<story><title>What, exactly, do philosophers do?</title><url>https://www.the-tls.co.uk/articles/public/where-modern-philosophy-began/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>dvt</author><text>Always warms my heart to see philosophy on top of HN. Philosophy is &lt;i&gt;hard&lt;/i&gt; -- much harder than one would think. And people that contribute are &lt;i&gt;incredibly&lt;/i&gt; smart -- far smarter than software engineers, by comparison. On the other hand, it&amp;#x27;s very political, and a lot of it is mental masturbation. Philosophy of Science, I think, is almost a completely bogus field. Philosophy of Mind, apart from a few great minds (Chalmers, Nagel) is also equivocal.&lt;p&gt;I went into undergrad with a primary focus on (meta-)logic[1] and I was taught by some of the world&amp;#x27;s premiere logicians (David Kaplan, Sam Cumming, a few others). But I fell in love with ethics -- a subject I&amp;#x27;d never thought I&amp;#x27;d enjoy as much as I did. I loved reading Moore, Foote, Anscombe, Geach.&lt;p&gt;My best memories were attending graduate seminars -- studying the philosophy of language and trying to figure out how logical connectives work in regular discourse, or studying abduction and trying to stitch together Horn clauses that seem to point to one conclusion rather than another.&lt;p&gt;Philosophers, in short, do all kinds of things: from pushing the boundaries of exotic logics, to solving ethical problems, to systematizing natural language or understanding the metaphysics of causality.&lt;p&gt;The article just &lt;i&gt;touches&lt;/i&gt; on all of the above (in fact, it doesn&amp;#x27;t discuss &lt;i&gt;modern&lt;/i&gt; philosophy at all). If you&amp;#x27;re interested in philosophy, the SEP[2] is a great resource.&lt;p&gt;[1] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;dvt.name&amp;#x2F;logic&amp;#x2F;&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;dvt.name&amp;#x2F;logic&amp;#x2F;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;[2] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;plato.stanford.edu&amp;#x2F;&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;plato.stanford.edu&amp;#x2F;&lt;/a&gt;</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>Osmium</author><text>Not down-voting you, because it&amp;#x27;s an interesting comment, but:&lt;p&gt;&amp;gt; far smarter than software engineers, by comparison.&lt;p&gt;This is just a dumb, specious statement. Would expect better from a philosopher ;)&lt;p&gt;Also, would be interested why you think:&lt;p&gt;&amp;gt; Philosophy of Science, I think, is almost a completely bogus field.&lt;p&gt;What makes it bogus?</text></comment>
<story><title>What, exactly, do philosophers do?</title><url>https://www.the-tls.co.uk/articles/public/where-modern-philosophy-began/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>dvt</author><text>Always warms my heart to see philosophy on top of HN. Philosophy is &lt;i&gt;hard&lt;/i&gt; -- much harder than one would think. And people that contribute are &lt;i&gt;incredibly&lt;/i&gt; smart -- far smarter than software engineers, by comparison. On the other hand, it&amp;#x27;s very political, and a lot of it is mental masturbation. Philosophy of Science, I think, is almost a completely bogus field. Philosophy of Mind, apart from a few great minds (Chalmers, Nagel) is also equivocal.&lt;p&gt;I went into undergrad with a primary focus on (meta-)logic[1] and I was taught by some of the world&amp;#x27;s premiere logicians (David Kaplan, Sam Cumming, a few others). But I fell in love with ethics -- a subject I&amp;#x27;d never thought I&amp;#x27;d enjoy as much as I did. I loved reading Moore, Foote, Anscombe, Geach.&lt;p&gt;My best memories were attending graduate seminars -- studying the philosophy of language and trying to figure out how logical connectives work in regular discourse, or studying abduction and trying to stitch together Horn clauses that seem to point to one conclusion rather than another.&lt;p&gt;Philosophers, in short, do all kinds of things: from pushing the boundaries of exotic logics, to solving ethical problems, to systematizing natural language or understanding the metaphysics of causality.&lt;p&gt;The article just &lt;i&gt;touches&lt;/i&gt; on all of the above (in fact, it doesn&amp;#x27;t discuss &lt;i&gt;modern&lt;/i&gt; philosophy at all). If you&amp;#x27;re interested in philosophy, the SEP[2] is a great resource.&lt;p&gt;[1] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;dvt.name&amp;#x2F;logic&amp;#x2F;&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;dvt.name&amp;#x2F;logic&amp;#x2F;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;[2] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;plato.stanford.edu&amp;#x2F;&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;plato.stanford.edu&amp;#x2F;&lt;/a&gt;</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>nomel</author><text>&amp;gt; And people that contribute are incredibly smart -- far smarter than software engineers, by comparison&lt;p&gt;Comparing a software engineer to someone contributing to the advancement of an entire field is not really a fair comparison. This is like comparing someone who has a job in &amp;quot;compliance and ethics&amp;quot; to someone making advancement in quantum computing.</text></comment>