What is Philosophy

 

 

What is Philosophy?

 

Philosophy originates from the Greek words Philia (meaning love) and Sophia (meaning wisdom), and thus literally means the Love of Wisdom. It is the pursuit of knowledge and understanding about fundamental aspects of existence, reality, values, mind, and reason.

• • Wisdom refers to the quality of having deep knowledge, meaningful experience, sound judgment, and the ability to understand complex aspects of life and reality.

• • The Greek philosopher Socrates referred to himself not as a wise man, but as a lover of wisdom, in contrast to the Sophists who claimed to be wise.

• • The term “sophomore” is derived from this tension — it combines sophos (wise) and moros (foolish), referring to someone who believes they know a lot but lacks true understanding.

Misconceptions Today

• • In modern usage, “philosophy” is often misunderstood as a theory, viewpoint, or guiding principle about any topic — for example, people refer to the philosophy of business, education, or even fitness.

• • Many people today also confuse philosophy with psychology or spiritual sciences, thinking it involves telepathy, spiritualism, dreams, or mystical experiences.

• • A psychologist studies observable behaviors and mental processes based on cause-and-effect relationships, while a philosopher addresses more fundamental questions — such as the value of facts, their validity, and their relation to other truths.

Definitions of Philosophy

Various thinkers and traditions have offered definitions of philosophy. Below are key interpretations:

 

• • According to Aristotle, philosophy is “thinking that aims at maximum concreteness” — meaning a type of thinking that attempts to discover connected truths across all experiences.

     

    • • The word “concrete” comes from the Latin concrescere, meaning to grow together.
    • • “Abstract” is derived from abstraho, meaning to draw away or to exclude.

     

• • Philosophy is often described as the acquisition of knowledge — not just isolated facts, but how those facts interrelate in a meaningful and rational system.

• • George Berkeley stated that “philosophy is nothing but the study of wisdom and truth.”

• • Karl Marx described philosophy as “the interpretation of the world in order to change it,” highlighting its practical and transformative nature.

• • Broadly, philosophy is the study of general and fundamental questions related to:

     

    • • Existence
    • • Reason
    • • Knowledge
    • • Values
    • • Mind
    • • Language

     

• • The term philosopher was first used by Pythagoras, who referred to himself not as a wise man, but as a Finder of Truth — someone in continuous pursuit of understanding.

• • Plato gave a famous definition: “He who has a taste for every sort of knowledge and who is curious to learn and is never satisfied, may be justly termed as a philosopher.”

• • In Book Gamma of Metaphysics, Aristotle stated: “There is a certain kind of science which contemplates being as being and what belongs to being in itself. This science is not the same as any of those that are called special sciences, for none of the latter inspect being in general, as being, but they separate off some part of it and contemplate its attributes as mathematical sciences do.”

This suggests that philosophy is more general and universal than science, which focuses only on specific parts of reality.

• • Philosophy studies being as a whole, encompassing all aspects of existence.

• • Science, on the other hand, studies only portions of being through specialized methods.

In Politics, Aristotle wrote:

“The whole is necessarily prior to the part.”

This means that an individual must be understood in relation to society, just as an apple cannot exist without an apple tree. Society shapes the individual — the whole comes before the part.

• • Hegel built on this idea by stating: “The true is the whole.”

This emphasizes the importance of understanding connections, and that truth emerges when all parts are seen as a unified system.

• • Philosophy seeks to understand connections between ideas, events, and realities — not in isolation, but in a complete and coherent system.

• • A true philosopher strives to put everything in its proper place, building a worldview where every part relates meaningfully to the whole.

 

Main Branches of Philosophy

Philosophers approach truth and understanding through various branches, each focused on specific types of questions:

1. Methodology (Logic)

• • Logic is the foundation of philosophical thinking.

• • It involves rational, structured thinking, where facts are observed, evaluated, and connected to general laws.

• • Methodology ensures that philosophical inquiry is not vague or random, but based on reasoned procedures and critical analysis.

 

2. Epistemology

 

• • Coined by James Frederick Ferrier (1808–1864), from Greek episteme (knowledge) and logos (theory).

• • Epistemology is the theory of knowledge — it studies the nature, source, limits, and validity of knowledge.

• • Key questions include:

     

    • • What is knowledge?
    • • Can humans truly know anything?
    • • How is knowledge of non-observable or absent things possible?
    • • What are the criteria for valid knowledge?

     

• • The foundation of epistemology is laid in John Locke’s An Essay Concerning Human Understanding (1690), which explores how knowledge is formed in the human mind.

3. Metaphysics

• • Metaphysics investigates the nature of reality — what exists, what it means to exist, and how different kinds of reality relate to each other.

• • It deals with physical, spiritual, mental, and universal realities.

• • It is an attempt to describe all types of being and explain how they differ and connect within a systematic framework.

4. Axiology

• • Axiology is the philosophical study of values, including ethics (moral values) and aesthetics (beauty and artistic values).

• • Philosopher Alain L. Locke described axiology as a modern substitute for metaphysics, as it focuses on human-centered values in place of abstract categories of being.

5. History of Philosophy

• • This branch explores the development of philosophical thought over time, analyzing the ideas of great thinkers in different eras.

• • Aristotle, in his writings, criticized earlier philosophers to build his own system.

• Diogenes Laertius (3rd century CE) wrote biographies of Greek philosophers, but much of his work focused on anecdotes and gossip rather than rigorous philosophy.