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Is the purpose of philosophy to find answers or better questions.

for example, off the top of my head, when you ask yourself something like, "which came first, the chicken or the egg?," do you do so in an attempt to actually resolve the question by choosing either the chicken or the egg?

People tend do develop opinions about the subject, and their opinions generally change over time, but it seems the genuine developments in philosophy come when somebody's like "the real question here is...", or "what we should really be asking ourselves is...".

Is there ever a place in philosophy for "answers" other than as provisionally adopted "opinions*"...?


*note: some statements are more logical than others

Life's a mystery. Philosophy is one means to better understanding it. The better the questions asked (and here it helps if one practices careful observation and critical thinking), the better the potential for answers which elucidate.

Of course, that's just my opinion.

The purpose of philosophy is to gain a better understanding of ourselves and our world. We may never arrive at any final answers, but in many ways it is the journey which is most important, not the destination.

Touche.

The purpose of philosophy is to be able to spell the word right in the first place.

I know I misspelled it

That's one of those nasty ingrained typing habits. I never do it when I actually write it out....I swear it!

the purpose is purely to explore "what if?". If we were looking for answers things would be alot less deep and would restrict the creativity of the mind.

According to Richard Rorty: Philosophy, specifically epistemology, exist simply because people continue to ask the same questions, though adequate answers and scientific advancement has made many of them moot in the first place. Thus philosophy becomes a self perpetuating cycle of questions that only exist for philosophers to discuss.

I tend to agree with this in most cases.

Philosphy exists in part to formulate an answer in each persons own mind, but not to truly create an overall agreement, although that does happen sometimes, rarely.

Originally posted by Yuna_And_Tidus
The purpose of philosophy is to be able to spell the word right in the first place.

Everybody dislike something, well I hate people like this, who can't go beyond wrongly spelled word and answer the question! Why are you on this forum anyway?! It doesn't matter how the word is spelled if you understand the point...I can't understand you...


I think philosophers should mainly focus on questions, because we have sciences now, who can get answers for philosophy...

Either will increase the signal-to-noise ratio of experience.

Philosophy is Greek word come from word Philos it mean "love of wisdom"

The root word of Philosophy is Greek

Originally posted by The Black Ghost
Touche. Worst usage of the word I ever encountered.

To find better questions but not answers. In philosophy we can only explore the possibilities, the "particular opinions" about that subject.

But to anwer the questions we will always need to trust in our intuition that what we believe is true.

Originally posted by Bardock42
Worst usage of the word I ever encountered.

It means more over here then. Mightve been a Family Guy inspired thing. Sort of a dying word though.

Originally posted by The Black Ghost
It means more over here then. Mightve been a Family Guy inspired thing. Sort of a dying word though.

Or you just misused it.

It was agreeing with the previous statement in a...different way

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RZchOT2KsyQ&mode=related&search=

Originally posted by The Black Ghost
It was agreeing with the previous statement in a...different way

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RZchOT2KsyQ&mode=related&search=

J-just that it was used correctly in that clip.

Originally posted by Goddess Kali
Philosophy is Greek word come from word Philos it mean "love of wisdom"

The root word of Philosophy is Greek

Thank you captain obvious for that most enlightening detail. Until next time, we will be waiting on you to throw a completely unnecessary detail neither pertaining to the conversation nor to it's development.

Originally posted by AOR
Thank you captain obvious for that most enlightening detail. Until next time, we will be waiting on you to throw a completely unnecessary detail neither pertaining to the conversation nor to it's development.

my defintions:

to challenge the mind and limit of one's imagination and what one believes of the universe and all things that inhabit it.

to give those of us who ask "what if" and "how come" something to talk about.

to put into perspective the universe in one's mind, to ask the unaswereable questions.