Dr. BJ Condrey

The Value of Philosophy: For those that have dabbled in philosophy, the phrase “The Value of Philosophy” is taken from Bertand Russell’s book The Problems of Philosophy. I am reading two great books right now that focus on philosophy from a Christian viewpoint. The two quotes below are from the Paul Copan’s A Little Book for New Philosophers where he addresses the idea that because philosophy can’t always be directly tied to success in the workforce, it doesn’t have any value. But what does this tell us about the underlying philosophy of education that undergirds such a statement? Here are two excerpts from the first chapter where Copan make a wonderful point. Philosophy might not bake bread (unless you go on to be a professor or author), but that doesn’t mean that it is not valuable unless you have adopted a philosophy of education that is anti-classical and does not have the formation of the full person in view.

Here is another book about Christian philosophy that I am very much enjoying: Philosophy: A Christian Introduction (James Dew and Paul M. Gould). This book is more academic in nature but still relatively accessible for the beginner. I just finished one part focusing on Reformed epistemology (specifically, Alvin Plantinga’s epistemology and the warrant (his word for justification) for belief in the existence of God in the absence of an argument). It is splendid. I hope to be able to use this text to teach an Introductory course in Philosophy one day.