What is Philosophy?

[Rakhel]

I am sure this subject has been asked about, however, I am also sure it has been a while since it has been explained to those of us who couldn't find our way out of a paper bag.

So can anyone explain philosophy?

 

[Skwim]

From Wikipedia,

"Philosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems, such as those connected with existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language."

 

[Rakhel]

I don't want wiki answers. Wiki requires no thought. No originality.

Using Wiki is cheating.

 

[elmarna]

: hamster hilosophy is a way of thinking that captures a concept with imagry that maintains the ways the person considers them. The line of thinking usually is in the form of "wisdoms" or a way of life that is used as a good "way".

 

[Rakhel]

Whose wisdom and who makes the decisions about which wisdom is the right wisdom?

 

[Wakeup]

Whose wisdom and who makes the decisions about which wisdom is the right wisdom?

I know Philosophy encompasses certain schools of thought like what is moral, knowledge, best, true, noble, and pure , but I think your philosophizing so long as your using reasoning to determine what is true. The main thing that is important is that its objective rational.

 

[chinu]

What is Philosophy?

Imagination flying with the help of two feathers: True and False.

 

[LegionOnomaMoi]

So can anyone explain philosophy?

It's the inquiry into the possibility of explaining and the validity of explanations.

 

[Brickjectivity]

Its coming up with a way to describe moral issues such that different people will come to the same conclusions about them.

Socrates questioning method is a good example. He would ask leading questions that would always have only specific answers. His series of questions would bring students to desired conclusions, and at the end not only would they have conclusions but also the ability to explain those conclusions.

That's Philosophy. Today you can find a lot of Philosophical scholars, but they all rely upon the works of certain very influential ones. They're influential, because they've come up with these methods that work well for teaching people how to derive a basis for their moral decisions.

 

[Rakhel]

To be honest, I forgot I had asked this question and the reason for the question

 

[Revoltingest]

Philosophy is the study of things outside of the material world.
(Tis no wonder then that philosophers ain't much use.)

 

[Willamena]

I once read that philosophy is nothing more than devising and seeking an answer to the question "Why?" In this sense, philosophy is the exploration of what it is to be, and specifically what it is to be "man" (including women).

I suggest... a different approach to the question, "What is philosophy?" and start from a very simple proposition, one that contains the central question of all philosophy: that the human being, as distinct from God, is mortal or, to speak like the philosophers, is a 'finite being', limited in space and time. As distinct from animals, moreover, a human being is the only creature who is aware of his limits. He knows that he will die, and that his near ones, those he loves, will also die. Consequently he cannot prevent himself from thinking about this state of affaris, which is disturbing and absurd, almost unimaginable. And, naturally enough, he is inclined to turn first of all to those religions which promise 'salvation'.
(Luc Ferry, 'A Brief History of Thought')

The final line is about religions that promise salvation, and how Western philosophy is pitted against them to find a rationality to salvation. Hence the metaphysical questions of what it means to be (ontology) and what it means to believe and to know (epistemology) were foundational in the West; in the East, where Brahman or Tao was an informing image, it was the question of man's relations: to man (ethics), to the world and to the gods.

 

[idav]

Philosophy tackles the ought questions and how they are applicable.

 

[Skwim]

From Wikipedia,

"Philosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems, such as those connected with existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language."

I don't want wiki answers. Wiki requires no thought. No originality.

Using Wiki is cheating.

Dummy me for not realizing this was a contest.

 

[Rakhel]

Dummy me for not realizing this was a contest.

Well seriously, if I had wanted an answer from WIki, I would have looked myself.

 

[Sir Doom]

I would say a philosophy is a conceptual mental filter through which one passes all thought and action through in order to pre-determine general reactions to hypothetical future events or challenges.

Philosophy itself would be the act of attempting to create the most infallible filter.

 

[Skwim]

Well seriously, if I had wanted an answer from WIki, I would have looked myself.

So what's wrong with Wiki's answer? Or is it that you know what philosophy is, but just wanted to see if we knew or not? In which case a simple:

Do you know what philosophy is?

□ YES
□ No

​

Would suffice.

 

[Willamena]

So what's wrong with Wiki's answer? Or is it that you know what philosophy is, but just wanted to see if we knew or not?

Belief in the concrete and absolute nature of definitions is but one of many philosophical theories.

 

[Rakhel]

Sheesh.
you are making this more difficult than it should be.
As I said if I had wanted a wiki answer I would have looked.
So, obviously I must have wanted an independent opinion of what you(general) thought Philosophy was.
That would explain why I considered a wiki answer cheating and without thought.

 

[Skwim]

Belief in the concrete and absolute nature of definitions is but one of many philosophical theories.

That's strange. I had several classes in philosophy while in college and don't remember any such theory.