From a distance, philosophy seems weird, irrelevant, boring — and yet, also, a just a little intriguing. But what are philosophers really for? The answer is, handily, already contained in the word philosophy itself. In Ancient Greek, philo means “love” and sophia means “wisdom” — philosophers are people devoted to wisdom. Being wise means attempting to live and die well. In their pursuit of wisdom, philosophers have developed a very specific skill set — they have, over the centuries, become experts at many of the things that made people not very wise. Five stand out. 1. WE DON’T ASK BIG QUESTIONS 2. WE ARE VULNERABLE TO ERRORS OF COMMON SENSE 3. WE ARE MENTALLY CONFUSED 4. WE HAVE MUDDLED IDEAS ABOUT WHAT MAKES US HAPPY 5. WE PANIC AND LOSE PERSPECTIVE The wisdom of philosophy is in modern times mostly delivered in the form of books. But, in the past, philosophers sat in market squares and discussed their ideas with shopkeepers or went into government offices and palaces to give advice. It wasn’t abnormal to have a philosopher on your payroll. Philosophy was thought of as a normal, basic activity, rather than as an esoteric, optional extra. Nowadays, it’s not so much that we overtly deny this thought, but we just don’t have the right institutions set up to promulgate wisdom coherently in the world. In the future, though, when the value of philosophy is a little clearer, we can expect to meet more philosophers in daily life. They won’t be locked up, living mainly in university departments — because the points at which our unwisdom bites and messes up our lives are multiple and urgently need attention, right now. More to read here: brainpickings.org/2014/10/24/what-is-philosophy-for-alain-de-botton/
Posted on: Sun, 28 Dec 2014 00:20:31 +0000