"Western Philosophy" what exactly is philosophy? What is philosophy?

In his Lectures on the History of Philosophy, Hegel holds that the development of absolute spirit started from Eastern philosophy, went through Indian philosophy, West Asian philosophy and Egyptian philosophy, and went to ancient Greek philosophy. Then from ancient Greek philosophy, Ancient Roman philosophy, medieval philosophy, modern philosophy, Kant's philosophy, Fichte's philosophy, Schelling's philosophy, and finally Hegel's own philosophy. The absolute spirit has finally come to an end, as Faust said: "Please stay!" In Hegel's own words, the whole hard work of the human spirit for 2,500 years has moved in that direction.

Hegel, of course, was arrogant, and the direction he was talking about was his philosophy. But there is truth in it, arrogantly enough, but there is a truth in it. The truth is that you can't be a philosopher without knowing the whole history of philosophy over thousands of years. Therefore, thinking about the relationship between philosophy and the history of philosophy from this Angle, it is no exaggeration to say that philosophy is the history of philosophy.

That is to say, if you really want to study philosophy, you have to start by studying the history of philosophy. It is not only historical but also illogical to study certain philosophical principles in the beginning, and it is impossible to really enter philosophy in such a way. For you have reduced philosophy to something rigid and frozen, that is, metaphysics as it is generally understood.

And philosophy is just a kind of living life, which can only be presented in the long history of western philosophical thought. And there is a problem that should be emphasized here, that is, from the perspective of biological evolution, the human brain structure has not undergone any fundamental changes in the historical process of 2,000 years, 2000 years is a very short time in the process of biological evolution, but a "snap of the finger". It is for this reason that we should believe that the western philosophers of the past 2,000 years, although older than us, are as intelligent and intelligent as we are. They are all great minds in history, otherwise their ideas would not have survived in history.

In fact, they are often smarter and more intelligent than we are. But we have our advantage, and our advantage is that we know not only what they thought, but how later thinkers criticized them. They may be wise, but at least they don't know how later philosophers criticize them and surpass them, so that's our advantage. In that sense, we may not be smarter than they are, but we have a broader, more holistic view, a broader historical perspective, which makes it easier for us to get into their minds. Of course, you have to get into this historical perspective. If you do not enter it, just simply to recite some philosophical principles or philosophical concepts, then you will always be a layman of philosophy!

In this way, therefore, philosophy must be transferred to the history of philosophy. Philosophy since it is about the forever also cannot tell, above the learning of "tao", so if we want to ask what is the "tao", if you want to ask this reality, the nature, if you want to explore a kind of advanced metaphysics, we can only in the long history of western philosophy, can really into the context of philosophy, Only then can we approach the profound implication of the ultimate "Tao".

Those figures in the history of Western philosophy are great thinkers, full of wisdom. We communicate with them by studying the history of philosophy, by thinking about the problems they think, by experiencing the troubles they experience, by engaging in deep conversations with them, we can place ourselves in the source of wisdom. At the same time, we will stand in the position of the latecomers, to question their thoughts, criticize and surpass.

When we study philosophy in this way, we have immersed ourselves in a river of thought, confronting the wisdom of the ancients with our own life experience. In my opinion, such an attitude is the real attitude to study philosophy. Those of us who study the history of Western philosophy always believe that one cannot really understand Marxist philosophy without studying the history of western philosophy. Marx himself is a westerner, and his philosophical thought represents an important stage in the development history of Western philosophy, which also grows out of the deep tradition of western philosophy.

How can you understand Marxist philosophy if you don't know the entire history of Western philosophy from Thales to Hegel? If the Marx's thought, and western philosophy in a separate state, to become a marxist philosophy and western philosophy are independent of (of course with the Oriental philosophy), and even the opposite of philosophy, this is not a praise highly of marxist philosophy and promote, on the contrary, it is a tarnished and underrated of marxism. Because Marx's philosophy is profound philosophy soil, more than 2000 years of traditional western philosophy constitutes the ideological background of marxist philosophy and theoretical support, if you put the traditional cuts off, completely outside of western philosophy in the marxist philosophy as a independent system of philosophy, then became a madrassa reflected marxism, Without roots, a philosophy full of vitality is solidified into a pile of dull philosophical dogmas.

This is why students hate and resist philosophy (in the minds of some students, philosophy is equivalent to Marxist philosophy), because you have turned philosophy into a dead thing, of course boring! We are not faced with living ideas, not nourishing the wisdom of the soul, but rigid dogma, boring knowledge system, of course, will feel disgusted and resistance. The study of philosophy must go through the spiritual training, which can only be completed in the process of learning the history of philosophy.