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"The magic you're looking for is in the work you're avoiding."
- Chris Williamson
Most days I ask myself this question somewhat skeptically:
What in the world does my discipline of philosophy have to offer?
It’s a question that tries to get at the core problem of how to make philosophy appealing.
The problem is not that people have no interest in ethical issues, to take one example.
You don’t have to look hard to see a flood of moral outrage through social media, identity politics, canceling, etc.
There are plenty of common points of interest between topics in philosophy and the average person going about their day.
I used to think that a solution to philosophy’s marketing problem was telling people, “Hey, you know that thing you seem to be interested in? Philosophers have written a lot about your thing!”
That news typically gets a tepid reaction at best.
It’s not that people don’t have a desire to learn; many people do have that desire.
But “learn” exhibits a process/product ambiguity: if I tell you I learned something, I could have in mind the product or outcome of learning, or I could have in mind the process of learning (or both). (I first learned about the process/product ambiguity while reading this paper from the philosophy of language, which you can download for free at the link.)
More specifically, many people have a desire to learn if we're referring to learning outcomes, apart from the necessary work that comes from the process.
Having this distinction in hand, I now have a better explanation for the gap between people’s desire to be rational, logical, clear, skilled at forming arguments, etc., and the hard things required to get there.
And that’s a universal problem we all face across almost every category in life.
We often want the outcomes without the process. A focus on the process, and the difficulties that comes with it, takes an entirely different mindset.
A few weeks ago, I wrote about the sought-after virtue of resilience. But I failed to recognize or remind myself that merely engaging with philosophy at any level takes a hefty dose of fortitude and resilience.
Philosophy is not easy, and it can often make you feel less than intelligent if you struggle to grasp what you're reading.
So maybe one way to market philosophy's appeal would be to actually lean in to its intrinsically difficult nature:
Do you want to be resilient? Check out philosophy and test yourself!
In my conversation with Nathan Howard, he gave what I thought was one of the best pitches for the value of studying philosophy. He said studying philosophy is like the intellectual equivalent of going to the gym.
It's like exercise for your mind, to keep you healthy.
You can easily find thousands of health books, podcasts, channels, etc. that emphasize physical resilience and overcoming the challenges that are inherent with fitness. It's an entire economy, industry, and subculture.
Maybe we've been missing an opportunity to apply those same principles to intellectual resilience and fortitude.
So if you're tempted to put aside that book or article because it seems a little too challenging, remember:
Do hard things.
The outcomes will follow.
Until next time.
Jared
This Week's Free Philosophy Resource:
Title: Manipulative Underspecification, forthcoming in Philosophical Review (a top-tier journal)
Author: Justin D'Ambrosio
Reading Level: Graduate level
Have you ever been listening to a politician talk and thought to yourself, "This person is saying words but is saying nothing whatsoever of substance"? The paper talks about underspecification as a means of achieving non-communicative goals. If you are interested in a more lay-level summary of the paper, he provides it here, where I first discovered the article.
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