Tuesday, March 1, 2016

Philosophy and Religion: Unanswerable Questions

What is the role of philosophy and religion in the academic arena? It is my contention that these areas should not be considered separate disciplines.  Below is an attempt to focus on the reasons why I believe as I do regarding these subjects.

There is virtually no agreement in any matter under discussion in these fields, including their definitions.  Here are some of the examples of questions addressed by philosophy:

• What kind of beings are human beings?
• If human beings have a capacity for reason, what is reason?
• What’s involved in knowing the truth? Is this possible for human beings?
• Is science the best or even the only possible way to know the truth about the world?
• Are there truths to know that science can’t reach?
• What does it mean to act rationally?
 • How is acting rationally related to acting morally?
• What are values?
• Are there truths to know about values?
• How are values related to the fact that human beings are social beings?
• Metaphysics (What is reality?)
• Epistemology (What is knowledge?)
• Logic (What is the structure of reason or reasoning?)
• Philosophy of Mind (What are minds? What is thought? How do they relate to their objects and to the world?)
• Philosophy of Language (How does language function as a medium of thought?)
• Philosophy of Science (What is science? How is it able to give us knowledge of the world?)
• Ethics (What are values? How should we act? What makes an action right or wrong, good or bad?)
• Political Philosophy (What is political authority? What would just institutions look like?)
• Philosophy of Religion (Is God possible? Can we know whether God exists?Is faith rational?)
http://web.utk.edu/~philosop/whyphilosophy.html

The main reason that there is no agreement in philosophy or religion is that they presently only address unanswerable questions and don’t give definitive answers.  Thus, they essentially do not deal in the area of knowledge (justified true belief), as do the sciences.  All of the sciences deal with answerable questions, at least in principle.

Philosophy and religion were humanity's earliest attempts to understand the world. They were the beginning of inquisitiveness.  They asked questions that were both answerable and unanswerable.  Philosophy eventually spawned valuable disciplines, such as logic and the sciences, that addressed answerable questions.

The children of philosophy and religion are doing fine with improving and understanding the world. There is virtually nothing that the parent can add to the functioning of its children. The inquisitiveness, reason and logic used by the children negates the need for the parent. The study of philosophy as a very important aspect of human history is certainly appropriate within the spawned disciplines, not as a separate field of study IMHO.

In closing, I agree with this statement:

It is by no means obvious that universities, and thus ultimately the state, should support philosophy but for historical precedent. If universities had been an invention of the second half of the twentieth century, would anyone have thought to include philosophy among the subjects that they taught and studied? It seems very doubtful. But the history of Western universities goes back 900 years—that of Islamic universities even further—and philosophy has always been one of the subjects taught and studied in them. It just does not occur to anyone not to include a philosophy department among those composing a university.  http://cup.columbia.edu/book/978-0-231-15052-1/the-nature-and-future-of-philosophy/excerpt

And this statement:

Remember, too, that schools of theology embrace two type of scholars: Biblical scholars, who figure out how ancient texts were constructed (many of these are atheists), and theologians, who try to figure out what God is telling us through those texts.  The former are involved in understanding how people came to believe in a nonexistent being, the latter are paid to rationalize the existence of that nonexistent being and to figure out what He wants.  Only the former is a useful exercise, as it’s part of human history. But it’s by no means the only part of human history and human culture.

Unlike Burton, I don’t see studying theology as the best way to embrace all of human culture. If you want to do that, study literature, history (including religious history if you must), psychology, and diverse courses in the humanities. Unlike theology, that will give you a balanced education.    http://whyevolutionistrue.wordpress.com/2013/11/03/the-atlantic-gives-the-worlds-worst-advice-study-more-theology/

Further comment

Richard Carrier spoke at Skepticon 6 on this subject.  This link is to a YouTube video of his talk:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YLvWz9GQ3PQ

From a Facebook post of mine:

Richard Carrier, in my opinion, is one of the best thinkers around. This attempted defense of the field of Philosophy is one of the best presentations on the subject to which I have been exposed. That said, I still am having a difficult time seeing philosophy as a valid independent discipline today. Yes, Carrier uses the term to describe some very important mental processes, such as hypothesis formation, drawing conclusions from experiments, mathematical processes, logical analyses and value judgements. However, his presentation was more valuable to me in exposing philosophy, as is practiced, as a waste of time, rather than in support of it.

So, I am left with a big question: How does adding the term "philosophy" to these recognizably important processes improve those processes and, thus, validate philosophy as a separate discipline? Any thoughts?
Carrier, a Facebook friend, commented, with a PDF of the talk and a referral to some elements of his talk to help me better understand his position.  I commented as follows:

Richard, I have read in detail the information on your slides to which you directed me. I think I have at least a somewhat clearer understanding of what you are calling "philosophy." You made what I consider the good case that philosophy has progressed in similar fashion as science with the following distillation of the best thinking within the categories of philosophy:

1.Naturalism (metaphysics) vs. Supernaturalism
2.Evidentialism (epistemology ) vs. mysticism, authoritarianism, dogmatism, a priori facts, faith
3.Consequentialism (ethics) vs. authoritarianism / absolutism
4.Democracy / Human Rights (politics) vs. fascism, aristocracy, autocracy, Athenian democracy
5.Aesthetic Relativism (aesthetics) vs. cosmic aesthetics / aesthetics as morality

I would argue that the above distillation is the result of observing the effects of the various philosophical thoughts on reality and concluding that the above selected positions are closer to truth and goodness than the competing positions. This thinking is essentially critical thinking based on evidence, which is scientific thinking in its broadest sense, in my opinion. If you and others wish to call it "philosophy", so be it. This may be more of a semantic issue than a true disagreement. My only argument is that such thinking presently takes place within the hard and soft sciences and, thus, I question the need for formal departments of philosophy.

You and others may disagree with me on where philosophy should be positioned in academia, but I think we agree on what it is and its importance. Thanks for your detailed response. By the way, we met a few years ago when you spoke at UNCGreensboro and I have always been impressed with your work. In fact, I frequently defend you regarding the issues of an historical Jesus and Bayesian Analysis of probability. Great work --- keep it up!!

Jerry Coyne addresses the relationship between philosophy and physics in this article.  Please note that he also questions the need for formal academic philosophy:

http://whyevolutionistrue.wordpress.com/2014/08/23/accommodationism-from-a-physicist/

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