Group 19 presented on Martin Heidegger’s ideas on the value of philosophy. Their skit was basically a fairy tale style book where the moral of the story was that philosophy doesn’t grant any knowledge, but it must work on the person to help them develop.
From the reading and presentation, it felt as if Heidegger was trying to say philosophy is meaningless in the real world. Saying things like “Philosophy cannot be applied directly.” Also, Heidegger states philosophy doesn't directly supply us with anything but it does shape our understanding. It shouldn’t be a foundation, yet it also shouldn't be rejected just because it is useless for certain principles. I almost felt like Heidegger was struggling to say that all the deep philosophical ideas that he has provided shouldn’t be looked at as fact. It’s like he is arguing with the audience to say, “Don’t just accept theses ideas I have written down; just think about them and let them work on you”.
Thad’s main objective for his students is to have a sincere struggle with the course material. I believe the struggle with the ideas presented is what philosophy is about. I feel like when you read Heidegger’s or any philosopher’s material, you are not supposed to take a stance right away on whether you think their right or wrong. You are meant to struggle with ideas the same way that the author struggled with the idea when they were forming them. This brings me to a question I would like for whoever reads this to answer. When does a question become philosophical versus just a scientific question? Because I often feel like some questions that people feel are philosophical to one person might not be the same for another. What I mean by that is, people don’t struggle with the same questions as everyone else. One person may be very concerned with the afterlife which might lead to an existential crisis that will shape their philosophy, but another person might have no interest in life after death so it wouldn’t really be a philosophical question.
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