Philosophy of Everyday Life

The philosophical work on the subject of the daily life of individuals and societies and directing critical, contemplative, and philosophical research and effort on it is not something new to the act of philosophizing since it appeared with the beginnings of Greek philosophy. This is on two levels: The level of what or how philosophy can benefit me in my daily life, and the level of making this daily life and its components a subject of contemplation, research, analysis, and philosophical criticism, and then theorizing and trying to diagnose the cracks, risks, trends, and ills in this life, and provide solutions as a goal and a priority.

On this basis, thinking about daily life appeared in the form of an attempt to search for a life of luxury and comfort for man, the good life, and then starting from daily reality to theorize what should be. However, descending into daily life in the manner intended in this proposal is not in the manner that previous daily philosophies were accustomed to presenting in the history of philosophical thought; At least because of the different pattern of the concept of the “daily,” which was more simple, monotonous, and rigid in the past, while it has become more complex, changing, and fluid today, which makes it more urgent to direct philosophical attention to the everyday, where it has become necessary to be aware of the rapid, fluid change and the risks and possible ills resulting from the introduction of determinants, agents, and components. Modern for everyday life.

Accordingly, daily reality has begun to raise various issues and challenges. Previous philosophies, especially systematic and idealistic ones, could not address or answer such problems related to daily life. Man has begun to live in estrangement or alienation, especially with the tremendous development in the field of technology and the scientific field in general, and this has been the case. Mostly at the expense of his humanity, which prompted philosophical attention to daily life and the necessity of returning to reality, questioning it, trying to diagnose it, trying to understand its ills, predicting its fate, or at least anticipating its future in order to exploit technical and scientific development for the benefit of humanity and not as a threat or danger to it, based on Living reality and daily life.

Therefore, thinking about the “everyday” is considered one of the contemporary philosophical trends because it is linked to current problems related to humanity and associated with daily life. Here, it has become necessary for philosophy to build a new cognitive edifice and a new philosophical theorization to answer the current challenges and human questions, needs, and contemporary issues in his daily life in its various dimensions. Accordingly, we must focus on the relationship between philosophy and the everyday, because we have begun to turn to the “everyday” to know it, question it, extract its meanings, and bring philosophy down to the daily social reality as a philosophy of action and as a practical or applied philosophy.