Philosophical Attitude
What is the true philosophical attitude? Or more specifically, what is the true meaning of our process of articulation that can ultimately contribute to the progress of our insight to expand the worldview, which can eventually lead us to the stance to see everything and everyone as it is?
This question sounds quite naïve; at the same time, looks an ambitious attitude since it is definitely unrealistic to consider ourselves as some of the great thinkers who have really contributed to the progress of human conscious evolution -- the contribution that can make us a bit or a quite wiser and smarter than we used to be. Although it is unrealistic, this does not necessarily mean that we can ignore the true meaning of such philosophical attitude.
Of course, the philosophical attitude is not that we generate the totally novel theories and practices out of our conventional, ego-oriented, narrow-minded, and dualistic speculations. Rather, the philosophical attitude is to humbly and modestly try to open our mind to make our best efforts to let us follow the trace of the past great thinkers and their best efforts of articulations. However, doing so is not that we simply stand on the tip of such huge iceberg and mindlessly tracing and introducing them so as to make their core thoughts more ambiguous with our unnecessarily interpreted countless footnotes and comments. But rather, doing so is try to our best efforts to transcend and include these articulations as much as possible.
And again, it is not that we should absorb and digest all those past theories, articulated discourses, and practices to produce something totally novel, which are of course impossible. What we try to do is at least to "reflect" upon them. Actually the post-modern attempt was such "reflection." The post-modern people tried to reflect upon all those past theories, articulated discourses, and practices. And of course in such thoughtful attitude, they did not forget to reflect upon themselves, either, which is called "self-reflection."
In my opinion (at least in the context of this writing) self-reflection is one of the "highest" achievements so far in the path to the human maturity. And in this self-reflective attitude, they keep on examining how much what they themselves saw have been distorted; how much they have misinterpreted what they see. Moreover, the act of seeing things is inevitably the act of interpretations, and such everything is indeed interpretation. Thus, we cannot avoid the pitfall of misinterpretations about us, others, and environments, and of course about God.
In the self-reflective attitude of such interpretations, ironically the more we try to be sincere on it, the more we have put ourselves on the so-called kaleidoscopic dizziness of opposite mirror, which leads us to the hermeneutic circle of no true answers whatsoever. Having no answers and yet at the same knowing that we could reflect upon everything and everyone including ourselves, such "having" and "knowing" inevitably lead us to what I call post-modern nihilism and post-modern narcissism. We become nihilistic in knowing there is no answer to understand everything at the same time probably unconsciously we are narcissistic in knowing we are the most matured ones to be able to reflect upon everything and everyone including ourselves.
Now, this is the "true crisis" on our act of articulation and of self-reflection. Indeed, the very end result of our intellectual act which can be regarded as conventional philosophical attitude has been chocking our own throat at the end. What is called the "end of philosophy" or the "death of meta-narrative" in effect becomes one of the manifestations upon such self-destructive intellectual dead-end. Thus, to overcome such "true crisis" of our own intellectualization, what we need is to restore and redefine the "philosophical attitude" as such in a more wholesome and sincere approach.
Indeed, doing philosophy is not the superficial bookish study of contemporary/past philosophers, and philosophies and philosophical theories. Doing philosophy is not to produce another version of interpretations in the midst of the above-mentioned post-modern hermeneutic vicious circle. Rather, doing philosophy, above all, is to seek for the true meaning of philosophizing and in so doing philosophy can be close to the act of true philosophizing as such.
And in my opinion, what we have to do in seeking for the act of philosophizing, first of all, is to be aware of and go about this "true crisis" upon our act of self-reflection per se. In short, put it bluntly, it is the attempt of reflecting upon our self-reflections. And I want to call it the act of "self-reflexivity" in this particular context.
Thus, what we need to do is: 1) to be aware of such post-modern crisis or the crisis of self-reflection; 2) to face the problem or the mean side of this self-reflection; 3) to realize that facing this mean side of self-reflection can lead us to the more sincere reflection on the self-reflections, which can be for our terminology here called self-reflexivity. And only in this attitude we can sincerely place ourselves on the progress of our intellectual (true philosophical) pursuit or we can restore such attitude and resume the path of our consciousness evolution.
More analogically speaking, when we are new-born babies, we were not aware of ourselves. We did not have self-awareness since we did not have clear consciousness per se. But then, when we have consciousness, we could have the self-awareness. Because of this self-awareness, we can see ourselves in front of us and in our own imagination (consciousness). But then, that we see ourselves (others, environments, God too) that way means that we have been divided into two -- the one who sees ourselves and the other who are seen by the one. Because of self-consciousness, we have to see and understand everything and everyone in such divided, separated duality.
To reduce this gap between seer and seen in the duality we have made a lot of numerous interpretations to explain and articulate ourselves (as well as; our world, others, environments, and God). And yet, the more we try to produce the interpretations, the more the gap has been expanded and gotten complicated. And finally we have realized that the very act of interpretation itself can not reduce the gap, rather it is the very reason to make a gap at the first place since the birth of consciousness (self-awareness). Then, we have despaired with a bit of arrogance in thinking we are the ones to know this truth. We have become nihilistic and narcissistic.
Yet, let us recall the fact that there was a certain "breakthrough" when we have transformed from "being unconscious baby" to "a man of self-awareness." Knowing this transformation, it is not so unrealistic to think that there will be another "breakthrough" for us to overcome this present dilemma of self-awareness. Indeed, the function of our self-awareness has shown its own limitation and mean side at this moment finally. In the act or the effort of self-reflexivity, restoring the true attitude of philosophizing, then at least we can sense a subtle beginning of the next breakthrough.
Theoretically when we were an unconscious baby (when we were the residents of Garden of Eden), we were able to see everything and everyone as it is unconsciously just like other animals, we were the part of the universe. And because of the self-awareness, the birth of consciousness, we have become the ones to see everything and everyone only in the separated dualities, while there are a lot of contributions in this dual separation such as having the "free will" as one of the most previous gifts from God, we could control and cultivate the world in one way or another.
Because of "free will," we are no longer the puppet of God and of the universe. However, because of "free will," we have had our free will not to see God or our will to see God only through our dualistic interpretations, subject-object separations.
This is one of the biggest ironies. Because of self-awareness, birth of consciousness, and free will, we have started questioning "Who I am," "Where I came from" and "Where I will go," etc. In other words, because of self-awareness, birth of consciousness, and free will, the very act of philosophy and philosophizing (or ultimately any intellectual activities) has taken place.
Probably the next "breakthrough" will be to overcome our duality and subject-object separation. We do not know how this will happen; however, we can expect that another transformation will be similar to such way that the transformation from "being an unconscious baby" to "a man of self-awareness." Probably this will be the transformation from a man of self-awareness to a man of something else... a man of full-consciousness, awakened, enlightened, and so on.
This question sounds quite naïve; at the same time, looks an ambitious attitude since it is definitely unrealistic to consider ourselves as some of the great thinkers who have really contributed to the progress of human conscious evolution -- the contribution that can make us a bit or a quite wiser and smarter than we used to be. Although it is unrealistic, this does not necessarily mean that we can ignore the true meaning of such philosophical attitude.
Of course, the philosophical attitude is not that we generate the totally novel theories and practices out of our conventional, ego-oriented, narrow-minded, and dualistic speculations. Rather, the philosophical attitude is to humbly and modestly try to open our mind to make our best efforts to let us follow the trace of the past great thinkers and their best efforts of articulations. However, doing so is not that we simply stand on the tip of such huge iceberg and mindlessly tracing and introducing them so as to make their core thoughts more ambiguous with our unnecessarily interpreted countless footnotes and comments. But rather, doing so is try to our best efforts to transcend and include these articulations as much as possible.
And again, it is not that we should absorb and digest all those past theories, articulated discourses, and practices to produce something totally novel, which are of course impossible. What we try to do is at least to "reflect" upon them. Actually the post-modern attempt was such "reflection." The post-modern people tried to reflect upon all those past theories, articulated discourses, and practices. And of course in such thoughtful attitude, they did not forget to reflect upon themselves, either, which is called "self-reflection."
In my opinion (at least in the context of this writing) self-reflection is one of the "highest" achievements so far in the path to the human maturity. And in this self-reflective attitude, they keep on examining how much what they themselves saw have been distorted; how much they have misinterpreted what they see. Moreover, the act of seeing things is inevitably the act of interpretations, and such everything is indeed interpretation. Thus, we cannot avoid the pitfall of misinterpretations about us, others, and environments, and of course about God.
In the self-reflective attitude of such interpretations, ironically the more we try to be sincere on it, the more we have put ourselves on the so-called kaleidoscopic dizziness of opposite mirror, which leads us to the hermeneutic circle of no true answers whatsoever. Having no answers and yet at the same knowing that we could reflect upon everything and everyone including ourselves, such "having" and "knowing" inevitably lead us to what I call post-modern nihilism and post-modern narcissism. We become nihilistic in knowing there is no answer to understand everything at the same time probably unconsciously we are narcissistic in knowing we are the most matured ones to be able to reflect upon everything and everyone including ourselves.
Now, this is the "true crisis" on our act of articulation and of self-reflection. Indeed, the very end result of our intellectual act which can be regarded as conventional philosophical attitude has been chocking our own throat at the end. What is called the "end of philosophy" or the "death of meta-narrative" in effect becomes one of the manifestations upon such self-destructive intellectual dead-end. Thus, to overcome such "true crisis" of our own intellectualization, what we need is to restore and redefine the "philosophical attitude" as such in a more wholesome and sincere approach.
Indeed, doing philosophy is not the superficial bookish study of contemporary/past philosophers, and philosophies and philosophical theories. Doing philosophy is not to produce another version of interpretations in the midst of the above-mentioned post-modern hermeneutic vicious circle. Rather, doing philosophy, above all, is to seek for the true meaning of philosophizing and in so doing philosophy can be close to the act of true philosophizing as such.
And in my opinion, what we have to do in seeking for the act of philosophizing, first of all, is to be aware of and go about this "true crisis" upon our act of self-reflection per se. In short, put it bluntly, it is the attempt of reflecting upon our self-reflections. And I want to call it the act of "self-reflexivity" in this particular context.
Thus, what we need to do is: 1) to be aware of such post-modern crisis or the crisis of self-reflection; 2) to face the problem or the mean side of this self-reflection; 3) to realize that facing this mean side of self-reflection can lead us to the more sincere reflection on the self-reflections, which can be for our terminology here called self-reflexivity. And only in this attitude we can sincerely place ourselves on the progress of our intellectual (true philosophical) pursuit or we can restore such attitude and resume the path of our consciousness evolution.
More analogically speaking, when we are new-born babies, we were not aware of ourselves. We did not have self-awareness since we did not have clear consciousness per se. But then, when we have consciousness, we could have the self-awareness. Because of this self-awareness, we can see ourselves in front of us and in our own imagination (consciousness). But then, that we see ourselves (others, environments, God too) that way means that we have been divided into two -- the one who sees ourselves and the other who are seen by the one. Because of self-consciousness, we have to see and understand everything and everyone in such divided, separated duality.
To reduce this gap between seer and seen in the duality we have made a lot of numerous interpretations to explain and articulate ourselves (as well as; our world, others, environments, and God). And yet, the more we try to produce the interpretations, the more the gap has been expanded and gotten complicated. And finally we have realized that the very act of interpretation itself can not reduce the gap, rather it is the very reason to make a gap at the first place since the birth of consciousness (self-awareness). Then, we have despaired with a bit of arrogance in thinking we are the ones to know this truth. We have become nihilistic and narcissistic.
Yet, let us recall the fact that there was a certain "breakthrough" when we have transformed from "being unconscious baby" to "a man of self-awareness." Knowing this transformation, it is not so unrealistic to think that there will be another "breakthrough" for us to overcome this present dilemma of self-awareness. Indeed, the function of our self-awareness has shown its own limitation and mean side at this moment finally. In the act or the effort of self-reflexivity, restoring the true attitude of philosophizing, then at least we can sense a subtle beginning of the next breakthrough.
Theoretically when we were an unconscious baby (when we were the residents of Garden of Eden), we were able to see everything and everyone as it is unconsciously just like other animals, we were the part of the universe. And because of the self-awareness, the birth of consciousness, we have become the ones to see everything and everyone only in the separated dualities, while there are a lot of contributions in this dual separation such as having the "free will" as one of the most previous gifts from God, we could control and cultivate the world in one way or another.
Because of "free will," we are no longer the puppet of God and of the universe. However, because of "free will," we have had our free will not to see God or our will to see God only through our dualistic interpretations, subject-object separations.
This is one of the biggest ironies. Because of self-awareness, birth of consciousness, and free will, we have started questioning "Who I am," "Where I came from" and "Where I will go," etc. In other words, because of self-awareness, birth of consciousness, and free will, the very act of philosophy and philosophizing (or ultimately any intellectual activities) has taken place.
Probably the next "breakthrough" will be to overcome our duality and subject-object separation. We do not know how this will happen; however, we can expect that another transformation will be similar to such way that the transformation from "being an unconscious baby" to "a man of self-awareness." Probably this will be the transformation from a man of self-awareness to a man of something else... a man of full-consciousness, awakened, enlightened, and so on.
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