Comment!
When you put it like that it looks like blogging has helped you over the last year. What I find good about it is that it forces you to at least pin yourself down, to verbalise an argument whereas without blogging you can get away with just umm-ing and ahh-ing. From your post it might be the same for you.
The other thing that strikes me as curious is that you virtually say you've rejected everything like philosophy as pointless but the only reason you give is that these are imperfect -- which I don't understand personally. Is there something I'm missing?
Michael,
>What I find good about it is that it forces you to at least pin yourself down, to verbalise an argument
I think of that as a good thing and a bad thing. Writing out your thoughts, your own whys and wherefores can be helpful in many ways. But the pinning down part has it's pros and cons. One of the pros is that you can't just er and ah your opinions (you can just copy and paste them! 
but one of the cons is... when you change your opinions, because you've mature intellectualy, for example, they're etched in cyberspace and your name is stuck with them.
I didn't mean say I've "rejected everything like philosophy as pointless..." Could you bring a quote so I can clarify or edit?
> Yet, 30% of the blogs on my RSS reader are frum or ex-frum, and those are the ones I read the most religiously. Why do I keep lingering in cyberspace, having conversations about frumkeit?
I used to wonder the same thing. Finally came to the realization that it doesn't matter. Why do I enjoy any of the things I do? Does it really matter? As long as my involvement in the OJ world isn't hindering my ability to grow in the direction I want it to (which it used to when I was first leaving), then I'm perfectly fine with being involved in this stuff.
Hedyot,
>Finally came to the realization that it doesn't matter. Why do I enjoy any of the things I do? Does it really matter?
Hmm...
It somehow seems dysfunctional or at least abnormal to me.
I don't feel that I need to make a complete cut off with the world of frumkeit, (I prefer not to use the term Orthodox. It's so not frum... but I do think that my "voyeurism", for lack of a better word, is somehow not good. I can't really put a finger on what it is but the feeling is there nonetheless.
But on the other hand! Sometimes I think it makes me especially hip, because I know all the lingo and can understand the culture of the Frum Community and even cooler because I'm not stuck in it.
Tzarich Iyun...
Anyhow...
As I read through brief Histories of Philosophy, I began to realize that our hopes for finding Truth were in vain. It’s been more than 2000 years and the greatest minds have come up with elaborate theories only to be rejected or shlugged up by their students.
This is what I was referring to -- you don't think that some questions have been resolved to a reasonable satisfaction?
I personally wouldn't mind being pinned down to an opinion that I change subsequently -- you can only ever hope to get something right by taking a chance on getting everything wrong -- which you do more by committing to your current opinion on a blog post than by never committing to a viewpoint at all
Michael,
>you don't think that some questions have been resolved to a reasonable satisfaction?
I specifically used Truth with a capital T. I do believe that we've discovered quite a number of truths but doubt that these add up to Truth or even that these truths are leading us to Truth. We've discovered answers to some questions to our satisfaction, but these questions are contingent and the answers we are satisfied with are also contingent.
What I'm skeptical of is Truth. I don't believe in the Ghost in the Machine that is called the Rational Mind, the Soul, or the Holy Ghost etc. depending on your tradition, that is capable of connecting to Truth, God, or Ein Sof etc. again... depending on your tradition. These are all interesting metaphors, but I don't think they describe anything in actuality, to borrow the colloquialism.
Now as to rejecting philosophy as pointless, I disagree entirely. I find much philosophy to be of great interest, even importance. It is a bit frustrating to feel that you aren't fixing the Worlds, both below and above, by learning it, like I felt when I learned Torah in Yeshiva. But I'm sure I'll get over it. For the most part, I am, but I can't help but reminisce and compare the two very different feelings. Also, as I said, it's disheartening, now that I don't believe that all the pieces fit together.
"Our puny brains are too primitive, our language plagued with paradox and contingency. We were built to pass on our genes, not to put the Universe into a box."
This defeatist attitude is unjustified by history and uncomfortably close to the "God did it" story -- in that both viewpoints, when taken seriously, stifle real progress. The history of scientific discoveries shows that while our brains may (or may not!) be too puny to get to the ultimate Truth, we have reason to believe we are still far from reaching the limits of its capabilities. We keep making real progress in our knowledge of the wold and whatever is in it, if sometimes that progress comes in fits and starts -- what makes you believe it all leads to a dead end?
Philosophy, on the other hand, seems to me largely self-referential (if sometimes very sophisticated) wordplay. I don't see a way to measure philosophical progress in a realistic way.
you did come along way. baby!
BD,
>This defeatist attitude is unjustified by history and uncomfortably close to the "God did it" story -- in that both viewpoints, when taken seriously, stifle real progress.
I think it's dependent on what kind of progress you're referring to. As I said, it's quite obvious that in Medicine and Technology, we're making progress. We're living longer, communicating more, and doing more stuff. Though, I'd be willing to give to some credence to unwanted side effects of some of this progress, on the whole, I'd rather have my blackberry and modern medicine then be without them.
But if you're talking about progress towards a theory of everything, I'd beg to differ. As I stated in my post, I don't think we'll ever "put the Universe into a box."
>we have reason to believe we are still far from reaching the limits of its capabilities.
I assume you're refferring to the human brain's capacities. That's an interesting way of looking at it. I think I like it, but I'll have to give it some more thought.
> We keep making real progress in our knowledge of the wold and whatever is in it, if sometimes that progress comes in fits and starts -- what makes you believe it all leads to a dead end?
I wouldn't call it a dead end. I'd call it an open ended, bottomless pit for all we know or may ever know.
Now as to this view being defeatist, I think it takes a certain level of complexity and sophistication to hold of my view point and still be inspired to be a great philosopher or theoretical scientist. Not trying to say that I'm right, but this is my understanding. I won't argue with you that Scientific Progress is best achieved when believing that we are making "real" progress, that the theory of everything is just around the corner, that the next greatest discovery has yet to be found. But IMHO, this attitude is like doing good deeds for the sake of Olam Haba.
"I assume you're refferring to the human brain's capacities."
Indeed I was.
"Progress is best achieved when believing... that the next greatest discovery has yet to be found. But IMHO, this attitude is like doing good deeds for the sake of Olam Haba."
How so? We've seen time and again (and again) that the next greatest discovery WAS indeed yet to be found (and was finally found by people believing just that), whereas with Olam Haba we've never observed any doer of good deeds getting there. Unless you seriously buy Hume's critique of induction, one is not like the other.
BD,
Just to be clear, we're talking about something along the lines of the Theory of everything, and not technological advances.
If the TOE is the goal, for example, then it is like Olam Haba. No one has yet known the TOE and told the rest of us about it, so too with Olam haba.
I mentioned Promissory Materialism in the past but when I did, I got an earful for quoting some theologian. I probably disagree with most of the rest he says, but I do think that he has a valid criticism when he doubts materialist science, sometime in the future, will be able to explain it all. Even if it could, for the sake of argument, it would have to explain it in words, be understandable to homo sapiens, etc. etc. And I've already explained this in my post...
"we're talking about something along the lines of the Theory of everything, and not technological advances."
False dichotomy. We're talking about the "next greatest discovery" that increases our knowledge of the universe (or maybe even universes). Whether that discovery will be a theory of everything we do not know and cannot know. The next greatest discovery will necessarily be something nobody has yet discovered.
>False dichotomy. We're talking about the "next greatest discovery" that increases our knowledge of the universe (or maybe even universes). Whether that discovery will be a theory of everything we do not know and cannot know. The next greatest discovery will necessarily be something nobody has yet discovered.
It seems to me that you are setting up the false dichotomy. Correct me if I'm wrong but you seem to be saying,
Either, Scientific Advances are leading us to a TOE or at least this is good possibility, (your view)
or, Scientific Advances are leading to a dead end (your understanding of my view)
I'm saying that scientific advances are leading us to better medicine, technology, truths about the Universe, but not leading us to a TOE. I see no reason to make the jump from gaining some knowledge to those gains leading to a TOE.
Could it? Well it's possible, but so are a lot of things, like Olam Haba. Is it an inspiring idea? For sure! but so is Olam Haba...
"I'm saying that scientific advances are leading us to better medicine, technology, truths about the Universe"
Yes, that's exactly what I'm saying as well. When you said "our puny brains are too primitive... to put the Universe into a box" I read you as despairing of us finding more and deeper truths about the universe. I took issue with that; I think we have good reason to suppose that new discoveries WILL lead us to a better understanding. As for the TOE, I do not know if there is such a thing or if our the human brain is unpunny enough to understand it.
BD,
FTU, That's quite a year. Humanity may have a lot to learn yet, and each individual may not be getting smarter, but it seems to me that great strides in human understanding have occurred. And just think what may lie ahead, especially considering that the pace of human knowledge and progress seems to be accelerating?
BHB,
It's certainly an exciting time to be alive.
FU,
"But at the theoretical level of science, it’s absurd to think that some intelligent primates that, on an evolutionary scale, are barely out of the primal grasslands could ever wrap their minds around the vast and mysterious universe (or is it subverse?) in all its quantum wonder?"
Why is that absurd? Look at what we've done so far! We live in a world where we manipulate atoms and genes at leisure - do you think primitive primates could wrap their minds around such things?
Human knowledge has been expanding exponentially. There is so much research and so many scientific papers being written nowadays that the whole of human knowledge doubles in the course of five years or less. This means that the number of papers written in the next five years may be equal to the number of papers written since the dawn of human investigation. Heady stuff.
OP,
>do you think primitive primates could wrap their minds around such things?
intelligent primates... but anyhow... my point was that I don't think that we have the fundamental structure in place (i.e. our brain is incapable) to fully understand the Universe.
>Look at what we've done so far!
I doubt that looking at all we've learned will convince me that we can learn everything. The more we know, the more we know we don't know.
Human knowledge may be expanding, but there are no signs of ever reaching full knowledge. In fact, I'd say it's showing the exact opposite. Despite the vast amounts of collective human knowledge, it still looks like a bottomless pit.
And that can be looked at as a good thing.
FU,
"intelligent primates... but anyhow... my point was that I don't think that we have the fundamental structure in place (i.e. our brain is incapable) to fully understand the Universe."
You mean that in the way it's impossible for the human mind to intuitively understand spatial dimensions above three? That may be true, one cannot see a hypercube in one's mind's eye, but it's a trivial matter to represent such a structure mathematically.
Similarly, our intutive problems understanding quantum physics is not an issue given the way we can perceive reality through our mathematical crutches.
"I doubt that looking at all we've learned will convince me that we can learn everything."
That's not the point - the point is that the fatalistic attitude you are promoting of man's eternal ineptitude is unjustified and far premature.
"Everything" is a tall order, and there may indeed be things out there permanently beyond our ken, but a progressively fuller and deeper understanding of ourselves and our environment is precisely where our collective efforts are taking us.
It's ironic that at a time when our learning is expanding at an expontential rate you have jumped to the idea that we have reached our limits.
OP,
We are in much more agreement then not. I have indeed worded things a bit dismally. But I said nowhere that we've reached our limits.
Interesting and honest post, very impressive.
I regret the fact that my energy (and free time) was depleted so quickly, and I simply could no longer keep up with the pace of all of those exciting debates.
I wish you the best of success in your search for truth.
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