Hi Chris. As always, thanks for the thoughtful reply. Some ongoing tasks for me are: (1) try to understand fundamentally what’s happening, (2) try to evaluate what I think is happening vis-a-vis possible futures, and (3) perhaps suggest actions/policies that might result in what I view as desirable outcomes. In this reply you touch on:
- analytical philosophy,
- change in the focus of universities,
- overuse of economics, and
- change in the understanding of truth and sincere speech.
You touch on MANY other topics in Stranger Worlds and elsewhere. In reading/studying your writings I’m working on my first task. You also often evaluate the topics you introduce, so I get some gist for my second task.
I’m fortunate in having found a serious researcher/thinker whose worldview and mental processes are similar enough to mine to enable many learning opportunities, and, amazingly, is willing to answer questions and make serious comments on my thoughts. Thanks again.
The pleasure is (almost) all mind, Frank! I hope to explore this university issue in a future month of Stranger Worlds. Thanks for opening up this path. All the best!
Hi Chris, other stuff has kept me away. I hope it’s a bit under control now.
Re:” It was in the decades after Einstein that the long slow march towards the intellectual gulags of specialisation commenced, narrowing the horizons of human experience both in the sciences and beyond.”
Taking this statement as true, and it seems to me that it is, what can cogently be said about why this happened? In your reply to RZD you claim that “the rise of analytic philosophy” was one factor. Without going “far beyond the scope of this piece” might your say a bit more?
Wonderful to hear from you! Life of course imposes its demands upon our time, and I appreciate any time you can spare to talk here. The more I think about this subject, the more I suspect that the rise of analytic philosophy (which I mentioned to Bob) may be an epiphenomena of the larger trend, which at heart may well be the transformation of the university between 1850 and 1950.
Partly I hint at the issue in this piece. Einstein through to Bohm, physicists were still well-read in both the humanities and sciences because of a common educational corpus that gave a shared background of understanding for all academics. However, by the end of World War II, the image of the university as a community of scholars vanished, and they began to transform into yet another profit centre, placing greater weight on research funds over teaching and elevating certain departments in the sciences over almost all of those in the humanities.
At the same time, the purpose of sending a student to university ceased to be to prepare them to be excellent citizens and began to be to sell them an education as a functional step towards employment. Today, this is the dominant understanding of what a university education is for: preparation to enter the 'job market', and not preparation for exemplary citizenship. This is all also tied up in the rise of economics after the Enlightenment, but again I wouldn't like to guess which is the phenomena and which is the epiphenomena here...
Finally, the topic I am pursuing here this July is also important: the transition from a wider understanding of truth and sincere speech into the focus on 'information' and the strictly true-or-false propositional view of truth, which despite its contemporary ubiquity is an exceptionally narrow conception, and a problematic one.
Many thanks for asking me to clarify, and I have made a note of this topic, as it would make an interesting theme for a future month, perhaps later this year.
"He {Einstein} came from the last generation of scientists who were given a broad education, one that included the works of Plato, Aristotle, and Immanuel Kant, and were thus philosophically grounded in both ancient European thought and the more recent ideals of the Enlightenment."
Unfortunately this statement is not correct...
You might look at the writings of Profs. John Wheeler or David Bohm, or many others
or look at some of the writings of Paul Halpern
I suppose by "ancient European thought " you meant Greek and Roman philosophy, science, and literature. But in parallel with these cultures, there were many other cultures contributing in the span of intellectual history.
Consider today some few examples of Physics courses offered:
Thanks for your challenge here, Bob, which I partially accept. Regarding "the last generation of scientists", I have always been ridiculously loose in my application of 'generation', but in this case I really did muddy the waters. I'll endeavour to expand on this point.
Let me start with the disagreement. I don't know Paul Halpern, but born in 1961 I will wager good money he's come in after the domination of analytic philosophy, which means he is 'lost in information', and not a likely counter-example as such. Likewise, the presence of philosophy introduction classes at post-university institutions is neither here nor there. I studied an introduction to business module at university, but this is nothing like having 'worked in the family business', as a Victorian gentlemen would have done - there's a huge pragmatic gap here.
What's more, if the kind of philosophical grounding I'm referring to is largely voided by the rise of analytic philosophy (as I would indeed claim, with Babette Babich as my second in this duel), anyone who comes after the point when Kant was part of the general curriculum is going to lack the discursive skills in philosophy possessed by the generations of scientists I'm referring to here. In this regard, however, the point I am wanting to make is far beyond the scope of this piece, although it *does* connect directly with this month's theme of truth vs information rather well!
However, I do have to concede to your point in terms of the early twentieth century physicists. Einstein was born in 1879, which puts him significantly older than the 'last generation' I'm referring to, which would include Oppenheimer (born 1904), Wheeler (born 1911), and Bohm (born in 1917), as well as many others especially in early quantum physics. (I might also note with relevance that Popper was born in 1902...)
Any physicist or scholar who completed high school before World War II (as all of these did) will fit the description I made, for which the choice of the term 'generation' was misleading. I do not think we have a word for the concept in my head here - a kind of 'discourse generation', for Einstein was in conversation with many of these people, albeit as 'the old guard'. I'll be more careful next time I make this point!
Thanks for this piece, Chris. Not sure if it's nostalgic or hopeful or perhaps both. In any case, I like the direction it points toward. The paragraph on the "religious nonbeliever" is the sort of thing I'd be relieved to hear discussed in secular circles. As things stand, it seems secular life has slipped into philistinism.
Do we lack a word other than nostalgia for appreciation of thought that has passed...? Perhaps this is another cost of the mythology of progress Christendom unwittingly unleashed. But there is definitely a hope in my yearning for what has apparently been lost. Nothing, however, is ever lost; the potential always remains. There is, after all, a time for all things - even rediscovery.
Hi Chris. As always, thanks for the thoughtful reply. Some ongoing tasks for me are: (1) try to understand fundamentally what’s happening, (2) try to evaluate what I think is happening vis-a-vis possible futures, and (3) perhaps suggest actions/policies that might result in what I view as desirable outcomes. In this reply you touch on:
- analytical philosophy,
- change in the focus of universities,
- overuse of economics, and
- change in the understanding of truth and sincere speech.
You touch on MANY other topics in Stranger Worlds and elsewhere. In reading/studying your writings I’m working on my first task. You also often evaluate the topics you introduce, so I get some gist for my second task.
I’m fortunate in having found a serious researcher/thinker whose worldview and mental processes are similar enough to mine to enable many learning opportunities, and, amazingly, is willing to answer questions and make serious comments on my thoughts. Thanks again.
The pleasure is (almost) all mind, Frank! I hope to explore this university issue in a future month of Stranger Worlds. Thanks for opening up this path. All the best!
Hi Chris, other stuff has kept me away. I hope it’s a bit under control now.
Re:” It was in the decades after Einstein that the long slow march towards the intellectual gulags of specialisation commenced, narrowing the horizons of human experience both in the sciences and beyond.”
Taking this statement as true, and it seems to me that it is, what can cogently be said about why this happened? In your reply to RZD you claim that “the rise of analytic philosophy” was one factor. Without going “far beyond the scope of this piece” might your say a bit more?
Dear Frank,
Wonderful to hear from you! Life of course imposes its demands upon our time, and I appreciate any time you can spare to talk here. The more I think about this subject, the more I suspect that the rise of analytic philosophy (which I mentioned to Bob) may be an epiphenomena of the larger trend, which at heart may well be the transformation of the university between 1850 and 1950.
Partly I hint at the issue in this piece. Einstein through to Bohm, physicists were still well-read in both the humanities and sciences because of a common educational corpus that gave a shared background of understanding for all academics. However, by the end of World War II, the image of the university as a community of scholars vanished, and they began to transform into yet another profit centre, placing greater weight on research funds over teaching and elevating certain departments in the sciences over almost all of those in the humanities.
At the same time, the purpose of sending a student to university ceased to be to prepare them to be excellent citizens and began to be to sell them an education as a functional step towards employment. Today, this is the dominant understanding of what a university education is for: preparation to enter the 'job market', and not preparation for exemplary citizenship. This is all also tied up in the rise of economics after the Enlightenment, but again I wouldn't like to guess which is the phenomena and which is the epiphenomena here...
Finally, the topic I am pursuing here this July is also important: the transition from a wider understanding of truth and sincere speech into the focus on 'information' and the strictly true-or-false propositional view of truth, which despite its contemporary ubiquity is an exceptionally narrow conception, and a problematic one.
Many thanks for asking me to clarify, and I have made a note of this topic, as it would make an interesting theme for a future month, perhaps later this year.
With unlimited love,
Chris.
"He {Einstein} came from the last generation of scientists who were given a broad education, one that included the works of Plato, Aristotle, and Immanuel Kant, and were thus philosophically grounded in both ancient European thought and the more recent ideals of the Enlightenment."
Unfortunately this statement is not correct...
You might look at the writings of Profs. John Wheeler or David Bohm, or many others
or look at some of the writings of Paul Halpern
I suppose by "ancient European thought " you meant Greek and Roman philosophy, science, and literature. But in parallel with these cultures, there were many other cultures contributing in the span of intellectual history.
Consider today some few examples of Physics courses offered:
https://www.ox.ac.uk/admissions/undergraduate/courses/course-listing/physics-and-philosophy
https://bulletin.brown.edu/the-college/concentrations/phph/
https://www.thegreatcourses.com/courses/the-great-questions-of-philosophy-and-physics
Thanks for your challenge here, Bob, which I partially accept. Regarding "the last generation of scientists", I have always been ridiculously loose in my application of 'generation', but in this case I really did muddy the waters. I'll endeavour to expand on this point.
Let me start with the disagreement. I don't know Paul Halpern, but born in 1961 I will wager good money he's come in after the domination of analytic philosophy, which means he is 'lost in information', and not a likely counter-example as such. Likewise, the presence of philosophy introduction classes at post-university institutions is neither here nor there. I studied an introduction to business module at university, but this is nothing like having 'worked in the family business', as a Victorian gentlemen would have done - there's a huge pragmatic gap here.
What's more, if the kind of philosophical grounding I'm referring to is largely voided by the rise of analytic philosophy (as I would indeed claim, with Babette Babich as my second in this duel), anyone who comes after the point when Kant was part of the general curriculum is going to lack the discursive skills in philosophy possessed by the generations of scientists I'm referring to here. In this regard, however, the point I am wanting to make is far beyond the scope of this piece, although it *does* connect directly with this month's theme of truth vs information rather well!
However, I do have to concede to your point in terms of the early twentieth century physicists. Einstein was born in 1879, which puts him significantly older than the 'last generation' I'm referring to, which would include Oppenheimer (born 1904), Wheeler (born 1911), and Bohm (born in 1917), as well as many others especially in early quantum physics. (I might also note with relevance that Popper was born in 1902...)
Any physicist or scholar who completed high school before World War II (as all of these did) will fit the description I made, for which the choice of the term 'generation' was misleading. I do not think we have a word for the concept in my head here - a kind of 'discourse generation', for Einstein was in conversation with many of these people, albeit as 'the old guard'. I'll be more careful next time I make this point!
Thanks for the challenge!
Chris
Thanks for this piece, Chris. Not sure if it's nostalgic or hopeful or perhaps both. In any case, I like the direction it points toward. The paragraph on the "religious nonbeliever" is the sort of thing I'd be relieved to hear discussed in secular circles. As things stand, it seems secular life has slipped into philistinism.
Do we lack a word other than nostalgia for appreciation of thought that has passed...? Perhaps this is another cost of the mythology of progress Christendom unwittingly unleashed. But there is definitely a hope in my yearning for what has apparently been lost. Nothing, however, is ever lost; the potential always remains. There is, after all, a time for all things - even rediscovery.
Many thanks for the comment, Asa!
Chris.