Philosophy Now Forum

Nicholas Maxwell points out where the Enlightenment went wrong.

https://philosophynow.org/issues/108/Ca ... arn_Wisdom

This sounds like an article Noam Chomsky could have written about institutional stupidity.

"The assumption is that no thesis about the world is accepted permanently by science independently of evidence." Popper would be very upset to read this. He certainly did not have this assumption. Any thesis about the world is only temporal, and evidence is not the word to use in sciences. Popper did try to avoid this evidence word.

It is rather dangerous to use "Enlightenment" as a name for so many different philosophers. This causes endless discussions about definitions. I do not view upon Voltaire as an enlightenment philosopher, for he was a rather conservative religious person and philosopher.

After a quick read, it seems that this author is blaming 'the Enlightenment' for the problems we have today in academia.
It starts off with a gloriously positive view of what was achieved. Then he concludes that they did us wrong. Eh?

We need to learn from the manner in which science makes progress towards greater knowledge how we can make social progress towards greater wisdom.
This is not a new idea. It goes back to the Enlightenment of the eighteenth century, especially the French Enlightenment. Voltaire, Diderot, Condorcet and the other Enlightenment philosophes had the profoundly important idea that it might be possible to learn from scientific progress how to achieve social progress towards an Enlightened world. And they did not just have the idea: they did everything they could to put it into practice. They fought dictatorial power, superstition, bad traditions and injustice, with weapons no more lethal than those of argument and wit. They gave their support to the virtues of tolerance, curiosity, openness to doubt, and readiness to learn from criticism and experience. Courageously and energetically they laboured to promote reason in personal and social life. And in doing so, in a sense they created the modern world, with all its glories and disasters.

...

The trouble, here is that the term 'Enlightenment' has SO many different meanings:

According to Bertrand Russell...the enlightenment was a phase in a progressive development, which began in antiquity, and that reason and challenges to the established order were constant ideals throughout that time.[9] Russell argues that the enlightenment was ultimately born out of the Protestant reaction against the Catholic counter-reformation, when the philosophical views of the past two centuries crystallized into a coherent world view. He argues that many of the philosophical views, such as affinity for democracy against monarchy, originated among Protestants in the early 16th century to justify their desire to break away from the Pope and the Catholic Church. Though many of these philosophical ideals were picked up by Catholics, Russell argues, by the 18th century the Enlightenment was the principal manifestation of the schism that began with Martin Luther...

...Although Enlightenment thinkers generally shared a similar set of values, their philosophical perspectives and methodological approaches to accomplishing their goals varied in significant and sometimes contradictory ways. As Outram notes, the Enlightenment comprised "many different paths, varying in time and geography, to the common goals of progress, of tolerance, and the removal of abuses in Church and state".[21]

In his essay What is Enlightenment? (1784), Immanuel Kant described it simply as freedom to use one's own intelligence.[22] More broadly, the Enlightenment period is marked by increasing empiricism, scientific rigor, and reductionism, along with increased questioning of religious orthodoxy
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Age_of_Enlightenment

So, 'The freedom to use one's own intelligence' - along with courageous fights, using reason against tradition and varying methods. In this respect, our lives have certainly evolved with freedom to question authority/religion.
However, the suggestion that the Enlightenment is to blame for 'creating the modern world with all its glories and disasters' hardly follows.


Later, we are offered this, as a revolutionary idea of what academia could or would do...to make us wise as to what is of value.

How to create a wise society
...
Academic thought would be pursued as a specialised, subordinate part of what is really important and fundamental: the thinking that goes on, individually, socially and institutionally, in the social world, guiding individual, social and institutional actions and life. The fundamental intellectual and humanitarian aim of inquiry would be to help humanity acquire wisdom – wisdom being the capacity to realise, that is, apprehend and create, what is of value in life, for oneself and for others. Wisdom thus includes knowledge and technological know-how, but much else besides.
Academia would seek to learn from, educate, and argue with the world beyond it, but it would not dictate. Ideally, academia would have sufficient power (but no more) to retain its independence from government, industry, the press, public opinion, and other centres of power and influence.

To attain personal wisdom, can take years of experience and learning. Even then, is it not a subjective philosophy? Based on individual circumstances, willingness to adapt.
Is it even possible for a society or a world to learn wisdom?

What would be nice to see, is not necessarily a revolution in academia but more graduates taking any lessons learned and applying them in the public arena. Groundwork in courage. But that doesn't pay the bills. We need seams of rich wisdom.

Back in the days: 'They fought dictatorial power, superstition, bad traditions and injustice, with weapons no more lethal than those of argument and wit'.
Today, we see plenty of commentary and hear lots of talk, talk, talk but fail to see any Effective Action from Academia or its graduates.
And you can't blame dependence on government etc. for that. Nor can you blame the Enlightenment.
Get wise.
To the ploys of political strategists. The powers that are and would-be. To the consequences of what might follow.
This is the difference - the 'Enlightenment' knew its enemy well. Religion. It got so far.
Why did we stop? Do we no longer feel any sense of danger ?

I've tried that for the past many years, and you guys have gotten exactly nowhere, magazine standard is still terrible low, forum is still flooded with utterly useless threads and answers, the retards rule philosophy ..and will always do so, until it's reformed, since they can't reform it themselves, they are simply not bright enough to comprehend relevance.

HexHammer wrote:I've tried that for the past many years, and you guys have gotten exactly nowhere, magazine standard is still terrible low, forum is still flooded with utterly useless threads and answers, the retards rule philosophy ..and will always do so, until it's reformed, since they can't reform it themselves, they are simply not bright enough to comprehend relevance.

Well, perhaps you should give up and leave it to others to carry on the fight.

Ginkgo wrote:

HexHammer wrote:I've tried that for the past many years, and you guys have gotten exactly nowhere, magazine standard is still terrible low, forum is still flooded with utterly useless threads and answers, the retards rule philosophy ..and will always do so, until it's reformed, since they can't reform it themselves, they are simply not bright enough to comprehend relevance.

Well, perhaps you should give up and leave it to others to carry on the fight.

I've seen no one fighting, not even trying.

It always falls back to simple minded questions and answers.

HexHammer wrote:

Ginkgo wrote:

HexHammer wrote:I've tried that for the past many years, and you guys have gotten exactly nowhere, magazine standard is still terrible low, forum is still flooded with utterly useless threads and answers, the retards rule philosophy ..and will always do so, until it's reformed, since they can't reform it themselves, they are simply not bright enough to comprehend relevance.

Well, perhaps you should give up and leave it to others to carry on the fight.

I've seen no one fighting, not even trying.

It always falls back to simple minded questions and answers.

Not always. We still need to keep in mind this is a non-professional philosophical forum. If you want to post on a professional philosophical forum then you need the relevant academic qualifications. From time to time there are some people who post here who have the relevant qualifications.

Ginkgo wrote:Not always. We still need to keep in mind this is a non-professional philosophical forum. If you want to post on a professional philosophical forum then you need the relevant academic qualifications. From time to time there are some people who post here who have the relevant qualifications.

If pro lvl are in a scale from 0-10 then it should be around 7-10, that would be pro lvl.

..but you guys are floating around 0.000000000001-0.00000000001, that's a far cry from even very very basic low lvl skill, you are not even trying.

Where are the forums with professional philosophers, acadamically qualified, who are doing more than talk.
Are they talking about reforming philosophy - or how academia can make effective change?
Does any of the talk ever transfer into action ? Where/How?
How 'wise' is it to continue asking questions like: 'What is Art/Beauty?'
https://philosophynow.org/issues/108/Wh ... _is_Beauty

HexHammer wrote:

Ginkgo wrote:Not always. We still need to keep in mind this is a non-professional philosophical forum. If you want to post on a professional philosophical forum then you need the relevant academic qualifications. From time to time there are some people who post here who have the relevant qualifications.

If pro lvl are in a scale from 0-10 then it should be around 7-10, that would be pro lvl.

..but you guys are floating around 0.000000000001-0.00000000001, that's a far cry from even very very basic low lvl skill, you are not even trying.

don't worry I am trying if that is what you mean.

P.S.

Just as a matter of interest Hex, where do you place yourself on your 0 to 10 scale?

Ginkgo wrote:don't worry I am trying if that is what you mean.

P.S.

Just as a matter of interest Hex, where do you place yourself on your 0 to 10 scale?

No u'r not.
Think I would be a 2-5/10.

The author of this article hasn't taken a number of things into consideration when he talks about universal wisdom. He doesn't consider the fact that wisdom, like everything else, has a shelf life. Wisdom is also prone to decay and need of renewal like the fossil fuels we use. Moreover, the wisdom for one time may not be the wisdom for another.

Wisdom is not, or shouldn't be, a fixed thing since the world is always in flux. It needs periodical revamping, like philosophy does.

The type of wisdom Maxwell wants to see is for a fixed world, one that is static and doesn't change. Such wisdom would end us in collapse like past glorious empires.

This kind of fixing the world mentality reminds me of another clumsy attempt to do so. It was a book that stated we are in need of moral enhancement because we are "unfit for the future".

If the world was endowed with the total wisdom Maxwell wants us to have there would be no problems on earth. But that is how humanity has developed and enhanced itself, though having problems and seeking solutions. Maxwell's way would take out all the wondering and learning from the endeavour if we were fully enlightened as he wished.

“The crisis of our times is that we have science without wisdom. This is the crisis behind all the others. Population growth; the alarmingly lethal character of modern war and terrorism; vast differences in wealth and power around the globe; the AIDS epidemic; the annihilation of indigenous people, cultures and languages; the impending depletion of natural resources, including the destruction of tropical rain forests and other natural habitats, and the rapid mass extinction of species; pollution of sea, earth and air; and above all, the impending disasters of climate change – all of these relatively recent crises have been made possible by modern science and technology. Indeed, if by the ‘cause’ of an event we mean a prior change that led to that event occurring, then the advent of modern science and technology has caused all these crises. It is not that people became greedier or more wicked in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries; nor is the ‘new’ economic system of capitalism responsible, as some historians and economists would have us believe.” –Nicolas Maxwell’s article, “Can The World Learn Wisdom?”, from Philosophy Now (issue 108): https://philosophynow.org/issues/108/Ca ... arn_Wisdom

First of all, I want to focus on a section in this that was never really elaborated on:

“….nor is the ‘new’ economic system of capitalism responsible, as some historians and economists would have us believe.”

Now I would ask anyone here to explain to me at what point in the article were those historians and economists who would have us believe this actually disputed. I assume here that the strategy was that the following argument would be so overwhelming that the argument against Capitalism’s role in this would be forgotten or assumed.

I fully agree that a lot of the problem comes from knowledge accompanied by a lack of wisdom. As I like to say about the more aggressive posters on the message boards:

“Intellect abundant; wisdom deficient.”

I have seen the results of the very point Maxwell is trying to make. Still, the fingerprints of Capitalism are all over the very crimes he describes. I mean how could they not be in the case of global warming, the impending depletion of natural resources, vast differences in wealth and poverty, the annihilation of indigenous people, etc., etc.. It’s as if he is trying to dance around offending Capitalism in a rather self contradicting way –that is even though the argument he makes is a valid one –or seems to be since my first reading of it was a little spotty in what I comprehended which means I’ll have to go through it again to better articulate on the following point.

It just seems to me that recognizing the role Capitalism has played in these problems can actually reinforce the very point that Maxwell is trying to make by recognizing the player mentality (that which is non-wise (that it tends to impose on the process of becoming knowledgeable. By imposing this Ayn Randian hierarchy on the process, knowledge becomes about little more than achieving status which gives one license to engage in unwise abuses. Thanks to Capitalism (which was evolving right around the same time as the Enlightenment movement (the Enlightenment project has become little more than a petty grab at power.

Not all that wise if you ask me.

I like wisdom. But one problem with wisdom is that those with it tend to sit on the sidelines and not get involved because they think, what's the point.

Those who think the world should be all wise are dumb because the world really advances through unwise means.