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March 22, 2004
Philosophy Can Make You Sane?
Right. And we suppose being good at math can get you laid.
Still, Lou Marinoff, author of Plato, Not Prozac and professor of Philosophy at City College, seems to think that there is some benefit in using philosophical methods to solve everyday problems.
We think that's pretty crazy. Yes, philosophers are trained in rigorous methods of critical thinking, and people tend to make fewer problems for themselves when they think critically about important decisions and events in their lives. But if we find ourselves in the throes of an anxiety attack, woe to the egghead who tells us it's because were stuck in a hermeneutical circle.
Seriously, Philosophy is good for lots of things (and not the things most people think). Philosophy is the mother of the sciences, political theory, mathematics, and most everything that's contributed to the development of civilization. What it's not good for is being a psychological panacea.
It's people like Marinoff who perpetuate the stereotype of Philosophers as know-it-all types who sit around contemplating The Meaning of Life or whatever. While there certainly are people doing that sort of thing, there are also lots of us working on important questions that have answers.
The moral of this tirade is just that, if someone tells you "Philosophy is the answer," and the question isn't something like "How do we go about justifying inductive generalizations?," just walk away, man.
Posted by matt at March 22, 2004 04:38 PM
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There was a piece in this past Sunday’s New York Times Magazine about Lou Marinoff and his American Philosophical Practitioners Association. Having not cracked open the magazine, I probably would have missed it if my neighbor over at greenideas hadn’... [Read More]
Tracked on March 25, 2004 02:59 PM
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