Hello Dazzle! Thanks for coming and hanging out with me today, I’m glad that you are here. I have been talking about video games in the context of philosophy a lot and will be doing that more in the future. Because of that, I thought it might be helpful to create a series that covered some of the basic ideas and concepts in philosophy that I frequently visit in my discussions.
So, what is philosophy?
Philosophy is from the Greek words philo and sophia, meaning “the love of wisdom”. At its most simple it is the study of knowledge, or “thinking about thinking”. The practice of philosophy is characterized by several general features: it is a form of rational inquiry, it aims to be systematic, and it tends to critically reflect on its own methods and presuppositions. It requires attentively thinking long and carefully about the provocative, vexing, and enduring problems central to the human condition.
In common usage, it sometimes carries the sense of unproductive or frivolous musings, but over the centuries it has produced some of the most important original thought, and its contribution to politics, sociology, mathematics, science and literature has been unmeasurable. Although the study of philosophy may not yield “the meaning of life, the universe and everything”, many philosophers believe that it is important that each of us examines such questions and even that an unexamined life is not worth living. It also provides a good way of learning to think more clearly about a wide range of issues, and its methods of analyzing arguments can be useful in a variety of situations in other areas of life.
In a broad sense, philosophy is an activity people undertake when they seek to understand fundamental truths about themselves, the world in which they live, and their relationships to the world and to each other. As an academic discipline philosophy is much the same. Those who study philosophy are perpetually engaged in asking, answering, and arguing for their answers to life’s most basic questions. To make such a pursuit more systematic academic philosophy is traditionally divided into major areas of study.
Metaphysics
At its core the study of metaphysics is the study of the nature of reality, of what exists in the world, what it is like, and how it is ordered. Metaphysicians attempt to answer basic questions including “Why is there something rather than nothing?”; “Of what does reality ultimately consist?”; and “Are humans free?”
A key topic in metaphysics concerns the question of whether reality only consists of physical things like matter and energy. Alternative suggestions are that mental entities (such as souls and experiences) and abstract entities (such as numbers and time) exist apart from physical things. Another topic in metaphysics concerns the problem of identity. One question is how much an entity can change while still remaining the same entity. A central distinction in metaphysics is between particulars and universals. Universals, like the color red, can exist at different locations at the same time. This is not the case for particulars including individual persons or specific objects. Other metaphysical questions are whether the past fully determines the present and what implications this would have for the existence of free will.
Epistemology
Epistemology is the study of knowledge. It is primarily concerned with what we can know about the world and how we can know it. It is also known as theory of knowledge and aims to understand what knowledge is, how it arises, what its limits are, and what value it has. It further examines the nature of truth, belief, justification, and rationality. Some of the questions addressed by epistemologists include “By what method can one acquire knowledge?”; “How is truth established?”; and “Can we prove causal relations?”
Many discussions in epistemology touch on the topic of philosophical skepticism, which raises doubts about some or all claims to knowledge. These doubts are often based on the idea that knowledge requires absolute certainty and that humans are unable to acquire it.
Ethics
The study of ethics often concerns what we ought to do and what it would be best to do. In struggling with this issue, larger questions about what is good and right arise. Philosophical ethics addresses such basic questions as “Are moral obligations relative?”; “Which has priority: well-being or obligation?”; and “What gives life meaning?”
The main branches of ethics are meta-ethics, normative ethics, and applied ethics. Meta-ethics asks abstract questions about the nature and sources of morality. It analyzes the meaning of ethical concepts, like right action and obligation. It also investigates whether ethical theories can be true in an absolute sense and how to acquire knowledge of them. Normative ethics encompasses general theories of how to distinguish between right and wrong conduct. It helps guide moral decisions by examining what moral obligations and rights people have. Applied ethics studies the consequences of the general theories developed by normative ethics in specific situations, for example, in the workplace or for medical treatments.
Logic
Logic is the study of correct reasoning. It aims to understand how to distinguish good from bad arguments. It is usually divided into formal and informal logic. Formal logic uses artificial languages with a precise symbolic representation to investigate arguments. In its search for exact criteria, it examines the structure of arguments to determine whether they are correct or incorrect. Informal logic uses non-formal criteria and standards to assess the correctness of arguments. It relies on additional factors such as content and context.
Logic examines a variety of arguments. Deductive arguments are mainly studied by formal logic. An argument is deductively valid if the truth of its premises ensures the truth of its conclusion. Deductively valid arguments follow a rule of inference, like modus ponens, which has the following logical form: “p; if p then q; therefore q“. An example is the argument “today is Sunday; if today is Sunday then I don’t have to go to work today; therefore I don’t have to go to work today”.
The premises of non-deductive arguments also support their conclusion, although this support does not guarantee that the conclusion is true. One form is inductive reasoning. It starts from a set of individual cases and uses generalization to arrive at a universal law governing all cases. An example is the inference that “all ravens are black” based on observations of many individual black ravens. Another form is abductive reasoning. It starts from an observation and concludes that the best explanation of this observation must be true. This happens, for example, when a doctor diagnoses a disease based on the observed symptoms.
Logic also investigates incorrect forms of reasoning. They are called fallacies and are divided into formal and informal fallacies based on whether the source of the error lies only in the form of the argument or also in its content and context.
Well, that’s about it for my rambling today. Thanks for coming and spending some time with me. If you like my rambling then click on that like button. It really does help! Until we talk again, you take care of yourselves!
Zebra Pig 
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