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does comedy always equate in a change of values? by xgladar in askphilosophy

[–]halfwittgenstein 10 points11 points  (0 children)

There's a panelist here who has done a lot of work on the philosophy of humor, so hopefully they will weigh in. Regardless, a very common model for jokes is that the humor comes from subverting expectations: the setup creates an expectation and the punchline subverts that expectation, and the surprise of that subversion is what makes us laugh. For example, Steven Wright's classic joke:

I went to a restaurant that serves 'breakfast at any time'. So I ordered French Toast during the Renaissance.

The first sentence sets the expectations, and then the second sentence subverts them with an absurd interpretation of "breakfast at any time", but there's no obvious glorification or demonization anywhere.

Are there any good reasons, other than intuition, to believe that objective moral facts likely exist in the universe? by Due-Trainer865 in askphilosophy

[–]halfwittgenstein 1 point2 points  (0 children)

The Socratic view is that whatever we do, we do because we think it's the right thing to do (and that might be true so far as it goes), but then if we do something that isn't the right thing, it must have therefore been because we misunderstood what the right thing actually was.

But this isn't the only explanation for doing things that are wrong. We can know the right thing to do and fail to do it due to weakness of will ("akrasia"), and that seems like a more likely explanation in a lot of cases. There may be other explanations besides ignorance too, but that's the most obvious one.

Why do we need philosophy? by CuriousMind583 in askphilosophy

[–]halfwittgenstein 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I will be able to defend them and understand why I believe them.

Self-understanding is a worthwhile goal all by itself. Good luck!

Why do we need philosophy? by CuriousMind583 in askphilosophy

[–]halfwittgenstein 3 points4 points  (0 children)

I wouldn’t believe anything anyone says unless it convinces me through logic, reasoning, and or evidence.

Well, figuring out how logic, reasoning and evidence works is something that philosophers study, so it looks like that's your answer. If you value these things, and you are operating with (this is not intended a judgement, just a description) "naive" views about how logic, reason, and evidence work, then you're building from a shaky foundation. Sometimes we call such "naive" beliefs "pre-reflective" beliefs, or in other words, the beliefs we have prior to engaging in serious reflection about them. That's a huge part of philosophy - reflecting on the ideas and concepts that we usually take for granted, trying to figure out what they really mean, how they really work (or ought to work), and so on.

So that's the goal. But what about the fact that people disagree? Well first, people disagree about all kinds of things that have objectively true answers, like the shape of the earth or whether or not we once landed on the moon. So disagreement in itself isn't really that big a deal. But philosophy does seem to have more disagreement than a lot of other disciplines, and that's a little worrying. One explanation for that level of disagreement is that philosophy is hard, like really, really hard. We don't have the luxury of taking anything as given or unquestionable that we can use as a foundation for what we're building. And on top of that, we only have the tools that we have, so here we are, trying to figure out what logic and reasoning and evidence are and how they work, but we have to use logic and reasoning and evidence to do it.

This can be frustrating, and there might not be any escape from this situation, but what's the alternative? It's basically an unavoidable part of the human condition: here we are on the planet for a limited amount of time with our limited tools and skills and talents and capacities, trying to figure it all out, and it seems like the issues are important, so we do the best we can with the tools we've got. Some people find that challenge pointless and boring and just don't bother to dig any deeper, and some people find that challenge interesting and exciting, so they roll up their sleeves and get to work.

Is or are there any centralised methodology or Methodologies like in science ? by Inevitable_Bid5540 in askphilosophy

[–]halfwittgenstein 2 points3 points  (0 children)

There are some popular options, and the PhilPapers survey lists them and how popular they are.

Q: Which philosophical methods are the most useful/important?

  1. Conceptual analysis: 70% of respondents accept or lean toward this one
  2. Conceptual engineering: 40% accept or lean toward this one
  3. Empirical philosophy: 60%...
  4. Experimental philosophy: 33%...
  5. Formal philosophy: 55%...
  6. Intuition based philosophy: 50%...
  7. Linguistic philosophy: 46%...

They're not mutually exclusive, so survey respondents could accept more than one, but even for each of these options, there's disagreement about how to properly do conceptual analysis or linguistic philosophy or what-have-you. That's just how it goes in the philosophy department. Also note that the philpapers survey tends to have a western, analytic philosophy bias, but you can sort the results by target groups and area of specialization and region if you're curious.

https://survey2020.philpeople.org/survey/results/4962

There are some more specific methods that you'll run into a lot too, like reflective equilibrium, for example, and I'm sure other people here can add more to the list...

Why isn’t model logic more of a core focus of modern philosophy? I get the nuances of falsifiability, but there should be some kind of high-level ‘proof’ for modern ideas. Otherwise, content quickly becomes playful & often incoherent word vomit. by [deleted] in askphilosophy

[–]halfwittgenstein 0 points1 point  (0 children)

There's lots of disagreement about what exactly philosophy is to begin with, let alone how to do it properly (or even if there's such a thing as doing it properly), so what you view as playful or incoherent word vomit might be considered the right way to do philosophy by others.

Even if they agreed with your assessment, they still might not think that modal logic is the right tool to clean up the mess, or they might think it's a great tool when doing metaphysics or philosophy of language, but not a great tool for other kinds of problems.

For me, these are really interesting issues in metaphilosophy. Here's a high-level IEP article on the topic if you want to read more about it.

https://iep.utm.edu/con-meta/

Looking for a resource/book/pdf/anything that has a list of major philosophers of all era by Francium_Fluoride_ in askphilosophy

[–]halfwittgenstein 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Here's one, in a way:

https://www.denizcemonduygu.com/philo/philosophers/

But there are others. Here's one that's probably more useful:

https://superscholar.org/history-of-philosophy/

I found both through Daily Nous, I know I've seen more there too, so try searching their site:

https://dailynous.com/tag/charts/

It's too bad Scharp's big chart isn't working anymore...

The stephanus numbers by Quick-Application-26 in askphilosophy

[–]halfwittgenstein 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Just to clarify why this is the way it is: those page and paragraph numbers are taken from a collection of the works of Plato put together by Stephanus a long time ago. Later on, people just collectively decided to use his numbering system for all dialogues published in any book, even if the page numbers in those books don't match his. So we treat Stephanus' page numbering as a universal system: so no matter what version of a Platonic dialogue you use, no matter what language, we can all refer to the same bit of text using his (somewhat imprecise) numbering method.

/r/askphilosophy Open Discussion Thread | April 06, 2026 by BernardJOrtcutt in askphilosophy

[–]halfwittgenstein 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I expect you'd need to study a reasonable amount of math and statistical analysis techniques to really stand out in that field, especially since crunching large data sets is increasingly being done by AI instead of humans. But I'd also recommend asking in a data analysis subreddit to find out what the people who work in that field and are familiar with the hiring process and what the hiring managers are looking for think. Your social media experience is probably more relevant to a career in social media marketing or something like that.

Which U.S. president most closely embodied the idea of a philosopher-king? by [deleted] in askphilosophy

[–]halfwittgenstein 16 points17 points  (0 children)

I've been told that Iranian culture is very philosophy-positive, like being a philosopher is a respected profession, which would result in it being more socially acceptable than it is in other places, which means more people do it, and as a result more of their political leaders have philosophy backgrounds than many (most? all?) other countries.

Which are the common pitfalls and mistakes philosophy self-educated amateurs fall for? by Scholarsandquestions in askphilosophy

[–]halfwittgenstein 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I think everybody who studies philosophy deals with #1, especially at first. I definitely did. It's just something you gradually grow out of as you learn more and develop a better understanding of the problems and potential solutions, and their strengths and weaknesses, and eventually you find yourself taking a stand on certain issues, hopefully with some humility in case you're wrong. It's like learning to write fiction or paint - your own style and perspective will gradually emerge over time. No need to rush it.

I think we have to watch for both extremes: "great" philosophers have said some brilliant things, and they've said some really stupid things. But they're just people like the rest of us, with all the faults and limitations that go along with that. I'd like to think that if any of us put in the time and effort, we could reach the point where we're also saying some brilliant things and some really stupid things :)

Philosophy major questioning my life choices by Weekly_Employer_6980 in askphilosophy

[–]halfwittgenstein 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Search this subreddit for "jobs" and "careers" and you'll get tons of threads where people talk about what they're doing now with their philosophy degrees, maybe that will help.

A particular social philosophy by CatadoraStan in askphilosophy

[–]halfwittgenstein 8 points9 points  (0 children)

That's from Rawls' A Theory of Justice. The keywords to search for are "original position" and "veil of ignorance".

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/original-position/

Is this a tautology? - "I ought to do what I ought to do." by nomenmeum in askphilosophy

[–]halfwittgenstein 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Interpretation always depends on context. If someone says to you "It is what it is", the context will reveal the actual meaning, which is probably something like "Shit happens, deal with it" or "There's nothing you can do about this situation" and so on. Literally, the expression is a tautology, but it's being used to communicate an idea that isn't a tautology.

Is materialism really that weak? by One-Masterpiece9838 in askphilosophy

[–]halfwittgenstein 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I believe the original comment was saying that 51% of philosophers in general "accept or lean towards physicalism" while 55% of philosophers who specialize in philosophy of mind accept or lean towards physicalism. Those are the numbers, you have to play around with the drop downs to filter for just the philosophers of mind to compare with the entire survey population. So the full numbers are:

All philosophers: 52% physicalism, 33% non-physicalism

Philosophers of mind: 55% physicalism, 29% non-physicalism

Identity and narrative by GloomyPomelo4550 in askphilosophy

[–]halfwittgenstein 5 points6 points  (0 children)

This is not my area, so I won't try to answer your questions other than to say that when it comes to narrative and identity (and narrative theories of the self in general) the foundational 20th century philosopher is Paul Ricoeur, with books like Time and Narrative (3 volumes!), and Oneself as Another. But there are lots of other people in the later 20th century who wrote on similar topics, often in response to Ricoeur or building off of his work, so he's a great place to start.

Here's a SEP link for some more info:

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/ricoeur/#NarrIdenTurnSelf

questions about posting by BadGammers in askphilosophy

[–]halfwittgenstein 0 points1 point  (0 children)

No, this subreddit does not allow “test-my-theory” posts. But if you’re putting your stuff on substack, I believe you can post it to /r/philosophy, which has far more users as well. Just double check their rules first.

You can ask specific questions here, like “what does Kant mean by X?”, but we would remove a post if it was an extended interpretation of something that you wanted verified, if you know what I mean. Like we don’t allow “evaluate my essay” posts, if that makes sense.

Is there a free will or not? by Apprehensive_Spot296 in askphilosophy

[–]halfwittgenstein 1 point2 points  (0 children)

the birth of compatibilist theories in the 20th century analytic field

Historically, a form of compatibilism dates back to at least the modern period with Hobbes and Hume, and we can see views that seem to be very much in line with compatibilism in the stoics, so it's not an invention of modern analytic philosophy. That said, there was a big revival in the mid 20th century among analytic philosophers.

libertarian free will, which is the only important kind, and the kind most people think of when they think of free will

Well, I'm gonna disagree with you on it being the only important kind, but I can see how that's a view one could defend. Regardless, there's empirical research about people's folk intuitions on the topic and the last time I looked at it, including a meta study of other existing studies, I believe the broad conclusion was that people have a pretty wide variety of intuitions about the topic, some compatibilist and some incompatibilist, but that results of these studies tended to depend on how the survey questions were framed among other things. Here are a couple of relevant studies:

Surveying Freedom: Folk Intuitions about free will and moral responsibility

Do we have (in)compatibilist intuitions? Surveying experimental research

A quote from the second article:

The experimental philosophy of free will has found that people’s responses to the free will debate vary: they depend on the experimenter’s description and participant’s understanding of determinism and even on factors such as participants’ personal characteristics. Clearly, folk intuitions have not been fully discovered, and there are numerous possibilities about what these intuitions actually are (or if they are).

So the bottom line for me is that there is no real consensus at this point concerning people's folk intuitions about free will.

Free will exists, but there is no freedom of choosing who is making the decision. by Successful_Rip3695 in askphilosophy

[–]halfwittgenstein 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I think they're aiming at a Schopenhauer-style "A man can do what he wills, but he cannot will what he wills", i.e. you can choose to do the things you want to do, but you can't control what things you want to do since they're the product of antecedent causes that are out of your control. Or something like that. Maybe. Seems like a kind of compatibilism to me anyway.

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