The unlived philosophy is not worth having

Created 27 May 2015 • Last modified 19 Aug 2022

Doing good philosophy isn't just a matter of saying the right things on paper or in a classroom. It's a matter of fulfilling your philosophy in your thoughts and actions.

They say that the unexamined life is not worth living. I say that, conversely, one's philosophy should be lived.

Too often, philosophers see their job as descriptive, as justifying and rationalizing what people already think or do. In my eyes, the proper goal of philosophy is prescriptive, to decide what to think or do to begin with. If

changing your epistemology has no consequences for your own beliefs, or
changing your ethics has no consequences for your own moral decisions, or
if you're a scientist, changing your mind about philosophy of science has no consequences for how you do scientific research, or
if you're an artist, changing your mind about aesthetics has no consequences for your art,

then the exercise is meaningless—you've changed your philosophical opinions only nominally. Doing good philosophy isn't just a matter of saying the right things on paper or in a classroom. It's a matter of fulfilling your philosophy in your thoughts and actions.