Jan 20, 2015 07:13 AM
http://iainews.iai.tv/articles/what-phil...o-auid-483
EXCERPT: Philosophers should stop paying so much attention to the history of philosophy and start asking humanity's most fundamental questions.
Philosophy is unique. There is no other academic discipline that has laboured for so long under such a massive misconception as to what its basic task ought to be.
The proper basic task of philosophy is to keep alive awareness of what our most fundamental, important, urgent problems are, what our best attempts are at solving them, and what the relative merits and demerits of these attempts are. A basic task is to articulate, and improve the articulation of, our fundamental problems, and make clear that there are answers to these problems implicit in much of what we do and think – implicit in science, politics, economic activity, art, the law, education and so on – these answers often being inadequate and having adverse consequences for life and thought in various ways as a result.
Philosophy should also try to help improve our attempted solutions to our fundamental problems, by imaginatively proposing and critically assessing possible solutions, all the time making clear, where relevant, that different possible solutions have different implications for diverse aspects of life. As a result of improving our attempted solutions to our fundamental problems we may thereby contribute to the improvement of our lives, and help us make progress towards a good world.
Even though these are the proper, fundamental tasks for philosophy, it hardly needs to be said that none of these tasks can be said to be the exclusive domain of philosophy or academic philosophers. Quite the contrary, a central task of philosophy is to stimulate as many people as possible to think about fundamental problems imaginatively and critically - that is, rationally. Philosophy is not to be characterized, or delineated from other disciplines in terms of who does it, but rather in terms of the fundamental character of the problems being tackled, and perhaps the value of the contribution in question.
What, then, are our fundamental problems? Our most fundamental problem of all, encompassing all others, can be put quite simply like this:
How can our human world, and the world of sentient life more generally, imbued with the experiential, consciousness, free will, meaning and value, exist and best flourish embedded as it is in the physical universe?
[...] How can our human world ... exist and best flourish embedded as it is in the real world?
[...] Academic philosophy today does not even recognize, as a fundamental problem of the discipline: What kind of inquiry can best help us realize what is of value in life? or, to quote the title of an article of mine What kind of inquiry can best help us create a good world?...
EXCERPT: Philosophers should stop paying so much attention to the history of philosophy and start asking humanity's most fundamental questions.
Philosophy is unique. There is no other academic discipline that has laboured for so long under such a massive misconception as to what its basic task ought to be.
The proper basic task of philosophy is to keep alive awareness of what our most fundamental, important, urgent problems are, what our best attempts are at solving them, and what the relative merits and demerits of these attempts are. A basic task is to articulate, and improve the articulation of, our fundamental problems, and make clear that there are answers to these problems implicit in much of what we do and think – implicit in science, politics, economic activity, art, the law, education and so on – these answers often being inadequate and having adverse consequences for life and thought in various ways as a result.
Philosophy should also try to help improve our attempted solutions to our fundamental problems, by imaginatively proposing and critically assessing possible solutions, all the time making clear, where relevant, that different possible solutions have different implications for diverse aspects of life. As a result of improving our attempted solutions to our fundamental problems we may thereby contribute to the improvement of our lives, and help us make progress towards a good world.
Even though these are the proper, fundamental tasks for philosophy, it hardly needs to be said that none of these tasks can be said to be the exclusive domain of philosophy or academic philosophers. Quite the contrary, a central task of philosophy is to stimulate as many people as possible to think about fundamental problems imaginatively and critically - that is, rationally. Philosophy is not to be characterized, or delineated from other disciplines in terms of who does it, but rather in terms of the fundamental character of the problems being tackled, and perhaps the value of the contribution in question.
What, then, are our fundamental problems? Our most fundamental problem of all, encompassing all others, can be put quite simply like this:
How can our human world, and the world of sentient life more generally, imbued with the experiential, consciousness, free will, meaning and value, exist and best flourish embedded as it is in the physical universe?
[...] How can our human world ... exist and best flourish embedded as it is in the real world?
[...] Academic philosophy today does not even recognize, as a fundamental problem of the discipline: What kind of inquiry can best help us realize what is of value in life? or, to quote the title of an article of mine What kind of inquiry can best help us create a good world?...
