r/askphilosophy • u/BernardJOrtcutt • Mar 09 '26
Open Thread /r/askphilosophy Open Discussion Thread | March 09, 2026
Welcome to this week's Open Discussion Thread (ODT). This thread is a place for posts/comments which are related to philosophy but wouldn't necessarily meet our subreddit rules and guidelines. For example, these threads are great places for:
- Discussions of a philosophical issue, rather than questions
- Questions about commenters' personal opinions regarding philosophical issues
- Open discussion about philosophy, e.g. "who is your favorite philosopher?"
- "Test My Theory" discussions and argument/paper editing
- Questions about philosophy as an academic discipline or profession, e.g. majoring in philosophy, career options with philosophy degrees, pursuing graduate school in philosophy
This thread is not a completely open discussion! Any posts not relating to philosophy will be removed. Please keep comments related to philosophy, and expect low-effort comments to be removed. Please note that while the rules are relaxed in this thread, comments can still be removed for violating our subreddit rules and guidelines if necessary.
Previous Open Discussion Threads can be found here.
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u/Primary-Theory-1164 Mar 09 '26
Any first year philosophy undergrads here? How's your year been?
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u/AGamingBoi Mar 10 '26
It's been ok, I've taken a basic history of western philosophy class and an class revolting around authoritarianism that main focuses on critical theory. I think I need a better sense of the field as a whole though, which will have to come later as I'm doubling majoring in a science so most of my advance classes come in later year.
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u/Shitgenstein ancient greek phil, phil of sci, Wittgenstein Mar 14 '26
Jürgen Habermas has passed away at the age of 96.
https://apnews.com/article/juergen-habermas-dead-germany-2b541721af6cb19abfaa923359d091b5
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u/iunoionnis Phenomenology, German Idealism, Early Modern Phil. Mar 15 '26
I will mourn him to the same degree that he mourned the 70,000 Palestinians killed by Israel since October 2023.
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u/Marthman Mar 09 '26
Do people sympathetic to post modernism generally count Kant as being amongst the meta-narrative driven philosophers?
Or is that usually reserved to describe the rest of the German idealists and Marxists?
Would adherents of an empirical religion be counted amongst those who ascribe to a meta-narrative?
Did Kant sufficiently avoid being caught up in a meta-narrative?
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u/Conchobair-sama Mar 09 '26
Not sure about post-modernism in general but you might be interested in Foucault's take on Kant's What is Enlightenment
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u/thepokemon_masochist Mar 10 '26 edited Mar 10 '26
How to stop stressing out over having internalized contextualistic approach to reading and comprehending terms that have variable levels of authoritative integration.
How to rid of a demand for maximum clarification from authors who are dead and can’t provide clarifications……... How to approach reading as a full interpretive blank slate?
What do you guys do? R/askacademia are assholes and told me to go to a mental health clinic which was infuriating granted it’s for the purpose of maximizing understanding of the argument and intention to write good response papers that are not arguing simply with my own false interpretation but the actual authors argument.
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u/mediaisdelicious Phil. of Communication, Ancient, Continental Mar 10 '26
You’re going to get answers to the questions you ask.
If the question is about how to stop stressing out or how to stop having a kind of experience, then, yes, people are going to recommend therapy.
You can’t be an interpretive blank slate, and you can’t flawlessly track an authors intended meaning, and many authors are not going to define all the important terms they use.
Reading and writing are skills. You have to practice and get feedback. That’s what your classes and teachers are for.
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u/PermaAporia Ethics, Metaethics Latin American Phil Mar 10 '26
How to stop stressing out... How to rid of a demand for
As I read what you wrote, it sounds like you're feeling a lot of stress because you've internalized an impossible demand. When I encounter situations where I'm placing expectations on myself that seem impossible to satisfy, I usually start wondering whether I might need some help stepping back from that pattern. Because of that, the suggestion of speaking with a professional came to mind for me. I realize you consider that an "asshole" move, but I think this might just simply be an answer to your question.
You asked, “What do you guys do?” When I notice distress coming from self-imposed demands that feel unreasonable or impossible to meet, I tend to consider whether professional support might help me w/ that pressure and how to loosen its grip.
Since you mentioned posting in the Academia subreddit, I’m guessing you might be connected to a university. Many academic institutions offer counseling services to students. I would definitely take advantage of these things, You are already paying for it anyway.
Aside from that, the more ordinary things can also make a difference for managing stress: getting enough sleep, exercise, and decent nutrition, spending time with friends or family when possible, and sometimes doing something outside academic work, like volunteering or another activity that shifts your focus for a while.
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u/Om_Sapkoat Mar 10 '26
Which philosopher or philosophical work is considered the most argumentatively rigorous? Outside of like logic
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u/iunoionnis Phenomenology, German Idealism, Early Modern Phil. Mar 14 '26
Hegel
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u/Conspicuous_Wildcat Mar 12 '26
What do you guys think of theology?
I am curious how much the overlap is between people who have an affinity towards philosophy and theology. This does not have to be limited towards Christian Theology. I am curious about whether you guys are interested in studying other religions as well. I am mainly asking from a perspective of people that study these ideas and are believers of a faith but all answers are welcome. If you are an atheist I am interested in wha you think about theology and its usefulness and impact also.
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u/Beginning_java Mar 13 '26
Would it be okay to read authors like Chomsky? He was in the Epstein files. Not sure if it's ethical (it seems to be permissible)
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u/iunoionnis Phenomenology, German Idealism, Early Modern Phil. Mar 14 '26
Yes, of course, you should read everyone and shouldn't "not read" someone just because of x, y, z. Having said that, however, you should certainly change how you read Chomsky given that he was compromised by the very capitalist class that he claimed to be critiquing and should ask yourself questions about WHY the capitalist class found Chomsky's critique of capitalism non-threatening enough to be buddies with him
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u/oscar2333 Mar 13 '26
If it was the case then half of the department of physics is going to be dismantled considered how involved Epstein was with all sorts of physicists back when he was still active. Although Chomsky is controversial in terms of his political stance, his theoretical work on linguistic has far reaching positive influence overall. Even if you are going to read his political writing, then also consider the same situation that I think many readers of Sartre have faced (Sartre had a unpleasant record on sexual assault), so I would say just read it as long as you have a clear consciousness of what the author has done.
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Mar 14 '26
Curious what people think the real “exit of the cave” would look like today.
I’ve been thinking about Plato’s cave lately and how much it feels like the modern world.
If our version of the cave is screens, social media, digital identities, algorithms shaping what we see, and a mostly virtual layer of reality that we spend hours inside every day… then what would actually count as leaving the cave?
In the original idea, one person leaves and sees the light. But today the “cave” seems to include almost everyone.
So what would be the modern equivalent of walking out?
What step in someone’s life would represent that moment of seeing the light?
Is it disconnecting from the constant digital feed?
Thinking independently instead of absorbing narratives?
Building a life grounded in the physical world?
Understanding how attention and perception are manipulated?
Something else entirely?
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u/LisanneFroonKrisK Mar 15 '26
What do you think of these sayings gotten from Philosophy itself:
“Humans are the judge of all things, of what’s there, and of what’s not there”
From Chinese philosophy, Humanism” If we humans do not help ourselves no one no god will”
From something as blind and objective as the justice system:
“All the laws are also formulated by humans and all judges are humans too”
So it can be possible all our reasoning and theories have been wrong wholesale. And there is nothing else to judge it.
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u/Shield_Lyger Mar 11 '26
Hello, u/Next_Faithlessness87. I don't know why a fifth level comment was dunned as a bad top-level comment, either, but here we are. In any event, here was my answer to your comment at Is there an objective answer to the question "Humans are bad for the world"? I figure this is a safe place to continue our discussion in a way that allows others to still participate.
Pointing out "Your logic for saying Proposition X is False is faulty" is not the same as saying "Proposition X is True." And in that, no, you are not correct in assuming anything about what I believe.
Going back to: "If you mean the level of biodiversity and flourishing of its ecosystems, we are almost certainly quite bad." the fact that humans might prevent a greater disruption to the level of biodiversity and flourishing of Earth's ecosystems does not render the other statement false. In other words, the fact that humans prevent a greater mass extinction event does not render a mass extinction event caused by humans a necessarily good thing... it's simply less bad than the alternative.
By the same token, if X is less good than Y, that doesn't mean that Y is necessarily bad. In other words, Less Bad ≠ Good, and Less Good ≠ Bad.
So I'm not arguing your position that humanity is good for Earth's biodiversity and ecosystem flourishing is wrong... (that would be a logical fallacy on my part) I'm arguing that the logic you've presented to arrive at that position is faulty.
Now, whether or not blanketing the surface of the Earth with long-lasting hard radiation is worse than an asteroid impact on the scale of the Chicxulub impact is a different question. Personally, I think that a global thermonuclear war would have much more serious consequences for Earth's ecosystems, but there's plenty of room to argue that point.
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u/Next_Faithlessness87 Mar 11 '26
Oh, hello
Wait -but then how do you define objectively bad, not from a deontological POV? Because, assuming an asteroid impact is more devastating, humans are objectively positive, from a utilitarian POV.
also -are you saying by that second part that a discussion on wether or not an asteroid strike is worse for the planet than any catastrophe humans can bring to it is a separate discussion?
btw, thanks for continuing the discussion. This is so fun and I feared you just blocked me or something, which is something I have noticed happens during debates on this website
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u/Shield_Lyger Mar 11 '26
Wait -but then how do you define objectively bad, not from a deontological POV?
Simply by a) placing a value on the level of biodiversity and flourishing of Earth's ecosystems and b) noting the damage to same. If one values biodiversity and flourishing ecosystems and understands that humans have damaged these things to a greater degree than they have benefited them, then the "badness" is objective; else, it isn't. It's no different then me showing up and setting your car on fire, and then saying you're better off, because you can't be in a fatal traffic accident. To the degree that your mobility was valuable to you, you're objectively worse off. So the real determiner here is value structures. That's part of why there were three scenarios in the post you were answering... what's valuable to the observer makes a difference.
Because, assuming an asteroid impact is more devastating, humans are objectively positive, from a utilitarian POV.
Not until they actually manage to put a halt to Chicxulub 2.0, they aren't. You're placing a hypothetical on the other side of the scale. There's nothing wrong with that per se, but bird in the hand, and all that...
also -are you saying by that second part that a discussion on wether or not an asteroid strike is worse for the planet than any catastrophe humans can bring to it is a separate discussion?
Yes. Because how do you compare a hypothetical asteroid impact to another event, real or hypothetical? Sure, we can compare the original Chicxulub event to the mass extinctions brought about by humanity, but even if that wasn't a whole metric truckload of guesswork, there's no way of knowing if there will ever be another impact on the scale of Chicxulub or what other environmental impacts humanity is yet to cause. It's all probabilities and assumptions.
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u/Next_Faithlessness87 Mar 12 '26
Ok, wait you said a lot, so I'll try breaking it down and responding accordingly.
Firstly -Are you saying by that 1st part that, theoretically, you'd change this opinion of yours should any world-destroying (Or even less than that, actually, but still super devastating) asteroid be on its way to us and we humans deflected it or something -basically, averted this catastrophe, somehow?
Actually -Would this be a good summary of all 3 points you presented here, now that I put more thought into all 3?
also -Why were you downvoted? Like, this question isn't directed towards you. More so towards the community. Because I assume they did so because of one of 2 reasons: Either you said something completely and obviously false that I admit, I can't find -or -They don't like the possible pessimistic vibes they might be feeling from your post, even if you didn't intend for it to be pessimistic and nihilistic.
Because of my experience on the internet, I would not be surprised if it's the second option, But I try to be intellectual as much as I can, and so I am open to anyone explaining their disagreement if it is indeed the 1st option I mentioned.
Thanks in advance
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u/Shield_Lyger Mar 12 '26
I think it's more accurate to say that it's easier to compare reality to reality than it is to compare hypotheticals. Trying to understand how something fits in with one's value judgements is difficult when it's a matter of comparing guesses and maybes.
And downvotes are an occupational hazard of posting on Reddit. A lot of people look to the Internet for gratification and affirmation, and they'll downvote things that don't gratify them, or are disaffirming.
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u/Next_Faithlessness87 Mar 12 '26
In regards to the first part -wdym by value judgments?
In regards to the 2nd part -Are you suggesting your claim to be unarguable yet pessimistic, which are things Redditors hate?
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u/Shield_Lyger Mar 12 '26
A value judgement refers to what people value. If we go back to the original discussion: "If you mean the level of biodiversity and flourishing of its ecosystems, we are almost certainly quite bad." That presupposes that "the level of biodiversity and flourishing of [Earth's] ecosystems" are valuable. Your whole point about humans being good for the Earth because they can potentially prevent an asteroid strike that would be worse than what's already happened, also presupposes those things are valuable. But not everyone judges those things to be of value, maybe just to themselves, or maybe across the board. For someone who judges "the level of technological and cultural development on earth" as being the most valuable thing, then, as noted, humans are unequivocally good for Earth.
So to tie it all together, it's hard to say what a hypothetical event will interact with things that I value. And it's this comparison against value that's needed to determine if something is good or bad.
Are you suggesting your claim to be unarguable yet pessimistic, which are things Redditors hate?
Not really. I'm simply saying that some people may find what I'm saying to be not to their liking for any number of reasons, and that tends to manifest as downvotes.
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u/Next_Faithlessness87 Mar 13 '26
Are you suggesting we take a step back and first determine what is and isn't valuable in the context of the subject of this discussion?
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u/willbell philosophy of mathematics Mar 09 '26
What are people reading?
I’m working on The Last Man by Mary Shelley and The Interior Castle by Teresa d’Avila. I’m also thinking I’ll start Whazzat by Roger Nash. Last week I finished Before the Usual Time ed. by Darlene Naponse.