Philosophy

I recently had a live chat (IM) with a German Philosophy professor, who teaches at a Southern U.S. university. He holds a PhD in Philosophy. We exchanged conversational pleasantries for a while. As the conversation turned to Philosophy from an historical perspective, I decided I did not want to waste my time plodding through Wittgenstein and the like. 

I asked my philosopher a simple question: Do you practice a personal philosophy in your daily life? 

The flurry of esoteric typing ceased for a time. "What do you mean?" he typed. I then clarified by sharing my sense of my own humanist practice in a nutshell. Again there was a pause. "We don't do that." he stated flatly. I wrapped up the conversation after that answer. 

Those who can't do teach? I could not see my professor. It was a blind chat. But I conjured the image of the typical overweight high school football coach. That man who was a gloried jock in high school and never really played football at an expert level himself. He doesn't practice sport. He teaches it.

This kind of hypocrisy lies at the heart of much of Academia. From ivory tower to shabby urban campus, young minds are influenced by those who have extracted themselves from the actual world. This perpetuates the hypocrisy in politics, government and the average workplace. Experts with degrees spout idealistic models which are then hammered down by government and business to fit real people and real situations. The Frankensteins which result are often lumbering catastrophes.

Mao Zedong may have been a mad autocrat, but he did one thing which made tremendous sense: He sent professors to the fields to live, to plant and to harvest crops with peasants.