What Is This
About?: Philosophy’s Aims and Methods
1. The Main Aims
and Methods of Philosophy
Although the word
“philosophy” seems to have been coined in
But the fact that
philosophy is first of all the pursuit of the truth must not be confused with
the idea that philosophers ever think they have found “The Truth,” or that
philosophers believe they will one day accomplish the complete grasp of some
transcendent, objective standpoint from which “The Truth” for all people, of
all times, everywhere will be known. The philosophical aim to grasp the truth
is more complex than this, because reality is complex. In a sense, the truth is
an aim for philosophers that philosophers do not expect to ever accomplish, but
that we are constantly making progress toward. Such a paradoxical pursuit makes
sense when you consider that most things worth inquiring about in life are
complicated. Because this is so, to know something well, is to be aware of its
complexities, nuances, paradoxes, and subtleties. Most of the time we tend to
forget this because we spend our time trying to make things seem simpler and
neater than they really are. Most of the time our studies are geared toward the
immediate practical needs of life. As a result, they intend to familiarize us
with the assumptions and settled knowledge of a particular area of
investigation, and as a matter of course must take a lot of these things for
granted.
Because the
philosophical pursuit of truth aims to recover and appreciate the complexity of
things, philosophy is one of the few fields of study whose primary intentions
include seriously questioning what we take for granted. This makes it unlike
most other studies, where we start out knowing relatively little about the subject
matter and end up knowing relatively more. In philosophy, in addition to
knowing more, the quality, (as well
as the quantity), of what we know
improves. When we know something after careful scrutiny we know it better than
at an earlier time when we may have taken our knowledge of it more-or-less for
granted.
As you might have
guessed, this aspect of philosophy leads to another interesting paradox, this
one associated with its basic methods:
philosophical activity leads to both a greater understanding of the things
philosophers think and talk about, and also a deeper sense of puzzlement and
more questions about them. As philosophers come up with answers to the
questions they ask, every new answer increases the number and depth of
questions we have. But this somewhat annoying fact that philosophy continues to
generate more and more questions instead of final answers is not a sign that
philosophy is somehow “broken.” Actually, the reverse is true: philosophy is
failing when it stops
generating new, deeper questions. When someone imagines the world is simple
enough for them to have figured everything out and answered all the important
questions they are being unphilosophical. The central method of philosophy is
therefore persistent questioning, in a manner that resists accepting any one
set of answers as final and complete. This resistance isn’t due to skepticism
that truth is a worthy over-arching goal—truth is the only real goal of
philosophy. Instead, it reflects a realistic appreciation of the complexity of
things, and of the historical and conceptual limitations on human knowledge.
Raising meaningful
and illuminating questions is a central feature of philosophy’s method.[1] But there are
different levels and types of questions that philosophers ask. Some are the
“answer-resistant” kind. More than most other fields of study, philosophy is
associated with these “deep issues” and so-called “big questions,” like, “What
is the meaning of life?”; “What does it mean to exist?”; “What is justice?”;
etc. Many philosophical writings, whether written by professionals who call
themselves “philosophers” or by novelists, playwrights, or poets, are meant to
help us think about such issues in ways that bring us closer to understanding
their subtleties—not because we expect to finally answer them. But,
philosophers also deal with questions that are not so big and intractable as
the “answer-resistant” kind. Many work on particular, focused questions in the
sciences, health care, the arts, sports, and other fields, helping to illuminate
and clarify the main issues, principles, problems, and concepts that organize
these fields. Ultimately, both types of philosophical questions are intended to
give rise to a more subtle, precise, and interesting sense of what is going on
in the area of human experience with which they are concerned.
Since the subject-matter of
philosophy ranges across all human experience, the field is commonly divided
into a number of branches. Although these branches can seem like self-contained
areas of philosophical scrutiny, they all depend on one another and are
intertwined in important ways. The four major branches of western philosophy
are Metaphysics, Epistemology, Aesthetics, and Ethics. They are usually
distinguished from one another according to what their questions mainly focus
on: Metaphysics is the branch of
philosophy that focuses mainly on questions about existence and being and the
nature of things. Epistemology is the
branch that focuses on questions about the nature and scope of knowledge. Aesthetics is concerned with the concept
of beauty and the nature of art. Ethics
(also called morality) most fundamentally deals with questions about the
goodness of ends (or aims) and the rightness of our actions (means).
In each of these
fields, through persistent questioning, philosophers are trying to illuminate
and examine all the evidence that pertains to what it is they are asking about,
so we can overcome entrenched assumptions and beliefs that might be
unreasonable or wrong. Hence, the final thing to note about philosophical
methods—they involve the use of reason and rationality. “Reason,” “reasoning,”
“reasonableness,” “rationality,” and related terms are used in numerous ways
and have shades of meaning in different contexts. But the meaning shared by all
of them involves a very basic human activity. Essentially, reasoning is the
activity of forming beliefs and assessing claims based on evidence. Holding
beliefs rationally means having evidence for them and keeping that evidence
open to scrutiny and criticism. By identifying the evidence for your beliefs,
you make them available for reflection and criticism. A person is reasonable if
he or she is willing to find out if their opinions stand up to such scrutiny.
This involves allowing evidence to be assessed by others, and agreeing to
accept the outcome of fair evaluation and assessment.
By contrast,
opinions or beliefs that are held without concern for what the evidence
indicates are called biased opinions. One is not biased just because one has an opinion, but because one’s
opinion is irrationally maintained. A position is biased if it is held in such
a manner so as to be impervious to reasonable evidence to the contrary. Bias
can happen when a person insists that something is true in the face of evidence
that would lead a reasonable person to question it. This is considered
irrational because it shows that someone really doesn’t care what the evidence
suggests.
2. Types of
Reasoning and Styles of Philosophy
It is important in
thinking about what it means to be rational to recognize that there are
different types of evidence appropriate to being reasonable depending on the
type of issue we are looking at. One type of evidence is objective, having to
do with empirical, quantifiable, and formal kinds of issues. Objective evidence
is rational to look for when considering issues that do not depend on personal
attitudes, feelings, points of view, perspectives, and interpretations, like
the questions we normally think of as arising in the natural sciences and math.
Mathematical equations work and planes fly for reasons that have nothing to do
with anyone’s feelings or perspectives. Planes fly because of objective
principles that hold for objects in space and time regardless of the
perspectives, points of view, and feelings of the persons involved. It’s
irrational to think about such things subjectively.
But, rationality
isn’t always about being objective. This is because many of the most urgent and
important issues people face in life simply cannot be decided or understood in
a purely objective manner. Subjective evidence is the kind of evidence involved
in being rational about issues that involve people’s perspectives,
interpretations, feelings, and points-of-view. Such issues cannot be reduced to
purely objective, formal, or quantifiable terms and decided once and for all.
Some things are reasonable from some perspectives but not others. If you have
ever found yourself trying to explain to a friend why something that “makes
sense” for him or her doesn’t also make sense for you, then you are familiar
with this common situation.
The subjective type
of evidence is also particularly important in trying to understand ethical and
political issues, where the perspectives and points of view of persons and
groups are usually central to the question. How a person or group understands
and feels about the morality of some act or set of arrangements is important
evidence to consider in making a reasonable determination about what the right
thing to do might be. Economic arrangements that can reasonably seem to make
good sense from the perspectives of some, can also and at the same time make no
sense at all from the standpoint of others who are not or do not feel like they
are sufficiently benefited by them.
Some things people
have questions about are more objective and some are more subjective, and the
types of evidence we can rely on to answer these different kinds of questions
differ accordingly. Likewise, the aims and methods of different groups of
philosophers reflect a range from the more scientific and objective to the more
humanistic and subjective. Philosophers whose main interests are human
subjectivity and the forms of writing and artistic production and performance
that is known to the arts and humanities are usually referred to as
“Continental” or “Humanistic Philosophers,” since this style of philosophy has
been the most popular one in
3. Argument: The
Basic Unit of Philosophical Activity
But whether they
are more interested in scientific or humanistic subjects, all philosophers
ultimately base their activity on the use of argument. The concept of an argument
is closely connected to philosophy. The sense of argument we intend unless
otherwise noted is captured in a simple definition that can be worded in
different ways: An argument is an
attempt to answer a specific question in a rational manner by appealing to
evidence. Another way to say this is that an argument is an attempt to
provide evidence in support of an answer to a specific question. Thus, an
argument is not merely a statement or assertion, or a group of statements or
assertions. It is not merely a report, description, or an uncontroversial
explanation. And although the word “argument” is often associated with
disagreement or dispute, that is not the main meaning intended in philosophy or
critical reasoning. To illustrate this, if I offer you my argument for my
position, I have presented the reasoning that I believe supports it. It could
be that you agree completely with my reasoning and with my conclusion. In this
case, each of us has an argument and there is no dispute. Or, it could be that
you agree with me completely about the conclusion, but have further evidence to
support it that I am not aware of. This would mean we now have two arguments in support of the same
conclusion about which we agree. But, in this case, we have two different
arguments and still no dispute!
An argument is an
intellectual process in which a claim or proposition is supported in response
to some question on the basis of some evidence. Arguments are sets of premises
supporting opinions. If you are a reasonable person, you are a person who tends
to hold opinions and beliefs on the basis of evidence that is the best
available. In other words, if you are a reasonable person you regard it as
important to have some evidence for the beliefs you hold, at least on issues
for which there is evidence available.
In everyday speech and most writing people aren’t always so clear and
direct about getting to their point as they could be. There are many reasons
for this. Writers and speakers are often pursuing many kinds of aims
simultaneously. They may want to convince us of something, but they may also
seek to spur us to action or inspire us. They may also be trying to hide
something from us, or to emphasize something in particular. Writers and
speakers have many tools at their disposal, both logical and rhetorical, that
they can use to make their cases. Logical tools are the ones that focus on
getting the listener or reader to understand and grasp the position the author
holds. Skill in using logical tools helps us get others to see what is true in
a position, on the basis of evidence they already find plausible or true.
Rhetorical tools are also important in making a case, but rhetoric is
mainly focused on how language and imagery that appeal to our desires and
emotions can be used alongside one’s strictly logical case. And rhetorical
tools can also be used in ways that are contrary to logic. Thus, rhetoric is
commonly associated with the intention to persuade
rather than the intention to provide a convincing
logical argument. Although the words are commonly used as if they were
synonymous, from a logical standpoint, it is helpful to carefully distinguish
effective persuasion from convincing argument. While logic and rhetoric can
blend into one another in some contexts, philosophers and logicians focus on
the more directly logical part of the wide spectrum of forms of argumentation,
which is aimed at convincing, not
merely persuading the listener.
In this sense, an argument has four main elements:
1. Conclusion - An argument offers
a claim or proposition, with evidence to support it, in answer to a question.
This claim or proposition is the author’s point and it is known as the conclusion, because it is thought to follow
logically from the evidence the arguer is using. The conclusion of an argument
is the speaker or writer’s answer to an issue or question.
2. Premises - The premises are the evidence or support presented and
implied by the arguer intended to establish the truth of the conclusion. Often,
premises are called “reasons.” Test results, statistical data, observations of
past experience or history, and eye-witness and expert testimony are commonly
offered forms of support for the claims arguers wish to establish.
3. Question - The question is the particular open or controversial
issue that occasions an argument. It is the specific matter which the arguer is
responding to and trying to resolve by offering a conclusion backed by
premises. An argument is offered as an attempt to answer a question as
convincingly and conclusively as possible.
4. Assumptions - An assumption is a
belief which may be stated or implied in an argument, which the arguer regards
as true, but for which he or she has provided no evidence. Premises that are
presented in an argument without evidence to support them are assumptions. More
interesting are the hidden assumptions that are not stated by the arguer. Some
of these, although hidden, are beliefs the arguer must hold in order for their argument to make any sense at all.
These foundational assumptions can be
thought of as the argument’s basic, essential, underlying belief structure.
Arguments always have some foundational assumptions which are necessary to
support their entire structure. If these foundational assumptions are weak or
false, any argument built upon them will be compromised.
Finally, an
argument also has a kind of "glue" that holds it together in a
logically coherent way. This is the structuring principle of the argument,
known as its inference. Actually, the
inference is something the argument makes your mind do! It is the mental action
you make when you recognize that a conclusion follows from some specific
premises. The inference is the movement of the mind by which it is compelled to
see that a conclusion is implied by some premises. For example, look at the two
premises marked (1) and (2) below. What would you infer if you heard someone
make these two claims? What follows from them?
(1) All sea-going
creatures with fins are fish. (2)
Whales are sea-going creatures with fins.
When you read these
two propositions, something spontaneously clicks in your head! From these two
premises you automatically draw the conclusion that, "Hmmmm, if these
claims are true, then it follows that, (3), whales must be fish." This
movement is what is meant by the term "inference," and getting you to
make it is what the argument's author intends to accomplish. These premises
imply that "whales are fish," and when you grasp that this follows
from these premises, you are inferring what the arguer implies.
Now, you are no
doubt also observing that this particular argument is false! Whales are not
fish, they are mammals! So, an argument does not have to be good in order for
it to be an argument! This argument, in fact, is an example of a valid
deductive argument, since, if its premises were true it would necessarily
follow that, "whales are fish." Even though this conclusion is false,
in other words, it is implied by these premises, as your mind correctly infers.
But we happen to know that one of the premises is actually not true. Hence,
although there is a valid formal inference here, this is an unsound argument.
This odd paradox is
one of many that the study of logic allows us to recognize concerning the
complexities of reasoning and argumentation. One of the most important
distinctions in logic is that between deductive and inductive types. Deductive
logic deals with formal inferences like the one in the fishy argument above. In
a deductive argument, if the premises are true, the conclusion must be true.
Inductive logic, by contrast, is concerned with inferences that are based on
experiential evidence and generalization. They do not follow formal patterns of
reasoning, and their conclusions are at their very best only more-or-less
probable. Inductive logic pertains to a great deal of the reasoning involved in
the sciences and in everyday experience.
For our purposes,
and as we read our philosophical writings and have our conversations about them
in this class, learn to direct your attention to the question of what the
writer or speaker’s argument is, before thinking about whether you agree or
disagree with their conclusion. It is one thing to note that you believe a
particular conclusion to be false. It is much more interesting and productive
in the pursuit of truth to be able to show why
the evidence offered for it doesn’t support it.
[1] This sense of “philosophy” as an activity in pursuit of truth that involves constant questioning that I am describing here is different from the common use of the word as a synonym for “a particular doctrine or approach.” So, for example, when Miami Heat Coach Pat Riley talks about his “defensive basketball philosophy,” or when a management guru talks about her “management philosophy,” what they refer to is simply the particular views they hold on each subject. But neither one is necessarily thinking about their field of expertise in a “philosophical” way. To have a “philosophy of defensive basketball” or a “philosophy of business” is just to have some beliefs about how things should be done in those fields. One might hold such views in a rational, self-critical, “philosophical” way. But very often people hold on to a set of ideas they might call a “philosophy” in a decidedly irrational and unphilosophical way. If one holds a view dogmatically, one no longer cares to think about whether it might be untrue or incomplete. That is the essence of holding a view unphilosophically. The everyday sense of the word “philosophy” to refer to a set of doctrines or an approach to something is separate from the sense intended by philosophers.