Metaphysical Animals: How Four Women Brought Philosophy Back to Life

by Clare Mac Cumhaill

But we humans are metaphysical animals. We dwell in the past as well as the present. ‘You should be ashamed’, ‘We are very proud of you’, ‘What you did was brave’, ‘You must say sorry’. Specialised descriptions – ‘humiliating’, ‘courageous’, ‘disrespectful’ – orientate us towards the world and to each other. We make promises and imagine our futures. It is part of our nature to question. By asking ‘Why?’ the child begins to draw connections – to trace the larger patterns that transcend the region of space and time in which he is situated; to relate cause and effect, purpose and goal. He can come to see the same event here and now as falling under different descriptions. He can view it against a wider background. A square of paper goes into a box in London: I am sending a letter; a fur coat is folded: I am contributing to an aid programme; a handle goes up and down: I am poisoning the inhabitants.