Talk:Philosophical progress

Instrumental optimism should not be presented as a "synthesis" of pessimism and reasoned optimism. Logically, it is one side of a dichotomy between two different views, both of which conclude that even though philosophy is incapable of scientific progress, philosophy still has value. This dichotomy is between whether that value is intrinsic or extrinsic. Hence, a reasoned optimist believes that philosophy has intrinsic value, and an instrumental optimist believes that philosophy has extrinsic value. Furthermore, these two different views can be fruitfully combined, since they are not mutually incompatible. --Susurrus 23:57, 2 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Lessons for Philosophy and Metaphilosophy
The following section seems perfectly useless to this article. It could have been included at the end of any article whatsoever about philosophy. I have therefore deleted it, but am including it here, in case someone wants to develop it further into a proper article of its own:


 * Philosophers are somewhat notorious for pursuing discussions to the point that even the most simple concepts take on the rarefied air of paradox, and the whole discussion collapses into a self-referential hall of mirrors. The fate of this article is no different; indeed, now it is even falling into self-referentiality about its own self-referentiality. But there is an important lesson contained in this about the nature of philosophical disputes: they exhibit their own peculiar sort of what Jean-Paul Sartre called "absolute inwardness:" every attempt to resolve a philosophical dispute essentially entangles us in disputes about the nature of philosophy itself. Meta-philosophical reflections on the nature of philosophy and the possibility of philosophical progress are not specialized side-notes to other philosophical work, but rather are involved in--and themselves involve--key debates in metaphysics, epistemology and philosophy of science, philosophy of language, and the theory of value. It may seem like philosophy is stuck with a terrible burden, if it is expected to explain itself as well as its subject-matter at every turn. But appearances may be deceiving: things may not be as weird as they seem. As Ludwig Wittgenstein was fond of pointing out, it may not be that remarkable that you use the same methods even when you philosophize about philosophy itself: "When you are learning spelling, 'SPELLING' is one of the words that you learn to spell. But you don't speak of 'spelling of the second-order.'"

--Susurrus 00:22, 3 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Under construction
Thanks, Susurrus, for your editing work on this article. I fear, however, that as it currently stands the article needs some substantial reorganization, and that some things will need to be put back more like they were before the edits in order to preserve important points and the textual flow. I've begun work on this and should be able to work some more on it soon.

Some points in response to specific concerns:


 * Instrumental optimism should not be presented as a "synthesis" of pessimism and reasoned optimism. Logically, it is one side of a dichotomy between two different views, both of which conclude that even though philosophy is incapable of scientific progress, philosophy still has value. This dichotomy is between whether that value is intrinsic or extrinsic.

This is only the case if you neglect half of the instrumental optimist position. It's certainly true that instrumental optimists are on the same side of the ledger as intrinsic optimists if the only question being asked is "Is philosophical inquiry worthwhile as a form of intellectual activity? (Y/N)". But that is not the only question asked; there is, also, the question "Where would the worth of philosophical inquiry have to come from, if it has any?"&mdash;on which the instrumental optimist agrees with the pessimist and not with the intrinsic optimist. That is a pretty important difference between them&mdash;generally, if two people agree that somet X is worthwhile but completely disagree about where that worth comes from, then they may very well have a disagreement about X that is every bit as wide as each has with someone who regards X as worthless; their positions may have nothing in particular in common except for the word "worth."


 * Hence, a reasoned optimist believes that philosophy has intrinsic value, and an instrumental optimist believes that philosophy has extrinsic value. Furthermore, these two different views can be fruitfully combined, since they are not mutually incompatible.

I think it's correct that someone could hold the instrumental optimist position as a historical thesis as an addition to holding the intrinsic optimist position. But most of those who are attracted to making any kind of fuss about instrumental optimism are drawn to it because they are suspicious of the Platonic picture about the internal value of philosophy. Indeed I'd argue that unless one makes the stronger case that not only instrumental optimism is true but also that philosophy could have no other source of worth as an intellectual activity, the position is just a distraction from the central question&mdash;unless and until you've argued that philosophy can't have worth apart from its good (non-philosophical) effects, the central question is going to be whether or not philosophy can have value on its own. Only once the question of intrinsic worth has been answered in the negative does the question of instrumental worth become interesting to whether or not people are wise or foolish to go into philosophy.

I've made some edits to reflect this in the article.

Radgeek 14:07, 5 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Hello, Radgeek.


 * Thanks, Susurrus, for your editing work on this article. I fear, however, that as it currently stands the article needs some substantial reorganization, and that some things will need to be put back more like they were before the edits in order to preserve important points and the textual flow. I've begun work on this and should be able to work some more on it soon.

I'll suspend judgement until I see the full edits.


 * This is only the case if you neglect half of the instrumental optimist position.

It is the case if you consider both questions you raise there. Both positions, as I said, are on the same side when you are answering the question of whether or not philosophy has value. Both positions, as I said, differ about whether philosophy has intrinsic or extrinsic value. You seem here simply to be saying that that difference is already very large. I don't have any difficulty with that. But I do not see the value of presenting instrumental optimism as a synthesis of reasoned optimism and pessimism.


 * I think it's correct that someone could hold the instrumental optimist position as a historical thesis as an addition to holding the intrinsic optimist position. But most of those who are attracted to making any kind of fuss about instrumental optimism are drawn to it because they are suspicious of the Platonic picture about the internal value of philosophy. Indeed I'd argue that unless one makes the stronger case that not only instrumental optimism is true but also that philosophy could have no other source of worth as an intellectual activity, the position is just a distraction from the central question&mdash;unless and until you've argued that philosophy can't have worth apart from its good (non-philosophical) effects, the central question is going to be whether or not philosophy can have value on its own.

I see no difficulty here either. But the "centrality" of the question would seem to depend largely on your point of view. I can imagine scientists being more concerned about the instrumental value of philosophy to science, for example.

--Susurrus 06:44, 8 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Clarity needed
I took the following excerpt from the section titled "Philosophy as intrinsically worthy." I have italicized my concern.


 * The perceived need for philosophy to prove itself in terms of some sort of scientific-technical progress is often diagnosed as a sort of creeping scientism, and repudiated as a drastic oversimplification of our intellectual life. This may have been the position of Ludwig Wittgenstein against the Vienna positivists--although if Wittgenstein saw any intrinsic value in philosophical inquiry he certainly didn't think that most people could profit from it.

This doesn't appear to be saying much. If philosophy is intrinsically worthy&#8212;i.e. is good in itself&#8212;then the question of people profiting from it is nonsense. From another point of view, furthermore, the discussion here precludes extrinsic worth&#8212;i.e. a good for some other end&#8212;so "profit" is meaningless. Perhaps the writer had a point, but I can't tell what it is. It probably deserves to be rewritten, either by the original author, or by someone else who knows Wittgenstein.

Vorpal Suds 21:23, 12 July 2005 (UTC)

What is this article about?
I am working on Metaphilosophy and copying some content from this article into our section on progress in philosophy. The bulk of this article appears to be about progress in philosophy, however, here and there, mostly in the lede, it seems to be about the concept of progress in general. The Progress disambiguation page says that this page is about progress in general, but it doesn't appear to be so.

I would like to suggest that this article be moved/renamed to "Progress in philosophy", and either a new article created under this name on progress as a philosophical concept, or, since Philosophy of history is already mostly about progress, just put a disambiguation header at the top redirecting people to Philosophy of history for a treatment on progress in general.

I'm going to do the latter now, but wait for comments before moving. --Pfhorrest (talk) 08:17, 3 February 2009 (UTC)