It is often asked of me, “Why philosophy?”
An appropriate response might be that it is of interest to me, or more primitively put, I find it amusing. But to say such a thing would regrettably be a product of the habitual mundane—a momentary redirect is necessary if what I truly see as a reason to study philosophy is to be befittingly conveyed.
In the back of my mind, now moving to the forefront, I examine my current situation. I find myself dropped into a reality in which a material object (with a similar resemblance to me) is asking me in a language I comprehend without conscious effort, “why do you seek truth?” Of course, such an experience entered my consciousness via “thought” from the peculiar depths of the subconscious—via language—and all at once. But if I am to even use the verb “entered,” I inadvertently usher in the notion of “past,” and rightly in turn, “present” and “future,” as if I am trapped by yet another phenomena so foreign (but perfectly familiar—it is all I know, all I have ever known, and all I ever will know) that I cannot help but examine it. But as soon as I examine it, I realize the very thing I am trying to analyze is acting as a lens by which I examine everything—including itself. Perhaps I have reached futility—a dead end—or maybe I have stumbled upon a pure intuition of the mind. But I will leave that inquiry for another “time” (or “now” located in the future, but connected to my finite connection to the infinite stream of nowness that is always presented immediately in experience). A question is being asked of me by a foreign object.
I now move to the issue of how I should answer the question that will satisfy the curiosity of the object—the thing I know as a person, as opposed to a “body” or “man” or “woman.” As I begin to try and formulate a better answer that would represent what I really do think about the seemingly simple inquiry, I am blindsided by the very experience that brought me into the discipline. Whether the question itself awoke me from my cursed, perpetual, conscious tendencies is irrelevant; the important thing is that I nonetheless find myself truly awake and separated from my dreams of what most call “every day life.” This new state of alertness is one of confusion. I instantly recognize that my previous state was nearly equivalent to unconsciousness—dead in the monotone scales of everyday living through moments carelessly strung together. But now, I feel almost thrown into a new moment—one in which I am fully conscious and aware of a world of objects and hidden phenomena. I feel detached.
Included under such “hidden phenomena” is the category of the understanding, “causality.” I don’t merely see objects existing in space and time; I see these objects causally interact. I see a tennis ball hit the ground and bounce upward, only to fall and bounce again and again until it finally comes to a rolling rest. So I wonder about what Hume calls “secret powers” and how such powers are contained within objects. As Hume notes, it is a tragedy that my existence completely depends on inductively contrived empirical explanations. Such explanations/reasons, like the inference that the ball will bounce every time it is dropped, can really only be said to be customary if it is held that what is occurring really is occurring and is being presented to the mind in a pre-Copernican way (“pre-Copernican” referring to the Aristotelian approach that generally holds that the world we observe is observed as it is in itself as opposed to what Kant offers with his Copernican Turn in his Critique). For induction is ultimately fallible, as it begs the question by assuming constancy. And reason can have nothing to do with fallibility.
That being said, it could be the case that there is no causality to begin with. Perhaps it only appears that the ball and the ground and gravity have causal relations, when in actuality I am only witnessing Leibnizian harmony. It would be hard to say that this is the case, however, because it seems counter-intuitive to assert that that which is most apparent is not actually true. The ball bounces, because every time I have ever dropped the ball, it has bounced. It has never not bounced. I seem to control it (freely), and this is contrary to pre-established harmony. But I must now laugh at such thoughts, since they require what I previously deemed fallible—induction. Forgive me though; such abderian behavior is brash. I should get back to the thought process furiously invoked upon the posing of the original question with the hope that it will give rise to a sufficient answer. For at this particular moment, I am still silent, my mind is wandering, and my inquirer is waiting.
Alluding back to my original experience of being thrown into a world of objects and hidden phenomena, I wonder how and why I crash-landed in the moment I find myself in. Why are their objects, what are these objects, and most importantly, what am I?
You are a person.
Yes, but what is a person? And why is there something instead of nothing at all? This entire experience of existence is extremely strange, and I am very, very lost.
Because of this experience of wonder (an experience I have unfortunately butchered with the limits of language), I find it to be absolutely necessary to find answers. I am here—now—and completely immersed in a reality I did not choose to be in. I—Dasein—have the peculiar ability to utilize reason and recognize many basic truths—mathematical, logical, perhaps metaphysical, etc.
Because of this truth (some hidden, and some immediate), I am confronted with things like morality, or what some call the “moral law.” I recognize a few different probable paths to an answer of how I ought to act—Utilitarianism, Deontology, Relativism, and Virtue Ethics (there are more, but these seem to be the most probable), but I don’t necessarily know which is best. I read Mill and find elements of the pleasurable truth I am seeking, I am astounded at the rational genius of Kant, I am perplexed by the godlike esteem of Aristotle, and I am terrified at the intellectual justification I find in postmodern relativism. And what about God? I mentioned Aristotle as being godlike, but what do I even mean by “G(g)od?” Who or what is God, and does such a being exist?
You are a Christian. You should abandon this line of inquiry and have faith in the revelation of God.
And perhaps I should. But what I have come to find is that such a proposition unfortunately renders God as an unlit candle—something waiting (no, desiring is a better word) to change into a beautiful and pleasing fragrance with the purpose of pervading my mind if only I would have the courage to light it—to truly seek Him. For through philosophy my understanding and finite comprehension of God has exploded to heights and depths I never thought possible. Theology is arguably the greatest philosophy, but I must not forget that “philosophy” is a part of that phrase and is paramount to understanding the noumenal revelation graciously bestowed to the godlike creation.
My mind now leaves this path of considering God and theology for another time and focuses on the new consideration of what is underneath my linguistic thought process. For such erratic thoughts expressed through language (i.e. always linguistically triangulated about another in time—specifically the future) once again cause me to return to the question of the nature of my being and its relation to the external world. How do I know the external world even exists? How do I know that the person asking me why I study philosophy is a real being or “another?” I am once again at a crossroads. Can I know the external world in itself, or am I hopelessly stuck in eclipsing illusions?
I feel I should begin with my own phenomenological experience, scrap a third-person objective viewpoint, and delve into what I—an “I” whose doubt I cannot reasonably dismiss—observe and am. I first realize that I am here, right now, and am bombarded by what my sensory manifold interprets as objects, or “this suches.” These suches exist spatiotemporally, but only according to the participation of my mind. And this “transcendental aesthetic” that has been tattooed into the wiring of my mind without my permission does not belong to the this suches—it has been actively imposed on them by my mind.
Secondly, I realize that I did not cause myself to exist here and now, but I rather “find myself” here (a phrase I use all too often, but is really the best way of describing the experience)—all at once and separate from any choice to be. What is more is I transcendentally transcend myself in a Kantian/Heideggerian sense, i.e. I cannot but be ahead of myself in the future—drawing pictures so to speak in anticipation of what will happen next in time. Even as I write this sentence, I cannot help but be already ahead of myself in language, lest I not know what word to write next in any kind of sensical way.
So I don’t actually exist in the present, I exist in the future of schematized potentials. I am a being always already projected into the future—therefore beyond myself and beyond my boundaries. I anticipate and react (even if what I anticipate does not occur) and I instantaneously adjust and schematize in different directions all the time. I do not make an effort at doing this. I just do (you, reader, do too). I must be this way and I cannot control it.
Finally, this series of metaphysical propositions presents me with a problem that deeply terrifies me. For since I am a being existing in the future, I must heed the fact that the future is similar to the now in that even as a succession of events continuously flows, it is flowing towards something. This may be illustrated by being in a boat. This boat I will call the typically understood notion of “future” (my “now”), and I am always there in the boat as I move to another “there” and call it a “here.” Next, I wonder where my statically drifting (“statically” refers to being stuck in the there, which is really the schematized future/”drifting” refers to the succession of events characterized by and through time towards some end) reality is traveling. For I realize that at any moment, I could cease to be—either altogether or just from the standpoint that I currently am (the latter being an ontological change, not an absence of being). Such death will likely occur in the same exact fashion as my coming into existence occurred—all at once and beyond the realm of my will. Even if I choose to take my life, I can really only do this in a physical sense, as it would appear that I really have no control over my being. For I am here, now, and did not ever choose to be here and now lest I be the absurd idea of a self-sufficient and self-causing entity. Only God, or what most call the “first cause” can really be considered under such a notion. Nonetheless, if it is the case (and I think that it is) that I am ontologically facing forward in time and am statically drifting towards an end I know nothing of, then it can be said of me that I am a being oriented towards imminent death, or the “mystery.” And it is this mystery that drastically individuates me and stirs up an intensely haunted state of mind. I become anxious—sometimes terrified—of what entering into the mystery might entail. I must admit that the mystery is almost as strange as my current state of existence, but holds my attention much tighter. For it is only when I consciously tap into my suspension over the mystery (a suspension that will eventually break) that I experience real anxiety—anxiety that is wholly demanding of my immediate attention.
My instinctual tendency is to retreat. I want to flee and occupy myself once again with the habitual mundane. By withdrawing from the anxiety, I am better able to function. But I must ask, is such functionality really what my nature as a rational being transcendentally pursues? No. I must reject such a thought, for reason itself wants answers, and the mere functionality of the habitual mundane contains none. While it is useful for understanding the fundamentals of being qua being, it is almost useless if the answer to the uncertainty-driven anxiety produced by my suspension over the mystery is to be found. And this very suspension is where I must finally concentrate, for I have not yet found an answer that is sufficient for the satisfaction of reason.
It is here where I approach a dilemma that few philosophers dare to step towards. Why? Because this final area of philosophical debate has been devastated by an earthquake revealing an infinitely deep chasm. On one side of the chasm is reason and all of its alleged boundaries. On the other is truth. But within the chasm is that which cannot quench the thirst of reason, yet must be necessarily crossed for the possession of truth. This chasm is the mystery and it is this very chasm that I am statically drifting toward. While it may appear that I am currently safe in the drifting boat, I am not, and I am terrified of the potential nothingness that is permeating me. If I were to dive into it in a desperate attempt at understanding, it would mean certain destruction. The chasm cannot be understood, for reason shouts into its miry depths, and they echo with silence. Death’s door is like a thick curtain—impenetrable by any means of sight or understanding. Death, then, is uncertainty. And while to some (maybe most), as Kierkegaard notes, “death’s despondency would make life a vanity,” I choose to adopt a more authentic approach to its uncertainty. I must confront it.
And I must leap.
For if the chasm is bypassed—literally leapt over—then truth may be arrived at. Granted, such a leap is contrary to reason, but my faculties need it, and my heart intrinsically desires it. It is in my nature to transcend myself, and if I only stop at the mystery’s echoed silence, then I see no point in continuing on in any kind of intellectual journey. This is why we hate the possibility of nothingness—I hate the possibility of nothingness, and so I leap. But where I land, however, is solely dependent on revelation. It was mentioned before that I am a Christian, and so I am. But in order to truly be a Christian, I must have faith that Christianity is true—I must leap over what I do not currently understand with the hope that I have acted rightly. And here, as my mind’s eye smiles, anxiety turns to joy. But now I’m venturing out of the realm of phenomenological philosophy into theology once again. I should continue, or else my interrogator may take my silence as unmannerly.
Alas, this personal phenomenology of my stream of consciousness resulting from the originally posed question of “why do you study philosophy?” is sadly poignant if philosophy’s potential depth is to be illustrated in any sort of fair way. I have effectively taken galaxies within the universe of philosophy and clumsily thrown them about in a successive manner without argument or counter in order to convey some sense of fluency of truthful thought. And in so doing, I have failed to bring to light the intricate makeup of such galaxies. For within galaxies are things like solar systems, and in solar systems there are stars and planets, and further simplification leads to the matter making up such entities as well as the molecules, atoms, and divinely orchestrated nature of the interaction amongst those atoms and protons and electrons making up such matter. What I have ultimately assembled, therefore, is a forlorn attempt at smashing together celestial philosophical theses and expecting it to produce a sufficient answer to the originally posed question. So forgive me for only scratching the surface of where the question has taken me, but I feel a thousand lifetimes would still fall short of doing an adequate job at penetrating the surface of the immense amount of existing truth. So enough of this philosophical banter. After all, I have been asked a question, and it would be rude to press on any further with terms, theses, and theories most are unfamiliar with and I myself am still learning and studying.
Why philosophy?
Because I want the truth.
