Philosopher: Your Role

“Philosophers are people who ask big questions, who do not necessarily accept things at face value but think about the implications, assumption and possibilities of what people do and say.”

If you have been chosen as your group’s philosopher, then you have the responsibility to find those “big questions.” First of all, we are not talking about questions like these: “What does the author mean when he says: ‘You’re in this dream of cotton plants.’” The author, in this case Gary Soto, has a very specific meaning for that line. Philosophers ask bigger questions. They ask the questions that has many different possible answers. For example, what is the meaning of life? What is our purpose? Every single person who tries to answer that question will, for the most part, have a different answer.

These are not math problems where there is a right or wrong answer. Rather, philosopher’s are meant to be broad - they are meant to be interpretive. So, instead of asking “What does the author mean,” you might say “what does it mean…” By eliminating the author, you are now asking everyone a question that they might have a different answer for.