Is a philosopher a profession or a state of mind?

2024 Author: Henry Conors | [email protected]. Last modified: 2024-02-12 02:41

Philosophy is present in the life of every person. Anyone who is capable of thinking is a philosopher, albeit an unprofessional one. It is enough just to think about how many times in your life you thought about why it happens one way or another, how many times thoughts went deep into the essence of this or that term, process, action. Of course, countless. So what is philosophy? Who are the most famous philosophers who founded entire schools of thought?

What is philosophy?

Philosophy is a term that can be defined from different angles. But no matter how we think about it, we still come to the conclusion that this is certain knowledge or a sphere of human activity, in the process of which he learns wisdom. And in this case, the philosopher is a conductor in the intricate structure of this science and its concepts.

Speaking in scientific terms, the term "philosophy" can be defined as knowledge about the objective reality that surrounds us and fromdoes not depend on us. It is enough to look at the etymology of the word "philosophy" - and it becomes clear what it means. This term comes from the Greek language and consists of two others: "philia" (from Gr. φιλία - "love, aspiration") and "sophia" (from Gr. σοφία - "wisdom"). We can conclude that philosophy is love or the pursuit of wisdom.

The same is true for the subject who is engaged in philosophy - the philosopher. Who it is will be discussed.

Who is a philosopher?

This term came to us, as is already clear, from Ancient Greece and appeared in the 5th-6th century BC. Over the long centuries of its use, there were no modifications, and the word retained its original meaning in its original form.

Based on the concept of "philosophy", a philosopher is a person who is engaged in the search for truth, understanding the world and its structure.

In the explanatory dictionary you can find the following interpretation of the term: this is a thinker whose main activity is the study, development and presentation of the basic concepts of the worldview.

Another interpretation of the term is the following: a philosopher is an individual who, by his way of thinking, belongs to one or another philosophical school, shares its ideas or lives according to them.

The birth of philosophy and the first philosopher

It is generally accepted that the first person who began to use the term "philosopher" was the ancient Greek thinker Pythagoras back in the 6th century BC. All because it was necessarydivide people with knowledge into two categories: sages and "non-sages". The first philosopher then defended the point of view that a philosopher cannot be called a sage, since the first only strives to know wisdom, and the second is the one who has already known it.

The works of Pythagoras have not been preserved, therefore, for the first time on paper, the term “philosopher” is found in the works of Heraclitus and Plato.

From ancient Greece, the concept spread to the West and East, where initially a separate science did not exist at all. Philosophy here was dissolved in religion, culture and politics.

The most famous philosophers

Many philosophers are inclined to believe that the people who sought to know how a person can become happy were just philosophers. This list can be very long, because all over the world philosophy has developed even independently of one current from another. Despite this, there are many common features in which the philosophy of the West and East are similar.

The first philosophers include such famous people from past centuries as Pythagoras, Buddha, Plato, Socrates and Seneca, Aristotle, Confucius and Lao Tzu, Marcus Aurelius, Plotinus, Giordano Bruno, Omar Khayyam and many others.

In the 17th-18th century, the most famous were Peter Mogila, Feofan Prokopovich, Grigory Skovoroda - these are philosophers who lived and cognized the essence of being in Russia. Thinkers of even later years - Helena Petrovna Blavatsky and Nicholas Roerich.

As we see, not only thinkers,but also mathematicians, physicians, emperors and universal connoisseurs were the first philosophers. The list of modern philosophers is also quite extensive. There are many more of them today than there were in antiquity, and they are less known, nevertheless they exist and actively develop and disseminate their thoughts.

Today these people include Jorge Angel Livraga, Daniel Dennett, Peter Singer, Jacques Derrida (pictured), Alasdair Macintyre, Jean Baudrillard, Alain Badiou, Slavoj Zizek, Pierre Klossowski, Karl Popper, Hans Georg Gadamer, Claude Levi-Strauss, Susan Blackmore and many more.

Philosophy as a way of life and profession

Earlier, the term "philosopher" referred a person to a certain school and its teachings, but now a philosopher is also a profession that can be obtained in many higher educational institutions. For this, faculties and departments are specially opened. Today you can get a diploma in philosophy.

The benefit of such education is not only that a person learns to think correctly and deeply, find non-standard ways out of situations, resolve conflicts and much more. Also, such a person can realize himself in many other areas of life, since he has received basic knowledge and understanding of the world (to a greater or lesser extent).

It is worth noting that many foreign firms today are happy to employ philosophers and young professionals in this field, in particular to work with people, for the reasons indicated above.