[extropy-chat] Science, religon and philosophy as apprended by Russell

[Brett Paatsch]

I think this quote from the Introduction in Bertrand Russell's
HISTRORY OF WESTERN PHILOSOPHY may provide
some additional handles and context for some current 
discussions.  

----

"  'Philosophy' is a word which has been used in many ways,
some wider, some narrower, I propose to use it in a very wide
sense, which I will now try to explain.

Philosophy, as I shall understand the word, is something
intermediate between theology and science. Like theology, it 
consists of speculations on matters as to which definite
knowledge has, so far, been unascertainable; but like science,
it appeals to human reason rather than to authority, whether 
that of tradition or that of revelation. All *definite* knowledge
- so I should content - belongs to science; all *dogma* as to
what surpasses definite knowledge belongs to theology. But
between theology and science there is a No Man's Land, 
exposed to attack form both sides; this No Man's Land is
philosophy. 

                  Almost all the questions of most interest to 
speculative minds are such as science cannot answer, and
the confident answers of theologians no longer seem so 
convincing as they did in former centuries.

(1) Is the world divided into mind and matter, and if so, what
is mind and what is matter? (2) Is mind subject to matter, or
is it possessed of independent powers? (3) Has the universe 
any unity or purpose? (4) Is it evolving toward some goal? 
(5) Are there really laws of nature, or do we believe in them
only because of our innate love of order? (6) Is man what
he seems to the astronomer, a tiny lump of impure carbon
and water impotently crawling on a small and unimportant 
planet? (7) Or is he what he appears to Hamlet? (8) Is he
perhaps both at once? (9) Is there a way of living that is 
noble and another that is base, or are all ways of living
merely futile? (10) If there is a way of living that is noble,
in what does it consist, and how shall we achieve it?
(11) Must the good be eternal in order to deserve to be
valued, or is it worth seeking even if the universe is 
inexorably moving towards death? (12) Is there such a
thing as wisdom, or is what seems such merely the ultimate 
refinement of folly? 

                             To such questions no answer can be
found in the laboratory....[t]he studying of these questions,
if not the answering of them, is the business of philosophy.

------

Brett 

(Shucks I put in the numbered brackets myself ;-) but
seriously I reckon I could answer a good few of those
questions pretty well by now, but would my answers
find resonance with others answers - that would be
interesting.)

Key point ?- Philosophy, as the term is used above, not
science, is the 'main game' even for scientists.