Talk:Purpose

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Contents 1 Shortness of article 2 Too much focus on 'western' philosophical viewpoint 3 Evolution 4 Final cause 5 Stories 6 Final Cause 7 The Matrix? 8 Essay removal

[edit] Shortness of article

Could it be said to be a deficiency of sorts of the current community of philosophers that this article is so still so short, after it's been on the list of philosophical topics for more than 14 months? Michael Hardy 21:59, 20 May 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Too much focus on 'western' philosophical viewpoint

I don't think it warrants specific refence to Aristotle when concept is prior to that split.

If you know any better references, certainly you can add them. Similarly if you know any non-Western or other viewpoints that are relevant here, you can add those too. Michael Hardy 01:27, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

[update] Sorry ripped out western - putting another badly defined term into this article will not help it. Will update when I have researched more

[edit] Evolution

April 1, 2005 Dean Gores thinks the following discussion is no longer applicable:

"Modern science has reversed the idea of purpose inherent in nature; an eye is no longer explicable as being 'in order to see"; instead, a lot of cause-and-effect accidents led to the eye organ, which allows us to see."

I think this statement is biased in favor of evolution. Also, the purpose page is a little weak on describing why certain activities make life meaningful. More needs to be done to discuss the need for purpose, etc.

[edit] Final cause

I was redirected here from "Final Cause"; wouldn't it be more appropriate for that to redirect to Teleology? (DM 8/31/05)

It currently has its own article, though I would prefer to see it combined in an article on Aristotle's four causes - it's only a sentence long and doesn't even describe what the term means. Richard001 00:29, 29 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Stories

what about the purpose of a story?

[edit] Final Cause

I agree with the above poster that "Final Cause" would be better as a redirect to Teleology; however, as I found out about the redirect through a link on that page, maybe it would be better to create a page with a short description of the final as one of the four Aristotelian causes, maybe with a brief example of how they interrelate focusing on the final. (I always liked the one that uses a statue).

Don't look to me, though, as I'm more inclined to agree with Spinoza and Democritus. --Andymussell 04:46, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] The Matrix?

The subsection on popular culture with a large quote from the Matrix does not belong in the general article on purpose. I think having odd popular culture references in general Wikipedia articles undermines Wikipedia's goals of catering to different kinds of people.

As for popular culture, "The Purpose Driven Life", a record selling book read by millions that specifically talks about purpose would be a better popular culture reference, regardless of bias. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Serialized (talk • contribs)

I agree that the quote of The Matrix is much too long. But rather oddly, it seems contemporary philosophers have neglected this topic, so that such a lowbrow source is actually providing us with better quotes than anyone has posted in this article by actual philosophers. I'll do some editing on that section. Michael Hardy 21:14, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

...done. Michael Hardy 21:22, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Essay removal

I have (twice) removed an inappropriate essay section contributed by User:Stevenson-Perez (diff). Please see my comments at User_Talk:Stevenson-Perez for further comments on related edits by this user. - David Oberst 19:49, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

FDCVBJCGBFK.GHJDFGHTGYHFUID TBHDTOE —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.181.148.1 (talk) 22:10, 7 November 2007 (UTC)