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H.B. Augustine is a senior undergraduate student at Denison University studying Philosophy and Communication. He has started a publishing organization called "Integral Publishing House" - contact him at august_h@denison.edu if interested in publishing Integral material.

The Problem with Contemporary Philosophy

A Student's Perspective

H.B. Augustine

This paper discusses why I see a serious flaw in contemporary philosophy and what we must do in order to eliminate it. I will not refer to any scholarly material throughout the course of my work. The essay relies upon intuitive justification alone for all claims made. I am currently in the process of sending it to the philosophy department heads of all major colleges and universities.

Introduction

Many people might say that there is nothing wrong with contemporary philosophy. These individuals see nil lacking in the status quo of arguably the most important discipline, perhaps even the first discipline. Indeed, if philosophy is not the most important human tradition, then it certainly is among the most important. Philosophy questions the very paradigmatic foundation that dictates its contemporary disciplines, possessing the power – like science and art – to spur paradigm shifts that eventually affect the entire human condition. Thus, if (contemporary) philosophy is significant as well as significantly flawed, then learning why this is true and what we must do in order to fix the problem is as equally imperative.

The aim of this work is to explain effectively why contemporary philosophy is seriously flawed and to present a means to overcome this cultural and social obstacle. The reason why contemporary philosophy is seriously flawed is that it emphasizes the ideas of past philosophers over the ideas that we, ourselves, can synthesize from them. Put simply, we must eliminate this problem by acting out of integrity and changing our beliefs and actions as harbingers for positive global change. This discussion will now begin by considering the problem of contemporary philosophy.

A Historical Recap

Before one understands the problem of contemporary philosophy, one must first acknowledge everything within philosophy that has led up to this issue. Philosophy began in Ancient times with civilization itself, with Sumer, Babylon, Egypt, and – of course – Greece. Greek thought was speculative and metaphysical above all, complementing the next major philosophical paradigm one sees illustrating Medieval thought as following Rome along with its adopting Greek thought. Modern science, however, soon vanquished its more mythical, dogmatic, and spiritualistic Ancient/Medieval predecessor.

The Modern paradigm affected “normative philosophy” (if one applies Kuhn's term beyond the sphere of science) by making it more rational, precise, and naturalistic. The philosophical worldview of a Universe consisting of matter and form, arranged in a sort of perfect celestial harmony by the grace of God or Being, soon transformed into the philosophical worldview of a Universe consisting of just matter, this time arranged in a sort of perfect terrestrial structure by means of billiard-esque cause-and-effect.

The Modern paradigm remained until Kant presented its first notable critique in 1781. Kant in his work represented what soon manifested more apparently with 19th and especially 20th century philosophy, which criticized the omnipotence of reason and humans' ability to know things about the World in such a superior way. Relativism overruled objectivism while pluralism grew out of individualism. Perhaps by now one has a sense of the Premodern, Modern, and Postmodern philosophical traditions.

Because the contemporary Postmodern paradigm is pluralistic, critical, and relativistic by its very nature, this makes the role of “contemporary philosopher” more an art historian than scientist. Put differently, the role of a contemporary philosopher is alike to that of an art historian instead of scientist because the latter only analyzes and compares that which has already been produced while the former actually contributes to that which is being produced. That which is being produced, in this case, is synthetic knowledge of the World – regardless of whether such is constructed or external.

Philosophical Synthetic Knowledge

What “synthetic knowledge” in this case means is “normative knowledge” or “ideas accepted by a majority of the academic community.” Evidently, synthetic knowledge as defined is not exclusive to hard science alone. One does not solely rely upon biology, chemistry, or physics in order to gain better holistic comprehension of this Universe. Rather, one accepts and embraces synthetic knowledge coming from all other disciplines, many of which extending beyond what one might take “science” to mean.

For example, in sociology, one has the ideas of “proletariat” and “bourgeoisie.” “Scientifically,” these concepts bare far less meaning than they do within the realm of sociology. However, regardless of which realm brings more meaning to such terms, what remains is that the idea of “proletariat” and the idea of “bourgeoisie” actually have external validity to them. Relative to capitalist society, it is true that a major socioeconomic gap manifests; it is true that the numeric and fiscal discrepancy demographically characterizing this gap is so significant that assigning each group a name definitely has so-called truth-value. These Marxist ideas contributing to the discipline of sociology are but two examples of how someone gains synthetic knowledge, as defined, outside of what he or she might regard as “science.” Philosophy, alongside sociology and all other traditions, provides such knowledge.

The following sections will demonstrate 1) that philosophy, too, provides synthetic knowledge, 2) that as it stands, it provides none of which, and 3) that for this reason, the contemporary tradition needs to change because its dominant paradigm affects – and in this case limits – the dominant paradigm underlying academia altogether. First, (contrary to prominent belief) the tradition of philosophy contributes such synthetic knowledge alongside “non- hard scientific” disciplines (e.g. sociology, psychology, linguistics) because philosophy actually dictates the very paradigmatic foundation of all other disciplines as a whole.

The Importance of Philosophy

Philosophy and that which comes from it is rightfully the ultimate paradigmatic foundation by which all other disciplines are influenced simply because that is what philosophy is. The four slices comprising the pie of philosophy (arguably) are metaphysics, epistemology, logic, and ethics. Perhaps we can slice this pie into additional primary sections; regardless, what remains is that a philosophical branch such as epistemology certainly dictates the mind of a politician, of a doctor, of a poet, of a priest, of a businessperson. How does this individual on a conscious or subconscious level perceive reality? Is he or she a realist, a dualist, a materialist, an idealist, a pantheist? Certainly, a pantheist quantum physicist will reach different conclusions from hir materialist colleague.

The same principle applies to all other main branches of philosophy. Was Einstein an empiricist or rationalist? What would happen if the business world valued abstract, deductive reasoning ability over linear, inductive reasoning ability? Is Nelson Mandela a rational egoist or does he side more with an ethic of care? As is plain, the branches constituting philosophy as such likewise play a major if not subordinate role in determining the worldview, beliefs, and actions pertaining to all individuals and all other disciplines. However – perhaps the claim remains unsatisfactorily unjustified as to why philosophy, while immensely influential and significant in its own right, still contributes synthetic knowledge. It is true that philosophy contributes synthetic knowledge because it is true that philosophy, throughout history, has produced novel ideas, which – as something such as the Enlightenment shows – later changed the greater course of human affairs. The logic behind this claim is rather simple.

The idea of “mind-body dualism,” for example, has not literally always existed; logically, there must have been a first time marking human history when someone thought of it. Furthermore, the idea itself has some abstract truth to it, since beyond naïve perception there certainly is a significant difference between the mind and body. Because this idea was at one point novel, because it has some truth to it, and because it comes from the realm of philosophy exclusively, this goes to show but one instance in which philosophy contributes to synthetic knowledge. Again, as philosophical paradigm shifts have indicated, this synthetic knowledge plays a major role for both culture and society. What now follows is a case for why philosophy and the contemporary philosophical community, as of now (and contrary to its past and legacy), contributes no synthetic knowledge at all.

The Problem with Contemporary Philosophy

The contemporary philosophical community, as of now, contributes no synthetic knowledge whatsoever because of how the Postmodern paradigm suffocates it. As mentioned, this model is centered on pluralism, criticism, and relativism. Pluralism values the many over the one. Criticism values negatives over positives. Relativism values the reality of subjectivity over that of objectivity. The goal of this argument is not to prove why pluralism, criticism, and relativism or wholly or partially false. Rather, the point is to show that the dominance of these values or themes underlying Postmodern or contemporary philosophy limits the community as a whole from contributing synthetic knowledge at all.

Philosophy today takes the form of deconstruction, not reconstruction. Professors write articles that involve only particular elements of a philosopher or philosophy, and nothing of something that might transcend yet include these smaller parts. Philosophers specialize in some past thinker, memorizing his ideas as an art historian memorizes pieces of famous art. However, very few of these Postmodern philosophy historians actually produce philosophy of their own that is, relative to this time, as groundbreaking and influential beyond the philosophical community alone as what past philosophers and philosophies were relative to their times. On the contrary, Postmodernism has led the philosophical community to focus only on ideas that already exist, analyzing them more and more until they cannot be analyzed any further – and still continuing to deconstruct them. If a philosophical doctrine were an onion, then it is as if the contemporary tradition takes this object with the knife of reason and proceeds to slice and dice it until the pieces are smaller than their knife's very edge.

Contemporary philosophers seldom agree with one another to build upon previous ideas as if contributing to one magnificent cosmic-philosophical intellectual jigsaw puzzle. Instead, these individuals most often attack one another simply because that apparently is their job and the only way they can write a philosophy paper these days. How often is a two-hour philosophy classroom session modeled on Plato's dialectic, in which a group of philosophers chooses an abstract idea (e.g. “goodness,” “beauty,” “truth”) to understand together through intellectual teamwork by means of thesis, antithesis, synthesis, and intuitive reasoning alone? Seldom does the professor of a social-political philosophy class begin by saying, “Students, forget the ideas of all these past thinkers from all these previous contexts. Let's spend this entire period creating or suggesting with our own words and ideas the best possible social-political system for all humankind and Earth!” After all, philosophy is useless if not made practical to life and living.

What comes from the current context is most practical to life and living, as opposed to what comes from previous contexts. For instance, consider which seems more practical and relevant to the current human condition between the ethical views of Aquinas and the ethical views of those who see value in (for instance) environmentalism, feminism, and multiculturalism (the latter of which having philosophically emerged only recently). The environmentalist-feminist-multiculturalist group likely has a philosophical problem with Aquinas' implicit anthrocentricism, misogynism, and ethnocentricism due to his contextually typical strict obedience to Medieval Catholic scripture.

Clearly, philosophers existed in contexts prior to what is now. While past philosophers were inspired by the ideas of their predecessors, what remains is that they synthesized something noteworthy and new; otherwise, philosophy today would not be studying them. However, philosophy today certainly is not studying ideas of past philosophers in order to be inspired to produce something just as novel and revolutionary. Philosophy today merely discusses only ideas from to prior contexts, but does nothing to produce ideas that will lead to new contexts. The knife keeps pointlessly cutting the onion into smaller bits, while the soul dictating it does not consider adding an item other than just onions to the usual recipe of that particular dish.

Philosophy must continue to illuminate academia, and ultimately the entire human condition, by becoming more creative, positive, and innovative, and less analytical, negative, and textual. After all, only creativity has ever led to innovation of any kind. In fact, innovation as such is contingent on creativity. For all of these reasons, the contemporary philosophical paradigm must radically transform in its classes and philosophers for the greater reason that doing so is simply its practical duty. Before understanding why such transformation is obligatory, this discussion will consider how and why classroom reformation can ensue.

Classroom Reformation

First, the contemporary philosophical community must restructure its classes so that they allow for the emergence of synthetic philosophical knowledge. The philosophical community needs to transcend Postmodernism because of how it limits positive or synthetic knowledge (to be acknowledged). Postmodern philosophy – which dictates the structure of many elite philosophy departments and other institutions today – is most characterized by careful analysis and textual discussion. Granted, there is nothing wrong with these things. However, in general the contemporary tradition analyzes far too much and discusses text far too exclusively. The philosophical community as a whole needs to restructure its classes in accordance with a paradigm following that of Postmodernism, which healthily and more comprehensively explores philosophical questions with “intuitive reasoning” in addition to exhaustive analysis, “creative insight” in addition to textual obsession.

As a more tangible way of explaining what philosophy class ought to become, 1) papers in this restructured environment could be written on anything logically and relevantly connected to the initial topic assigned, approved by hir review; 2) students would not need to cite specific textual evidence in order to receive the best possible grade – he or she would simply refer to the most general ideas recollected (from the text), without any need for citation whatsoever; 3) overall grades would be based on quality of writing and argumentation as well as, and most significantly on, uniqueness of thesis or argument; 4) rewriting papers would serve more of a purpose since the student could do so as many times until it earned hir a grade (replacing all previous ones) accurately reflecting a merit with which he or she is content; and 5) teachers would not be encouraged or enforced to make hir class structure hierarchical from a meritocracit standpoint – meaning potentially all students could receive “As,” as opposed to there being a certain “necessary” distribution of letter grades making the teacher and hir respective course seem to the administration “optimally” “not too easy, yet not too difficult.”

For the most part, philosophy class would consist of pure dialectic concerning some philosophical idea, naturally backed by the philosopher(s) who thought of it. Class would consist of “warm up” to begin during which everyone engaged in a “philosophy game” to get the energy moving, focus set, and creativity bubbling. An example of such a game might be “Ask and Answer,” in which everyone gets in a circle or arrangement of some sort and proceeds to go around asking, one person to the next, a philosophical question of any kind (e.g. “What is the good life?”). The person to whom this question is asked then responds in one sentence accurately to hir philosophical stance. Next, he or she asks the next person either a completely new question, or something inspired by the last one(s). Ask and Answer would be a mandatory class warm up because in addition to improving energy, focus, and creativity, it would also stimulate autonomy and communion, expression and listening, within the class as a group.

Another element of class, following the latter description, would be a ten minute silent philosophical meditation session, during which all students think deeply on something related to the overarching philosophical theme and, afterward, exchange their ideas with one another in an inclusive and dynamic way that would allow for more complex and comprehensive ideas to be innovated and synthesized through an integration of reason and intuition (or marriage of sense and soul, as Wilber would have it).

Philosophy class must not have a curriculum structure significantly more related to mathematics than to art. Ideally, philosophy is or at least ought to be (both literally and figuratively) a perfect mean between mathematics and art, combining pure logic while intuitively or abstractly using it to explore the World from a theoretically objective standpoint on as intuitive or abstract a level. However, when philosophy leaves this “harmonic frequency” and becomes too similar to the extreme of mathematics or too similar to the extreme of art, then the love of wisdom and its power correspondingly diminishes.

More specifically, philosophy class structured on true-and-false alongside fill-in-the-blank tests (as mathematics and science classes administer) to constitute a large portion of the student's overall grade is just as ineffective as philosophy class structured on the doctrine that there is no such thing as truth or objectivity and that everything is as equally a relative interpretation (as some might argue applies to art) as everything else is. The overall grade should be based on effort and quality of work, doubtless. However, work should consist of papers, discussions, and presentations only, each allowing the student to express novel ideas with as little reference to the musings of past thinkers.

This section serves to articulate how philosophy class can change to transcend the Postmodern paradigm. As an underlying principle, philosophy class must be structured in a way that allows for as much innovation, creativity, and synthesis as possible, while staying rightfully between the extremes of mathematics and art. The classroom must not stay in such a way that merely instructs students to memorize past philosophers' ideas and criticize them effectively. Rather, this intellectual environment must simultaneously be to a philosopher as the laboratory is to a scientist and the studio is to an artist.

Other Changes and Conclusion

In addition to the structure of philosophy class changing, the outlook, intentions, and actions of actual philosophers also needs to be different from what is now in place. First, philosophers must take pride in what they do, take pride in their specialization, because philosophy is perhaps (or at least has shown itself to be) the most important of all disciplines. Philosophy explores the World at its deepest level, seeking to find answers that no other discipline, by virtue of its definition or function, seeks to accomplish. Furthermore, philosophy – with its breakthroughs and epiphanies – inspires any other kind and number of traditions.

For instance, Premodern philosophy complemented the emergence of religious scripture and theological testament, which naturally played a strong determining role in conjunction with culture during its time. Modern philosophy – emphasizing realism, naturalism, and empiricism – inspired “natural philosophers” such as Bacon, Galileo, and Newton to advance the influence and development of science. Postmodern philosophy in the early 19th century inspired a whole host of so-called “Modern” (but actually Postmodern) writers to come such as Dickens, Woolf, and Golding. In short, the new paradigm and those individuals embodying it must come up with new ideas that change the world just as much as past thinkers have done. In this age of pluralism, now everyone can be as original and influential as the greatest philosophers who ever lived.

If all philosophers unite and agree to collaborate in order to advance our construction of that intellectual jigsaw puzzle beginning with the birth of civilization, then humanity's evolution in consciousness will manifest as equally fast. Knowledge not only is power, but it also has the power to bring peace, prosperity, harmony, happiness, and fulfillment to all humankind and Earth. Philosophy is unique because it binds and influences all other discipline, to a certain but often still potent degree. Philosophers need to agree with one another more and collaboratively build off each other's ideas just as scientists and many other scholarly figures do. If philosophy conjures up a New Enlightenment and affects the entire planet just as history has thus seen, then the future will be significantly brighter for those who will be in it.

In conclusion, this paper has argued that the contemporary philosophical tradition is seriously flawed because it lacks synthesis, novelty, innovation, originality, influence, primarily because it values overanalysis of past texts over creativity that would transcend and include them. As of now, this community only affects itself but does not have nearly as much power from an external standpoint. However, as explained, philosophy needs to resume its role as this major cultural and societal influencer, alongside art, religion (institutionalized spirituality), and science. Let this urgent unfolding in the narrative of philosophy ensue as that all too familiar synchronized hand of time turns our page to this new decade, this new century, new millennium – and Age.