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THE MODES OF PHILOSOPHY




Philosophers agree that the modes of philosophy contribute a lot to its health

Philosophy is said to be a discipline of problems because it keeps asking the question of ‘why’. One sets out to find out the reasonability of any activity or any perceived reality. Philosophy asks questions that ought to be reflected on and if possible be answered and the answers will also be questioned. The great Rene Descartes introduced the narrative ‘cogito ergo sum’ (I think therefore I am) while he was searching for the indubitable truth. He doubted everything and thought about each of them and came out with what he called the indubitable truth. Philosophy can also be referred to as the mother of all subjects because it provides an opportunity to ask ‘why’ on anything in any subject. It can be presented in three modes or styles as follows

Speculative philosophy is the way of thinking about all that is or about everything that exists. The human mind is inquisitive and wishes to see things as a whole which makes them not contented with one aspect of reality. It wishes to understand how all different things that have been discovered together form some sort of meaningful totality. Speculative philosophy searches for order and is applied not only to particular items or experiences but to all knowledge. Kneller (1972, 2) summarizes speculative philosophy as an “attempt to find a coherence in the whole realm of thought and experience.” We can therefore conclude that speculative philosophy aims at finding order against disorder, chaos, unconnectedness, or disjoint bits of anything. A relationship among the details that make up something must be discovered.

Prescriptive philosophy is the mode of philosophy that seeks to establish standards for assessing values, judging conduct, and appraising. It tries to examine what is meant by good and bad or what is right and wrong. It asks whether these qualities are inherent or learned. Are things themselves or they are projections of our own minds? For example if one says that a cat is black. Could it mean that is actually black and someone else can see as though? Or it is that person’s projection? The prescriptive mode of philosophy points us to ontology (things in themselves).

Prescriptive philosophy wants to evaluate the worth of human behavior which would be described as worthwhile or worthless. It wants to discover and recommend principles for deciding what actions and qualities are considered most worthwhile or worthless.

The analytic mode of philosophy capitalizes on language and semantics (meaning of words). Many people often think that philosophical questions are problems of language which is at some point true but largely not. It analyses how words influence the world. Language is always meaningful in a given context. This means that a word and its context are fundamental to understanding a given communication. In logic, we have what we call ‘words’ and ‘terms’ in which a word can mean different things in different contexts while a term means the same in all contexts. The analytical mode of philosophy is very paramount when trying to understand the meaning of a given language.

The analytical mode of philosophy examines notions such as cause, mind, academic freedom, and equality of opportunity to asses different meanings are got in different contexts. It shows how inconsistencies and illogicalities occur when we apply the same words in other given contexts. It does not take things or words for granted. Analytical philosophers are normally skeptical, conscious, and disinclined to build systems of thought.

Most philosophers agree that all three modes of philosophy contribute a lot to the health of philosophy.



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