A.N. Whtehead " Speculative philosophy is the endeavor to frame, a coherent, logical, necessary system of ideas in terms of which every element of our experience can be interpreted"

Speculative philosophy does not limit itself to the scientific method, phenomenology or to the analysis of language.

Speculative philosophy does not mean undisciplined thinking. It is a rational enterprise with a commitment to rationality.

The modernist approach (empiricism and sense perception) has abandoned the seeking of ultimate answers. It has confined philosophy to a much more limited sphere and been satisfied with much more restricted answers..

I think that is because what you call the "modernist approach" would want to know what "ultimate questions" would be, and how it could be determined whether ultimate answers to these questions would be correct or incorrect if any were suggested. It may be that "modernists" want to have some reason to think that they are not embarked on a pointless quest. Sounds reasonable to me.

Speculative philosophy is a game for thinkers (rationalism and ontology) not for knowers (epistemology and empiricism). It is not part of a "quest for certainty"

This is not to say speculative systems are completely free to ignore facts and knowledge only that they are not limited in their construction to what can be proven or empirically demonstrated. Rational systems should not contradict empirical fact or contradict direct experience but they are not limited by such notions as logical positivism, linguistic analysis or analytic philosophy. Speculative philosophical systems seek to meet the criteria of self consistency AND adequacy to the facts.

Einstein "Imagination is more important than knowledge"
I take this to acknowledge the role of speculation, imagination and intuition in making advances in thought as opposed to confining your thinking to what is known or can be shown to be fact in current terms. In fact many scientific advances are the result of speculative or creative thinking not of experimentation.

Besides "What can be known for certain"
A little Hume and Kant leads to the conclusion our only knowledge of reality is sense data and that "reality in itself" lies beyond human grasp.
This leads to phenomenalism- the notion that all we can do is describe phenomena as they appear to us. Ultimate reality lies beyond our grasp.
Or Solopism- the doctrine that we have no proof that a world beyond our own experience even exists.
All systems of thought entail at least one axiomatic principle that must be accepted and can not be proven- incompleteness theorems.

Whiteheads reflections on philosophical method

"Philosophy has been misled by mathematics into thinking its method should be that of deduction from axiomatic certainties"

"There are no precisely stated axiomatic certainties from which to start. There is not even the language in which to frame them"

"the pathetic desire of mankind to find themselves starting from an intellectual basis which is clear, distinct and certain"

"The doctrine that science starts from clear and distinct elements of experience and that it is developed by a clear and distinct process of elaboration dies hard"

Speculative philosophies start from a "working hypothesis" and reject "dogmatic methods". Philosophy does not have to begin with an idea whose truth is certain.

The intractable problems of modern philosophy stem from many causes but the "quest for certainty" and the "need for certain premises" are high among them. These notions have stifled the innovative, imaginative speculative types of thinking that will be necessary to break the dualism which the materialist and sense perception assumptions of modernism have resulted in.

The intractable problems of modern philosophy stem from many causes but the "quest for certainty" and the "need for certain premises" are high among them. These notions have stifled the innovative, imaginative speculative types of thinking that will be necessary to break the dualism which the materialist and sense perception assumptions of modernism have resulted in.

On the whole modernism is not an appeal to reason but an anti-intellectualist movement and a limiting of contemplation to brute fact (empiricism) and sense perceptions.

Yes, I agree. Certainty is given much more value in modern times. Mostly this has to do with scientific/technology developments in the area of warfare. Countries with superior scientific/technology armaments can build wealth very quickly. This China's incredible amount of focus on technology. They know that they need weaponry.

The problem arises when certainty starts bleeding into areas of grand uncertainty such as the human condition or financial instruments. When scientists, start pretending that they have certainty in these areas for example (one only has to follow the money), then there are lots of unpredictable consequences. Things get very messy.

So I agree, many professions, including philosophy, have decided that in order to be successful, they must mimic the scientific paradigm of exuding certainty. People, it seems, do not want to hear the word maybe anymore.

Rich

1. The quest for certainty is fruitless

Rich

As one moves away from the physics, the value of science as a predictive method diminishes.

I hope you are right but I do not think this has become the dominant mode of thinking and if it has; it would represent a significant shift from the machine view of the universe of Newtonian mechanics and Laplace type determinism of the early modernist period.

I would agree with the pragmatic definition of knowledge as opposed to a "quest for certainty" or "indisputable premises". This would basically support the argument I am making about the respectability and utility of rational speculation.

Pierce, James, Bergson, Whitehead and Hartshorne are considered the primary founders of what is now termed "constructive postmodern philosophy" which is a form of speculative philosophy. Postmodern philosophy directly challenges materialism, and determinism.

It depends on what one means by speculation. I tried hard to imply that philosophical speculation was a rational process which took into account empirical information but was not limited by it. The emphasis was on those speculations which were rational as opposed to those which could be empirically or scientifically demonstrated. For instance the inability of science to determine the extent and type of "experience or mentality" present in non human species (other humans, higher animals, lower animals, plants, etc).
Strawson "What is it like to be a bat".

For instance:
1. the notion of process philosophy that events or "occasions of experience" in relation are primary reality not substances with attributes.
2. Panexperientialism- the notion that experience, perception or prehension is widely present even pervasive in nature not limited to man.

These both are postmodern philosophical speculations which are present in Pierce and which challenge materialism and the sensory perception theory of knowledge (two pillars of modernism) respectively.

You are also putting ideas in my mind so overall it is a plus.


I do not think any pre modern philosophers thought so but I think logical positivism, linguistic analysis and analytic philosopher (although making some important contributions and insights) overall have led philosophy away from its traditional task of providing more expansive insights into the nature of reality and human experience.

As one moves away from the physics, the value of science as a predictive method diminishes. In any field that involves living organisms predictive accuracy markedly diminishes. I would attribute this to the increasing degree of freedom which is present but I am not a determinist. In fact I think all physical laws are stochastic not determinative. To call economics, sociology, psychology sciences is to utilized entirely different methods and paradigms than those utilized in particle physics. The task of philosophy would be to seek unifying principle behind all these aspects of experience not to compartmentalize and fragment experience.

The power of science in dealing with the objective material aspects of "reality" has led to efforts to duplicate this success in virtually every field.

It has led to the assumption (even hope) that every experience ultimately has an entirely material explanation.

It has led to the denigration of any notion of "mental or spiritual" except as an epiphenomena or emergent property of insensate inert matter.

It has led to the notion that "freedom", "moral responsibility", and "mental agency" are illusions in direct conflict with universal human experience, pragmatic assumptions, presuppositions of practice, "hard core common sense" or "commonsensism (Pierce) daily employed and acted upon in the process of living.

How does life and mind emerge from a universe composed of completely inert and insensate primary particles? Should not we question these materialist and deterministic assumptions?

Is it not rational to question materialism, mechanism, determinism, reductionism, dualism, scientism and other modernist assumptions?

Does not rational philosophical speculation have a potentially important contribution to make here in overcoming the mind body problem and other intractable problems of science?
Should philosophy be conducted according to the rules of science and empiricism?
Have not ideas in speculative philosophy often laid the groundwork for breakthroughs in science and other fields of human endeavor and thought?

I hope you are right. Over in the Dawkins forum (where I was posting before here) they are practically all mechanistic determinists (materialists) of one sort or another. That world view is most common among atheists. So basically in your view all science is tentative, contingent, subject to change and speculative?


Are there varying degrees of certainty? Can we be pretty sure the world is more round, than square or flat?
Would you consider materialism or determinism to be a speculative philosophy?
A scientific speculation needs to be based on evidence and observation or falsifiability?
Should philosophical speculations have the same requirements? If not what are the criteria for a philosophical theory or proposal if any?



Yes, of course. Thank you. Should teach me not to rely on memory. The point being that interior experience (subjective experience) is not available to the scientific method and discussion about it is always speculation most often by analogy and reason not by measurement.

We ought to distinguish between subjective or psychological certainty, and what philosophers mean. Subjective or psychological certainty is just a feeling of strong confidence in a particular proposition. Some people are subjectively certain that there is a God, and some are just as subjectively certain that there is no God. Subjective certainty has no truth-import. One can be certain in the subjective sense, but be wrong, as either the theist or atheist (one of them) must be. Subjective certainty, of course, comes in degrees of more or less. But philosophers have in mind objective certainty. They mean by that, infallibility, or the impossibility of error. Thus, objective certainty does have truth-import. In that sense, one cannot be certain and wrong. Objective certainty implies truth.

When I pick up my cup of coffee and drink, I'm demonstrating confidence that it won't suddenly change into acetone on the way down my esophagus. If I took seriously the possibility of error, I would set the coffee down.

You could see philosophy as struggling to find some working scenario to explain my certainty.

This attitude would make philosophy kin to science in approach...

I don't think so. To explain your subjective feeling of certainty, we would need psychology, since we are talking about feelings.

Philosophical certainty, of the kind Descartes, Russell, and others talk about is not a feeling (of confidence). It concerns infallibility, and the impossibility of error, as I tried to explain in the post you are responding to. We can feel very confident and still be mistaken. But we cannot be philosophically certain, and be mistaken.

Russell and Whitehead tried to reduce mathematics to logic in the Principia Mathematica. They failed. Subsequently the failure was not one of intellect but of the fact that it is not possible to create infalliable self contained systems of thought. All such system depend upon one or more axioms which are simply stated or postulated. This is related I think to the incompleteness theorems of Goedel, the liars paradox and other logical paradoxes.

The quest for philosophical certainty which led to the enthusiasm for logical positivism, language analysis and subsequently to analytic philosophy attempted to reduce philosophy to logic. In the process it moved philosophy away from its traditional task of considering ultimate questions to a subdivision of logic and or science.

Science used to be a subdivision of philosophy know as the natural philosophy. The "quest for certainty" so restricts what questions can be asked and what questions can be answered as to render philosophy incapable of dealing with the larger questions of existence, meaning, value and life. I used the term "speculative philosophy" precisely to indicate that one can take into account what is known and use reason to speculate about the larger questions. There is no need for certainty and in fact certainty is not available to us about ultimate questions of meaning. Speculative philosophy is a rational enterprise but it does not attempt and does not claim to result in infallible answers to ultimate questions. It is traditional philosophy resurrected.

It may be just because these questions of ultimate meaning had no answer because they were so vague and nebulous, that philosophers discarded them, and turned to issue that did make sense, and could be answered. That was not a quest for certainty, which was discarded with the rise of science, and the realization that scientific knowledge was fallible knowledge since it depended on inductive, and not deductive inference. This realization that knowledge is fallible, and not infallible, was first discussed, and argued, by C. S. Peirce, the founder of American pragmatism. In my view, though, what you call speculative philosophy is closer to science fiction, than it is to what philosophers do nowadays; at least in the Englishspeaking areas of the world, and those areas influenced by them.

I love Pierce and the other pragmatists as well (James,Dewey) but they are not analytic philosophers. James and Pierce especially are regarded as among the founders of constructive postmodernism.