<p>It's not the first time I hear Columbia described as the more "philosophical" Ivy, i.e. the students are more engaged with those "there is no spoon"/"parallel universe" type debates relatively speaking. </p>
<p>Obviously it will never do to generalize the type of students attending a large university, but just out of curiosity-- as a prospective student at Columbia, do you consider yourself a pragmatist or a philosopher at heart?</p>
<p>Thanks for answering beforehand. :)</p>
<p>Pragmatist.</p>
<p>pragmatist as well...</p>
<p>Interesting question. Yet, it seems that you're asserting that (1) philosophy is inherently impractical and (2) that pragmatism is not a philosphy in and of itself. Both of which i disagree with. Philosophy goes far beyond the obscure, existentialist questions apparent in Keanu Reeves's famed trilogy. </p>
<p>I apologize if I sound too pedantic, I have a habit of over-thinking things, and spending time building flowery arguments.</p>
<p>So you can put Jorian down for the philosopher side, then. ;)</p>
<p>Put me there too. Why would you do anything with immediate practical value for society when you could engage in largely useless intellectual postulations for fun?</p>
<p>Speaking of philosophy, who's your favourite philosopher? Or favourites, since it's hard to narrow it down to one.</p>
<p>philosopher - my favorite is probably Voltaire, but I like many others. Im also a socialist.</p>
<p>p.s. the phrase "in and of itself" needs to be abolished, as well as "insofar as" - both of these phrases sound ridiculous</p>
<p>I read Candide this past week. It was decent but not as blazingly insightful as I anticipated it to be.</p>
<p>I'm practical but I like to think and discuss. Useless philosophical "there is no spoon" debates seem kinda silly to me, although I take part sometimes just as something to do. Maybe if we were arguing things that actually mattered: conservatism vs. liberalism, Alaskan oil drilling, what to do about them terrorists...</p>
<p>Bouncetotheizzo- any particular reason why you recommend discontinuing the use of "in and of itself." I said it out of habit, and now that you brought it to attention, i'm not really even sure what it means--'of itself', it is ridiculous. Any guesses as to its origin/popularity?</p>
<p>It exists because it uses more intellectual-sounding words to make the same point as just 'itself'. People like to sound pompously intellectual.</p>
<p>Yes, that is true--funny how redundance (word? is it just 'being redundant'?) is considered intellectual. I apologize for falling in to the status quo's traps of false sense of intellectual superiority. I humbly apologize.</p>
<p>Philosophical. Prospective Econ/Philosophy major.</p>
<p>I think "in and of itself" denotes that the quality being referred to is more inherent within whatever it is that has that quality. "Pragmatism is not a philosophy in and of itself" means to say that pragmatism is not truly a philosophy but could be considered philosophy when approaching it from a certain angle. At least that's what I figure.</p>
<p>The point is that you could just say 'in itself' instead of 'in and of itself' and mean the same thing. Redundancy.</p>
<p>Jorian:
I'm not exactly implying that philosophy is "inherently impractical" or that pragmatism is not a philosophy. But, very simply, for the sake of this argument pragmatism relates more to "reality" and the saying "what you see is what you get" than philosophy does. You can substitute "realist" for "pragmatist" here and the discussion wouldn't be too different.</p>
<p>My fave philosopher is Emerson; Socrates is a close second.</p>
<p>
Amen!</p>
<p>By the way, has anyone read The Athenian Murders by Jose Carlos Somoza? That book is a gem for philosophy buffs.</p>