Yeah, pretty much. Philosophy people can be helpful though, their idea processing systems are fairly robust, and unlike a statistician or scientist, they sort of end up with a side-specialization in communication. Which is extremely valuable these days.
Asking a question can have many purposes asides simply answering it. I think if a philosopher thinks they are definitively answering important questions, they’re perhaps engaging in a bit of hubris, and while that may have been more appropriate in earlier centuries, I doubt very many in the modern day fall into that kind of self-important trap.
Coming up with hypothesis and working out the brain with new methods and ideas is important in other ways, you simply don’t need that sort of certainty that belongs more in the arena of faith. Call them “answers” or whatever, that’s fine. The purpose is not to arrive or convince, though, it’s to strengthen through exercise and come up with new things. Much like how martial arts is no longer as useful for self defence in a world with handguns, but instead makes for very good exercise and social connections, and is just fun.
Not that philosophy cannot answer any questions, mind you. But I don’t think that’s very important anymore when more rigorous methods exist. Finding answers is a very small thing philosophy can accomplish, that is minor and unimportant compared to the much more valuable things it can do for a person’s skillset. If it did not contribute to skillsets in a very efficient way, I doubt it would have much relevance anymore.
Yes, that’s the “new stuff” part that I mentioned. You don’t want to stagnate in a world where things are constantly changing as time flows. And you can always continue to refine methods, ask new questions, ask questions in new ways, and yes, even sometimes constrain or find an answer.
Martial arts continues to change as well. New schools appear, new styles appear, etc. I’m not sure what point you’re ultimately trying to make.
During a presentation by an executive with Google’s Israel branch on Monday, a Google Cloud engineer stood up and shouted, “I refuse to build technology that powers genocide or surveillance.” They were later fired.
You can handwave it away as some magical maybes if you want, but I prefer a more quantitative, substantial, evidence-based understanding. Less poetry, more fact.
I think if he wasn’t looking for publicity, he would have tried to organize within his company. This kind of posturing stuff is just about image.
Unless he’s some mental child or something, that just “couldn’t hold his intense feelings inside anymore” or whatever.
He could have done something real. This kind of petulant bullshit isn’t it though. It’s just not how the corporate world works, it won’t move anything, and actually makes his cause look more childish.
Look, I respect the guy for having the right opinion. But that’s not good enough in the real world. Never was, it takes more than that. If just being a decent fellow was enough to fix problems, we’d have fixed them all already.
Harder decisions are required, it’s not easy. If he’d have leaked something, or maybe gotten himself fired for simply not-disruptively speaking out and sued or something, or organized a walk-out or whatever, that’d be admirable.
This kind of “oh people on the internet are gonna like this” move is just immature though. It doesn’t do jack shit. Standing up isn’t good enough, just gets your fucking head blown off. That’s just how the world works. Entrenched power isn’t some dumb pushover, otherwise generations of activists would have pushed it over already.
In my defense that was a qualified statement. I did not just say “that guy is some mental child” or somesuch. It is just one very unpopular interpretation of his actions.