The Ivy Tech Community College-Columbus/Franklin chapter of Phi Theta Kappa will sponsor a bone marrow drive for the German Bone Marrow Donor Center, on Wednesday, February 8, from 8:00 a.m. until 9:00 p.m. in the Room to Breathe Lounge in the Columbus Learning Center. Read the rest of this entry »

“The unexamined life is not worth living.” These words, from the Greek philosopher Socrates, are a basic guide to life lived with intellectual vigor. In my role as a philosopher at Ivy Tech Community College-Columbus/Franklin, I believe they are the archway through which we enter into a world in which the prime subject material is life itself. Historically, philosophy has been known as “queen of the disciplines.” The reason for this is that we can discuss almost everything in the college curriculum—the arts, sciences, and humanities—from a position of humility, fascination, and awe.

The past four decades or so have shown unprecedented rapidity of growth in information and its availability to the average person. Many have despaired that the level of human understanding has not kept pace with the sheer volume of information that is available to us in 2012. Particularly in the field of medical ethics, modern ethicists struggle to find a philosophical framework to evaluate emerging technologies and what constitutes their morally acceptable use.

None of this is lost on our students at Ivy Tech, because, even in south central Indiana, the modern world and the information it offers touch almost everyone—every day. A stroll through the commons area on our campus reveals philosophical conversations going on. People talk about education, healthcare, national and world affairs, the economy, and so much more. The reality is that almost everybody does some philosophical thinking on a daily basis, even if we are not fully aware of it. My mentor, D. Elton Trueblood, used to say that anybody who asks critical questions about what is going on around them is a philosopher, whether they are professionally involved in the discipline or not.

It is a privilege to be in a position to help students to develop the tools to do what they already do every day, but do it better. We constantly strive, in our classroom and online discussions, to not only consider what is being said, but why it is being said. The value of a question is not in the answer alone, but in the other questions that it precipitates. It is the journey of a lifetime and is one that is never complete. One of the main points of emphasis is “Nothing is ever final,” because we never know what information will come onto the scene and how it may cause us to have to modify the knowledge we have relied upon up to that point.

One of the current phrases in vogue with students is “I’m just saying.” The phrase essentially connotes an attitude of one making an assertion without a willingness to have a rational basis for it. This is the polar opposite of being philosophical. In embarking on what we call “the examined life,” each step needs to be questioned, and an attempt at justification must be made. The answers may be elusive, and in the end, we may never have some answers. Trueblood also said sometimes we simply have to go with the answer that leaves the fewest questions unanswered. Even when no answers emerge, we are better people for having asked.

Dr. Clarence White is associate professor of humanities and philosophy at Ivy Tech Community College-Columbus/Franklin.