Metaphysics

Way to Wisdom

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Karl Jaspers

1950

Way to Wisdom is Jaspers's introduction to philosophy for the general reader — a series of radio lectures delivered in post-war Germany that seek to make philosophy relevant and urgent for ordinary human life. Jaspers argues that philosophy is not a professional speciality but a fundamental human activity: the act of thinking seriously about one's own existence, freedom, and place in the whole of Being. The book covers the sources of philosophy (wonder, doubt, the sense of being lost), the major questions (What can I know? What ought I to do? What may I hope for?), the history of philosophy and its great figures, and the importance of communication — genuine meeting between persons — as the medium in which philosophical truth emerges. Way to Wisdom is notable for its insistence that philosophy cannot be separated from the person who does it: it is always a form of self-clarification, an expression of the philosopher's own existence, and it loses its force when reduced to information or technique.