The square root of (-1) is......... the penis?

[Meticulous Man]

Baudrillard

If we were able to take as the finest allegory of simulation the Borges tale where the cartographers of the Empire draw up a map so detailed that it ends up exactly covering the territory (but where, with the decline of the Empire this map becomes frayed and finally ruined, a few shreds still discernible in the deserts — the metaphysical beauty of this ruined abstraction, bearing witness to an imperial pride and rotting like a carcass, returning to the substance of the soil, rather as an aging double ends up being confused with the real thing), this fable would then have come full circle for us, and now has nothing but the discrete charm of second-order simulacra.l

Abstraction today is no longer that of the map, the double, the mirror or the concept. Simulation is no longer that of a territory, a referential being or a substance. It is the generation by models of a real without origin or reality: a hyperreal. The territory no longer precedes the map, nor survives it. Henceforth, it is the map that precedes the territory — precession of simulacra — it is the map that engenders the territory and if we were to revive the fable today, it would be the territory whose shreds are slowly rotting across the map. It is the real, and not the map, whose vestiges subsist here and there, in the deserts which are no longer those of the Empire, but our own. The desert of the real itself.

In fact, even inverted, the fable is useless. Perhaps only the allegory of the Empire remains. For it is with the same imperialism that present-day simulators try to make the real, all the real, coincide with their simulation models. But it is no longer a question of either maps or territory. Something has disappeared: the sovereign difference between them that was the abstraction's charm. For it is the difference which forms the poetry of the map and the charm of the territory, the magic of the concept and the charm of the real. This representational imaginary, which both culminates in and is engulfed by the cartographer's mad project of an ideal coextensivity between the map and the territory, disappears with simulation, whose operation is nuclear and genetic, and no longer specular and discursive. With it goes all of metaphysics. No more mirror of being and appearances, of the real and its concept; no more imaginary coextensivity: rather, genetic miniaturization is the dimension of simulation. The real is produced from miniaturized units, from matrices, memory banks and command models — and with these it can be reproduced an indefinite number of times. It no longer has to be rational, since it is no longer measured against some ideal or negative instance. It is nothing more than operational. In fact, since it is no longer enveloped by an imaginary, it is no longer real at all. It is a hyperreal: the product of an irradiating synthesis of combinatory models in a hyperspace without atmosphere.

[Varwnos]

Since philosophy itself is a vast subject, despite its decline in respectability there are still countless new concepts which can be thought of, and analysed in introduction or in depth in new books.
However i agree that it is most common to find modern philosophers who are niehter capable of, nor appreciating of, simplicity of words and economy with the use of so-called "key-terms".
So many philosophical works are full of such "key terms", which by themselves acquire supposedly a new, more profound meaning, but which in reality were never needed in the first place. Language by itself has its own dynamics, and frequently those philosophical works become unreadable, bizarre, borring enigmata.

There is a nice saying attributed to a mathematician: "the proof that one has understood perfectly a theory is that he is able to explain it with simple words to the first person he happens to meet on the street".

[Meticulous Man]

I don't really understand why Dawkins is such a celebrated figure. So man evolved from apes and the Bible is bullcrap - O RLY? What exactly are Dawkins' own substantial contributions to science/philosophy?

[Kuciwalker]

Says the man quoting Baudrillard.

[Meticulous Man]

Here's where the communication gap between the American scientist and PoMo lies:

[...]It is difficult to identify non-trivial claims that would be common to all the preceding philosophical movements. The term "continental philosophy", like "analytic philosophy", lacks clear definition and may mark merely a family resemblance across disparate philosophical views. Some scholars have suggested the term may be more pejorative than descriptive, functioning as a label for types of western philosophy rejected or disliked by analytic philosophers.[3] Nonetheless, some scholars have ventured to identify common themes that typically characterize continental philosophy.[4]

First, continental philosophers generally reject scientism, the view that the natural sciences are the best or most accurate way of understanding all phenomena. Continental philosophers often argue that science depends upon a "pre-theoretical substrate of experience", a form of the Kantian conditions of possible experience, and that scientific methods are inadequate to understand such conditions of intelligibility.[5]

Second, continental philosophy usually considers these conditions of possible experience as variable: determined at least partly by factors such as context, space and time, language, culture, or history. Thus continental philosophy tends toward historicism. Where analytic philosophy tends to treat philosophy in terms of discrete problems, capable of being analyzed apart from their historical origins (much as scientists consider the history of science inessential to scientific inquiry), continental philosophy typically suggests that "philosophical argument cannot be divorced from the textual and contextual conditions of its historical emergence".[6]

Third, continental philosophy typically holds that conscious human agency can change these conditions of possible experience: "if human experience is a contingent creation, then it can be recreated in other ways".[7] Thus continental philosophers tend to take a strong interest in the unity of theory and practice, and tend to see their philosophical inquiries as closely related to personal, moral, or political transformation. This tendency is very clear in the Marxist tradition ("philosophers have only analyzed the world: the point, however, is to change it"), but is also central in existentialism and post-structuralism.

A final characteristic trait of continental philosophy is an emphasis on metaphilosophy. In the wake of the development and success of the natural sciences, continental philosophers have often sought to redefine the method and nature of philosophy. In some cases (such as German idealism or phenomenology), this takes the form of the traditional view that philosophy is the first, foundational, a priori science. In other cases (such as hermeneutics, critical theory, or structuralism), it is held that philosophy investigates a domain of knowledge that is irreducibly cultural or practical. Yet other continental philosophers (such as Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, the later Heidegger, or Derrida) harbor grave doubts about the coherence of any traditional conceptions of philosophy.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continental_philosophy

[aneeshm]

So basically you're saying that in philosophy, the truth value of something is determined by how many people said it was true, and in what way, and by what books they wrote about it.

Do I need to say anything more?

[Kuciwalker]

To paraphrase Sokal, any philosopher who doubts the inherent reality of scientific laws is welcome to jump out my window.

[Meticulous Man]

So basically you're saying that in philosophy, the truth value of something is determined by how many people said it was true, and in what way, and by what books they wrote about it.

I'm not sure where I said that

To paraphrase Sokal, any philosopher who doubts the inherent reality of scientific laws is welcome to jump out my window.

I'm not convinced that he knows what he is talking about if that one was directed against Lacan, Deleuze, Baudrillard & co...

[aneeshm]

Originally posted by Aivo½so


I'm not sure where I said that

Where analytic philosophy tends to treat philosophy in terms of discrete problems, capable of being analyzed apart from their historical origins (much as scientists consider the history of science inessential to scientific inquiry), continental philosophy typically suggests that "philosophical argument cannot be divorced from the textual and contextual conditions of its historical emergence".[6]

[DaShi]

I found it ironic that a blatant intellectual imposter like Dawkins would write a critique of other supposed imposters. However, I'm never surprised at who his fans turn out to be here.

[Odin]

Originally posted by Aivo½so
Here's where the communication gap between the American scientist and PoMo lies:


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continental_philosophy

Scientism:

Continental philosophy is almost entirely full of sh*t. It all went downhill the day they started bastardizing Kant.

Second, continental philosophy usually considers these conditions of possible experience as variable: determined at least partly by factors such as context, space and time, language, culture, or history. Thus continental philosophy tends toward historicism.

Karl Popper showed Historicism to be BS.

[Odin]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker
To paraphrase Sokal, any philosopher who doubts the inherent reality of scientific laws is welcome to jump out my window.

[Meticulous Man]

OK, so "philosophical argument cannot be divorced from the textual and contextual conditions of its historical emergence" = "the truth value of something is determined by how many people said it".

[BlackCat]

Originally posted by Aivo½so
OK, so "philosophical argument cannot be divorced from the textual and contextual conditions of its historical emergence" = "the truth value of something is determined by how many people said it".

IPCC

[Straybow]

tldr