Philosophy in the current Brazilian social and political scenario

Abstract

The formation and education of successive generations of women and men is a fundamental concern
of every human society, once the existence of the society itself depends of the possibility of
reproduction of the material and spiritual conditions which permits its own perpetuation in history. It
is in this that lies the importance of human formation and education: of them depends, amongst other
things, the greater or lesser conformation of the individuals/students to the society in which they live
and for which they are being prepared to be citizens. Philosophy also has a great interest in the
manner the human being have to be formed and educated; testify this interest the countless works,
beyond the themes of formation and education specifically, that talk about ethics, politics,
epistemology, aesthetics, in a word, talk about themes so closely related to the human affairs and
questions. However, in a world almost completely turned to the satisfaction of economical and
political immediate interests, like this currently existing, philosophy is unfortunately reputed as a
kind of “useless” knowledge, for which are destined precious and scarce social resources, since the
“benefits” of philosophy to society in which it exists is considered of little value. Such opinion, that depreciates the real value of philosophy to the enhancement of individuals and society, opinion that
demonstrates ignorance of history and of human affairs, has found a recent way of expression, in a
social network, in which the president of Brazil exposed it without limping. It does is worrisome that
a head of State may propagate such an wrong opinion, because, due to the position he occupies, he
is able to negatively influences the citizens’ fair and impartial appreciation of the real value of
philosophy to human affairs and particularly to the interests of our country; in addition, insofar as
the government makes difficult the realization of studies on this area, it will deprive Brazil and
Brazilians of opportunities of fully develop themselves, doing a great harm to our people. For this
reason, this article constitutes an apology of philosophy in face of the Brazilian actual social and
political scenario, apology founded on the perspective of the fundamental utility of philosophy to
human affairs.