Western Civilization

>>3391740
>takes 2000 years for their philosophy to catch up with eastern thought

>literally a revisionism of ME civilization
Hmm...

>>3391759
I'm a brainlet, what's ME civilization?

>>3391769
Middle-East.

>>3391750
Care to elaborate please? As far as I know eastern philosophy is pretty shitty.
They didn't even know that the earth was round until 17th century

>>3391834
>astronomy is now philosophy

>>3391834
Guys like Wittgenstein and Derrida were beaten to the punch by poo-in-loos by thousands of years

>>3391834
Ego death was first theorized by chinese philosophers and it's pretty much the only concept which matters in philosophy

>>3391860
natural philosophy, to be precise

>>3391879
I really doubt that

>>3391934
what is ego death?

>>3391965
>I really doubt that
Well you'd be wrong. Have a read of the Upanishads

>>3391740
why do you think that?

Is rationalism an overrated meme?

>>3391740
At the moment, certainly. But its going to go back to China rather soon.

>>3391834
Yes, but they imagined universe to be a round object with a flat earth in its centre. Westerners also thought up until 1600 that the Earth is the center of the solar system. If you think the Earth is flat or not doesn't change so much when it comes to calculating the movement of astronomical objects. And Chinese were better in that, than Westerners. Though both had the same structural mistake that the Earth is the centre of the solar system.

>>3391740
Yes. While we are very close, the East can't match Western expansion.

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>>3391834
>As far as I know eastern philosophy is pretty shitty.

>>3392056
Well, ancient Greeks already had the idea of a heliocentric model, only back then there wasn't really any evidence to support it, so they went with the more intuitive geocentric model instead.
And realizing that the earth isn't flat is not really all that hard, Greeks were even manage to calculate the size of earth. Chinese really werent good at natural philosophy, when compared to greeks

>>3391834
>>3391879
Schopenhaur/Nietzsche/DavidHume/Heidegerr/etc all have components from the East.

Even the whole premise of ancient greek philosophy is borrowed from the East.

See The Shape of Ancient Thoughts.

>>3392080
Yeah, but my point was it doesnt really matter in what shape you imagine the astronomical bodies to be like. You can imagine Mars to be triangle-shaped and it would still move the same way it does as a sphere.

>>3392083
As far as I know, Greeks and chinese came up idependantly with same concepts, when it comes to philosophy of society, for example the golden rule.
Yet in natural philosophy, chinese really lacked behind the western civilization, which was the reason for their eventual inferiority

>>3392105
But Chinese didn't have any way to tell how big the earth actually was, while the Greeks did.

>>3392108
Not Chinese, but Greek-India

The concept of independent origination is very much a product of our ignorance. Anytime we don't have information, we can always claim as "independent origination" but with more knowledge, things become more nuanced and connected.

Persian empire/Alexander/Age of Exploration are great times when ideas were transplanted. They just aren't attributed or acknowledged because it would change our concept of individual civilization achievements.

>>3392137
Do you see any evidence for exchange of ideas between Chinese and Greek philosophies?

>>3392152
Only route I see is from from an indirect route. The silk road, more accurately, the Bactrian-Buddhist influencing the Chinese. However that's more Indian philosophy with added Greek imageries/sculpture aesthetics

>>3392113
Which is also a useless information, same as we knowing or not knowing how big the universe is.

>>3392168
My point is that Greek philosophical model and mathematics where much more advanced and able to make better predictions than Chinese ones.
So the idea that Chinese philosophy is somehow superior to Western is obiviously wrong, since even the ancient Greeks were already ahead of Chinese

>>3392158
I meant more like philosophical ideas that appear in both schools

>>3392189
>implying mathematics is the only branch of philosophy
Chinese and Indian thought was streets ahead in ontology and epistemology

>>3392204
>Chinese and Indian thought was streets ahead in ontology and epistemology

No, it wasn't. Also, even if it had been, that's not actually a good thing. Ontology and epistemology are literally meaningless woowoo and sophism.

>>3392204
>Chinese and Indian thought was streets ahead in ontology and epistemology
care to give some examples?

>>3392189
But they literally weren't, chinese sky maps were much more accurate than Western ones.

Civilization is garbage, so no.
>>3391834
The earth isn't round you brainlet.

>>3392219
I don't know if this is true, but mapping the sky is a practical skill.
We are talking about philosophical models of the world, in which Greeks were clearly ahead of Chinese

>>3392209
Why not admit you've not read any philosophy?
What are you hoping to gain here? If you think ontology and epistemology are literally meaningless woowoo and sophism how can you possibly pretend to know whether greeks or indians were more advanced.
And just for fun, how do you know epistemology is meaningless? Just wondering how you have come by this information.

>>3391740
I don't know.

However I do know that whatever mix of cultures, philosophies and ideologies western civilization is made of got it to effortlessly conquer the entire globe, send men to space, give birth to three industrial revolutions, allow for the mentalities necessary to find value in exploring the past and thus write most of the world's states and peoples' History books, and enable high standards of living for the multitude.

Does that make it the best? Maybe not anymore, now that it seems to be declining into a culturless, consumerist concrete monstrosity. However it certainly was the apex of civilization not too long ago.

>>3392214
Upanishads is a good start. The poo-in-loos solved the ship of theseus paradox before the greeks had even thought of it

>>3391740
>western civilization
>originated in eurasian (more eastern than western) country (Greece)
There's no such thing as western civilization. It's just a buzzword that vaguely remits to the germanosphere, France, *ngland, and now the USA

>>3392209
Stop posting. You don't have to appease your ancestors anymore.

>>3392233
>solves
ontologylets actually believe this

>>3392224
Mapping the sky is the actual science part. Greeks were good in talking out of their ass without proofing shit and were wrong 99% of the time.

>>3392233
could you elaborate please, so I dont have to look it up? What exactly did the Indians solve?

>>3391759
A mix of ME with steppe <<<{{{[[[(((""""""""""civilization""""""""")))]]]}}}>>>

>>3392244
I would argue that science consists of looking at evidence, creating a hypothesis and then testing it through experimets.
Mapping the stars is just a skill, there is no hyphotesis involved that could be tested

>>3391934
*indian philosophers

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>>3392222
wtf I'm anprim now
wtf I hate round earthers now

>>3392256
>collecting empirical data has nothing to do with science

OH BOY

>>3392265
sc*nce is rationalist nonsense, so no.

>>3392214
>>3392248
Not the other guys but this short text.

>The Questions of King Milinda
In old Greeco-style debate format.

And the Abhidhamma is a huge mental/psychological text book. Thats just the early Buddhist part, the middle phase of Buddhism is where Nagarjuna(2nd century) and his famous Madhyamaka really dives into ontology. The Dignana and the others does much work on epistimology. These are around 4th-8th century I believe.

>>3391740
My question was more whether Western Civilization was the best people can offer, and if not what can be improved? Rather than which ancient civilization was more advanced.

>>3392265
collecting data alone is no science

>>3392306
Talking out of your ass isnt either.

>>3392306
Its called data science

>>3392320
>Data science, also known as data-driven science, is an interdisciplinary field about scientific methods, processes, and systems to extract knowledge or insights from data in various forms, either structured or unstructured,[1][2] similar to data mining.
Did Chinese extract knowledge from data?

>>3392356
META AS FUCK

>>3392356
The Chinese created methods of creating gunpowder from their alchemic run datas.

So its safe to assume they extracted knowledge from data.

>>3392356
Yes, thanks to their astronomical knowledge they were able to figure out that magnetic compasses can be used as a navigation tool.

>>3392376
dont switch the topic, we are talking about star mapping

>>3392382
Do you have a source for compass beeing related to star mapping?

>>3392405
>The polymath Chinese scientist Shen Kuo (1031–1095) was not only the first in history to describe the magnetic-needle compass, but also made a more accurate measurement of the distance between the pole star and true north that could be used for navigation. Shen achieved this by making nightly astronomical observations along with his colleague Wei Pu, using Shen's improved design of a wider sighting tube that could be fixed to observe the pole star indefinitely. Along with the pole star, Shen Kuo and Wei Pu also established a project of nightly astronomical observation over a period of five successive years, an intensive work that even would rival the later work of Tycho Brahe in Europe. Shen Kuo and Wei Pu charted the exact coordinates of the planets on a star map for this project and created theories of planetary motion, including retrograde motion.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_astronomy#True_north_and_planetary_motion

>>3392411
fair enough

>>3392248
Obviously you can't simplify this stuff into the medium of a meme based Bhutanese embroidery pow wow, but classical Indian philosophy managed to transcend the logos, noumena stuff that caused so many difficulties in Western thought

Define western civilization.

If it is Greco-Roman Christian culture, then what makes it greater than other civilizations?

I would say:
Art tries to be realistic instead of symbolic. Compare the Dying Gaul with any statue from other civilizations.
The belief in rationalism, things can be explained and understood by the human mind. Mystic or authoritarian arguments doesn't fly.
The history of democracy (Athens) and republics (Rome) that legitimizes such governments in the mind of Westerners.

>>3393077
>Art tries to be realistic instead of symbolic
Not a good reason
>The belief in rationalism,
Not a good reason
>The history of democracy
Not a good reason

Brainwashed romaboo.

>>3393092
Buddy, if you don't explain your point, then your argument is baseless.

>>3392056
But isn't the fact Earth is the center of the color system, thanks to relativity?
No preferred reference frames means it can be said that earth is the center of the universe as far as humans are concerned and as humans that's all that matters.

>>3393108
All arguments are baseless, mate.

>>3393124
You could model it this way and still get good results. E.g. if you wanted to fly to Mars based on this model you could. But that doesnt change the fact that Earth is, in fact, revolving around the sun, not the other way around. this can be clearly proven by, well, looking at it.

>>3393147
>looking is proof
Redditors actually believe this

>>3391740
First define civilization. Then define Western civilization.

>>3392241
O I am laffin