10 ms·

Philosophy tool kit

121 points by miobrien 10y ago

ranko 10y ago
It strikes me that a good philosopher would make a very good software tester. Maybe this article could be adapted as "with-the use of heuristics anybody can think like a tester".
- nercht12 10y ago
  It should not be surprising then that many software engineers are interested in philosophy. :) The personality type of many programmers and philosophers is INTP, which tends to be geared towards these sorts of things.
ajarmst 10y ago
There's something delightfully twenty-first century about a project to replace Western Philosophy with a dozen or so definitions, shortcut heuristics and simplistic approximations.
- Tloewald 10y ago
  "These five heuristics might help you prove the existence of God!"
  - drdeca 10y ago
    I am reminded of https://github.com/FormalTheology/GoedelGod https://github.com/FormalTheology/GoedelGod
- CharlesW 10y ago
  "I'll wait for the BuzzFeed listicle, thanks!"
- woodruffw 10y ago
  We clearly didn't learn our lesson in the 1920s and 30s ;)
jessriedel 10y ago
Here's Hayek's formal paper on a lot of these ideas: http://philrsss.anu.edu.au/sites/default/files/Philosophical%20Heuristics%20and%20Creativity.final-2.pdf http://philrsss.anu.edu.au/sites/default/files/Philosophical... Nick Beckstead once told me informally that new philosophical ideas can usually be classified as one of these: arguments (in the sense of formal logic, with premises and conclusions), examples (e.g., intuition pumps), and distinctions (e.g., normative vs. positive statements).
- justin66 10y ago
  > Here's Hayek's formal paper on a lot of these ideas Hájek, not Hayek. Not trying to be pedantic, only reassuring people that The Austrians are not threadcrapping.
  - jessriedel 10y ago
    Whoops, thanks. Note though that these are just Czech variants of the same name.
jawns 10y ago
Whenever I read or hear a philosophy professor teaching about fallacies, I always look at their examples. And whenever their examples all spring from a consistent worldview (e.g. they all debunk liberal ideas or conservative ideas or religious ideas or anti-religious ideas), it raises my eyebrows, because it makes me suspect that they're more interested in defending their worldview than they are in teaching logic. But when someone presents example arguments that are inconsistent with one another, perhaps debunking an anti-religious argument first, then debunking a religious argument, then I know that they're primarily concerned with teaching, rather than indoctrinating. I won't say which camp I think Prof. Hájek falls into with this Aeon piece, but let's just consider this suspicion of consistent-worldview examples another tool in the philosopher's toolkit of critical thinking.
- GavinMcG 10y ago
  Why not say which camp you think the author falls into? You're practically doing so by raising the issue specifically in relation to this piece, and you could have stuck with "here's another tool...". What's the virtue of being coy?
- andkon 10y ago
  I mean the great thing about fallacies is their content isn't important. It's their structure that makes them flawed in leading to the truth. The examples, as a result, are something you can safely ignore, whether or not they're ones you agree with. For what it's worth, learning to notice the underlying structure of an argument is probably a far more important philosophical skill than noticing that your interlocutor doesn't share your political viewpoints.
  - adrianratnapala 10y ago
    We humans tend to train ourselves to subject opposing arguments to rigorous analysis while letting arguments we like off the hook. Learning about fallacies using examples we like is particularly likely to encourage this habit.
- trendroid 10y ago
nemo1618 10y ago
>It seems we should grant [that "Our world is not the best of all possible worlds"], since we can easily imagine our world being better – more happy people, less suffering. Only if you define "better" in those terms. I'm sure that Romeo and Juliet would have preferred a world in which they remained alive as lovers -- but would that be a better story?
- adbachman 10y ago
  The counterargument to "this is not the best of all possible worlds" from the perspectives of the people experiencing it (the world) would be to show that every single person experiencing suffering believes it to be "best." That there is no better outcome than that they suffer. This seems unlikely to be true.
  - samirillian 10y ago
    Huh?
  - nemo1618 10y ago
    >the perspectives of the people experiencing it (the world) Well, a lot of things rest on that equivocation. Personally I consider the world to be more than just the sum of the experiences of individuals. To me, it is more like a story in which everyone plays a part.
- samirillian 10y ago
  I mean, also, it's just silly to emptily claim that you could imagine a better world. The trick is to imagine it in all its detail. I mean, what if pain is simply a concomitant of consciousness. Would a better world be devoid of consciousness? The trick is not to see the stupidity in the formulation (the stupidity is obvious), but to see the less obvious intelligence in the formulation. It's extremely rational, almost apodictically true.
  - boomboomsubban 10y ago
    > I mean, what if pain is simply a concomitant of consciousness. Would a better world be devoid of consciousness? If I'm imagining a new world, pain is whatever I want it to be. That it seems to be a necessary part of consciousness in this world isn't important.
ehudla 10y ago
Two book recommendations: Short, with a lot of punch: Philosophical Devices: Proofs, Probabilities, Possibilities, and Sets. https://www.amazon.com/Philosophical-Devices-Proofs-Probabilities-Possibilities/dp/0199651736/ https://www.amazon.com/Philosophical-Devices-Proofs-Probabil... A much more detailed and introductory book: The philosopher's toolkit : a compendium of philosophical concepts and methods. https://www.amazon.com/Philosophers-Toolkit-Compendium-Philosophical-Concepts/dp/1405190183/ https://www.amazon.com/Philosophers-Toolkit-Compendium-Philo...
tyre 10y ago
This is perfectly targeted to today's readership and, simultaneously, not at all about the core of philosophy. These tips are generally about logic. Logic is necessary but not sufficient to derive truth from the world. Philosophy is the search for knowledge, which is much broader and deeper than logic. Meaning, purpose, ethics, knowledge, and truth (to name a few) can't be picked apart or pieced together with proofs and syllogisms.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- randcraw 10y ago
  I'd say philosophy is the search for ideas and models of thought, not whether they're true (knowledge) but only whether they're plausible and consistent. Philosophers also search for "toolkits" -- methods and relations (logic) that enable manipulation of "thought atoms" in ways that minimize loss of signal or introduce contradiction. Knowledge is the purview of science, since scientists have to judge each of their models against only one possible universe. Philosophers are not so constrained, thus their notion of truth is relative. Like Derrida's, for example.
  - tyre 10y ago
    Oh no, this is a very dangerous mis-interpretation of philosophy. The word itself can be literally translated to "love of knowledge": "philos" (love, from the same root as "phile", as in "francophile" or "anglophile") + "sophos" (wisdom or knowledge.) Science is one subsection of philosophy, but certainly does not have a monopoly on knowledge. We "know" quantum mechanics (because it works for small things) and we "know" general relativity (because it works for big things) and yet they cannot coexist as we understand them today. On the other hand, how do we know that human life has value? Certainly not through science. There is no axiom or mathematical proof that says, "a human life has value." And yet it is pretty absurd to think of progress or knowledge independent of human value. What's the value of science if not its positive effect on humanity? Truth, in the philosophical sense, makes no sense unless it relates back to reality in this universe. Relativist truth is, in my opinion, a necessary thought experiment but breaks down in the real world; therefore it is not true in the true sense of the word. "Cogito ergo sum" is not relativist in any sense—there is no other side to thought requiring existence.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]

121 points by miobrien 10y ago

ranko 10y ago

It strikes me that a good philosopher would make a very good software tester. Maybe this article could be adapted as "with-the use of heuristics anybody can think like a tester".

nercht12 10y ago
It should not be surprising then that many software engineers are interested in philosophy. :) The personality type of many programmers and philosophers is INTP, which tends to be geared towards these sorts of things.

ajarmst 10y ago

There's something delightfully twenty-first century about a project to replace Western Philosophy with a dozen or so definitions, shortcut heuristics and simplistic approximations.

Tloewald 10y ago
"These five heuristics might help you prove the existence of God!"
- drdeca 10y ago
  I am reminded of https://github.com/FormalTheology/GoedelGod https://github.com/FormalTheology/GoedelGod
CharlesW 10y ago
"I'll wait for the BuzzFeed listicle, thanks!"
woodruffw 10y ago
We clearly didn't learn our lesson in the 1920s and 30s ;)

jessriedel 10y ago

Here's Hayek's formal paper on a lot of these ideas: http://philrsss.anu.edu.au/sites/default/files/Philosophical%20Heuristics%20and%20Creativity.final-2.pdf http://philrsss.anu.edu.au/sites/default/files/Philosophical... Nick Beckstead once told me informally that new philosophical ideas can usually be classified as one of these: arguments (in the sense of formal logic, with premises and conclusions), examples (e.g., intuition pumps), and distinctions (e.g., normative vs. positive statements).

justin66 10y ago
> Here's Hayek's formal paper on a lot of these ideas Hájek, not Hayek. Not trying to be pedantic, only reassuring people that The Austrians are not threadcrapping.
- jessriedel 10y ago
  Whoops, thanks. Note though that these are just Czech variants of the same name.

jawns 10y ago

Whenever I read or hear a philosophy professor teaching about fallacies, I always look at their examples. And whenever their examples all spring from a consistent worldview (e.g. they all debunk liberal ideas or conservative ideas or religious ideas or anti-religious ideas), it raises my eyebrows, because it makes me suspect that they're more interested in defending their worldview than they are in teaching logic. But when someone presents example arguments that are inconsistent with one another, perhaps debunking an anti-religious argument first, then debunking a religious argument, then I know that they're primarily concerned with teaching, rather than indoctrinating. I won't say which camp I think Prof. Hájek falls into with this Aeon piece, but let's just consider this suspicion of consistent-worldview examples another tool in the philosopher's toolkit of critical thinking.

GavinMcG 10y ago
Why not say which camp you think the author falls into? You're practically doing so by raising the issue specifically in relation to this piece, and you could have stuck with "here's another tool...". What's the virtue of being coy?
andkon 10y ago
I mean the great thing about fallacies is their content isn't important. It's their structure that makes them flawed in leading to the truth. The examples, as a result, are something you can safely ignore, whether or not they're ones you agree with. For what it's worth, learning to notice the underlying structure of an argument is probably a far more important philosophical skill than noticing that your interlocutor doesn't share your political viewpoints.
- adrianratnapala 10y ago
  We humans tend to train ourselves to subject opposing arguments to rigorous analysis while letting arguments we like off the hook. Learning about fallacies using examples we like is particularly likely to encourage this habit.
trendroid 10y ago

nemo1618 10y ago

>It seems we should grant [that "Our world is not the best of all possible worlds"], since we can easily imagine our world being better – more happy people, less suffering. Only if you define "better" in those terms. I'm sure that Romeo and Juliet would have preferred a world in which they remained alive as lovers -- but would that be a better story?

adbachman 10y ago
The counterargument to "this is not the best of all possible worlds" from the perspectives of the people experiencing it (the world) would be to show that every single person experiencing suffering believes it to be "best." That there is no better outcome than that they suffer. This seems unlikely to be true.
- samirillian 10y ago
  Huh?
- nemo1618 10y ago
  >the perspectives of the people experiencing it (the world) Well, a lot of things rest on that equivocation. Personally I consider the world to be more than just the sum of the experiences of individuals. To me, it is more like a story in which everyone plays a part.
samirillian 10y ago
I mean, also, it's just silly to emptily claim that you could imagine a better world. The trick is to imagine it in all its detail. I mean, what if pain is simply a concomitant of consciousness. Would a better world be devoid of consciousness? The trick is not to see the stupidity in the formulation (the stupidity is obvious), but to see the less obvious intelligence in the formulation. It's extremely rational, almost apodictically true.
- boomboomsubban 10y ago
  > I mean, what if pain is simply a concomitant of consciousness. Would a better world be devoid of consciousness? If I'm imagining a new world, pain is whatever I want it to be. That it seems to be a necessary part of consciousness in this world isn't important.

ehudla 10y ago

Two book recommendations: Short, with a lot of punch: Philosophical Devices: Proofs, Probabilities, Possibilities, and Sets. https://www.amazon.com/Philosophical-Devices-Proofs-Probabilities-Possibilities/dp/0199651736/ https://www.amazon.com/Philosophical-Devices-Proofs-Probabil... A much more detailed and introductory book: The philosopher's toolkit : a compendium of philosophical concepts and methods. https://www.amazon.com/Philosophers-Toolkit-Compendium-Philosophical-Concepts/dp/1405190183/ https://www.amazon.com/Philosophers-Toolkit-Compendium-Philo...

tyre 10y ago

This is perfectly targeted to today's readership and, simultaneously, not at all about the core of philosophy. These tips are generally about logic. Logic is necessary but not sufficient to derive truth from the world. Philosophy is the search for knowledge, which is much broader and deeper than logic. Meaning, purpose, ethics, knowledge, and truth (to name a few) can't be picked apart or pieced together with proofs and syllogisms.

deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
randcraw 10y ago
I'd say philosophy is the search for ideas and models of thought, not whether they're true (knowledge) but only whether they're plausible and consistent. Philosophers also search for "toolkits" -- methods and relations (logic) that enable manipulation of "thought atoms" in ways that minimize loss of signal or introduce contradiction. Knowledge is the purview of science, since scientists have to judge each of their models against only one possible universe. Philosophers are not so constrained, thus their notion of truth is relative. Like Derrida's, for example.
- tyre 10y ago
  Oh no, this is a very dangerous mis-interpretation of philosophy. The word itself can be literally translated to "love of knowledge": "philos" (love, from the same root as "phile", as in "francophile" or "anglophile") + "sophos" (wisdom or knowledge.) Science is one subsection of philosophy, but certainly does not have a monopoly on knowledge. We "know" quantum mechanics (because it works for small things) and we "know" general relativity (because it works for big things) and yet they cannot coexist as we understand them today. On the other hand, how do we know that human life has value? Certainly not through science. There is no axiom or mathematical proof that says, "a human life has value." And yet it is pretty absurd to think of progress or knowledge independent of human value. What's the value of science if not its positive effect on humanity? Truth, in the philosophical sense, makes no sense unless it relates back to reality in this universe. Relativist truth is, in my opinion, a necessary thought experiment but breaks down in the real world; therefore it is not true in the true sense of the word. "Cogito ergo sum" is not relativist in any sense—there is no other side to thought requiring existence.

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]