Saturday, March 28, 2015

Philosophy

I'd like to toss around some ideas here.  I hope I'm not displaying my ignorance too prominently.

Proposition:  Philosophy is opinion.

(Philosophy being defined as the rational investigation of the truths and principles of being, knowledge, or conduct).

Demonstration:  Philosophers have disagreed and debated for millennia.  One establishes a point, and another tears it apart.  Therefore, philosophy is debatable, and that which is debatable is opinion.

Granted, these are well-established opinions, but they are, nonetheless, nothing more than opinions.  The decision to follow a philosophy, too, is an opinion -- opinion upon opinion.

Therefore, philosophy (particularly metaphysics) does not arrive at objective truth (that which is in accordance with reality) unless the proposition is established by testing and experimentation (I'm a big fan of Francis Bacon here).

But then is it still philosophy, or is it science?

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