An introduction to the discipline of Philosophy

welcome to the macat multimedia series and to my cat's introduction to philosophy is the study of fundamental questions about the nature of reality human existence knowledge values and beauty the term philosophy stems from ancient Greek it literally means love of wisdom philosophers seek wisdom because they want to know how to live a good life what happiness really consists of what is right and wrong and how to best run a society all these questions fall under the branch of philosophy called ethics to answer such ethical questions philosophers try to understand what human beings are they look at what makes us different from other things and at what the nature of reality is really like they ask what is there and is there a god and these problems are termed metaphysics of course it's really not that simple in order to claim any knowledge about reality about one's self or what is right and wrong philosophers also investigate how we really know something and how real knowledge differs from mere opinion this is the domain known as epistemology although science now offers its own answers to some of these conundrums philosophy still addresses questions that everyone at some point thinks about working out how to live a good rewarding life and how to relate to other people and the world we live in these are timeless problems that concern us all the Mehcad library traces the ways in which these questions have been studied from the distant past into the present the earliest surviving works to address the great questions are plato's in the Republic he suggests that reality ultimately consists of ideas or forms and that the form of the good and the beautiful illuminates everything else something we can discover he adds in symposium by falling in love Plato's pupil Aristotle presents in metaphysics a subtly modified theory of the world in which every object is comprised of both form and matter and changes to be understood as things taking on their proper form or losing it in Nicomachean ethics Aristotle applies his metaphysics to human life and argues that humans realize their essence by governing life through reason and engaging in pure contemplative activity in other words by living the life of a true philosopher one thing that philosophers do especially well is to follow arguments to their logical conclusions taking this course can radically transform the way in which we see the world in his critique of Pure Reason immanuel kant argues that the world we know depends in part on the functioning of our own minds the world as it is in itself though Kant insists is something we cannot know anything about an idea that Hegel tried hard to disprove in his phenomenology of spirit other philosophers have dedicated themselves to resolving some of the other fundamental problems of existence such as the question am i more than just my body dick after reflects in his meditations on the relation between mind and body and concludes that they must be complete distinct entities a dualism and a concept that many philosophers continue to wrestle with today and that Gilbert Ryle vigorously challenges in the concept of mind so studying philosophy can be confrontational but it can also lead to deep understanding of the human condition Friedrich Nietzsche asks us why we would continue to live if God does not exist and everything is ultimately meaningless in beyond good and evil he challenges us to create our own values to make life worth living Soren Kierkegaard on the other hand suggests in sickness unto death that the only solution to human despair is to make a leap of faith and affirm the existence of God Socrates the founding father of Western philosophy declared that an unexamined life is not worth living Mehcad is your guide to an examined life and to the ideas of the greatest philosophers come inside to find out more Mehcad learn better think smarter aim higher

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