Philosophy is very related, it's based on logic, many great scientists and mathematicians were also philosophers, and many key scientific theories started life as philosophical concepts.
I will order some of those as soon as I can, thanks. And >>5 , as >>6 said, philosophy kind of goes hand in hand with both subjects. From what I remember, the concept of the atom was one that of an ancient Greek philosopher, not to mention many early sciences started out as philosophical ideas applied to technology as it was invented. So its importance is great.
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Anonymous2008-08-23 8:12
99% of philosophy is masturbatory bullshit and a waste of time. Formal logic is alright, but mathematicians do it better.
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Anonymous2008-08-23 9:11
I'm reading Russell's History of Western Philosophy. Not quite what I expected since the book is about 75% history/biography and 25% discussion of philosophy. Every page is densely packed with information so you have to read slowly to absorb the material, but it's very much worth it.
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Anonymous2008-08-23 10:08
>>6 Only parts! And only those parts that are not judgemental.
If a logicall principle is correctly used there is no basis for discussion without being metaphysical.
Also yes, in former time many of the genius were universal genius!
Are there any philosophists today that are also great physicist/mathematicians?
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Anonymous2008-08-23 11:01
>>7
|the concept of the atom was one that of an ancient Greek philosopher
I'm not that impressed by this. So what if some old crone got slightly lucky with an idea? It's hardly the greatest acheivement to come up with a smallest, indivisible particle, and he didn't know what he was talking about.
But yeah, Greek philosophers were all over the place. It was almost inevitable one of them would get it right by chance, and it really was by chance.
Pretty much all of Greek philosophy is bullshit. Greek mathematics, on the other hand, were pretty impressive.
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Anonymous2008-08-23 19:46
Of course they were impressive.
Archimedes just some thousands year ahead of his time!
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Anonymous2008-08-23 19:48
>>13
Archimedes defined his time, so no, he wasn't.
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Anonymous2008-08-24 1:23
Hitler was also WAY ahead of his time
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Anonymous2008-08-24 6:40
>>14
Yes he was.
He didn't only define his time.
He was ahead of his time!
He was actually the first to found methods to approximate curvilinear areas and not Leibniz/Newton!
Go to /b/, it contains some of the most profound philosophical ideas of this millennium.
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Anonymous2008-08-29 13:34
>>16
Since Ancient Greece seems to be rife with genius, Archimedes probably wasn't THAT ahead of his time. If Christianity hadn't come and plunged us into the dark ages then who knows how fast science and maths would have progressed?
>>12
You're right, the only inspiring philosophy I can see in Ancient Greece comes from Socrates. Having said that, I would class Socrates over and above almost all philosophers pre-20th Century.
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Anonymous2008-08-29 17:47
>>20
Socrates didn't even write any works. I guess you mean Platonic Socrates.
Yeah, I was aware of the ridiculousness of what I was writing as I wrote it, hoping /sci/ wouldn't call my bluff. Guess I forgot it was /sci/ :p
I kind of mean Platonic Socrates, but I've read that as Plato wrote more and more about Socrates, he increasingly adapted Socrates' philosophy to reflect his own. For example the dialogue where Socrates "draws out" a mathematics proof from a slave-boy, confirming Plato's idea of innate knowledge.
What I love is the idea of the Socratic method. Making someone realise how unfounded their beliefs are through questioning until you reach a contradiction. I like how it cuts through assumption in a similar fashion to the modern scientific method.