3 ms·

“Philosophy of science is about as useful to scientists as ornithology is to birds.” ― Richard Feynman Came to my mind.

by 725686 4y ago

danielam 4y ago
Read in a straightforward manner, Feynman simply didn’t understand the value of philosophy, though he did inevitably and unwittingly tread across philosophical territory. In some sense, we all philosophize to one degree or another. We can either acknowledge that and learn to do it well, or we can do it poorly.
- practal 4y ago
  So according to you, Feynman did it poorly? Seems to me then being a poor philosopher is a good thing.
  - ngcc_hk 4y ago
    may be to some individuals like him but not to all. Bell’s theorem came into mind. If you think philosophy not the academic one but the one about what you are doing and what assumption you made, you cannot just shut up and calculate. The standard model has to stagnate for 50 years. May be a re-think of the fundamental can drive new innovation.
- yakubin 4y ago
  Or we can acknowledge that and aim at restraint, stopping ourselves whenever we catch ourselves doing it, recognising that it's a bug in our software. I've spent most of my life reading philosophy. I've been clean for several years and I'm glad (it's no small feat for me). I recognise now that it was nothing but a bug in my mind. To younger people, I'd advise to focus on the actual mathematics and science, because that's where true knowledge lies. Solution to talking nonsense is not talking better nonsense, but recognising that one speaks nonsense and should better be silent.
  - anthk 4y ago
    This. I was like you 100%. Most of liberal arts it's bullshit. It's the facts, not the opinions. Liberal arts guys love to quote people based on opinions as if the were an absolute truth.
    - yakubin 4y ago
      I suspect by "liberal arts" you meant humanities and social sciences. Curiously, the term "liberal arts" encompasses natural sciences and mathematics as well. I wouldn't go quite as far as to say they're bullshit. For one, I do appreciate some poetry and other fine arts. Where my sympathies end, is appropriating the hard-earned credibility of science by so called social sciences and humanities, which often, as you wrote, use quotes of prior authors as some proof of truth. Rule of thumb: if papers in a field use "[famous author] wrote X, therefore Y" as the standard of proof, instead of "we conducted those experiments with this methodology and here is what we found", then it's closer to scholasticism[1] than to science and should have no business using the word "science" anywhere. To be fair, in each field of such a social science there are usually people trying to move it away from the authority-driven philosophy model and nearer the science model of experiments, so I wouldn't necessarily say it's all bullshit. But each time I hear someone "studying psychology" say "Freud wrote this", "Lacan said that" and expand that as if psychology was some Freud&Lacan fanfic, then proceeding to make conclusions from that about the real world with the asserted credibility of someone talking about discovery of the electron, I roll my eyes. [1]: Reading works of scholasticism was dreadful. "Aristotle this, Aristotle that, I'm so insecure I'm afraid to utter a sentence without supporting it by something Aristotle said" and not a single experiment in sight.
      - danielam 4y ago
        (Reply to first response) But it takes philosophy to make the sorts of claims you make, making them self-refuting and incoherent. Perhaps the problem was not philosophy, but how you practiced it or how those you engaged with practiced it. (Reply to second response) W.r.t. the liberal arts, we must distinguish between genuine liberal arts and some decadent ersatz or blatantly ideological counterfeit. I don't wish to spend time making distinctions here and now, but it is worth keeping that in mind. However, I should also note that what "the sciences"[0] give us is not a straightforward matter, either, and what they give us, the actual character of scientific aims, methods, research and results is precisely the domain of the philosophy of science. (My view is that a strong impetus in empirical science is mastery of nature and technological production, not necessarily the truth. The story is a bit more complicated than that, but I'll leave it here.) Empirical science is very much informed by background assumptions and can make metaphysical insinuations, assumptions and insinuations that are not the proper domain of the empirical sciences, but philosophy. The notion that science is magically free from the usual human foibles like unwarranted appeals to authority or bullying or ideological insinuation or whatever is, of course, false. Add to that the confusion that some scientists show when they fail to distinguish between science and scientism, for instance. Holding philosophical views or presuppositions, at least tacitly, can hardly be avoided. W.r.t. scholasticism, I'm sorry if that was your experience, or your interpretation of your experience, but I would call that a thoroughly unjust characterization of scholasticism. Citations and giving credit is a normal part of any published work, but scholasticism is certainly not characterized by obsequious deference to prior authors (say, Aristotle; indeed, within the broad scope of what is traditionally called "scholasticism", you have varying views of, e.g., Aristotle). Scholasticism is famous for its rigorous disputations and appropriately draws from developments elsewhere. [0] Even what the broad view of what "science" is will vary by language. The English/Anglophone meaning of "science" is generally the more restricted "empirical science", while, say, the German "Wissenschaft" is more inclusive and broad and it would seem closer to the classical or traditional view of a science as a body of systematized knowledge.
sicp-enjoyer 4y ago
If you study science and philosophy you will see that most scientific programs started in philosophy and still use their vocabulary and concepts. Remarks like this are so common and so obviously false to people who have read, it's almost painful.
jcourt1 4y ago
Somewhat hoist by his own petard there - it’s not at all obvious that ornithology has no use to birds… Not sure if underneath what he said he meant “philosophy of science is not at all useful to science” (which is doubtful) or the more restricted “pick a working scientist, they probably have little to gain by devoting time to philosophy of science” (maybe reasonable, if a little dogmatic to insist that is true in all cases). If we took the comparison seriously though, it might actually turn out to be a reasonably insightful metaphor - eg. ornithologists don’t have the same primary concerns as the individual birds they study, a bird is not going to understand or get any profit from studying ornithology (and yet that it can still be a good bird) etc.
tephra 4y ago
A counter from another physicist (who coincidentally used to have Feynmans desk when he was at caltech). https://www.preposterousuniverse.com/blog/2014/06/23/physicists-should-stop-saying-silly-things-about-philosophy/ https://www.preposterousuniverse.com/blog/2014/06/23/physici...
dr_dshiv 4y ago
Except he probably didn’t actually say that, unless you have a source? https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/37670/did-richard-feynman-say-philosophy-of-science-is-about-as-useful-to-scientists https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/37670/did-richa...
axxto 4y ago
"I fully agree with you about the significance and educational value of methodology as well as history and philosophy of science. So many people today - and even professional scientists - seem to me like somebody who has seen thousands of trees but has never seen a forest. A knowledge of the historic and philosophical background gives that kind of independence from prejudices of his generation from which most scientists are suffering. This independence created by philosophical insight is - in my opinion - the mark of distinction between a mere artisan or specialist and a real seeker after truth." ― Albert Einstein, correspondence to Robert Thornton (1944)

“Philosophy of science is about as useful to scientists as ornithology is to birds.” ― Richard Feynman Came to my mind.

by 725686 4y ago

“Philosophy of science is about as useful to scientists as ornithology is to birds.” ― Richard Feynman Came to my mind.

Read in a straightforward manner, Feynman simply didn’t understand the value of philosophy, though he did inevitably and unwittingly tread across philosophical territory. In some sense, we all philosophize to one degree or another. We can either acknowledge that and learn to do it well, or we can do it poorly.

practal 4y ago
So according to you, Feynman did it poorly? Seems to me then being a poor philosopher is a good thing.
- ngcc_hk 4y ago
  may be to some individuals like him but not to all. Bell’s theorem came into mind. If you think philosophy not the academic one but the one about what you are doing and what assumption you made, you cannot just shut up and calculate. The standard model has to stagnate for 50 years. May be a re-think of the fundamental can drive new innovation.
yakubin 4y ago
Or we can acknowledge that and aim at restraint, stopping ourselves whenever we catch ourselves doing it, recognising that it's a bug in our software. I've spent most of my life reading philosophy. I've been clean for several years and I'm glad (it's no small feat for me). I recognise now that it was nothing but a bug in my mind. To younger people, I'd advise to focus on the actual mathematics and science, because that's where true knowledge lies. Solution to talking nonsense is not talking better nonsense, but recognising that one speaks nonsense and should better be silent.
- anthk 4y ago
  This. I was like you 100%. Most of liberal arts it's bullshit. It's the facts, not the opinions. Liberal arts guys love to quote people based on opinions as if the were an absolute truth.
  - yakubin 4y ago
    I suspect by "liberal arts" you meant humanities and social sciences. Curiously, the term "liberal arts" encompasses natural sciences and mathematics as well. I wouldn't go quite as far as to say they're bullshit. For one, I do appreciate some poetry and other fine arts. Where my sympathies end, is appropriating the hard-earned credibility of science by so called social sciences and humanities, which often, as you wrote, use quotes of prior authors as some proof of truth. Rule of thumb: if papers in a field use "[famous author] wrote X, therefore Y" as the standard of proof, instead of "we conducted those experiments with this methodology and here is what we found", then it's closer to scholasticism[1] than to science and should have no business using the word "science" anywhere. To be fair, in each field of such a social science there are usually people trying to move it away from the authority-driven philosophy model and nearer the science model of experiments, so I wouldn't necessarily say it's all bullshit. But each time I hear someone "studying psychology" say "Freud wrote this", "Lacan said that" and expand that as if psychology was some Freud&Lacan fanfic, then proceeding to make conclusions from that about the real world with the asserted credibility of someone talking about discovery of the electron, I roll my eyes. [1]: Reading works of scholasticism was dreadful. "Aristotle this, Aristotle that, I'm so insecure I'm afraid to utter a sentence without supporting it by something Aristotle said" and not a single experiment in sight.
    - danielam 4y ago
      (Reply to first response) But it takes philosophy to make the sorts of claims you make, making them self-refuting and incoherent. Perhaps the problem was not philosophy, but how you practiced it or how those you engaged with practiced it. (Reply to second response) W.r.t. the liberal arts, we must distinguish between genuine liberal arts and some decadent ersatz or blatantly ideological counterfeit. I don't wish to spend time making distinctions here and now, but it is worth keeping that in mind. However, I should also note that what "the sciences"[0] give us is not a straightforward matter, either, and what they give us, the actual character of scientific aims, methods, research and results is precisely the domain of the philosophy of science. (My view is that a strong impetus in empirical science is mastery of nature and technological production, not necessarily the truth. The story is a bit more complicated than that, but I'll leave it here.) Empirical science is very much informed by background assumptions and can make metaphysical insinuations, assumptions and insinuations that are not the proper domain of the empirical sciences, but philosophy. The notion that science is magically free from the usual human foibles like unwarranted appeals to authority or bullying or ideological insinuation or whatever is, of course, false. Add to that the confusion that some scientists show when they fail to distinguish between science and scientism, for instance. Holding philosophical views or presuppositions, at least tacitly, can hardly be avoided. W.r.t. scholasticism, I'm sorry if that was your experience, or your interpretation of your experience, but I would call that a thoroughly unjust characterization of scholasticism. Citations and giving credit is a normal part of any published work, but scholasticism is certainly not characterized by obsequious deference to prior authors (say, Aristotle; indeed, within the broad scope of what is traditionally called "scholasticism", you have varying views of, e.g., Aristotle). Scholasticism is famous for its rigorous disputations and appropriately draws from developments elsewhere. [0] Even what the broad view of what "science" is will vary by language. The English/Anglophone meaning of "science" is generally the more restricted "empirical science", while, say, the German "Wissenschaft" is more inclusive and broad and it would seem closer to the classical or traditional view of a science as a body of systematized knowledge.

sicp-enjoyer 4y ago

If you study science and philosophy you will see that most scientific programs started in philosophy and still use their vocabulary and concepts. Remarks like this are so common and so obviously false to people who have read, it's almost painful.

jcourt1 4y ago

Somewhat hoist by his own petard there - it’s not at all obvious that ornithology has no use to birds… Not sure if underneath what he said he meant “philosophy of science is not at all useful to science” (which is doubtful) or the more restricted “pick a working scientist, they probably have little to gain by devoting time to philosophy of science” (maybe reasonable, if a little dogmatic to insist that is true in all cases). If we took the comparison seriously though, it might actually turn out to be a reasonably insightful metaphor - eg. ornithologists don’t have the same primary concerns as the individual birds they study, a bird is not going to understand or get any profit from studying ornithology (and yet that it can still be a good bird) etc.

tephra 4y ago

A counter from another physicist (who coincidentally used to have Feynmans desk when he was at caltech). https://www.preposterousuniverse.com/blog/2014/06/23/physicists-should-stop-saying-silly-things-about-philosophy/ https://www.preposterousuniverse.com/blog/2014/06/23/physici...

dr_dshiv 4y ago

Except he probably didn’t actually say that, unless you have a source? https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/37670/did-richard-feynman-say-philosophy-of-science-is-about-as-useful-to-scientists https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/37670/did-richa...

axxto 4y ago

"I fully agree with you about the significance and educational value of methodology as well as history and philosophy of science. So many people today - and even professional scientists - seem to me like somebody who has seen thousands of trees but has never seen a forest. A knowledge of the historic and philosophical background gives that kind of independence from prejudices of his generation from which most scientists are suffering. This independence created by philosophical insight is - in my opinion - the mark of distinction between a mere artisan or specialist and a real seeker after truth." ― Albert Einstein, correspondence to Robert Thornton (1944)