INTRODUCTION TO PHILOSOPHY

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Introduction to Philosophy

Contents

What is Philosophy?

Objectives of Philosophy

Aspects of Philosophy

Different school of thoughts in philosophy

Philosophy of education and its importance

Philosophy

Ancient Greco-Roman philosophy is a period of Western philosophy, starting in the 6th

century [c. 585] BC to the 6th century AD. It is usually divided into three periods: the pre-

Socratic period, the Ancient Classical Greek period of Plato and Aristotle, and the post-

Aristotelian (or Hellenistic) period. A fourth period that is sometimes added includes the

Neoplatonic and Christian philosophers of Late Antiquity. The most important of the ancient

philosophers (in terms of subsequent influence) are Plato and Aristotle. Plato specifically, is

credited as the founder of Western philosophy. The philosopher Alfred North Whitehead said of

Plato: "The safest general characterization of the European philosophical tradition is that it

consists of a series of footnotes to Plato. I do not mean the systematic scheme of thought which

scholars have doubtfully extracted from his writings. I allude to the wealth of general ideas

scattered through them.

It was said in Roman Ancient history that Pythagoras was the first man to call himself a

philosopher, or lover of wisdom, and Pythagorean ideas exercised a marked influence on Plato,

and through him, all of Western philosophy. Plato and Aristotle, the first Classical Greek

philosophers, did refer critically to other simple "wise men", which were called in Greek

"sophists," and which were common before Pythagoras' time. From their critique it appears that a

distinction was then established in their own Classical period between the more elevated and

pure "lovers of wisdom" (the true Philosophers), and these other earlier and more common

traveling teachers, who often also earned money from their craft.

The main subjects of ancient philosophy are: understanding the fundamental causes and

principles of the universe; explaining it in an economical way; the epistemological problem of

reconciling the diversity and change of the natural universe, with the possibility of obtaining

fixed and certain knowledge about it; questions about things that cannot be perceived by the

senses, such as numbers, elements, universals, and gods. Socrates is said to have been the

initiator of more focused study upon the human things including the analysis of patterns of

reasoning and argument and the nature of the good life and the importance of understanding and

knowledge in order to pursue it; the explication of the concept of justice, and its relation to

various systems of life.

In this period the crucial features of the Western philosophical method were established:

a critical approach to received or established views, and the appeal to reason and argumentation.

This includes Socrates' dialectic method of inquiry, known as the Socratic Method or method of

"elenchus", which he largely applied to the examination of key moral concepts such as the Good

and Justice. To solve a problem, it would be broken down into a series of questions, the answers

to which gradually distill the answer a person would seek. The influence of this approach is most

strongly felt today in the use of the scientific method, in which hypothesis is the first stage.

What is philosophy ?

Philosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems, such as those connected

with reality, existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language

Humans have always asked questions about the “stuff” around us. Some of the questions

were practical, asking what we could use for food or clothing. Other questions were concerned

with what we use to build shelter. Money is always important, so gold and silver were of great

interest.

Other questions humans have asked dealt with more basic issues. What is all this “stuff”

made of? Today we can go into a laboratory and measure what is in a particular material. This

ability was not available until the last couple of centuries.

The ancient philosophers thought a lot about many issues. Philosophers ask difficult

questions and try to answer them. Philosophers think and discuss questions. They don’t go into

the lab to find answers. For many centuries there were no labs to do research in. Thinking about

questions was the only approach available.

When we talk about philosophy, we are really referring to the thoughts and ideas that

began in Asia Minor around 600 B.C. The word “philosophy” comes from the Greek words

philein, which means “to love” and soph, which means “wisdom.” So “philosophy” literally

means the “love of wisdom.”

The earliest philosophers clustered around the Mediterranean Sea most notably ancient

Greece. As we mentioned earlier, scientific thinking got its start in Asia Minor with the Greek

philosophers. Thales of Miletus (625-545 B.C.) was the first Greek philosopher. After Thales of

Miletus, there was Anaximander (611-547 B.C.) and Anaxemenes (550-475 B.C.) both

from Miletus. Then there was Heraclitus of Ephesus (540-475 B.C.), Pythagoras of Samos (582-

500 B.C.) Parmenides of Elea (480 B.C.) Empedocles of Agracas (500-430 B.C.) Leucippus of

Miletus (440 B.C.) and Democritus of Abdera (420 B.C.)! What a lot of long names to

remember! However, all of these philosophers, in one way or another, had something to offer to

science and we will learn more about them later.

However, the three Greek philosophers that had the biggest influence on science and

philosophy were Socrates (477-399 B.C.) Plato (427-347 B.C.) and Aristotle (384-322 B.C.).

Both Socrates and Plato came from Athens. Aristotle was from Stagira and was the student of

Plato. Plato was the student of Socrates. Socrates did not like to study the natural world. He liked

to think about human nature instead. Socrates didn’t think there was anything valuable to learn

by looking at nature. Plato, however, did like to look at nature and thought it was important. He

began the first school dedicated to philosophy and natural philosophy.

His school was called the Academy. It was located in Athens and survived for over 800

years. Plato’s most famous student was Aristotle. Aristotle studied at the Academy for almost 20

years before he was asked to tutor the son of King Philip II of Macedonia, Alexander. Alexander

would go on to become Alexander the Great. Aristotle took the study of natural philosophy even

further than his teacher Plato. His work, which included logic, physics, cosmology, anatomy, and

even ethics, marked the beginning of a 2000 year history of Aristotelian thought that dominated

much of the Western world.

Objectives of philosophy

Problem-solving and critical thinking skills

An ability to think independently

An ability to analyze current issues, practice and ideology

An understanding of philosophical basis for the practice of education

Foster an appreciation of the power of philosophical deliberation and application of

philosophical methods a way of resolving issues in education.

Inquire into questions of value, meaning and truth as they relate to education

Inquire into questions of value, meaning and truth as they relate to education

Aspects of Philosophy

Epistemology

Ontology

Axiology

Epistemology

The word epistemology comes from two Greek words episteme and logos meaning

knowledge and theory or discourse. It literally means theory of knowledge or theory of knowing

or discourse on knowledge. This branch of metaphysics is also called CRITERIOLOGY from the

Greek word kriterion meaning criterion or the rule by which one may test knowledge to

distinguish truth from falsehood or truth from error. It is sometimes also called criticism which is

derived from the Greek word krites meaning a judge. Thus epistemology has the task of judging

and evaluating knowledge itself. There are many definitions of epistemology. Here are some

examples.

The Dictionary of Philosophy defines epistemology as “The branch of philosophy which

investigates the origin, structure, methods, and validity of knowledge.” Vaan Steenberghen

defines epistemology as “an objective and disinterested inquiry which studies the nature,

conditions and value of knowledge without deciding beforehand what the result and

consequences of its study will be.” It is that branch of philosophy, which is concerned with

the nature and scope of knowledge. However, whatever definition is given to it, one thing is

clear, that it is a philosophical study of knowledge. Epistemology deals with the problems of

knowledge in all its aspects.

It critically investigates and establishes the very capacity of the mind to know things as

they are themselves and thus refuting scepticism and agnosticism. Epistemology upholds the

value of metaphysical knowledge against the attacks of empiricism. It demonstrates that what the

mind knows is reality existing independently of the knowing mind, as against all forms of

idealism or subjectivism. It should be clear that epistemology is not merely an apologetic or

defensive science fighting the extremists. On the positive note, epistemology is a metaphysics of

knowledge. It considers human knowing in the context of everything that exists.

OntologyThe general name for ontology is metaphysics. Ontology is a combination of two Greek

words ontos and logos meaning being and study respectively. Thus ontology is the science of

being. On the other hand, it was Andronicus of Rhodes who coined the phrase ta meta ta physika

biblia meaning, “after the books on nature”. Andronicus used this phrase to describe Aristotle’s

untitled works, when he was classifying and cataloguing Aristotle’s works. He came across the

corpus that was neither about physical things, nor about politics, nor about ethics or biology. He

referred to them simply as the “Books after the Books on Nature”.

Aristotle himself referred to this corpus as the First Philosophy or Theology or simply

Wisdom. Thus metaphysics means beyond the natural. The word came to be used in reference to

studies that dealt with things that were beyond the physical world, things that are considered to

be in existence yet cannot be perceived by the senses. It is also used in reference to the study of

the ultimate causes of things. From its etymological derivation, it can be understood in three

senses:

• The BOOKS that were written after the books on nature;

• The THINGS that were studied after the things of nature;

• The SCIENCE that was done after the science of natural things.

In modern philosophical usage, metaphysics generally refers to the field of philosophy

dealing with questions about the kinds of things that are and their modes of being. Its subject

matter include the concept of existence, thing, property, event, distinctions between particulars

and universals, individuals, classes, change, causality, nature of relations of mind, matter, space

and time.

Principal questions of ontology include:

What can be said to exist?

What is a thing?

Into what categories, if any, can we sort existing things?

What are the meanings of being?

What are the various modes of being of entities?

What is existence, i.e. what does it mean for a being to be?

Is existence a property?

Is existence a genus or general class that is simply divided up by specific differences?

Which entities, if any, are fundamental?

Are all entities objects?

How do the properties of an object relate to the object itself?

Do physical properties actually exist?

What features are the essential, as opposed to merely accidental attributes of a given object?

How many levels of existence or ontological levels are there? And what constitutes a "level"?

What is a physical object?

Can one give an account of what it means to say that a physical object exists?

Can one give an account of what it means to say that a non-physical entity exists?

What constitutes the identity of an object?

When does an object go out of existence, as opposed to merely changing?

Do beings exist other than in the modes of objectivity and subjectivity, i.e. is the subject/object

split of modern philosophy inevitable?

AxiologyAxiology (theory of value): the inquiry into the nature, criteria, and metaphysical

status of value. Axiology, in turn, is divided into two main parts:

ethics and esthetics.

Although the term “axiology” is not widely used outside of philosophy,

the problems of axiology include (1) how values are experienced, (2) the

kinds of value, (3) the standards of value, and (4) in what sense values can

be said to exist. Axiology, then is the subject area which tries to answer

problems like these:

1. How are values related to interest, desire, will, experience, and means to-?

End?

2. How do different kinds of value interrelate?

3. Can the distinction between intrinsic and instrumental values be maintained?

4. Are values ultimately rationally or objectively based?

5. What is the difference between a matter of fact and a matter of value?

There are two main subdivisions of axiology: ethics and esthetics. Ethics

involves the theoretical study of the moral valuation of human action—it’s

not just concerned with the study of principles of conduct. Esthetics involves

the conceptual problems associated with the describing the relationships among our feelings and

senses with respect to the experience of

art and nature.

Different school of thoughts in philosophy

Idealism Existentialism developed as a form of existential phenomenology, although it had its

remote origins in the writing of Kierkegaard. The existentialists made their own return to the

existent reality of man, partly to liberate him from being a moralized phase of the idealistic

absolute, partly to discover the sense of freedom and moral decision, and partly to gain

orientation for the study of being. Martin Hiedegger’s analysis of being (Dasein) in the world,

being alone with others and being related to instruments and to integral things, are clues to the

metaphysics of being for which he sought. Jean Paul Sartre on the other hand thinks that both the

social and religious project of man are unavoidable and yet doomed to frustration. Gabriel

Marcel and Karl Jaspers maintain a three-fold kinship. They are highly critical of

depersonalizing effects of technological civilization; they regard the free human existence as

being related to transcendence as well as to the world; and they recognize the limiting effect of

life situation upon the project of reaching God.

Idealism advocates the Coherence theory of Truth. Idealism is a view that the object of

knowledge depends upon the perceiving mind for its existence. Knowledge consists in the ideas

of the perceiving mind. Truth is the consistency among the ideas. The Idealist thinkers like

Berkeley, Leibnitz, Spinoza, Hegel, Bradley, Bosonquet, Shankeracharya, advocate the

Coherence theory of Truth. For Idealist thinkers, Reality is rational. There is only one

comprehensive and harmonious system of knowledge. Truth is coherence or harmony of one

statement with another statement. An isolated and alone statement does not have truth value of

its own.

Different statement of one system are logically connected with one another. Every

statement or proposition is in harmony with the rest propositions. Non – contradiction among

these statements is truth and contradiction or in consistency among these propositions is falsity.

Truth is an internal relation among statements. Truth consists in complete coherence among all

the statements of a system. Truth of a statement can be known only with its relation to

the whole system. That is why any proposition is partly true. Knowledge is a coherent whole of

propositions. Every statement in it has its own definite place. Every statement contributes to

the coherence of the whole system. A complete system can be wholly true. Truth is extensive and

all inclusive. Human intellect is finite. It can conceive the statement in the

limited sphere Eron any error is partial truth.

From the absolute stand point there is no error at all. There are different branches of

knowledge, such as mathematics, physics, chemistry, botany. The statements of one branch

should be consistent with another. They must also be coherent with the statements of another

branch of knowledge. In other words the different systems of knowledge must be consistent with

one another. All branches are the parts of one comprehensive unique system of knowledge.

RealismPhilosophic realism in general is defined by Phillips (1987, p. 205) as “the view that entities exist

independently of being perceived, or independently of our theories about them.” Schwandt adds

that “scientific realism is the view that theories refer to real features of the world. ‘Reality’ here

refers to whatever it is in the universe (i.e., forces, structures, and so on) that causes the

phenomena we perceive with our senses” (1997, p. 133). Such views were ignored or disparaged

during much of the twentieth century, both by positivists and by constructivists and other

antipositivists.

However, they have emerged as a serious position in current philosophical discussion

(Boyd, 2010; Devitt, 2005; Niiniluoto, 2002; Putnam, 1987, 1990, 1999; Salmon, 2005). In the

philosophy of science, including the philosophy of the social sciences, realism has been an

important, and arguably the dominant, approach for over 30 years (Baert, 1998, pp. 189–190;

Hammersley, 1998, p. 3; Suppe, 1977, p. 618); realism has been prominent in other areas of

philosophy as well (Miller, 2010). There are ongoing philosophical debates over realism that

remain unresolved, and realist philosophers themselves disagree about many of these issues;

one advocate of realist views claimed that “scientific realism is a majority position whose

advocates are so divided as to appear a minority” (Leplin, 1984, p. 1).

However, equally serious issues confront alternative positions, and the idea that there is a

real world with which we interact, and to which our concepts and theories refer, has proved to be

a resilient and powerful one that has attracted increased philosophical attention following the

demise of positivism. In the social sciences, the most prominent manifestation of realism is the

“critical realist” tradition usually associated with the work of Roy Bhaskar (1978, 1989, 2011;

Archer, Bhaskar, Collier, Lawson, & Norrie, 1998; Manicas, 2006; Sayer, 1992, 2000).

However, Bhaskar’s work, particularly his more recent development of critical realism as

an emancipatory perspective, which he called “dialectical critical realism,” departed in

significant ways from the position I take here, and has been criticized by others in the “critical

realist” tradition (e.g., Pawson, 2006 1 ; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roy_Bhaskar, accessed

11/2/2009). I have therefore not adopted Bhaskar’s views in general, although I find his basic

positions (particularly on the importance of distinguishing ontology from epistemology)

compatible with the stance that I present here.

My position draws substantially from other versions of realism that I see as compatible

with the key ideas of the critical realist tradition, and that provide additional insights and

alternative perspectives for using realism in qualitative research.

NaturalismNaturalism is any of several philosophical stances, typically those descended from

materialism and pragmatism that do not distinguish the supernatural (including strange entities

like non-natural values, and universals as they are commonly conceived) from nature. Naturalism

does not necessarily claim that phenomena or hypotheses commonly labeled as supernatural do

not exist or are wrong, but insists that all phenomena and hypotheses can be studied by the same

methods and therefore anything considered supernatural is either nonexistent or not inherently

different from natural phenomena or hypotheses. Some naturalists also insist that a legitimate

distinction between supernatural entities and natural entities cannot be properly made (focusing

on the conceptual distinction itself), and that when someone is talking or thinking about

supernatural entities, they are actually referring to natural entities (though confusedly).

PragmatismPragmatism is a philosophic school generally considered to have originated in the late

nineteenth century with Charles Sanders Peirce, who first stated the pragmatic maxim. It came to

fruition in the early twentieth-century philosophies of William James and John Dewey. Most of

the thinkers who describe themselves as pragmatists consider practical consequences or real

effects to be vital components of both meaning and truth. Other important aspects of pragmatism

include anti-Cartesianism, radical empiricism, instrumentalism, anti-realism, verificationism,

conceptual relativity, a denial of the fact-value distinction, a high regard for science, and

fallibilism.

For Pragmatism, Truth is the workability and fruitful consequence of our ideas. The

thinkers like Peirce, William James, Schiller, John Dewey advocate Pragmatic theory of Truth.

Pragmatist thinkers believe that there is no Absolute or Eternal Truth as such. Truth is empirical.

We observe the changing world. It is obvious that our understanding of the world also

changes. Truth is that which survives in the course of time. Truth goes through the process of

verification. The process of evolution points out the survival of the fittest. Truth consists solely

in practical satisfaction of will and desire. Our knowledge about the path of IDE is true if we

really reach to the institute. The Perception of mirage in a desert is false because it does not

quench our thirst. Truth is an adventitious feature, added to knowledge when successful practice

follows it. According to William James, Truth is the name of whatever proves itself to be good in

the way of belief.” There can be different, equally correct approaches towards reality. Truth is

the successful adjustment between our purposes and the world.

A true idea is that which leads to successful consequences where as a false idea is that

which leads to unfruitful consequences. Truth has practical bearing. It must satisfy in

individual’s needs. Scientific truths keep changing from time to time. Truth is constructed in the

course of our experiences. The fruitful consequences of our action reconstruct the concept of

Truth. Our ideas or statements or judgements are not valid in themselves. They are validated by

the satisfaction of the purpose. John Deweys’ theory is called as instrumentalism. He believes

that thinking process is closely connected with our life. Thought is a function among other

functions originating from the needs of life. Knowledge helps us to survive through the struggle

of life. It helps us to lead good life. Our thoughts, beliefs and ideas are working tools i. e.

instruments to live the life in a better way. Truth is relevant to a specific situation and valuable

for a purpose. For Instrumentalism, true knowledge is an instrument of successful life. The belief

which leads to promotion of life is true. Truth serves the purpose of survival. It is the fittest

possible response in the struggle of life.

A wrong response may cost even the life. Truth is tested in practice. There is no ultimate

truth. Truth must be constantly revised and reconstructed. Truth is made by different events. It is

still in the process of making and awaits the parts of its completion from the future. John Dewey

believed that social reforms and changes in educational set up can lead to better life. Such

changes bring about fruitful consequences. We know that the problem of Truth is closely

connected with the problem of reality for pragmatist thinkers, there is no ultimate reality as such.

Ultimate Realty is shaped in accordance with the purpose of the individual. Human ‘intellect’

can offer many equally plausible alternative solutions to the same problem. Human ‘will’

Chooses the alternative that results in greatest satisfaction. Thus for pragmatist conative

satisfaction or utility becomes the criterion of truth.

Existentialism

Existentialism developed as a form of existential phenomenology, although it had its

remote origins in the writing of Kierkegaard. The existentialists made their own return to the

existent reality of man, partly to liberate him from being a moralized phase of the idealistic

absolute, partly to discover the sense of freedom and moral decision, and partly to gain

orientation for the study of being. Martin Heidegger’s analysis of being (Dasein) in the world,

being alone with others and being related to instruments and to integral things, are clues to the

metaphysics of being for which he sought. Jean Paul Sartre on the other hand thinks that both the

social and religious project of man are unavoidable and yet doomed to frustration. Gabriel

Marcel and Karl Jaspers maintain a three-fold kinship. They are highly critical of

depersonalizing effects of technological civilization; they regard the free human existence as

being related to transcendence as well as to the world; and they recognize the limiting effect of

life situation upon the project of reaching God.

ISLAMIC PHILOSOPHYIslamic Philosophy is the systematics investigation of problems connected with life, the

universe, ethics, society, and so on as conducted in the Muslim world .Not all Islamic

philosophers have been Muslims. Christian such as Yahiya Ibn Adi and Jews such as

Maimonides have been important contributions to the Islamic philosophical traditions, and

others, such as Ibn al-Rawandi and Muhammad Ibn Zakariya al-Razi, used philosophy to attack

Islam.

Early Islamic philosophy began in the 2nd century AH of the Islamic calendar(Early 9th

century CE) and lasted until the 6th century AH(late 12th century CE).The period is known as

the Islamic Golden Age, and the achievement of this period has a crucial influence on the

development of modern philosophy and science; for Renaissance Europe, the influence

represented “One of the largest technology transfers in World history.(1)This period began with

Al- Kindi in the 9th century and ended with Averroes(Ibn Rushd) at the end of the 12th century.

The death of the Averroes effectively marked the end of a particular discipline of Islamic

philosophy usually called the peripatetic Arabic school, and philosophical Activity declined

significantly in Western Islamic countries such as Islamic SPAIN and NORTH AFRICA.

Philosophy persisted for much longer in Eastern countries, in particular Persia and India

where several schools of philosophy continued to flourish Avicennism, Illuminationist

philosophy, Mystical philosophy, and Transcendent theosophy. Ibn Khaldun, in his

mukadimmah, founded the disciplines of historiography and sociology and made important

contributions to the philosophy of history. Interest in Islamic philosophy revived during the

Nahda (awakening) movement in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and countries to the

present day. Prominent representatives of contemporary ISLAMIC philosophy include

Mohammad Baqir-al-Sadr and Hossein Nasr.

Islamic philosophy refers to philosophy produced in an Islamic society. It is not

necessarily concerned with religious issues, nor exclusively produced by Muslims. [2] Nor do all

schools of thought within Islam admit the usefulness or legitimacy of philosophical inquiry.

Some argue that there is no indication that the limited knowledge and experience of humans can

lead to truth. It is also important to observe that, while "reason" ('aql) is sometimes recognized as

a source of Islamic law, this may have a totally different meaning from "reason" in philosophy.

Islamic philosophy is a generic term that can be defined and used in different ways. In its

broadest sense it means the world view of Islam, as derived from the Islamic texts concerning the

creation of the universe and the will of the Creator. In another sense it refers to any of the

schools of thought that flourished under the Islamic empire or in the shadow of the Arab-Islamic

culture and Islamic civilization. In its narrowest sense it is a translation of Falsafa, meaning those

particular schools of thought that most reflect the influence of Greek systems of philosophy such

as Neoplatonism and Aristotelianism.

The historiography of Islamic philosophy is marked by disputes as to how the subject

should be properly interpreted. Some of the key issues involve the comparative importance of

eastern intellectuals such as Ibn Sina (Avicenna) and of western thinkers such as Ibn Rushd, [3]

and also whether Islamic philosophy can be read at face value or should be interpreted in an

esoteric fashion. Supporters of the latter thesis, like Leo Strauss, maintain that Islamic

philosophers wrote so as to conceal their true meaning in order to avoid religious persecution.

Philosophy of EducationAll human societies, past and present, have had a vested interest in education; and some

wits have claimed that teaching (at its best an educational activity) is the second oldest

profession. While not all societies channel sufficient resources into support for educational

activities and institutions, all at the very least acknowledge their centrality—and for good

reasons. For one thing, it is obvious that children are born illiterate and innumerate, and ignorant

of the norms and cultural achievements of the community or society into which they have been

thrust; but with the help of professional teachers and the dedicated amateurs in their families and

immediate environs (and with the aid, too, of educational resources made available through the

media and nowadays the internet), within a few years they can read, write, calculate, and act (at

least often) in culturally-appropriate ways.

Some learn these skills with more facility than others, and so education also serves as a

social-sorting mechanism and undoubtedly has enormous impact on the economic fate of the

individual. Put more abstractly, at its best education equips individuals with the skills and

substantive knowledge that allows them to define and to pursue their own goals, and also allows

them to participate in the life of their community as full-fledged, autonomous citizens. Equips

individuals with the skills and substantive knowledge that allows them to define and to pursue

their own goals, and also allows them to participate in the life of their community as full-fledged,

autonomous citizens.

But this is to cast matters in very individualistic terms, and it is fruitful also to take a

societal perspective, where the picture changes somewhat. It emerges that in pluralistic societies

such as the Western democracies there are some groups that do not wholeheartedly support the

development of autonomous individuals, for such folk can weaken a group from within by

thinking for themselves and challenging communal norms and beliefs; from the point of view of

groups whose survival is thus threatened, formal, state-provided education is not necessarily a

good thing. But in other ways even these groups depend for their continuing survival on

educational processes, as do the larger societies and nation-states of which they are part; for as

John Dewey put it in the opening chapter of his classic work Democracy and Education (1916),

in its broadest sense education is the means of the ―social continuity of life‖ (Dewey, 1916, 3).

Dewey pointed out that the ―primary ineluctable facts of the birth and death of each one

of the constituent members in a social group‖ make education a necessity, for despite this

biological inevitability ―the life of the group goes on‖ (Dewey, 3). The great social importance

of education is underscored, too, by the fact that when a society is shaken by a crisis, this often is

taken as a sign of educational breakdown; education, and educators, become scapegoats.

It is not surprising that such an important social domain has attracted the attention of

philosophers for thousands of years, especially as there are complex issues aplenty that have

great philosophical interest. Abstractly, at its best education equips individuals with the skills

and substantive knowledge that allows them to define and to pursue their own goals, and also

allows them to participate in the life of their community as full-fledged, autonomous citizens.

But this is to cast matters in very individualistic terms, and it is fruitful also to take a

societal perspective, where the picture changes somewhat. It emerges that in pluralistic societies

such as the Western democracies there are some groups that do not wholeheartedly support the

development of autonomous individuals, for such folk can weaken a group from within by

thinking for themselves and challenging communal norms and beliefs; from the point of view of

groups whose survival is thus threatened, formal, state-provided education is not necessarily a

good thing. But in other ways even these groups depend for their continuing survival on

educational processes, as do the larger societies and nation-states of which they are part; for as

John Dewey put it in the opening chapter of his classic work Democracy and Education (1916),

in its broadest sense education is the means of the ―social continuity of life‖ (Dewey, 1916, 3).

Dewey pointed out that the ―primary ineluctable facts of the birth and death of each one of the

constituent members in a social group‖ make education a necessity, for despite this biological

inevitability ―the life of the group goes on‖ (Dewey, 3). The great social importance of

education is underscored, too, by the fact that when a society is shaken by a crisis, this often is

taken as a sign of educational breakdown; education, and educators, become scapegoats.

It is not surprising that such an important social domain has attracted the attention of

philosophers for thousands of years, especially as there are complex issues aplenty that have

great philosophical interest. The following are some issues that philosophers have deeply thought

about and philosophy is still in the process of answering these questions.

Is Education as transmission of knowledge versus education as the fostering of inquiry

and reasoning skills that are conducive to the development of autonomy (which, roughly, is the

tension between education as conservative and education as progressive, and also is closely

related to differing views about human ―perfectibility‖—issues that historically have been

raised in the debate over the aims of education); the question of what this knowledge, and what

these skills, ought to be—part of the domain of philosophy of the curriculum; the questions of

how learning is possible, and what is it to have learned something—two sets of issues that relate

to the question of the capacities and potentialities that are present at birth, and also to the process

(and stages) of human development and to what degree this process is flexible and hence can be

influenced or manipulated; the tension between liberal education and vocational education, and

the overlapping issue of which should be given priority—education for personal development or

education for citizenship (and the issue of whether or not this is a false dichotomy); the

differences (if any) between education and enculturation; the distinction between educating

versus teaching versus training versus indoctrination;

The relation between education and maintenance of the class structure of society, and the

issue of whether different classes or cultural groups can—justly—be given educational programs

that differ in content or in aims; the issue of whether the rights of children, parents, and socio-

cultural or ethnic groups, conflict—and if they do, the question of whose rights should be

dominant; the question as to whether or not all children have a right to state-provided education,

and if so, should this education respect the beliefs and customs of all groups and how on earth

would this be accomplished; and a set of complex issues about the relation between education

and social reform, centering upon whether education is essentially conservative, or whether it

can be an (or, the) agent of social change.

It is here that that philosophy of education plays an important role in providing direction

to education on the following issues as well as providing a theory of knowledge for education to

work upon.

Philosophy of education is essentially a method of approaching educational experience

rather than a body of conclusions. It is the specific method which makes it philosophical.

Philosophical method is critical, comprehensive and synthetic.

Philosophy, religion, and science have always been closely related. The emphasis shifts,

but the point of these endeavors is the same: the importance of ideas and understanding, of

making sense out of our world and seeing our lives in some larger, even cosmic, perspective.

Ideas define our place in the universe and our relations with other people; ideas determine what

is important and what is not important, what is fair and what is not fair, what is worth believing

and what is not worth believing. Ideas give life meaning. Our minds need ideas the way our

bodies need food. We are starved for visions, hungry for understanding. We are caught up in the

routines of life, distracted occasionally by those activities we call “recreation” and

“entertainment.” What we as a nation have lost is the joy of thinking, the challenge of

understanding, the inspirations as well as the consolations of philosophy.

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Gunga, S. O. (2008). Philosophy of education. chicago: american philosophical association.

Nolan, R. T. (2008). PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGIOUS EDUCATION. new york: Harper and Row, Publishers.

Russell, B. (1912). The Problems of Philosophy. new york: New York : H. Holt.