The idea that philosophy cannot be useful

Note: This blog post has been retracted, since I no longer think of it as a good representation of how I think about its topic. I may, or may not, have written a better post about the same topic since; check the full list of posts.

The idea that philosophy cannot be useful is given by comparing the world with the mind and finding that one cannot be used to know the other.

• In the world, it is said, there is only change, and no permanence. All is always in flux. Nothing is ever the same.
• In our intellect, by contrast, all of our ideas are unchanging and permanent.
• Having discovered both of these facts, we then easily conclude that our intellect cannot possibly be used to know about the world, since our ideas do not change when the world does, and therefore can have no correspondence with it. We could know these two facts – that of the constant change of the world and of the immutability of ideas – but this would be our last knowledge, since it would be the proof of the uselessness of our only instrument of knowledge to find out about anything else.

What, then, do we do with this?

There are three options.

Ideas are illusory

We could accept the problem, and having accepted it, give up on philosophy, in the sense of rational inquiry into the world. Our ideas are awfully poor instruments, so let us not use them.

In effect, we give up on being men, and decide to always trust our senses, like the beasts. Some will find this option intolerable; others will find it very attractive.

The world is illusory

Having accepted the problem, we could decide that the constantly-changing world is in fact a world of illusion, and that philosophy is useful precisely to show us the immutable ideas which constitute the only reality. This is what Parmenides did, more or less.

The problem is illusory

Wait, who told you that there is only change in the real world? This is stupid. Have you ever looked at things, and while you looked at them, they were staying the same? Of course you have. Change and permanence, clearly, both exist in the real world. The idea that they don’t was made up by a sceptic to confuse you.

There is another, similar version of this problem, where instead of the world having only change and no permanence, it instead has no difference and only sameness. The ways to deal with it are roughly the same as above.