Philosophy literally means “Love of Wisdom”. What is wisdom? Gathering knowledge is good, but being wise is more than simply having knowledge. It is one thing to memorize books and facts. It is another to use this knowledge wisely. Boxing up concepts is good, but the ability to think outside the box is greater.
We all use our minds to understand ourselves and our world. Often, these understandings are wrong or incomplete, and we must reason, interpreting and reinterpreting our situation. When things are known, set and steady, we have beliefs and answers, understanding and knowledge. When things are unknown, changing and unsteady, we have doubt and questions and need to reason and re-reason. The ability to question and reason well, to think critically when things are unknown, is wisdom. As life is always somewhat unknown, wisdom is always useful and valuable.
Across ancient and modern cultures, we generally speak of knowledge and understanding as grasping, as if we are holding ideas set and steady with our hands, and speak of wisdom and reason as seeking, as if we are searching and exploring a space with our eyes. While we hold on to what we have, it is wise to look down the road and see what changes are coming.
All of us experience tragedy, loss and pain in life. Sometimes this leads us to be close-minded and self-centered. At other times we are inspired to be open-minded and compassionate. Across human cultures, we generally think those who are close-minded and self-centered to be foolish, and those who are open-minded and compassionate to be wise. The foolish take the short term view of what they themselves desire at that moment, while the wise take the long term view of what is best for themselves and others overall.
Over four thousand years ago in ancient Egypt, Phah-hotep, vizier to the Pharaoh, wrote, “Do not be proud of what you know, nor boast that you are wise. Talk to the foolish as well as the wise, for there is no limit to where wisdom can be found. Good speech is rare like a precious jewel, yet wisdom is found amongst the maidens at the grindstone”.
The Buddhists of ancient India considered wisdom as the highest of the five virtues, symbolizing it with the lion, considered the king and most courageous of the animals.
In ancient China, Confucius said that the wise consider the whole rather than the parts, while fools consider the parts rather than the whole.
In ancient Greece, Socrates argued that his awareness of his own ignorance was the greatest wisdom in all of Athens. Because he showed others that they were unaware of their ignorance, and only partly know what they claim to know, he was executed.
In the Americas, the Aztecs said that the wise sage is a torch without smoke, the one who puts a mirror in front of others, who looks outside and within. The greedy and foolish were compared to turkeys, small and weak in heart.
While all cultures value wisdom, as individuals we are insecure and have trouble questioning ourselves and our beliefs. If we open up and learn from each other, living life as an adventure rather than anxiety, each of us can grow in wisdom, reason and compassion for the rest of our lives, if we are courageous enough to try.
Nietzsche, the great mustachioed one, said that if we want to be great individual, revolutionary thinkers, we each must take an individual stand between the twin dangers of morality and nihilism.
Morality, the dogmatism, laws, traditions, and rules of the cultures that surround us, can prevent us from thinking critically and improving ourselves and our culture. However, if we question everything, this can lead to excessive skepticism and doubt, nihilism, such that we believe in nothing and do not have the courage and passion to take an individual stand and create new meaning and truth.
In Thus Spoke Zarathustra, Nietzsche uses the symbol of the tightrope walker to stand for the individual who balances between opposite sides. We must have the courage to learn from the morals, rules and dogmas, as well as question them freely and critically, taking from them what we each individually choose for ourselves. We can each use dogmatism and skepticism as we want to to create new truth and meaning, transforming the old. This became central to Existentialism, and then later Poststructuralism and Postmodernism.
All new thinking is dangerous and risky, but if we are afraid to think for ourselves, we do not take the risk that could pay off and be revolutionary. The history of religion, law, philosophy and science is made by great individuals who take the leaps that inspire everyone else. Those who think outside the box are the ones who get to change the box.
Nietzsche inspired other great thinkers to question reality. Heidegger said we can be boxed up by our use of time and technology. Sartre said we can be boxed up by social roles and social class. Fanon said that we can be boxed up by racism, institutional and internalized. Foucault said we can be boxed up by institutions that divide the normal from the abnormal, the criminal from the legal, and the sane from the insane.
By learning from these skeptical thinkers, we do not get a recipe or rulebook as to how we should be great individuals or what we should choose to do. Instead, we see how we are boxed up, so that we can think outside the box and about the box, to choose how to think and how to live.
Many people believe that there are exclusive and separate human races and that some races are naturally smart and kind while others are unintelligent and mean. This is all mistaken, modern day mythology. There is more genetic variation between individuals than between ethnic groups. There is no genetic evidence that some ethnic groups are smarter or kinder, and individuals can increase their intelligence and compassion throughout their lives regardless of their genes.
The interactions we have with others create categories and frames in our heads that mislead us into thinking that certain types of people are smart or unkind and mislead us into treating them as separate types of people. Neuroscientists have shown that within milliseconds we identify others by ethnicity, gender and age, before we have a chance to think or speak. This can negatively frame our thinking, communication, and interactions. We naturally show frustration and negative emotions when we consider someone a threat, and this reinforces these reactions in ourselves and in others, including children, whether or not we’re aware of it. Psychologists have shown that we are all somewhat racist, the privileged and disadvantaged, some of us more so, and some less so. We are all imprinted with negative attitudes towards ethnicities who share our common culture, even if we actively ignore it in ourselves or live where racism is far more covert than overt, more thought to oneself than spoken out loud.
As Europe rose in wealth and power over the last five hundred years, Europeans dominated Africa and the Americas and labeled Africans, Latinos, and Native Americans as savage and inferior. We’re still dealing with this today. In our diverse society, it is mentally and physically healthier to talk about our problems rather than ignore them and to discourage the idea that we are on opposing teams. When we focus on not making mistakes, this has a negative impact on our thinking and the perceptions of others, but when we focus on having a positive and open interaction, this is good for thinking and communication. Positivity helps us see each other as individuals and not as categories. Understanding that our thinking and personalities are not fixed, but can be enriched and developed, helps us to identify with each other and thrive.
Confucius said that if you put yourself with any two people at random, you can take their strengths as a model to follow and their faults as a warning. This is wise advice, as we all share similar strengths and faults. Intelligence and compassion are human virtues. Ignorance and brutality are human problems. We can see these are valued and useful yet difficult to develop in all human cultures, ancient and modern. Just as genetics shows we are actually one race with a variety of interrelated ethnicities, we share one culture with many cross-pollinating branches of subculture. We can draw on excellent and terrible examples from all of humanity to become better people. While this may seem obvious, it is easily forgotten.
Thought Itself 