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football5680
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I would say that Philosophy is just more of a broad outlook on the universe as a whole. The greatest Philosophers through philosophical thinking have been led to the conclusion that God exists but once you accept that and begin to say, "Okay, what is God like?" You move into the realm of theology. Both ask many of the same questions but Theology deals specifically with God and religion.
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Resha Caner
Expert Fool
Theology is a study of God and how he relates to the universe.
The literal meaning of philosophy is a pursuit of knowledge. What we now call "physics" used to be called "natural philosophy". So, in one sense philosophy is more general than theology.
However, it has come to mean something much narrower, which is basically the use of reason to investigate concepts we can't study through the physical sciences.
The literal meaning of philosophy is a pursuit of knowledge. What we now call "physics" used to be called "natural philosophy". So, in one sense philosophy is more general than theology.
However, it has come to mean something much narrower, which is basically the use of reason to investigate concepts we can't study through the physical sciences.
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bhsmte
Newbie
This study's results show 72.8% of philosophers are atheists.
What percentage of philosophers believe in God?
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This is the philosophy forum. What are you doing dragging facts in? That'll turn this into a scientific discussion with actual answers rather than endless semantic nitpicking, opinions and posturing.
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Jeremy E Walker
Well-Known Member
Good day to you all. I am new here and am excited to be able to discourse with you all about philosophy. I enjoy talking about things like this with friends and acquaintances when I have the chance and I am happy to say that now that I am a member here, my chances of talking about philosophy with others has greatly increased!
So with great eagerness, but with all humility, I pose a question directly related to the most recent posts:
When we speak of "The greatest philosophers", of our time, or the past, or in history (whatever the case may be), is this not a matter of subjective opinion?
What I mean to say plainly, is that to me, Augustine may be the greatest philosopher while to others, Marx or Nietzsche or Plato might have that honor.
Would not a less subjective term be more appropriate. For example:
Would we not be more objective if we discussed who the most "influential" philosophers were? To be sure, even this term "influential" is not wholly void of some element of subjectivity. But to be sure, we can look at the work of various philosophers and their influence on philosophy and say: "Well this man here did this and this and wrote this book or that book or was an inspiration to this philosopher to come after him."
It just seems to me that it would be less controversial and less a matter of subjective opinion to talk about who the most influential philosophers were instead of who the greatest philosophers were. That is unless when one uses the word "greatest" they intend to convey "influential" or some like concept.
To support my view, there are readily available on the internet, lists that have been compiled by various philosophers containing philosophers who have been deemed to be the most influential philosophers in history i.e. Augustine, Plato, Socrates, Aquinas, etc. etc.
As to be expected, these lists that have been compiled are not the same across the board, but when one takes even a cursory look at them and compares them, one will find the same names over and over again. What were these men's beliefs? Were they atheists? Were they theists?
And if we take a step even further back and ask what were the views of the most influential thinkers/people in history when it came to the matter of whether or not God existed, you will find the answers to this question to be fertile ground for rousing and stimulating discourse.
So with great eagerness, but with all humility, I pose a question directly related to the most recent posts:
When we speak of "The greatest philosophers", of our time, or the past, or in history (whatever the case may be), is this not a matter of subjective opinion?
What I mean to say plainly, is that to me, Augustine may be the greatest philosopher while to others, Marx or Nietzsche or Plato might have that honor.
Would not a less subjective term be more appropriate. For example:
Would we not be more objective if we discussed who the most "influential" philosophers were? To be sure, even this term "influential" is not wholly void of some element of subjectivity. But to be sure, we can look at the work of various philosophers and their influence on philosophy and say: "Well this man here did this and this and wrote this book or that book or was an inspiration to this philosopher to come after him."
It just seems to me that it would be less controversial and less a matter of subjective opinion to talk about who the most influential philosophers were instead of who the greatest philosophers were. That is unless when one uses the word "greatest" they intend to convey "influential" or some like concept.
To support my view, there are readily available on the internet, lists that have been compiled by various philosophers containing philosophers who have been deemed to be the most influential philosophers in history i.e. Augustine, Plato, Socrates, Aquinas, etc. etc.
As to be expected, these lists that have been compiled are not the same across the board, but when one takes even a cursory look at them and compares them, one will find the same names over and over again. What were these men's beliefs? Were they atheists? Were they theists?
And if we take a step even further back and ask what were the views of the most influential thinkers/people in history when it came to the matter of whether or not God existed, you will find the answers to this question to be fertile ground for rousing and stimulating discourse.
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PsychoSarah
Chaotic Neutral
Actually, intellectuals of the past often found that their pursuits yielded evidence that suggested the opposite.
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Entirely yes.
You can be pretty influential without being very interesting (or good) philosophically. Ayn Rand and C.S. Lewis spring to mind.
The point being that whatever our definition of 'greatest' it wouldn't just include theist philosophers who concluded that God existed.
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Jeremy E Walker
Well-Known Member
I concur with this wholeheartedly!
I also agree here. And for the sake of clarity we can agree that our definition or rather, our understanding of the term "influential" when it comes to philosophers is not limited to just theistic philosophers, but rather this list of influential philosophers would include men like Nietzsche or Marx who certainly were not theistic!
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I've seen this statistic before. It's fairly low, IMHO, for well trained academics. I would think that if more than a quarter of philosophers believe in a God, that is pretty high relative to the rest of the educated community. Yes?
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It would be low compared with scientists I don't know how common it is in the other branches of academics.
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I saw a list of percentages of academics who were theists broken into discipline.
http://www.owlnet.rice.edu/~ehe/doc/Ecklund_SocialProblems_54_2.pdf
Page 294
Still seems like a relatively high percentage to me.
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Given their representation in the population at large, If 27.8 were a high representation of believers in an academic branch, then we could conclude Nitzche right about where the usefulness of God as an explanation was headed.
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Jeremy E Walker
Well-Known Member
Where exactly did Nietzsche say the usefulness of God as an explanation was headed?
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It was what he was talking about when his most famous quote was uttered.
Nietzsche - The Key Ideas: God is dead
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Jeremy E Walker
Well-Known Member
Ahhh!
Much thanks to you. I had heard of the "Madman", now I understand it more clearly.
So essentially he is stating that God as an explanation for reality is no longer of any use...
Would you say that what I just wrote was an accurate summation of his view?
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In my understanding he, the philosopher was the madman, and he wasn't particularly happy about either the state of affairs of God or the modernist replacements for the concept.
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