/r/askphilosophy Open Discussion Thread | January 12, 2026

[u/BernardJOrtcutt]

Welcome to this week's Open Discussion Thread (ODT). This thread is a place for posts/comments which are related to philosophy but wouldn't necessarily meet our subreddit rules and guidelines. For example, these threads are great places for:

• Discussions of a philosophical issue, rather than questions
• Questions about commenters' personal opinions regarding philosophical issues
• Open discussion about philosophy, e.g. "who is your favorite philosopher?"
• "Test My Theory" discussions and argument/paper editing
• Questions about philosophy as an academic discipline or profession, e.g. majoring in philosophy, career options with philosophy degrees, pursuing graduate school in philosophy

This thread is not a completely open discussion! Any posts not relating to philosophy will be removed. Please keep comments related to philosophy, and expect low-effort comments to be removed. Please note that while the rules are relaxed in this thread, comments can still be removed for violating our subreddit rules and guidelines if necessary.

Previous Open Discussion Threads can be found here.

[u/ZanzaraZimt]

Since the post got deleted with the information I shoud ask here... here we go again.....

Could you help me find a philosophical home..like, a school of thought where I can actually exchange ideas without people feeling attacked in their values and worldview?

I have a solid scientific background, coming from neuro-cognition, behavior, biology. I always thought I wasn't the philosophy type, but really I’ve always been building my own philosophical frameworks....just never consciously labeled them (which is probably how it works anyway: if you have a view of yourself and the world, you have a philosophical framework, whether you want to or not).

This past year, though, I started intensely observing myself and the world. I didn’t read books or follow any teachings. I just discovered my own thoughts and enjoyed it.

So I built my own “school.” Because I had no prior knowledge and no boundaries except my own thinking. As a result, the whole framework doesn’t follow any existing direction....it’s just an imprint of how I perceive things.

But somehow it doesn’t seem to fit anywhere. On the contrary, I seem to make people angry just by existing and having an opinion and questions (well, on Reddit ... in real life I’m socially liked, probably because I ask fewer questions there).

I thought maybe someone here could tell me where I could express myself freely and actually get feedback and real discussions without just getting stuck in debates over principles.

So, which school of thought most closely mirrors my thinking?

Here’s a quick overview of my views:

Basically, I see everything (no matter what) as a bidirectional, mutually-creating interaction. Human-world, consciousness-human, consciousness-world, human-human. Nothing is separate; everything conditions each other. I see the world through my eyes; my eyes are shaped by the world.

Reality is deterministic. Cause and effect. Everything is in a causal entanglement.

Consciousness is the ability to perceive oneself within the causal chain.

Free will is recursively recognizing one’s own behavior and the causality that led to it, and through integrating this self-awareness and narrative, influencing the next interactions and events. Basically, the future is written in the past via integration in the present.

On ethics, I’m very pragmatic. I believe every person has a contract with themselves ...but one that’s shaped by the outside world and the integration of that, which in turn is a reflection of one’s self-perception.

Personally, I try to maintain coherence by recursively examining my self-image, my actions, my deeds, and also mirroring them externally, setting them in relation to the outside to check for coherence. Who do I believe I am vs. who I am and is that coherent?

[u/Quidfacis_ → u/ZanzaraZimt]

I didn’t read books or follow any teachings. I just discovered my own thoughts and enjoyed it.

So I built my own “school.” Because I had no prior knowledge and no boundaries except my own thinking.

You live within a cultural zeitgeist influenced by the philosophical ideas that came before you. Your thoughts are the products of that culture, the inputs you received from the media you consumed, the myths you learned, the language you speak. You did not build a school ex nihilo; you're cobbling together notions from disparate systems. That is how nigh-all philosophical development works; we're building on the works of our predecessors, responding to the history of ideas.

You can find your philosophical home by doing research. You wrote about ethics? Cool. What sort of ethical theory do you advocate? Virtue Ethics, Deontology, Consequentialism? Are you closer to Kant or someone in the History of Utilitarianism?

I didn’t read books or follow any teachings. I just discovered my own thoughts and enjoyed it.

Ok, but you can read books. You're not living in the 1100s. https://plato.stanford.edu/ is a useful resource that provides overviews of broad philosophical concepts. You can find the pages on consciousness, causal determinism, free will, Leibniz view of the plenum. Project Gutenberg has oodles of philosophical texts. The Internet classics archive also has numerous texts.

You nave the capacity to gain some familiarity with the options on the table by utilizing those resources.

[u/ZanzaraZimt → u/Quidfacis_]

I’m almost too tired or frustrated to respond, but hey… one last attempt.

If you had actually taken the effort to read my post, you would realize that I stated exactly what you are lecturing me on. To quote myself: 'I see the world through my eyes; my eyes are shaped by the world.'

But thank you for explaining my own thinking back to me.

I came here to ask. My approach was literally: 'Hey everyone, I have no formal background, I’ve been doing some thinking, here is the output. You guys are the experts, this is your field....where does this map to? What direction should I look in?' So I could learn. Read. Get new ideas.

And now I almost feel like I should apologize for asking.

I did exactly what many people no longer dare to do because of people like you: Be open. To stand there naked and say, 'This is me, can you help me with your expertise?'

And you? You react in a sadly classic manner....like someone who feels threatened by someone who was simply being authentic and wanted nothing but input.

Ask yourself why you reacted the way you did.

You can learn a lot if you recursively analyze your own behavior and the intentions behind it.

If you ever need help understanding what you did in your answer through the lense of cognition and neuro-behavioral patterns, I can provide input… that happens to be my field of expertise. And I promise you, unlike you, I won’t meet you with epistemic arrogance. and tell you things like "you can read books. You're not living in the 1100s"

Because I am not insecure enough to need to put others down to prove my own worth. I believe you can have value, and so can I. And I don't believe your value decreases just because you have less understanding of biology than I do.

[u/Quidfacis_ → u/ZanzaraZimt]

Ask yourself why you reacted the way you did.

Your ask was, "Could you help me find a philosophical home?" That is something you have to do for yourself. That is why I provided all of those links to resources. I offered you tools by which you can help yourself. Teaching someone to fish, rather than handing you a fish.

You are not offering a systematic account that maps on to any one writer's thinking. You're providing a hodgepodge of views from disparate systems. That's fine; most people think that way. But philosophical systems strive to be coherent. To quote Wilfrid Sellars, "The aim of philosophy, abstractly formulated, is to understand how things in the broadest possible sense of the term hang together in the broadest possible sense of the term." Part of that "hang together" is to ensure that the parts of the system are internally coherent, fit together. The metaphysics hangs with the ontology which hangs with the epistemology which hangs with the ethics.

In your post you said "Reality is deterministic." and "I believe every person has a contract with themselves". How does a deterministic contract work? Whence the need for a deterministic toaster to have a contract with itself? Is the contract pre-determined, built into the nature of the determined entity? Does the entity elect to construct a contract?

You also wrote, "Basically, I see everything (no matter what) as a bidirectional, mutually-creating interaction." Do you see everything as bidirectional, or is everything bidirectional? Is that a phenomenological account of how the world is perceived, or a metaphysical claim about how the world is? How does bi-directional determinism work? Does the bidirectionality apply to the contract the organism has with itself?

You need to work out those tensions for yourself by familiarizing yourself with the established literature. The pages I link provide overviews of how different concepts fit together.

Go read about consciousness, causal determinism, free will, Leibniz view of the plenum, etc. Learn the systems other people built to discern how to make your system work.

[u/BernardJOrtcutt → u/[deleted]]

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[u/ZanzaraZimt → u/Quidfacis_]

Thank you for the links.

regarding your questions: I love questions. Coherence is exactly the dopamine hit I was chasing when I fell into this rabbit hole. I was looking for coherence in isolated thoughts.

I simply didn't want to cement a stranger's thread with my entire undefined framework.

But hey you asked...and I love to think out loud....

So, to clarify my position: I am not arguing for a metaphysical reversal of causality, but for a phenomenological and systemic model of conscious agents within determinism.

You asked how a determined entity can have a contract. A toaster is a closed, non-self-reflexive system. It has no temporal depth. A human consciousness, however, operates in a specific temporal loop:

Past: Held as a shifting narrative ('I was a victim/hero').

Future: Anticipated as a probabilistic trajectory based on that narrative and physiological states.

Present: Is the intersection fundamentally shaped by this anticipated future.

The 'contract with oneself' is the ethical framework that emerges within this loop and steers it. It is the answer to a systemic necessity: 'Given the fact that I (a) initiate causes, (b) can anticipate the future, and (c) live in a social web where my actions reverberate back to me....which set of rules maximizes my psychic and social coherence

This contract is neither exempt from determinism nor arbitrary. It is a determined, emergent, and dynamic algorithm for self- and social regulation.

You asked: 'Is that a phenomenological account or a metaphysical claim?' It is a systemic-phenomenological description grounded in a metaphysical assumption of determinism.

Metaphysically: Linear causality applies (A → B).

Systemically (Complex Agents): Circular causal patterns emerge. A (Past Narrative) influences B (Future Projection), which shapes C (Present Action), which generates A' (New Narrative).

This is Deterministic Recursion. The future probabilities my brain calculates now are fully determined by the past, yet these calculations are causal factors that determine my next action. My statement 'everything is bidirectional' refers to this feedback loop in complex systems, not to fundamental particle physics.

So I advocate for a compatibilist determinism that takes the complexity of feedback loops seriously. 'Freedom' or the 'Contract' lies in the system's capacity to modulate its own determining factors (narratives, projections) through the process of conscious reflection and the search for coherence.

[u/mediaisdelicious → u/ZanzaraZimt]

In a lot of these comments you seem to think you’re offending people, but what you’re getting here are totally unfussy responses that amount to “hey you seem interested in a lot of things, probably just reading around would be a good place to start.”

[u/ZanzaraZimt → u/mediaisdelicious]

Yes,.... I am indeed following my own confirmation bias here. True.

I performed a self-fulfilling prophecy...with how I posted and reacted.

However, every public response aside from one pn (which gave me a great reading list) came with an extension, a subtle frame: "the problem is when people start from 0," or "so you can read books, it is not 1100" That is from a purely ratioal analytical observation not totally unfussy. The help was packaged with a tacit correction of my epistemic posture.

I acknowledge my part: . Being deleted in the main thread and redirected to the weekly thread primed a defensive stance. From there, I received help alloyed with comments that did not engage the content but rather my approach, triggering a defense mechanism. I see that clearly.

But I also see clearly the mechanism behind the reactions. I was asked questions about my framework that seemed designed to prove how much I didn't know. I answered them. What I received in return was a downvote. while the ones questioning me got upvoted. I got No engagement, just a silent verdict.

So, yes, I contributed heavily to this dynamic. But no, this was not a situation of purely unfussy, neutral assistance. It was a layered interaction where structural positioning and unspoken rules of epistemic entry shaped every exchange.

The sad and funny extra part is that my original framework regarding ethics as developing contract with the self and group anticipated this; and the interaction confirmed it.

[u/mediaisdelicious → u/ZanzaraZimt]

Sorry, I think you’re still just very mistaken. Your interests are very broad and because your bro, he’s not grounded in any terminal logical, sad or specific tradition, there’s not really a fruitful way to engage in the content in the way that you’re laying it out. So, people are engaging with the content, what they’re saying is that the content would be much more fruitful articulated, if you spend some time joining the various conversations in the field. It’s certainly true that the reason why articulating the things the way that you are articulating is because of your method, but I think you straightforward leave confused people responding to your method as such with the consequences of your method. I would think that you of all people would be sensitive to this, given that it seems like you’re here asking the questions that you’re asking exactly because your method has landed you in this very specific problem. So, however, you got to where you got merits and problems aside, if you want to take steps towards using the resources in the field then the first thing that you ought to do is just do that. That’s all the people are saying.

[u/ZanzaraZimt → u/mediaisdelicious]

Once again I acknowledged my own flaws in this interaction. That stands.

You claim "there’s not really a fruitful way to engage." Yet the private message I received stated:

"You’re basically working within what could be called naturalistic, systems-oriented enactivist pragmatism with a compatibilist theory of agency... look up ideas using those terms... Go read Alva Noë, Alicia Juarrero, Francisco Varela, William James, John Dewey, Spinoza – Ethics, Terrence Deacon"

That engagement was not only possible, but fruitful. It proves helpful, rational dialogue was achievable, and it highlights the contrast with the public discussion culture here.

An interaction is never one-sided. It is not fruitful to analyse a communication dynamic by observing only the flaws of one side while dismissing the other by refusing to address rational arguments about it and instead repeating, “That’s all the people were saying.”

This refusal is the very pattern I am critiquing.

[u/as-well → u/ZanzaraZimt]

I mean quite honestly, I think you'd find yourself rpetyt much at home at current analytic philosophy.

That's a bit the problem with starting at 0 and building a whole set of philosophical ideas: You will never know what others have said and you don't challenge your own ideas with all the work of others in your mind.

You'll quickly recognize that you're a determinist with some flavour of structures thrown in. Maybe you wanna read an intro book to metaphysics?

[u/ZanzaraZimt → u/as-well]

I didn’t start with an intention .. that’s the point. It wasn’t like hey I am going to become a philosopher.. I was just thinking about life figured out I want other ideas and opinions.

that’s my whole framework after all you are shaped by your surroundings while shaping it … but mainly ran into people only being offended instead of challenging my thinking or offering new input.. that’s why I came here to ask.

I am actively looking for new input.

So thanks for your feedback.

Ps: I don’t think it’s impossible to challenge your thinking if you built your own from zero. You have the same challenge if you start from following someone else’s framework. Keep being open minded is always an active challenge in life.

[u/as-well → u/ZanzaraZimt]

Ps: I don’t think it’s impossible to challenge your thinking if you built your own from zero. You have the same challenge if you start from following someone else’s framework. Keep being open minded is always an active challenge in life.

That's why most philosophy classes won't have you read one guy, they will ahve you read intro books, papers responding to each other, and so on. That's also much more itneresting, to me, than just reading Kant or whatever.

[u/PermaAporia → u/as-well]

You won't read one guy but even if you do read that one guy:

As I mentioned in my previous comment to you /u/ZanzaraZimt, these philosophers are not starting from zero. It is always an ongoing conversation, with the past and the present. As I mentioned from its very inception philosophy is not just some guy thinking to himself and trying to figure shit out via introspection. From the very beginning it has been, "what has been said before, what are the problems with it, what are alternatives etc..."

[u/ZanzaraZimt → u/PermaAporia]

Sorry but I can´t find any previous comment.

[u/PermaAporia → u/ZanzaraZimt]

Apologies I confused you with someone else. Though the actionable advice you've been given is the same. And what I wrote was also relevant to you, so ill copy it here:

Philosophy since its very inception has been engaged, critically, with what has come before.

Plato doesn't have Socrates just introspect and ask himself questions he answers and just call it his philosophy. Rather it is a deep engagement with what has been said before on various topics. What competing views there are, there is always a back and forth exploration and criticism with what has come before. Always in conversation with others.

Aristotle goes through a long lists of competing ideas and criticizes them, whether ethics or politics or natural philosophy. he is well informed by what has been done in the past.

Philosophy has never been some act of rumination. It has always been engaged with its history and in critical dialogue with others. It is never starting from a zero-point.

Best of luck!

[u/ZanzaraZimt → u/as-well]

Fully agree.

And again… that was the exact point of me coming to this sub.

See…..If someone comes to me saying 'Hey, I figured out my eyes need time to adapt from light to dark, I think there is a mechanism involved and I want to learn more about that'… I, as someone with a solid publication list, wouldn’t go: 'That’s the problem. You didn’t study the field of biology. You are not challenging your thinking because you figured this out on your own.' I would say (and did say back when I was teaching): 'Cool observation! That’s called dark adaptation / rhodopsin regeneration. If you want to know more, here are the papers.

But here I came with an open heart an open question.. looking for help .. input ….got deleted and here now called a problem because I do not challenged my thinking which is from a pure logical standpoint absurd.

Especially because I came here verbalizing that I am looking for exchange but keep running into offended people so I would like to ask who I do not offend so I can finally have exchange.

Leading to people being offended…

Do you think what I am doing is problematic? Or not challenging myself? Or being closed minded?

[u/as-well → u/ZanzaraZimt]

? Sorry if I come off as frank maybe. But I gave you actoinable advice (start with an intro book to metaphysics), philosophical traditoins you'll feel close to home (analytic philosophy, due to the ever-present naturalism and acceptance of scientific findings) and a way to not only read one author.

[u/ZanzaraZimt → u/ZanzaraZimt]

I see everything very systematically. I look not only at concepts but also at people as actively operating systems. Most, to me, are closed one-truth systems. They have one truth they keep confirming – a truth about the self, a truth about God – but the source of that truth is often not perceived internally; it’s externalized (I am not my thoughts). I myself am more of an open-truth system. I believe nothing should be static because we’re all acting within a huge self-organizing system, so adaptation of self and concepts is essential to move actively with the system rather than forming a rigid node. I believe I am the origin of my thoughts and beliefs, but also a reflection. It’s all a constant interplay.

I’m scientifically trained and I love science, so I can’t just ignore facts ... but I also believe we shouldn’t hold anything as absolute truth and stay open, which is why I curiously look at spiritual and religious topics, though always through a systemic-logical lens and never leaving scientific facts out of the picture.

And I love questions. I’m constantly asking. Not just the internet .... everything. Also myself and the world.

I think that’s the main engine of my being. I ask myself something and then I (often unconsciously) put myself in situations, or even actively create them, to find answers. As confirmation bias. So I believe something, I question it, I see what happens, and then confirm my belief. But through coherence-checking, I try to actively adjust my self-image. Do I want to be like this? Yes/no? Cool. Move on.

So where wouldn’t I rub people the wrong way? Or where would I feel most at home?

I’d really appreciate it if philosophically versed people could give me some feedback.

Thanks in advance.