Think Like a Philosopher

एक दार्शनिक की तरह सोचने के सर्वोत्तम तरीके आपको समझदार बनाएंगे

How often do you reflect on your life?

We often think of philosophy as something esoteric and impractical. However, it doesn’t have to be that way. Thinking like a philosopher doesn’t mean asking never-ending questions or setting up intellectual traps.

The word “philosophy” literally means the love of wisdom — it’s about getting more involved with the world. To better understand how we act and think.

Wisdom distinguishes great leaders from the rest. If knowledge is information, wisdom is acting upon that knowledge. We can gain a lifetime of knowledge, yet never extract any wisdom out of it.

You don’t need to become a philosopher to think like one — you need to be a lover of wisdom.

Go Slow to Go Fast

Our world is driven by speed. We feel forced to keep pace with things because we fear missing out. But, if we are always in a rush, we are more prone to making mistakes and losing perspective.

Thinking like a philosopher requires to create space for reflection.

To be fast in making decisions, you must slow down — make time for contemplation.

By taking more time when reading or writing, you train your mind to slow down. You clarify your thinking. Instead of moving from one thing to another, you try to understand what’s underneath something — what’s driving our behavior.

Wise leaders slow down their minds — they observe things from a distance. Making wise decisions requires balancing urgency and rigor.

Focus on What’s Essential

We associate more with better. The more you do and the more you have, the better person you become. Unfortunately, this endless race to do and achieve more and more drives confusion and frustration. When everything is important, we can’t separate what matters from what doesn’t.

Focus on What’s Essential

We associate more with better. The more you do and the more you have, the better person you become. Unfortunately, this endless race to do and achieve more and more drives confusion and frustration. When everything is important, we can’t separate what matters from what doesn’t.

Spot the Weakness in an Argument

The words we don’t challenge become true.

The purpose of philosophy is not to find an error, but to avoid acting based on false assumptions.

We are usually prone to various cognitive biases. The confirmation bias, for example, is our tendency to look for and to recall evidence that confirms, but not that disconfirms, our beliefs and hypotheses.

Logical fallacies are arguments that fail to make sense scientifically — though they can often make an emotional appeal, they do not prove the underlying claims. Proof by example is a fallacy that uses one or more cases to suggest a general rule. For instance, when you observe people from a particular group doing something and then assume everyone who belongs to that group acts the same way.

Be Intellectually Humble

Most leaders tend to overestimate how much they know. They don’t make wrong decisions because of a lack of facts but of low self-awareness.

That’s the problem of celebrating intellectual brilliance — we reward certainty, and condemn doubts. Being right, then, matters more than finding the correct answer.Practice being obsessively curious. Challenge everything — especially what you believe is right. Leave the door open for better solutions, rather than sticking to your answer. Intellectual humility is letting go of certainty.

Consider Alternative Possibilities

Most of the times, we can’t find the real solution because we’re not looking for it. The congruence bias completely dominates our minds; we can’t even realize there are alternative theories.

Systematically considering alternative possibilities — common to both philosophical and scientific thinking — is an effective way to overcome this bias. Practice generating various explanations for each observation.