Robin:

Hello, Agnes. Hello, Arnold.

Arnold:

Hi, Robin.

Agnes:

Hi, Robin. Um, so today we're gonna talk about a question that is the most common question that I get, um, for a request for advice. Uh, uh, I get this request, I would say, um, you know, maybe at least 10 times a year. Uh, and it is from somebody who, um... Let's pick this form of it. Um, uh, the more popular form is, "I- I'm an undergraduate. I'm about to graduate. I majored in philosophy, but, um, what comes next? That is, how do I somehow keep this philosophy thing in my life after I graduate? I really enjoyed it. It, you know, uh... I was passionate about it. I learned a lot, um, but I don't quite wanna go to graduate school. Um, that is, that's not the direction I want my life to take. Uh, that seems like too much of a commitment to philosophy, um, and also for various reasons, I have other career ideas for myself. But I also don't just wanna, like, forget about philosophy forever, and just set it aside in favor of the rest of my life. What do I do? How do I preserve the philosophical education that I've had?" I'll add, just as an addendum, that I also get a version of this question from people who maybe they did or maybe they didn't major in philosophy, but they're older, and they're just like: "I want more philosophy in my life. Um, what do I do?" Uh, okay. Arnold, uh, Arnold- so Arnold and I- um, Arnold also recently got this question from a student, and he was very unsatisfied with my answers to this question. Uh, and so now we're gonna explore... Arnold prop- is gonna propose a candidate answer, and, uh, and, and then I want to have you evaluate it, and maybe you have different answers. Okay, Arnold, candidate answer.

Arnold:

Yeah, so, uh, uh, let me lay down a few constraints on the problem so as to give my answer a little more, um, bite maybe. And, and in general, one might say that, um, um, the- this is in, in some sense a question, like, what, what does a, a, a, a liberal education or, um, um, uh, some time spent in school developing sort of an intellectual life, um, w- what's supposed to be the way that that shows up in, uh, one's life? Um, so the, uh, uh... Obviously, there's the answer, go to grad school and become an academic. That, that isn't suited to very many people. Uh, uh, uh, e- even a tiny fraction of the people who believe that they want that. And, um, uh, so we've often... I think Agnes and I have both often suggested to students that they do things like set up reading groups with their friends, um, find other sort of people who are also interested in talking about philosophy, and talk, talk to them about it, to keep reading philosophy, um, and maybe to write philosophy. Uh, uh, uh, but these answers are unsatisfying because they, uh, don't say what you're doing, they just say how you're doing it. Um, they don't say what, like, why are you supposed to be talking to your friends? What would make that count as a success or a failure, um-

Agnes:

What are you trying to achieve-

Arnold:

Right

Agnes:

... in a reading group?

Arnold:

Right. Um, uh, and it, you know, it's not like this is supposed to produce some kind of saleable product. It's, it's more that, um, there needs to be something holding this activity together as a, you know, now that the degree is, is one.

Agnes:

So you can tell whether you're doing it well or badly, for example.

Arnold:

Right. And so, um, the best idea I've come up with, uh, in the last few days that I've been thinking about this in earnest, um, is that a person who wants to keep philosophy in their life or, or, you know, continue to be, in some sense, a philosopher, despite m- moving on from the degree and not going to grad school, um- and, and maybe this is actually also good advice for anybody who wants to go to grad school, is that what they should do is come up with a coherent set of ideas about how to live and, um, how the world works and, uh, what their place in it is. And, uh, they should probably write those ideas down, because it's gonna be a lot easier to keep track of them and examine them if they write them down. Um, and that they should see their philosophical education as aiming at the production of this set of ideas, and then they should try to live out those ideas in such a way that if, uh, somebody read their autobiography, or sorry, their, their, their biography in a hundred years, and no mention was made of these ideas, they'd be able to sort of roughly, um, predict them. Um, and, uh, uh, so, uh, you know, where, where, where the thought is that what a philosophy education is supposed to be training you to do is produce and then live according to a conception of how to live and, um, how to interact with the world and how to deal with it. Uh, uh, uh, and, um, the, you know, m- maybe even it would be useful to tell philosophy students this from the beginning, so that they could pick their courses not willy-nilly, but according to what they think will help them do this. Um, and we wanted to know what you thought of this. Uh, uh, uh, uh, I don't mean to, to, to flatter you, but it occurred to me that you were, uh, actually maybe a particularly good example of a person who, um, has a kind of coherent system of ideas and then tries to live according to that. Um, though, um-

Robin:

Right

Arnold:

... you, you do so in such a way that makes you quite unusual, but-

Robin:

I'm weird. Okay, yes. We, we can just say it.

Agnes:

... yeah. So, so, uh, uh, uh, yeah, you seem like a good person to, to run this idea by.

Robin:

It's, it's- so it's a good question, it's a good topic, and it's something that, you know, certainly I think should be discussed more by other academics and students more generally. Uh, I'm- you know, I might rephrase it in a way that isn't just philosophy. I might say, all students could plausibly say, "I've liked school. How could I continue something like this after school?" It wouldn't have to be specific to philosophy-

Agnes:

Mm-hmm

Robin:

... but maybe there's a different answer for philosophy. And school presents itself as something you should enjoy or, you know, be engaged by, so it's something of a failing of school that it doesn't already have an answer for this.

Agnes:

Yeah.

Robin:

It shouldn't be our job to come up with it. The entire institution is set up to be inviting people into the world of school for a few years, and then it should expect that some people might like that and it should have its standard answer for what, what you could do if you wanted to continue, other than going to grad school. That, that just seems like something all of academia should have set up as a standard, uh, question and answer. So... And we, we shouldn't wait till they ask us, we should take the initiative to say, "Okay, you guys, you're graduating now. Here are- here's our standard answers about what you might wanna do if you wanna continue this." And of course, that would benefit us in the sense that some of that might be complementary to the things we're doing. That is, you know, we like people to come to grad school, but even if they don't come to grad school, they could be doing things that are complementary to and supporting the rest of what we're doing f- from full-time people. So this is just maybe the relationship between amateurs and professionals.

Agnes:

Mm-hmm.

Robin:

In many fields, you can find a productive way to inspire amateurs that will help professionals, and that both of them together can be pursuing some shared, you know, venture.

Agnes:

Mm-hmm.

Robin:

Um, so, uh, you, you're proposing a thing specific for philosophy, which could work for philosophy, but it isn't what philosophy is set up to do now. So as you say, you might need to change how philosophy is done now if this is going to be the continuation, 'cause it's not actually the continuation of what they're doing now. The simpler answer would be to find a way to let them continue what they're doing now as an undergraduate in philosophy, uh, i- farther on outside. Uh, but that, you know, it does raise the question of, what is it that they are most essentially doing-

Agnes:

Mm-hmm

Robin:

... that they would be motivated to continue, that they would enjoy continuing? Uh, and presumably, what we're trying to do is not pre- at least pretend that the whole point of this wasn't just to get a degree and get a job.

Agnes:

Right.

Robin:

Right? That's one of the cynical answers here, is the reason we aren't doing this, and we don't do it, is everybody kinda knows, well, the whole point is just to graduate and get a job, and after that, once you get the job, you can pretend you cared about anything here. You can stop pretending.

Agnes:

Mm-hmm.

Robin:

Right.

Agnes:

Right.

Robin:

But those of us who, you know, went on to grad school or whatever, we, we, we think we're not just pretending, that there's something valuable here that we enjoy and that we wanna continue with. And so yes, there should be a story of what that would be. Um, but I'm, I'm, I'm more tempted to think of minimal variations that could satisfy these constraints, as opposed to maybe most ambitious or most inspiring versions. I might just say-

Agnes:

Mm

Robin:

... well, let's look at what people actually do in school, that they actually enjoy and motivates them, and find a way for that to continue in a, you know, feasible way in the rest of their lives. And if there are other more ambitious versions you can layer on to that, great, but I wouldn't start with that. Like, having a whole life philosophy seems to me something that most, even grad students or professors don't have.

Agnes:

Yeah.

Robin:

Certainly, most philosophy undergraduates don't have it, so making that the standard of what you should try to do once you've left school and now you have all sorts of other distractions, seems like a pretty high bar that's just gonna lead to disappointment, 'cause most of them aren't gonna have the time or energy to do it. Uh, but if, if, if you wanted to say, what was... You know, what's the most obvious thing that... Look, if they're saying, "I've enjoyed this, I wanna continue," the, the place to start is, "Well, what about this have you enjoyed? What about this has motivated you and engaged you that you would wanna continue?" Seems to me the most obvious candidate there is to just continue to explore areas and learn more about them. You know, I mean, there, there'd be two kinds of things. One is just to learn, the other is to contribute, so that, that would be the two main distinctions in academia.

Agnes:

Mm.

Robin:

Many people just wanna continue to, to read and learn after they... And you know, for most undergraduates, they didn't actually contribute, they were mostly learning, and that would be a fine thing from them. They could have reading groups or write their own essays or whatever. I don't think it's that hard of a problem to imagine them grading them with each other or having some outside source that could grade essays they wrote, test them on things. If they wanted to do that, that would certainly be feasible. I don't know how much they want, but that would be feasible, if that's what actually is engaging them now. Um-

Agnes:

Mm-hmm. So you're making me realize that there's something behind this question, um, which is- which says something like, "I've enjoyed this, and I think it's good for me, and I want to continue it, but I don't think that I'm sufficiently motivated to do it on my own." That is, the, the kind of added incentives provided by the credential and the classroom and whatever, were important to me. And so it's not the fully cynical reading, which says all they ever wanted was the credential, but it's also not the fully idealistic reading, which is just to say, "Oh, they love learning for learning's sake." In effect, if that were true, they wouldn't be coming to you with this question. They could, you know, just, um, like, like, think about philosophical ideas or read books or whatever, right? Um, um, it seems like there's a lot of different possibilities for how to do this if you are independently motivated. Um, so I think one issue is that they are... And that's why I've proposed, like, the group- the reading group, because I think people can keep each other motivated. They want a community-... to do this together. That's, a- a- and, and, and just they have a problem with motivation. And the other issue is they want it to f- and these are related, they want to feel like it's going somewhere. Um, so it's like just learning more, um, um, feels, um, kind of v- um, fuzzy in terms of what it is that you're doing and whether you're succeeding or failing. Um, and, um, they want to be moving towards something that will be the culmination of it. I don't think that necessarily has to be a matter of contributing to scholarly literature, but that is an easy, you know, um, answer to that, but it- it's not gonna work for most people. Um, I will note that undergraduates these days, more and more, are demanding... Or not demanding, that's too strong a word, but they- they're asking to, um, be part of research. E- every week, I get a request from an undergraduate saying something like... I literally got one this week: "My roommate is, like, participating in, you know, bi- bio research, 'cause she's, like, helping out at some lab or whatever, and I- I'm jealous. I'm a philosophy major. I want to participate in philosophy research. How can I be, like, a research assistant to a philosopher?" And so they want to be contributing in that way. Um, it's a kind of a, um, uh... Unfortunately, that's not a thing in philosophy. There's not really a thing you can do-

Robin:

It's very hard to figure out how to-

Agnes:

To-

Arnold:

Right.

Agnes:

It's hard to figure out how to make use of a person in that way. Um, but so, so these are the- actually, already the, the students, while they are students, have this idea of contributing, that doesn't really map onto the way philosophy works. Okay.

Robin:

But, but few of them actually do much research as undergraduates. So if there, if there's this thing they hope to continue, and they're afraid of losing it, it isn't research-

Agnes:

Right

Robin:

... 'cause they're not doing that.

Agnes:

So they would like to do the research, but yes-

Robin:

Right

Agnes:

... you're right that-

Robin:

Okay.

Agnes:

Yeah.

Robin:

But, but if the thing is learning that they've been doing, and that, and that's the most obvious thing they would continue to enjoy doing if they were to continue it, 'cause that's what they've mainly been doing, right? They- if they say, "I've been enjoying this, I'm mean- this is meaningful, I wanna continue," that's the thing they are saying they have found valuable and meaningful. So i- I think it would be more... So, like, my wife does OLLI, where these are sort of retirement classes. So there's whole schools where retirees go take classes. And they sit in classes, and they talk, they read things together, but the main thing they don't do is assignments and grading. But apparently, that is the form that actually happens in the world. So that might suggest that even new undergraduates might like that format, too, uh, where they read things together and get guidance in the discussion, but don't produce something or get graded. Um, I mean, I don't... I mean, it's about what, in fact, is most motivating and engaging and interesting about the classes they've had that they wanna continue, and apparently, that, that format suggests the grading, the assignments and grading are not the thing they most wanna do.

Agnes:

Though i- is it that they have the option of, uh, the assignment and grading classes, and they just choose not to take those, or is it that nobody has tried? Maybe they would like... Maybe your wife would like it even better if there was one with assignments and grading, but that's just not on offer because the people that they can get to teach these things don't wanna do that much work.

Robin:

I, I think this is reflecting some market demand here. I don't think this is just an arbitrary thing. This- you know, they, they've had these classes for many years on a wide range of contexts, so there's something to learn here. But it might be that undergraduates just have a different stance toward this than retirees-

Agnes:

Mm-hmm.

Robin:

... and they would be willing and interested to do more. Um, so I mean, the simplest thing is just they continue a class, but that's time-consuming, I guess. A- as you say, if they got together as a reading group... Uh, so I remember, as I was a early young professional out of school, I very much enjoyed reading groups, where we would get together and read a somewhat academic book and discuss it together, and that was a way that many sort of people with intellectual ambitions and inclinations, who weren't in school but enjoyed it, could, um, continue to be intellectual.

Arnold:

Yeah, I mean, I guess, I guess, to pick up on Agnes' sort of second question from a minute ago, um, I, I think part of what I'm worried about is, uh, uh, the question, like, what is it that's giving structure to this activity? Um, because I think that the, um, um... w- they can continue... So, so, you know, I, w- when I, when I was trying to lay this problem out, I said, one of the constraints on the problem is not just to provide them with an activity that, you know, that they enjoyed from their undergraduate days, but to give them something like a, um, uh, uh, uh, something that, that, that would structure their time, right? So something that, uh, uh, is something like the direction that this activity is supposed to be guided by. Um, and then, uh, uh, the, the slightly strange suggestion that I came up with, I think, is th- that, one, come up with something like a coherent conception of, you know, d- your life and, um, what you're supposed to do, and how you're supposed to relate to the world, and what's going on in the world, um, is just that... I think ostensibly, that is what philosophy is supposed to actually produce. That is, it's supposed to produce people who live according to an idea, rather than-

Robin:

But that's not what you're actually producing.

Arnold:

Yeah. That's true. Um-

Robin:

Neither as professionals, nor as undergraduates, nor as grad students, none of you are producing that, so that just, uh-

Arnold:

Well-

Robin:

... seems a non-starter as the thing they should be trying to do-... to continue what they've enjoyed.

Arnold:

I, I, I think if you look at philosophy research, um, um, and then ask, "What is this all driving towards?" I think plausibly it is driving towards something like, um, um, the set of ideas that people could live by. And then, uh, it's, it's mostly driven by, you know, I've published this paper, and you've got some critique of it, and so you're gonna publish your- another paper, and then I wanna object to your critique, and so I'm gonna publish another paper, and stuff like that. But then i- if we sort of ask, like, what is it that all of this research is supposed to be adding up to in the way that physics research is supposed to be adding up to eventually a coherent and correct conception of nature? Um, it would be something like this. It would be a coherent, and, um, correct, and widely distributable conception of, uh, how a human being should live and what their place in the universe is.

Robin:

Let me propose a generality that encompasses this and the two examples you gave.

Arnold:

Yeah.

Robin:

You say, "Physicists should have a conception of nature. Philosophers should have a, you know, guide to life." But on reflection of what happened to me at that stage of life and what I've seen other people do, I see two main activities. Um, one is that people like to get together, reading a book and discussing it, because they want to form an opinion on the topic of the book, say, and that's the thing that motivates them to suggest a book, and to read it, and then to remember it. A part of what-

Arnold:

Mm-hmm

Robin:

... their life experience is, is to have slowly accumulate more opinions on big, important topics by having read books that take opinions on- take stances on those topics, and they either are for or against it. And then those opinions could be for a great many purposes but that's a shared thing that happens at- across a wide range of people at that stage in their life, is they want to read and discuss things in order to form their own opinion on the question. So those could be about how to live your life or about the nature- structure of nature, and, you know, various purposes can be encompassed through that particular activity. And then the other activity I see that's related is, when they are motivated enough by thinking about things and forming their opinion, they want to write down their opinion, and they write blog posts or essays and things like that, and that's the- that, that fewer people do that, but that seems to me the obvious next step. And then some of those people decide to go back to school, grad school, or to write a blog, and, and have many opinions. But-

Arnold:

Mm-hmm

Robin:

... that, that seems to me the thing that motivates people, is to have a quest- a topic that's, you know, where different opinions are possible. And then what they do repeatedly is read or discuss the topic, form an opinion, then debate that opinion with other people. But the things they've accumulated over time are their opinions on those topics, and then they may well write more and, and enter the world of intellectuals by writing those opinions. But I think it's not so much they just want to join the world of intellectuals, it's more o- more often, in my view, that they have so many opinions, and they're so eager to get those opinions engaged and become part of the world that, you know, generates and manages those opinions, that that's why they want to come join. They want to be part of the world that generates and, eh, evaluates, and those opinions. That- that's what I remember, and the people around me, but maybe that's just me.

Arnold:

Mm.

Robin:

You can tell me that somebody else is different.

Agnes:

I think that, um, they... When they say, "What do I do next?" They don't just mean, um, "How do I keep doing the exact thing I've been doing in college?" They mean, "What comes next? Like, what- what's the next step? How do I level up?" But not grad school. Um, so I, I guess I think that they wouldn't really be satisfied if you were like, "Oh, you could just take evening classes on Kant or whatever." They're like, "No, I've done that. Um, I wanna know, like, I'm, I'm really interested in this philosophy thing. I'm- you know, I've done, like, I've done my four years, I've gotten this education. What comes next? What's the next step?" And that's partly why the reading group thing is a bit unsatisfying because it sounds a little bit too much like, um, just keep to... How to keep doing what you were doing before. Um, and where- and the thing you're now proposing, which is like, well, maybe you would form these opinions and then write them, that would at least satisfy this, uh, this concern about, if there's supposed to be something that comes next. But I also think that maybe a difference, where people who are interested in philosophy, and this isn't all, but it's maybe half. Um, it's not that there is some topic, and they would like to form an opinion on the topic, and so they find a book that says something on that topic, and they're gonna decide whether they agree or disagree with the book. It's like, "I really wanna know how Heidegger thinks. I really wanna get Kant. I really wanna be able to think like Kierkegaard." Um, that is, there are these great thinkers in the history of time that are somewhat mysterious and opaque, and they wanna kind of work their way into those minds, and that's a big part of their motivation, and it's not just like, "I wanna figure out whether Heidegger was right or wrong." That question pretty much doesn't arise. It's pretty much irrelevant to the study of Heidegger.

Robin:

But the people in your world, who are the people that otherwise go to, as those people really get Heidegger, the way they achieve that and demonstrate is by writing essays on Heidegger, right? Essays about particular-

Agnes:

Not on whether he's right or wrong.

Robin:

No, but about particular aspects of Heidegger's thoughts.

Agnes:

Yeah.

Robin:

They- they... Those essays will have a thesis. They will disagree with other theses. That's what I mean by having an opinion. So the, the idea of generating an opinion and, and then writing to defend it, fits into the framework of wanting to really understand Heidegger. It's just a different set of opinions, isn't it?

Agnes:

... Right, so I, I'm actually kind of, Arnold gave an answer, and then you're like, "No, no, that's a terrible answer because it's too different from what they were doing."

Robin:

That's terrible.

Agnes:

And then, I'm just translating from Robin-ese- -to normal-ese. And then, uh, and then you propose this thing, which is basically Arnold's answer again, um, as far as I can tell. Namely, what Arnold said is, um, you know, use philosophy to produce a bunch of opinions. Now, uh, the way I would paraphrase it is a manifesto, okay? He was saying, "Get- write a manifesto." Um, uh, the, the difference maybe with what you're saying is, you weren't putting a constraint on the set of opinions, namely, that they all fit together. Um, but clearly that's desirable, right? As a, as a bonus. That'd be a nice bonus if the opinions fit together. Um, but I think that y- your thought, which is produce a bunch of opinions, and Arnold's thought, which is produce a bunch of opinions that fit together, um, are not very far from each other. Kind of seems like you're just making his proposal, but in a slightly weaker version.

Robin:

But I meant to focus on this difference as, as a key obstacle. That is-

Agnes:

Mm

Robin:

... people who are going to make a manifesto of their views, uh, they often actually go wrong. That is, there's actually a bunch of different ways that amateur intellectuals go wrong. A- and one of them is to generate their own manifesto about physics and engineering, and all sorts of... economics, and all sorts of things. As opposed-

Agnes:

I, I am gonna say that I, I receive many manifestos-

Robin:

Mm-hmm,

Agnes:

-in email form, and not one has ever been of interest to me.

Arnold:

Yeah. So, so I, I, I get these, too. Um, my favorite is a long series of manifestos that I've been getting from this one guy, who a- as far as I can tell, essentially claims that all historical people are John the Baptist. Um, and-

Robin:

Okay

Arnold:

... that, that they're all one guy, and like-

Robin:

Right

Arnold:

... all the works of Plato and Aristotle, and all the works of, you know, whatever, Shakespeare even. And it, it's just... Uh, uh, but, uh, I guess, I guess the thing to say in defense of these manifesto writers is, um, they're doing very badly what in some sense I think people just ought to be doing, which is, um, um, coming up with, uh, a, a sense of how they should live their lives that's theirs. And that, that if philosophy has an end, how could it be anything but that? Um, and presumably, it, it's not just that we want people to write manifestos. People are terrible at that, as you, as you observe. Um, and the things that they say, especially when they start getting into things like physics, are just, um, wildly wrong, and probably an impediment to their learning anything about it.

Robin:

Right.

Arnold:

But it's like, but that's why we're supposed to educate them. I mean, it, it-

Robin:

But, but what, what does education consist of? Uh, I would say that a big central element of education that is the thing that makes people not go off on the manifesto failure mode is the idea that instead of thinking through some topic for yourself in many different details and finding an integrated version, you should look for minor modifications of what other people have said. That's the main thing education does.

Arnold:

Right.

Robin:

It makes you read what other people said, respond to what they've ever said, and maybe disagree, but only with minor modifications what other people said. It pul- pulls you into this shared knowledge that we have, and-

Arnold:

Yeah

Robin:

... to try to help build that up, rather than go construct your own separate things.

Arnold:

Yeah. So, so when I imagine the utopia in which everybody does this, makes- follows my suggestion, I don't imagine a bunch of people coming up with their own ethical theories. I imagine these manifestos often consisting of something like, "Look, here's my understanding of, say, Kant's deontological ethics, and, um, here are some contemporary debates about it, and they're worried about these issues, and, um, here's my take on it. Uh, and, uh, so I'm a Kantian with the following minorific, you know, modifications, um, in order to incorporate these critiques." And that, that what a well-educated manifesto would look like, I think, is largely, um, a modification of the best views that we've produced as a-

Robin:

Right

Arnold:

... community of intellectuals.

Robin:

But the way to get people to do that, to avoid the mistake mode, is to have them for a while not try to make a manifesto, but just slowly, you know, decide which of the opinions exist that, that they agree with, and then making minor modifications to those and defending them-

Arnold:

Yeah

Robin:

... and then only much later trying to make an integrated manifesto. It's just a mistake too early on to try to make manifestos.

Arnold:

Yeah, yeah.

Robin:

So telling them that you should right now, that you're out of college, go generate your own integrated theory of everything, is just a mistake.

Agnes:

Basically, what you're saying is, college, it's just, it's too... We, you know, we, we have elementary school, we have high school, we have college. What we really need is more education, maybe like eight more years- -after college before people go work. Um, because we, we don't wanna s- you know, set them off-

Arnold:

Yeah

Agnes:

... uh-

Arnold:

I, I guess I'm wondering maybe if, if what you're saying, effectively, is we just need to be doing a much better job educating people, such that they get... They're gonna be ready for their manifesto writing after four years. I mean, what, what, what excuse do we have for they get out of college, they get out of a four-year philosophy degree, and they're still not able to write a manifesto in a reasonable, intelligent, coherent way?

Robin:

Maybe they should spend their last year on failed attempts at manifestos, where you slap them every time they go wrong.

Arnold:

Yeah, yeah.

Robin:

'Cause you're not practicing.

Agnes:

Instead of the BA thesis.

Arnold:

Yeah, they have to do a manifesto, BA manifesto.

Robin:

Right.

Arnold:

Um-

Robin:

I mean, the, the idea would be to push them to be a little more general and to go a little farther away from what they have in their essays from their student essays, but to help m- help them manage the ways that can go terribly wrong. And the only way to do that is to have them try to be a little more general, a little farther away from what they've written, and then try to show them how, you know, how to do that.

Arnold:

Right.

Robin:

That is, there might not be a way-... just maybe student essays have just not been ambitious enough in college.

Arnold:

Right. Right.

Robin:

And they need to try to have more ambitious essays with larger topics and bigger claims and themes, but they need to do that under supervision so that they just don't do the manifesto thing, the, the-

Arnold:

Right

Robin:

... usual failed manifesto thing.

Arnold:

Right. It's, it's that students are encouraged to write essays about philosophy, even graduate students, even professors, most of the time, are encouraged to write essays about philosophy, but they're generally dissuaded and kept away from the practice of writing essays of philosophy. And I guess maybe my suggestion is something like, um, if we try to think about what students- how students should, you know, try to live a philosophical life after their degrees, you know, um, setting graduate school and stuff aside, um, that they should be engaging in philosophy and doing works of philosophy. We don't train them for that. We, we train them to write about it, but we don't train them to try to do it. We don't try to train them to try to-

Robin:

And you, you do train them to do it as grad students, to some extent.

Arnold:

Mostly, we train them to write essays about other essays. And I-

Robin:

Okay

Arnold:

... maybe that's not what we're talking about.

Robin:

But some grad students try to write philosophy, right? At, at least that's a point where if they tried to do it, you would be willing to help them, and that would be within-

Arnold:

Yeah, yeah

Robin:

... the scope of things they're allowed to do, right?

Arnold:

Yeah. But I'd, I'd say maybe, what, 20% at most of graduate students end up doing something like that.

Agnes:

I mean, I think that even if they did that, they would have to engage the literature, and that that's primarily what philosophical discourse is, is finding a sort of conversation where there's a bunch of people, and you're saying which ones you agree with and which ones you disagree with, and why. Most importantly, the second thing.

Robin:

Right. But so maybe the key thing is you should have some classes in undergraduate where they do that, where their job is-

Agnes:

But they are doing that, that is, in, in papers they are doing that.

Robin:

I-

Agnes:

Um-

Arnold:

Well, I, I think the problem is that they're not doing that with an eye to the significance for them of the manifesto.

Agnes:

Mm.

Arnold:

Right? It's just targets of opportunity, where- wherever you can make some kind of intellectual comment-

Agnes:

Right.

Robin:

Right

Arnold:

... you make the, make the comment. But it should be guided by this thought that, "This has to contribute in some way to my manifesto."

Agnes:

Mm.

Arnold:

I'm not even sure that human beings are supposed to write these even by the-

Robin:

Do not... Just do not use the word manifesto in whatever you actually expect them to do. But I think the idea might be, okay, like independent reading or something. Instead of, "Here's a class with a syllabus and assignments, and you should do it," like you say, "Okay, you should now pick your own question-

Arnold:

Yeah

Robin:

... it's something you care about."

Agnes:

That's the BA thesis.

Arnold:

Yeah.

Agnes:

Um-

Robin:

But, but they should maybe not just one, maybe they should be writing many small BA thesis-like essays earlier in the process. They should, you know, have classes where they start... The po- point is not to have write a commentary on the reading you gave them, but more fundamentally, to just take a position on an interesting question, and-

Arnold:

Right

Robin:

... help them practice that.

Arnold:

So, so maybe something like an, what, extradition to ethics, where they write, like, the final paper is, um, come up with a correct ethical theory, and they have to do their best to modify some existing-

Robin:

Well, that, that's again, I would think that's too much. Just make a, an ethical claim that you think is interesting and valuable, and defend it. But it sh- doesn't have to be, you know, responding to a very particular thing you read by somebody else. It could be, but to say, "You know, what do you think is interesting and important? Think about it, make a claim, defend it." And let them, in a supervised context, learn how to do that.

Arnold:

Mm-hmm.

Robin:

Don't call it a manifesto, and don't make them think it should be-

Arnold:

Right

Robin:

... a big question that integrates lots of things.

Arnold:

Right.

Robin:

Initially, think, you know, a small question, like, "Should I go to a wedding when I think I don't like the purple?" or something, right? Just some practice, maybe a, an concrete question in their lives around them.

Arnold:

Yeah. Though, something that I'd want them to have some experience with is trying to, um, uh, uh, uh, build a theory that is a, a, you know, so-

Robin:

The theory maybe would integrate many pieces. First, just make them argue for the pieces, and then when they have a couple of pieces, then you could say, "Maybe it's now time to try to put your pieces together into something bigger."

Arnold:

I'm, I'm worried that that's a skill that needs special attention in, in somebody's training. That is the-

Robin:

Yes, but that's why if, if they try it without the attention- training, it's gonna go very badly.

Arnold:

Yeah.

Agnes:

So, like, I think that, um, um, everyone thinks that they are living in accordance with ideas that are their own ideas. That is, um, at least everyone I've ever met. Um, and, um, this could be a bit of a selection point, but, um, they think that, like, they're making choices about their own lives, and those choices reflect their values and their kind of integrated outlook on life and on what's important. And, um, one thing that the study of philosophy reveals is that's not true. Um, what they're in fact doing is just copying the people around them, and that their so-called system of ideas is riddled with contradictions, crucial vague points, undefined terms, et cetera. And the thing they thought was a theoretical structure that was holding up their lives was, like, just a bunch of spaghetti or something. And I think that, um, um, that, that should have some kind of payoff, is what Arnold is saying. That is-... It should be that if you have a philosophical education, then you're in at least a somewhat better position than the average person to live in accordance with a set of ideas that are your own ideas, that you've examined, that are such that if somebody asks you, "Wait, how does this relate to this other part?" You're not just like, "Why should any of it relate?" or something. You, you, you feel beholden to that kind of consistency. So it makes sense to me that this would be a kind of, um, this should be a benefit that we're providing.

Robin:

I mean, this isn't what you're doing now, but it sounds like a fun exercise where you take undergraduates and you say, "Okay, what we're gonna do now is, you need to take a bunch of ethical positions or personal positions on a bunch of topics. You're gonna need to write those down, and now w- the rest of your classmates here are gonna attack the coherence of that."

Agnes:

Mm-hmm.

Robin:

"They're gonna say how that doesn't fit together, and then you're gonna need to defend the coherence of these things. And then maybe you should modify them as the way to defend the coherence. Maybe we'll find that it isn't working. You will... In this ex- class or exercise, you will slowly make your set of positions more coherent with each other." That's what this whole thing is about. That it could be, you know, a context, a class, or whatever it is, where the task is to make a more coherent set of positions toward-

Agnes:

Well, I-

Robin:

... life.

Agnes:

I think it's not quite right to say that that's not what we're already doing. If I just think about what I did this week in my philosophy class, we, uh... we're examining the claim, everyone desires the good. That is, is it true that everyone is always motivated to achieve the good in everything that they do and in everything that they want? And then, um, uh, here's the first kind of realization that we came to is, that claim is actually ambiguous between two versions of it, namely, everyone desires what they take to be good, and everyone desires what really is good. That's already progress, right? Because none of them had ever noticed that there-

Robin:

Right

Agnes:

... were these two interpretations, and they would just say, "Oh, everyone desires what's good."

Robin:

Right, right.

Agnes:

And they wouldn't even notice that there's this crucial ambiguity. Now, once I put the... Once I disambiguated in that way, they were all inclined to say, "Well, everyone desires what they believe to be good." That's the plausible version, right?

Robin:

Right.

Agnes:

And then I would sort of give them examples, like they... I would give- You know, I was like: Sh- show me what's an example of something where somebody desires something that they believe to be good, but it might not actually be good. And they're like: Oh, someone might wanna insulate their house with asbestos, but the asbestos is actually gonna give them lung cancer. And then I'm like: "Well, is it the lung cancer that they desire? That's... 'Cause lung cancer is bad, I'm gonna agree with you."

Robin:

Right.

Agnes:

"But is that what they desire? Do they desire this bad thing, lung cancer, believing that lung cancer is good?" Like, no, no, no. They desire, um, insulation. It's like, well, insulation is a good thing, right? So the thing that they desire is a good thing. It's a thing we all agree is good. And then there's a bad thing, lung cancer, and they didn't know they were getting that. They didn't desire it, right? Okay, so the point is, I gave them a bunch of examples, and I showed them how you could factor out the examples, and you could show that the object of their desire in every case was a thing that we would all agree is good. Um, and that now looks like an argument for the stronger version of the thesis. No, everyone desires what really is good. People only ever desire stuff that really is objectively, actually good. Um, and that, that's a shock to them, right? They never thought that their, kind of, basic intuitions sort of boiled down to that. Now, we could question the argument, but the point is that they were coming with their own conceptions of what, what motivation is, and we were talking about cases like depression, being, feeling suicidal, et cetera. Can we construe those as desiring the good? Um, and I think that what was happening in the class was that their sort of pre-theoretical intuitions about human motivation that were... That have been guiding them in their lives, were coming in for examination. So I, I think that is the-

Robin:

But-

Agnes:

... this activity

Robin:

... what you're describing is the evolution of people's concepts over time, which certainly is happening in, through the undergraduate world. People come with a set of concepts, and then they, and leave with a different set of concepts that are more carefully honed and made clear and related to each other. But a set of concepts is different than a plan of action or philosophy of life, or set of opinions on ethics or something. That's what I thought Arnold was more hoping that people would generate. Uh, but you, you could just say, "I just want a more coherent set of concepts in my head," and that's a different sort of, uh, ambition. But still, I, I still think your students acquired that one little edit to their concepts, and they are slowly getting many little edits to their concepts. But that's different than saying, "Okay, c- I can describe my set of concepts ," and, you know, put 20 of them on paper and show how they relate to each other and, and make claims about the relationships. That's an attempt to a larger scape- scope of coherence, which you could do for concepts, or you could do for opinions about politics or morals, or you could do for a wide range of other topic areas. I don't... I mean, that's-- You were saying that's something you thought people wanted and they would be motivated by, and if so, you could have more exercises where people do the work of trying to make a set of things coherent.

Arnold:

Yeah, I mean, uh, so, uh, you know, just speaking about the history of the education in philosophy, philosophy is maybe the first thing, um, uh, uh, where we have, have the idea of an education, like a, uh, a non-skills education coming up, um, is, is in these early philosophical schools. Um, and, uh, uh, you know, so, so, so as one good example of the way that philosophical education, um, was very different from the way we do it in the modern period is, uh, in Descartes's day. He... You know, D- Descartes wrote, um, his Principles of Philosophy largely as an alternative educational system. So he, he, he was thinking that this is the new textbook that everybody would get in their Paris universities, um, if, if his, if his attempts were successful. And what it would do is, it, it would replace, um, you know, say, Suarezian Scholastic metaphysics as the-... dominant regime. But in, it was a, it was a com- competition between two comprehensive theories that were taught to students as philosophy. And, um, Descartes' comprehensive theory, um, you know, like Lucretius before him, like maybe Aristotle, like maybe, uh, maybe to a much lesser extent, Plato, was a total conception of the world, of human beings, their place in it, and how they should live. And, um, this was just understood to be what it meant to be educated in philosophy, was to be given this sort of thing. And now we're in a period where, um, uh, I think, to our benefit, um, we no longer think there's, like, one idea that we should be teaching all of our students. We no longer teach them dogmatic metaphysics or dogmatic ethics or anything like that. We teach them this wide array of stuff. But I, I... And, and then maybe what we're seeing with this question that students ask us, like, "What's this all supposed to add up to at the end of the philosophy degree, um, other than a career in a very difficult part of academia?" Um, is, is we've, we've swung pretty hard in this other direction, where there's so little sense that this coheres or that there's something right about what we're doing, or this is supposed to fit together into something. That, um, uh, uh, uh... Because w- we're sort of just teaching them stuff willy-nilly, where like, "Here's this big pot of classes. You'll learn some distinctions over here, you'll learn some history over there, you'll learn some really interesting niceties about the philosophy of language over here." And, uh, they never get any sense that this is supposed to add up to something. Um, and, and then I, I guess the question is just, like, like maybe one response, and, and maybe I detected this in your responses earlier, is philosophy shouldn't be doing that. Um, when it does attempt to do that, like Descartes did, it ends up making all sorts of terrible mistakes and leading people astray, and that it should be less coherent. It should be less comprehensive, it should be more thing- doing things like distinction training and stuff like that. Um, but yeah, I, I, I guess, I guess one way to put it is just we have this historical mode of doing philosophy and teaching it, and we've swung very, very hard in the other direction. And at this point, it, it feels a little like, um, uh, uh, it, it doesn't add up to something as an education.

Robin:

So this is a very, to me, a rather different question than the one you started with.

Arnold:

Mm.

Robin:

But it's related. So, I mean, there's the question of, "I'm an undergraduate. I've just finished. I kinda like it. What can I keep doing to be continuing this rather than dropping it all?" That's somewhat different to the question of, what's a coherent claim for what education gives you, such that, uh, you can say at the end, "Here, we gave it to you, uh, and here's how you're gonna use it, and, you know, good job"?

Arnold:

Mm-hmm.

Robin:

Edu- academia less does that.

Arnold:

Yeah.

Robin:

Right? Uh, one version, of course, is that, that, you know, you won't get a good job unless you do this, and so you better do this to get a good job. And a related version is, if you wanna be part of, you know, research, you'll have to do this and then do more to be part of the research world. For if you wanna be part of the research world, then, you know, y- you'll have to come up with your own motivation for that, management of knowledge. And you might think... I was hoping there was an, a third rationale to be offering people for why they should be educated, and that we could show that we had achieved it.

Arnold:

Yeah.

Robin:

And that does seem to be something like, you get to think clearer about many things.

Arnold:

Mm-hmm.

Robin:

But that's kinda hard to show on any particular thing. Uh, it would certainly be a way to show it if you say, "Well, here's my integrated system for everything-

Arnold:

Yeah

Robin:

... and see how it works all together," and that would be a way to show that you were thinking more clearly, 'cause hey, you've got a system. But nobody has that now, much less undergraduates a year after they graduate.

Arnold:

Well, so there I a little bit disagree with you, and I think that this is why I brought you up as a counterexample. That is, I, um, I'm quite good, um... I believe, I guess maybe it's worth testing this. But I, I think I'm quite good at thinking, "What would Robin think about this?" Um, I, I can rarely predict your detailed views about topics you know more about-

Robin:

Right

Arnold:

... than I do, but, but I can, I can sort of get a Robinsonian reaction, I think, with some reliability. Uh, you can tell me if you think that's true.

Agnes:

I haven't tested it.

Arnold:

Yeah.

Robin:

Okay.

Agnes:

I can tell- I can say that he believes he does.

Robin:

Yeah. Right.

Agnes:

'Cause he often will say-

Robin:

No, but-

Agnes:

"This is what Robin would say."

Robin:

I mean, I, I think what you're probably l- just seeing is, to a first cut, the fact that I'm a polymath, and a polymath is a person who studies many areas and then tries to fit them together to have-

Arnold:

Yeah

Robin:

... views that make their views in the different areas all fit together. And that will stand out differently to somebody who just knows one particular area as an academic, and then all their other opinions are just the usual sort of-

Arnold:

Right

Robin:

... public opinions on things. Um-

Arnold:

And, and you, you haven't written a manifesto. Uh, maybe that, that's not really necessary. Um, but nevertheless, there is sort of a way you approach problems, a way that you, um, um, you know, handle decisions and, and so on. And that's more or less identifiable. Um, uh, in, in, for example, in the case of Aristotle, as an Aristotle scholar, I, I work backwards from something like a giant manifesto to the way that Aristotle thinks. And so when people, as they frequently do, students ask me questions, "What would Aristotle think about this?" Where this is something that he never wrote about, like artificial limbs or, you know, AI or something. Um, I can give what I think are pretty reasonable answers. That is, I can say, "You know, these are the kinds of tools that he would bring into the question, and this is sort of how we'd try to think about it." Um, and, uh, I-... uh, so I, I, I, I don't know that, like, a document is the key thing here, but it's something like having a coherent way that you do things intellectually.

Robin:

Well, let's not make it binary. Make it a continuum, a degree of coherence.

Arnold:

Yeah.

Robin:

Then I think you could say one of the great virtues of an education in general is that you will just be more coherent. That is-

Arnold:

Mm-hmm.

Robin:

Look, so, like, it's a standard result in politics that when you ask ordinary people their opinions on various policy questions, the answers you get are just pretty random relative to each other. And as you get more educated people, the answers are more coherent. They more fit together across topics.

Arnold:

Right.

Robin:

That's a virtue of education, is that your answers across diverse nearby topics will actually be related to each other, have co- connections, really, coherence. And you might just say, "Yes, coherence is a virtue." It's a practical-

Arnold:

Mm-hmm

Robin:

... virtue, but it, it's a virtue, but it's not a thing you acquire with a manifesto. It's a thing that takes a lifetime to get better at, and you never get fully coherent. But yes, let's call it a virtue. Let's call it the goal, and to say, if, if you wanna c- what you've been doing here in school is becoming more coherent, and what you'd like to continue to do is to come- be- continue to become more coherent. And then the way to do that is to look at view- look at... you know, read about things, think about them, that are adjacent to each other, and then notice conflicts between adjacent opinions, and try to resolve them. That's-

Arnold:

Yeah

Robin:

... what produces coherence. You know, it's a local production of a degree of coherence.

Arnold:

But, but-

Robin:

But that is a great virtue, and it's a good thing for people to be doing. And our world maybe just needs, I don't know, just a way to have a Nobel Prize of a coherence or something, just a way to- P- people aren't even rated on coherence. We don't score-

Arnold:

Yeah

Robin:

... students on their coherence. We don't, we don't, uh, you know, have prizes for most coherent. We don't even talk so much about a person's coherence of their views, per se.

Arnold:

Yeah.

Robin:

Uh, maybe we should just be highlighting that as a feature and a virtue.

Arnold:

But I, I, I wanna add something to the idea of coherence or maybe just point something out a- about the idea, which is that, like, we can imagine two people. Um, Tom and Jerry both have entirely coherent or maximally coherent beliefs, or at least to the same degree, coherent beliefs. Um, um, in the case of Tom's case, this is just a lucky accident. He's a bit of an idiot, but he so happens to have wandered into a set of beliefs that all just kind of fit together. Um-

Robin:

Right, there are such things, like libertarian policy, like, you, you just have a very consistent set of beliefs across a wide range of things, if you just pick some simple axioms and boom-

Arnold:

Yeah

Robin:

... consistently follow the axioms through. There you go.

Arnold:

Well, well, now, now it sounds like you might be talking a little more about Jerry. Jerry is somebody who- ... has thought through all of his beliefs from a set of principles that, um, he, he, you know, has some good reasons for adopting, and they're, uh... as a result of his efforts to think through his ideas, they're coherent. So maybe, um, uh, uh, Jerry's a libertarian. Tom has all the same views as a libertarian, but just because, um, the people around him mention these things to him, and he, he gets them off Twitter or something-

Robin:

Right

Arnold:

... but he, he's never really put them together or tried to think about it, or he doesn't understand the order that they come in, or that there are any principles-

Robin:

Right

Arnold:

... and versus theorems. He just sort of has adopted them.

Robin:

But, I mean-

Arnold:

And so we don't want... Like, like, the, the idea is not that there are a bunch of people like Tom around. It's that there are a bunch of people who have coherent beliefs because they have put them together.

Robin:

But if you ask this first person adjacent questions near the set of consistent beliefs they have, they- those won't be coherent because they can't... There's this vast space of adjacent opinions, whatever actual opinions they have so far-

Arnold:

Yeah

Robin:

... and you will easily be able to tell their coherence by just asking them adjacent questions. So I don't, I don't think it's that hard to test coherence, whether it's systematic or accidental. Accidental just can't survive a continued testing of adjacent issues.

Arnold:

Yeah, yeah. No, the issue isn't, isn't telling the difference exactly. It's, it's more like, um, um, the thing that we want people to be when we want them to be coherent isn't consistent with themselves over time, necessarily. It's something more than that. It's something like to be, um, to have it be the case that all their beliefs are the flowering of some really important core set of beliefs, for which they have some really good reasons for holding or something.

Robin:

We- But that's just the main way we know to produce coherence, that, that-

Arnold:

Yeah

Robin:

... in fact, when we try to be coherent, w- the main way we, we resolve that is to try to find some pattern, abstract it to a principle, and then, you know, eliminate the differences between our principle and the details. That's the main way we ever get coherent. There, there is no other way.

Arnold:

Right. Right, right. So, so, um, um, um, but we are driving towards something like an ability that a person has to think in a certain way, rather than just, um, a kind of alignment of belief. And then, and then the question is: How do we produce that ability?

Agnes:

Right, but now I'm starting to think, like, the manifesto, even if, um, impractical in the sense of, um, you know, there are many failure modes, is a thing that a person could coherently put together over, you know, the first 10 years of their lives after graduating. But the idea that what you're supposed to develop is kind of a skill of thinking, um, that seems less... it less has that, uh, teleological motivating structure, where there's something that you're producing, that you can kind of hang onto as, um, the goal, the completion of your activity. It's just like we'd all like to get better at being more consistent, and you can keep working at it, and you can keep getting better. That doesn't feel like a real answer.

Arnold:

Yeah, I agree that, that, that we- coherence would just be a necessary condition. That is, we want coherence and, um, uh, uh, we want the, the ideas to actually be good, too. But y- you might take that to be-... you know, an extension of coherence with, like, perception and, and just normal encounters with the world. It, it depends on whether or not you're a coherentist.

Agnes:

I, I, I feel like what these people are asking for, or one way to understand what they're asking for, is, say I'm gonna do some philosophy stuff over the course of the rest of my life, which might be just thinking on my own, it might be having conversations at a dinner party, it might be reading books. What should be my goal in those activities? What should I be aiming for? And I still kind of think that maybe Arnold's answer is the only answer. That is, you should be aiming for a, um, systematic, coherent, and complete account of how to live, that you can also use to live. But maybe the right thing to say is, um, you should be aiming for that in such a way that, like, on your deathbed, you could write it down.

Arnold:

Mm.

Agnes:

Um, that is, don't write it down now, because we're working to that. Um, um, but think of it as the thing that you're working towards, and there's a kind of a nominal manifesto. Um, and that what you're trying to do is make your life look more like it's idea-driven, which involves examining ideas. It does involve clarifying concepts, but it also involves getting clear on substantive questions and whatever, and that that's what you're working towards in your philosophical activity.

Robin:

So I guess I notice the thing you're pointing to is a common goal people wanna have, and it makes some sense, and I've always disagreed with it strongly, so I just- I-

Arnold:

Mm

Robin:

... I wanna plant my flag about h- where I disagree. I see these people who are gonna spend their whole life producing this coherent thought in their head, and then when they die, it's this magnificent thing they've constructed, and I go, "What a waste!" I want to be part of a world where we all together build this thing that will take generations, which is the world understanding things better, and I want to invite you to join me in that exercise. And for that, what you should do is go find any part of their- our shared beliefs or understanding, and help f- fix it and improve it. It's less about you having this magical thing that you produce, and more about us together having a shared consensus that we are going to s- slowly improve. And for that, yes, you should be f- looking for sm- for what we have now and editing it. Now, that doesn't mean you have to be a researcher or academic, per se, because there's lots of topics on which we sort of have shared opinions that academics hardly ever talk about. And so there's lots of openings for less formality, things that couldn't be published in a journal, et cetera, for you to just look at conventional wisdom or what people say and say, "Does that make sense? Is that coherent and consistent with things nearby?" And help us edit our shared understanding. But for that, you should just look for: what is the usual opinion on something, what are the standard opinions, and ask, "Which of those can you help improve?"

Arnold:

Yeah, the, the thing you just said is, is like something like an ethics, that is something that might fill out a manifesto. Um, I, I, I, I guess what I'm saying is, it... You, you can't object to the idea of, "Let's come up with a way to live according to ideas," by saying, "Well, here are some ideas that you should live according to. Now, let's try to figure out how the world works using those ideas." It's like, that is an ethical theory that you're e- espousing. I mean, it's, it's, it's-

Robin:

Right, but, but, but-

Arnold:

... in a certain way, communitarian. It's, uh, uh, uh, it, it's, you know, philo-

Robin:

But I don't, I don't have the ambition to write it all out as a, you know, document describing this coherent account. I think it's the sort of thing I can quickly describe, point to roughly, and that we could have a shared motivation of people who are trying to do it together.

Agnes:

But, um, it seems like if, you know, you have this goal of the world understanding things better, that world is just composed of individuals who have some understanding. And that project of the world understanding things better only makes sense if the individuals inside that world are taking that stuff up and, like, making use of the understanding, and then being like, "Oh, this is awesome. I understand stuff." And, um, and so I think what Arnold is sort of proposing is that you be one of those people who understands stuff and gets the benefit. Um, um, that is, that this kind of, um, intellectual advancement that the, um, professionals are producing not go to waste, that there be somebody who consume it. Um, 'cause if nobody ever cared about living their lives in accordance with any ideas-

Robin:

Right

Agnes:

... then, like, what are you doing producing the better ideas?

Robin:

But remember you talked about how most people are just copying other people and not actually thinking this stuff through? And you might say, "That's good. That's exactly how it should go." Most people should just copy what other people do with rough rationales for it, and then some people should specialize in working out those things more thoughtfully in particular areas. But nobody should have a coherent view of everything. That's too hard. What you should focus on is looking for areas where you could help the usual views on those things, that everybody's habitually copying and not thinking about, more co- more sensible, more informed, et cetera. That, that's the highest ambition, is to take chunks of the thing we are habitually thinking and saying, and making that make sense. And-

Arnold:

But that... I think this is why the distinction between Tom, the idiot, and Jerry, the coherent thinker, is important. It's because y- you're, you're suggesting here that, um, um, Tom, the guy whose beliefs just happen to be consistent, is, um, is in fact a beneficiary of this big project. And then the question is, is he?

Robin:

Right.

Arnold:

... right? It, it, is there any, anything really worthwhile in having a bunch of aligned beliefs, as opposed to being the one who aligns them on the basis of some sort of core? Um, 'cause it-

Robin:

I mean, if the point of understanding is to support action-

Arnold:

Yeah

Robin:

... and the people who take action roughly inherit habits and patterns of action that make sense according to coherent beliefs that other people have worked on for the purpose of action, then it makes sense to have a division of labor where most people just inherit habits and thoughts without thinking them through, and that some people specialize in making those make sense when you think them through. But most people can't be bothered, and shouldn't be bothered, to have to think them through.

Arnold:

Mm-hmm. Good. I think that we've reached a really good point of disagreement here, which is that I think it really is basically fundamental to philosophy and philos- philosophical education, and the sort of perspective of philosophy, that beliefs are important for some reason other than action. Though, that is itself something philosophers debate, of course, and there are pragmatists, and so on-

Robin:

Right

Arnold:

... that, um, uh, uh, uh, maybe, maybe that's, that's what we should say, is that if ideas, and having the right ideas, and having coherent ideas, and all of that, are important only for action, then one thing follows. And if that's not the case, then another thing follows. If there's some value to just having-

Robin:

Right, right

Arnold:

... the truth, or having-

Agnes:

Um, there's an ambiguity when it comes to a claim like, "ideas are only important for action." Um, one way to, um, uh, hear that claim is, the differences in ideas has to manifest in a set of different bodily movements. Another way to hear that claim is, um, performing the same set of bodily movements, but with a different idea, might give those bodily movements a different meaning. Uh, and if the second counts as a way of, um, ideas mattering for action, then I think that many philosophers would be happy with that. That is, um, we don't necessarily have to go to the theoretical to get, um, the importance of ideas.

Arnold:

Mm.

Agnes:

Um, but that would just be to say that Tom doesn't, um, act the same as Jerry. Um, because since Jerry has an understanding of why he's doing some of the things he's doing, he has a different set of ideas backing his action.

Arnold:

Or at least they're differently responsible, or at least that would be a sign for what you're saying, is that we would hold Jerry to be more responsible for doing this stuff on the basis of having thought it through.

Agnes:

Yeah, I'm not sure we would... Uh, um, um, I think if it was negative responsibility, that is, they did something bad-

Arnold:

Mm

Agnes:

... we might hold them equally responsible. But if it's positive responsibility, we would hold Jerry more responsible.

Arnold:

Mm-hmm.

Robin:

So, so there's a way the conflict is less if you say, "Okay, some people aspire to this, you know, really understanding things," but if that's only actually a minority of the... small minority of the population, and most people don't wanna really understand things that well, they just want good guides to action that they don't understand, then we need some people to specialize in understanding things.

Arnold:

Mm-hmm.

Robin:

And so those people, it's fine if they have a goal beyond merely helping everybody else to understand things. They just really wanna understand. There's a, a consistency in the social arrangement at least, where most people are just looking for a guide to action, and a few people just really want to understand, and that's just the central thing to them. But they can have a nice role in the world, where they help the other people with their action by understanding, and there's not really a social conflict here, even if there's a conflict in any one person, which goal they would have.

Arnold:

Yeah, I mean, I, of course, I agree that we should have philosopher kings. Um- ... if that's, if that's what you're saying. Uh, uh, uh-

Agnes:

These are the last words, 'cause we've gone over-

Arnold:

Right

Agnes:

... so you get the last word, Arnold. You agree that we should have philosopher kings, but go ahead.

Arnold:

No, I, I, I guess I, I hadn't been thinking about this in terms of sort of the social roles that these kinds of endeavors would play. That is, why we would wanna train some people as philosophers and other people as not. Um, the, the, the question for me was something sort of like, um, um, w- w- what, what can I promise as the good of the education in philosophy, especially the way we now teach it, which is in this very much, um, decentralized way? Um, that is, where, where there isn't a sort of coherent, dogmatic theory that we teach. Again, which is a good thing. Um, but, but maybe it is worth considering the question, um, w- which is sort of more ready to hand with all of these other academic disciplines, which is just what, what role are, are these trainees supposed to play in the, the, the, the social life of human beings? Um, why is it... Might, might, why might it be important that some of us are, um, good at system-building, whereas others are good at investigating? Um, and, and it, it's a sort of truism that if you get a scientist, for example, they're gonna be very, very, very good at thinking about their specialty. And then if you ask them about any other topic, they're no better than an ordinary person, mostly. And um, um, maybe philosophy is the discipline which is supposed to be teaching people to be good judges in general, um, if anything can be said in general about how to make those kinds of judgments. And then there's a substantive question about whether or not, um, you can train somebody in that. And maybe that's just an unresolved question in philosophy, is: Is there any such training?

Robin:

I think, um, there's a virtue in having some people, more than we have now, who just have a more integrated points of view over larger scopes of things.

Arnold:

Mm-hmm.

Robin:

We have become too fragmented in intellectual world, and integration on the margin would be better. I don't, uh, I don't think we should claim that everybody should try to be such an integrated person, and then or all their lives are worthless if they don't have it.

Arnold:

Right.

Robin:

But there's a substantial value practically in it, and just, it's a virtue, I would say, to have a integrated... I'm happy to agree with you there, at least for some of us. It's a virtue-

Arnold:

Mm

Robin:

... to generate and sustain an integrated view of things, because that's beautiful.

Arnold:

Mm-hmm. Okay, well, thank you for, uh, uh, talking this over with me.

Robin:

All right. Until we talk again.

Agnes:

Bye.

Robin:

Bye.