[Bups-dis] An alternative approach to the purpose of philosophy

[David Mitchell]

  There are, I believe, two fundamentally different ways to view the purpose of philosophy. The first way, which can be called the ‘analytic approach’, corresponds to academic orthodoxy in Britain and the U.S, and is a view with which most people will be relatively familiar. The second way, which I will call the ‘transformative approach’, will be less familiar and is, contrastingly, rooted largely in the continental tradition of philosophy. The following is a collection of notes and ideas which will, hopefully, give an outline of how these approaches differ, and what I mean by a ‘transformative’ philosophy. Apologies in advance for the excessive length
   
  The analytic perspective: broadly speaking analytic philosophy views understanding as essentially ‘atomistic’. What this means is that understanding and reality can be broken down into distinct, logically independent units [for instance, philosophy as a field of understanding is logically independent of sociology]. This ‘atomism’, further, applies not only to the content of understanding itself, but also to the individual’s relation to that understanding: the life of the student remains logically independent of their study.
   
  By ‘logical independence’ here, I mean that there is no necessary or essential connection between philosophy and the life of the individual. Of course there might still be external or contingent connections between the two, for instance the study of ‘political philosophy’ might be employed by an individual when deciding how to vote. However this purpose is largely external or instrumental, in other words I’m using philosophy as a means to achieve some other aim/end in my life, in the same way I might, say, use knowledge of mathematics to help me build a bridge.
   
  The consequence of this is that philosophy, like all other areas of understanding, might be useful as a means for the achievement of certain ends in life, but this is a contingent point, it need not be, and indeed in most cases isn’t, the case. The philosophers’ relationship with his subject is then analogous to that of the scientists, as with his counterpart, there is no logical or necessary reason why his subject should impact upon his life outside of study.
   
  In contrast, transformative philosophy asserts that the life of the individual is always and necessarily affected by philosophy. The reason for this goes back to a fundamental difference in the way understanding is viewed. Whereas the defining feature of analytic thought is atomism, the view that reality can be broken down into logically distinct units, the chief characteristic of the transformative approach is a ‘holistic’ or ‘relational’ conception of understanding. On this view all aspects of human understanding are fundamentally connected, in the sense that we can understand any phenomenon only by looking at it as part of a relational whole. For example: we understand religion properly not by viewing it in isolation, but by seeing it in light of its relations to other aspects of human culture and life, in particular morality, philosophy and art.
   
  Further, this notion of connectedness extends to the individual. The individual consciousness, and its relation to the world, exists as a relational whole, each aspect of consciousness being fundamentally, necessarily, related and integrated. Understanding here, then, does not exist as an ‘addition to’, a contingent predicate, of the individual, but is rather that which constitutes and informs his whole being. As such the question of how to ‘apply’ philosophy in our lives does not arise, simply because philosophical understanding is ubiquitous in our existence, it forms an irreducible aspect of our relation to the world.  It follows from this that philosophy is by its very nature ‘transformative’, a change in understanding necessarily affects both the subject and the world of which she is an integral part. As such, philosophy is inherently radical: in the process of understanding the philosopher changes both themselves and the world.
   
  But returning to the original question, if philosophy is essentially transformative, does this then tell us what philosophy aught to be? The answer is that these two questions, of ‘is’ and ‘aught’, are not distinct, rather what we think philosophy ‘is’, fundamentally relates to what we think its purpose aught to be. By denying the essentially transformative and relational nature of philosophy in theory, the analytic tradition suppresses this nature in practice. By making philosophy a self-enclosed academic domain, concerned only with a particular set of established questions and problems, analytic philosophy prevents, as far as it is possible, philosophy, from realising its transformative nature. Philosophy then, as it exists currently, comes to resemble what some would like it to be, an enterprise restricted in thought and practice to the world of academia, an activity divided from the actual lived existence of man, an activity without purpose.
   
  Contrastingly a transformative philosophy, in recognising the radical nature and potential of philosophy, would endeavour to re-establish the connection between philosophy and the world. In seeking this reconciliation between man and understanding, between philosophy and the real life of the individual, philosophy would restore to itself its true purpose: the development of man. Philosophy would, by developing, rather than suppressing, it’s transformative nature, become fully and consciously what it had always been implicitly or inchoately, an enterprise for the transformation of man.
   
  David Mitchell

       
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