Philosophy Football By Monty Python: Study Guide
2014-02-18
WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY?
PHI 1024 F
Today:
‘Philosophy football’, by Monty Python.
INTRODUCTION TO
PHILOSOPHY
WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY?
Your input.
Four not-so-helpful proposals (for how to work out what Philosophy is).
2014
Three more serious (and more helpful) suggestions.
2
WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY?
WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY?
Words suggested by the word
‘philosophy’:
2) Arguments
1) Question
3
4
1
2014-02-18
WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY?
WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY?
3) Thinking
4) Curiosity
5
6
WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY?
WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY?
How are we to work out what
Philosophy is?
How are we to work out what Philosophy is? A) Perhaps we just need to know who
(some of) the most important
Philosophers are.
B)
Is Philosophy ‘useless trifling, hairsplitting distinctions, and controversies on matters concerning which knowledge is impossible’? Objection: Can we work out what
Luge is in this way?
(Bertrand Russell, ‘The Value of Philosophy’;
NB: Russell argues against this view of Philosophy.)
7
8
2
2014-02-18
WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY?
WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY?
Against Option (C)
Philosophers are Cagey and Cryptic:
How are we to work out what
Philosophy is?
• ‘…philosophy is a way of trying to be a systematic spirit without having a system.’
~ Raymond Geuss, attributed to Friedrich Schlegel.
C) Perhaps we just need to know the definition(s) of ‘philosophy’ given by contemporary philosophers.
• ‘[What is Philosophy?] I’m hard pressed to say, but one thing that is certainly true is that ‘What is Philosophy?’ is itself a strikingly philosophical question.’
~ A. W. Moore
• ‘Philosophy is what I was told as an undergraduate women couldn’t do — by an eminent philosopher who had best remain nameless.’
~ Donna Dickenson
9
WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY?
Against Option (C)
Quite a Diversity of Definitions of ‘Philosophy’ :
• ‘[Philosophy] for me [is] the Socratic gadfly: refusing to accept any platitudes or accepted wisdom without examining it.’ ~ Donna Dickenson
• ‘[A philosopher] is a moral entrepreneur. […] It’s somebody who creates new ways of evaluating things — what’s important, what’s worthwhile — that changes how an entire culture or an entire people understand those things.’
~ Brian Leiter
• ‘Philosophy is thinking really hard about the most important questions and trying to bring analytic clarity both to the questions and the answers.”
~ Marilyn Adams
• ‘I think the Greek term has it exactly right; it’s a way of loving knowledge.”
~ Robert Rowland Smith
(Quotes from Philosophybites.com)
They’re also used by Maria Popova in an online article, available here: 11 http://www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2012/04/09/what-is-philosophy/ 10
WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY?
How are we to work out what Philosophy is? D) Perhaps we just need to come up with the correct definition of ‘philosophy’?
Objection:
The single correct definition, of any word, is very difficult to come up with.
12
3
2014-02-18
WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY?
WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY?
Three More Serious Proposals:
Three More Serious Proposals:
2) Philosophy: ‘the rational investigation
1) Philosophy is what you try to find out once you’ve stepped back from your self. of the truths and principles of being, knowledge, or conduct.’
Metaphysics
(From dictionary.com)
(In this sense of ‘philosophy’, young children cannot philosophize.)
Epistemology
Ethics
(I am using a dictionary here, but we should be wary of using dictionary definitions when we do Philosophy.)
13
14
WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY?
Three More Serious Proposals:
3)
WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY?
Three More Serious Proposals
Philosophy is about:
3)
• Trying to answer fundamental questions; and it’s about …
• Arguments;
• And, Yes, about distinctions.
Philosophy is about:
• Trying to answer fundamental questions; and it’s about …
Tomorrow
• Arguments;
• And, Yes, about distinctions.
15
Tomorrow. Read ‘Terms and methods by then.
16
4
2014-02-18
ALSO RELEVANT:
Reading for This Week
By Monday 17th February you should read:
Philosophy as love of wisdom?
‘Philo’ – from the Greek for love.
‘sophy’ – from the Greek for wisdom.
• Course Outline; and
• Wanderer, J., Introducing Philosophy; and
• Blackburn, S., Think, ‘Introduction’.
Other fairly cryptic, but famous, ‘definitions’:
(famous amongst philosophers)
By Tuesday 18th February:
• Pryor, J., ‘Philosophical Terms and Methods’ (in your course reader). ‘The aim of philosophy […] is to understand how things in the broadest possible sense of the term hang together in the broadest possible sense of the term’.
~ Wilfrid Sellars
By Wednesday 19th February:
• Blackburn, Think, Chapter 1, ‘Knowledge’, especially pp. 1528; and
• Descartes, ‘First Meditation’.
‘Philosophy is a battle against the bewitchment of our intelligence by means of language.’
17
~ Ludwig Wittgenstein
18
5
WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY?
PHI 1024 F
Today:
‘Philosophy football’, by Monty Python.
INTRODUCTION TO
PHILOSOPHY
WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY?
Your input.
Four not-so-helpful proposals (for how to work out what Philosophy is).
2014
Three more serious (and more helpful) suggestions.
2
WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY?
WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY?
Words suggested by the word
‘philosophy’:
2) Arguments
1) Question
3
4
1
2014-02-18
WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY?
WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY?
3) Thinking
4) Curiosity
5
6
WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY?
WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY?
How are we to work out what
Philosophy is?
How are we to work out what Philosophy is? A) Perhaps we just need to know who
(some of) the most important
Philosophers are.
B)
Is Philosophy ‘useless trifling, hairsplitting distinctions, and controversies on matters concerning which knowledge is impossible’? Objection: Can we work out what
Luge is in this way?
(Bertrand Russell, ‘The Value of Philosophy’;
NB: Russell argues against this view of Philosophy.)
7
8
2
2014-02-18
WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY?
WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY?
Against Option (C)
Philosophers are Cagey and Cryptic:
How are we to work out what
Philosophy is?
• ‘…philosophy is a way of trying to be a systematic spirit without having a system.’
~ Raymond Geuss, attributed to Friedrich Schlegel.
C) Perhaps we just need to know the definition(s) of ‘philosophy’ given by contemporary philosophers.
• ‘[What is Philosophy?] I’m hard pressed to say, but one thing that is certainly true is that ‘What is Philosophy?’ is itself a strikingly philosophical question.’
~ A. W. Moore
• ‘Philosophy is what I was told as an undergraduate women couldn’t do — by an eminent philosopher who had best remain nameless.’
~ Donna Dickenson
9
WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY?
Against Option (C)
Quite a Diversity of Definitions of ‘Philosophy’ :
• ‘[Philosophy] for me [is] the Socratic gadfly: refusing to accept any platitudes or accepted wisdom without examining it.’ ~ Donna Dickenson
• ‘[A philosopher] is a moral entrepreneur. […] It’s somebody who creates new ways of evaluating things — what’s important, what’s worthwhile — that changes how an entire culture or an entire people understand those things.’
~ Brian Leiter
• ‘Philosophy is thinking really hard about the most important questions and trying to bring analytic clarity both to the questions and the answers.”
~ Marilyn Adams
• ‘I think the Greek term has it exactly right; it’s a way of loving knowledge.”
~ Robert Rowland Smith
(Quotes from Philosophybites.com)
They’re also used by Maria Popova in an online article, available here: 11 http://www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2012/04/09/what-is-philosophy/ 10
WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY?
How are we to work out what Philosophy is? D) Perhaps we just need to come up with the correct definition of ‘philosophy’?
Objection:
The single correct definition, of any word, is very difficult to come up with.
12
3
2014-02-18
WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY?
WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY?
Three More Serious Proposals:
Three More Serious Proposals:
2) Philosophy: ‘the rational investigation
1) Philosophy is what you try to find out once you’ve stepped back from your self. of the truths and principles of being, knowledge, or conduct.’
Metaphysics
(From dictionary.com)
(In this sense of ‘philosophy’, young children cannot philosophize.)
Epistemology
Ethics
(I am using a dictionary here, but we should be wary of using dictionary definitions when we do Philosophy.)
13
14
WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY?
Three More Serious Proposals:
3)
WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY?
Three More Serious Proposals
Philosophy is about:
3)
• Trying to answer fundamental questions; and it’s about …
• Arguments;
• And, Yes, about distinctions.
Philosophy is about:
• Trying to answer fundamental questions; and it’s about …
Tomorrow
• Arguments;
• And, Yes, about distinctions.
15
Tomorrow. Read ‘Terms and methods by then.
16
4
2014-02-18
ALSO RELEVANT:
Reading for This Week
By Monday 17th February you should read:
Philosophy as love of wisdom?
‘Philo’ – from the Greek for love.
‘sophy’ – from the Greek for wisdom.
• Course Outline; and
• Wanderer, J., Introducing Philosophy; and
• Blackburn, S., Think, ‘Introduction’.
Other fairly cryptic, but famous, ‘definitions’:
(famous amongst philosophers)
By Tuesday 18th February:
• Pryor, J., ‘Philosophical Terms and Methods’ (in your course reader). ‘The aim of philosophy […] is to understand how things in the broadest possible sense of the term hang together in the broadest possible sense of the term’.
~ Wilfrid Sellars
By Wednesday 19th February:
• Blackburn, Think, Chapter 1, ‘Knowledge’, especially pp. 1528; and
• Descartes, ‘First Meditation’.
‘Philosophy is a battle against the bewitchment of our intelligence by means of language.’
17
~ Ludwig Wittgenstein
18
5