Is med-school fit for a philosopher?

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I'd like to know if it's really necessary to pepper every post with entry level jargon from 1A general ed classes.

I can see the OP sitting in front of the computer with a stack of his "My first college books" feverishly looking up terms to post so that everyone knows he knows them. The pretentiousness of freshman gunners is amazing sometimes.

"If I knew half as much as I thought I knew when I was a freshman, I'd be a genius."

That quote was originally slightly different, but it still applies.

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Who the hells loves teaching? They do it for noble reasons such as sense of duty. I am sure teachers don't like teaching, the like the idea of teaching so to speak. They like the consequences their job produces, but the job itself... i doubt it.

Again the trick is that the word love and like changes meaning in different context. What i am arguing against is liking/loving as in getting pleasure out of a process of work itself.

I like teaching. It gives me pleasure. Have you seriously never had a teacher/professor who enjoyed their job? I'm not even talking about this 'sense of duty' you're spilling out. Some people like the very act of explaining, perhaps similar to people who like the act of solving problems. I'm not suggesting they receive some sort of intellectual and orgasmic climax; they just like doing it.

Well to be honest i agree that it is possible to enjoy once job. Just that i do not believe one is born liking something, rather one grows to like something by exposure to it and emotional events related to it. Of course personality has to fit in with the job as well.

If the statement in bold is taken to mean we have no innate predispositions, that is just blatantly false.

I was born liking sustenance. I knew exactly where to find milk.

If it means you can't like anything without having experienced it, that's just uninteresting. It's like telling a deaf kid he doesn't like music...

I meant to say "such as" a sense of duty. The actual process of standing in from of 30 people and trying to explain something you already know is not that fun is it? What is fun is knowing that those people will get out of your class more educated then when they came in.


Does a doctor who goes to Africa and work for **** money but saves lives do it because he "likes" it? I think he does it because of consequences such as saving kids who would die and some other moral sense like a sense of duty.

Again, I enjoy standing in front of people explaining things I already know. So do millions of other people. Why? Maybe because teaching is an exercise of power? You can doubt this all you want, but you will be in a very funny position.

People do seemingly selfless things for reasons alternative to what might be described as 'moral' or 'ethical.'

For instance, there are 100 babies in a conveyor belt that leads to a high-powered blender.

I have a magical lever that can turn the blender off, or prevent it from working.

Suppose I see one baby go through; the sight of a blending baby displeases my brain. Maybe not at first, but perhaps after 4 or 5 are blended.

So when I pull the magical lever to prevent more babies from being blended, I am not acting from a sense of duty but rather I just don't to see blended babies.
 
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You are not a philosopher. Rawls and Nozick were philosophers.
This thread is moot.
 
Wait, so you believe in practical jobs afterwards rather than following what you love... so you decided to be a philosophy major? Go get that Econ degree son
 
1. Those personality traits are not unique to any specific profession. And I would argue that the last one isn't quite on the dot.

2. You may want to consider M.D./Ph.D programs that offer a Ph.D in bioethics or something similar.

3. It is embarrassing for a self-proclaimed philosopher to misspell 'utilitarian.'


I just wonder why it took 20 posts before someone mentioned this.
 
Philosophers have the right to make up new words lol...

To the OP. In all seriousness, it takes a philosophical person to consider the ethical issues that surround the field of medicine today. So as long as you take your studies seriously, you will be an asset to the profession.

Good luck.
 
Now that i read back what i wrote i see that i made my posts too ambiguous. I should have either keep my mouth shut or think it though instead of making half-*** posts. I hate arguing on internet because of the amount of misunderstanding that goes on. At least during personal conversation it is easy to clear up.

See even if i was a freshman who doesn't know anything, why the hell would someone take their time to make a post JUST to offend me? It makes no sense that in such a profession like medicine, someone would do it. Seems to be hypocritical to the medical philosophy.

Forums always disappoint me in terms of inability to make a civilized discussion. It seems like on forums people suddenly lower themselves to annoyed monkeys.
 
Eh.. maybe this is just me, but I don't call somebody who studies philosophy a philosopher. I call a person who has produced some compelling work of philosophy a philosopher. I'm a philosophy major too, but I certainly wouldn't call myself a philosopher, and I'm guessing you aren't one either.

As for the usefulness of the study of philosophy for medicine, I love it. It helps a lot when critically examining research so you can draw your own conclusions rather than simply accepting the conclusions of researchers, or taking everything you read in a science textbook as the truth, a bad habit a lot of science students have. That kind of insight is what leads to innovation in science. A background in philosophy is also very helpful when questions of bioethics come up, and that's inevitable for doctors.

I'm a little confused by your portrayal of philosophy, though. Sure, a critical spirit is good, but I find that making the most charitable interpretations possible even more enriching (i.e. what interpretation makes what this philosopher is saying make the most sense?). Otherwise you'll probably overlook some brilliant work--Hegel's a great example for this--because you didn't look deeply enough into it. Usually the way things appear at first glance turns out to be wrong, and if you dismiss things too quickly you won't learn much. I asked my first philosophy professor what I should do to succeed in philosophy, and he told me to try to defend the philosopher, because that's a bigger challenge than critiquing. It's the best advice I could have been given.

Furthermore, you probably should study the philosophy of science more. I recommend you read Kuhn especially. If you're interested in science, you must understand that science requires accepting (at least at the time you conduct an experiment) certain things as truth. If, say, you do an experiment and get results that contradict Newton's laws, you're probably going to think something is wrong with your experimental setup rather than Newton's laws. No, nobody would question Newton--and for good reason, not only because Newton's laws have been well tested, but also because if you don't start with some kind of framework accepting certain hypotheses, you can't make any progress.

As for ignoring common sense, I don't think this is a fair characterization of philosophy. Aristotle for one paid a lot of attention to common sense to see what knowledge he could derive from it. Of course not everyone agreed with his philosophy, but that's just the point.

This disturbs me the most:

I think "money doesn't matter" is one of these conventional folk-wisdoms that philosophy taught me to proudly ignore and think for myself. The same goes for existence of god, existance of soul or a just world.

Philosophy doesn't teach one to "think for oneself," but to use reason (unless you're in the anti-rationalist camp, in which case... well, let's not get into that). On the contrary, as I read it, thinking for oneself is very unreasonable ("I believe this way because I want to, and I don't care what your argument is.") Let the logic persuade you, not your own inclinations.
 
Now that i read back what i wrote i see that i made my posts too ambiguous. I should have either keep my mouth shut or think it though instead of making half-*** posts. I hate arguing on internet because of the amount of misunderstanding that goes on. At least during personal conversation it is easy to clear up.

See even if i was a freshman who doesn't know anything, why the hell would someone take their time to make a post JUST to offend me? It makes no sense that in such a profession like medicine, someone would do it. Seems to be hypocritical to the medical philosophy.

Forums always disappoint me in terms of inability to make a civilized discussion. It seems like on forums people suddenly lower themselves to annoyed monkeys.

Well, in fairness, some people aspire to be annoyed monkeys.
 
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Now that i read back what i wrote i see that i made my posts too ambiguous. I should have either keep my mouth shut or think it though instead of making half-*** posts. I hate arguing on internet because of the amount of misunderstanding that goes on. At least during personal conversation it is easy to clear up.

See even if i was a freshman who doesn't know anything, why the hell would someone take their time to make a post JUST to offend me? It makes no sense that in such a profession like medicine, someone would do it. Seems to be hypocritical to the medical philosophy.

Forums always disappoint me in terms of inability to make a civilized discussion. It seems like on forums people suddenly lower themselves to annoyed monkeys.

This is the quote of a truly practical person who is not an idealist.

Anyone who has used the internet knows forums are the last place to execute a civilized discussion on something as radicalized as your approach to philosophy. Maybe you are an idealist but are too blind to realize it?
 
Eh.. maybe this is just me, but I don't call somebody who studies philosophy a philosopher. I call a person who has produced some compelling work of philosophy a philosopher. I'm a philosophy major too, but I certainly wouldn’t call myself a philosopher, and I’m guessing you aren’t one either.

As for the usefulness of the study of philosophy for medicine, I love it. It helps a lot when critically examining research so you can draw your own conclusions rather than simply accepting the conclusions of researchers, or taking everything you read in a science textbook as the truth, a bad habit a lot of science students have. That kind of insight is what leads to innovation in science. A background in philosophy is also very helpful when questions of bioethics come up, and that’s inevitable for doctors.

I'm a little confused by your portrayal of philosophy, though. Sure, a critical spirit is good, but I find that making the most charitable interpretations possible even more enriching (i.e. what interpretation makes what this philosopher is saying make the most sense?). Otherwise you'll probably overlook some brilliant work--Hegel's a great example for this--because you didn't look deeply enough into it. Usually the way things appear at first glance turns out to be wrong, and if you dismiss things too quickly you won't learn much. I asked my first philosophy professor what I should do to succeed in philosophy, and he told me to try to defend the philosopher, because that’s a bigger challenge than critiquing. It's the best advice I could have been given.

Furthermore, you probably should study the philosophy of science more. I recommend you read Kuhn especially. If you're interested in science, you must understand that science requires accepting (at least at the time you conduct an experiment) certain things as truth. If, say, you do an experiment and get results that contradict Newton's laws, you're probably going to think something is wrong with your experimental setup rather than Newton's laws. No, nobody would question Newton--and for good reason, not only because Newton's laws have been well tested, but also because if you don't start with some kind of framework accepting certain hypotheses, you can't make any progress.

As for ignoring common sense, I don't think this is a fair characterization of philosophy. Aristotle for one paid a lot of attention to common sense to see what knowledge he could derive from it. Of course not everyone agreed with his philosophy, but that’s just the point.

This disturbs me the most:

I think "money doesn't matter" is one of these conventional folk-wisdoms that philosophy taught me to proudly ignore and think for myself. The same goes for existence of god, existance of soul or a just world.

Philosophy doesn’t teach one to "think for oneself," but to use reason (unless you're in the anti-rationalist camp, in which case... well, let's not get into that). On the contrary, as I read it, thinking for oneself is very unreasonable ("I believe this way because I want to, and I don't care what your argument is.") Let the logic persuade you, not your own inclinations.

Thanks for this great post!

Ignoring common sense was a little too harsh of an expression to use. I should have used something like "common sense is not satisfactory answer for a philosopher". A great example is epistemology. What is knowledge? Common sense type of people will say something like "well i read it in a book and thus i know it!" or "i see a table in front of me and thus i know its there?" but philosophers are not satisfied with that. In fact there is scary amount of literature on such superficially easy topic as "how does one know"

What i meant by "think for yourself" has to do with ignoring convention, and relying on reason. For example if 99% of people believe in god, it is reasonable to ignore them unless they make a reasonable argument for its existance. So we are not really disagreeing there, just that we have different understanding of what the expression means.

I agree with the rest of your points!
 
This is the quote of a truly practical person who is not an idealist.

Anyone who has used the internet knows forums are the last place to execute a civilized discussion on something as radicalized as your approach to philosophy. Maybe you are an idealist but are too blind to realize it?

Is it really too much to ask for a civilized discussion on a intellectual forum? It is people like you who make it uncivilized. Was this post really necessary?
 
I think of philosopher as a personality trait, just like an artist.
 
What i meant by "think for yourself" has to do with ignoring convention, and relying on reason. For example if 99% of people believe in god, it is reasonable to ignore them unless they make a reasonable argument for its existance. So we are not really disagreeing there, just that we have different understanding of what the expression means.

Absolutely, but I fear you ignore popular opinions because you don't like them and you aren't looking for good arguments one way or another to examine whether they are compelling or not. I strongly suggest a philosophy of religion course--the arguments for God are ingenious. Even if you aren't convinced by them, they sure will make you think. That was probably my favorite philosophy course.
But your rationalization for your claims in this thread about money as a justified motivation doesn't seem very well thought out, and that's what suggests to me that you aren't really exercising reason. Then again, consistent with my argument for charity, I'll suppose you might have your reasons and just decided not to type them out.
 
Is it really too much to ask for a civilized discussion on a intellectual forum? It is people like you who make it uncivilized. Was this post really necessary?

Like I said, you apparently have never used a forum before. Welcome to the internet, grow a thick skin or gtfo.
 
Absolutely, but I fear you ignore popular opinions because you don't like them and you aren't looking for good arguments one way or another to examine whether they are compelling or not. I strongly suggest a philosophy of religion course--the arguments for God are ingenious. Even if you aren't convinced by them, they sure will make you think. That was probably my favorite philosophy course.
But your rationalization for your claims in this thread about money as a justified motivation doesn't seem very well thought out, and that's what suggests to me that you aren't really exercising reason. Then again, consistent with my argument for charity, I'll suppose you might have your reasons and just decided not to type them out.

Philosophy of religion is THE most favorite topic for me! I read The god delusion, breaking the spell and the end of faith. I watch god vs atheism debates for fun for christ sakes! I watched over 100 of them during the past year. Atheism is a much stronger position logicly, although neither is deductive. What i mean by atheism is a lack of belief in god/gods and not a statement that god doesn't exist. Almsot every god arguement there is can be used to prove that a cookie monster exists and created the universe.
 
Like I said, you apparently have never used a forum before. Welcome to the internet, grow a thick skin or gtfo.
Oh right! It is not the problem that needs to be fixed! It is my problem for not accepting it as it is! Tolerate all the **** in the world! Who needs change! **** civil rights movement! I love your attitude dude.
 
If God is willing to prevent evil, but is not able to
Then He is not omnipotent.

If He is able, but not willing
Then He is malevolent.

If He is both able and willing
Then whence cometh evil?

If He is neither able nor willing
Then why call Him God?

-Epicurus

This is like my favorite quote! Expresses my doubts about the jeudo-christian god perfectly.
 
Oh right! It is not the problem that needs to be fixed! It is my problem for not accepting it as it is! Tolerate all the **** in the world! Who needs change! **** civil rights movement! I love your attitude dude.

I cant believe you just compared civil rights with discussion on an internet forum. Thanks for the analogy, go back to your hippie school and try to learn real things instead of the 'philosophy' imparted unto you.
 
I cant believe you just compared civil rights with discussion on an internet forum. Thanks for the analogy, go back to your hippie school and try to learn real things instead of the 'philosophy' imparted unto you.

Had a little too much red bull? Haha dude cheer the **** up! :love:
 
Philosophers are quite fit for medical school, the real question is whether medical school is fit for philosophers. If P is fit for Q, it doesn't follow that Q is fit for P. Justification for the former is self-evident, justification for the latter is still needed.
 
Now that i read back what i wrote i see that i made my posts too ambiguous. I should have either keep my mouth shut or think it though instead of making half-*** posts. I hate arguing on internet because of the amount of misunderstanding that goes on. At least during personal conversation it is easy to clear up.

See even if i was a freshman who doesn't know anything, why the hell would someone take their time to make a post JUST to offend me? It makes no sense that in such a profession like medicine, someone would do it. Seems to be hypocritical to the medical philosophy.

Forums always disappoint me in terms of inability to make a civilized discussion. It seems like on forums people suddenly lower themselves to annoyed monkeys.

I guess you are completely detached from the rest of humanity if you don't understand that people are offensive.

When someone makes ignorant statements or belittles a field of study (like you are doing with philosophy), people are going to react aggressively.

If you said the same things you have been saying in this thread, to someone in a conversion at school... they would laugh at you, then cry, then slap you across the face with a Kant book, then cry some more and laugh at how you think you're a philosopher.
 
Your friendly, smiling, assistant mod here, leaving a second reminder that the discussion board isn't the place for personal insults.

It wasnt an insult though. This guy really does have a problem with understanding reality and he inadvertently confirms it throughout this thread. I wish I knew a real philosopher so I could convince myself they arent all like the TC.
 
Is an expert at throwing knives fit for medical school?


lulzzz ;)
 
It wasnt an insult though. This guy really does have a problem with understanding reality and he inadvertently confirms it throughout this thread. I wish I knew a real philosopher so I could convince myself they arent all like the TC.

To simply say someone is full of **** - very easy.
To actually say WHY someone is full of **** - harder.
To understand a person/philosopher or defend him - Something you are incapable of doing.
 
To simply say someone is full of **** - very easy.
To actually say WHY someone is full of **** - harder.
To understand a person/philosopher or defend him - Something you are incapable of doing.
LOL, that is a poetic usage of the "To"
 
Has it ever occurred to those who accuse me of being an idiot implicitly, that they just don't understand my viewpoint? Although it may be 60% my fault with sloppy writing. Look up "straw man" fallacy online. It may change your life.

Person A argues X
Person B creates a caricature of argument Xc
Person B disproves Xc
Person B says "you are stupid" for making that argument.
Person A says "i never made that argument!" i said X not Xc!
 
To the OP, if you're looking for respect/usefulness/money/reliability combination, I guess medicine would be an okay choice. If you haven't already, I'd sit down and consider careers that interest you and grade them using those factors and see where stuff lines up. And I wouldn't worry about bias in your rankings; after all, they're meant for you only.
 
To simply say someone is full of **** - very easy.
To actually say WHY someone is full of **** - harder.
To understand a person/philosopher or defend him - Something you are incapable of doing.

Thanks for the mastercard-esque post. I concede, your knowledge is far superior to my own!

arguing_on_the_internet.jpg
 
You know, those Mastercard commercials were one of the most profitable marketing campaigns to date. If he was going to go for anything, I'd say either that or "Got Milk" would be a good choice.
 
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