tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4464222071440015933.post4120655779446124888..comments2024-01-23T17:14:04.067-05:00Comments on Jaltcoh: The philosopher paradoxJohn Althouse Cohenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11703450281424023177noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4464222071440015933.post-57318839662834483582009-03-06T23:45:00.000-05:002009-03-06T23:45:00.000-05:00I think Russell defends philosophy better than I e...I think Russell defends philosophy better than I ever could, so I won't bother here. <BR/><BR/>The job market for philosophers is...well...lousy, so this means that it had better be 'a calling' for you, because it's difficult to rationalize the decision by pointing to the great jobs to be had. Not many people are willing to devote 6-8 years of study for a 50% chance of getting a 60-80K job. An MBA student would die of hysteria if someone informed him that those were his chances after graduation.<BR/><BR/>If someone said, "You have to be supersmart to be a rocket scientist", would anyone second-guess him? I don't think so. Doing philosophy at a high level is pretty much the same, but even fewer people have such an ability than those who can learn rocket science.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4464222071440015933.post-59968703721097387322009-01-07T15:12:00.000-05:002009-01-07T15:12:00.000-05:00Philosophy shouldn't be an excuse for driving ones...<I>Philosophy shouldn't be an excuse for driving oneself crazy over minutiae.</I><BR/><BR/>Bingo!<BR/>Not when we've got theology for that...Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4464222071440015933.post-30286197618942391812009-01-05T12:50:00.000-05:002009-01-05T12:50:00.000-05:00"The rational life is the best life" -- is that tr..."The rational life is the best life" -- is that true? Has anyone ever proven it? "The purpose of philosophy is to arrive at correct answers." Is that true?<BR/><BR/>There are people who love to think, and in many cases to write about what they think. Everything they think may be wrong. Thinking may lead them into difficulties in life, of a kind and degree which differ in an unknown way from the difficulties they would otherwise have had. Should they be barred from, or bar themselves, or be cautioned against, philosophy, as Plato wanted to banish the poets? <BR/><BR/>Hannah Arendt said (somewhere!) that since ultimate answers are not to be found, the purpose of philosophy is to stand exposed in, enwrapped by, the "wind of thought," as a lifelong meditation, a flow experience (the word "flow" hadn't yet been used in that context but I think it applies). The life of love for thought. She intuited that that was the experience of the ancient Greeks: what made you a philosopher was the life of asking questions, whether or not you found the right answer. <BR/><BR/>If the questions, the problems, are trivial, or if they are asked tendentiously, then of course that's worth pointing out. Philosophy shouldn't be an excuse for driving oneself crazy over minutiae.Richard Lawrence Cohenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01951947957345891398noreply@blogger.com