A philosophy is a system of beliefs
about reality. It is one’s integrated view of the world. It includes
understanding of the nature of existence, man and his role in the world.
Philosophy is the foundation of knowledge. It is the standard by which ideas
are integrated and understood.
Philosophy is a necessary man’s
product rational mind. To live, man must gain knowledge of the world. To
understand the world, man must form conclusion about his very nature. For
instance, to gain knowledge of particular objects, man must recognize that
conclusions are possible because the world does exist and exists in a
particular way.
Philosophy provides the framework for
which man can understand the world. It provides the premises by which man can
discover the truth, and be able to make use of his mind in order to support his
life. Every man must have a philosophy, even if it is never made explicit.
It is also a study that seeks to
understand the mysteries of existence and reality. It tries to discover the
nature of knowledge and truth and be able to find the main value and its
importance in our lives. Philosophy also establishes relationship between
nature and humanity and also between nature and humanity philosophy arises out
of wonder, eagerness and the desire to know and understand. Philosophy is thus
a form of inquiry which is by process of analysis, enticism, interpretation and
speculation.
IMPORTANCE OF
PHILOSOPHY TO MAN
Philosophic idea is an unavoidable
part of human existence. Almost everyone
has been confused from time to time by such essentially philosophic questions
as “what does life mean?” Did I have any existence before I was born?” and ?
“Is there a life after death?” Most people also have some kind of philosophy in
the sense of a personal outlook on life. Even a person who claims that
considering philosophic questions is a waste of time is expressing what is
important, worthwhile, or valuable. A rejection of all philosophic thought is
also in philosophy itself.
By standing philosophy, man can
clarify what they believe, and they can be stimulated to think about ultimate
questions. A person can also study past philosopher’s thought in order to know
why they thought as they did and value their thoughts may have in one’s own
life. There are some people who simply derives pleasure in reading the great
philosophers, especially those who were also great writers, they did all these
to know more about life.
Philosophy has had a great influence
on our everyday lives. They very language we speak uses classifications derived
from philosophy. For example, the philosophic idea that there is a difference
between action and thing. And if we begin to ask what the difference is, we are
commencing a philosophy inquiry.
System of education follows a
society’s philosophic idea about what children should be taught and for what
purpose. Democratic societies stress that people learn to think and make
choices for themselves. Non-democratic societies discourage such activities and
want their citizens to surrender their own interests to those of the state. The
values and skills taught by the educational system of a society thus reflect
the society is philosophic ideas of what is important.
Every institution of every society is
build and based on philosophic ideas, whether that institution is the law,
government, the family, marriage, religion, business, or education. Philosophic
differences have led to the over throw of governments, drastic changes in laws,
and the transformation of the entire economic systems.
Such changes have occurred because the
people involved held certain beliefs about what is important, true, real, and
significant and about how life should be arranged.
The study of philosophy is something
like intellectual equivalent of training in sports. Those with natural talent
and no training will often be better than those with training but with little
talent, but proper training should be develop and enhance whatever talent most
people have to begin with.
Philosophy also pointed out that not
all philosophical idea or writing is very good and perhaps more importantly,
not all philosophic thinking are good or very well thought.
The tool in philosophy are important
to man and society because knowledge itself is no substitute for philosophy
just as philosophy is no substitute for factual knowledge. Philosophy is about
the intelligent and rational uses of knowledge, and it is about the security of
beliefs to see how clearly and how reasonably they are in the light of
knowledge we have. Philosophy is a way that man uses to scrutinize idea about
which goals are the most worthy one.
Philosophy can also help to increase
our thinking skills. Most field of study such as history, economics and
physics, are mainly about providing us with the knowledge of some sort.
However, some fields of study are more practical. Such as computer engineering,
and there are mainly about providing us with the skills. Practical field are
providing us with skills. Practical field are supposed to help us in improving
our abilities, so that we can do something using them.
Philosophy is not necessary a primarily
skill oriented field of study, but it is the specialized field of study for
critical thinking, and it can help us improve our critical thinking skills.
Critical thinking skills are highly related to logic (a philosophical domain),
which is the study of proper reasoning. That shouldn’t be surprising because
the main idea of critical thinking is to reason well. The critical thinking
classes taught by philosophers teach students logic in addition to providing
practice problems that can improve their critical thinking skills. Although,
philosophy can be used to improve critical thinking and most people want to
reason properly, it’s a hard thing because people who know just as nuch as
those who know quite a bit about it.
Very few people seem to realize that
they need to improve their knowledge of these things and one relevant study
showed that people who were tested in their competence in logic overestimated
their logical reasoning ability relative to their groups.
Philosophy can be informative and give
us some type of knowledge we might wonder if philosophy is important in any
sense. Some people criticize philosophers for doing research while everyday
life from their minds. One possible answer is that knowledge has value – that
it’s always better to be knowledgeable. Even if philosophy isn’t useful. It might
still be worth doing. That’s why mathematicians don’t always tell us what we
can do with their results, but most of us seem to accept that it has some sort
of value anyway. However, there are many other reasons as to why philosophy has
value and I think this is why philosophy can be of the most importance to
making our lives a better one. The reason I think this is the case is because
various philosophical issues have unique ways of helping people.
Nuberu Aliyu Adedayo
Nuberu Aliyu Adedayo