Sitting here, eating breakfast, and just reflecting
and this thought came to mind…how does
history, what is currently happening, reflect on
philosophy?
For example, why within 100 years, three of the greatest
philosophers the world has ever seen, why did they
come into the world at that time? I am of course referring
to the hundred year stretch where we saw Socrates, the Buddha
and Confucius all live… roughly from 525 BC to 425 BC…
the years are a bit flexible… the important part is why,
why did these years have some of the greatest philosopher
ever?
I would argue that these years were years of great change…
that the world itself was in transition from one economic
system to another…and it was also in transition in
terms of the political situation going on at the time…
What conditions did all three, Socrates, the Buddha
and Confucius all face? The world around them transitioning
from the second economic stage, the first of course being
Hunter-gatherer… what is being called Pastoralism…
which is the herding of domestic animals like sheep,
goats, cattle and camels…This is the step before
the arrival of cities…and many parts of the world at
that time, had both hunter-gatherer and the next
step, Pastoralism within them… in other words,
we had three different types of economic systems
at work at the same time before and during
the rise of Socrates, the Buddha and Confucius…
The world was in a state of confusion, which way of life,
was the one to follow? (BTW, all three argued for following
the old ways, there were reactionaries… trying to get
their fellow citizens to follow the past traditions, past values,
not embrace the new values)
Anyway, this points out an important idea in terms of
when philosophers tend to show up in societies…
When the state/society is in transition, the rise of
capitalism also brought forth an entire class of
philosophers like Marx and Hegel…to name a
few Philosophers that turned up after the primary
political event of the modern era, The French Revolution…
also note that with each revolution, philosophers
came along an attempted to understand that revolution…
The rise of Science, the scientific revolution, brought
about philosophers like Spinoza and Descartes…
Who discussed the questions of knowledge,
what is knowledge and how do we know what we know?
questions of knowledge reflect a scientific heritage…
questions about morality come from a different
heritage… one where the old rules no longer apply,
exactly like the stage when our three hero’s were born…
all three, Socrates, Confucious, and the Buddha were
concerned with moral problems, not knowledge problems…
and this because the times they lived in were changing,
and part of that change was questions of how is one to live?
What is the right thing to do? How are we to act and interact with
our fellow human beings? All three philosophers were moral
philosophers, asking these questions of the ‘‘right thing to do’’
morally… it is a reflection of the times they were living in…
Philosophers/philosophy only becomes during times
of difficulty and distress… where the state/society stands
between a couple of possibilities and they didn’t which
way to turn… let us examine other examples…
the next great phase of philosophy came during the Roman
period… and that too came about due to both social
and political unrest… the Roman world was changing
from a Republic to a Monarchy/dictatorship and the
new philosophy/philosophers attempted, as best they could,
to work out what this change from a Republic to Monarchy
meant to us… there were no great philosophers from
the fall of the Republic to around 400 AD… and why?
although the situation was changing, it wasn’t drastic enough
to require explanations from philosophers…
The next great change occurred around 400 AD…
the transfer of the Roman state/society into a
Medieval society/state was well in hand by that point…
around 400 AD, the old world was dying and the new one
was being born… and we find one of the greats here,
at this point in time… St. Augustine… Augustine was
clearly a transitional figure… from one way of life into another…
and that is when we see the rise of philosophers…
periods of transitions… as there were no great
transitions from roughly 400AD to 1100 AD…
and what was the transition at that time of 1100 AD?
it was the time of the Crusades…
Then we get several excellent philosophers,
Anselm, Abelard, Aquinas, Duns Scotus…the next
time for philosophers came after the scientific revolution,
as I mentioned… and with every great transition period,
we get philosophers to explain said transition…
The rise of Capitalism brought about dozens
of great philosophers… including Marx and Adam Smith…
to name just a few…the transition from an agricultural
period to our modern industrial age brought about
many different philosophers…
Every single transitional time period brings about
people attempting to understanding and explaining
it to others… people we like to call philosophers…
and what about our own age? What does 2025 bring us
in terms of being transitional age? As far as I can tell,
which is kinda like describing a tornado inside of a tornado,
our age is in some sort of transition… from the rise of
technology like computers, cell phones, the ever present TV
culture, space travel, modern medicine and even to
transhumanism… the mating of man and technology…
and what does that all mean? What is moral
and ethics in our technological age?
Another brick in the wall is the loss of traditional
sources of morality and ethics… Every major philosopher
in the 20th century delt with this… From Kierkegaard,
Nietzsche to Sartre and all of the existentialists, were in
one fashion or another, exploring morality/ethics…
Even those philosophers we believe weren’t moralists
like Heidegger and Wittenstein were, and they said so at
the time, they were moralists… trying to discover on what basis
can we now work out our morality and ethics?
I believe due to the changing world, and this transition
we are going through, that a rise of great philosophers
will emerge… I have always said that I wasn’t the Messiah,
but I was John the Baptist… announcing the arrival of
the great philosophers…
Today, we are in a time of transition, and what will
be your response?
Kropotkin