Sphinx
Nov 19 2007, 01:47 PM
I've come to the conclusion that modern entertainment is killing philosophy. People don't think anymore because of quick and easy distractions. This lack of thought is causing the decline in modern philosophy. Your thoughts?
Zarathustra
Nov 20 2007, 10:39 AM
It is not only entertainment and the dwelling always in the passing moment (especially with football), but the unwillingness to spend more than twenty minutes on subjects which require attention. Too many individuals want the gratification of having the answer in 500 words or less.
Far too often, our educational institutions have become the slave to making education both practical and entertaining, and ill prepare their students for independent thinking, or with the background necessary to reach beyond their own time. Benda, in a forgotten book, argued that by politicising thinking, the intellectuals had committed treason; in this, he was probably correct, but the treason to civilisation extends now to the religionising of thinking, to their abdication of any sort of standard different from a show of hands at the moment, and to their pandering to the average.
What is least thought about in our modern age, to echo Heidegger, is thinking itself. Any sort of intellectual effort (reading philosophy, DOING philosophy) should guide our thoughts beyond the commonplace, and lead us---often by difficult and hidden paths--- to secluded spaces where we find ourselves dwelling amid encompasing thoughts. Far too many want their thinking easy, quick, and above all CERTAIN.
Thus rants Zarathustra
solaris32
Nov 24 2007, 04:13 AM
When all the good stuff has already been thought about, what more is there to think about without repeating what has already been said?
JohnWho
Nov 24 2007, 09:00 AM
Yeah, why waste brain power thinking previously though thoughts?
I stopped thinking a long time ago.
Zarathustra
Nov 24 2007, 09:31 AM
Well, all the good moves in chess have already been thought of, and carefully discussed in MCO, but millions still play the game. Or one could possibly say the same thing about music, that every tune has already been written, so why bother to compose new music?
Philosophy is an open endeavor of human civilisation, and its attempt to provide a unified, coherent, and complete picture of the ever-expanding known universe seems to imply that the data upon it is grounded will thus influence the picture philosophy attempts to provide. Consider the advances in our knowledge of DNA, or our exploration of space and its influence on explanations.
For its own sake and as such, then philosophy is not a closed perspective, and even though we often compare differing philosophies, we generally accept some and reject others---no world view seems completely adequate to the task and no world view has had universal acceptance. Then, too, the acquaintance with perspectives other than our own, or the current givens, adds a depth and variety to the ways we look at ourselves and understand the world in which we live.
As a practical activity, philosophy serves as a tool to enhance our ability to think critically. By following reasoned arguments propounded by great thinkers and by learning to apply logic to statements and claims, we are less likely to blindly adhere to propaganda and shout the slogans of ideologues.
Z
Zarathustra
Nov 24 2007, 10:49 AM
(Aside)
I wonder if Kant would have been as profound as he was if he had carried a cellphone on his famous walks, or Descartes if he had turned on the TV while he meditated on the famous piece of wax.
Z
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