GENIUS FORUMS

I clump these three schools of thought together, since I'm firmly convinced that they represent a lazy refusal to think.

To refresh everyone's memory (I apologize in advance for any bias I may inadvertently include in these definitions):

Pragmatism is an American philosophic camp that holds that the only value of a statement is the consequences of believing it to be true. Whether or not something can actually be true is considered beyond the scope of philosophy.

Postmodernism is a camp filled with people who refuse to call themselves postmodernists; who universally cannot understand one another; who play complicated word-games, which they often claim are inspired by great thinkers like Nietzsche, and fashionable thinkers like Foucault, Kant, and Derrida, where they try to re-arrange all their thoughts into arbitrary patterns; and who universally contradict themselves with the beliefs that all knowledge is relative and truth is an illusion.

Logical positivism is an off-shoot of Wittgenstein's Tractatus which I would say is defined by the fact that it bears only one similarity to Wittgenstein's writing: it borrows heavily from his vocabulary. Logical positivists, by misinterpreting Wittgenstein's purpose, make the baffling metaphysical claim that all metaphysical claims are meaningless.

Should any or all of these three schools be relegated to the dustbin of history, or has something been added to philosophy by their inclusion in the history of thought?

Since all of the conclusions they reach in all the classical areas of philosophy, including ethics, are based in false formulations, I vote dustbin. Anything that might accidentally be worth retaining has been said by others anyway.

Trevor,

Pragmatism is an American philosophic camp that holds that the only value of a statement is the consequences of believing it to be true. Whether or not something can actually be true is considered beyond the scope of philosophy.

Basically they question that we can actually reach any ultimate truth beyond our human perspective (beyond the scope of philosophy).

Postmodernism is a camp filled with people who refuse to call themselves postmodernists; who universally cannot understand one another; who play complicated word-games, which they often claim are inspired by great thinkers like Nietzsche, and fashionable thinkers like Foucault, Kant, and Derrida, where they try to re-arrange all their thoughts into arbitrary patterns; and who universally contradict themselves with the beliefs that all knowledge is relative and truth is an illusion.

This is only a contradiction to those who believe, or at least act as though they do, that the dictionary is infallible.

Logical positivism is an off-shoot of Wittgenstein's Tractatus which I would say is defined by the fact that it bears only one similarity to Wittgenstein's writing: it borrows heavily from his vocabulary. Logical positivists, by misinterpreting Wittgenstein's purpose, make the baffling metaphysical claim that all metaphysical claims are meaningless.

This is a meta-metaphysical claim and it is in fact not a contradiction because we can see the entire scope of metaphysics from our human perspective.

Should any or all of these three schools be relegated to the dustbin of history, or has something been added to philosophy by their inclusion in the history of thought?

Dustbin them if you want, that's exactly where I am putting your philosophy right now. :)

Neil, when someone agrees with 3 entirely different philosophies, it is often a sign that he doesn't understand a single one of them.

Trevor Salyzyn wrote:Neil, when someone agrees with 3 entirely different philosophies, it is often a sign that he doesn't understand a single one of them.

I understand nothing about any of them other than what you condemned them for. If what you typed was the meat of them I would salvage all three though I presume they differ somehow.

I understand nothing about any of them other than what you condemned them for. If what you typed was the meat of them I would salvage all three though I presume they differ somehow.

So, the snake reveals himself. I now have hard evidence that all you do is act contrary to me, and you do it intentionally, no matter what I type. If you are going to behave like this, there simply is no reason for me to talk to you whatsoever. It is raw disrespect. There is nothing to commend this attitude you have adopted.

Trevor Salyzyn wrote:

I understand nothing about any of them other than what you condemned them for. If what you typed was the meat of them I would salvage all three though I presume they differ somehow.

So, the snake reveals himself. I now have hard evidence that all you do is act contrary to me, and you do it intentionally, no matter what I type. If you are going to behave like this, there simply is no reason for me to talk to you whatsoever. It is raw disrespect. There is nothing to commend this attitude you have adopted.

Buddy. From what you said about each of those philosophies I felt as though I agreed with them all on something. This has nothing to do with simply arguing against you.

Neil,

This has nothing to do with simply arguing against you.

Your words ring hollow after the farce of a post you were compelled to write in reply to my first post. You didn't even bother doing any independent research: instead, I was automatically wrong. I am now through talking with you. You are not a stable enough thinker to be worth my time.

Postmodernists are a joke. Bunch of coffee house philosophical wannabes. 'There are no true answers' - they contradict themselves.

And isn't it interesting, looking in the list of optional courses on my faculty, through the semesters we have a wide variety to choose from, and among them are - Wittgenstein's philosophy, Kant's philosophy, Descartes, Quine, Hume, Hegel, French structuralism and post structuralism (I'm craving for this one you can tell)... had anybody heard of Nietzsche, Kierkegaard, Schopenhauer? Who? Naah, let's give 'em 'early christian and medieval philosophy' instead, or how about pragmatism and post pragmatism course, that's got to be more challenging.

Well these sound like mind games. I think that the best philosophers would have their own philosophy on what philosophy is.

To me, it's a shopping list, and science is a shopping list plus all of the prices of each item.

Sometimes post modernism is convenient.

Boyan wrote:Postmodernists are a joke. Bunch of coffee house philosophical wannabes. 'There are no true answers' - they contradict themselves.

Mind-body duality -- the infallibility of concepts and reason.

Neil Melnyk wrote:

Boyan wrote:Postmodernists are a joke. Bunch of coffee house philosophical wannabes. 'There are no true answers' - they contradict themselves.

Mind-body duality -- the infallibility of concepts and reason.

What?

Boyan wrote:

Neil Melnyk wrote:

Boyan wrote:Postmodernists are a joke. Bunch of coffee house philosophical wannabes. 'There are no true answers' - they contradict themselves.

Mind-body duality -- the infallibility of concepts and reason.

What?

"There are no true answers" is only a contradiction when we believe that the concepts (words) we communicate with and think with are infallible. Once we recognize that they evolved for practical purposes in man and that they are not infallible or God-given we can overcome these contradictions.

Neil wrote:

"There are no true answers" is only a contradiction when we believe that the concepts (words) we communicate with and think with are infallible. Once we recognize that they evolved for practical purposes in man and that they are not infallible or God-given we can overcome these contradictions.

You are still using these "practical" words and concepts to arrive at what you think is the truth - namely, that there are no true answers. So in this instance at least, you are treating words and concepts as infallible.

There is a word for this kind of behaviour. It is called hypocrisy .....

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