Topics Philosophy

Question Why do most philosophers tend to answer complicated questions with complicated answers? Why can't there be something simple? Is it that we can't accept simple answers to difficult questions?

Accepted:
October 19, 2005

Comments

I suspect this will be exactly the type of complicated answer you have in mind, but... philosophers often do succeed in giving concise answers to important philosophical questions. Here are two almost randomly-chosen one liners:

Difficult question #1: What makes an action morally right or wrong?
Consequentialist answer: An action is morally right if and only if it maximally satisfies the interests of all those affected.

Difficult question#2: How can we freely choose our actions if they are brought about by micro-physical processes (be these deterministic or indeterministic)?
Compatibilist answer (roughly): Our actions are free if and only if they follow in the right way from characters of the right type.

These are succinct answers, and in that sense "simple. But the devil is in the details, of course. The complications come in when we specify how we should understand the answers' central formulations--for example, what counts as an 'interest"?; what is "following in the right way"; and what is the "right type of character"? Complications also enter when we try to understand exactly what is being asked--these are difficult questions after all--and why the proposed answer might count as a good one. What arguments can we give in favor of our succinct answer?; and what objections does it face? Addressing all of this is surely bound up in fully answering a question.

There is nothing in philosophical methodology that would prohibit us from giving a one word answer to a question, if that answer were plausible and thorough. (In my book, a simple "No" doesn't count as a substantial answer to the question "Do we know that there are other minds?") And if a simple answer is the truth, then I would think we could accept that, and rejoice in it. But the truth in philosophical matters is often complicated. In fact, I'm inclined to be suspicious that a very simple answer can be given to the really enduring philosophical questions, for these questions endure because they arise from conflicting and deep considerations that any adequate answer will need to sort through and balance, often with great subtlety. Indeed, confusion is a common, natural and healthy stage in coming fully to appreciate the really good philosophical questions.

None of this is to deny that there are plenty of impenetrable philosophical texts, if that's what you have in mind. Many contorted philosophical answers have been given that could and should have been given much more simply, or not at all. But this is probably true in all fields.

Question Why do most philosophers tend to answer complicated questions with complicated answers? Why can't there be something simple? Is it that we can't accept simple answers to difficult questions? Accepted:October 19, 2005

Question Why do most philosophers tend to answer complicated questions with complicated answers? Why can't there be something simple? Is it that we can't accept simple answers to difficult questions?

Accepted:
October 19, 2005