Is the future of philosophy a return to common sense?

Question

During the course of the last century, the traffic of philosophy has plunged off the endless road to Platonic perfectionism into the ravine of post-modernist self-refutation. Will the future of the discipline involved the construction of a bridge of commonsense across the ravine to the more modest and reachable destinatination of human optimization? Or will the wheels fall off and stay off?

Gentlepersons, start your engines!

Oops! That should, of course, have been *destination* - I'm a bit tipsy.

richard - I read "Quineing Qualia" and I admire Dennett's method of pushing back the boundaries - but he gives the appearance of working towards a complete nominalism (one in which, ironically, even names are no longer of any strict use). But suppose the nominalist project succeeds in showing that all things are particular, will this do away with the need for univerals (properties, kinds, categories)? Of course it won't - nothing can be done without them. So perhaps 'common sense' will mean establishing which universals we simply cannot do without.

Answer 1

philosophy is always common sense to the people writing it, what you are talking about are just the broader sweeps of fasions in thought as far as i know. even such a "post modern self refutation" as the tractatus was seen by its author as a "ladder, and once we climb up it it can be thrown away" (sorry thats not the exact quote but ... meh), which is indicative of the way he thought about it, as something that was to be understod as a lesson, not a way of life.

daniel dennet has a very interesting take on this, with his notion of "intuition pumps" his most notable example is the cogito, descartes famous peice of "common sense" which dennet attempts to rubish using this notion that philosophers offten use rhetoric to make us agree with them essentialy by making the alternatives "look stupid".

incidently that would be my guess for the thrust of philosophy in the next ten years, alot of it will be done by people with an actual understanding of some of the harder siences. perhaps this will make it seem less like common sense, perhaps not. Bottom line, common sense has very little to do with philosophy, it is about leaving things unexamined.

Answer 2

A future of common sense? How uncommon. There can be no common sense as long as greed and jealousy are a part of the human equation. When someone in power wants more power or more things their way, whether it is a person or a group of persons, then they will continue to brainwash and condition others to think that what they are proposing is common sense when it really is not. Common sense will therefore be restricted to the "common" folk who comprehend that material possessions and power, and winning something is less in importance than being decent and honest and truthful, generous and considerate and caring..

Answer 3

Philosophy's examination of reality without really knowing what reality is as revealing as a physical exam when the patient does not undress. What really does the universe look like when it's clearly revealed without it's fashionable cultural wardrobes of abstractions? And, how can there possibly be any commonality of sensibility with 6 billion unique sets of compounded abstractions? What is the commonality of "common sense"? Edwin Powell Hubble wrote, "Equipped with his five senses, man explores the universe around him and calls the adventure Science." Man and his breadth of awareness and comprehension and rationality rises not on the fog of philosophies or religions and the compounded abstractions of cultures, but upon the lucid commonality of our perception of nature. Our perception of nature grows more lucid by the hour. Only those abstraction sets, philosophies and religions that fail to find a place in that commonality will survive the years to come. Only they will lose their wheels, so to say. But, "common sense" . . . deriving knowledge and meaning from our rational observations of nature. . . will never cease, as it never has, as long as humans and their five senses are around to rub two sticks together.

Answer 4

Hmm...isn't philosophical thinking the antithesis of "common sense"? Common sense comes from the assumptions and prejudices that were drilled into you from the day you were born, by your family, religion, school, and the society in which you live. What is considered common sense in one culture is not necessarily the same in another. Philosophy is all about questioning the assumptions we make about the world around us. So, the answer is no. Common sense is not philosophy.

Answer 5

to boot to you stating the perception that 'people are the only beings with souls,' (that's absurdly ignorant,) the heaven/hell mentality (between different issues) on no account made experience to me interior the Catholic faith: The good judgment continually appeared rather improper... ...that interior this minuscule fragment of time, we are sitting on the proverbial cusp between eternal damnation or salvation? Eternity without exchange (e.g. "it rather is heaven! No undesirable movements right here!") is a hell interior itself and keeping apart 2 absolutes (detrimental/advantageous) each and each into their very own afterlives paints a image that devolves dramatically from the complicated remarkable thing with reference to the international we are residing in now. i'm easily dumbfounded once I see baseless arguments clumsily affected via "you are going to hell!" on youtube, etc. How would desire to the mentality have long gone in this long? the thought technique very practically seems medieval in the twenty first century.

Answer 6

Common sense.
Comes from ones own thought pattern.
Some have it others do not.
And be not conformed to this world:but be transformed by the renewing of your mind,that ye may prove what is that good,and acceptable,and perfect will of God.Rom12:2.
Your mental attitude always makes a difference "you are what you think!

Answer 7

The wheels will fall off and stay off. You can thank George W. Bush for that. Wannabe politicians like him are teaching today's young people that it's okay to be an antagonistic, hypocritical jerkoff.

Answer 8

Let's just say that since humans are creatures of habit who go by their own philosophies based on their own experiences, history will always repeat itself.

Answer 9

Yes, no where to go negating the basics !

Answer 10

philosophy can only realize itself through disolution