What Philosophy Is

Philosophy means love of knowledge. It's the first human endeavor. Imagine several cavemen huddled around their eldest - he's maybe 20-years old or so. They ask him, how'd you do that, how'd you live longer than anyone else. He tells them his secret - around here, you get smart or die. Admittedly, he was kind of a pompous fellow, with a knack for stating the obvious. So it's not surprising he's a relative of ours.

He was by definition, the first philosopher. I remember Poe's The Cask of Amontillado from his Complete Works, the first book I read, other than all the Hardy Boys books which my grandmother bought me, and all the Nancy Drew books she bought for my sister. I was in the fifth grade, I guess, and wanted to know stuff. 

Poe is difficult, he uses big words like he wants to impress you with them. It's very irritating when you don't know what they mean. Kind of a stupid thing for a writer to do. And it's also hard to figure out what he's trying to say. But to me, The Cask of Amontillado - where the rich old guy gets sealed away forever in the unknowing basement, meant this - ignorance is fatal. 

I like Orwell's take on that - ignorance is bliss - his description of evil mind control. What religion and government use to keep people in line. And I think of animals cuz we learn by observing what's around us (per Hannibal Lecter...and others). Do animals have the same fear of mortality that we do. Mick Brazel says they're all individuals, like us. And have the same degree of individual sensitivities that we do.

My oft-sleeping cat didn't seem to worry that someday she'd die of cancer. I suppose she couldn't have known, and thus wouldn't have spent time sweating the unknowable. She was housed, fed and loved, and thus per Maslowe, was doin okay. Better than me anyway. Maybe all those sleeping dreams were a fulfilling life for her. I hope so. She never complained anyway. 

But quite oddly, she didn't purr as a kitten. So I taught her, by imitating what I'd learned from other cats. And she's show off her newly acquired knowledge by hopping up on the couch late at night when I was trying to sleep, and thunder purring sounds into my ear. Well done kitty. Who needs to sleep, just to get to work on time. 

You could say a little knowledge is a dangerous thing. I don't know. When I'se little, my elders would sometimes spell out words rather than saying them, like Wash Hogwallop in the movie O Brother Where Art Thou. But like Wash's boy (and maybe Stewie Griffin) I determined to crack that code.