Scientists know what the scientific method is; they don't need philosophers to tell them.
Whoah. And you say my statement is condescending. The scientific method is not natural or intuitive. It is hard and counter-intuitive. People don't 'just know it'. They have to be trained in it, in logic, in fallacies, in null hypothesis and so forth.
The mistake you're making is that scientists and philosophers are separate and distinct creatures. They're not.
Should we argue that all philosophy is actually just a subset of whatever that was?
I'd like to hear you articulate what it is you're talking about here, rather than just appeal to a mysterious authority.
Does philosophy get priority just because we happen to have a word for it today?
By 'today', do you mean 'pretty much all of recorded history'?
These word games you're playing to denigrate philosophy in favour of science... are philosophy. If you think philosophy is so useless, then why engage in arguments around semantics?
They are, today, separate and distinct. Little proto-scientists are trained in the scientific method in science classes. You can go to any school in the U.S. and science is taught by scientists in science classes in the science department. They are not in the philosophy department. At my college, philosophy was housed in the humanities department.
Philosophers love love love to relive the history of philosophy, but it's history, not present fact. Newton called himself a "natural philosopher"--true. But today most folks call him a scientist.
The question is not "where did science come from," the question is what does philosophy do for scientists today. The structure of that question assumes the very division that you are trying to erase.
I happen to think that there are actual answers to that question; but "all of science is actually philosophy" is not one of them.
Philosophers love love love to relive the history of philosophy, but it's history, not present fact.
Please read back over our discussion - you were the one who brought in ancient history. The things I have mentioned are all aspects of philosophy that are relevant in the current day.
Newton called himself a "natural philosopher"--true. But today most folks call him a scientist.
There is no dichotomy. Being a scientist and doing philosophy are not only not mutually exclusive, but you can't do good science without engaging in philosophy to some degree. This is not the same as 'all of science is actually philosophy', but a comment that the methods of good science require philosophy.
the question is what does philosophy do for scientists today
Why does philosophy need to find factoids or bring something fresh every year in order to be valid?
"And philosophy is not the only discipline that engages in studying the workings of science. So do history and sociology of science, and yet I never heard you dismiss those fields on the grounds that they haven't discovered the Higgs boson." - http://www.huffingtonpost.com/massimo-pigliucci/neil-degrass...
That quote comes from an interesting article, well worth reading. The author is countering Tyson's public misrepresentation of philosophy - with the postscript that Tyson apparently accepts these criticisms.
The philosophy of science is similar to mathematics in what it offers science - you find a new technique that gives good results, so you use it in future. "What does philosophy do for scientists today?" is like saying "What does calculus do for scientists today?".
> guygurari: What new thing did philosophy contribute to physics in the last 100 years?
> vacri: If it weren't for philosophy, you wouldn't have the scientific method in the first place.
That's arguing from history.
> There is no dichotomy.
Not in your mind there isn't, but obviously there is in the minds of a lot of scientists, including for example the author of the linked article, every scientist he mentions by name, and guygurari, the person to whom you responded. You can keep asserting it over and over but that doesn't mean it's true from all perspectives.
If you think that the way science is performed hasn't been significantly changed and refined in the past 100 years, the original timeframe suggested... I don't know what to say. Much of what we call the scientific method has been defined, refined, and expanded in this last 100 years.
dichotomy stuff
The things you're referring to are occupations. 'Philosophers' and 'physicists'. Not 'philosophy' and 'physics'.
The article author quite clearly states that physicists (the occupation) can make good use of philosophy(the realm of knowledge). The realms of physics and philosophy are not mutually exclusive - they are not two wholly separate things; not a dichotomy. And the scientists the article author is mentioning by name are people he's saying have this problem with the faulty perception of philosophy - it's the point of the article.
In any case, like I said at the end of my last comment - philosophy gives us robust techniques for doing science, just like maths does. How do these become 'stale', 'not valid', or 'not useful', just because there hasn't been a recent breakthrough? We don't demand the same of techniques from the realm of mathematics.
> If you think that the way science is performed hasn't been significantly changed and refined in the past 100 years, the original timeframe suggested... I don't know what to say. Much of what we call the scientific method has been defined, refined, and expanded in this last 100 years.
I'm not trolling; I would encourage you to come back to this exchange later and consider it from a different angle. You're committed to the primacy of philosophy, but that is not the only way to view the situation on the ground today.
Trolling or not, you're talking in short, low-context sentences, while avoiding responding to many of the points I raise. It's not really worth talking to someone doing that.
You're committed to the primacy of philosophy
Eh? Where did I say that philosophy is better than anything else? The whole idea that these things are in competition - or that one is 'better' than the other - is entirely within your head, not mine. Read my reply to mercer above.
I had a lecturer in AI who use to do exactly this: he would rail at the uselessness of Philosophy and then present his own theory of AI which was just so much bad philosophy.
Whoah. And you say my statement is condescending. The scientific method is not natural or intuitive. It is hard and counter-intuitive. People don't 'just know it'. They have to be trained in it, in logic, in fallacies, in null hypothesis and so forth.
The mistake you're making is that scientists and philosophers are separate and distinct creatures. They're not.
Should we argue that all philosophy is actually just a subset of whatever that was?
I'd like to hear you articulate what it is you're talking about here, rather than just appeal to a mysterious authority.
Does philosophy get priority just because we happen to have a word for it today?
By 'today', do you mean 'pretty much all of recorded history'?
These word games you're playing to denigrate philosophy in favour of science... are philosophy. If you think philosophy is so useless, then why engage in arguments around semantics?