_theory The value of something like just war theory isn't so much to say the concept is right or wrong, or this historical war was right or wrong, although plenty of people love to derail the discussion to grind their own particular axe on those topics, but the real value is to define the right way to talk about the topic, and that doesn't change much with time. As a minimal example of a very small corner of the field today, look at the current Catholic dogma where they say the right way to talk about it is WRT the damage an aggressor or proposed victim is causing must be "lasting, grave, and certain". Arguably the order the arguments are discussed implies a certain priority to the issues. Hopefully I've managed to offend grand op by pointing out that as long as it takes PR to cause a war, then the philosophical subfield of just war theory will be living and growing continuously over time, while also offending great grand op by pointing out that just because you haven't read Saint Augustine on the topic of just war (or possibly anything else) doesn't prove he has nothing of value in 2017. Or my genealogy of posts might be inaccurate, but whatever.

miloshadzic 10y ago

Philosophies absolutely deal in absolutes. See for example -- Hegel.

Gimpei 10y ago

Not sure if I agree with the contention that old philosophical arguments don't get less correct over time. Look at logical positivism. I don't think anyone believes that there is a clean divide between positive and synthetic statements anymore.

n72 10y ago

If you think Plato is cool with the 'but that's just you're opinion' defense, I'd suggest a reread.

sedachv 10y ago

> In philosophy, later philosophers may suggest a counterargument to the early philosopher, but as philosophy does not normally deal in absolutes it is impossible to say the later philosopher is now more correct and worth reading instead of the earlier philosopher. Absolutely wrong. I have heard this on several occasions - where do people get this misconception from? The whole point of materialism (and especially new materialism, and even the "materialist Hegelianism" of Badiou and Zizek) is to show that idealism, whether in Greek or Eastern form, is wrong and misleading, and the negative effects it has had on people's every day lives in terms of religion, politics, and thinking about "the way the world works."