Philosophy
 

Too broad a topic. Philosophy applies to all academic disciplines, and is not limited to just "life philosophy". Basically, once you've reached the bleeding edge of whatever discipline you're working in, questions of philosophy will turn up. There is the philosophy of science, for example, as well as the philosophy of art (aesthetics) and history, and so on.

For a start, anyone who intends to discuss philosophy will need to work on logic. Ascaloth, I suspect, is the best person to direct any budding philosopher to the entire lexicon of rhetorical techniques and traps to apply and avoid.

Once we've got the basics, the best place to start, I feel, is the philosophy of knowledge, that is, epistemology. What is knowledge? What can we know? Are there limits to what we can learn? If so, what are the implications?

I'm most interested in moral philosophy, that is, the study of ethics. To me, it comprises the most important questions about what it means to live a "good" life.

Apparently, all it takes to be the best available guide to rhetorical techniques and traps for budding philosophers nowadays is a firm grasp on the sacred art of Google-fu.

Logic sure isn't worth much these days. [/kyon]

:cool:

Orwell said: "He who controls the past, controls the future. He who controls the present, controls the past."

- All truth exists in the past. Hence, the study of history, from the analysis of research data to the outcome of a battle to staying in touch with the older generations is essential to getting a well-rounded idea of 'the truth'.
- All plans are made for the future, by applying the lessons of the past to expected circumstances. What should or should not be changed, require ethical standards for judgement to be formulated. Contracts, promises, hopes, all of these pertain to future time.
- All action is taken in the present. Action requires some force of exertion; nothing is gained if you just sit around and discuss stuff without actually doing it. It requires some sort of sacrifice.

∴ - What happens in the present then becomes the past, which will then be learned and judged for the future.

I took an optional Philosophy class before, though I mostly studied the history of it in different parts of the world rather than an in-depth exploration of any of them (except science philosophy, though I could only remember by "science don't give a f*** about philosophy"). How there has always been a big clash between Idealism and Materialism, and that a lot of the philosophical ideas could be traced to their roots in either of those two. Only, I forgot most of it now. Like, I can't remember the three main values of each branch of philosophy (the epistemology, and the other two). Though, I don't know, I consider myself to be "more attuned" to philosophical thinking (at least, compared to some of my colleagues who have more immediate practical problems to solve rather than sitting around thinking abstractly), but I haven't really been tried & tested in it.

As for psychology, I don't know much about it. My understanding is that even the darkest, vilest form of ugliness of humanity is part of, rather than deprivation of humanity.

Can you please don't encourage people to lie in the way of a steamroller. :twitch: You are 20 years older and presenting yourself as a bad influence already! :p

Anyway, I do agree with TRL, philosophy is an unusually large and wide topic, it is something like a diagram that encompasses and links every discipline of science, arts and aesthetics. It is impossible to pin down a specific and not go off topic with it.

If the TS wants, a sensible yet humourous read for a curious philosopher to be would bethis.

Hmm...having touched a large number of subjects, philosophy has come before my path a few times. However, upon further research, I discovered that it is too much of a personal and subjective matter to actually discuss with other people - even more so, considering the fact that few people have a stable view of the world, since everything changes (one may argue the timelessness of certain ideas, but I doubt it can be proven within a lifetime).

Psychology, on the other hand, promotes teamplay :) I consider the knowledge of psychology a very useful tool in communication; it is made easier and much more fun, particularly when you start to seek out the reasons behind all kinds of behaviour and responses.

``I don't know whether I am Turing dreaming that I am a machine, or a machine dreaming that I am Turing!''
I think I like this. :heh:

Best ways to learn about philosophy:

a) Create your vision of pure bliss and lose yourself in it.

b) Journey to the borders of life/death and spend sometime in the hazy area in between.

c) Experience true despair by losing the thing you hold dearest.

d) Bring yourself to the brink of insanity and stare, wide-eyed, into the abyss. This is the last step and where the greatest wisdom lies.

Just don't lose yourself to insanity or death.

If you can do all these things, you may not find the purpose of life, but you will understand the true nature of human emotion.

This makes two false assumptions. One, that everything historical is true, and two, that truth is bound temporally. In reality, truth transcends time. E=MC² was true before Einstein discovered it, and it will be true one thousand or even one million years from now.

You can argue that since we haven't experienced the future, we can't truly know the future, but we haven't experienced the past, either. There are probably fewer than a dozen people alive today that were born in the nineteenth century; everything beyond their experience is guesswork and hearsay. No one alive today has experiences the 1880s or before. We barely know what's happening before our eyes; we certainly don't know what happened before we existed.

And yet, underneath our cloud of misguided judgement, truth remains. We may never find it, but it's never pointless to search. With lives as short as ours, understanding may be the noblest pursuit possible.

Speaking of Tao, as you delve further into the realm of Physics, you will notice how appropriate it is to call Physics "Modern Taoism".(disclaimer: I didn't actually study a lot of these subjects in depth, but as I read the stories and theories, that's the feeling I get)

Everything & Nothing: an atom is about 99.99% or something empty space. What wasn't an empty space was the protons, neutrons, and electrons, which were further comprised of 99.99% empty space. And the trend seems to be continuing with the smaller building blocks. So an atom is mostly nothing. And since the known (observable?) universe are made up entirely of atoms (not really, since there are the theoretical dark matters and energy, but let's say we discount those) , Everything is (mostly) Nothing.

Dualism: E=mc2. Which also touches on relativity. Mind and Matter might just be made of the same substance. And then there's the quantum world which is even more bizarre. Almost like the Assassin's Creed quote "Nothing is True, Everything is Permitted".

And so on, but I don't have the proper knowledge nor authority to speak further. But you get the idea.

When talking philosophy it might help if we start with the basics.

There are generally 5 branches of the philosophy tree:

1.Metaphysics: This is the study concerning the big questions. (Is there a god? or why are we here? etc) Its the birthplace of theology really. It's also what just about every conversation comes down to after smoking a joint with someone.

2.Aesthetics: contemplation of beauty and the birthplace of criticism.

3. Ethics: the beginnings of law and the overall study of right and wrong.

4. Logic: This is the one that gets the most attention nowadays, most likely because Mr. Spock was just that cool, but also because it's what led to science and basically everything we have that makes us civilized beings and no longer animals living in caves.

5. Epistemology: Finally, my personal favorite is the study of thought and any thing to do with how or why we acquire knowledge or even if we already possess a certain level of it at birth. To me this is the most lacking field of philosophy when it comes to the education system. If humans will ever find peace it will come through a better understanding of Epistemology; both general and on a personal level. Every person seems to have their own unique source for how or why they think in the way they do.

Imagine being a teacher and trying to impart knowledge to 30 unique individuals a class and have little background in epistemological study. I doubt you are getting through to more than a small percentage of those people. The key to unlocking human understanding on a universal level will be found in this branch I think.

Anybody else "geek-out" to a certain one of these branches?

Martin Heidegger >>> Friedrich Nietzsche > Soren Kierkegaard >>> Jean-Paul Sartre... on now to watch ToLOVEる, since these guys are not a good choice for bed-time reading :p

try some mushroom :heh:

Mushrooms?

Honestly though, it is not like you are a rock star, I would avoid mixing drugs with philosophy.

I love philosophy, particularly in the "big question" sense, but I love applying it to as many topics as possible.

Stuff like this, for example, fascinates me:

Dynamic tag cannot be rendered. (PrintableThread)
I wish I could find the whole presentation, I would love to see the other people on the panel talk too.

http://s8.postimage.org/jrlmsbfrn/5639892_460s.jpg

So is Philosophy under humanities or science?

University I go to has philosophy under arts and humanities

Philosophy is part of the humanities.

Since there seems to be an interest in the topic, but not much in the way of direction, how about someone start the ball rolling with a question or two? All philosophy begins with questions.

For example, what is "good"? Why should we be "good"?

Either try to answer those, or start another line of discussion with a set of questions of your own.