logicandlanguage.net

Working as someone who has come out of a background in mathematics into philosophy, I've got a different take on the envy of neighbouring disciplines. I don't find it to be an issue of desiring the knowledge in the adjacent discipline. What I like, when looking over the fence into mathematics, is the different constraints on work, and the different mode of research. I like the shift between the formal, constrained definition/lemma/theorem/proof/corollary style of the mathematical disciplines like formal logic and the open-ended, discursive, exploratory, dialectical style of philosophy. One provides definitive results, which are open to interpretation. The other provides understanding, but little in the way of definitive results.

I like playing both sides of this field. It keeps the envy down, and when I get frustrated with working on one side of the formal/informal divide, I can work on the other.

There does seem to be a certain amount of science envy in philosophy at large. For some this is physics or math envy. Cognitive science envy definitely seems to come up as well. In my case, I might have a little computer science envy (because they have compilers that tell them if what they're doing just doesn't work like they think it will, while we just have to rely on other people reading our papers). But I've never heard of law envy.

And do the other humanities really have philosophy envy? Linguists certainly seem not to, though they probably don't count as "humanities". I suppose we'd have to ask a wider academic audience, like that at Crooked Timber or something.

Mathematicians get off no easier at social gatherings. The only difference is that, apart from teaching, the only profession that people associate with maths is actuary. When I try to explain that my knowledge of statistics is easily matched by an average high school student, they tend to eye me with deep suspicion.

Subject envy runs rampant in other disciplines though. For instance, many computer scientists have maths envy, easily noticeable by the use of phrases of the sort "oh, that's too mathematical". This creates a negative view of computer scientists in the eyes of many mathematicians, exemplified by the following quote:

"Undoubtedly the latter [[stone spaces]], aimed at readers with fairly sophisiticated mathematical palates, is strong meat for those computer scientists (the majority) whose stomachs are not inured to it;..."
-- Peter Johnstone
Topology via Logic., Review author[s]: P. T. Johnstone
The Journal of Symbolic Logic, Vol. 56, No. 3, Sep., 1991

Any law envy I have comes from this thought: "Wouldn't it have been nice to have gone to school for three years and have people compete to give me well-paying jobs?" Ah well.

I do experience some linguistics envy, for the reasons Gillian mentioned: I wish I knew that stuff. As for science envy, perhaps some people think, "Philosophy should be more like science, but I'm glad it's not." I would think that if I thought that philosophy should be more like science, which I don't, really.

One other enviable thing about the law: I do think that it would be great to see the results of one's work in the real world. It is one thing to argue to other ethicists that, say, membership of the (surprisingly rich and strong) deaf community is a significant benefit of being deaf, but it would be amazing to stand up in court and literally help a judge or jury to understand that. Or even just as an academic in law, to be able to anticipate some substantial improvement in the world as a result of one's arguments.

Some ways of being a scientist do not seem attractive. I have no desire to count drips for someone else's experiment. (Punt and Denis (British comedians from the now defunct "Mary Whitehouse Experience") once pointed out that there are two sides to science: one of them is accelerating subatomic particles to near light speed. And the other one is melting ice in a bucket.)

But I envy scientists because I would love to understand the world better. It is simply cool to have a good understanding of our current best theories of how the world works, and (possibly contributing to its desirabliity) these days that's actually quite difficult and requires some hard graft to pick up the necessary mathematics.

So I think it's possible to drum up some science envy without thinking that philosophy should be more like science; some of us just want it all.

Gillian,

Thanks for the plug! And great to be in touch again. I like your blog very much -- I especially enjoyed the primer on Dummett and local reduction. I've always been curious about that.

I thought perhaps Garber's remark about law envy was metaphorical: as I said, something about adversarial style, and the dangerous obsession with winning arguments or debates, not just finding the truth. There is something in that charge, though I'm not sure it's really what she had in mind. (Like you, she might have been thinking about making a difference in the world.)

At any rate, I'm entirely lacking in science envy myself. But I have a bit of humanities envy. I'd like to be able to write like Stanley Cavell or Bernard Williams: philosophers who speak to a (slghtly) wider audience. But of course, the audience there is still mainly academics, not the public at large.