Your complimentary articles

You’ve read all of your complimentary articles for this month. To have complete access to the thousands of philosophy articles on this site, please

If you are a subscriber please sign in to your account.

To buy or renew a subscription please visit the Shop.

If you are a print subscriber you can contact us to create an online account.

Editorial

Skeptics & Terraformers

by Rick Lewis

What exactly is philosophy? Maybe people have asked you that, and perhaps you have a favourite answer, as I do. Mine goes, “Philosophy is any sort of systematic investigation of the nature of the world or of human beings.” I read that once somewhere and was impressed by its tidiness. Sometimes the inquirer then remarks, “But surely that would apply to science too?” And that gives me the chance to reply smugly, “Yep, science started out as a branch of philosophy.”

It was certainly started by philosophers.

…