Ignorance Is Not A Simple Lack Of

When We Enter A New Situation In Life And Are Confronted By A New Person, We Bring With Us The Prejudices Of The Past And Our Previous Experiences Of People. These Prejudices We Project Upon The New Person. Indeed, Getting To Know A Person Is Largely A Matter Of Withdrawing Projections; Of Dispelling The Smoke Screen Of What We Imagine He Is Like And Replacing It With The Reality Of What He Is Actually Like.

Instead Of Encouraging The Student To Devote Himself To His Studies For The Sake Of Studying, Instead Of Encouraging In Him A Real Love For His Subject And For Inquiry, He Is Encouraged To Study For The Sake Of His Personal Career; He Is Led To Acquire Only Such Knowledge As Is Serviceable In Getting Him Over The Hurdles Which He Must Clear For The Sake Of His Advancement.

Philosophy Is A Necessary Activity Because We, All Of Us, Take A Great Number Of Things For Granted, And Many Of These Assumptions Are Of A Philosophical Character; We Act On Them In Private Life, In Politics, In Our Work, And In Every Other Sphere Of Our Lives -- But While Some Of These Assumptions Are No Doubt True, It Is Likely, That More Are False And Some Are Harmful. So The Critical Examination Of Our Presuppositions -- Which Is A Philosophical Activity -- Is Morally As Well As Intellectually Important.

No Matter How Many Instances Of White Swans We May Have Observed, This Does Not Justify The Conclusion That All Swans Are White.

Genuine Philosophical Problems Are Always Rooted Outside Philosophy And They Die If These Roots Decay.