Adding philosophical depth to anything and everything
Philosopher Thomas Kuhn argued that science is “a series of peaceful interludes punctuated by intellectually violent revolutions” in which “one conceptual world view is replaced by another.” (The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, 1962) The longer-lasting, more tranquil periods of “normal science” are guided by a dominant paradigm. Astrophysics has been […]
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Peirce (1839-1914) developed the basic idea of pragmatism as a method for improving the accuracy of science in its search for truth. His father was a mathematician on faculty at Harvard University. This enabled the younger Peirce to get his own education at Harvard and to meet a number of […]
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In philosophy, there is a divide between continental philosophy and analytical philosophy. Some people say that this isn’t really a divide, it’s just a different approach that creates the divide. Some analytical philosophers are fond of saying that they work within the analytical tradition, and the word “tradition” is very […]
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For several decades, French philosopher Henri Bergson (1856–1941) was probably the most famous philosopher in the world. He is now tragically largely forgotten because his work is incorrectly dismissed as mere speculation because it is not reducible to the methods of analytical philosophy. Bergson, similar to G.W.F. Hegel, thought of […]
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Embedded video, click to play; text transcript below. It’s a new exciting season of The Curse of Oak Island! Will it be exciting or will it be the same old boring stuff I ask those two questions because those are the two extremes that we see in the response […]
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Danish philosopher, Søren Kierkegaard (The proper Danish pronunciation of his name is “sorn KEER-ke-go.”) rebelled against the dominant view that people are nothing more than a part of a historical process. Kierkegaard chose to reject much of what his society taught him, especially the Hegelian system. Hegelianism taught that humans […]
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David Hume’s (1711-1776) philosophy was the culmination of the trajectory of British empiricism (see Chapters 8 and 11). Hume’s shocking conclusion was that the long quest for understanding had reached no true understanding at all. Descartes was not a true skeptic because he believed that knowledge is possible. Hume was […]
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There is a TV show. Inside it are many tall tales. It demands we give up all the critical thinking we have ever been taught. Its absurdity is everywhere. Its nonsense is right before our eyes. They are not honest, they have never been honest. Why am I being so […]
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I feel bad for Bertrand Russell, not because Russell was wrong; anyone can be wrong. By all accounts, he was a decent person; a bit stodgy, but he was British so he probably couldn’t help that. He co-authored one of the most important books in the history of philosophy that […]
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Perspective Shifts “Perspective shifts will unlock more than smartness will.” – Dr. Astro Teller There is wisdom in this quote, but like all wisdom, it has to go deeper than a slogan or it isn’t really wisdom at all. Dr. Teller’s slogan is a wonderful test case to explore this. […]
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