The Value of Philosophical Education

Abstract

The title of these reflections encloses their basic premises which, at the same time, form a project that is always in progress, that is that is to say, always to be realized through a constant openness to the adjustments and adjustments and developments dictated by concrete situations. The premises on which I base myself are valid, in fact, as a sort of “regulatory ideal ideal” à la Kant, that is to say as reference criteria to which to tend towards, never realizable in absolute fullness yet capable of regulate our thinking and doing. In other words in other words, these are points of aggregation of our intellectual activities intellectual activities and our practices, which, in the specific case, concern the overall unity of the teaching of philosophy and of its potential its potential reception by those who receive it. In this light, I intend to consider the teaching and study of philosophy as an interpersonal practice that unravels into a plurality of values individual and collective values to be constructed in the mutual exchange of questions, points of view, aspirations and projects that gradually come forward. forward. My first premise is therefore to understand the practice of philosophy as a polyvalent activity rather than as a body of knowledge endowed with some privileged value or function. I will try to make explicit some elements that, in my opinion, make up the polyvalence of philosophical activity. Regarding the sense of the other premise implicit in the title of this intervention of mine, I understand the phrase “philosophical education” as indicating that the teaching and study of philosophy cannot be reduced to mere information on the philosophical doctrines that have come and gone and and continue to appear in our cultural history.