Philosophy vs. Ideology

by Eustolia Manhart, July 2015

1500 words

5 pages

essay

One can find very significant dissimilarities between ideology and philosophy. Ideological background identifies a collection of opinions, ideas that support a particular social establishment or a specific group. Philosophy is the term for examining existence in a matter-of-fact way and seeking to comprehend why life must be as it is as well as the guidelines regulating it. Ideology conveys discontentment with the present condition and seeks to become certain future condition while philosophy attempts to comprehend life in its present condition. To put it differently, ideology is targeted at transforming the world whilst philosophy is directed at searching for the truth.

According to Harris (1972), ideology, as the term itself, , is commonly utilized quite freely (Harris, p.1). Because of that he tries to narrow down the definition to be more precise about its usage.

“Strictly, it means the science of ideas and was originally the name given, in the eighteenth century, to the sensationalist empiricism of Condillac. But it is also, and nowadays more commonly, used to mean any system of ideas, especially religious, moral, political and artistic, that is typical of a special group or class of people” (Harris, p.1).

Harris (1972) claims that Karl Marx offered the word an additional perspective by utilizing it to suggest that virtually any such structure of ideas is a by-product of a specific economic framework as well as class arrangement in a culture, and that the ideas on their own should not be comprehended just as they are, or in accordance with their express claim, but as a influential tool for promoting and prolonging the social and political condition. Thus, ideology develops into the methodical justification of class prejudice facilitated by the economic framework of a country (Harris, p.1).

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Should this be the standard Marxian usage of the word, it, however, isn't generally so perceived. More generally, these days, the term is utilized to relate basically to any specific structure of social and political philosophy and / or concept, proclaimed to inspire the exercising of particular forms of governing administration. Furthermore, it is utilized nearly if not completely as interchangeable with political philosophy (Harris, p.1). It should be mentioned that, regardless of whether or not we conform tightly to the Marxian perception of the term, generally known as ideologies, they are either the direct derivative, or equivalent with well-known political philosophies, with the -isms related to idelogy being commonly assigned to advocates of a given philosophy(Harris, p.1).

According to Parel et el (1983),

“it is hardly necessary to say that one can renounce one ideology for another, just as one can abandon one philosophy for another, and that in such cases one does not put oneself outside the sphere of ideology or of philosophy. It is also possible to abandon or leave aside ideological commitment, just as it is possible to abandon philosophy for gardening, or novel-reading, or world-travel” (Parel et el, p.31).

However, let us imagine that somebody who has …

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