The Joy of Philosophy

Part 1: The Love of Wisdom “Know Thyself” --Socrates The Joy of Philosophy is an exploration of the workings of philosophy. It encourages us all to regard philosophy in a different light, as a passion for knowledge and wisdom and not as some hedonistic tool of the egotist. He teaches us to see philosophy as we see life, full of passion and love, thick with a fullness of hope and vigor. This is a man who says life is rich, and he means it. Solomon begins this book with a rant. “Philosophy is too often thin.” What he means by this is that philosophy, like life, should be rich and fulfilling. It should have substance, drive, and well… passion. He says, in a way, don’t think about where you’ve been or where you’re going, focus instead on where you are right now. Think how to make the best of the present, and do not worry about tomorrow. Make your life meaningful, full of the passion of living. Philosophy is a search for truth. People often push away what they don’t agree with, as in politics, religion, and even philosophy. But I think, and Solomon would agree, that human beings are defined buy our opposites. So in order for us to know what we believe we

Are we not all defined by our opposites, and if so isn"tmt how we deal with death a reflection of how we live Part 4: A world without you. It won"tmt ever show us what we are, but it shows us what we aren"tmt. In that sense philosophy is intrinsic to humanity. Sometimes people look into the eyes of death before it is their time, they see what they are and where they are going and it scares them to see how brittle life truly is. To him the good life is not defined solely by cold hard logic, but is a manifestation of virtuous passion that wills the passionate person to fight for truth without compromise. It is in our search for life that we find truth. He says that we should neither deny death nor celebrate it, but instead we should accept it. Solomon argues that we should not be obsessive either. " Emotions provide reasons for the way we act, and even the way we rationalize, but they also involve rationality themselves. We must embrace rationality as the toolkit of philosophy, whereas emotions and experience are the raw materials. We try to deny it or put it off but it will come, and we all secretly know. "I'm going to hang up this phone and then I'm going to show these people what you don't want them to see. I'm going to show them a world without you, a world without rules and controls, without borders or boundaries, a world where anything is possible. We must instead use them to build a better life. It interested me to see what his thoughts were.