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Barmar
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As in many disciplines, there's a significant difference between solving the practical, day-to-day problems we encounter, and studying the theory of that discipline in critical detail.

For instance, the average computer programmer doesn't need to know much about information theory or Turing machines. I have been a professional programmer for over 4 decades, and I can't convert a regular expression into a finite state automaton. But if you go over to Theoretical Computer Science SE these are the kinds of things they talk about.

Or if you want to manage your finances, you should understand budgeting and how compound interest works, and you might want to work with a financial planner, but neither you nor the FP need to have much expertise in micro- or macro-economics.

The same thing applies to philosophy. For most practical purposes, intuition works fine for understanding what people are thinking and making ethical decisions -- our minds and societies have evolved to do this naturally. But academics aren't interested in just solving these mundane problems, they want to understand the underlying details, like a physicist who wants to know how the interplay between subatomic particles leads to the macroscopic properties that we see.

And as in all these other areas, that generally makes things more complicated. The Trolley Problem doesn't come up often in real life, but studying it can lead to insights that can be helpful in other situations.

If you want to discuss practical issues that are somewhat philosophical, you can find them in Interpersonal Skills SE. There you'll find simple answers like "Apply the Golden Rule: be nice to someone, and expect them to be nice in return." But don't expect such simplicity here, where philosophers can debate endlessly what "be nice" really means.

As in many disciplines, there's a significant difference between solving the practical, day-to-day problems we encounter, and studying the theory of that discipline in critical detail.

For instance, the average computer programmer doesn't need to know much about information theory or Turing machines. I have been a professional programmer for over 4 decades, and I can't convert a regular expression into a finite state automaton. But if you go over to Theoretical Computer Science SE these are the kinds of things they talk about.

Or if you want to manage your finances, you should understand budgeting and how compound interest works, and you might want to work with a financial planner, but neither you nor the FP need to have much expertise in micro- or macro-economics.

The same thing applies to philosophy. For most practical purposes, intuition works fine for understanding what people are thinking and making ethical decisions -- our minds and societies have evolved to do this naturally. But academics aren't interested in just solving these mundane problems, they want to understand the underlying details, like a physicist who wants to know how the interplay between subatomic particles leads to the macroscopic properties that we see.

And as in all these other areas, that generally makes things more complicated. The Trolley Problem doesn't come up often in real life, but studying it can lead to insights that can be helpful in other situations.

As in many disciplines, there's a significant difference between solving the practical, day-to-day problems we encounter, and studying the theory of that discipline in critical detail.

For instance, the average computer programmer doesn't need to know much about information theory or Turing machines. I have been a professional programmer for over 4 decades, and I can't convert a regular expression into a finite state automaton. But if you go over to Theoretical Computer Science SE these are the kinds of things they talk about.

Or if you want to manage your finances, you should understand budgeting and how compound interest works, and you might want to work with a financial planner, but neither you nor the FP need to have much expertise in micro- or macro-economics.

The same thing applies to philosophy. For most practical purposes, intuition works fine for understanding what people are thinking and making ethical decisions -- our minds and societies have evolved to do this naturally. But academics aren't interested in just solving these mundane problems, they want to understand the underlying details, like a physicist who wants to know how the interplay between subatomic particles leads to the macroscopic properties that we see.

And as in all these other areas, that generally makes things more complicated. The Trolley Problem doesn't come up often in real life, but studying it can lead to insights that can be helpful in other situations.

If you want to discuss practical issues that are somewhat philosophical, you can find them in Interpersonal Skills SE. There you'll find simple answers like "Apply the Golden Rule: be nice to someone, and expect them to be nice in return." But don't expect such simplicity here, where philosophers can debate endlessly what "be nice" really means.

Source Link
Barmar
  • 1.9k
  • 8
  • 13

As in many disciplines, there's a significant difference between solving the practical, day-to-day problems we encounter, and studying the theory of that discipline in critical detail.

For instance, the average computer programmer doesn't need to know much about information theory or Turing machines. I have been a professional programmer for over 4 decades, and I can't convert a regular expression into a finite state automaton. But if you go over to Theoretical Computer Science SE these are the kinds of things they talk about.

Or if you want to manage your finances, you should understand budgeting and how compound interest works, and you might want to work with a financial planner, but neither you nor the FP need to have much expertise in micro- or macro-economics.

The same thing applies to philosophy. For most practical purposes, intuition works fine for understanding what people are thinking and making ethical decisions -- our minds and societies have evolved to do this naturally. But academics aren't interested in just solving these mundane problems, they want to understand the underlying details, like a physicist who wants to know how the interplay between subatomic particles leads to the macroscopic properties that we see.

And as in all these other areas, that generally makes things more complicated. The Trolley Problem doesn't come up often in real life, but studying it can lead to insights that can be helpful in other situations.