Retitled: Modern philosophers are full of it!

[Asher]

Originally posted by Agathon
No it isn't. Most uses of "or" in ordinary discourse are the exclusive use. In symbolic logic the exclusive use is not the common one.

In symbolic logic the "or" sign in "A v B" stands for the truth function "at least one must be true (perhaps both)" not "at least one and only one must be true" [that is (A v B).~(A . B) IIRC (although it's a while since I did symbolic logic)].

Pwned again.

WTF? How on EARTH do you consider that owning?

or -- in logic -- means at least one must be true.
xor (or exclusive or, or exclusive disjunction) means one and only one must be true.

That, of course, has absolutely nothing to do with what was discussed here and just goes to show that you should brush up on your reading comprehension.

The meaning, in the context of the dictionary definition:

A student of or specialist in philosophy.

quite clearly implies that student and specialist are different (which is also common sense). GePap's assertion is the "or" is used in the English way of alluding to synonyms, which is ridiculous.

This has nothing to do with exclusive disjunctions...

Still, if you do look at the statement purely logically, it would also show that GePap is wrong. If it was the exclusive use, they obviously are not synonyms.

[Asher]

statement: a philosopher is a student of or specialist in philosophy

1. student does not imply specialist
2. specialist does not imply student
3. therefore specialist is not synonymous with student
4. therefore an argument with the premise that a philosopher must be a specialist is false

QED...

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by Agathon


And private universities exist by means of ancient endowments, charity and tax breaks, not by direct sales.

In any case, this only bolsters my example. What happens in such a system is that a few universities with wealthy donors and substantial endowments do well, and the others suck.

You have comparatively few good universities and lots of terrible ones. It's hardly an efficient way to distribute higher education. The same goes for your ridiculous primary and secondary education systems. They are appalling too.

You're missing the point. Philosophy education ought only to be distributed as much as there is a demand for it - which is only those people who want to study philosophy. It's not like you guys benefit the rest of us.

[MrFun]

Asher has issues, to say the least.

[Asher]

Originally posted by MrFun
Asher has issues, to say the least.

Coming from the History graduate student working at Target with the worst sense of humour imaginable, that is a pretty damning statement.

I'm just a guy who likes watching the Philosophers squirm. They don't do anything and don't like it when people call them on it.

For comparison sake I tried to view recent UofT Philosophy publications but couldn't even find a list of any sort.

[MrFun]

Originally posted by Asher

Coming from the History graduate student working at Target with the worst sense of humour imaginable, that is a pretty damning statement.

I'm just a guy who likes watching the Philosophers squirm. They don't do anything and don't like it when people call them on it.

For comparison sake I tried to view recent UofT Philosophy publications but couldn't even find a list of any sort.

Hey, the bait worked.

[Kuciwalker]

You expect us to believe you're capable of trolling?

[Asher]

Originally posted by MrFun
Hey, the bait worked.

...he says as he silently weeps to himself

[MrFun]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker
You expect us to believe you're capable of trolling?

Actually, I learned to have very little expectations of most Apolytoners lately.

[Nostromo]

Originally posted by Asher
statement: a philosopher is a student of or specialist in philosophy

1. student does not imply specialist
2. specialist does not imply student
3. therefore specialist is not synonymous with student
4. therefore an argument with the premise that a philosopher must be a specialist is false

QED...

I think we all understood your point. Its true that we sometimes use the word "philosopher" to refer to students in philosophy. However, students in philosophy aren't philosophers in the professional sense of the word. Just like students in medecine aren't doctors. When students in philosophy write an opinion letter in a newspaper, for example, they can't write that they're philosophers, they can only write that they're students in philosophy. And what is a professional philosopher? Like I pointed out earlier:

what we call today a professional philosopher is someone who teaches and, most importantly, does research in philosophy for a living (in other words they write books and articles and get them published). Its a sociological fact that the people who correspond to that description have, 99 % of the time, a graduate degrees in philosophy.

Carly certainly wasn't a philosopher in that sense. If you want to criticize professional philosophers, criticizing philosophy students isn't exactly fair. Now if you want to criticize philosophy majors, its another thing. But if so, whether Carly was a philosopher or not is beside the point.

[Asher]

Originally posted by nostromo
I think we all understood your point.

I don't think GePap did.

[Sandman]

Originally posted by Asher

Health care, general education, and policing are generally in the interest of society as a whole.

Tell that to the libertarians.

[Ogie Oglethorpe]

Originally posted by Agathon


And of course we should always expect this sort of bovine cogitation from you.

Go back to school and bother me when you have actually learned to read.

You mean the false premise below pee wee?

On another note, it is amusing to see proponents of technology who have such a low opinion of philosophy and the arts, when the greatest technological achievement in history was really effected for no reason other than to provide a transformative experience to humanity, which is exactly what good philosophy and good art do.

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by Sandman
Tell that to the libertarians.

Okay.

[GePap]

Originally posted by Asher

I don't think GePap did.

When I walked into my Pol Sci classes the only Political Scientist there was the professor. The students most certainly were NOT political scientists. If they were, they would not need to be students. Ditto for any other class I ever took.

Last time I looked, a student of human behavior need not be someone taking a class on it. Unless you are ignorant of the uses of the word student as well?