In our newest “how can we help you?” thread, a reader asks:
In a recent thread a lot of people were sharing a sentiment that it doesn’t really matter what you publish about because basically no one will read your work anyway. To people who feel this way, I wanted to ask, what are you doing philosophy for?
On the one hand, one answer to this question seems pretty obvious: many of us do it for ourselves (i.e., because we enjoy doing it, writing it, treat it as a process of personal discovery, etc.). And of course this rationale doesn’t just apply to philosophy but to other things too. I’m not merely a philosopher but also a musician, and I still write and record songs. Why? Because I love creating music!
On the other hand, I wonder if many of us who adopt this perspective also fall prey from time to time to the nagging feeling, “If no one ever reads my philosophical work, is the internal enjoyment of doing it/discovery enough to make spending so much time on it worthwhile?”
Fortunately (I think?), claims that “no one reads your work” may be overblown. Looking at people’s PhilPeople/Philpapers pages, lots of works do appear to be read (or at least downloaded) by significant numbers of people. And why isn’t the possibility of “changing or influencing a few minds” on something enough? Can’t we ask similar questions about most human activities, all of which ultimately fade into the dusts of time?
What do readers think?
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