How worthless is Philosophy?

[Belacqua]

It looks as though you may have wandered off again, and I certainly wouldn’t blame you for doing so. I thought I’d type a response to your OP, though, based on a good old philosophy text.

I know you’ve worked on Plato’s Phaedrus in the past, as I recall you mentioning it here before. It seems to me that parts of that dialogue are relevant to the issue at hand.

As you remember, the dialogue begins as a discussion of relations between an older man and his adolescent boyfriend. Such relationships are taken for granted, so what they’re discussing here is exactly what type of emotion and benefit should be involved.

Phaedrus has a copy of a speech by Lysias, in which the latter argues that it’s better if the two partners are not in love with one another. Or rather, it’s assumed that the adolescent won’t be in love with the older man, but the older might feel passion for the younger.

Lysias thinks of the relationship as entirely transactional. The older man gets sex and the company of a beautiful boy, and the younger one gets the practical benefits of increased status and guidance into the political life of the city. The more elite one’s mentor is, the more one will benefit, which means that the more beautiful a boy is the more he will have his choice of mentors.

Both Lysias and Socrates, in his first speech, argue that love can only interfere with this transaction, because love, as is well known, tends to make people irrational. A passionate mentor may behave in an embarrassing way in public, which would work against the gain in status that the boy wants. He also might become jealous, or ruin himself financially trying to please his boyfriend. So a cool, transactional, useful relationship is best, they argue.

Plato doesn’t make this explicit, but many commentators over the years have seen this as a description of transactional relationships in general, not only those between boyfriends. A life which is supposed to be utilitarian, commercial, and practical can only be disrupted by non-practical erotic passions.

Then remember Socrates’ second speech, in which he dialectically goes beyond what he just said before. He does not deny that erotic passion can make a person irrational, but he says that some kinds of irrationality are good. And here you have to remember what Plato means by the full weight of the term Erotic. It isn’t only sex. It is also a necessary drive toward the highest forms of understanding. So Socrates concludes that a transactional, passionless relation will be useful in a practical life, but that a philosopher must surpass this. He needs non-transactional, passionate attraction to what is best and highest. 

Socrates also makes it clear that such passion will have negative effects in a practical sense. Most people will consider this philosopher to be crazy. He will not fit well into the smooth-running utilitarian life of the city. 

So I think we can answer your OP question from Plato’s perspective. Whether philosophy is worthless or not depends on what you want. If you want to fit smoothly into the flow of society, it will not be helpful. If you take a philosophy class with a transactional goal in mind, you will not benefit. Saying “I will commit to three credit hours of Intro to Philosophy, and in return I expect to receive X benefit,” won’t work. A lot of people seem to think that taking philosophy in college will help a person to think more clearly or to be more rational. Judging by the conversations of people who have taken some philosophy in college, this certainly doesn’t seem to be the case. There might be philosophy classes in this world which have that benefit, but it’s clear that most of them don’t. 

Learning philosophy (maybe in a class, maybe not) may have great benefits, but they are not of the transactional, practical type. Expecting to get that sort of thing from a college class is not reasonable. The kind of benefits that one actually might get are not the kind of thing that practical societies tend to value.

Sorry to necro here. But this is an amazing post. I simply had to respond. I miss conversing with you, Bel. Because you are an insightful dude. The Symposium is an incredible work (as is Phaedrus). And to get into the meat of what you said, we need to discuss one of those two works.

But I wanna talk about the Republic here. Because a lot of your points pertain to it.

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Yeah. I don't do forums like I used to. I pop in every few months and talk to people. I miss chatting with folks like you and Nudger. But I found it's not so good to involve myself in internet shit on a daily basis. Because it's mostly shit. You know it. I know it. And Nudger knows it. Even Camus knows it. (I miss you guys btw. Especially Camus.)

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I'd like to share a passage from the Republic that exemplifies what you mean.

"Then, Adeimantus, I said, the worthy disciples of philosophy will be but a small remnant: perchance some noble and well-educated person, detained by exile in her service, who in the absence of corrupting influences remains devoted to her; or some lofty soul born in a mean city, the politics of which he contemns and neglects; and there may be a gifted few who leave the arts, which they justly despise, and come to her;—or peradventure there are some who are restrained by our friend Theages’ bridle; for everything in the life of Theages conspired to divert him from philosophy; but ill-health kept him away from politics. My own case of the internal sign is hardly worth mentioning, for rarely, if ever, has such a monitor been given to any other man. Those who belong to this small class have tasted how sweet and blessed a possession philosophy is, and these are unable to resist the madness of the world;and have also seen enough of the madness of the multitude; and they know that no politician is honest, nor is there any champion of justice at whose side they may fight and be saved.Such an one may be compared to a man who has fallen among wild beasts—he will not join in the wickedness of his fellows, but neither is he able singly to resist all their fierce natures, and therefore seeing that he would be of no use to the State or to his friends, and reflecting that he would have to throw away his life without doing any good either to himself or others, he holds his peace, and goes his own way. they therefore in order to escape the storm take shelter behind a wall and live their own life. He is like one who, in the storm of dust and sleet which the driving wind hurries along, retires under the shelter of a wall; and seeing the rest of mankind full of wickedness, he is content, if only he can live his own life and be pure from evil or unrighteousness, and depart in peace and good-will, with bright hopes."

Even Plato, who obviously espoused how valuable philosophy is, made sure to point out that philosophy is nothing more than a "small remnant" in the grander scheme. But, as I think Plato would agree, it's still a valuable thing. And indispensable, despite it's being less important than other fields of knowledge, it's still ESSENTIAL. Or perhaps, FUNDAMENTAL.

This is discussed by Plato in Phaedrus. But it also features in the Symposium. I think Diotima's Ladder says what Phaedrus was trying to say better than Phaedrus said it. (Although Phaedrus said it pretty good too.) But (y'know) I bet you and I agree on which was the better work.

It's good to see you again! Thank you for reading my long post.

I certainly understand why you'd want to limit the amount of time you devote to the Internet chat life. It can take a lot of mental energy, and I'm sure you have lots of other good things going on. 

It does seem to me that the Symposium and Phaedrus are about the best things that human beings ever wrote down. The Symposium being the main theme, and then Phaedrus almost like a dialectical response. I have no idea if that's historically accurate -- like the order in which they were written. But that's how I use them. And the degree to which, every time I read them, I find new things I didn't notice before -- that's always a pleasure. 

I confess that I have not worked on the Republic with anything like the same degree of attention. But the passage you quote reminds me that I should! Of course the thing that everybody remembers about the book is that when real philosophers make their way out of the cave and glimpse the truth, they should go back and become the leaders of the city. But the part you quote seems to work against that. It is much more pessimistic, suggesting that those few who continue to love wisdom will inevitably be rejected by society. Far from becoming leaders, they end up with a life of (as the man said) silence, exile, and cunning. 

It looks to me as if the term "small remnant" refers not to philosophy itself, but to the few people who end up devoted to it. As I say, I have to work on that. 

But it's true that what he says here echoes the Phaedrus, in that someone who loves wisdom first and foremost will not be rewarded for it. Or I should say, will not be rewarded in any worldly, practical sense. I do think he maintains the idea that the love of wisdom is its own reward. A quiet life devoted to love what's best, instead of a chase for worldly success, will look like failure to worldly people, but is in fact the best that one can hope for in a material culture. 

There's a lot of this kind of thinking in Chinese culture, I expect you know. When political events forced the government officials out of their jobs, they retired to their (extremely beautiful) gardens, read the classics, drank tea, and wrote poetry. It might have been sour grapes, but the implication was that this was the life they had actually wanted all along. One of the most beautiful gardens in all of China is called "The Garden of the Failed Politician." (Or "Humble Administrator" in a less-harsh sounding translation.) 

I think this still makes sense. The idea of a successful life to me is not the chance to go to the Super Bowl or buy a Tesla but the ability to sit quietly in one's garden and listen to one's own thoughts. So the life of the small remnant doesn't seem so bad to me.