What is the “shape of water?” Not the molecule, but the actual thing? The answer I’m implying is that it doesn’t have one, it takes on a shape that it must.
I think of philosophy as water. In a classroom, with desks and unedited comments from fleshy objects, philosophy becomes one thing,
In a book it becomes something else. A forum something else. A child’s head something else.
It’s possible that whether we like or dislike philosophy has more to do with the shape it happens to be taking on when we first encounter it.
I can already hear your wheels churning, finding a way to find the essence of philosophy, regardless of where it’s found, the one thing that makes it philosophy in all cases. A laudable goal and a sound I don’t find objectionable. but that’s not my real goal here with this post. There’s no doubt you can do it, but that’s not the goal. And the question, “what is the shape of water” is really not the question here, although it might make a fine one, somewhere else. You might be tempted to “it doesn’t have one,” or some other pithy comment, studied and designed to make me feel stupid for asking it. That’s sometimes a quality of the shape of philo when you encounter it in a forum.
What I’m feeling when I write this is sadness over the memory of first encountering philosophy in a group setting. It was slow and painful. The teacher (or usually TA) was wordy and pompous and slow. He wasn’t merely doing philosophy. He was very much into “being” a philosopher. And the students who raised their hands to comment, usually were equally slow, or one-sided, or comments were sophomoric. And the responses to the comments were tired and telegraphed to the point that I began to wonder why such little substance had to be stretched out into such a long thing, a long, 3 dimensional thing, a theater of the pathetic, a chunk of my day spent absorbing this water through a foolish thin and leaky receptacle.
But saddest of all is how I remained silent for years, assuming my comments would be equally stupid and equally judged by a judge as harsh as myself. Making myself a small a target as possible. Never to raise my hand, only to scowl silently as others did, attempting to get closer to truth. On the very rare occasion I raised my hand, going back even to high school or before, I recall getting pounced on, people not understanding my comment, usually one obnoxious guy who wanted to be smart would interrupt and put what I said down, and that would shut me up and make me boil inside. Gamer was never confrontational. Gamer 2004 was the result of not being confrontational, not speaking up, and terrified of being like the others, slow, boring, devoid of fire and relevance, devoid of at least a new or intriguing point.
Online you can put forth your points, all of them, you can edit and massage until you are almost sure you at least won’t be misunderstood. And if someone puts you down, you can avoid the awkwardness of having a body, a face, the evolution of shame or fear and proximity and peer pressure and rejection. You are just your ideas, and if you feel worried you can vanish, or retreat a million miles away into oblivion. Or you can tactically respond, take your time and make sure you are once again giving it your best, not merely on the spot and out of desperation.
So that’s philosophy in a forum.
I also like it in a young boy’s mind. Talking to a loving dad, or a friend, one on one. Sometimes it’s confrontational. Sometimes if you’re lucky, it’s seeking and loving. That’s the best shape of philosophy, the purest, the most nourishing…most quenching as water, most hydrating to a plant.
And there’s the shape of philosophy when you read about it alone. Pure concept and system, history lesson, logic concept, language game, but usually solipsistic and soundless. A song of the neurons read and played from a manuscript written long ago. A sad solo in the dark by candlelight, it can of course spark new questions, or you might marvel simply at the beauty of it, so it’s not a bad thing necessarily.
What is the best shape of philosophy for you?
