The Importance of Philosophy: Understanding How the World Works
What is Philosophy?
Philosophy, by definition, is the study of the fundamental nature of knowledge, reality, and existence, especially when considered as an academic discipline. Which that is pretty wordy, to simplify it, philosophy is essentially trying to understand and figure out how and why everything works. Famous people like Aristotle, Socrates and Descartes pathed the way to what we now know as philosophy. They asked things like what is good or bad? Why do we think and act the way that we do? What is our grand purpose in the universe or in life? What even is you, me or the self? Is it the brain? A spirit? Some of these questions are impossible to answer because they can vary from person to person or depending on what society deems the answer to be at the time. For some of the questions, there just is no current way to even know the answer. So why is philosophy important then, especially if it can’t always answer all the questions it may ask?
The Importance of Philosophy
Even though philosophy may not be able to give solid unmoving answers to all of life’s questions, it still gets us thinking and potentially coming up with our own answers. These answers may differ between people, like how some believe animals should have more rights and choose not to eat them, while others continue to be omnivores in there day to day life without giving a second thought about it. Can we for sure say who is in the right there? On one hand, we now know some animals are more intelligent than we previously thought. So should those animals be subjugated to potential suffering and imprisonment just to feed us? However, we as humans have ate animals for survival throughout our history and other animals obviously still attack, kill and eat each other. Yet, since we are more advanced beings than most, should we move away from such barbaric tendencies? Is it morally and ethically right to treat animals like this when we have the capabilities to get nutrients elsewhere?
The answer to that is whatever you want it to be. Currently in our society, the majority still leans in favor of owning and killing animals for our needs. Will this eventually change in the future? Only time will tell. Philosophy is important because it helps guide us towards understanding the world around us. Without asking questions like this, maybe we would still have slavery. Without someone thinking at least once, is it right to own someone else, it may be common place still to just have humans as property. Things we think are normal or common sense nowadays in our society weren’t always the norm. The Civil Rights movement in America happened roughly only 60 years ago. People used to not be able to use the same drinking fountain just because of the color of their skin, which to most (sadly, not to all) sounds ridiculous now. Plus, even today in a lot of places around the world women still don’t have rights or things like child marriages are still legal.
In most parts of the world, things like everyone having rights or not getting married to a child - just is common sense. However, in these places due to traditions or religions they believe the opposite is the right way or natural order of things. Why is this? How can such a large group of people have such different morals or ethics than so many other people? They are clearly in the wrong, right? Well, we as a society have mostly deemed those things to be wrong but is it just us who decides what is wrong or right? Or maybe it’s not us, it’s God or gods that tell us things should be a certain way.
Philosophy and Religion
Currently, according to Wikipedia, there are an estimated 10,000 distinct religions across the world. The top 3 most popular being Christianity, Islam and Irreligion (Atheism, Agnosticism, etc.). So just within the top 3 of the world, we get such differing views on things. Both Christianity and Islam believe in one God. However, Christianity believes in the Trinity and Jesus being the son of God while Islam believes Jesus is just a prophet and God is just a single indivisible being. Then, Irreligious people reject most religions, beliefs and the existence of a God or gods in their entirety. Obviously, someone has to be wrong then…right? According to most religions, other religions can’t exist because their God, gods, beliefs or views are the only true things in life.
Religions tell people how they should live their lives. They give them their morals, ethics and beliefs on how the world works. So philosophy and religion go hand in hand. However, philosophy primarily relies on reason, logic and critical analysis while religions rely more on faith, belief and revelation. If someone believes God, the creator of everything according to their religion, tells them to think and do things a certain way…how can you reasonably make them not listen to that belief? Even if that belief, to you, may seem very in the wrong, immoral or even evil. There is currently no way to prove or disprove God, yet some people still say they have undeniable proof and evidence that says He does exist. Which to them, no matter how much proof or evidence you may have to the contrary, they’ll still believe and follow what they’ve told is right.
The Importance of Understanding and Empathy
No matter what, I believe philosophy is important to learn about because it teaches you how to understand and empathize with the people and world around you. You may not live the same lives or believe the same things as other people but if you question why they think that way, you can come to a better understanding of how they got to their beliefs. Sometimes it may solidify your own beliefs or it may make you question things you once thought you knew. You may also find common ground and understanding that you once didn’t see. It’s important to keep an open mind and sometimes question the knowledge you know. Sometimes that knowledge will be backed up and you’ll be confident in what you know. However, that question can make you realize just how little we still need to learn and understand about each other and the universe.
Nobodies perfect and most people just try to do what they believe is right and good for them. However, those things may contradict what you think is right and good. That difference could be because of lack of knowledge in yours, theirs or both of your lives. Instead of immediately fearing, demonizing or shunning some idea you might not understand or be against - maybe first try to understand. Think. Question why? How? Then come up with an answer to the best of your ability. Maybe other people will agree with you, maybe they won’t. However, never stop being curious, keep questioning, keep learning and maybe one day we’ll all finally find the answer to everything. Until then, we’ll all just have to keep trying our best to figure out what is right and what is wrong. Thank you for reading.
