The Philosurfer

What should we think when philosophy gets weird?

February 28, 2018 by The Philosurfer Leave a Comment

This week we are talking about the Problem of Material Constitution: how can a material object retains its identity through change? To bring the problem into focus, we looked at the Ship of Theseus, a very strange thought experiment. A tempting thought when things get weird is to punt to skepticism. You might think, “This is exactly why I hate philosophers. Why waste your time on pointless questions like this?!” After all, it seems obvious that material things survive change and if philosophy is going to say otherwise then it’s stupid. What can we say about philosophy when it seems to go off the deep end? Here are three ideas.

1. Breaking you down to build you back up

Socrates, one of the progenitors of Western philosophy, was sentenced to death for moral corruption of the youth. I like to believe the following account is why. In a passage in Plato’s Meno, Socrates interrogates Meno into exposing his ignorance about the nature of virtue. This can easily be mistaken for an attack on the existence of virtue itself, but I think Socrates’ purpose is to bring Meno to a better understanding of virtue because he believes such understanding will steel Meno’s resolve to be virtuous in the face of temptation whereas a faulty understanding will cause him to falter. For example, I might resist trying heroin because my parents told me so, but I’ll be much more likely to reject it if I see its effect on others and learn the staggering statistics of misery.

In the same way, when philosophy gets wacky such as in the case of material constitution, we might not have to construe our inquiry as destructive. Imagine the Ship of Theseus paradox actually happens. Someone takes all the replaced planks, rebuilds the ship, and posts it on eBay. Had you already bought the continuous ship, seeing the eBay advertisement might shake your faith in the existence of material objects. Wouldn’t it be nice to have a theory as to how material objects can retain their identity through time? Maybe that’s all we’re after when we talk about the Problem of Material Constitution.

2. Philosophy takes time

One of my favorite quotes about philosophy comes from Harm J.M.J. Gorris. When evaluating a philosophical theory that would have us reject a common-sense view of the world, Gorris says, “I think philosophy must first do its homework and present an airtight, non-circular argument before it may dismiss such an intuitive insight as mere illusion.” That stuck with me because it resolved an issue that had been haunting me. When he converted to theism, then-renowned atheist A.J. Ayer gave the rationale that we must, “Follow the evidence, wherever it leads.” What bothered me about that quote was that throughout history people have thought up new arguments for and against God. What if the evidence changes just a little tomorrow so that it slightly favors the opposite? For me, faith is life-changing. Am I to change my life with the academic wind?

Gorris’ quote is important to me because it reminds me that we don’t need to throw out our beliefs just because some new, wacky doctrine comes along. Philosophy actually takes a long, long time to advance, and what is philosophically fashionable today needs some time under its belt before it can be established. Philosophers are working daily to show why philosophical theories are untenable. It could easily be the case that the new, cutting-edge theory of today is the cautionary tale of tomorrow. Maybe when philosophy gets weird, we should just wait.

3. The world is weird

In college, a friend of mine ran into a tree so hard that his legs and arms literally shot out like on a cartoon. It was one of the greatest moments of my life and I still cherish the memory. However, if we are being scientifically accurate, he never did run into the tree. Our best science has led us to conclude all physical objects are actually made up of much smaller particles that never truly touch each other. Both my friend and the tree are made up of a tiny fraction of a percentage of stuff, and the rest is empty space. Instead of hitting the tree, the electrons in my friend were unable to fill the correct role in the atoms of the tree and vice versa due to some bizarre atomic property. When we look at my friend and the tree, however, it certainly doesn’t look that way. It looks like both are totally solid, filled-in objects that smack into each other. In other words, the world is a lot weirder than it initially looks.

Philosophy makes strange claims at times. Sometimes it is only for the sake of better understanding of common sense, sometimes it’s just because philosophy hasn’t had enough time to work things out, but it might be just because the world is weird. If science has established that the world is totally different than it appears, then maybe we should expect the same of philosophy. It would be odd to say that the world isn’t as intuitive as it seems after we’ve done science, but then we do philosophy and it’s totally what we anticipated. Maybe weird is just what we should expect.

Instagram Meddling in Russian Election?

February 21, 2018 by The Philosurfer Leave a Comment

Rational egoism is the idea that the only rational choices people can make are those that maximize their own benefit. In this week’s series, we explored how this applies to individuals, but a further question remains as to how groups can make rational choices. The issue becomes especially poignant when we consider groups we treat as individuals, such as corporations. To illustrate, let’s take a look at a recent development amongst American companies in Russia.

Alexey Navalmy was the only legitimate threat to president Vladmir Putin in the upcoming elections, but that all changed when he was accused of corruption by the Russian government—a move he claims was politically motivated. However, Nvalmy continues to attempt to depose the current powers in Russia, most recently through a video accusing deputy prime minister Sergei Prikhodko of accepting bribery. To do so, he used media showing the deputy prime minister on a businessman’s private yacht. The Russian government ordered him to take the media down and he refused to comply. They then told Instagram and YouTube to take down the offending material and hinted they might block access to the country in case they were disobeyed. Clearly, both companies would stand to lose a great deal of advertisement money if they were blocked from a country as big as Russia. Facebook, who owns Instagram, complied while Google, who owns YouTube, has not (at least at the time of this writing).

Who is making the right choice? If we want to say an American corporation should have no concern about how a foreign government rules itself, then we should also agree it is okay for American companies to sell the material used in NBC weapons to dictators that employ them on their own people. If, on the other hand, we want to say American corporations should get fully involved in how a foreign government rules its own nation, we will be resurrecting imperialism. Probably the truth lies somewhere in between. In this case, however, Instagram and YouTube have a much greater responsibility, because they are providing the platforms of speech. If people are able to access the state’s information but not the dissenting side’s information, then these corporations are providing the means to squash free speech. So, assuming Putin’s regime is fixing the future election, covering up corruption, and blocking free speech, Instagram is at least facilitating crimes. If YouTube gets blocked, they will not be facilitating these crimes, but will be losing a lot of money for themselves and shareholders. The question is whether Instagram is right for worrying about losing money or YouTube is right for worrying about being complicit in the corruption of a foreign government.

Interestingly, this debate shares similarities to our topic for the week. In laissez faire capitalism, it is thought that the goal of corporations is to maximize profit. An obvious objection is that this means corporations should act in morally reprehensible ways, but these philosophers of economy respond that such behavior would be far more likely to result in loss of profit due to competition (e.g., if they cut corners, people will buy from competitor corporations). If corporations are acting rationally and if there is sufficient competition, then they must act in a way that is commensurate with what we typically take to be moral. It is assumed that corporations will act rationally, so the only thing we must concern ourselves with is the sufficiency of competition, something laissez faire economists believe should be ensured by the government. Of course, this is a problem when the corporation is operating outside of the government’s jurisdiction, is operating under a corrupt government, or the nature of the product is such that there can be little competition. All of these are issues in the current case. Instagram is operating outside of the US, it is operating in a notoriously corrupt country, and is a platform not easy to leave because the connections people make on it aren’t transferable (notice that YouTube might hold the first two criteria in common with Instagram, but it is much easier to imagine transferring my material to Vimeo).

It may seem like laissez faire capitalism is just rational egoism applied to corporations instead of individuals, but there is a premise here that is not present in rational egoism. Both views hold that the only rational option is to benefit the chooser, but laissez faire capitalism makes the further claim that the benefit is profit, whereas rational egoism leaves the nature of the benefit open. Because of this, a rational egoist could argue that the right choice is whatever contributes to the common good because it benefits the user more to live in a world where everyone is happy than in one where she hoards all goods. A drawback to this view is that it no longer becomes clear what choice should be made. The laissez faire capitalist has a clear aim: get that money. A rational egoist aiming at the ‘common good’ isn’t totally sure what that means or how to get there. However, he will be much more likely to act in a way we find acceptable than the laissez faire capitalist.

I don’t claim to know what YouTube or Instagram should do. Maybe their goal should be profit—though I find this repugnant—in which case Instagram is right. Maybe their goal should be to most benefit their corporations, in which case it’s hard to see what other benefit there could be for such an entity than profit. However, if their goal should be to most benefit their members, then it is very plausible that YouTube is right. What do you think?

Human Choice and 3 Reasons Science Needs Philosophy

February 7, 2018 by The Philosurfer Leave a Comment

This week we explored the ultimate nature of human motivation (see my videos here, here, and here). Let’s say Reyna risks her livelihood to convince her friend Kylo Ron to leave his evil organization and join her good one. Why would she do so? A psychological egoist would say Reyna must do so because she is getting something out of it, even if she doesn’t realize this. It may be that Kylo Ron would be a great asset to her organization or maybe she will just feel good about herself for helping him. Whatever it is, it is ultimately because of the benefit to her that she actually chooses to do so, even if it appears to her that it is for another reason. A psychological altruist believes Reyna might help Kylo Ron s olely for his sake, even if she gets some benefit as well. A final view believes Reyna might help Kylo Ron just because she feels a sense of duty or obligation to help out those in need.

One thing that is interesting about this question is that it is an empirical one, so it’s not solely–or even essentially–the domain of philosophy. It is tempting to project our philosophy onto the situation. We might, for example, want Reyna to act altruistically because we believe acting selflessly is what makes an act moral. Or we might want it to be impossible that Reyna act any way but selfishly because we believe capitalism requires acting in our own best interests. However, if we are asking why someone made a particular choice, there is no pre-theoretical reason to believe one way or the other. Instead, we must look to science for an explanation.

It is the job of the experimental psychologist to determine the actual motivation of a human choice. She must devise experiments in which human agents are presented with a choice and the most reasonable prediction differs given each possible view. Subjects should then be tested accordingly with all appropriate variables controlled (e.g., subjects should probably not know they are being observed at the time). The result will tell us what actually motivates human choice. For example, if the hypothesis is that Reyna isonly helping Kylo Ron because he will help her organization, have Kylo Ron pretend to lose his powers. If it’s that Reyna just wants to feel good about herself for helping, devise a way that she would feel bad for helping (e.g., maybe everybody, including Kylo, would tell her they would hate her for helping him). After whittling away possible motivations, we will hopefully be left with the true one.

We may be tempted to think that if this is the case, why do we even need philosophy? Here are three ways philosophy is important in this question.

First, we use philosophy to clarify the question. I said we are asking what does motivate human choice, but we could also be asking what could and what should motivate our choices. The latter question can be pragmatic or ethical, but it is not a scientific question. However, as we saw on the video, it is easy to confuse these questions. A philosopher can help untangle issues like this.

Second, philosophy can help us clarify our terms. For example, a psychological egoist might claim Reyna is acting selfishly because she is fulfilling her desires. This can’t be right, however, because Reyna might desire what is best for Kylo Ron. If that’s the case, then she would be acting altruistically. So, if a scientist were to devise a test to see if Reyna acts without any desires, she would be missing the whole point. Analyzing concepts is a philosopher’s job, not a psychologist’s, so philosophy is an important tool here.

Finally, experimental psychology is not as precise as some sciences, such as physics. Sometimes science gives us great evidence for believing a theory, but that is usually when we can easily measure things. The reasons and desires of people are opaque to observers because they reside in the mind, and we cannot see the minds of others. We can observe our own minds, but only reflectively. It may be the case the experimental psychology gives us some reasons to think one way, but philosophy is needed to push us over the edge into belief. For example, maybe Reyna chooses to help Kylo Ron even to her own detriment, but there is always the possibility that she is self-deceived and subconsciously believes everything will work out alright. However, if philosophy could (and I’m not saying it can) give us a solid account of free will, we could show how Reyna’s altruistic choice is at least possible, and this would give us reason to believe that she really did want what’s best for Kylo Ron. Even if he did kill Don Solo.

Is Philosophy against My Faith?

January 11, 2018 by The Philosurfer Leave a Comment

I’m not Episcopalian, but I used to teach Introduction to Philosophy at an Episcopal school. One year, a student told me she was surprised the school offered my class because she thought it was antithetical to the faith. I reassured her that although there were a good deal of non-Christian philosophers that rejected Christianity on philosophical grounds, there were also a good deal of Christian philosophers who thought philosophy supported their beliefs. She surprised me, however, by saying that this was just the problem.

(Warning: this is a philosophy blog, not a Bible study! What follows is definitely of interest as an exercise in reasoning, but my main goal is to assuage people who are afraid the Bible disallows them to do philosophy.)

Hebrews 11:6 says, “And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him.” Philosophy, however, seeks knowledge about just such things as God’s existence. Some would argue that you can’t believe in something if you know it. If this is so, then if philosophy is successful in showing God exists, then it would make it impossible to please God.

I don’t think this is the right interpretation, however, as there are other passages in the Bible that seem to teach Christians should engage in just such endeavors. In 1 Peter 3:15, Christians are admonished to “Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect….” Giving a reason for belief in God sounds a lot like what we were worried about before. Further, in the Book of Acts, the apostle Paul (the author of a great deal of the New Testament of the Bible) engages with philosophers (Stoics and Epicureans) on Mars Hill. He doesn’t tell them to quit their jobs, but rather reasons (or philosophizes?) with them. In this context, Paul is set out as a person to emulate. So, it seems like far from being something to avoid, Christians should engage their faith through philosophy.

How are we to resolve the tension between the different passages? I think there are several possibilities. First, it could be (and likely is) the case that we can never get total, indubitable knowledge of God’s existence through philosophy and must content ourselves with good reasons for believing in God (if they are available). If this is so, the problem is mitigated. It would still be the case that philosophy reduces the need for faith, but it would never obviate this need. If it’s also the case that pleasing God is proportional to the amount of faith we must rely on–i.e. more faith = more pleasing–then philosophy would lessen the amount God would be pleased, but it would also be commanded of us so that it is a necessary evil.

A more likely possibility, however, is that the two kinds of faith are different. In the latter case, the concern is for convincing others of God’s existence and the Christian soteriological plan (plan of salvation). However, Hebrews 11 is talking about living a life of trust in God. I’ll explain the difference through an analogy.

When my oldest son was very young, he was fascinated by fire. He kept trying to touch the flame on the stove top and I had to keep telling him not to. Eventually, I gave him a little smack on the hand. I know, corporal punishment, right? But, it was all I could do to save his poor little hand from being burned. Of course, the little man couldn’t understand why I would do this. “Why would dad keep me from what I want?” I mean, think about it: fire is bright, it moves in really cool ways, and it feels nicer the closer you get to it (up to a point). Why would dad not only keep it from me, but even inflict pain on me! He didn’t understand why, but he did know that I loved him and that I knew better than him, and for that reason he chose to trust me. I think this is the kind of faith the writer of Hebrews is interested in. In order to please God, you have to trust him even when you don’t understand why something happens to you because you know He is wiser than you and He loves you. If that’s what the author means, then there is no conflict between this kind of faith and philosophical investigation.

Net Neutrality: How to Think about It

January 6, 2018 by The Philosurfer Leave a Comment

Net Neutrality is currently a huge point of contention in the United States. What is the issue and why do people disagree? A philosopher’s job is to understand the perspective of others to the best of her ability. For that reason, we are very excited to present a new series at thephilosurfer.com: The Philosurfer’s World, a look at current events from a philosopher’s perspective. I have three videos relating to Net Neutrality. In the first, I explain the issue as objectively as I can, and then I explain the philosophical perspective undergirding both sides of the issue so that we can better understand the reasons they give for their positions. In the next two videos, I consider some of the more important arguments for and against Net Neutrality respectively. Finally, on this post I have collected all the arguments, objections, and responses I have discovered. You can review them to see what you think and comment here if I missed anything so I can update this blog post. With your help, we will have a comprehensive view of the issue and will be better equipped to decide what we think about Net Neutrality.

KEY

A1 = Argument 1 (i.e., “reason to believe this”)

O1 = Objection 1 (i.e., “reason to doubt this”)

S1 = Support 1

R1 = Response 1

Arguments for these Net Neutrality rules

A1: without these regulations, ISPs are able to slow or block access to certain websites, which restricts free speech
- O1: the same is true for television and radio: we don’t force television stations to provide a platform for every view
  - R1: most websites are different than airtime because the competition for bandwidth (for non-streaming websites) is much smaller than for airtime
- O2: if an ISP blocked or slowed access to websites for speech reasons, people would stop using that ISP and they would lose money, so they wouldn’t do so
  - R1: most people don’t have much choice of ISPs, so ISPs wouldn’t lose any business
  - R2: they could do so without us knowing
    - O1: it is the FTC’s job to protect us from that
  - R3: some ISPs own some content providers, so it might be worth it for them to slow other content provides
    - S1: Apple blocks us from some apps so we are forced to use their apps, yet we still buy iPhones
- O3: the government could do the same if we give them power over the internet
- O4: restricting free speech is illegal for other reasons
A2: it’s not fair that people that people that can afford it can buy faster internetI.e., this would make a “fast lane for the rich,” which isn’t fair
- O1: this could be a benefit for poor people
  - S1: I could pay less if I don’t stream
  - S2: if it’s worth it to me, I could pay more and have my internet even faster
  - R1: more likely that ISPs will slow down internet for those who can’t afford it
    - Remember: people that hold this position distrust big business
- O2: this is totally fair, it’s just not something people like
- O3: content providers do this too
  - S1: Facebook and Instagram are always asking for money to boost the posts of commercial pages
A3: removing Net Neutrality rules makes an uncompetitive environment for small businesses
- S1: big businesses can partner with ISPs; competing small businesses can get slower connection so that people will be much less likely to wait around for their pages to load
- O1: this is an FTC problem
- O2: this is a problem in every industry
  - S1: Walmart has pushed out small businesses throughout the United States employing similar tactics
A4: removing Net Neutrality rules makes an uncompetitive environment amongst ISPs
- S1: ISPs can partner with or purchase content providers and have exclusive rights to them
  - I.e., you may have to go through Verizon to use Facebook
- O1: the problem isn’t these rules, but the fact that local governments require kickbacks for infrastructure, which makes it impossible for small ISPs to survive
  - S1: Google fiber thrived in cities that didn’t demand kickbacks
  - R1: this may be an additional problem, but it doesn’t prove that removing Net Neutrality rules isn’t also a factor
A5: the internet is so important should be a considered a public utility
- O1: we don’t get many technological advances in public utility because there is no incentive for it; treating ISPs like that would result in the same stagnation
A6: Chairman Pai pushed this through because he is really working with Verizon
- O1: genetic fallacy
A7: dictating what information we have access to is fascism
- O1: ISPs aren’t government, so they can’t be fascist
- O2: argument by popular appeal

Arguments against these Net Neutrality rules

A1: these are unnecessary rules because there was no problem with the internet before they were created
- I.e., this is a “solution in search of a problem”
- O1: these are meant to be proactive rules
  - R1: there is no way to tell how this technology will change, so there is no way to tell what kinds of rules we should adopt
    - O1: we can make wiser choices, even if they aren’t perfect
A2: stifles innovation
- S1: there is no incentive for ISPs to improve because they will have to make the same one-size-fits-all plans
  - S1: maybe there is some super-fast, incredibly cheap way of providing service to individual consumers, but ISPs won’t try to discover it if it doesn’t benefit them at all
A3: other factors slow down streaming services, so there will never be exactly equal service anyway
- O1: doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try to make it as equal as possible
- O2: there are unjust ways of things being unequal
  - S1: say two people want to play basketball; they are unequal in height and unequal in economic status; it would be okay for the NBA to discriminate for the former but not the latter reason
A4: this is the jurisdiction of the FTC or congress, not the FCC
- S1: the FCC gets its powers from Federal Communications Act, but this doesn’t mention the power to tell ISPs how they can distribute content
  - O1 (FCC): indirect authority- Congress’s instructions in the 1996 Telecommunications Act, which requires the commission to promote broadband deployment and adoption across the country, so the FCC should make sure it’s not restricted in any way
- O1: the FTC can’t make rules
  - R1: they can, but rarely do
- O2: the FTC is meant to be reactive not proactive, but this doesn’t protect consumers
  - R1: part of their mission is to prevent anticompetitive practices
- O3: as a matter of practice, the FTC doesn’t step in unless consumers have been deceived
  - R1: this means the FTC should be improved
    - O1: until we do so, we need the rules in place, and the FCC has done the job
A5: President Obama forced the FCC to implement these regulations b/c he couldn’t get the laws passed
- O1: internal documents show that’s not true
- O2: genetic fallacy
A6: these rules are socialism
- O1: they are no more socialist than public utilities
- O2: argument by popular appeal

Is philosophy totally useless?

December 22, 2017 by The Philosurfer Leave a Comment

“When will we ever need to know this? What’s the point?” The question is a semester killer. Until now, most of your students have trudged through the blizzard of information that is your class, naively assuming there is a point. Now they are all jutted upright in exasperation, waiting for your assurances. Surely, you will assuage them with purpose. You are the teacher. You will know why.

“Because it will be on the test,” you say. You blew it. You just told them your class is nothing more than a hurdle to college and career. You serve no purpose but to stand in the way. You are a speed bump. But, this isn’t why you became an expert in your field. You didn’t major in this because it was on the test. Why did you need to know this?

A better answer would have been to show students what they could do with the knowledge you provide. Want to launch rockets? Here’s how to use physics to get your first one going. Like travel? Here’s how to use Spanish to get an experience the average tourist could never hope for. Like money? Here’s how to use math to make it rain. Most people won’t go on to be teachers in your subject—which is good because if everyone were a teacher, we’d have no food, shelter, or surfboards. Showing students how your knowledge helps them do what they want to do makes your knowledge something they want.

However, that’s probably not why you majored in this. It isn’t usually the case that Physics teachers are just former rocket scientists, Spanish teachers are just travelers, or Math teachers are just rich (or have any money at all). No, there is something about the knowledge itself that fascinates people. It should be mind-blowing that we can use physical equations to perfectly plan the trajectory of a projectile. It should be incredible that we can describe how an entire language works through a few rules. It should be awesome that we can use numbers to predict the future of a market. That’s what inspires people to dedicate themselves to something. When knowledge is for the sake of something else it is good, but only as a means to an end. When knowledge is for its own sake, then it is good in and of itself.

There is precious little you can do with the philosophy. You won’t send anyone to the moon, you won’t communicate with foreigners (though you’ll sound like one), and you definitely won’t make money (believe me). But that isn’t why people study it in the first place. After years of teaching philosophy, I am convinced now more than ever that it houses the questions people love most. What are we: souls, animals, machines, illusions? What is happiness and what is the point of this life? Is God real and if so what is God like? How can I know whether this is all just a dream or that I’m not the only person among very realistic robots? Is it better to save a life or respect cultural beliefs? Some have argued that these questions are pointless. Maybe. Some say they are a waste of time. Okay. But, no one says they are uninteresting. And, if something done for its own sake is good, then it is good to philosophize.

Objections to Philosophy Are Impossible

December 20, 2017 by The Philosurfer Leave a Comment

It is impossible to lodge a reasoned objection to philosophy without doing philosophy. This should be considered irrefutable evidence that we can’t rationally reject philosophy. However, interestingly enough, I’ve found this to be the least effective response to objections to philosophy. How is it possible that such strong evidence convince so few? Watch the video!

After the video, see a little expounding below.
In this episode, I say objections to philosophy are self-refuting, and you may have felt a little confused by this. To say a claim is ‘self-refuting’ means that it is false by its own standards. Here are some examples.

“Never listen to what a philosopher says.” Making a claim includes wanting others to listen to you, but this claim tells you not to listen to me. It says something like this: “Listen: don’t listen.”
“I can’t type a word!” I made this claim by typing, so if the claim were true, I couldn’t have made it.
Finally, “I don’t speak a word of English.” I mentioned this claim in the episode. I made this claim in English, so it can’t be the case that I don’t speak a word of English.

But—hold on! Surely you can truly say, «No hablo español,» right? Maybe someone would say you were wrong or lying or making nonsense, but imagine the following scenario. You are walking down the street and someone stops you who only speaks Spanish. The only three Spanish words you know are no, hablo, and español. Should you not say «No hablo español»? Would it be a lie? Or, false? Few would say you shouldn’t say it, but they might not all agree as to why. Some might say it is false, but you should still say it because it will be helpful. Some might say language is used because it elicits a desired action, not because it is meaningful, so there is no problem in the first place.

One interesting solution is to say that almost all claims we make include assumed but unspoken qualifications. For example, we might say, “There’s nothing to eat!” but we don’t mean there is literally nothing to eat. When we make this claim, all interlocutors assume qualifications like in this house or that I want to eat. When we say «No hablo español,» we are assuming qualifications like aside from these words or enough to communicate with you. So, just because a claim is literally self-refuting doesn’t necessarily mean it is self-refuting. Instead, we have to determine what the speaker intends to communicate first, and then determine if it’s self-refuting.

Beggars Can’t Be Choosers? Philosophy and Choice

December 15, 2017 by The Philosurfer Leave a Comment

One day when I lived in Philadelphia a homeless person asked me for money. Normally I would offer to buy him food rather than give him money because I knew there was a problem with drug and alcohol abuse amongst the homeless and I was afraid I might be enabling an epidemic. On this particular day, however, I was running late for something very important. I couldn’t stop to buy something—but I did have a $20 bill in my pocket. I thought quickly: this money could really help someone trying to get back on his feet, or it could really do a lot of damage to someone struggling with addiction. Should I give it to him and hope for the best? Should I withhold it and risk letting someone go hungry? What choice should I make? What would you choose?

One choice would be to give it no thought and just do whatever I felt like doing. However, imagine someone who lived in such an impulsive way: acting purely on desire and without any thought. Such a person (a ‘wanton,’ to use Harry Frankfurt’s term) would be little better than a wild animal: giving or keeping, helping or harming, hugging or strangling with whatever whim happens upon her. Such a capricious life has never been attractive to me, so this wasn’t really a choice. I needed a thoughtful decision.

The problem is that there are so many considerations that choices like this can be confusing. Here are three examples:

Is it best to give people the means to make their own choice or is it best to give them an environment that is most conducive to success?
Is it better to have a society where people help each other or one where people are independent?
Why should I help someone in the first place?

These questions are, respectively, questions of human nature, political philosophy, and ethics. In other words, these are philosophical questions, and they have a direct impact on our lives.

On that Philly sidewalk, I didn’t have the time to sift through all these criteria; I had only a few moments to act. Philosophy is something best done when we have time to sit and consider, not on the fly. So, one reason we have to do philosophy (and read philosophy blog posts) is that it will help us to make the difficult decisions that arise in life.

I make my own meaning! And, 3 reasons why you still need philosophy

December 12, 2017 by The Philosurfer 1 Comment

In a recent video, I argued we should do philosophy to (a) discover the meaning of life, or (b) determine there is no meaning of life. Maybe we can avoid this dilemma with a third option?

Consider a line from the 1992 classic film Wayne’s World. “It could happen. Yeah, and monkeys might fly out of my butt.” The sentence literally means it is possible that small primates take wing and exit Wayne’s anus. Notice, however, that Wayne is being sarcastic. The meaning he is communicating is actually the opposite of the literal meaning. You might think this shows the meaning of an act of speech depends on the speaker’s intention (for more, see Paul Grice). And, maybe we can say something similar about the meaning of life?

Call the way a thing is outside of the mind ‘objective‘ and the way it is inside the mind ‘subjective.’ In the aforementioned video, I claimed that, if life is meaningful, we must do philosophy to discover what that meaning is. To say life’s meaning must be discovered seems to imply it is objective: outside of the mind to be discovered, like a planet. Maybe the meaning of life is subjective: determined by the one who lives it like the meaning of an act of speech is determined by the one who speaks it. If that’s the case, we might think, we don’t need philosophy to discover the meaning of life because we just make it up ourselves without philosophy.

However, I think we will still need philosophy, and here are three reasons why.

1. We need philosophy to know our options

If I choose my own meaning of life, I will have several options: building something lasting, helping others, living pleasurably, etc. In each case, I will need to know the reasons for and against that option and the possible consequences. For example, let’s say I dedicate my life to patriotism. What if an evil genius rises to power and begins the Fourth Reich in my country? If I find that unacceptable, will I have to abandon the patriot option right now? Maybe I could say the Fourth Reich is an impostor organization and I will be patriotic to the true country, but what constitutes the true country? Just people who agree with me? I will need to do philosophy to sift through these issues.

2. Even if meaning is only subjective, I can only figure that out through philosophy

Even if we totally determine our own meaning, we aren’t absolutely certain that is the case. For all we know, objective meaning could exist, and not living our lives accordingly would mean our lives were unsuccessful. Worse, there could be great repercussions if we don’t live our lives according to their objective meaning (e.g., delay of moksha, hell). So, we should do philosophy to make sure meaning is not objective.

3. Subjective meaning might just be another word for self-deception

If the meaning of life is subjective, it is either because (a) there is an objective meaning of life, which is to determine our own subjective meaning, or (b) there is no meaning of life but we can make up our own. If (a), then there is an objective meaning that we must discover. We will need philosophy to find out our meaning comes from determining a subjective meaning for ourselves.

Possibility (b), however, seems wrongheaded. Imagine I believed I had a grasshopper that lived in my head and guided me in right and wrong, but there was no real grasshopper there. You wouldn’t say there was a subjective grasshopper; you would say I was deluded. In the same way, if the meaning of my life is only in my mind, then even if it directs my actions it is a fiction.

So, it seems subjective meaning either implies objective meaning or is an illusion, and in either case we will want to do philosophy to find out.

Meaning of Life

December 11, 2017 by The Philosurfer Leave a Comment

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