Philosophy, it Seemed, Was One

Philosophy, it seemed, was one of those disciplines that involved professors in tweed coats and thick glasses, playing chess and smoking their pipe, arguing over things that were so esoteric and complicated they had no real relevance to anyone's life, save other academics. In fact, philosophy attempts to answer questions about what really makes one human -- about the similarities and differences we all share, but more why we tend to think and act the way we do. What is fascinating is finding out that many of the same questions have been debated for over 10,000 years -- since humans first began to group together in cities and organize a cultural hierarchy. The most fascinating part, though, is that many of these same questions remain unanswered after so many thousands of years of debate, interchange of ideas, and technological evolution.

This is really echoed in Bertrand Russell's Prejudices of a Practical Man. For Russell, the practical man is concerned with the here and now, the tangible, the visible, not the strategic or esoteric -- even though he acknowledges that they exist. Philosophy, though, takes that mind a bit further and provides a different set of values and perceptions that while difficult, help the individual grow and actualize. The practical person sees what they perceive by their senses as real -- the philosophical mind knows that it is the individual perception that is real, not the actuality of the object or event. In fact, Russell is surely right when he says that philosophy helps define what knowledge is, and focuses us on ways to move beyond what we thought in the past to "why" we thought what we did, or think what we do now. To have a way of establishing a moral template -- the ethics of being able to live together in a cooperative society in which the positive outweighs the negative, we must have a way to consider (cognate, think, ruminate) over issues that defy perception. That, it seems, is why we have so many types of knowledge -- from metaphysics (what is really real and how do we know that), through epistemology (the study of the scope and limits of knowledge), to values (ethics, morals, and aesthetics as a way to define beauty, good, evil, and humanity).

The central ideas about this knowledge may be categorized into four parts: knowledge, wisdom, belief, and opinion. Some are individualized -- some culturally based, some based solely on sensory perception, and some, from consideration. In its most practical state, "knowledge" may be information about which we are aware -- facts, figures, accepted truths, ways of doing things. Wisdom, in contrast, takes that knowledge and allows individuals to make judgments and decisions based on knowledge -- presumably gained through experience or the process of learning. Belief is a culturally (thus cognitively) based make up of what we hold to be true simply because we innately know it without the need of proof or method. Opinion, is a personalized belief of judgment that has no proof, no certainty, but generally takes in information (whether correct or not) and synthesizes it into an idea that allows for individuals to have stands and strong views on certain subjects or ideas. It seems that most philosophers believe that a critical difference between the four is one of degree. Trust, for instance, involves individual responsibility and accountability -- therefore that trust must be based on something we wither know intrinsically or know experientially. The degree of knowledge, then, is where that knowledge arises, and how it transforms or aids the individual. For example, who would one rather have on a trip through the Kalahari Desert; a Rhodes Scholar who speaks the language, has studied the anthropological history of the Bushmen; or a seasoned tracker, survivalist who has not real factual knowledge about linguistics, colonialism, or history, but can clearly survive in the wilderness? Thus, the overwhelming issue is that often philosophy is relevant -- or utilitarian in its presumptions. However, simply being able to discuss and reinvent one's own personal believes makes it a powerful societal necessity that separates out the tactical and primitive society, from the strategic and advanced cooperative maze.