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Well yes but its not what you think. Philosophy as a field in the US has become too narrow. I remember taking a class in the German department on German Romanti

Well yes but its not what you think. Philosophy as a field in the US has become too narrow. I remember taking a class in the German department on German Romanticism, which was actually very important for understanding later developments in German philosophy and some of the authors involved are even referenced directly by Hegel in his Lectures on Aesthetics. But when I was doing my Philosophy MA one of the faculty members was complaining once, in a class on Aesthetics, that they couldn’t teach German Romanticism as a class because the school had deemed it “too literary” and we just had one seminar on it. Its also the case that you wouldn’t have a great understanding of, say, Plato or maybe even Aristotle if you studied them in philosophy vs Classics, since in the latter you actually read and analyze the text at the level of the grammar and open up the complexity of the potential intepretations, whereas in Philosophy there is often a somewhat rote or dumbed down version of Plato and Aristotle taught to undergrads because the teachers don’t actually know any Greek. But that depends on the faculty and the course obviously, I just wouldn’t trust most philosophy departments to teach Plato well these days.

bonoboTP 1y ago
Yes, this is the curse of specialization due to ever more intellectual works in existence but the same amount of time per person. I think it's much better to learn in an integrated way, so history, art, science, politics, philosophy, technology, math, economics in a sort of horizontal, cross-cutting way. For example to understand the political relevance of some art movement, you need to know the history of the period, understand the art, the political climate, the philosophical underpinnings. To understand the impact of Darwin on his time, you need to know the historical context, and I'd argue you should actually understand evolution too (not in a comic book fashion, but quantitatively including our modern understanding and what he couldn't know then), also his religious background, you should understand what is Unitarianism and what is Anglicanism, how the Catholic Church reacted, and how their general situation was at that time, etc. etc. But in my experience academics really dislike interacting with their neighboring fields, they look down upon each other in a mutual way, or they simply don't see any benefit in an exchange because their publications are aimed at extremely narrow specialized journals, and a "hybrid" work will not fit either journal. Of course sometimes it works, but in my experience "interdisciplinary" is mostly a buzzword that admins like to use a lot and academics also pay lip service to but in reality they highly prefer just sticking to their well known bubble and be left alone.

bonoboTP 1y ago

Yes, this is the curse of specialization due to ever more intellectual works in existence but the same amount of time per person. I think it's much better to learn in an integrated way, so history, art, science, politics, philosophy, technology, math, economics in a sort of horizontal, cross-cutting way. For example to understand the political relevance of some art movement, you need to know the history of the period, understand the art, the political climate, the philosophical underpinnings. To understand the impact of Darwin on his time, you need to know the historical context, and I'd argue you should actually understand evolution too (not in a comic book fashion, but quantitatively including our modern understanding and what he couldn't know then), also his religious background, you should understand what is Unitarianism and what is Anglicanism, how the Catholic Church reacted, and how their general situation was at that time, etc. etc. But in my experience academics really dislike interacting with their neighboring fields, they look down upon each other in a mutual way, or they simply don't see any benefit in an exchange because their publications are aimed at extremely narrow specialized journals, and a "hybrid" work will not fit either journal. Of course sometimes it works, but in my experience "interdisciplinary" is mostly a buzzword that admins like to use a lot and academics also pay lip service to but in reality they highly prefer just sticking to their well known bubble and be left alone.