cyr:-
I am careful so that's OK then.
How do you not walk in the footsteps of your predecessors.
"I can hear the ancient footsteps like the motion of the sea.
Sometimes I think there's someone there sometimes it's only me.
I am hanging in the balance of a perfect finished plan
Like every sparrow falling
Like every grain of sand".
Blind Boy Grunt.
Quote:How do you not walk in the footsteps of your predecessors.
By remembering that the road you are walking was there before them.
cyr:-
Hey-I'm not Adam Ant.How could a road exist before the word.In THE BEGINNING was the word.
Cyracuz wrote:What is it to be conservative? It is to walk in the footsteps of our predesessors.
not really, unless one advocates a hunter-gatherer lifestyle. and survivalists livin in the hills don't count, unless they make their own bows & arrows & sew hides to make clothing & footwear.
Cyracuz,
I think "philosophy" and "other fields" both progress by a spiral of mutual interchange of concepts. All "progress" moves from the familiar to new territory so of course "old positions" tend to be restated but not normally as "the last word". I agree that "philosophers" who cannot modify their ideas or merely regurgitate are "empty vessels", but I think it was Einstein who said of those who resist new alternatives, " we must wait for them to die".
Cyracuz
Quote:By remembering that the road you are walking was there before them.
Yes. And by knowing that your footsteps are different from the others.
You see, I believe that when a man says: "the earth moves" he is saying something new. It is his own idea.
When I think of something I read in a book, that idea becomes mine, becomes part of what I am. And I am different, like any other man.
Didn't you ever read that extraordinary Borges' novel "Pierre Ménard, author of the Quixote"?
When I said " by remembering that the road was there before them", I meant that our ancestors didn't create the world. They shaped it how they saw fit acording to their own needs and wants, and that is how they came to trust their own ideals, the ones that were transferred to us. Remember that, and make your own choices based on your own feelings and your own moral code. Every being in the universe knows right from wrong.
What I mean by "walking in our ancestors footsteps" is that we tend to adapt these ideals and model our wants and needs after them.
Re: Modern philosophers- jukeboxes...
extra medium wrote:Cyracuz wrote:I asked him if he thought four years of school transformed him to a philosopher. He said that it did, and we proceeded to argue.
You argued with him over the definition of a philosopher? Sounds like you are both well on your way to becoming great philosophers!
VERY good point. I think being a philsopher is a state of mind. I also think that you can be a philosopher can be done without being trained - but I think you will spend a LOT of time just recreating the wheel.
TTF
I think I am arriving at the conclusion that most western philosophy is about what came first, the chicken or the egg...
People continously make the same stupid mistake.
Person A thinks long and hard about something and then comes up with a way of acting.
Person B copies that way of acting and thinks he's doing the same thing as person A, when he didn't duplicate the "think long and hard" part.
You aren't a philosopher because you say the same things as old philosophers, you are a philosopher because you do the same thing... you think.
the important part of the word 'philosophy' is the first part; the 'love' part.
to 'love' knowledge one must be fully preoccupied with it, 'committed' to it.
Having said that, every philosopher knows that there are, and will never be any actual 'answers' to many of the questions that will always remain beyond our reach. It is the thrill of the chase that makes it all worth while.
Not to 'know', but to know that you have done your utmost to 'know'!
[Wisdom is more commonly wrapped in a cloak of obscurity, than defined by the harsh light of knowledge.]
Watchmaker and BoGoWo, great posts.
Yes, great posts.
But in the same way love has little to do with sex, wisdom has little to do with knowledge. Love of wisdom is love of life, or of experience. That is why it is such a contradiction for a young aspiring philosopher to pour over books to gain some weight in the field.
Another good post--very original thought.
Cyracuz
Reading philosophy books doesn't make us philosophers. You can describe the ideas of Plato, Leibniz or Kant and be unable to have your own ideas.
A philosophy book to me is like a dialogue, between me and the author. That is perhaps why I like so much Plato's dialogues: not because I agree with his conclusions but because I can see in every moment the possibilities open by the discussion.
Even the books I most loved, like Kant's "The critique of Pure Reason", Heidegger's "Sein und Zeit", Wittgenstein "Tractatus", were more a source of questions that an archive of ultimate solutions. Even with these authors I disagree in many points.
The importance of those books - and others, even those that are very far from my ideas (Descartes, Spinoza, Berkeley, Leibniz, Hegel) - is to teach us how to think, how to make the right questions. Some of their ideas are precious guides, points of reference in the process of building our own view of the world (a process that only ends with death).
You seem to oppose books versus experience. But books are part of the experience. I always thought that we don't need to be very worried about getting experience. Experience comes to us, in every moment of our lives. In fact, experience is life. Even the most commons aspects of life.
Val wrote:
Quote:The importance of those books - and others, even those that are very far from my ideas (Descartes, Spinoza, Berkeley, Leibniz, Hegel) - is to teach us how to think, how to make the right questions.
Yes, I agree. But the danger is that you come to trust books too much. Before you know it you are reading about the blue skies when all you have to do to experience them is to lift your eyes up.
I do not oppose books, I love them, and I also agree that a book can be a great experience. But when it comes to these philosophers I am a bit more careful. Reading about copernican twists and categorical imperatives in the hopes of establishing a system for our mental capacities seems to me to be a bit far fetched. As I said before: To do such a thing is to clasp a ball and chain on our facilities of free thought.
Re: Modern philosophers- jukeboxes...
Cyracuz wrote:I've met a few people recently who got me thinking.
This one guy, an old friend, told me he was studying to be a philosopher. "In less than six months I have my degree in philosophy", was what he said.
I asked him if he thought four years of school transformed him to a philosopher. He said that it did, and we proceeded to argue.
My stand is that he was a historian with expertise on ideas and philosophy, but he didn't agree. He thinks that since he knows the works of philosophers through time he is a philisopher.
He could not give any answer to any question I had if it was not previously concieved by some ancient.
So here's my statement: Too many modern philosophers are no more than jukeboxes replaying whatever philosopher was the favorite during school. It's pitiful, and it should be the duty of any man with a love of wisdom to show these fake jukebox philosophers that they are no more special than the geek who memorizes all the names of the players on his favorite football team.
I agree with you. Ironically, I believe your argument transformed him into a philosopher, at least for the argument's duration.
Cyracuz wrote:I do not oppose books, I love them, and I also agree that a book can be a great experience. But when it comes to these philosophers I am a bit more careful. Reading about copernican twists and categorical imperatives in the hopes of establishing a system for our mental capacities seems to me to be a bit far fetched. As I said before: To do such a thing is to clasp a ball and chain on our facilities of free thought.
ideally, books can be training wheels, to be put aside when one no longer needs them.
Cyracuz wrote:..... in the same way love has little to do with sex, wisdom has little to do with knowledge. Love of wisdom is love of life, or of experience. That is why it is such a contradiction for a young aspiring philosopher to pour over books to gain some weight in the field.
[s/he'd be better of to tuck them into her/is pants!! :wink: ]
val wrote:...............A philosophy book to me is like a dialogue, between me and the author. ...............The importance of those books - and others, even those that are very far from my ideas (Descartes, Spinoza, Berkeley, Leibniz, Hegel) - is to teach us how to think, how to make the right questions. Some of their ideas are precious guides, points of reference in the process of building our own view of the world (a process that only ends with death)............books are part of the experience. ..............
as the physical remains of a 'visionery' person turn to dust; their psyche, their ideas, their vision - right or wrong - lies safely, quietly waiting on the pages of a book, for the next interaction with immortality.
[some ideas live forever]
