Everyday ethics: Ask right questions to get answers
I once read a philosopher who claimed, “We might not have all the answers, but we do have a monopoly on questions.”
There’s some truth in that philosopher’s claim since starting with the right question is the best approach to finding an answer. Too many begin with the wrong question and end with the wrong answer. Or like others they start with an answer then end missing any facts or truths their questions might have led them to find.
On her deathbed, the poet Gertrude Stein was asked, “Gertrude, Gertrude, what is the answer?” She responded, “What’s the question?”
There are some questions that are basic to the study of philosophy, which translates as the “love of wisdom.”
Why is there anything at all?
What happens after I die? Why do bad things happen to good people?
Why do good things happen to bad people?
What is time?
Where do I go when I’m asleep?
Why does God permit evil?
What’s the best way to live?
Since ethics is about how best to live as individuals and societies, I’ve spent a great deal of time and thought asking and then responding to the question of how best to live. I’ve arrived at a simple response: Speak and act with truth and compassion. All the rest is commentary and opinions.
I know I will cause some frustration by not answering most of these big questions but simply posing another one: Does it really matter at all to ask these questions?
My response may also be frustrating. To some people it doesn’t matter if they ask any of these questions since they say there are no answers anyway, so why try? Or, as the common response is to most questions we can’t answer: “It is what it is.” To which I respond with another question: What do you mean by “it” and “is” and why do you think this is the best answer?
Philosophy begins in wonder, and wonder leads to questions. And the answers to wondering can be revolutionary, leading to answers and then more questions. It’s this kind of process that makes us more than programmed, unthinking creatures.
If our ancient ancestors had never asked questions we’d still be living in caves.
Plato told a story about people living in caves, afraid to venture outside. They thought the shadows cast on the walls from the entrance were real, and until someone ventured outside to tell them about the world outside theirs, they would not admit any truth other than what the shadows revealed.
If Plato’s story was updated to modern times, I think he might have been describing people living in totalitarian states who only believe what their leader tells them to be true, or people who watch or read only one source of information, believing this to be the only truth and not venturing outside, or those seeking to ban books with ideas different from their own.
“Wisdom begins in wonder,” said Socrates, and “wonder implies the desire to learn,” added Aristotle. And we are here to learn about ourselves, others, and the world outside ourselves. That’s our primary purpose for being thinking beings, to venture outside the cave and continue learning.