The Ways in Which Philosophy Is Practical From the Reading Include
Why is Studying Philosophy Relevant: The Practical Value of Philosophy
In Chapter 1 the author does a good job in providing many reasons for why the written report of philosophy is "invaluable in whatever career you choose to follow." (p. eleven). Proceed in listen though that in addition to giving you lot skills for beingness more successful in any job, there is some other role of education in full general and philosophy in particular that is non much emphasized in today's functioning/results based guild. Education in full general and the study of philosophy can change who you are.
So with the author's basic points in mind and the above additional consideration, let's elaborate and summarize.
1. Critical Thinking
Everyone involved in education agrees that learning to be a critical thinker is a skillful thing. (Chapter 2 is mostly on the details of some of the logical tools one uses for critical thinking.) As the author explains, learning to be a critical thinker is just learning to be a conscientious thinker. Do we really take good reasons to buy a detail product (car, computer, cell phone service, etc.) rather than some other? Do we really have skilful reasons to vote for one candidate running for a public office versus another? At this phase in your life you probably have some beliefs that y'all have clarified for yourself. Probably nearly of you either believe in a God or not. But do you have skillful reasons? Suppose you live your whole life, making many judgments for happiness based on believing in God, and He does not be? Suppose you live your whole life thinking God is a myth that people created to feel good, merely HE does exist!
Presumably at this stage in your life you lot have bought something based on what y'all thought were expert reasons and then discovered that you lot did not really accept good reasons and the production was a rip off. Advertisers attempt to educate and psychologically persuade us to buy products all the time. Suppose yous really wanted a new Apple iPhone. Suppose you run into an ad:
"No one can beat All-time Purchase'due south prices and this weekend everything is up to 50% off."
Suppose Best Buy sells iPhones and yous assume that you tin get a bang-up deal at Best Buy this weekend on an iPhone. Only await. Think advisedly. What does it mean that no 1 tin vanquish Best Buy'south prices? Suppose that the price at Best Buy is $699.99. (Notice the ".99" office is also part of the play a joke on psychology. Nosotros all know this is really $700 but it just feels better if the price is some .99 number.) Well what if we went to another store and also found the toll to be $699.99? Notice that the starting time part of the advertisement is truthful -- the second store did not beat Best Buy! So what is this role of the ad actually saying? Nothing. It is not maxim that they accept the lowest prices -- the mistaken determination many people volition come up to . It is only claiming in a fancy, deliberately tricky, psychologically persuasive style that Best Buy's prices are the aforementioned that anybody else has. They could take said, "Come to Best Purchase today and we guarantee that we have the same prices as anybody else." Just obviously they don't accept ads like that because they would non be every bit psychologically persuasive.
But what most the 2d part of the advertizing? Usually you see these ads like this:
up to fifty% OFF
The "50%" part is huge and the "up to" is barely visible. The creators of this advertisement deliberately engineer this then that you volition focus on the 50% role and non run across the "up to" part. But the "up to" part is very important to think near what the ad is really proverb. Hither you need to know a little mathematics, and of form the advertisers are counting on the average person having poor math skills. Suppose I endemic H-Zone (UH sports store) and I tell everyone, "Today everything in my shop volition be upward to l% off." How many things would I need to have on sale and how much off would they exist off the regular price? Legally, logically, and mathematically Simply One ITEM and the ane item would have to be l% off!
What you say? You said "everything." How tin this exist? Hither is where the "upward to" comes in. Since the numbering system starts at zero (0), zip is the first number, my statement means that everything has to exist in this range, 0 to 50% off. So, everything else can be 0% off just ane thing at 50% and the advertizing is truthful. Get it? The ad from Best Purchase actually does non say much of anything, only information technology says it in a deliberately tricky, psychologically persuasive way to get you to accept the trouble to go to that shop rather than another one.
Major signal: Generally advertisements tell the truth, merely many who write and produce them will rely on the reader or listener not thinking carefully, on not being a critical thinker.
So, one major reason for being a disquisitional thinker is to avoid exploitation and manipulation. You don't desire to exist a pawn and allow others push you around.
But what if the beliefs you have well-nigh happiness, God, and war are the results of like tricks? Philosophers assume beliefs matter; they determine a lot of our actions. So, we should have skilful reasons for our beliefs but every bit we should have good reasons to buy something. Hence, since in philosophical thinking nosotros are constantly examining beliefs critically, nosotros exercise a lot of disquisitional thinking.
On state of war and major life choices, philosophers tell the famous story of the aboriginal Greek philosopher Socrates (470 BCE-399 BCE). Initially Socrates was very loyal to his Athenian society. He volunteered and fought bravely as a soldier. But somewhen he discovered that the politicians that controlled his metropolis state of Athens, Greece had phony, but psychologically persuasive reasons for going to state of war with Sparta, another Greek metropolis state. The politicians appealed in fancy speeches to loyalty and blind patriotism. They demonized the people of Sparta and fabricated everyone call back that their unabridged way of life would exist destroyed if they did not attack Sparta. (Athens started the war.) But the real reason was economical. Athens wanted to control all of the aircraft lanes and commerce in the Aegian sea part of the Mediterranean ocean. Athens lost this war, called the Peloponnesian war.
This experience had a powerful event on Socrates. He realized that at that place were then many of import beliefs near life that he did not know if he had good reasons for. As we will read later on, he spent the balance of his life trying to get the people of Athens to think more than critically about what they were suppose to believe. But this eventually upset the people in potency. Socrates' disquisitional thinking was blamed for Athens losing the war. He was eventually arrested and tried for the capital offenses of impiety (questioning the existence of the gods) and corrupting the youth of Athens (he made them remember!). He was convicted and put to death.
Then, plainly a major value of using critical thinking is to gain more control over one's life. If i wants to exist truly free, and so one's decisions should be based on not only the best available information, simply one wants to reason about that information correctly.
Still, critical thinking will often produce insecurity. What if you carefully examine the behavior you lot have and the ones you inherited from your family, and you find that the reasons for these behavior are very weak! The story of Socrates shows that in general people don't similar someone rocking the gunkhole with questions most what one's civilisation or gild believes. It produces confusion and insecurity. Some students will claim that philosophy courses undermine their family beliefs and just leave them with lots of questions on life'southward major issues.
But philosophers see this insecurity every bit positive. Learning that i's beliefs are weakly supported provides one with 2 choices. Either meet if better reasons exist for your beliefs or change your beliefs to better supported beliefs. Either way philosophers argue the value of this insecurity is personal growth. Hopefully in learning what is true, or at least learning what is probably not true (because of poor reasons for the beliefs) one grows in awareness as an individual. In general, philosophy accepts as positive an ongoing process of critical thinking compared to security and stagnation of dogmatic answers.
2. Communication Skills
Philosophy forces one to read, write, and recollect about large ideas. It exercises the heed to the max because it deals with abstract ideas. Students often complain that abstract ideas are hard to empathise. Yes they are and they take time, but the pay off is huge. Abstract ideas are the hush-hush to life. They assistance you organize details. They are similar a big net that tin can exist placed over a lot of detailed information then that the "dots" of the detailed information are connected into a meaningful whole. Smart people run across the big movie of the forest and they don't get lost in the forest of copse and so to speak.
More often than not managers and people who become high salaries are people who are very skilful at the process of organizing and adopting a perspective on lots of information. They tin can see the big perspective because they tin network ideas. These people are good at presentation skills also. They can write and speak well, and they are able to take the process of organizing and adopting a perspective on lots of information and communicate to others the aforementioned perspective. They are able to have the large ideas in their minds and put them into other minds.
Philosophy teaches these same valuable skills. You are constantly encouraged not simply to empathize big ideas and to critically evaluate those ideas, merely as well to communicate your thoughts to others, especially in writing. And so, equally the writer of our textbook notes, recent studies prove that studying philosophy is actually very valuable for careers in business organisation.
See the commodity, "I Think, Therefore I Earn."
iii. Clarification of your beliefs and values
Consider that your philosophy is simply your bundle of beliefs. Hence, you cannot escape being a philosopher! Even if you lot believe that philosophy is a waste of time, that is even so a philosophy and requires an argument to be supported. Believe it or not there have been philosophers who believed that most traditional philosophical questions and problems were a waste product of time, and that humanity would be much better served past just concentrating on science. Read most the philosophers known as Logical Positivists.
But many students practice not fifty-fifty know what they believe and they need to put some time into clarifying what they believe. Discover obviously i must do this showtime Before one can take aim with ane'southward critical thinking skills to meet if in that location are good reasons for the beliefs. It is too very difficult to maintain consistency in conventionalities unless one thinks hard about ane's behavior. Typically, equally we grow up nosotros selection up i belief in ane situation and another conventionalities in some other situation, and only later might realize that the beliefs conflict. For instance, many students in our age volition believe that women should be treated equally to men and that men and women should have the same rights. Also, more often than not many students will believe it is wrong to kill children. Just what about abortion? For some people the issue of abortion reveals a conflict between the right of a woman to choose what takes place in her torso and the rights of a fetus to life. For another example, suppose you are a devout Christian and you believe that all people are created equal from God'south perspective. But you have been taught that homosexuality is wrong and you lot oppose gay marriage. Gay couples who are non legally married are deprived of many benefits (tax, inheritance, wellness coverage, etc.) granted to heterosexual couples. Are they existence treated equally? Are your beliefs consistent? They might exist, just thinking and explanation would be required from a philosophical point of view.
Philosophy forces you to clarify your beliefs and examine them for consistency by constantly providing you with challenging simply conflicting opinions on the big questions of life.
4. Global Sensation
In our age business leaders tell us every day that in addition to critical thinking and advice skills understanding other cultures is vital for our economic system. One tin fifty-fifty detect statements like this in the Want Ads, "Must be able to work in a multicultural setting."
In studying philosophy nosotros non only prepare our minds for beingness open enough to understand the views of others, just nosotros also study the details of intellectual history. By studying the history of philosophical ideas we written report not only past cultures, but also the origin of the beliefs that people accept today. So, in many means philosophy trains one to exist open to understanding prior to judging. Philosophy is disquisitional, so it will railroad train you not to accept the beliefs of just anyone. Merely it will train you to ever make an attempt to fully understand the beliefs of others BEFORE you guess them.
v. Tolerance and Understanding
It can be confusing to think hard virtually life. Studying and hearing nigh then many different beliefs tin indeed brand one insecure about his or her own beliefs. But this uncertainty tin have a very positive spin-off: humility and less violence. Comparison ideas casts a little doubt on the certainty of your own behavior and usually makes ane more than openminded. With a piffling incertitude a person is less likely to button ideas on others and volition at to the lowest degree accept a lot more time before he or she is willing to fight over conventionalities differences.
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Source: http://www2.hawaii.edu/~pine/Phil100/pracvalue.html
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