| 1. | Philosophy & neoliberal rationality in education |
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Assume as a placeholder that neoliberal educational rationality involves asking how any educational program delivers return on investment, market competitiveness, or entrepreneurial abilities. Accordingly, several things about value get left out: long term value (beyond market cycles), intrinsic value, non-competitive or non-opportunistic values and capacities, and benevolent or socially just values, among others.
I am curious how philosophy practitioners in education (at any level) have successfully defended philosophy without reducing it to neoliberal evaluation. By a successful defense, I do not mean only the argument - although that is of interest - but also the programs, mission statements, public outreach, etc. that have been taken up in an educational system or program. I am looking for case studies especially.
Is it true, as seems so, that mission-driven institutions (e.g., Jesuit universities or a "lighthouse" university such as Central European University) have a better time in making the defense?
Can programs in philosophy be structured to resist neoliberal educational rationality, and if so, how?
Since neoliberal rationality tends to drive administrative and planning processes in programs and institutions, are there any good examples that come to mind of places that have built philosophical practice well into administration or strategic planning, thereby creating an alternative rationality to a neoliberal one in program or institutional planning processes?
Etc.
I should close by stating that I assume that philosophy, whose object is wisdom, and wisdom, which takes in values that exceed neoliberal rationality, cannot be successfully reduced to neoliberal rationality and essentially resists it as a good guide to human life.
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Jeremy Bendik-Keymer
Beamer-Schneider Professor in Ethics
Case Western Reserve University
Cleveland OH
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| 2. | Re: Formal Logic |
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I take exception to Miles Rind's restriction. For formal logic serves as a template for much of correct reasoning in any area where heavy reasoning is done.
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Alex Blum
Professor Emeritus
Bar-Ilan University
Ramat-Gan
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Original Message:
Sent: 01-20-2019 03:41
From: Alex Blum
Subject: Formal Logic
In response to John's note, I think it would be hard to understand no less appreciate, say Quine, "to be is to be the value of a variable", or Davidson on causality and events, the slingshot, or Kripke on the necessity of identity, or on the necessity of some a posteriori truths, without at least a solid knowledge of a text such as Quine's Methods, or the first half of Copi's Symbolic Logic. Furthermore, elementary reasoning such as if p implies q then the necessity of the former implies the necessity of the latter, or simply modus tollens, it seems to me, may not be at a philosopher's fingertips without a solid grounding in formal logic. I was wondering how much?
Original Message------
Most philosophers need very little formal logic.I would say very few need any symbolic logic. I would add that almost none need to know the basics of mathematical logic: soundness and completeness of first-order logic.And none need to be indoctrinated into the latest fashions and jargon. But regard these words as a tentative opening of a dialogue.
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John Corcoran
Bradenton FL
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| 3. | Re: Formal Logic |
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I should think that the proposition that a philosopher needs a lot of formal logic (L) won't be refuted by anyone who knows little formal logic, because why believe ~L unless there's a sound argument for ~L? - and a sound argument must be formally valid. Of course, in turn, formal validity, and the crafting and verification thereof, is a matter mostly of formal logic, and its use. As far as I can tell, Aristotle worked out nothing more than a tiny, tiny fragment of first-order logic and a matching proof-theory for it, but we then saw a continuous ascension of formal logic that continues to this day. Yet philosophy-separate-from-formal logic could be put in front of Aristotle and he would smoothly digest. That, I submit, should be a revealing contrast, when pondered. Most informal philosophy, when formalized, makes use, minimally, of higher-order logic, and intensional operators to boot, so it's also stunning to see the continued survival of the notion that a quick course or two that stops at the rudiments of first-order logic and its metatheory is sufficient for a degree in philosophy.
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Selmer Bringsjord
Profesor
RPI
Troy NY
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Original Message:
Sent: 01-19-2019 13:32
From: Alex Blum
Subject: Formal Logic
How much formal logic is essential for a philosopher to master?
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Alex Blum
Professor Emeritus
Bar-Ilan University
Ramat-Gan
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| 4. | Re: Formal Logic |
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>>I should think that the proposition that a philosopher needs a lot of formal logic (L) won't be refuted by anyone who knows little formal logic, because why believe ~L unless there's a sound argument for ~L? - and a sound argument must be formally valid.<<
So, according to you, a sound argument must be (not only valid but) formally valid, and there is no reason to believe a proposition that is not supported by a formally valid argument? Do you have a sound argument for that claim?
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Miles Rind
Adjunct
Boston College Philosophy Department
Cambridge MA
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Original Message:
Sent: 01-21-2019 19:14
From: Selmer Bringsjord
Subject: Formal Logic
I should think that the proposition that a philosopher needs a lot of formal logic (L) won't be refuted by anyone who knows little formal logic, because why believe ~L unless there's a sound argument for ~L? - and a sound argument must be formally valid. Of course, in turn, formal validity, and the crafting and verification thereof, is a matter mostly of formal logic, and its use. As far as I can tell, Aristotle worked out nothing more than a tiny, tiny fragment of first-order logic and a matching proof-theory for it, but we then saw a continuous ascension of formal logic that continues to this day. Yet philosophy-separate-from-formal logic could be put in front of Aristotle and he would smoothly digest. That, I submit, should be a revealing contrast, when pondered. Most informal philosophy, when formalized, makes use, minimally, of higher-order logic, and intensional operators to boot, so it's also stunning to see the continued survival of the notion that a quick course or two that stops at the rudiments of first-order logic and its metatheory is sufficient for a degree in philosophy.
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Selmer Bringsjord
Profesor
RPI
Troy NY |
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| 5. | Re: Formal Logic |
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Yes, I do. However, one shouldn't write a paper in a forum like this, so i'll say only informally that: If rational Jones is going to come to know ~L, then Jones is, minimally, going to come to believe ~L, and to believe that some argument A (or interconnected web of arguments) has as its output/conclusion ~L. If this is rational belief, then A will need to be surveyable and verifiably valid. (Otherwise, philosophy becomes rhetoric or pure power or some sort of swindling; rationality is gone.) No argument can be surveyable and verifiably valid unless its inferential links abide by (= instantiates) some inference schemata. But this is what formal validity is. Easy peasy (though confessedly in broad strokes here).
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Selmer Bringsjord
Profesor
RPI
Troy NY
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Original Message:
Sent: 01-21-2019 19:23
From: Miles Rind
Subject: Formal Logic
>>I should think that the proposition that a philosopher needs a lot of formal logic (L) won't be refuted by anyone who knows little formal logic, because why believe ~L unless there's a sound argument for ~L? - and a sound argument must be formally valid.<<
So, according to you, a sound argument must be (not only valid but) formally valid, and there is no reason to believe a proposition that is not supported by a formally valid argument? Do you have a sound argument for that claim?
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Miles Rind
Adjunct
Boston College Philosophy Department
Cambridge MA |
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| 6. | Re: Formal Logic |
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After 50 years of listening to all sides of this important debate, which until now I stayed out of, I noticed that the more logic a person knows the less enthusiastic they are about requiring students to take courses in it and conversely the less logic a person knows the more enthusiastic they are about jamming the latest dogmas down the throats of unwilling students.
I wrote about this without being contentious.
I am not sure about any of my points.
www.academia.edu/23200837/...
www.academia.edu/33771248/FIRST_DAYS_OF_A_LOGIC_COURSE
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John Corcoran
Bradenton FL
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Original Message:
Sent: 01-21-2019 19:37
From: Selmer Bringsjord
Subject: Formal Logic
Yes, I do. However, one shouldn't write a paper in a forum like this, so i'll say only informally that: If rational Jones is going to come to know ~L, then Jones is, minimally, going to come to believe ~L, and to believe that some argument A (or interconnected web of arguments) has as its output/conclusion ~L. If this is rational belief, then A will need to be surveyable and verifiably valid. (Otherwise, philosophy becomes rhetoric or pure power or some sort of swindling; rationality is gone.) No argument can be surveyable and verifiably valid unless its inferential links abide by (= instantiates) some inference schemata. But this is what formal validity is. Easy peasy (though confessedly in broad strokes here).
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Selmer Bringsjord
Profesor
RPI
Troy NY |
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