Post made on TUESDAY
As we saw in class, many people have this question on their minds, why philosophy? As time has passed, society has evolved into a new “type of thinkers”, we don’t pay attention to the meaning of things anymore. People, including myself, loose the value of meaning and replace it with solid facts, facts who are visible and therefore are solid, facts that aren’t malleable and therefore reliable. So is no surprise one may wonder, why philosophy? Isn’t it the study of nothing?
After reading the introduction in Savater’s book, “The Questions of Life”, I reaffirmed my beliefs. All though I’ve always consider myself a logic person per se I also believe philosophy is an important teaching in our development as human beings. Philosophy is about the teaching of our inner-self, by philosophizing we learn about ourselves, matter that can’t be taught by anyone, therefore one must know the importance of it. If we understand philosophy we can understand or at least try to understand our world, starting from the very basics, ourselves.
We live in modern times, were ideas aren’t questioned as much as before, we believe in facts and what they represent but we don’t take a minute to deeply analyze them and understand what they represent to us as a person. This is why philosophy is so important, because it isn’t about learning 1+3, it is about finding the meaning of things and how this meaning relates to us and affect us. By philosophizing we learn about the things, ideas, facts, etc that mean the most to us and how we evolve according to them. We find meaning in our lives, in our actions and in our ways of thinking, this reinforces us as persons of true and self beliefs, persons with solid bases who are committed to make themselves better.
To conclude, philosophy is important because some may say is the study of nothing, but if you take a close look into it, you will find it’s the study of everything, of everything that MEANS something to us, that represent a major change in ourselves, so if we want to evolve as sons, daughters, moms, grandparents, we need to find the meaning of life and its derivatives, and philosophy gives us that gift. By thinking philosophically we learn the most valued type of learning, the one nobody can teach us but ourselves and will remain for the rest of our lives.
I agree with you when you say that because of the modern times we don't take time to analyze ideas. We think that because they are facts they are true. But we have to analyze and think deeper and think like there's no one else, and make you own thoughts and beliefs.
ReplyDeleteNice work here, Monica. And to add to Mariel’s line: It’s kind of ironic that we trust “facts” so much now, anyway, and rest in them, when they, too, are malleable (or more aptly put, unreliable). According to which news outlet you listened to last spring, either thousands or 17 people died of N1H1 in Mexico.
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