Question

Why is it still possible to study philosophy at a university? It do not see any point in that ... thing. It seems like philosophy is science but without testing the stuff that one predicts. So what is the point? After all the philosophers came to some weird conclusions that make no sense. Did they contribute in any way to todays society? People still use Pythagoras theorem...

Answer 1

Philosophy is the study of knowledge
Philosophy and science used to mean the same thing,

I know that todays philosophy is very different to todays science, but philosophy knows it is not provable or disprovable

Philosophy is an attempt to justify reason...

Answer 2

I see your a fan of Walter Lewin too

Answer 3

Philosophy is all around us. The way you live is based off of some philosophy. UnkleRhakus has it right, Science and Philosophy used to go hand in hand...They still do, somewhat.

Let's not be naive though, many great philosophers have contributed to humanity. Hobbes, Locke, Machiavelli, Aristotle, Plato to name a few.

In today's society though, there is no place for true intelligence, therefore there is no place for philosophy.

Answer 4

But what are the achievements of philosophy? Science and mathematics got us on the moon and other things.
Just thinking about something without testing it seems kind of weak. Everybody could start thinking about X and reason that from that thing this and that follows but if we do not test these predictions they seem worthless.
I thought the importance of sciences is that we prove the predictions no matter who says this or that is true.
In philosophy we learned (in latin-class) that there are even authorities who are not to be questioned - that seems just so plain wrong.

Answer 5

I see where your coming from, and I agree with you, not much has come from philosophy except for very entertaining poetic rants. There are not many philosophers who did anything "solid" that lasted until now. For the most part, philosophers are respected for just being very intelligent people in general.

I do know of one philosopher though who created guidlines for leadership which have not failed ever (so this could be considered 'solid').

Machiavelli

Machiavelli's 'The Prince' is a book which laid down the rules for leadership. Anyone who follows the rules in this book remain in power, those who don't lose their power. So technically he invented the 'science' to leadership.

but other than that, can't think of many great contributors besides Hobbes and Locke.

Answer 6

Philosophy (like science) is still the pursuit of Truth,

Answer 7

Tom, if your questioning philosophy as a science because it doesn't follow the "scientific method" then let me explain this; it is only the sciences that invovle chemicals that we can control that follow the "scientific method".

i.e.
We can test chemicals in the brain that light up when people are happy. We can only test that because we can control it. (Set the experiment in a room and make sure there are no variables.)

Once you get to the more complex things such as 'life' persay, that's where you find philosophy. Philosophy explains things through generalization, correlation, and logic. Stuff that makes sense. It's impossible to prove through the 'scientific method' because there are so many variables, but for the most part "it just makes sense." and everyone agrees.

A better example is Astronomy. The study of space cannot use 'the sceintific method' because we cannot control space and the stars. We replace the scientific method with mathematics and assumption through correlation. Yet Astronomy is an amazing science.

My point is, science is not defined by the scientific method but instead, the scientific method provides to science in a confirmable way.

Answer 8

Hmmm I see. Although I often hear some stuff that some philosopher said that could easily be tested e.g. that heavy objects fall faster than small objects.

In my original question I was wondering what the point of philosophy is/was. The idea of coming to conclusion just by thinking about stuff is nice but the non-excisting test seems to spoil that idea.

Answer 9

Just because philosophers didn't test their theories, doesn't mean the theories were useless . Later scientists came along and debunked philosophies which shows progress .

Some theories like Democritus theroy of atoms have been very useful in a sense that really big concepts have set a course for scientist to prove / disprove - explore

you might like this article
http://chem.tufts.edu/AnswersInScience/RelativityofWrong.htm

Answer 10

:) Well back then there might be two guys around. Demokrit said there are atoms and Emokrit said is no such thing as atoms. So one of them had to be right. Today we say Demokrit was so smart that he already postulated back then that atoms exist BUT Einstein proofed it. So if enough people mack happy guesses than of course there are some people that guessed right but that does not make them as smart as Einstein.
PS: I´ll read you link - I have not read it yet but I am about to.

Answer 11

i am not suggesting that Demockrit was smart for getting the answer right,
but i think he and Emokrit were smart for guessing, for suggesting that there was an answer to such a question, that they knew they could not prove