<p>I'm wondering what made some people so terrified of Philosophy. The actor, Steve Martin majored in Philosophy but dropped out. I remember him saying "don't study Philosophy. if you study chemistry, 5 years down the road, you won't remember anything. if you study philosophy, 5 years down the road, you'll remember just enough to screw over your entire life". i think this was after he studied the "scary philosopher" whose name start with a W. Wittgenstein I think? Well he also said he dropped out because Philosophy just seems to be a big play on words. I'm wondering why are people so scared of Wittgenstein? (I haven't studied him yet. Maybe I should avoid him). And what else make people scared of Philosophy? Is it having to face the depressing truths of life?</p>
<p>HA HA HA HA</p>
<p>Yes, I’m going to major in philosophy or minor in philosophy. Anyway, people are terrified of philosophy just like people are terrified of the things they do not understand. For instance, when Europeans encounter native Americans, the first reaction was fear quickly followed by resentment. In the same way, when people look at those almost unfathomable philosophical doctrines, they are terrified because they don’t understand it.
Secondly, philosophy imposes meaninglessness on otherwise meaningful life. For instance, after reading works of existentialists and Nietzsche, i considered suicide. 
Such is called “existential crisis,” where one cannot comprehend the meaning of existence; therefore, choosing to end it by death.
Thirdly, speaking of that Wittgenstein dude, that dude was crazy, man. He was a genius, praised by Russel and many of his contemporaries. His book was totally unfathomable, yet extremely simplistic in both content and style.
His book Tractatus Logico Philosophicus was his doctor thesis. Even his instructor, Lord Bertrand Russell could not comprehend it.
But basically, he destroyed metaphysics. He raped the works of all western metaphysicians by pure symbolic logic. </p>
<p>Anyway, if you are, like me, have nothing to do in this life. You can try to read Derrida’s book. Man, reading his book is like smoking weed, you feel as if you are speaking english in another planet.</p>
<p>PS: Wittgenstein had a miserable life. His brothers suicided, and his parents were, I believe, INSANE. All philosophers in the west who couldn’t get laid were insane. For instance: Nietzsche, Kant, and Wittgenstein.</p>
<p>By all means, marry. If you get a good wife, you will become happy; if you get a bad one, you will become a philosopher.</p>
<p>i <3 Wittgenstein!</p>
<p>Socrates, Socrates, Socrates and his ugly wife.
But not quite, Marx had a prettttttty wife. But Marx, in family life, was a real ******* anyway. He had wrote a hundred love letters to his wife before they went married.</p>
<p>Because they’re scared of it.</p>
<p>Scared to think, and scared to explore what lies beyond the walls of their bubble.</p>
<p>Although now, Bertrand Russell was a bit of a playboy.</p>
<p>“But basically, he destroyed metaphysics. He raped the works of all western metaphysicians by pure symbolic logic”</p>
<p>I’m sorry, but didn’t Kant lay a smack down on metaphysics before Mr. W. here?</p>
<p>Quote from “Critique of Pure Reason,” chapter “Transcendental Deduction B,” section 25:
“There is no proper knowledge if I thus merely indicate what intuition of an object is not, without being able to say what it is that is contained in the intuition. For I have not then shown that the object which I am thinking through my pure concept is even so much as possible, not being in a position to give any intuition corresponding to the concept, and being able only to say that our intuition is not applicable to it.”</p>
<p>Translate: Metaphysics is BS because it does and cannot combine intuition with pure concept, but rather is only concept and has no real implication. This is basically what W. meant when he said in Tractatus Logico Philosophicus: “7. Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent.”</p>
<p>Then again, they both gave me ulcer.</p>
<p>The above quotes is one reason why you don’t study philosophy. At the same time, they might be the only reason why you should study philosophy.</p>
<p>is philosophy like a all or none thing? like you either get it or you don’t? no in-between. O_O</p>
<p>Philosophy is something that requires chronological studying to get the maximum benefit. You don’t jump in physics and expect to comprehend quantum mechanics right off the bat. I recommend that you start at the beginning and work your way up. All philosophers learn from their predecessors and draw from them. Reading Kant without a good foundation in Descartes, Locke, Hume, Wolff, Newton, and Leibniz (some Berkeley if you have time) would be like getting mind rape. I remember it took me six hour straight to read and understand EIGHT whole pages. I can promise you that once you get through the first half of the Critique of Pure Reason, your mind would be opened to a whole new way of thinking and seeing. And without understanding Kant, it would be futile trying to understand many modern philosophers who have many worthwhile things to say.</p>
<p>To spark of your interest, I highly recommend Plato’s Apology where Socrates is on trial for impiety. This dialogue is wonderfully written and if it doesn’t get you excited about philosophy, then probably nothing would.</p>
<p>I’m a freshman thinking of double majoring in English (Literature concentration) and Philosophy. I’m still not entirely sure about Philosophy though. I decided to declare it as my second major after a course in fiction where we delved into Aristotle’s Poetics and also after a course in world history after 1400 that dealt heavily with philosophical movements. And I guess because I enjoyed reading Nietzsche and all my favorite writers are Kafka-inspired.</p>
<p>Since I guess most posters in this topic are/were philosophy majors, are those things I listed enough to make me a competent philo. major? And what made you guys major in it? A lot of people have tried to dissuade me from it and I’m a bit intimidated by that. But then again, I’m looking at my textbooks for my philosophy class and I’m excited for when we take all those up.</p>
<p>yeah, i’m an english major, now considering double majoring in philosophy too. i took my first philosophy class in high school and liked it, but they didn’t call it that. they just called it a humanities program that combined philosophy and english. so even though i was taking philosophy, i didn’t know i was. it wasn’t until last year when i was reading through majors and finally read the description for philosophy. i was interested, so i took an intro class, realized it was similar to what i took in high school, and also liked the intro class. i don’t know if i’ll actually follow up on the major since i’m already a junior, but i definitely want to learn more philosophy. now i’m taking epistemology. and i also read the descriptions for philosophy classes, and found a lot I was interested in. I’m just taking it slowly and see from quarter to quarter, but it’s most likely i will take another philosophy class next quarter.</p>
<p>I am a math major and still need two semesters of humanities for distribution requirements, so I figured I might try philosophy next semester. The prospect of writing papers about texts that I will likely not understand scares the hell out of me…</p>
<p>Technically, Kant did not “rape” metaphysics. He merely changed the way metaphysics was studied. He hoped to change metaphysics into a science. An obscure a priori science.</p>
<p>Here is a quote to prove my point:Introduction, Critique of Pure Reason, sections III, Philosophy Stands in Need of a Science which shall determine the possibility, the principles, and the extent of all a priori knowledge. “The science which with all its preparations, is in its final intention directed solely to their solution is metaphysics.”</p>
<p>Kant didn’t change how metaphysics was studied, he practically destroyed it, or if some would prefer it, he severely diminished it. Whoever wanted to keep metaphysics had to patch up something else. I think you have taken Kant’s quote out of context and misinterpreted his point. Here is the WHOLE quote of what he was saying (what’s in the bracket is my interpretation of it):</p>
<p>“what is still more extraordinary than all the preceding
is this, that certain modes of knowledge leave the field of all
possible experiences and have the appearance of extending
the scope of our judgments beyond all limits of experience [this is what Metaphysics does], and this by means of concepts to which no corresponding
object can ever be given in experience…[Kant later said in Transcendental Deduction B that without experience there CAN’T be knowledge, Metaphysics does not rely on experience, hence Metaphysics cannot be knowledge]…
It is precisely by means of the latter modes of knowledge,
in a realm beyond the world of the senses, where experience
can yield neither guidance nor correction, that our reason
carries on those enquiries which owing to their importance
we consider to be far more excellent, and in their purpose
far more lofty, than all that the understanding can learn in
the field of appearances [Metaphysics = making a lot of mistakes]. Indeed we prefer to run every risk of error rather than desist from such urgent enquiries, on the ground of their dubious character, or from disdain and
indifference…[your quote is coming up right here] The science which,
with all its preparations, is in its final intention directed
solely to their solution [the solution for the question of God, immortality, and freedom] is metaphysics and its procedure
is at first dogmatic, that is, it confidently sets itself to this
task without any previous examination of the capacity or
incapacity of reason for so great an undertaking.”</p>
<p>One of the most important reasons why Kant wrote the Critique is to understand not only how we know, but the great limitation to what we can know. We have knowledge by having imagination uniting intuitions (pure and empirical) with a priori concepts. Metaphysics relies solely on concept with no intuition, and therefore cannot be considered a knowledge. Metaphysics CANNOT determine a priori knowledge. He just said that it does right there on the last line! He is not saying metaphysics is the answer, he is pointing out that many people have used Metaphysics to try and find the answer and fail miserably.</p>
<p>If we go by what you are saying and believe that metaphysics is the science that “determine the possibility, the principles, and the extent of all a priori knowledge,” then what the heck determined metaphysics…? Metaphysics claims to be an a priori knowledge and yet it also self justifies its own existence? That’s a tall order for anything except God (which Kant also claims we cannot know).</p>
<p>"He just said that it does right there on the last line! "
I’m sorry, I actually meant,
“He just said that it does NOT right there on the last line!”</p>
<p>And also, I was throwing the word experience around a bit loosely there, I meant to say intuitions (both pure–space and time–and empirical–i.e. experience).</p>
<p>my school only had one course on Wittgenstein, and now it’s not even offered anymore. hahah. anybody know why? it sounded pretty interesting too.</p>
<p>“Philosophy is something that requires chronological studying to get the maximum benefit.”</p>
<p>I see where this point comes from, but I absolutely disagree, and I think this is the type of thinking that turns a lot of people off of philosophy. Classical philosophy is not interesting to everyone. Trust me, I love Plato’s Apology, but I don’t expect most people to feel similarly. I do, however, think that most people, if exposed under the right circumstances, can learn to love certain elements of philosophy. </p>
<p>In many programs, the idea of applied philosophy is largely neglected. Philosophy doesn’t have to be the study of old dead guys. It doesn’t have to be historical or linear or divided into schools at all. Someone can be a happy and excellent philosophy student and yet not have any idea what Wittgenstein stood for, when he lived, how he was influenced, or what he did to metaphysics. Is this one way to study the subject? Of course. Is it a good way, and do some students find it the best way? I imagine so. But it’s not the best way for everyone, and it’s certainly not the only way.</p>
<p>I do think that some background in philosophy is good. For one thing, it familiarizes students enough so they’re then able to reap max benefit from later classes. I don’t think that your average student should jump into an upper division seminar and expect to be able to really follow or appreciate the discussion. But I don’t think that “some background in philosophy” necessarily needs to be historical. That said, I also think that some knowledge of philosophy’s history can be interesting for its own sake. Beyond this, the historical approach can be very useful (perhaps imperative) in certain instances, branches, arguments, whatever. So don’t get me wrong…I have nothing against chronological study. I’m definitely not suggesting that it’s useless or unbeneficial. I just don’t think that it’s always necessary, even for “maximum benefit.” If I had believed otherwise before pursuing a philosophy major, I might have been one of the students who ran away scared.</p>
<p>“Philosophy is something that requires chronological studying to get the maximum benefit.”
I think his statement is basically correct. How can you understand, say, Leo Strauss without knowing Plato?
And regarding to the practical side of philosophy, I don’t think philosophy needs to be practical. In fact, philosophy is not meant to be an empirical science nor is philosophy a form research and development.
Philosophy is kind of like literature, it was initiated by the Socrates and his contemporaries, and later elaborated by succeeding western philosophers. Philosophy is just an investigation to a complex reality which cannot be explained by science and common sense.
After Kant, philosophers in Britian and philosophers in continent Europe began to separate themselves into two distinct schools, analytical and continental. The two schools of philosophies present you with two diametrically opposed philosophies with former taking almost everything out of context and totally disregard the history of philosophy, while the latter viewing everything in terms of its social, political, economic context and asserting the supreme importance of the history of philosophy, or the development of western philosophy.</p>