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Philosophy
Value

Is there any value in "thinking for yourself" on subjects that have long been thought about before? Regarding whether God exists, for instance, lots of people far smarter and more knowledgeable than I have been unable to come to a consensus. If they can't figure it out, I have little hope of finding the truth myself. And if they did happen to come to consensus, it would be silly of me to try and prove them all wrong. So why should I think for myself if smarter people have already thought for me?

Philosophy doesn’t really advance by consensus. In the history of philosophy some of the most important philosophical works are ones that were not widely adopted at the time they were written. It may be that on any number of issues, someone has “figured it out,” even if it’s not universally acknowledged by other philosophers. If by “thinking for yourself” you mean putting aside the work of others because there hasn’t been consensus, then you’re right that such a strategy is unlikely to yield results. But if you mean that you should critically examine philosophical views that are not popular or widely accepted, then you are much more likely to be able to contribute to a discipline that progresses more by the combined efforts of its participants, than by the singular insight of individuals.
Happiness
Philosophy

It seems that many philosophical positions are very depressing and scary. For example, a world without God, a world without freedom, or a world where everything can be explained away by science, even a world where everything that makes us human can be reduced to neuroscience. Not all philosophers endorse these views I know but how can some philosophers be happy people and live fulfilling lives with some of the positions in philosophy? I enjoy philosophy but some of the possibilities scare me or worry me too much for me to think about.

Whether one finds view, philosophical or otherwise, is depressing or scary is likely a function of one’s prior beliefs. If you already belief that God is the source of all things, has endowed us with freedom, and is the ultimate moral authority, then challenges to the existence of God may indeed be scary and depressing. But many atheists believe that there couldn’t be a being of the sort that provides the positive explanations of the existence of the universe, human freedom, and morality. But it doesn’t follow that such individuals can’t embrace non-theistic answers to such questions. Atheists can and do theorize about the origin of the universe, the nature of human agency, and the specialness of humanity. One who believes that the mind can be understood by neuroscience doesn’t think that the mind is “explained away” by neuroscience. Rather it can be explained by neuroscience, and the possibility of such explanations for such a person may be exciting and uplifting. Such an individual may delight in the...
Philosophy

When using an example to try and support some point you are trying to make, is it better to use a common example that your audience is familiar with, or an exotic thought experiment?

The choice of an example in support of a philosophical position, or the choice of a counterexample to criticize a philosophical position, depends on the topic under investigation. If we were wondering whether two individuals could be physically identical but mentally different, for example, we might need to resort to the exotic twin earth examples found in the literature in the philosophy of mind. It is a good policy to avoid gratuitous exoticism, however, and instead use examples that involve familiar circumstances and contexts when possible. The reason for this is that in philosophical discussions the aim is to find as much common ground as possible. If examples used to ground a position are themselves controversial, then it will be more difficult to advance an argument based on them than if more familiar, accepted examples are invoked.
Education
Philosophy

How do you think technology will affect the teaching and practice of philosophy? During my undergraduate degree (in philosophy), I took notes in numerous classes on a laptop and could download papers from a variety of journals as PDF. I have seen numerous academic perspectives regarding technology and learning - from Bert Dreyfus' idea that the podcast of his lectures at Berkeley on philosophy and literature reduced class attendance, to law schools having "laptops off" sessions to science professors encouraging (or even requiring) graduate students to blog about their lab work. I even saw a theory that ethical theories are implicitly tied to the technology of their time - the printing press linking with Kant, utilitarianism, Mill-style liberalism, the mass media of television, radio and newspapers doing the same for Rawls and Nozick. And, of course, many philosophy professors like Brian Leiter now have blogs and some have podcasts too. At technical conferences, we use technology to provide things like ...

Computers have found their way into philosophy over the lasttwenty years or so, though philosophers disagree about the significance of thisfact for philosophy itself. Many philosophers see technology merely as an aidto productivity. There probably aren’t many professional philosophers who stilluse typewriters; most use computers for writing, and e-mail and the web for scholarlycommunication. The use of “Web 2.0” tools, such as blogs, wikis, and the likehave been adopted by still a minority of philosophers, and there remains a fairdegree of skepticism about the usefulness of such tools for research purposes.The availability of online access to many journals is a great help, thoughaccess and availability varies widely by institution, and by journal. There areonly a handful of “online only” journals. No established hard-copy journal thatI know of has gone exclusively online, though most have made back issuesavailable electronically, often through jstor.org or other aggregators. Use ofthe web by...