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Is Philosophy Dead?
Human beings as a species are unique among all other known species in their level of consciousness and capacity for abstract reason. Whether this is the result of evolutionary chance or god(s) given ability it has produced a yearning. A desire to understand the universe around us and, as part of that universe, a desire to understand ourselves.
We ask questions and search for answers.
Philosophy forms part of this desire and the search for the answers to our questions. As long as we continue to ask questions and until we find all the answers the essence of philosophy will remain to some degree a part of human activity. In this sense philosophy is certainly alive and will remain so for sometime to come. However we commonly regard philosophy as something more specific than just a search for answers
Its contemporary meaning would seem to be narrower. Much of what once may have been considered philosophy has been sectioned off and given separate titles. Language changes and evolves over time it is a dynamic medium. One way of interpreting a death for philosophy is not that any of the substance of philosophy and philosophical practice has disappeared just that the use of the term itself has died out. It's respective elements and activities given different titles: science, sociology, psychology
Philosophy does not seem to have yet suffered a linguistic death, it is still in common usage. Another linguistic possibility for the death of philosophy is that its meaning has evolved to such an extent that it is perverted beyond recognition and that the essence of its meaning is dead. Philosophy remains linked in its modern meaning to wisdom, truth and the search for answers. Philosophy therefore escapes this second linguistic death.
We do however talk of philosophy in different ways and within these ways it's meaning changes.
Firstly we speak of: a philosophy of education, the philosophy of Kant, political philosophies and even in the contemporary world the corporate philosophy of a business. This is philosophy as a noun. These philosophies are essentially systems of answers or if we wish to avoid the conclusiveness of 'answers', systems of belief or of ideas. As long as humans remain able to think this type of philosophy is safe from death. For even if we chose to believe in nothing (scepticism or in its extreme nihilism) that is still a belief system or system of answers, in the same way that to choose to do nothing is in itself a choice between action and inaction.
If we consider Philosophy as a verb, to philosophise, we get perhaps a purer form, not just of answers but also of method. A dictionary defines philosophy as "The use of reason and argument in seeking truth and knowledge It is this methodological approach to philosophy that is perhaps more interesting and what we mean when we consider the academic discipline of philosophy. At first glance though this would seem not too different from a popular definition of science but we instinctively see philosophy as separate from science.
The difference between the two is in the sort of truth and knowledge they seek or put another way in the type of questions they attempt to find answers for. As we have already said we do not consider practical questions such as: what time does the number six bus leave, philosophical ones. Neither would we consider this question a scientific one. Other questions such as: at what temperature does water boil, or why do objects fall, we would consider scientific questions but we would still not consider them philosophical. These scientific questions are more abstract and less directly practical, although the implementations of their answers may be practical, crucially however they have practical answers. Philosophical questions do not have straightforward practical answers.
One explanation for a reported decline in philosophy is that there are simply fewer questions without practical answers. The splintering of philosophy into the natural and social sciences is an indication of this. These fields emerged as the philosophical questions which formed their base such as; why do people go mad, began to have practical answers; imbalances in brain chemistry.
Academic philosophy is more of a process than a conclusion, a search for none-straightforward answers to none-practical questions that deal with the fundamentals of existence: I am alive, what should I do with my life, am I free, what is freedom? The process is rational in nature and based on argument. The true philosopher also differs in attitude from their counterparts the politician or the theorist, whilst philosophising on an issue they are attempting to discover the truth and not win an argument or defend a position. If we now have some idea of what philosophy is, or isn't, what is its role, its appeal and does it achieve anything.
It must also be remembered that Philosophy itself is not a homogenous discipline. It is divided into schools of thought and areas of subject. Individual branches can sprout, grow and wither without causing the death of the tree. Hence you will find few people arguing an Aristotelian categories approach to reality whilst a positivist empirical theory remains strongly held. Broadly speaking philosophy can be divided simply into two categories: moral or ethical philosophy and epistemology or theory of knowledge.
Morality as a philosophical pursuit is far from dead, and as long as we wish to distinguish between right and wrong and attempt to do so rationally moral philosophy will continue. Indeed the modern world with its possibilities of allowing us to wipe out whole races and also create, select and improve new life both natural and artificial throws up perhaps many more ethical questions than were faced by the ancient Greek moralist. Epistemology requires a greater examination for if in this age of science we are certain of our knowledge, or for the post modernist certain of our uncertainty, epistemology may indeed have died.
The pressure to somehow make progress in philosophy during the 20th century led Philosophy to change its focus. The rejection of much of the grand classical philosophies and a concentration on what philosophy could achieve through analytical philosophy and explorations that sort to clarify language as an attempt to solve, or dissolve (Wittgenstein) the problems of philosophy. This endeavour too seems not to have produced the analytic objective answers that its proponents wished.
This is perhaps because it was born out of a frustration with philosophies inability to make progress and therefore delved into the areas of language and mathematics in order to do so, but yet found these answers lacking in philosophical pronouncements and indeed merely uncovered yet more philosophical questions. As Gellner wrote a cleric who loses his faith abandons his calling, but a philosopher who loses his redefines his subject. This dead end for philosophy is the result of defining in terms of its ends rather than its means, the strive to achieve results focused philosophy not on its methodological routes but what could it produce.
The questions philosophers concern themselves with do change. They do not stand outside their time but are a part of it.Philosophy in its truest form can be perverted by asking questions in certain ways or by pursuing arguments solely to justify opinions already held. Philosophy has been used in history to justify the supremacy of one ethnic group and commit genocide towards another. Much of the heralding of the death of philosophy has come from philosophers themselves. Heidegger said that philosophy died with Nietzsche, and that Nietzsche killed it.
What is meant by this is that post-modernist thought claims a relativist perspective. Since we can never stand outside our time, we can never be without our own bias and therefore can never gain objective knowledge. If we can not have objective knowledge, truth, then the pursuit of Philosophy is pointless. This is to fail to understand two things. Firstly what philosophy is, as we have already discussed, that it's essence lies more in process than in conclusion. For philosophy is the love of wisdom as opposed to the possession of wisdom.
Secondly it fails to see that this relativist pronouncement far from settling all the questions of philosophy creates new ones. If relativism proclaims that we can not have objective knowledge, it is itself a form of knowledge and therefore can not be held objectively. Is relativism therefore self-contradictory? Much like the positivists verification principle that itself lacks the capacity for verification it is not an entirely unproblematic position.
As Suber writes:
Metaphysics may be dead; but epistemology cannot die until proclamations of its death are not so epistemologically naive and problematic that they demand the attention of philosophers.
Indeed it is with the solution to this problem that contemporary epistemology concerns itself with and has lead to the emergence of new and interesting ideas. To call a doctrine post-modernism is a step of supreme arrogance just as it is to proclaim the end of time. It is also a symptom of a naivety best avoided among philosophers as to a finality of their own time. As with science that once proclaimed with certainty an earth centered universe, and then with even more zeal a universe based on Newtonian physics and has now had to accept the emergence of a quantum reality. Philosophy too is a genus of truth.
Although we have said that science has absorbed many of the areas of thought that used to be classed as philosophical that is not to say that science has detracted from philosophy. Science often produces as many questions as it achieves answers. On the epistemological side questions like how can a causal understanding of the universe be reconciled with an instinctive experience of freedom. On the moral side, what are the ethics of cloning, should we be playing god. Science also does not provide the definite answers that perhaps it desires. It evolves: Newtonian mechanics gives way to a quantum understand. It also persistently fails to answer some of the very biggest questions, what is the nature of consciousness.
Philosophy also persistently fails to answers any of these big questions. It does however work through arguments, finding their flaws working through their inconsistencies, the contradictive nature of relativism for example. This work will continue and with it will be thrown up new questions the process is self-perpetuating. It may not reach any definite conclusions but in many ways it does make progress even if this progress is negative by discrediting theories.
Still why continue with it if it never achieves any definite conclusions? Has my enjoyment of music ever achieved anything, why do we love and not simply reproduce, the question why bother to philosophise if it does not achieve anything is as much as philosophical one as any. It has no straightforward practical answer. The often mocked philosophy student when asked to explain why the table is not really there might do better to explain that whether the table is actually there or not is irrelevant in practical sense as long as we can still put our drinks on it. Many of the great philosophical questions if answered would in no way change our everyday reality. The questions themselves and the attempt to achieve their answers in fascinating a reflection of a true love of wisdom for its own sake, aside from any practical benefit.
We still feel the need to ask these questions. Indeed in the world at large there seems to have been an emergence of a dissatisfaction with technocracy and a re-emergence of the need for a deeper understanding. This re-emergence manifests itself in increased religion, in spirituality and in popular philosophy. These are simply different approaches to the search for answers and truth. Whilst philosophy builds itself on reasoned argument religion builds itself on faith. Spiritualism seeks to find answers outside the material world these answers can be based on faith or on reasoning hence it need not be incompatible with neither religion nor philosophy. The academic philosopher should not fear the popularising of philosophy. It is true that such philosophy lacks the subtly and rigour of its academic counterpart
What necessitates the answers to our questions to be complicated or come from the academic field? It also serves to fuel philosophy with interest. Sunday afternoon daydreams in the greater minds develop into life long pursuits and serious theories. We continue to ask these questions because it is in our nature to do so and that they confront us within our normal lives. Humans think and that thought goes beyond the mere necessities of survival to greater questions, unless this changes philosophy will remain in essence a part of life.
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Conclusion
Philosophy is alive. It is alive in three important ways. Firstly that systems of ideas persist. Secondly that philosophy is not an end but a methodological process, one that requires reason and argument to discover truth. That this process is not yet complete is not a signal of its death but of the enormity of its task and the limitations of our endeavours. Not only does it have work in the ethical field to consider but also within the epistemological realm. Finally philosophy remains alive in attitude and in essence as a reflection on the human condition and a desire to ask questions and seek answers. Simply put a love of wisdom.
It is the egoist in us all that declares the primacy of our own age; the philosopher would do better to avoid this. Certainly philosophy is not free from episodes of poor thinking or periods of bigotry, but it is the true philosophers job to keep the torch of truth burning not to dwell depressively on their own demise.
Bibliography:
Brenda Almond, Exploring Philosophy, Blackwell: Oxford, 1995
John Cottingham (Ed), Western Philosophy An Anthology, Macmillan Publishing: London,2001
Thomas Mautner (Ed), The Penguin Dictionary of Philosophy, Penguin Books: London, 2000
P3, Brenda Almond, Exploring Philosophy, Blackwell: Oxford, 1995
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