Philosophy is the study of the fundamental nature of knowledge, reality and existence. The word ‘philosophy’ means love of wisdom. ‘What do I know?’- from this basic question several branches of philosophy such as metaphysics, epistemology, logic, ethics, aesthetics, psychology and so on have been emerged. The focus of this issue is on metaphysics and ethics. Metaphysics is concerned with the first principles and causes of being or the primary sense or senses of reality or its fundamental categories whereas ethics is concerned with the goodness of persons or the rightness of actions or the best value in consequences.
It is not easy to say what metaphysics is. Ancient and medieval philosophers might have said that metaphysics was, like chemistry or astrology, to be defined by its subject matter: metaphysics was the ‘science’ that studies ‘being as such’ or ‘the first causes of things’ or ‘things that do not change’. It is no longer possible to define metaphysics that way. In modern philosophical terminology, metaphysics refers to the studies of what cannot be reached through objective studies of material reality. Areas of metaphysical studies include ontology, cosmology and often epistemology.
Metaphysics and ethics are usually considered as two distinct philosophical domains. Ethics is a discipline concerned with what is morally good or bad and morally right or wrong. Ethical theories are philosophical attempts at explaining and systematizing human morality. An ethical culture is characterized by honesty, trustworthiness and a commitment of doing the thing, even when difficult or unpopular. Different ethical theories provide a unique perspective in ethical analysis when a person is on the path of decision making. In order to judge whether an action is good or not, Normative ethics develops eudaimonism, hedonism, deontology and utilitarianism; but meta ethics is concerned with naturalism, intuitionism, emotivism, prescriptivism and so on in order to clarify the meaning of goodness; whereas the practical ethics deals with the problems which are emerged from our day-to-day life such as euthanasia, animal rights, feminism, environmental degradation and so on.
In Indian philosophy, metaphysics explains about the existence of soul (ātmā) and the perishable body and explains that the soul and the body are two different entities. The domain of morality and ethics is at per with the ‘dharma’ from the Indian perspective. Dharma comes from the root ‘dhṛ’, which means to hold together and thus the function of dharma is to hold the human society together for its stability and growth. Right conduct is essential if the human society is to survive. Indian ethics is absolutistic and spiritualistic. It is basically based on our social structure, culture and religious and it serves ideas of honesty, integrity and morality. Without following the path of righteousness, no-one can attain supreme goal (mokṣa) of life.
Authors are requested to submit their papers (within 3000 to 5000 words) along with an abstract (within 300 words) of the papers either in Bengali or in English or in other languages also within 31st August, 2024) through the weblink—https://journal.skbu.ac.in/arts/philosophy1/Submit_Paper for SKBU Journal of Philosophy (Vol. IV, Issue.1)
Professor (Dr.) Dinanath Ghatak
Chief Editor
SKBU Journal of Philosophy (Vol. IV, Issue. I)
01.05.2024
