BothAndBlog Forum

Nature of the Philosophical Project
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussi ... ent/747181
What is the philosophical project?

My hypothesis is that the philosophical project as such is, at its heart, metaphysical. Fichte says that. "To proceed beyond the facts...to go beyond experience as a whole...this is philosophy, and nothing else." — Pantagruel

I agree. Aristotle referred to what we now call "Metaphysics", as "First Philosophy". But, for some on this forum Metaphysics is a four-letter word. And it may be true that some people will justify their out-of-bounds speculations under the pretense of merely doing metaphysics. But that's the risk we take for allowing freedom of thought. In a free society, we have to tolerate Neo-Nazis, even if we don't like what they say. Without freedom of thought, there would be no creativity, no progress. However, the free exchange of ideas must be funneled through a skeptical filter to remove the BS & cons. Yes, that's censorship, so even the skeptics must be subject to skeptical filtering.

For good practical reasons, Modern Science has constructed a restrictive box to contain its own speculations. Physics is limited to the study of details of the material world of the senses. But philosophy has goals that are not limited to pragmatic real-world results. With logic & imagination, it goes beyond the specific things of the world to reason-out general & universal principles. Even Physics makes use of unprovable generalities, such as natural laws, in order to make accurate predictions of physical behaviors. But those "normative rules" themselves must be accepted as "self-evident". We don't discover natural laws by dissecting Nature, but by viewing it as an integrated (whole) system. This approach is not necessarily super-natural, but it is Holistic (another four letter word for those who fear thinking outside Pandora's box).


Metaphysics (Greek: τὰ μετὰ τὰ φυσικά, "things after the ones about the natural world"; Latin: Metaphysica[1]) is one of the principal works of Aristotle, in which he develops the doctrine that is sometimes referred to as Wisdom, sometimes as First Philosophy, and sometimes as Theology, in English. It is one of the first major works of the branch of western philosophy known as metaphysics.
It is a compilation of various texts treating abstract subjects, notably Being, different kinds of causation, form and matter, the existence of mathematical objects and the cosmos.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metaphysics_(Aristotle)

Systems-centric is another way to characterize it: holism is one of the key characteristics of complex emergent systems. In this guise, it can form the focus of a legitimate paradigm shift, rather than just being a dirty word. — Pantagruel

Yes. That was the premise of physicist Fritjof Capra's 1982 book, The Turning Point. In which he introduced the concepts of Holism and Systems Theory. He applied those ideas to all phases of modern culture. The name of the book suggests a future "paradigm shift" from narrow Reductive methods to broader Holistic thinking.

PS__Holism does indeed require "going beyond the [reductive] facts" in order to see both sides of reality at once : material parts + metaphysical (mathematical) inter-relationships. Philosophy without imaginative Holism would be factual Physics. Yet. some posters seem to prefer it that way.
PPS__A crucial aspect of Philosophy is skepticism toward your own flights of fancy, to keep your feet on the ground.

Ancient Skepticism :
The Greek word skepsis means investigation. Literally, a “skeptic” is an inquirer. Not all ancient philosophers whom in retrospect we call “skeptics” refer to themselves as such. Nevertheless, they all embrace ways of life that are devoted to inquiry. Ancient skepticism is as much concerned with belief as with knowledge. As long as knowledge has not been attained, the skeptics aim not to affirm anything. This gives rise to their most controversial ambition: a life without belief.
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/skepticism-ancient/

A very helpful idea I encountered around 30 years ago was from Albert Ellis, a psychologist, influenced by the Stoics. He said - "You have considerable power to construct self-helping thoughts, feelings and actions as well as to construct self-defeating behaviors. You have the ability, if you use it, to choose healthy instead of unhealthy thinking, feeling and acting.” That idea changed how I deal with others and how I deal with any information I come upon. — Tom Storm

I too, read books by Albert Ellis, and was impressed with his Rational-Emotive self-therapy. You could think of it as self-directed Philosophy, or merely as self-discipline. In a marginal note I wrote : "most people seem to think that emotions and reasoning are separate, un-connected processes. Whereas, in reality they mutually influence each other : emotions color our thinking, and thinking modifies our emotions". Perhaps Hamlet foreshadowed Ellis : "There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so". And Hamlet may be paraphrasing the Stoic philosopher Seneca : “Reason shows us there is nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so.”