A Touch of Fire

Philosophy has no practical value in the modern world. Do you agree?

“I Will Burn”

Questioning if philosophy has any practical value in our modern world would imply that it could be gotten rid of. In a generation confined to the commodity of instantaneity, we are accustomed to throw out anything that has no practical value. We want quick answers, and philosophy asks only deep questions. Is it possible to get rid of philosophy? Our minds are always running; always thinking and questioning.

Philosophers ask questions such as, What is justice? What is morality? But so does everyone else, which would mean we are all philosophers, just of a different kind. The issue with what I’ve coined as “casual philosophers” (common people like me), is that they rarely speak about their findings. Another characteristic of newer generations besides instantaneity, is the abounding fear of failure. Too many are afraid to share their reflections and questions in fear of judgement. But most of us are casual philosophers whether we like it or not. For that very reason, “pro” philosophers are needed in our modern, ever-evolutionizing world. Without people who have the courage to ask the hardest questions, we will tumble and snowball into an unmeditated future.

In his final judgement, on trial for asebeia and corruption of youth, Socrates unapologetically philosophized that “A life unexamined is not worth living.” Truth can be found in his word. Exactly these higher cognitive processes: wondering, asking questions, and making reflections, are what makes us different than other animals. These virtues of human beings allow us to seek our higher purpose. Without questions, how could we transform ourselves?

Plato and Socrates might have had a lot to say, but the most important lesson about philosophy I learned came from my Spanish teacher, Ernesto Carriazo, Ph.D. , one of the few people vested in cultivating my wisdom rather than stuffing my mind with disposable information. After one of our conversations, he emailed me under the subject, “The Usefulness of the Useless,” a picture of a graffiti, that read, “Living is nothing but to blaze in questions,” a quote originally by French poet Antonin Artaud. To this, frustrated as to how I would ever express my ideas without turning them into question marks, I replied: “I will burn.” Capturing the essence of the value of philosophy, he responded,

“You must be like the Phoenix! Let yourself be burnt by questions over and over so that you reemerge and take flight from your own ashes. In other words, using more prosaic, non-metaphorical language, reinvent yourself! What would the ashes represent to you? To me, they represent the questions that used to bother you, but you have already processed. They now feed other firebrands; i.e., new disquieting questions. That’s how you destroy and reconstruct the best version of yourself.”

Better said by him than by any other great old mind, the ashes of our burning questions are the fuel to new ones, and this is the only way to reinvent ourselves. In a search for a practical value for everything, we have forgotten the magic of the irrational. Indeed, the world today wants us to produce fast answers, but philosophy inspires deep questions and -the best part- no absolute answers. These deep questions can only create more interrogation, the igniting energy everyone in the world, all casual philosophers, need to fly.

References:

The Trial and Death of Socrates. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://freedomandcitizenship.columbia.edu/socrates

Antonin Artaud. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/antonin-artaud