Whenever it is found that we are able to think for ourselves on any given topic or aspect of reality to be observed a part of us becomes, so to speak liberated from the common mass of thinking that most people do and in so doing we also find ourselves enveloped by a sense of wonder and purpose in these moments of pure unconditioned thought.
From the moment we are born we are prepared for a conditioned life by those in authority who happen to raise us whether they are our parents, relatives or some other guardian and in us is instilled by others subjective modes of thinking due to our conditioning in this regard.
Now to follow societal conditioning without questioning it, I must add, seems to me to be a long road towards ignorance and error and this is because all second hand conditioned thinking is merely impersonal and lacks all trace of a personal judgement and assessment of the truth. Historical facts must be accepted as they are written but should also be compared to the common sense aspects of reality that we know of as well as to the other written or factual sources that exist for their truths to be understood realistically and beneficially. There are amongst us those completely delusional human beings who think that the fantasy and the conditioned thinking impressed on them by society could somehow apply to the experiences of their senses in the real world that they live in. Now clearly these fantasies, delusions and societal conditioning that they have thought about do not exist as part of their sense experiences in any shape or form. Errors in judgement usually occur when the subjective is confused for the objective and this is because all ideas of the truth originates from objective reality via the senses. Intense and acute subjectivity is a repression of one's own desire for objective and impartial truth and most human beings suffer from far too much subjectivity at the expense of objective truth and this is because of societal conditioning and plain old ignorance and mental laziness.
Objective truth and modes of thinking tends to get repressed because it usually undermines and puts into doubt many of the things that have been learned due to societal conditioning that is currently believed to be true whether religious or spiritual or just general things we have been taught by our guardians and society. The concept of the pure knowing subject is how the objective truth in matters is allowed to flood and saturate our consciousness and this is achieved in a sense by being empty, impartial and unopinionated in one's judgements of matters and to allow comparisons, differences, diversity, similarities, identities and sameness in ideas to occur by itself until a conception of the truth of a matter is arrived at in one's understanding organically and by itself without any subjective prodding or interference. The ego, the subjective and the personal aspects of one's being can be highly illusory and are what leads people astray and it is the universal and the objective which yields impartial truth. The solutions to the problems in the world and also in our lack of understanding of reality can be found once we have overcome all the false and arrogant aspects of the ego and the "I" that exist within us and this can only occur when we realize that the universal is preferable to the personal mind and ego and its petty, temporary, self-important and illusory attitudes. The personal mind and ego are only an illusory dewdrop relative to the universal and objective truth that is like an ocean and we should all learn to become one with this ocean of truth that exists out there in the cosmos. What I propose is that we as human beings live truthfully, straightforwardly, sincerely and objectively rather than subjectively, dishonestly and selfishly without any care for the truth, posterity and the universal. Impartial truth is only revealed inwardly when one is empirical, objective, real, factual, unbiased, unemotional, analytical, logical, scrutinizing and so on. There are many emotional subjectivists who claim that the truth does not even exist and if it does, then it only exists in language games or only in one's own opinions. I must add, that these subjectivists end up dealing in many sophisms. There are also people who claim that the concepts of the "subjective" and the "objective" modes of thinking and feeling are antiquated and are no longer useful, I think that this type of opinion could not be any more wrong. The concepts of the subjective and objective modes of thinking and feeling are very useful and important concepts in epistemology and cannot be replaced by anything else. Postmodernists in general like to niggle over the meaning of the word "truth" whenever they can, they behave as though objective truths do not really exist, they make out as though philosophers and scientists have never really figured out anything about the world and called them truths. Objective truths are things that we observe or discover about the world, whereas subjective truths are things that we create or that give us inner meaning, we can also say that subjective opinions can exist that are either true or false. Objective truths can never be viewed as being opinions or false conclusions, this is what makes them objective truths, they are facts and realities of the world, that exist independently of us or our wishes. Some people think that the concepts of subjective and objective create a dualism or dichotomy, but I think that these concepts can be understood in many ways that are useful and necessary. We can say that all things and events are not objective in and of themselves, we can say that many things simply exist as facts or events, etc., yet for any person to understand these things clearly and properly without bias, it is required that this person identifies with this object or thing in the sense of being a type of pure knowing subject or receptacle for what this object or event really is in essence. The fact is that we are separate from all the things in the world, so this is why we call ourselves a subject, with all the feelings, ideas, thoughts and emotions of our own that are different from the objects and events in the world. Many people talk about and claim that they can replace these useful concepts of the subjective and objective modes of conceptualization with better concepts, but then afterwards they fail to produce these so-called new useful concepts that they claim to have developed. Sometimes people confuse the concept of a "subject" with that of being "subjective". Some people think that because knowledge must past through a subject, then one is always in a subjective mode as this is occurring, this is not true. The word subject refers to a person or any organism that perceives or assesses knowledge, whereas being subjective means using one's own feelings and opinions in one's assessment of knowledge. The desire to want to know truths that exist independently of us always involves objectivity even though we classify ourselves as a subject, so we call these truths objective truths. It is far easier to attain objectivity in simple truths or observations, whereas it is much more difficult to obtain objectivity in elaborate theories of the world.
Friday 21 March 2008
Friday 14 March 2008
ON THE VALUE OF PHILOSOPHY
Anyone with a deep interest in philosophy will from time to time encounter cynical, apathetic, skeptical and generally negative attitudes towards the value and necessity of philosophy from the opinions of others. Anyone with a healthy interest and love for philosophy I feel would find that it is of great significance that he or she in a sense reassesses what philosophy really means to them and what they hope to accomplish by it. Speaking for myself I would say that philosophy is a science that is objective, empirical, real and factual and it does not have a thing to do with the subjective fancies that some people are known to invent in their imaginations, but in a sense philosophy does not deny and is not against the subjective experiences people have where and when it counts, for example, in the improvement of our lives and in self mastery. It is a well known fact that most of the ideas of the truth that we attain in our consciousness as human beings has been received through our senses and only a minority of the truths that we have are subjective. Subjective truths correspond with the minor facts of our lives and also to the few original ideas or insights we might happen to have.
It is true that philosophy does not produce anything in the way that science, engineering and industry does but this does not mean that philosophy is useless and redundant. Even though philosophy does not produce objects and things in the literal sense it cannot be considered of any less value therefore and this is because we cannot learn anything from the possession of objects themselves but only from what they can do, whereas we can actually learn many things from the use of philosophy itself as an act and a process and as a thing that we do analytically. Even though we can value physical objects as products and tools, they are ultimately of less importance and value to us than what is going on in our minds and feelings and actions and this is because how we live our life determines whether we are happy or fulfilled and so on or whether we are living purposefully. The value of our lives does not exist in the physical objects that we use and own as products but exists within us in how we live our lives, in our thoughts, feelings and actions. The way we live our life is enhanced and improved by the correct use of philosophy applied in all the aspects of our lives. Science, engineering and industry, etc, cannot teach us how to live and these things cannot teach us how to find meaning because only philosophy can teach us these things. Philosophers, for example, should not have to compete against scientists and this is because scientists only think about a few particular types of phenomenon and things, whereas philosophers think about all the different aspects of reality and its truths whether subjective and personal or objective or impersonal. Now philosophy attempts to figure out and describe the truths of reality, its laws, rules, principles, axioms, etc; philosophy uses logic and different methods of reasoning to do this and to attain knowledge. The more that philosophy evolves the more limited people attempt to make it and an example of this can be found in some of the statements of Ludwig Wittgenstein in the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus where he tries to make out that philosophy is only limited to the logical clarification of thoughts and he claims that philosophy has not a thing to do with nature, reality or the natural sciences. According to wittgenstein's narrow view a philosopher has no right to have theories on reality and nature, which begs the question; since when was natural philosophy not philosophy anymore?
The whole point about philosophy is that a philosopher can love wisdom and truth in all its forms and a philosopher should have theories, ideas, inferences, insights, hypotheses, etc, on all aspects of reality and nature and its truths. I have a strong belief people should quit limiting the role of philosophy in their opinion of what they think it should be. Jacques Derrida the 20th century philosopher claims that human reason has been shaped by a dishonest pursuit of certainty and that reason is indifferent to the other (i.e., the things it does not know or cannot account for either morally or factually) and in a sense this makes reason a tyranny which can only be sustained by the evils of repressing and excluding what is uncertain. According to this so-called dishonesty of reason humans are lead into atrocities such as world wars and the launching of atomic bombs etc. I do not think that reason is dishonest or blind in all the avenues it takes up or is applied to, but it does seem to be this way when it is used to back up opinion, choice or self-interest. But when reason is applied in an objective sense and also with a full awareness of right and wrong it becomes a tool that is useful and has aided human beings for thousands of years. Derrida's observation only points out that reason has both negative as well as positive aspects to it, but then again people can say this about many things in nature anyway. Reason can only be blind if it is clouded by the wills desire to fulfill its own blind, evil or dishonest needs and motives and also the will does not like to be opposed and opposition makes the will more evil and cruel. Objective reason on the other hand always attempts to create a balance and sense of justice in all assessments of behaviour or potential behaviour. Reason by its very nature has dual negative and positive aspects to it in the sense that it has a negative, dishonest and blind aspect to it, but it also has a positive, useful, harmonious and objective aspect to it also and so one has to be careful in how one uses, and justifies their own use of reason in the analytical sense of being able to explain it and condone its use in any given situation.
Obviously reason and rationality are more favourable than irrationality and confusion but the use of reason itself must be explained and condoned by facts and motives and by further reasons also otherwise it is merely blind or can be used for all kinds of ends whether these ends happen to be good or bad. All the motives and reasons for why people do things ultimately comes from their own inner nature and this is why people can use reason to condone and justify negative, positive and ignorant things because these are all aspects of human beings and this is because human beings are not perfect and there are also many things that they do not know or understand and this is because they have not given it sufficient thought in the course of their lives. All true philosophers know that it is not reason or logic that is at fault in the world, but it is simply that the world and the people in it are not perfect. Philosophy gives us certainty and guidance and solutions and also the knowledge of the reasons for things and also the knowledge of the truth. Where would human beings be without reason and philosophy? Animals do not have these things to the extent that human beings do and look at where they are in the scheme of things! It would be impossible for a great philosopher to abandon, or doubt his or her own philosophy in favour of the wretched ignorance of the masses and their herd type of behaviour. The worst and most useless kind of philosophers are the one's who cannot think for themselves and are known to swallow the philosophies of other thinkers hook line and sinker to the extent that they are even known to repeat the errors of those other philosophers they have followed. Even though the western philosophical tradition has given a lot to humanity it has a negative aspect to it in the sense that it puts a lot of emphasis on argument and critical thinking. Discourse itself should be a means to an end and peoples ego's should not get in the way of attaining to truths, solutions and conclusions in their propositions and hypotheses.
It has become clear to me why some thinkers and philosophers have a cynical or oppositional attitude towards a lot of propositions and theories that they encounter and this is because many people have an insecure and unsure grasp of the truth, but yet have a sort of misplaced ego-trip type of certainty and love of argumentation and critical thinking. Argumentation is only useful in a discourse when both parties are unsure of the result of the propositions and theories being discussed or when one party is not convinced of a truth the other happens to be sure of. Written philosophy as a representation, description and analysis of the truths of reality and phenomenon goes through long chains of rationalizations, because in a sense writing is an extension of speech and speech which is a passive action but of thoughts is in turn an extension of ideas which are representations of empirically perceived things which we have attained via the senses. Now for a person to claim that written philosophy is merely a dead useless undecided exercise which quickly loses its meaning will of course not find any value in philosophy because in their view there is no connection between observed truths and its representations in written form, but if this was so then one would not be able to practice philosophy at all or use it in any way which is not so because philosophy itself has been utilized by many people for thousands of years with obvious results, even the declaration of independence itself is a philosophy but presented in political form and is well known to have created many changes in the fabric of society both practically and as an ideal. Philosophy is not just a word game or a language error game like that cynical sophist Wittgenstein claims. Philosophy is not useless and absurd nonsense as some people assume. Philosophy is the most important and significant thing in our lives and this is because as a human being we have no choice about the fact that we need a philosophy. Science, materialism and all materialistic ways of thinking are secondary, whereas our philosophy and exact way of thinking, and feeling and how we live our life is a primary and vital thing to us and this can only be developed by our own philosophy both subjective and objective. Philosophy allows us to be truthful to ourselves at all times, and also about the world and our place in it. Philosophy also allows us to utilize reason to make the correct and best decisions for us personally.
We can say that philosophy is a science in its reasoning abilities, in the sense that it can demonstrate most of its conclusions by example and evidence. Philosophy can also be viewed as a science of knowledge because it can be systematically applied to phenomena to achieve results (in other words, it is a system like science). In my essay called "Philosophy Is Not An Exact Science But It Is A General Science Nonetheless" I explain my ideas concerning philosophy as a science more fully. Now philosophy is a science that is empirical, factual, objective, actual, real, logical, analytical, scrutinizing, impartial and unbiased. Philosophy deals in descriptions, propositions, statements, attempted explanations, advice, suggestions, theories, hypotheses and notions, etc. Not all the conclusions and theories of philosophy can be demonstrated conclsusively, but one can say this about science also and this is because our senses cannot go everywhere to demonstrate everything.
All propositions in philosophy should be factual and rational and relate to actual things, either concretely, abstractly or logically.
It is true that philosophy does not produce anything in the way that science, engineering and industry does but this does not mean that philosophy is useless and redundant. Even though philosophy does not produce objects and things in the literal sense it cannot be considered of any less value therefore and this is because we cannot learn anything from the possession of objects themselves but only from what they can do, whereas we can actually learn many things from the use of philosophy itself as an act and a process and as a thing that we do analytically. Even though we can value physical objects as products and tools, they are ultimately of less importance and value to us than what is going on in our minds and feelings and actions and this is because how we live our life determines whether we are happy or fulfilled and so on or whether we are living purposefully. The value of our lives does not exist in the physical objects that we use and own as products but exists within us in how we live our lives, in our thoughts, feelings and actions. The way we live our life is enhanced and improved by the correct use of philosophy applied in all the aspects of our lives. Science, engineering and industry, etc, cannot teach us how to live and these things cannot teach us how to find meaning because only philosophy can teach us these things. Philosophers, for example, should not have to compete against scientists and this is because scientists only think about a few particular types of phenomenon and things, whereas philosophers think about all the different aspects of reality and its truths whether subjective and personal or objective or impersonal. Now philosophy attempts to figure out and describe the truths of reality, its laws, rules, principles, axioms, etc; philosophy uses logic and different methods of reasoning to do this and to attain knowledge. The more that philosophy evolves the more limited people attempt to make it and an example of this can be found in some of the statements of Ludwig Wittgenstein in the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus where he tries to make out that philosophy is only limited to the logical clarification of thoughts and he claims that philosophy has not a thing to do with nature, reality or the natural sciences. According to wittgenstein's narrow view a philosopher has no right to have theories on reality and nature, which begs the question; since when was natural philosophy not philosophy anymore?
The whole point about philosophy is that a philosopher can love wisdom and truth in all its forms and a philosopher should have theories, ideas, inferences, insights, hypotheses, etc, on all aspects of reality and nature and its truths. I have a strong belief people should quit limiting the role of philosophy in their opinion of what they think it should be. Jacques Derrida the 20th century philosopher claims that human reason has been shaped by a dishonest pursuit of certainty and that reason is indifferent to the other (i.e., the things it does not know or cannot account for either morally or factually) and in a sense this makes reason a tyranny which can only be sustained by the evils of repressing and excluding what is uncertain. According to this so-called dishonesty of reason humans are lead into atrocities such as world wars and the launching of atomic bombs etc. I do not think that reason is dishonest or blind in all the avenues it takes up or is applied to, but it does seem to be this way when it is used to back up opinion, choice or self-interest. But when reason is applied in an objective sense and also with a full awareness of right and wrong it becomes a tool that is useful and has aided human beings for thousands of years. Derrida's observation only points out that reason has both negative as well as positive aspects to it, but then again people can say this about many things in nature anyway. Reason can only be blind if it is clouded by the wills desire to fulfill its own blind, evil or dishonest needs and motives and also the will does not like to be opposed and opposition makes the will more evil and cruel. Objective reason on the other hand always attempts to create a balance and sense of justice in all assessments of behaviour or potential behaviour. Reason by its very nature has dual negative and positive aspects to it in the sense that it has a negative, dishonest and blind aspect to it, but it also has a positive, useful, harmonious and objective aspect to it also and so one has to be careful in how one uses, and justifies their own use of reason in the analytical sense of being able to explain it and condone its use in any given situation.
Obviously reason and rationality are more favourable than irrationality and confusion but the use of reason itself must be explained and condoned by facts and motives and by further reasons also otherwise it is merely blind or can be used for all kinds of ends whether these ends happen to be good or bad. All the motives and reasons for why people do things ultimately comes from their own inner nature and this is why people can use reason to condone and justify negative, positive and ignorant things because these are all aspects of human beings and this is because human beings are not perfect and there are also many things that they do not know or understand and this is because they have not given it sufficient thought in the course of their lives. All true philosophers know that it is not reason or logic that is at fault in the world, but it is simply that the world and the people in it are not perfect. Philosophy gives us certainty and guidance and solutions and also the knowledge of the reasons for things and also the knowledge of the truth. Where would human beings be without reason and philosophy? Animals do not have these things to the extent that human beings do and look at where they are in the scheme of things! It would be impossible for a great philosopher to abandon, or doubt his or her own philosophy in favour of the wretched ignorance of the masses and their herd type of behaviour. The worst and most useless kind of philosophers are the one's who cannot think for themselves and are known to swallow the philosophies of other thinkers hook line and sinker to the extent that they are even known to repeat the errors of those other philosophers they have followed. Even though the western philosophical tradition has given a lot to humanity it has a negative aspect to it in the sense that it puts a lot of emphasis on argument and critical thinking. Discourse itself should be a means to an end and peoples ego's should not get in the way of attaining to truths, solutions and conclusions in their propositions and hypotheses.
It has become clear to me why some thinkers and philosophers have a cynical or oppositional attitude towards a lot of propositions and theories that they encounter and this is because many people have an insecure and unsure grasp of the truth, but yet have a sort of misplaced ego-trip type of certainty and love of argumentation and critical thinking. Argumentation is only useful in a discourse when both parties are unsure of the result of the propositions and theories being discussed or when one party is not convinced of a truth the other happens to be sure of. Written philosophy as a representation, description and analysis of the truths of reality and phenomenon goes through long chains of rationalizations, because in a sense writing is an extension of speech and speech which is a passive action but of thoughts is in turn an extension of ideas which are representations of empirically perceived things which we have attained via the senses. Now for a person to claim that written philosophy is merely a dead useless undecided exercise which quickly loses its meaning will of course not find any value in philosophy because in their view there is no connection between observed truths and its representations in written form, but if this was so then one would not be able to practice philosophy at all or use it in any way which is not so because philosophy itself has been utilized by many people for thousands of years with obvious results, even the declaration of independence itself is a philosophy but presented in political form and is well known to have created many changes in the fabric of society both practically and as an ideal. Philosophy is not just a word game or a language error game like that cynical sophist Wittgenstein claims. Philosophy is not useless and absurd nonsense as some people assume. Philosophy is the most important and significant thing in our lives and this is because as a human being we have no choice about the fact that we need a philosophy. Science, materialism and all materialistic ways of thinking are secondary, whereas our philosophy and exact way of thinking, and feeling and how we live our life is a primary and vital thing to us and this can only be developed by our own philosophy both subjective and objective. Philosophy allows us to be truthful to ourselves at all times, and also about the world and our place in it. Philosophy also allows us to utilize reason to make the correct and best decisions for us personally.
We can say that philosophy is a science in its reasoning abilities, in the sense that it can demonstrate most of its conclusions by example and evidence. Philosophy can also be viewed as a science of knowledge because it can be systematically applied to phenomena to achieve results (in other words, it is a system like science). In my essay called "Philosophy Is Not An Exact Science But It Is A General Science Nonetheless" I explain my ideas concerning philosophy as a science more fully. Now philosophy is a science that is empirical, factual, objective, actual, real, logical, analytical, scrutinizing, impartial and unbiased. Philosophy deals in descriptions, propositions, statements, attempted explanations, advice, suggestions, theories, hypotheses and notions, etc. Not all the conclusions and theories of philosophy can be demonstrated conclsusively, but one can say this about science also and this is because our senses cannot go everywhere to demonstrate everything.
All propositions in philosophy should be factual and rational and relate to actual things, either concretely, abstractly or logically.
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