What Philosophy Is for

An analysis of the state of philosophy today, how it got there, and how it can be adjusted to have a more immediate relationship to daily life and the events of the world.

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What is the state of philosophy today, and what might it become tomorrow? With What Philosophy is For, Michael Hampe answers these questions by exploring the relationships among philosophy, education, science, and narrative, developing a Socratically inspired critique of philosophical doctrines. Philosophers have generally thought that their distinctive commitment to critical reflection entailed the development of systematic theories that lay out the basic structures of human experience, in order to teach the rest of humanity how to conceive more truly our place in the world. Hampe argues against this line of thinking, positing that the world consists fundamentally of individual things whose nature can never fully be captured by general concepts. As a result, philosophy should strive to challenge the false authority by which established patterns of thought and feeling hold us captive, enable the creative imagination to develop new forms of self-understanding, and thereby restore a sense of individual possibilities that would bring philosophy closer to the practices of literature and the arts. What Philosophy is For is simultaneously an introduction, a critique, and a call to action. Hampe shows how and why philosophy became what it is today, and, crucially, shows what it could be once more, if it would only turn its back on its pretensions to dogma: a privileged space for reflecting on the human condition.