Philosophy: An Insight into an Ordinary Sight

We study in a world of desperate commercialism. A father wants his son to be doctor or an engineer or something else; the very else-s that are mostly wished to be ended up in a job, hand-full of salaries. From this perspective, a student who has to walk into university on an undergraduate program in Philosophy, most common people hardly feel it alright to digest their unsuccessful 12-year (from class 1 – class 12) academic life, which, in most cases, makes that student frustrated.

But when asked, “Why do you think - taking graduation on philosophy is bad?” the commonly common people come up with a pathetic answer – it’s bad, because philosophy students do not have better job opportunities. But a bit uncommonly common people speak a little different. Instead of making a generalized comment, they say – it’s bad, because a few philosophy students get into better jobs. But when asked again, “suppose, quite hypothetically, things somehow converted into a situation where only philosophy students and no others can dream of a good career life, a better job opportunity, then would you be courageous enough to admit – taking philosophy is good?” most probably, both kinds of common people would be agreed that in that hypothetical situation taking philosophy would the best, if not, at least a better one for an able student to take, as because this two kinds of common people are the worshippers of unwarranted and unjustified virtues of the world of desperate commercialism in which they believe they live and they have got no way escape from this. Quite unfortunately, most people are of these two kinds.

However, a master-thinker can deduce, with no ambiguity, one thing in common from the real and the hypothetical situation about taking philosophy; that is – of the two no situation suggests any fluctuation of the contents in philosophy. And what raises the contradiction among common minds is that they, unconsciously, compare the virtue of an academic discipline with a better (or worse) job opportunity. But this breaks the law of secular parallelism. Secular parallelism says - you can bring down a comparison among things that can be considered to be equal in classes or that are, somehow, inter-bridgeable, at least, in one characteristic or existential trait, i.e.  An integer can be compared with a fraction as they both belong to natural numbers. Even a dog and a human can be compared on some issues as the both are from the mammal class of vertebrata group. This secular world doesn’t permit us to compare an integer with a square or a human with a chair. Actually, one cannot compare two things in between which they can't draw a straight line, the straight line which conclusively ensures one of the two is independent of the other. An academic discipline cannot go in comparison with job facilities, for the former is independent of the later.

When asked – what’s philosophy? Most people would probably say – philosophy is something abstract. When asked again – abstract!?! Well, how it’s abstract? This time, for sure, those people have hardly any precise ideas to talk on.

Let’s leave it and turn on an argument between a theist and an atheist:

Atheist: why do you think there’s God?
Theist: aaaaaah….I think there’s God, because I have faith in God.

Atheist: hmm…..so say other believers. Can you just tell me what your logic behind trusting in God is? I don’t think you can stand any proposition that can conclusively prove the existence of your God.
Theist: hay!!!! When did I say – I trust in God?!? I was talking about Faith, dear. Of course, I do have trust in God, because I find it more logical to trust in God than not to from my religious teachings. But it’s different point to argue on. We were talking about faithfulness and faithlessness in the existence of God. The fact is that to have faith is something that involves believing in a materialistic, non-materialistic or abstract thing with no conclusive supporting evidence. Trust is different. You trust someone or something - more likely means: you have long term give-and-take relationship with them which works as a strong supporting evidence of your prediction that they are not going to step off the way you think they would go through. Nevertheless, both faith and trust may eventually go wrong. You cannot even employ any proposition that can conclusively prove the existence-less-ness of God in reality.
                                                                                            
Atheist: Now you know, both faith and trust may eventually go wrong, and still you have faith in God? Isn’t doing so simply gullible?
Theist: Yes, you’ve got it right. It seems logically more of gullibility to have faith in God, but it’s not necessarily harmful either. Contrarily, it’s beneficial! Suppose X and Y are two individuals where X have faith in God and Y doesn’t have it. X is morally very good person, and Y is a terrible criminal. Let’s think both of them somehow died together. Now imagine after their death they find that there’s no God at all. In that situation both are safe, as there’s no one to judge them. But suppose God does exist. In this context, there’s no way escape for Y as he totally ignored the very existence of God, where X would logically be rewarded for his having faith even when he had no conclusive evidence to prove – God exists.

Atheist: hmm…your argument is seemingly impenetrable.

The argument above is not a usual kind of argument where egos fight to win. They carried out the argument to clarify the reasoning behind their ideas about whether to have (or not to have) faith in the existence of God. And none of the two cares about winning, because they know everyone wins in clarifying what they knew they know. Here, the atheist and the theist have done philosophy.

Now it’s much clear that doing philosophy is practical, and is mainly about analyzing ideas to examine if we truly know what we think we know and synthesizing all our knowledge to observe if we can attain a larger and better view of everything. Widely speaking, philosophy is thinking about thinking.

Even scientists can’t stay apart from and avoid doing philosophy. To quote from rebirthofreason.com, “If scientists try to divorce themselves from philosophy by ignoring it, they will fall victim to it. And worse, they probably won't know it. Philosophy is concerned with one's fundamental premises, and sets the stage for how you interpret the evidence of your senses”.

Not that I’m trying to make the readers convince – philosophy is the best thing in the world to do. I don’t find anything new to suggest people to do philosophy either, for everybody does philosophy, if not in conscious, at least, in subconscious minds. My point is that – each and every single academic discipline has and will have certain contributions to the world we are living and to that world we will be living. And this would be our narrowest thought if we underestimate those contributions on the basis of job facilities. If you be honest to yourself, won’t a better life (not to be misunderstood as life in billions of dollars instead of meaningful life) be in logical consequences for you?