english -- creative writing
film studies -- filmmaking
theatre as literature, theory, etc. -- theatre as acting, producing, etc.
art history -- art
music appreciation -- music
four so-called humanities remain: philosophy, history, linguistics, and religious studies. religious studies, which is basically a combination of philosophical and historical approaches, doesn't have a fine art counterpart, but it does have a counterpart "in practice" ("in practice" being similar to how fine arts are disciplines where the practice of an art differs from that art's appreciation/theory/aesthetics, etc.) -- the practice of religion in real life. history actually constitutes both social sciences and the humanities because it studies everything about the past: economics, politics, religion, art, literature, etc. the debate over history as a social science centers mostly around whether or not it, like anthropology or sociology, actually has testable hypotheses, and generally speaking it does not; when practiced as a social science, history operates more like a theoretical science than a lab science. in any case, since history is basically a wastebasket term encompassing all of the past, it is a combination of social sciences and the humanities whose sole reason for existence is temporal, based on the past (if history were a study of the present, it would be dismissed as being too broad and unfocused, and would be broken down into sub-disciplines that constitute the various social sciences and humanities that already exist *or* at the very least it would focus on specific events in-depth instead of broadly summarizing what happened over the course of each year or something along those lines). it should be noted that history, although it studies social science -- past economics, politics, etc. -- when it does not operate like a social science (as i mentioned earlier, when it does operate like a social science it resembles a theoretical science than a lab science at that), it usually functions as a humanities, studying both social science and the humanities in the past tense through a humanities lens (the notable exception to this rule of thumb is 20th century history, which is often taught like contemporary political science). linguistics is a very complicated situation, and although it has deep implications in the humanities and can be practiced as a social science, for the sake of this discussion i am going to classify it as a natural science simply based on its epistemological constitution (the exact details of this can be discussed at a later time or researched on the internet if one is eager to learn how i arrived at this conclusion). this leaves us with the only one remaining humanities: philosophy. unlike all the other humanities, philosophy does not have an "in practice" counterpart; the only conceivable practice of philosophy would be education, which is already inherent to every discipline, so philosophy stands alone as the only humanities without a proper counterpart. before delving into this complicated issue, let's reexamine the previous disciplines mentioned. i demonstrated how most humanities have a fine art counterpart; as such, humanities per se are simply concerned with aesthetics -- the interpretation of art -- and loosely with metaphysical questions -- what is love?, etc. the odd man out, religious studies, having its practice be its counterpart, demands that the discipline be concerned with the notion of faith. so do aesthetics, implicit metaphysics, and faith constitute what the humanities are? before i answer that question, we now begin our descent into a lengthy examination of what philosophy actually is...
first of all, let's examine the analytic-continental divide in philosophy that has divided the discipline for over a century now. analytic philosophy studies mainly science (philosophy of science, philosophy of physics, etc.) and the individual (philosophy of mind) and uses a rational approach to studying language (philosophy of language). continental philosophy concerns itself mainly with social science and people (history, anthropological theory, social theory, etc.) and uses a more subjective approach to studying language (semiotics). now, the only contemporary overlap between the two is social philosophy, and even there the approaches differ considerably. continental philosophy used to study the mind via early psychology (freud, jung, etc.) and the phenomenologists, but has since abandoned theorizing about the mind expect implicitly through metaphysics and language's implications for the mind.
i am now going to make four bold proclamations that most certainly will be open to attack. for one, aesthetics can usually do a decent job of analyzing what does not make good art, but is rather vague about what does make good art; if it had succeeded at defining what good art is, then good art would be much more formulaic and easy to produce, and the creative process would be less mysterious and less creative. as such, i am stating here that aesthetics amounts to nothing more than an opinion, a step-child of metaphysics that, due to its inability to establish metaphysics, failed in its own discipline. second, implicit metaphysics similarly also amounts to an opinion since it cannot be substantiated rationally, empirically, or conceptually. third, faith ultimately boils down to being an opinion, because it is not rooted in fact (this can be discussed more in-depth at a later time). fourth, it would now be helpful to refer you back to a previous post called "bridging the gap between theory and praxis: an optimal political ontology" to inform you as to what i consider politics to be. in defining a political ontology, i created a system in which a person overstepping its boundaries has violated a certain metaphysical code and in the process made life worse for the collective whole. analytic philosophy only studies society through social philosophy, political systems, and ethics, and ultimately leaves the political decisions, or what can be designated as "politics", up to the reader/student because while studying these things can be informative, none of them establishes enough concrete evidence to support one ideology over another. so politics is strictly an informed opinion. and in the context of my previous blog entry i referred you to earlier in this paragraph, i can define an opinion now as follows: an opinion is an approval or disapproval of metaphysical status without properly establishing a hierarchical metaphysical system and not concerning one's position and contribution to the metaphysical system with the opinion.
now, to elaborate on this a bit more, let's examine the idea of intentionality regarding opinion. when one breaks the so called "metaphysical code", they have obviously failed to realize their intentionality in their decision-making process unless not achieving their goals was an acceptable and/or expected outcome. so failed intentionality amounts to having the right to form an opinion and ask questions without metaphysical repercussions. as such, the following chain occurs:
intentionality without metaphysics (failed intentionality) --> opinion --> subjects that cannot be addressed by analytic philosophy --> love, politics, etc. --> love can only be analyzed/explored via aesthetics, implicit metaphysics, and/or faith --> philosophy is defined as humanities via aesthetics, implicit metaphysics, and/or faith
if you can't follow the above, let me elaborate on it a bit more. failed intentionality amounts to nothing more than an opinion. opinions can only be used in philosophy for subjects that cannot be addressed by analytic philosophy, such as love and politics. since love can only be analyzed/explored as it is manifested via art and not be analyzed metaphysically (explicit) in analytic philosophy, love can only be analyzed indirectly through aesthetics, implicit metaphysics, and/or faith. as such, continental philosophy is defined as a humanities via aesthetics, implicit metaphysics, and/or faith.
unfortunately, this type of philosophy amounts to nothing more than good intentions, often gone bad and enacted with detrimental results. so how do continental philosophers justify this approach? by denying the existence of an independent, objective reality, everything becomes subjective and there is no accountability for failed intentionality. so, whereas the case of the former amounted to nothing more than good intentions, living in a subjective world amounts to nothing more than ignorance is bliss. either way, philosophy still does not have a counterpart the way other humanities do. this has two major implications. first of all, philosophy has adopted counterparts over the past century. continental philosophy has made other humanities and social sciences its counterpart through aesthetics (in essence, theoretical aesthetics, implicit metaphysics, and/or faith studying/exploring applied aesthetics, even scantier metaphysics (if there exists any at all in the other humanities except possibly religious studies), and/or faith) -- this is using the idea of philosophy being reduced to aesthetics, implicit metaphysics, and/or faith in an objective reality. on the other hand, analytic philosophy has made science and logic its counterparts. this is where it becomes useful to examine history, philosophy, and the history of philosophy. for one, due to the incredible specialization occurring in the social sciences after world war 2, history has been forced to rely more on theory with a political slant to maintain some sort of all-encompassing approach to studying things -- things such as social theory are in essence postmodern philosophy studying situations in the present tense (mainly politically-oriented) that in the future will be looked back upon as important historical events. on the flip side of the same coin, philosophy became history, meaning something relegated to the past, because true conventional philosophy imo (again, one could write a thesis on this topic alone; and by conventional philosophy, i mean the end of the philosophical tradition from the ancients through the continentals, not including the analytics or postmodernists) ended with heidegger and the only way to keep it going (besides turning it into something silly and unintelligible or shifting the focus away from metaphysics to epistemology) was to apply it to something, merging it with "history", or rather, the study of contemporary events via a politically-slanted philosophical lens. so, after ww2, continental philosophy and history in many respects became one and the same.
secondly, i will prove that the idea that philosophy existing solely through aesthetics, implicit metaphysics, and/or faith to be classified as a humanities is wrong. while those three things themselves constitute pure humanities, vice-versa is not always true. what distinguishes philosophy from other humanities is that it is able to define itself as something in addition to aesthetics, implicit metaphysics, and/or faith. the history of philosophy is useful for studying the evolution of metaphysical systems for context (metaphysics ultimately was abandoned by analytic philosophy and later replaced by "pesudo-problems" (philosophy of mind, philosophy of language, etc.); for continental philosophy, metaphysics, for the most part, reached its end with heidegger and everything after that is pretty much postmodern, and in terms of theoretical metaphysics, is rather silly, unintelligible, derivative, and/or lacking rigor). in any case, analytic philosophy works as a meta-science through the use of logic and being a framework for science. conceptually, analytic philosophy is basically a critical thinking tool; concepts of metaphysics in the history of philosophy are debatable, but they seem to build on each other until ultimately reaching a chaotic endpoint with heidegger. in analytic philosophy, concepts of metaphysics are debatable, but there are definite instances in which certain ones can be debunked without much question. concepts of metaphysics in postmodern philosophy are also debatable, but quite often they cannot be proven one way or another because they are either unintelligible or position themselves within a subjective framework so as to be impregnable to criticism within their own domain -- that is to say, the criticism of their position can only be from an external context due to a lack of proper perception. even if they can be criticized within their own domain, the criticisms can often be reduced to opinions as can the position itself because the subjective currency of discourse makes it hard to establish a level playing field of engagement, instead being a constantly shifting field with neither the philosophy nor the criticisms ever remaining on stable ground. given the conceptual nature of the "explicit metaphysics" in analytic philosophy, can it be considered a humanities due to this alone? the short answer metaphysically speaking in terms of scope and implications is no, but epistemologically is yes. that is to say, the method of inquiry is solid and still a humanities, but the range of subject matter it can investigate is limited/specialized and the typical metaphysical implications existing as a result of the inquiry are virtually non-existent. on the other hand, postmodern philosophy is a humanities aesthetically, implicit metaphysically, and faith-wise in an objective reality, but epistemologically it is not -- it is epistemologically not a humanities according to philosophy's standard (objective metaphysics), only according to the standard of other humanities. the reason for this is that the original goal of philosophy was to aim for the truth -- establish a factual foundation for inquiry into existence. analytic philosophy definitely falls in line with this goal and postmodern philosophy does not. this begs the question, does the existence of postmodern philosophy -- everything "continental" after heidegger -- and the fact that philosophy appears to have outgrown its original goals -- philosophy originally was a humanities both epistemologically and metaphysically -- mean that philosophy as a whole is dead? well, yes, but only in terms of its original conception's goals within its self-conceived domain, not in terms of its capacity for infinite knowledge (as well as the unforeseen "setbacks", i.e., philosophical discoveries that seemed to undermine how the ancients had envisioned philosophy to evolve) its original foundation has evolved to accommodate. but to finish off the idea of postmodern philosophy and everything being a subjective reality, review the following:
from what i understand, in rejecting an objective reality, postmodern philosophy believes there are no facts, only opinions. therefore, one can claim that:
1) the only fact is that there are only opinions. (this statement contradicts itself)
2) it is an opinion that there are only opinions. = it is an opinion -- the opinion possessing its opinion qualities is a fact, not an opinion -- that there are only opinions (again, contradiction)
2a) it is an opinion ad infinitum that there are only opinions. (only plausible solution)
the problem with 2a is that it defeats all standards of intelligibility, and if you don't have that, then what you have is basically worthless. so while postmodernists might be technically correct in this sense, they don't seem to have much that is worthwhile, and this is evidenced in the fact that non-subjective disciplines (analytic philosophy, math, cs, engineering, science, etc.) have not been altered by the postmodern landscape, whereas disciplines whose frameworks were subjective and fragile to begin with were very susceptible to the postmodernist wave (to be fair, the domain of metaphysics that cannot be verified rationally, empirically, or conceptually -- e.g., what is love? -- will always deserve a notable place in philosophy and the implications it holds for the social sciences, humanities, and arts; other possible exceptions will be discussed at a later time). john searle discusses these implications:
First, the movement in question is for the most part confined to various disciplines in the humanities, as well as some social science departments and certain law schools. The antirationalist component of the contemporary scene has - so far - had very little influence in philosophy, the natural sciences, economics, engineering, or mathematics. Though some of its heroes are philosophers, it has, in fact, little influence in American Philosophy departments. One might think that since the points at issue are in a very deep sense philosophical, the debates about the curriculum that are connected to the desire to overthrow the Western Rationalistic Tradition must be raging in philosophy departments. But at least in the major American research universities, this, as far as I can tell, is not so. Professional philosophers spend a lot of time fussing around the edges of the Western Rationalistic Tradition. They are obsessed by such questions as: 'What is the correct analysis of truth?,' 'How do words refer to objects in the world?,' and 'Do the unobservable entities postulated by scientific theories actually exist?' Like the rest of us, they tend to take the core of the Western Rationalistic Tradition for granted even when they are arguing about truth, reference, or the philosophy of science. The philosophers who make an explicit point of rejecting the Western Rationalistic Tradition, such as Richard Rorty or Jacques Derrida, are much more influential in departments of literature than they are in philosophy departments.
ultimately, the analytic-continental, or to be more accurate, the analytic-postmodern schism does not only divide philosophy, but all of academia. proof of this can be seen in psychology, which even outside of the realm of cognitive science has largely been categorized as a natural science by most universities, whereas anthropology and sociology remain as social sciences. now, while it is true that psychology focuses on the individual and the other two on many people, it is also true that psychology has not been influenced (barring a few exceptions) by postmodernism, whereas the other two have. when you reduce the social sciences to their root theories, you ultimately have analytic philosophy (meta-science and philosophy as a critical thinking tool in an objective reality perspective) and postmodern philosophy (humanities from an aesthetic, implicit metaphysical, and faith-based perspective in an objective reality perspective). as such, most social science can ultimately be classified as a humanities (social science theory being the humanities per se, with the science/research part being its "practice" counterpart), with the remaining non-postmodernist social sciences being considered simply as science.
