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I don't think the problem is with PhDs failing to engage with philosophy, but rather, with the name "philosophy" having been hijacked and turned towards somethi

I don't think the problem is with PhDs failing to engage with philosophy, but rather, with the name "philosophy" having been hijacked and turned towards something that isn't worth studying. When you say students should learn more epistemology, I'm 100% on board - but when you say students should learn more "philosophy including epistemology", I suddenly anticipate them being exposed to a bunch of low-quality thinking reflecting long-dispelled confusions. Most of the good philosophy work has moved to other labels, like "rationality", out of a need to distance itself from the concentrated confusion being taught in universities. If you want to teach good philosophy, great! But please, please don't expose your students to the concentrated confusion that passes for most of philosophy; apply a strong filter and teach your students to apply that filter themselves.

littletimmy 11y ago
It may be that philosophy is not worth studying, but this is something a person has to realize for himself. As Wittgenstein said, it is a ladder that must be thrown away AFTER a person has used it.
- jimrandomh 11y ago
  Or... they could skip the Wittgenstein and go straight to Kahneman, Yudkowsky and Pearl. Why would you study something that you expected to later decide wasn't worth it, when there's so much good stuff?
  - littletimmy 11y ago
    Mainly to identify the good stuff. So let's take the example of the subject political economy. Political economy has a rich philosophical tradition. You start at Hobbes, then you've got Locke, Rousseau, Smith, Marx, Ricardo, Mills, Keynes, Hayek, Friedman... Each of these philosophers cites a previous philosopher and has transformed our thinking of political economy in some way. You cannot just ignore all of them because then you'd have no clue about how the world came to be the way it is and when you read contemporaries you'd have no frame of reference. So, who do you eliminate?
    - jimrandomh 11y ago
      There is a difference between learning philosophy, and learning the history of philosophy. We don't need more historians; we need people able to think clearly about hard questions. Not understanding how the world came to be the way it is would be unfortunate, but the opportunity cost of making everyone study history is just too high.
      - littletimmy 11y ago
        Thinking about hard questions absolutely requires history, particularly in a field like economics. Studying macroeconomics without knowing the history of political economy is useless.
  - EliRivers 11y ago
    Wait, Yudkowsky is considered worth skipping Wittgenstein for?

littletimmy 11y ago

It may be that philosophy is not worth studying, but this is something a person has to realize for himself. As Wittgenstein said, it is a ladder that must be thrown away AFTER a person has used it.

jimrandomh 11y ago
Or... they could skip the Wittgenstein and go straight to Kahneman, Yudkowsky and Pearl. Why would you study something that you expected to later decide wasn't worth it, when there's so much good stuff?
- littletimmy 11y ago
  Mainly to identify the good stuff. So let's take the example of the subject political economy. Political economy has a rich philosophical tradition. You start at Hobbes, then you've got Locke, Rousseau, Smith, Marx, Ricardo, Mills, Keynes, Hayek, Friedman... Each of these philosophers cites a previous philosopher and has transformed our thinking of political economy in some way. You cannot just ignore all of them because then you'd have no clue about how the world came to be the way it is and when you read contemporaries you'd have no frame of reference. So, who do you eliminate?
  - jimrandomh 11y ago
    There is a difference between learning philosophy, and learning the history of philosophy. We don't need more historians; we need people able to think clearly about hard questions. Not understanding how the world came to be the way it is would be unfortunate, but the opportunity cost of making everyone study history is just too high.
    - littletimmy 11y ago
      Thinking about hard questions absolutely requires history, particularly in a field like economics. Studying macroeconomics without knowing the history of political economy is useless.
- EliRivers 11y ago
  Wait, Yudkowsky is considered worth skipping Wittgenstein for?