Philosophical Reflection

In the words of Socrates, the Great Greek philosopher, “The unexamined life is not worth living”. One of the major things that distinguish man from other animals is his ability to ruminate. To be is to be conscious and to be conscious means to be fully aware and thoughtful. In a world where different belief systems are flying around, man needs to test all things and hold on to that which is certain. We should pattern our lives in such a way that we separate truth from illusion and make decisions after careful or critical consideration.

Philosophical reflection is the careful examination of life situations. This involves the weighing of several alternatives and using specific standards to evaluate one’s actions. A man reflects philosophically when he is able to build on previous actions, events, or decisions. This essential attribute spells the difference between man and other lower animals whose basis of action is their feeling. Making an assessment of my life, i will say that philosophical reflection has been a part of my life.

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I learnt the importance of making the right choices early in life. My father used to tell me; “You are what you do”. I guess this made me develop a cautious attitude towards making decisions and evaluating issues before coming to a conclusion. I have grown up to see things from different points of view. I do not accept a view because of who said it, rather, i put all things into scrutiny in order to hold on to that which is true.

Before making a decision, i draw up a probable conclusion on the eventualities and weigh up the effect of my actions. I believe the wisest of men can learn from a fool and in view of this, i do not write-off anybody. I carefully and critically examine a pre-existing belief before incorporating it as my belief system. As i have discovered, many of the things people believe are lies and illusions. I do not attach sentiments to whatever i do because this will lead my judgement astray.

The Oxford English Dictionary defines philosophy as “Knowledge, learning, scholarship; a body of knowledge; spec. advanced knowledge or learning.” By this definition we can gather that philosophy is, essentially, the pursuit of knowledge or understanding on a much higher level than usual. In the following paper I will present my views on philosophy as a whole by examining what I believe philosophy is supposed to do, as well as how it can benefit the life of any individual willing to invest time in it and the societies that promote such thoughts.

I found out that the written article (Existentialism and man’s search for meaning) by Eduardo Jose E. Calasanz are incredibly fascinating and mind blowing. As Aristotle quoted “all men desire to know.” And as one entity quench for knowledge about the mystery of our embodiment. Calasanz spread to us the table of an unsophisticated and different tenet of the classical and the modern philosophers. Admittedly, I do not agree to the philosophers about their theories in such that it is hard to believe to their theories because of lack of sense and feasible proof but even if I do not believe to the great philosophers I still consider Gabriel Marcel’s tenet to be the most outstanding among the six philosophers have mention in the Article. She said that the existence of life to human in answering the question “for what I am living for”. To able me to defend my own opinion, I will relate this Gabriel Marcel’s theory to my own story of life.

I am always asking to myself “for whom am I living for?” and “who are the person who am I live with?” I study here at University of Makati for me to fulfill my dream to become a teacher someday but the real question is for who am I living for? For studying more? For me to be able to reach my goals in life. I think yes, because if I do not study right not I will not able to achieve my goals and I will stay as I am right now. Standing and sitting here in our house waiting for some grace to come. to depend on others who are in capacity to support me and depend to the people that I know never live me even if I do not do something to change my life But if I study, I can able to fulfill it and share my knowledge to the other people. I can be independent on my own. I can have a permanent job that may support all my expenses and able buy anything all that I want. This dream of mine may help also my family in terms of financial. I know that dream of mine is very hard to reach but I will strive more and face the challenges in life, I can achieve the goal that I wanted to achieve and that is to become a teacher.

Ever since its very beginnings in 6th century BCE, philosophy has been used as a tool to help better understand complex questions regarding logic, knowledge, truth, and even human existence itself. I have long considered philosophy to be a method of deeper understanding when it comes to the human life. Why is this? Perhaps it is because a large part of philosophy is focused on argument, debate, and overall interaction with fellow humans, as opposed to other methods that do not focus on these aspects. It is my belief that if we were to attempt to answer by ourselves the difficult questions life poses, then our lives would be very dull and difficult to properly question.

Allow me to expand on what I briefly mentioned at the end of the previous paragraph. Each and every one of us is, in my opinion, a prisoner of our respective perception. From birth our minds are plagued by outside influences that shape our mind regardless of how much we try to avoid it. These influences can take on many different forms such as: media, parents, teachers, etc. What ideologies these influences plant in our minds also depends on a number of variables such: nationality, class, race, etc. This, in turn, leads to bias and prevents anyone from being 100% subjective in any matter. We cannot know any one thing or pass off one of our perceptions as absolute truth.

In fact, what you are currently reading is only my interpretation of what I have perceived. Therefore, the only way to truly gain an improved understanding of our life and the world we live in is to explore our different perceptions by sharing and challenging these views with others in debate and/or argument. As Socrates once said, “The unexamined life is not worth living.” In other words, if you are not going to break out of your own prison of perception, then your life will be bland and very difficult.

Approaching matters in a philosophical fashion is great for people as individuals, but it is also extremely important in societies as a whole. When members of a particular society strive to be thoughtful of their own views instead of just bashing the views of others, then there is an increase of tolerance and open-mindedness. Through this tolerance the society can then obtain a higher sense of fraternity and respect for one another. Societies that promote debate and an open-minded outlook tend to be more democratic and infringe on the rights of the people less.

When we hear the word “Love” we always think that is relationship but if we will see in our environment, all the people that we belong with even the people that we hate much is what you call Love. If you are asking me why? I will answer it like this. No among us never felt that they did not feel that they are in love or we are being love by other. Even when we are in womb of our mother, our parents are very excited to see us, they are so careful on what they do specially our mothers to make us being safe. After we given birth all the people that surrounds us are very happy and that is the sign of love. And after so many years, their are so many people that express to us how love it is? Even our enemy, we able to express love to them even we hate them we already express them love by giving them mercy when they do wrong and that is the sign of love. But when the philosophers spoke about they are so incredible.

For an instance, a famous Book Publisher Erich Fromm write a book “the Art of Loving”. In his book, He says that the popular notion of love at the present is “Falling in Love” but there are also reasons that I have read in the article. First the “Love is equated with Romance”; love has something to do with romance. Because love without romance is just like you are holding a match box without match stick. The match box there will never spark without that match stick. Second is the Love is a many splendored thing, love can do many things just what had said in the song “ I can do anything for love”. All of us can do something that can make our love once a certain happiness and enjoyment when they see us. And the last one is “love hurts”, no one in the world are experience that they are not felt hurt after they are in love. Many of us experience being hurt by the person that we love.

Take Ancient Greece for example, Ancient Greece is where philosophy was born and just also happened to be unlike any other society at the time. Slavery did exist and the women were not considered true citizens, but when compared to other, much more tribal cultures at the time, the Greek people experienced a freedom unheard of in any other part of the world. Modern countries would do well to incorporate philosophy in areas such as: government/politics, education, etc., and thankfully many do.

Given the topics discussed in this paper, I find it hard to believe that the introduction of philosophy into one’s life would not be beneficial in many ways. Analysis and consideration of all views, the careful contemplation of oneself and the environment around them, and the intellectual freedom and open-mindedness that such a practice lends to the societies it is promoted within. I can say with confidence that I believe philosophy is an integral part of human life and should be promoted on an international scale in order for countries to work together to logically solve global problems.