Scott Hershovitz - Nasty, Brutish, and Short: Adventures in Philosophy with My Kids

I nee a philosopher. Hank was standing in the bathroom, half-naked.

What? Julie asked.

I nee a philosopher.

Did you rinse?

I nee a philosopher, Hank said, getting more agitated.

You need to rinse. Go back to the sink.

I nee a philosopher! Hank demanded.

Scott! Julie shouted. Hank needs a philosopher.

I am a philosopher. And no one has ever needed me. I rushed to the bathroom. Hank, Hank! Im a philosopher. What do you need?

He looked puzzled. You are not a philosopher, he said sharply.

Hank, I am a philosopher. Thats my job. Whats bothering you?

He opened his mouth but didnt say anything.

Hank, whats bothering you?

DERS FOMETHING FUCK IN MY FEETH.

A flosser. Hank needed a flosserone of those forked pieces of plastic with dental floss strung across it. In retrospect, that makes sense. A flosser is something you could need, especially if you are two and your purpose in life is to pack landfills with cheap pieces of plastic that provided a temporary diversion. A philosopher is not something that people need. People like to point that out to philosophers.

What do philosophers do, exactly?

Um, uh... we think, mostly.

What do you think about?

Anything, really. Justice, fairness, equality, religion, law, language...

I think about those things. Am I a philosopher?

You might be. Do you think about them carefully?

I cannot count the number of times that Ive had that conversation. But thats because Ive never had it. Its just how I imagine things would go if I were to tell a stranger that Im a philosopher. I almost always say that I am a lawyer. Unless I am talking to a lawyer; then I say that Im a law professor, so that I can pull rank. If I am talking to another law professor, though, then Im definitely a philosopher. But if I am talking to a philosopher, Im back to being a lawyer. Its an elaborate shell game, carefully constructed to give me an edge in any conversation.

But I am a philosopher. And I still find that improbable. I didnt set out to be one. As a first-semester freshman at the University of Georgia, I wanted to take Intro Psychology. But the class was full, and Intro Philosophy fulfilled a requirement. If a spot had come open in that psychology class, then I might be a psychologist and this book might be full of practical parenting advice. There is a bit of parenting advice in this book, but most of it is not so practical. Indeed, my main advice is just this: talk to your kids (or somebody elses). Theyre funny as helland good philosophers too.

I missed the first day of that philosophy class, because my peopleJews, not philosopherscelebrate the New Year at a more or less random time each fall. But I went to the second class, and by the second hour I was hooked. The professor, Clark Wolf, asked each of us what mattered, and as he went around the room, he scratched our answers on the board alongside our names and the names of famous philosophers who had said something similar.

Happiness: Robyn, Lila, Aristotle

Pleasure: Anne, Aristippus, Epicurus

Doing the Right Thing: Scott, Neeraj, Kant

Nothing: Vijay, Adrian, Nietzsche

Seeing my name on the board made me think that my thoughts about what mattered might matterthat I could be a part of a conversation that included people like Aristotle, Kant, and Nietzsche.

It was a crazy thing to think, and my parents were not happy to find me thinking it. I remember sitting across from my father in a rotisserie chicken restaurant, reporting that I planned to major in philosophy. Whats philosophy? he asked. That is a good question. He didnt know the answer because when he registered for classes, there was a spot left in psychology, and that became his major. But I realized that I had a problem: I didnt know the answer either, and I had been in a philosophy class for several weeks. What is philosophy, I wondered, and why do I want to study it?

I decided to show my dad rather than tell him. We think were sitting at a table, eating rotisserie chicken and having a conversation about how college is going, I started. But what if we arent? What if someone stole our brains, put them in a vat, hooked them up to electrodes, and stimulated them so as to make us think that were eating chicken and talking about college?

Can they do that? he asked.

I dont think so, but thats not the question. The question is how do we know that they didnt? How do we know that we arent brains in vats, hallucinating a chicken dinner?

Thats what you want to study? The look on his face was something other than encouraging.

Yeah, I mean, dont you see the worry? Everything we think we know could be wrong.

He did not see the worry. And this was before The Matrix came out, so I couldnt appeal to the authority of Keanu Reeves to establish the urgency of the issue. After a few more minutes of muttering about brains and vats, I added, The department has lots of logic classes too.

Well, he said, I hope you take those.