Much of the time that people think of philosophy, they are involved in something very very serious. I would even go so far as to say that it is so serious that most people when they hear the word philosophy, run away really quickly. They think some super-intellectual, academic, weird, difficult way of thinking.
I hear “philosophy is very serious. What we talk about in philosophy matters.”
Well, what is it then? What are we talking about?
The Missing of the Matter
Most of the time when I mention the word philosophy to anyone, one of three things happens:
1) The person says, “wow, you must be really smart.”
What they mean by this is they’ve been trained not to think. They hear the word philosophy, and they immediately think that they are less than. And I say this “less than”, because most of the time there’s like this mixed sort of expression where they’re interested and yet they feel like it doesn’t matter to them, like they don’t want to think philosophically, and philosophy just seems like something that’s useless (and So serious). So I say, they’ve been trained. Indeed, I would say that career philosophers have been trained and are indoctrinated. But maybe I’ll get to that in a minute.
2) They say they’re interested, and they seem kind of excited. Many times they will say something to the effect that they enjoy philosophy, they read philosophy books in high school, they minor in Philosophy. Things like that.
So then I’ll start to engage with them, just casually, I don’t jump into Hegel something like that. I just continue to talk with them the way I was talking, but I figured that they were interested now and why I would be calling whatever it is “philosophy.” And they’re interested in what kind of philosophy that I do. I might even give them a paper I’ve written or a book of mine just depending on how interested they seem. Inevitably, I would say in my 25 years 998 out of 1000 might start to read it, but then never do. If we’re talking, they’ll get to a point we’re basically we have to agree to disagree, which usually happens relatively quickly.
3) We start to talk and soon they will start to bring up ideas they know that other philosophers have, and make argument s about the veracity of their points.
If I then ask, “well, what do you think?” And inevitably, I will most often get their opinions about various philosophers that they are aware of. And then I might go “but what do you think?” And they will refer to other peoples ideas.
If I point out the strangeness of having thoughts and ideas that are only with reference to an opinion based on what other people think, then we might get into a discussion about 20th century philosophies, the various authors, the various ideas, etc.
It’s literally like we never really start to engage Philosophy. Then, in line with my post here, we never really start to engage with what matters. We really are only engaging with ideas, at that, ideas that other people had.
When did it all start?
The infamous Philosopher Soren Kierkegaard gets into some discussions somewhere about “starting in the middle”. I think this is what he’s talking about. That people just begin with what ideas are already given them, at that, through various sort of institutional structures. They begin with material that matters while they themselves are not mattering, or only matter by virtue of the intellectual prior systems they can evidence themselves to regurgitate.
🌈
There I went mentioning a name. And again we will have one of those three reactions because now I’ve mentioned a Philosopher’s name. Immediately people will often stop thinking, and they will start talking about an idea that somehow they had, somehow they came up with, this idea to argue against it without ever really thinking about where that idea came from. It is, as I say, a given idea.
Matters
The point I am making is that philosophy is about matter. Philosophy, in the words of some contemporary authors, matters. Or better: philosophy is mattering.
What most people think of when they think of philosophy is the structured ideas given through history. They don’t think about how that’s even possible. They don’t think about what history is. And especially they don’t think about how they are even given knowledge at all. They simply process ideas without actually using their ability to think.
This in evidence, and if a whole bunch of people are doing this, is the definition of real problem.
Then people come to get psychotherapy about this problem they are encountering.
The short of it is, if I was to refer to refer to refer, to people, to ideas, the past, to this century, to that culture back and back and back and we go…at what point do we have a human being that had a novel thought at all? Such that my reference of another’s idea has the credence and veracity I suppose of it?
…I say, exactly when you started reading this post. That is when philosophy begins because that is philosophy mattering.
Nothing is wrong.
I’m not saying that anything is wrong with these reactions, though it is a bit frustrating to me for sure. I engage anyways and enjoy it, but I also notice it. And then my mind goes to why is there difficulty, why is there problem? And then I come up with all these great ideas such as: people are trained to not actually matter in themselves.
Then I come to the conclusion that this is what is wrong. It’s not wrong in the sense that somehow people need to understand some sort of intellectual philosophical category in order to correct themselves – as though, don’t you know, everyone needs to think critically and intelligently about their world in their life in a particular manner in order to be, somehow, a self-realized human being.
Maybe they do, but how could I know for sure ?
You are matter mattering
When looking at the world around us, the kind of idea of others being incorrect because I have the greatest idea there is going into the world is just plain ridiculous. It’s based on a certain self-righteousness attitude that I have that I have access to what is true of the world. Which is insanely pompous and presumptuous. But nonetheless, that is how everyone behaves at all times. Some intellectuals have argued that this is human life.
It’s like a friend of mine used to say:
He was “king baby”. And what he meant was, he sits on the throne and proclaims to the rest of the world What and how it is supposed to be and how people are supposed to be, but at the same time, if anyone has any sort of comment or criticism about him, then he acts out and whines and cries like a baby.
I feel that has a certain relevance.
But I got a little further and ponder that It’s because people are trained to know that they don’t matter. And so it must be something out there. It must be something that is not going on with me; the problem must be out there because I’m special. I’m a human being. But then Because I’m a human being, it’s not because I matter. It’s not because I am the activity of mattering.
The mental problem must be something very seriously wrong with me because I am not allowed to matter enough to be able to know what is going on such that I am encountering a mental problem.
Anyways….
What do you think?
👽