The reason I ask this is because it seems to me that there is a lot of REALLY poor reasoning and thinking going on in our modern American political discourse. In addition to the ignorance of the masses, even many political leaders do not seem to see blatantly evident hypocrisy and irrationality in their own words and deeds. They seem to have a "mindset", which is a poor excuse for a philosophy.

I'm not talking about opinions or priorities or the other differences between people that are at the root (or SHOULD be at the root) of any political differences in any society. I'm talking about a fundamental inability on the part of many to even PROCESS the arguments on any level north of their navel. Whether it is intellectual laziness or a lack of the tools, or laziness due to the difficulty of thinking without the proper tools, I'm not sure, but it sure seems to me that FAR too many people go through life making decisions and forming opinions based on very base feelings and visceral reactions, without ever even attempting the calculus of logic, much less arriving at the correct conclusions based on that calculus.

Philosophy classes are not about teaching a person WHAT to think, but about HOW to think. First you learn basic logic. Then you see the basic cases of where logic is insufficient to form absolute conclusions and assumptions or differing priorities need to be inserted. Then as you advance, you learn about various great thinkers have approached life's most basic and complex questions, and the truths they illuminate and pitfalls into which they fall. These tools allow a student to begin to form their own philosophy and apply it to the facts of the world, which if the philosophy is sound, will allow for the facts to mold the philosophy and grow over time.

Eschewing the concept of philosophy, in my experience, leads to closed-minded, ignorant, and ultimately disjointed people who are ruled by anger, fear, and other base animal tendencies due to their inability to integrate the facts of the world with their inflexible (usually religiously based) mindsets.

Thoughts?

I found the philosophy courses I took pretty much a waste of time other than easy padding of the gpa. I think I learned more about thinking and the logical processing and application of data in classes like physics and chemistry.

Unfortunately, ours is not the world of the philosopher-king. Instead, we have lawyer-kings, doctor-kings, and business-kings.

The type of people that advance in our political climate are not those who are inclined towards philosophy, even if they might have obtained an understanding of it in school. In fact I'd say they are the opposite. They are the puppet masters, the manipulators, the deceivers, the actors.

But you already know all this. The answer to your question is yes, if you study it correctly, which I doubt most people are taught to do given the quality of our public education and general apathy of the population.

Oh, also, there is that little thing called religion that replaces critical thinking in something like 40% of our population.

One has to wonder whether a philosopher could make a decent politician.

What would make you think that because a person believes in a religion, which out right say requires faith, would be unable to think critically in other facets of their lives? You must think Obama is a complete idiot. Kennedy as well.

See, I found that I learned almost nothing about logic and critical thinking in science and math classes. I learned how to apply data to formulas, but I rarely learned how the formulas came to be, or how one formula may be inter-related to another if you understood its origins, thus allowing one to see how other things fit together as well. I learned all that sort of stuff out of my own curiosity, if at all.

Applying data to known formulas is more akin to having a "mindset" than a philosophy, and that is as it should be since the vast majority of science and math is settled. There's not much up for debate or re-examination by subsequent generations. You can build upon it, but rarely is there any call to rebuild the foundations due to them crumbling under the weight of the modern world. It's why Einstein is considered such a genius, because he DID re-examine and re-interpret some ideas that seemed very basic and settled. But that is exceedingly rare.

Social sciences, on the other hand, are constantly in flux and needing to change to accommodate new facts. Every generation should re-evaluate the most basic foundational assumptions underlying all of society. If those foundations are based in solid philosophy, they will not need to be replaced (yet), but if they are built on shaky ground, then the foundations should have repairs or even fundamental rebuilding.

When a person in charge of such societal structuring (a politician, religious leader, or other person of influence) is not schooled in the tools necessary to make the judgments of how society should move forward, it's like having your building designed by someone who doesn't understand the basics of architecture.

It's why our government's policies so often resemble this:

A number of philosophers have. Wondered, that is. There is a particular instance that comes to mind where the author discusses the role of the statesman vs. the role of the philosopher in governing and covers your question pretty much exactly... I'm drawing a blank right now on which author this was but if you're interested I should be able to find it pretty easily.

Then you went to a really shitty college or had no drive to take science/math classes.

I just didn't take science classes in college, because I had enough credits from high school to place out. Knowledge of advanced math, chemistry and physics is irrelevant to those who don't use those things for a living. But basic philosophy is useful, and dare I say essential, to every member of society.

A person doesn't need to know what so-and-so German philosopher from the 18th century thought about the nature of the state, but everyone should understand the difference between correlation and causation, and most people don't.

And I'm sure you'd love to believe that I went to a shitty college. It would bolster your belief that a law degree is just a piece of paper.

I don't know what it's like in the US but over here, science was teached very much as you describe even up to A-Level (age 17,18). I took Physics at university, and the approach was a huge contrast. It was taught how it should be - a close relative to philosophy. Logical thinking, acceptance of other views, doubting current accepted 'facts' and composing measured experimental techniques.

With regard to your original post and the absence of logical thinking within political circles, you're probably half right. But as I'm sure you know, it's not just that they can't reach the truth, it's that they don't want to. They have their own goals, and they see logic as merely a hurdle.

Clearly there are many, especially leaders, who have ulterior motives and no interest in truth or logic, but I'm more concerned with those who don't have the ability to DISCERN between those who are making sense and those who are not, be they leaders or followers.

I do long for the days of the philosopher-king president. Adams and Jefferson ftw.

There's definitely a tendency lately to promote 'business studies' as the most important part of education.

Also, the suitability of any research study now is judged by how much monetary gain it will obtain. Acquisition of knowledge, culture, thought is put down the priority list. As a result, in science at least, no breakthroughs are being made, no groundbreaking papers, just improvements to tried and tested money making technologies. It's far easier to get a grant for electronics research than astronomy.

So all 'thought' is blinded by the $. Although it's always been the case, it's worse than ever.

That's over the line. Everyone learns differently and went to university for different things.

In business related courses quite a bit of critical thinking is taught and used when when reviewing why a company failed or succeeded, working in groups for presentations.

Physics class is great for teaching it. Learning how to create a hypothesis, testing your hypothesis, collecting and reviewing data.

All it takes is a good teacher and a setting that matches the way you learn.

this sort of sounds like it comes from one of those "dark totalitarian future" movie narrations.

Woodrow

Sure, pick the one that didn't work out.

cool, buffalohed can be next in the line of philospher segregationist presidents

I appreciate your vote, but I'm not running.

I smell a write-in campaign.