It's true that many earlier positions in philosophy seem to have been rendered obsolete by modern science. Not all. And modern science may have created new philosophical problems.

@Frank I know, however it seems that many countries are reducing its weight in education, could what Hawking's said be related? (Not because he said it, but because it being a spread opinion, maybe even touching some philosophers! That's the motivation for the question)

@Frank Indeed, look at our recent question.

Unger describes modern analytic philosophy as "empty" in his book Empty Ideas. Here is his interview:"you really have to engage with a lot of science. And very few philosophers do any of that, at least in any relevant way... it all goes down into these nonsensical so-called theories of reference and all that stuff — which itself isn’t anything deep, it’s just about how people use certain words... To me, all this sort of stuff is parochial, or trivial." But he praises Maudlin.

@Frank, I can't think of a single idea in modern philosophy (going back to Descartes) that has been rendered obsolete by modern science.

@Conifold Unger is after analytic philosophy only? (which is a subset of philosophy) If so, what he means by "empty" could be something along the lines that analytic philosophy tries to leverage logic, which is just an "empty" (of meaning) set of tools to conduct proper reasoning. It may not be an assault on all of philosophy being an empty pursuit, or even on all of analytic philosophy being an empty pursuit.

I suspect that Hawking also had analytic philosophy in mind, continental philosophy has a different focus, and its takes on science are often peculiar. Try his interview, his sentiment concerns currently prevailing ways of philosophizing and is roughly "people who are signing up for philosophy... want to learn something about the ‘ultimate nature of reality’, and their position in relation to it... you don’t have a prayer of offering even anything close". For balance, here is Williamson's critical review.

@Conifold hmmm - that reduces the scope considerably to whether philosophy can offer answers about the ultimate nature of reality, where it competes with science. But that's not all there is in philosophy.

Where philosophy competes with science on knowledge about nature, philosophy has no chance, because it doesn't have tools to verify its claims like science does.

@Frank, where does modern philosophy compete with science on knowledge about nature?

@DavidGudeman Maybe it doesn't - I should have said "if".

The post modernist position seems to be that philosophy never had meaning in the first place. So, one is tempted to hold up all PMists. But, the OP said has any philosopher. And also argued." Since neither applies to PMists...

I had no idea the invention, and systematic critique and ordering, of concepts wasn't needed anymore... Stephen Hawkins, although his great contribution to physics has to be respected, should probably have stayed in his lane. He should have known that physicists introduce new concepts and engage in their critique all the time, a part of their job that is philosophical in nature. The above quote from Unger inspires me the same kind of vibe: an academic who thinks other fields he hasn't studied are useless and only his own is worth studying? What a surprise! What a novel perspective!

@armand I think it's more that compared to natural sciences who can check their claims against experiments, observations etc etc, philosophy tends to have only speculation to show for itself (or at least that's the perception, and philosophy seems to have a long tradition of that). Physicists can invent their own concepts, sort them out etc etc, AND present evidence for their claims.

@Frank word salad posing as philosophy does exist indeed. But reduce philosophy to speculations tells more about the ignorance of the person doing it than philosophy itself, imho. This is a very outdated view of philosophy, like if I said "medicine is dead" by pointing at medieval practices like bloodletting. Inventing and sorting out concepts IS a philosophical work and physicists have to use this tool to interpret their experiments and decide which is relevant to do next. Wittgenstein already said philosophy is not a science but a tool for science. Hawkins is just about a century late.

@armand So why all the contemporary hate for philosophy, even at academic level, when there isn't even a philosophical background for it? Or is indeed postmodernism that philosophical background? Is postmodernism so popular today?

@armand Among my scientific friends in maths and physics, there is little interest or need for philosophy it seems. I'm not aware of physicists that would wait on philosophers to interpret their experiments or decide what to do next. There are probably interactions between scientists and philosophers, but I really don't think scientists are systematically in conversation with philosophers or need philosophers.

@Frank maybe your scientific friends don't understand that the very method their job is based upon comes from the work of people who has a double qualification of scientific and philosophers like Karl Popper. As a scientific myself, I do understand it. I'm sure they at least understand concepts like falsifiability, which invention and critique is precisely part of philosophy. Also note that I never said they had to collaborate with philosophers, but that part of their job was philosophical in nature.

@armand To sharpen the position, I think that today, if you are, say a physicist, you can contribute to philosophy, but conversely, a philosopher that wouldn't have an in-depth knowledge of physics would have nothing useful to contribute to physics. Physicists are very capable of any "philosophy" they might need but unless a philosopher really understands the details of physics, I'm not sure what they could contribute. I would be curious to hear about examples of modern philosophers that contributed fundamental ideas to physics.

@eirene from my experience of academia and engineering, which is how I pay my bills, experts in a field love nothing more than to badmouth experts in other fields. The fact that it's also much easier for quacks to pass themselves for philosophers than for physicists or chemists, because a bit of word salad is all they have to do to impress laypeople, probably does not help with the reputation of the field itself.

@armand Physicists have a lot of of things to do without stopping to reflect on what "to know" means. And philosophy is not a source of what to do next for them.

@armand I agree that the minimal background in philosophy has been incorporated in science by now - and it's been a two way road with scientists triggering philosophical question. But no physicist stops to consider what "to know" means to do their day to day job.

@Frank I can't help but notice that you needlessly narrow down the question further and further. Who said it had to be physicists or that it had to be something they do day to day? Not me. At this point we are not having the same conversation, you and me.

There are very interesting books by neurologists like Antonio Damasio, for exemple, who inquire the nature of the mind or the self from their laboratory but also addressing the philosophical problems arising from their findings, because such questions inevitably come to mind. As long as there are people contributing to the field of philosophy, whatever their background, that means the field is not dead and Hawkins was talking out of his ass (as is often the case when scientists leave their lane)

@armand "Physicists" was just an example. There is goodness in narrowing down discussions, because it's easy to deal with generalities that don't quite match reality. The Damasio example is a very good narrowing down of the conversation. I wouldn't put too much credence in Hawkins' soundbite, for sure :-)