"I've got an idea..." ("citizen philosophy")
I've been thinking about how the gap between amateur and professional philosophy could be better bridged, and I had an idea that could perhaps be adapted into some feature of these forums, or any philosophy discussion medium really, but I thought I'd share it here in case the mods here feel like doing anything with it.
The idea is that there could be some kind of loosely structured discourse where people who think they might have new philosophical ideas (either new possible positions, or new arguments for existing positions) can say what those ideas are, and then the responses should only be either affirming that that actually is a new idea so far as the respondent knows, or else, a link to or quote of or other brief educational presentation of someone else who has already had that (supposedly) exact idea, and why (if) not everyone is on board with it already.
The first poster can then clarify how (if) their idea is different from the older version, or put forth what they think is a new argument that defeats the existing counterarguments that have been presented. Then repeat the process from before: respondents can either affirm that that is new so far as they know, or present where it has been said before and how it was received. And so on, until either the first poster doesn't think they have anything new to add to the discussion anymore, or all of the respondents agree that they've never heard of this idea before. (Or, I suppose, the first poster still thinks their idea is different, but none of the respondents can see what the supposed difference is).
So the outcome in any case (except the last, failure to communicate, case) is one of two things:
either a novice learns of the professional discourse that has happened thus far on a topic of interest to them, so information from the professional world gets filtered down to the amateurs better;
or else, an actual new idea, however small, gets filtered up from the amateur world to more educated people, who might then be able help to actually bring it to the notice of the professionals.
This thought was inspired by reading something about "citizen science", and wishing that there was some philosophical equivalent of that, "citizen philosophy", then pondering what that would even be: some way for amateurs to contribute something useful that professionals can then take further than the amateurs could by themselves. I love it when I can pass along knowledge I have to amateurs who lack it, referring them to encyclopedia articles etc on subjects that are new thoughts to them but old school to others. And I've long wished that someone even more educated than me could do the same for me, let me know which if any of the ideas I've thought were new actually were. Thus... this idea.
(Now watch, this already exists somewhere and someone just has to tell me about it...)
The idea is that there could be some kind of loosely structured discourse where people who think they might have new philosophical ideas (either new possible positions, or new arguments for existing positions) can say what those ideas are, and then the responses should only be either affirming that that actually is a new idea so far as the respondent knows, or else, a link to or quote of or other brief educational presentation of someone else who has already had that (supposedly) exact idea, and why (if) not everyone is on board with it already.
The first poster can then clarify how (if) their idea is different from the older version, or put forth what they think is a new argument that defeats the existing counterarguments that have been presented. Then repeat the process from before: respondents can either affirm that that is new so far as they know, or present where it has been said before and how it was received. And so on, until either the first poster doesn't think they have anything new to add to the discussion anymore, or all of the respondents agree that they've never heard of this idea before. (Or, I suppose, the first poster still thinks their idea is different, but none of the respondents can see what the supposed difference is).
So the outcome in any case (except the last, failure to communicate, case) is one of two things:
either a novice learns of the professional discourse that has happened thus far on a topic of interest to them, so information from the professional world gets filtered down to the amateurs better;
or else, an actual new idea, however small, gets filtered up from the amateur world to more educated people, who might then be able help to actually bring it to the notice of the professionals.
This thought was inspired by reading something about "citizen science", and wishing that there was some philosophical equivalent of that, "citizen philosophy", then pondering what that would even be: some way for amateurs to contribute something useful that professionals can then take further than the amateurs could by themselves. I love it when I can pass along knowledge I have to amateurs who lack it, referring them to encyclopedia articles etc on subjects that are new thoughts to them but old school to others. And I've long wished that someone even more educated than me could do the same for me, let me know which if any of the ideas I've thought were new actually were. Thus... this idea.
(Now watch, this already exists somewhere and someone just has to tell me about it...)
Comments (31)
It's a nice idea but it requires quite a lot of discipline from all concerned. :)
This is intended as a serious response. There really are no new philosophical ideas. There probably haven't been any since soon after people developed written language.
So, is my idea that there are no new ideas a new idea? Definitely not.
Yeah, or else heavier moderation for those kinds of threads to keep responses in format.
Quoting Kenosha Kid
Thanks! And I sure hope so. That’s basically what I wanted when I first came looking for philosophy discourse online, and have been mostly disappointed about so far.
Quoting T Clark
Surely then you could cite a previous example of that idea being put forth in professional philosophy somewhere, and some responses it received to explain why not everyone is on board with it already?
And even if that were true, it would just mean that all of the threads of this type would have the first of the two possible outcomes (novices learn of the professional discourse that has already been had), and that’s still a good thing.
From the Bible - Ecclesiastes 1:9
What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun.
Just because it's not a new idea doesn't mean people will agree with it.
From "The Black Cottage" by Robert Frost:
[i]For, dear me, why abandon a belief
Merely because it ceases to be true.
Cling to it long enough, and not a doubt
It will turn true again, for so it goes.
Most of the change we think we see in life
Is due to truths being in and out of favour.[/i]
Yes but presumably those who disagree with it will give some explanation as to why.
You cite Ecclesiastes. Surely someone has commented somewhere in the past few thousand years on why they think that passage is wrong? And, for that matter, surely someone has offered an explanation of why they think it's right? Ecclesiastes just states that it is, without argument.
Actually, the first verse of Ecclesiastes says there is nothing new under the sun. The rest of the chapter explains why. The issue is another old idea under the sun - cyclic time vs. progressive time. Are we just going around in circles or are we headed somewhere?
That is half of the aim of this idea, too: for people to learn more about the ideas that have already been had.
Quoting T Clark
Care to summarize that for us? And, again, why isn't everyone already on board with that idea? (As in, what reasons would they give for rejecting it?)
So, treating this not as poetry, but as philosophy for a moment, is the claim that all beliefs are always true, and are only counted false at times, or that beliefs can at some times be true and at others untrue? If the latter would this depend on changing conditions or is the poet suggesting that truth and falsity depend on prevailing belief?
Do you think Heidegger's understanding of being had a precursor? Hegel's dialectic? Spinoza's God? Kant's noumenon and transcendental ego? Descartes' "evil demon"? Leibniz' monads? Kierkegaard's leap of faith? Nietzsche's genealogy of morals? Wittgenstein's forms of life? There were precursors to all?
I can't speak to most of those. I have been struck by how Kant's noumenon is similar to Lao Tzu's Tao, even though I know he wasn't directly influenced. Schopenhauer considered himself a Buddhist. An evil demon who misleads humans has been part of folklore and religion for millennia. The idea that reality might be an illusion ditto. As I said, I am not familiar enough with the others to comment.
I don't think Kant;s noumenon is really similar to the Tao. The Dao is understood to be a "way" of being or living which can be intuited but cannot be directly spoken about, as I interpret it. Also the thing-in-itself referring to things as they are in themselves as opposed to how they appear I think has nothing really to do with the Dao.
I also don't think it's accurate to say that Schopenhauer considered himself a Buddhist. As far as I remember from reading a biography by Safranski many years ago Schopenhauer would customarily read the Upanisads in bed before sleeping, though. In any case I didn't mention Schopenhauer as an originator of an idea, but that said he is credited with being the first to think the noumenon or ding an sich as blind purposeless will. This idea may be thought to have a precursor in Spinoza's conatus, though.
Descartes' evil demon was posited as a possible entity that completely deceives us, which is a little different and stronger than saying that reality is hidden behind a veil of illusion (Maya).
I just don't think it is true that there have been no new ideas since soon after the dawn of writing; I haven't seen any evidence to support that claim and much to refute it.
If you are at all familiar with my oeuvre, you've heard me say that metaphysical ideas are not true or false, they are more or less useful in particular situations. That's part of the sense I get from what Frost has written, although there's a lot more going on too. But, dear God, he says it better than I ever could. He's one of our most philosophical poets.
I'm not the one to give you a better argument than the admittedly weak one I already have.
Quoting T Clark
Fair enough. Let me just say that I think there is a sense in which what you said is right, but there are many senses in which I think it is not. How's that for unequivocality that may even speak to Frost's very point?
Nice idea.
Quoting Pfhorrest
...which would then devolve into a carbon copy of every single thread we already have since no two ideas are so identical that no such argument could be made. Cue endless arguments about how your x is really the same as their y... You've still got the same blind spot you have in all the posts of this sort. You think that the way the world seems to you is just as clear to others. It's just a theory of mind issue, quite common. Things that seem clearly delineated to you are not delineated that way to others. It means that complex things like ideas can't be compared via 'weights-and-measures' as if they were packs of lumber. Ideas either resonate or they don't. They're like a hat, they either suit you or they don't. They're not atomic structures to be dissected and compared like an Ikea flat pack.
Have you read "Black Cottage?" It's my favorite Frost poem. My favorite poem. One of my favorite written works. It gives me shivers every time I read it. As I said, there's a lot more going on than just what I quoted.
I think its a great idea, an effective way for those from all different kinds of background to acquaint with the origins of their opinions and beliefs in centuries-old schools of thought. I know I would be interested!
It probably requires a strong commitment by some very competent professional philosophers or some cadre familiar with a lot of primary sources to really get going.
Of course all the quirks of life such as time constraints etc. are a barrier. For me, I have a medical condition that doesn't cause physical interference, I mean I see the page and understand the concepts well enough, but my ability to strongly commit towards reading a lot of material in depth from many different eras on my own can be limited. If a lot of interested parties were willing to support participants such that a safe and welcoming literary climate is created, it could be amazing, even revolutionary. But easier said than done.
(Many are inclined to want to kick my ass because I have a fudged up brain in exactly the worst kind of way lol Still searching for a cure.)
I think if perhaps such a system were build from the bottom up, with large numbers of kinda-knowledgeable people responding to the even larger numbers of complete novices, and smaller numbers of moderately more knowledgeable people responding to most of whatever goes unanswered by those lower tiers, then perhaps it could begin to attract the attention of even more educated people who would only have to respond to the little that actually makes it through all of those lower-to-middling tiers.
That's the complication: in order for it to become safe and effective, very influential interests have to get involved, and as soon as very influential interests get involved, an agenda not usually to the benefit of the less influential begins to materiaize and cause problems. The internet provides copious evidence of the trainwrecks that entirely bottom-up organizing cause. But perhaps a way exists...
Thinking about the possibilities and hurdles kind of provides a commentary on modern life.
I'm glad you liked it.
So am I!
I had a thought today about the technological implementation of this, although I'm not sure how exactly it would work with this forum software (@jamalrob care to comment?). The thought was that:
- there could be different classes of volunteer respondents who want to get pinged with different levels of these "hey is this a new idea" posts.
- only members of a given education level can be of a higher-level tier, though highly-educated users can also voluntarily be of a lower tier: so Tier1 can be anyone, Tier2 must be at least AAs, Tier3 must be at least BAs, Tier4 must be at least MAs, and Tier5 must be PhDs.
- and only members of the next-lowest tier are able to ping users of a given higher tier, so volunteers at higher tier levels get pinged less often about the low-hanging fruit: so anyone can ping Tier1, but only Tier1 can ping Tier2, only Tier2 can ping Tier3, only Tier3 can ping Tier4, and only Tier4 can ping Tier5.
So if a PhD were willing to volunteer just a little bit of time to checking out things that none of the volunteers with at least MAs recognize as existing ideas, they could sign up to the Tier5 role. What they stand to get out of that time volunteering is a chance to be exposed to things that are possibly genuinely novel thoughts, that they might then be happy to co-author papers about. But they wouldn't have to wade through every single instance of someone reinventing a 2000 year old wheel to find those, because lower tiers of respondents would be filtering those out. And likewise for the lower and lower tiers too, so e.g. someone with a BA can be available to ping if nobody less educated has ever heard of an idea, without having to be right on the front lines getting pinged by everyone all the time.
The amateur needs the professional's experience and the professional needs the amateur's novel viewpoint. Many a times, professional philosophers are so absorbed in figuring out and learning by heart what has been said that they simply don't have the time or the energy contemplating on what can be said.
Amateurs, on the other hand, aren't bogged down in this way, they know next to nothing of what has been said and ergo, they're all about what can be said. The downside? What can be said is precisely what has been said (reinventing the wheel, committing the same mistakes as one's predcessors).
It's a dilemma:
Either risk making the same mistakes/waste time reinventing the wheel (amateur) OR spend your entire life memorizing standard positions and responses to them (professional).
Protagoras paradox seems relevant but that's another story.
How can we put an amateur and a professional in the same room and hope for sparks to fly, you know, let magic happen?
This, at first, seemed to me an unsolvable problem but then I realized it's only so in terms of 1 person, individualistic in flavor but all one has to do is to kindle the team spirit in ourselves and a solution presents itself - the amateur and the professional complement each other, together the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. :lol:
And what if someone's idea is that good that he is afraid of being stolen?
(I am not that someone by the way).
:100: :up: :clap:
Quoting dimosthenis9
Then he’s free to keep it to himself, or publish it in an attributable way on his own.