I wonder if the “philosophy is conceptual, not empirical” view is still compatible with empirically-informed projects in philosophy. I think they probably are. Roughly, the idea is that while some philosophical disputes may require empirical input, when that’s all said and done, no additional empirical evidence or data will decisively settle the issue. For instance, moral anti-realists may make empirical assumptions about human psychology, but those empirical claims can’t really settle the dispute between realists and anti-realists. That’s at least the thought—I’m not sure if it works.
Agree, for sure, that's what I see as work in "the borderlands."
Though--while empirical input won't settle the debate between moral realists and anti-realists, I doubt conceptual or a priori considerations ever will either.
I like the idea of thinking about questions that are "left over" or resistant to empiricism. Questions of meaning and value, for example, are not going to be answered by empirical studies. Of course, as Michael suggests below, that does not mean empirical studies are irrelevant to philosophical questions. When it comes to humanistic questions that resist empiricism, philosophy is competing, so to speak, with literature rather than science. We've probably all had the experience of a literary work responding to some "philosophical" question more adequately than philosophy itself. Although on those questions philosophy distinguishes itself with a different standard of rigor and at least a gesture toward universality that is often absent in literature.
I stopped caring about what philosophy ‘is’ very early in my career, indeed, before I had a career. Stopping caring happened in a clear and discrete moment. It was the Boston “meat market” meeting of the American Philosophical Association in 1994. I was being interviewed for a job by what I'll call a S.W.A.T. team of philosophers from Pittsburgh. They had me surrounded (quite literally) and asked “why aren’t you just a physicist?” It was clear to everybody in the room after two minutes that I had no answer to this question. And yet the same question was asked, in various forms, for the next 50 minutes, as if the most important thing about my candidacy for this position was whether I could address this 'important issue'. (If it were to happen today the 50 minutes wouldn’t happen because I’d just walk out.)
That’s when I lost interest. Ever since (and in some sense before, but naively), I just ask and pursue the questions that interest me, and if the questions, or my attempts to respond to them, are ‘not real philosophy’ (as I’ve been told on several occasions) that’s fine.
About 5 years later I gave a talk at the University of Chicago about why we shouldn't use intuitions as evidence. Apparently it wasn’t real philosophy, and a very annoyed John Haugeland (rest his soul) stood up and said “you’re either crazy or a dilettante.” It’s maybe the only time in my life that the ‘afterwit’ (“l’esprit de l’escalier”) occurred *in the moment* rather than after, and I responded “Why not both?”
Thanks! I've had similar experiences and reactions. I think the demarcation problem is interesting but silly as an objection. "Is this idea really philosophy?" Who cares. Is it interesting? Is it true?
Very thoughtful and extremely useful framework. This was a very simple and short article but it’s actually restructuring a lot about how I understand the issue with philosophy today, as well as why we still need it. It makes sense from a historical perspective as well.
I would say that in the future, philosophy should perhaps become more of a prerequisite to science and other fields than being its own field, as it is the foundation for how we get anything complex done at all. A good example of this is how important it is for scientists to read Kuhns book, or to understand the epistemological roots of science from people like Francis Bacon and Descartes. Thanks
thank you for this wonderful essay! do you view “what is left over” as an infinite set? theoretically, for every known (or knowable) empirical fact, there is an associated a priori question (why is it this way?), which, even if answered, would just generate an even higher level question.
Really enjoyed this framing, especially how you walk through both the evolutionary and epistemological accounts without trying to force a false unification. I think they can, and should, coexist, but in different “realities” of measurement.
The epistemological view belongs in the universal realm, where inquiry is judged against the broadest possible canvas; questions that resist empirical closure but still demand rigor, precision, and the discipline of abstract reasoning. That space will always be a kind of philosophical commons, even as parts of it drift toward science.
The evolutionary view, however, is rooted in the social reality of human history. It’s a map of what philosophy has been in practice: an adaptive, subjective space that sheds what can be empirically measured and keeps what can only be contested, reframed, or reimagined within the cultures that produce it. That’s why it explains the messiness; the lack of consensus isn’t a flaw in the method so much as a feature of the terrain.
Holding both in view allows us to see philosophy as more than “what’s left,” while also keeping us honest about where and how we’re measuring it.
When I was a freshman, I didn't even try to major in philosophy, because I found it really difficult. I was an English major for a brief time, but I actually was still a poor logic writer. (This was 23 yrs ago). I learned that reading alot is a way to slowly digest philosophical ideas, but presented with abstract ideas without context can sometimes appear difficult.
I believe that for much greater progress in science, a new community will need to emerge whose only purpose would be to provide scientists with various *accepted* principles of metaphysics, epistemology, and axiology from which to do science. To help distinguish this from traditional philosophy these professionals might instead be referred to as “meta scientists”. In practice I suspect that several competing groups would vie to become so distinguished, and with science itself ultimately determining which principles found science most effectively. So in effect there wouldn’t just be science as well as what remains after other disciplines fall away (or philosophy), but a community which provides scientists with agreed upon non-science principles from which to effectively do science.
I wonder if the “philosophy is conceptual, not empirical” view is still compatible with empirically-informed projects in philosophy. I think they probably are. Roughly, the idea is that while some philosophical disputes may require empirical input, when that’s all said and done, no additional empirical evidence or data will decisively settle the issue. For instance, moral anti-realists may make empirical assumptions about human psychology, but those empirical claims can’t really settle the dispute between realists and anti-realists. That’s at least the thought—I’m not sure if it works.
Agree, for sure, that's what I see as work in "the borderlands."
Though--while empirical input won't settle the debate between moral realists and anti-realists, I doubt conceptual or a priori considerations ever will either.
I like the idea of thinking about questions that are "left over" or resistant to empiricism. Questions of meaning and value, for example, are not going to be answered by empirical studies. Of course, as Michael suggests below, that does not mean empirical studies are irrelevant to philosophical questions. When it comes to humanistic questions that resist empiricism, philosophy is competing, so to speak, with literature rather than science. We've probably all had the experience of a literary work responding to some "philosophical" question more adequately than philosophy itself. Although on those questions philosophy distinguishes itself with a different standard of rigor and at least a gesture toward universality that is often absent in literature.
I stopped caring about what philosophy ‘is’ very early in my career, indeed, before I had a career. Stopping caring happened in a clear and discrete moment. It was the Boston “meat market” meeting of the American Philosophical Association in 1994. I was being interviewed for a job by what I'll call a S.W.A.T. team of philosophers from Pittsburgh. They had me surrounded (quite literally) and asked “why aren’t you just a physicist?” It was clear to everybody in the room after two minutes that I had no answer to this question. And yet the same question was asked, in various forms, for the next 50 minutes, as if the most important thing about my candidacy for this position was whether I could address this 'important issue'. (If it were to happen today the 50 minutes wouldn’t happen because I’d just walk out.)
That’s when I lost interest. Ever since (and in some sense before, but naively), I just ask and pursue the questions that interest me, and if the questions, or my attempts to respond to them, are ‘not real philosophy’ (as I’ve been told on several occasions) that’s fine.
About 5 years later I gave a talk at the University of Chicago about why we shouldn't use intuitions as evidence. Apparently it wasn’t real philosophy, and a very annoyed John Haugeland (rest his soul) stood up and said “you’re either crazy or a dilettante.” It’s maybe the only time in my life that the ‘afterwit’ (“l’esprit de l’escalier”) occurred *in the moment* rather than after, and I responded “Why not both?”
Thanks! I've had similar experiences and reactions. I think the demarcation problem is interesting but silly as an objection. "Is this idea really philosophy?" Who cares. Is it interesting? Is it true?
Very thoughtful and extremely useful framework. This was a very simple and short article but it’s actually restructuring a lot about how I understand the issue with philosophy today, as well as why we still need it. It makes sense from a historical perspective as well.
I would say that in the future, philosophy should perhaps become more of a prerequisite to science and other fields than being its own field, as it is the foundation for how we get anything complex done at all. A good example of this is how important it is for scientists to read Kuhns book, or to understand the epistemological roots of science from people like Francis Bacon and Descartes. Thanks
thank you for this wonderful essay! do you view “what is left over” as an infinite set? theoretically, for every known (or knowable) empirical fact, there is an associated a priori question (why is it this way?), which, even if answered, would just generate an even higher level question.
Really enjoyed this framing, especially how you walk through both the evolutionary and epistemological accounts without trying to force a false unification. I think they can, and should, coexist, but in different “realities” of measurement.
The epistemological view belongs in the universal realm, where inquiry is judged against the broadest possible canvas; questions that resist empirical closure but still demand rigor, precision, and the discipline of abstract reasoning. That space will always be a kind of philosophical commons, even as parts of it drift toward science.
The evolutionary view, however, is rooted in the social reality of human history. It’s a map of what philosophy has been in practice: an adaptive, subjective space that sheds what can be empirically measured and keeps what can only be contested, reframed, or reimagined within the cultures that produce it. That’s why it explains the messiness; the lack of consensus isn’t a flaw in the method so much as a feature of the terrain.
Holding both in view allows us to see philosophy as more than “what’s left,” while also keeping us honest about where and how we’re measuring it.
When I was a freshman, I didn't even try to major in philosophy, because I found it really difficult. I was an English major for a brief time, but I actually was still a poor logic writer. (This was 23 yrs ago). I learned that reading alot is a way to slowly digest philosophical ideas, but presented with abstract ideas without context can sometimes appear difficult.
On the thought of philosophy being “what’s left after other disciplines fall away”, I think this is a perfectly reasonable position. And I’d also like to add to the theme of a comment that I recently left at the wonderful mentioned post from @Michael Hannon. https://open.substack.com/pub/michaeljhannon/p/why-cant-philosophers-answer-the?r=5674xw&utm_campaign=comment-list-share-cta&utm_medium=web&comments=true&commentId=141884880
I believe that for much greater progress in science, a new community will need to emerge whose only purpose would be to provide scientists with various *accepted* principles of metaphysics, epistemology, and axiology from which to do science. To help distinguish this from traditional philosophy these professionals might instead be referred to as “meta scientists”. In practice I suspect that several competing groups would vie to become so distinguished, and with science itself ultimately determining which principles found science most effectively. So in effect there wouldn’t just be science as well as what remains after other disciplines fall away (or philosophy), but a community which provides scientists with agreed upon non-science principles from which to effectively do science.