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W hat is Philosophy?
Quite literally, the term "philosophy" means, "love of wisdom." In a broad sense,
philosophy is an activity people undertake when they seek to understand fundamental
truths about themselves, the world in which they live, and their relationships to the world
and to each other. As an academic discipline philosophy is much the same. Those who
study philosophy are perpetually engaged in asking, answering, and arguing for their
answers to life’s most basic questions. To make such a pursuit more systematic academic
philosophy is traditionally divided into major areas of study.
M etaphysics
At its core the study of metaphysics is the study of the nature of reality, of what exists in
the world, what it is like, and how it is ordered. In metaphysics philosophers wrestle with
such questions as:
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Is there a God?
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What is truth?
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What is a person? What makes a person the same through time?
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Is the world strictly composed of matter?
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Do people have minds? If so, how is the mind related to the body?
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Do people have free wills?
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What is it for one event to cause another?
Are there any metaphysical questions that planning seeks to answer? Think about
planning, process and product as well as objectives and goals. Is there any area in which
this is applied to answer any planning question?
Epistem ology
Epistemology is the study of knowledge. It is primarily concerned with what we can know
about the world and how we can know it. Typical questions of concern in epistemology
are:
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What is knowledge?
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Do we know anything at all?
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How do we know what we know?
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Can we be justified in claiming to know certain things?
Is planning about knowledge and the quest for knowledge? Are we in any way seeking for
knowledge in planning, or is planning itself any knowledge? If so, what do planners
know? How is planning knowledge obtained, used/ applied, etc?
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Ethics
The study of ethics often concerns what we ought to do and what it would be best to do.
In struggling with this issue, larger questions about what is good and right arise. So, the
ethicist attempts to answer such questions as:
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What is good? What makes actions or people good?
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What is right? What makes actions right?
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Is morality objective or subjective?
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How should I treat others?
Is planning an ethical question? Are there an ethical standards to planning, or is planning
itself an ethical procedure or end?
Read about environmental ethics and understand about the various ethics.
Logic
Another important aspect of the study of philosophy is the arguments or reasons given
for people’s answers to these questions. To this end philosophers employ logic to study
the nature and structure of arguments. Logicians ask such questions as:
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What constitutes "good" or "bad" reasoning?
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How do we determine whether a given piece of reasoning is good or bad?
Do we reason in planning? In which cases can we apply any form of reasoning in the
process of plan preparation?
Logically, seek to answer these questions,
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what is planning?
What is planning theory?
Is planning theory important in the understanding of what planning is?
History of Philosophy
The study of philosophy involves not only forming one’s own answers to such questions,
but also seeking to understand the way in which people have answered such questions in
the past (in these questions, understand that we are seeking to be specific – ours is the
philosophy of planning). So, a significant part of philosophy is its history, a history of
answers and arguments about these very questions. In studying the history of philosophy
one explores the ideas of such historical figures as:
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Plato
Locke
Marx
Aristotle
Hume
Mill
Aquinas
Kant
Wittgenstein
Descartes
Nietzsche
Sartre
What often motivate the study of philosophy is not merely the answers or arguments
themselves but whether or not the arguments are good and the answers are true.
Moreover, many of the questions and issues in the various areas of philosophy overlap
and in some cases even converge. Thus, philosophical questions arise in almost every
discipline. This is why philosophy also encompasses such areas as:
Philosophy of Law
Philosophy of Feminism
Philosophy of Religion
Philosophy of Science
Philosophy of Mind
Philosophy of Literature
Political Philosophy
Philosophy of the Arts
Philosophy of History
Philosophy of Language
Philosophy of Planning
So where did philosophy originate from?
Interesting philosophical anecdotes
1. ‘Who am I?’ asked Rene Descartes. Answer: cogito ergo sum!
2. One Taoist philosopher dreamt that he was a butterfly flapping its wings in
eternity. When he woke up, he did not know whether he was a beautiful butterfly
in eternity dreaming that it was a man
3. Is it worse to fail at something or never attempt it in the first place?
4. If you could choose just one thing to change about the world, what would it be?
5. To what extent do you shape your own destiny, and how much is down to fate?
6. Does nature shape our personalities more than nurture?
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Should people care more about doing the right thing, or doing things right?
8. What one piece of advice would you offer to a newborn infant?
9. Where is the line between insanity and creativity?
10. What is true happiness?
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11. What things hold you back from doing the things that you really want to?
12. What makes you, you?
13. What is the truth?
14. What is reality?
15. Do you make your own decisions, or let others make them for you?
16. What makes a good friend?
17. Why do people fear losing things that they do not even have yet?
18. Who defines good and evil?
19. What is the difference between living and being alive?
20. Is a “wrong” act okay if nobody ever knows about it?
21. Who decides what morality is?
22. How do you know that your experience of consciousness is the same as other
people’s experience of consciousness?
23. What is true strength?
24. What is true love?
25. Is a family still relevant in the modern world?
26. What role does honour play in today’s society?
27. If money cannot buy happiness, can you ever be truly happy with no money?
28. 26. How do you know your perceptions are real?
29. How much control do you have over your life?
30. What is freedom?
31. Isn’t one person’s terrorist another person’s freedom fighter?
32. What happens after we die?
33. What defines you?
34. What do people strive for after enlightenment?
35. Do we have a soul?
36. What is intelligence?
37. How should people live their lives?
38. If lying is wrong, are white lies okay?
39. Is trust more important than love?
40. Is it easier to love or be loved?
41. Is it better to love and lose or never to love?
42. Do aliens exist?
43. The structure of DNA appears to be intelligently designed, what are the
implications?
44. If everything evolved from amoebas, how does the world still have amoebas?
45. Is life all a dream?
46. When does consciousness begin?
47. What are numbers?
48. Can we have happiness without sadness?
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49. How did the universe begin?
50. Is there a supreme power?
51. What is education?
52. What will happen at the end of the world?
53. Is there a reason to life?
54. Where does the soul live?
55. Is it more important to be liked or respected?
56. Does sound happen if nothing is present to hear it?
57. What is infinity?
58. Where does the universe end?
59. Does observation alter an event?
60. Does the Law of Attraction exist?
61. How does gravity work?
62. Where were people before they were born?
63. What is beauty?
64. Where do thoughts come from?
65. Is mind or matter more real?
66. What is time?
67. How can people believe in truths without evidence?
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