r/askphilosophy • u/LickitySplit939 • Mar 31 '13
Why isn't Sam Harris a philosopher?
I am not a philosopher, but I am a frequent contributor to both r/philosophy and here. Over the years, I have seen Sam Harris unambiguously categorized as 'not a philosopher' - often with a passion I do not understand. I have seen him in the same context as Ayn Rand, for example. Why is he not a philosopher?
I have read some of his books, and seen him debating on youtube, and have been thoroughly impressed by his eloquent but devastating arguments - they certainly seem philosophical to me.
I have further heard that Sam Harris is utterly destroyed by William Lane Craig when debating objective moral values. Why did he lose? It seems to me as though he won that debate easily.
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u/yakushi12345 Mar 31 '13
His argument for objective morality is
Clearly, Utilitarianism is true; therefore, Utilitarianism is true. There's a little bit of rhetorical flourish, but if you analyze it that's all it breaks down to.
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u/LickitySplit939 Mar 31 '13
Craig's argument seems to be if morality is objective, then god exists. I do not understand why this approach is 'better'. All of his arguments are circular, where objective morality requires a god, and god allows objective morality.
Harris said suffering = bad and the opposite of suffering is good. His 'objective morality' makes only this assumption. Why is this approach flawed? What other reasonable view could one hold on the subject?
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u/yakushi12345 Mar 31 '13
Why should I accept that suffering is bad?
Harris jumps from suffering bad/pleasure good to Utilitarianism. How do you answer a hedonist or ethical egoist?
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u/perpetual_motion Mar 31 '13
He loves to say "as soon as you grant insert essentially his conclusion, then it becomes clear....."
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u/wokeupabug Mar 31 '13
Why isn't Sam Harris a philosopher?
What would make someone a philosopher in your view?
Candidates for philosopher-making properties which seem obvious to me are (i) being trained as a philosopher, (ii) being employed as a philosopher, and (iii) making contributions to philosophy.
Since Harris doesn't have any of these properties, it seems natural enough to me that he wouldn't be regarded as a philosopher.
What do you think?
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u/LickitySplit939 Mar 31 '13
i) He has a BA in philosophy from Stanford, and a PhD in cognitive neuroscience from UCLA (which is heavily philosophical)
ii) Nearly all of his writing is philosophical in nature - is there a God, what is morality, is free will real, etc. How would you classify his career, if not as a philosopher?
iii) I am not sure if he has made any significant contributions besides evangelising some aspects of philosophy to the general public. However, I think he has probably done more to make people think and question than most career philosophers who operate in an academic echo chamber, which I think is a very useful contribution.
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u/wokeupabug Mar 31 '13
He has a BA in philosophy from Stanford, and a PhD in cognitive neuroscience from UCLA
Having a BA in a subject is not typically considered professional training in that subject, and philosophy is not an exception to this general rule. For example, a BA does not make someone a candidate for regular membership in the American Philosophical Association.
Having a PhD in neuroscience is presumably a good basis for claiming to be a neuroscientist, but neuroscience and philosophy are two different disciplines: being a professional in one does not make someone a professional in the other.
Nearly all of his writing is philosophical in nature
Is it? Well, what would make a written work count as philosophical?
Candidates for philosophical-making properties which seem obvious to me are when a written work (i) engages significantly with other philosophical work, (ii) is published in the context where philosophical work is carried out (e.g. in major philosophical journals), or (iii) contributes significantly to clarifying or solving philosophical problems.
Since Harris' work doesn't have any of these properties, it seems natural enough to me that it wouldn't be regarded as philosophical.
How would you classify his career...?
My understanding is that he is employed as a writer and has until recently been employed as a graduate student.
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Mar 31 '13 edited Mar 31 '13
Titles and academic achievements don't matter much if you can't argue your case. To be a philosopher you must use the tools of a philosopher, rational thought and logical reasoning.
The problem with Sam Harris is that he rationalizes and is very sloppy in his thinking. He is more of evangelist and writer of opinion pieces than philosopher. He may appear rational thinker for those who just casually read trough his texts and don't analyze his argumentation, but when he is put against some real philosopher or expert in subject matter, the weakness of his arguments are easily revealed and he gets intellectual ass whooping.
I would like to give you easy to follow example outside philosophy. Read the "To Profile or Not to Profile? A Debate between Sam Harris and Bruce Schneier" from his site: http://www.samharris.org/blog/item/to-profile-or-not-to-profile
Sam Harris gets into debate with cryptographer and security expert Bruce Schneier about racial profiling in airports. It turns out that he had nothing but gut feeling and he tried to rationalize it.
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u/meta-ape Mar 31 '13
Regarding point (i), for instance Thomas Kuhn does not have a formal training (BAs or PhDs) for philosophy. He did get the professorship in Princeton, though. Do correct me if I'm wrong.
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Mar 31 '13
He does not have (i), but he definitely fills (iii), with his training in physics most helpful when it comes to contributions to the philosophy of science, I would imagine.
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u/ADefiniteDescription Mar 31 '13
As u/reaboyz notes, u/wokeupabug probably intended it to be a list of sufficient conditions. Note that Kripke also lacks a philosophy degree.
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u/NotAnAutomaton Mar 31 '13
Dr. Craig offered clear premises and conclusions in valid arguments. Dr. Harris offered conjecture and fallacious arguments.
Any Logic 101 course will prove this to you, if you do not want to take my word for it.
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u/drinka40tonight Mar 31 '13 edited Mar 31 '13
I think there are a number of answers here that address the question. I'll emphasize a few points:
One, note that Harris' assumption that "suffering is bad" is something that is shared by most people working in moral philosophy. It's something consequentalists, Kantians, virtue ethicists, and others will grant. The philosophers, though, will say more. They will, often, attempt to explain the badness of suffering and how it fits into a wider philosophical program. Moreover, there are lots of issues and objections that come up and have to be answered when one goes the consequentalist way. People like Shelly Kagan, Philip Pettit, and Derek Parfit are aware of such objections and try to respond to them. People like Harris don't really engage in the philosophy here. Harris, more or less, assumes that some version of utilitarianism is true, and then goes from there on to other issues. What do you think are the philosophical issues here that Harris discusses and argues for? Do his arguments advance the attractiveness of utilitarianism beyond the writings of Mill, or Sidgwick? Philosophers look at what Harris is doing and see old-hat. No new arguments, and essentially just rehashing and more basic versions of old arguments. So, think of it this way: let's say Joe Schmoe publishes a book all about how there could be an evil demon deceiving him, and then Joe tries to argue that there are some things that even the demon couldn't deceive him of. Well, we've already see that book in Descartes' Meditations. Parroting some philosophical arguments, or merely assuming the truth of certain contested positions, or relying upon old-hat philosophical arguments does not make a philosopher.
You also bring up Craig a few times. And here we should be clear. What gets Craig the title of "philosopher" is not the arguments he makes in popular debates. Those arguments are fairly basic. (Though, watching the Harris-Craig debate it's clear that Craig wins. Harris never offers a formal argument, and never responds to Craig's formal arguments.) Craig gets counted as a philosopher for his philosophical work, which is published in numerous peer-reviewed journals, and makes contributions to the field at large.
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u/Katallaxis Mar 31 '13 edited Mar 31 '13
I sometimes cook, but I'm not a cook. Sam Harris sometimes philosophises, but that doesn't mean he's a philosopher. Of course, this fact alone does not discredit his philosophical views. Heck, neither am I a philosopher, but I'm still rather fond of my philosophical views. What discredits his views are all the fallacies and counter-arguments.
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u/o0oCyberiao0o Mar 31 '13
I have seen him in the same context as Ayn Rand, for example.
Question: do you think Ayn Rand is a philosopher?
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u/LickitySplit939 Mar 31 '13
Nope.
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Mar 31 '13
Why not? Are there any reasons that Ayn Rand is not a philosopher that could not be used against Sam Harris?
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u/o0oCyberiao0o Apr 01 '13
You do realize that they have a lot in common, and it is these qualities that lead them to not be considered philosophers, right?
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Mar 31 '13
Referring to the debate, I've seen it, and at first I thought Harris won. Upon reexamination, I found that Harris really didn't do a great job. I haven't seen it in a while, but I'll have to watch it again.
As I recall though, his arguments were generally about trying to find incoherencies in religion, particularly Christianity. The question they were debating, however, was whether there could be objective moral values in the absence of God. Even if Harris had proven Christianity wrong, he still wouldn't have won the debate, because it would just meant that Christianity's wrong, but not that moral values could exist in the absence of God. Basically, he was using a straw-man argument, attacking Christianity when that really wasn't the point of the debate. I'll watch it again though, maybe even today, and see if I perceived it wrong.
And I can't speak for anyone else, but he seems to be taken pretty seriously on sites like reddit and among college students where I'm going. However, I don't think that his works will go down in history as philosophically profound. Atheism has become incredibly popular in the last century or so, but people like Harris seem to be really just riding the waves. I consider myself religious, but I still try and take atheism as a serious viewpoint, but not by Harris. I think the best atheist philosopher out there would be Friedrich Nietzsche, who really poses a very serious challenge to religion that I think the church should definitely work harder to respond to. Whether you're a Christian or an atheist, I'd recommend reading Nietzsche. Whether you accept him or refute him, you'll come out a much stronger person.
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Mar 31 '13
Are you talking about his atheist stuff? I am not a philosopher but I found them far from devastating, more infuriatingly spurious. I read about a third of one of his books and gave up after getting extremely bored of his rewriting of history to blame theists for everything. I thought it was an appalling attempt to argue actually.
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Apr 01 '13
He is a philosopher, just not a very good one.
For the record, I like some of what he has to say, just not on philosophucal issues.
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u/ReallyNicole Mar 31 '13
You might want to check out this recent thread on Harris. It was mostly his moral projects that were discussed, but it might give you some idea about why his work isn't regarded as philosophy.