The Reflective Character of Philosophical Enquiry

At least since Socrates, philosophy and the humanities devolving from it have considered themselves not only as a quest for theoretical knowledge, but also a pursuit of wisdom - and wisdom entails not only knowing what there is, but most of all knowing how to comport ourselves with respect to it (Kohák 1993, 240). As Berlin (1962, 4) pointed out, the two well known categories of academic investigation are empirical observation (employed by the natural and social sciences) and formal deduction (employed by mathematics). Nevertheless, observed Berlin, besides these two major categories of knowledge, there arise questions which fall outside either group, and these are the ones which can be said to be truly philosophical.

The idealist British philosopher, Bernard Bosanquet, indicated what is implied in a

“philosophical theory”, as distinguished from theories which make no claim to being

philosophical:

The primary difference is, that a philosophical treatment is the study of

something as a whole and for its own sake. In a certain sense it may be

compared to the gaze of a child or of an artist. It deals, that is, with the

total and unbroken effect of its object. It desires to ascertain what a

thing is, what is its full characteristic and being, its achievement in the

general act of the world. History, explanation, analysis into cause and

conditions, have value for it only in so far as they contribute to the

intelligent estimation of the fullest nature and capabilities of the real

individual whole which is under investigation (Bosanquet 1923, 1-2).

As Bosanquet alludes above, philosophy refrains from limiting itself to empirical

data. Concerning this Maritain wrote:

Philosophy appeals to the facts, the data of experience. To obtain the

necessary materials it uses as instruments the truths provided by the

evidence of the senses and the conclusions proved by the sciences. It

Research Methodology in Philosophy within an Interdisciplinary and Commercialised African Context 95

depends on both, as a superior who cannot do his own work depends

on the servants he employs. …. He therefore judges by his own light of

whatever his servants bring him to supply his needs. For example, one

of the most successful students of bees, Francois Huber, who was

blind, interpreted by the light of his intellect the facts seen by his

servants’ eyes (Maritain 1979, 88-89).

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