Philosophy as Rigorous Science, Chat, Thought or Whatever

Philosophical thought may be about finding meaning or whatever else is 'wise'. Wisdom may be simplicity or awareness of the truth within a convoluted social world with litigious minutia destroying the woods and the trees. Sartre wrote his 'Being and Nothingness' during World War Two Paris after being released by the Nazis from a p.o.w. camp. He wrote 'Critique of Dialectical Reason' and lost an eye during the venture, and also visted Stalinist Russia. One might consider his work unrigorous since it has no math symbols, yet it is a good way of viewing human social organizations with a different lens-simultaneously phenomenally and sociologically even with individual and collective epistemology baed on analysis on cognitive subjectivity.

Edmund Husserl was a philosopher born in 1859 determined eventually to make philosophy a rigorous science. He wrote quite a lot with titles like 'Logical Investigations'. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy notes that his later works were helpful in relating scientific ideas to pre-scientific conceptual paradigms. Husserl was a phenomenologist.

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/husserl/

One may find rather readily quite a bit of depth in philosophical history of logic. Of course one remembers Aristotle' invention of classical logic, then one can skip to Leibniz' invention of mathematical logic that he kept in a drawer and never published, and on to Frege, Russell and eventually the 20th century analytic philosophers. The development of symbolic logic then use of it in an expanding permutation of forms found use in things from computer programming to algebra and SO3 groups etc.

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/probability-interpret/

That philosophical development of formal logic has had quite a number of individuals that have put work into it from Strawson to Kripke (Naming and Necessity). One may expand one' own interest in logic over decades if given an opportunity, yet one also might wish to apply such rigorous thought to the world of perceptions and even cosmology.

Individuals may read logic and epistemologies derived from it and apply it as a filter to consider the works of philosophers like Immanuel Kant's 'Critique of Pure Reason' or simply to reading a newspaper and discovering commonplace logic fallacies in politics. Philosophical thought may lead one to an awareness of the inadequacy of the mundane social existence, of why reality T.V. and soap operas haven't much prospect for making the world utopia, or why the reorganization of society into a better functioning organization de facto is so challenging. Not all philosophical thought is along the lines of a technical occupation pursuit with guaranteed pay.

Many people with graduate degrees in philosophy become lawyers or else in order to draw a paycheck-not a bad idea either. Nearly a quarter of lawyers get into another occupation within a few years. Considering society without a paycheck may free one a little from corporate control and the threat of termination if one does not hush-that's why so many executives are fairly mute in politics today except for sycophantic utterances.

It is a good thing to have a rigorous approach to knowledge and run experiments. It is also interesting to have a disciplined approach to reading as much of the world's knowledge concerning philosophy as one may in a lifetime, yet of course the time runs out and one is left with faith and hope that The Lord will accomplish His miracles. One must try to apply one-self a little earlier then to apply rigorous methods to faith activities-perhaps the mere Lutheran style of reform bringing a Priesthood of Believers to graduate beyond the hierarchical priesthood left over from the feudal era...there are many disciplined activities for philosophers today and not all require scientific method.

On the premise that 'Anything is morally acceptable to prevent global ecosphere collapse."

I was wondering about that-nice thought. Means and ends issues though. I think its possible that if society is really rotten at heart that one might have to let it go destroy itself with a clear conscience and rely on God to save the elect.

Its also the case practically that social rule becomes increasingly corrupt in the public and corporate sectors as individualism is annihilated and collective power is concentrated. The people in governmemnt and the corporate world with so much power may be the least likely to fix anything in an ordinary Utopian perfection acceptable to perfectionists.

Merry Christmas.